#489- Grammy Winning Songwriter Daniel Tashian on Working with Ringo Starr + What Makes Kacey Musgraves Great + Naming His Kids After Peter Pan Characters

Published Jan 14, 2025, 6:05 AM

On this episode of the BobbyCast, Bobby sits down with Grammy winning songwriter, Daniel Tashian. Daniel talks about what it was like working with Beatles legend Ringo Starr on Ringo's latest country album, his dad touring with the Beatles, and why his dad didn't want him getting into the music industry. Daniel also discussed the perfect time to write a song, citing a recent example with Kacey Musgraves and why her songwriting is so great. Plus, Daniel tells Bobby the story of how he proposed to his wife, and the reason behind naming his daughter Tinkerbell. 

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We've now got the power of purpose, and I thought, Okay, that's it. That's the phrase, the power of purpose. And what I mean is the best way to write a song is when you need to write a song.

Daniel Tashian he wrote Casey Musgrave's Golden How where He's got two Grammys, an ACM, A CMA. I mean, I could go through a lot of the songs he wrote, slow Burn, Happy and Sad, Golden Hour, Lonely Weekend. I mean all that's Casey Hometown Girl by Josh Turner, that was his first number one, White Horse by Til Towns, good Night by Billy Currington. I mean, the guy's been doing music at a high level in a different ways for a long time. I really enjoyed him because you can definitely tell like he does his own little thing, even with how he dresses, how he talks, and it's extremely original and it was refreshing. So this is Daniel Tashian. You can follow him on Instagram at the Silver Seas, which by the way, he also co produced and saying on the upcoming Ringo Star album, which we were debating that's a country album or not, So that's pretty cool, all right?

Here we go. Daniel Tashian, Hey Daniel, good to meet you.

Yeah, you too.

I was talking on a podcast recently about Ringo's upcoming country record, Yeah, and what I was comparing because I was with a guy who was like, Ringo is not a country you know, that same tired huh narrative that people just like to say without really any knowledge of the artist or the history of country music, et cetera. And we were just talking about some of the songs Ringos written, what Ringo's done over the past twenty five years, even the Beatles. But now what's great is and the timing was accidental.

You were very much a part of this project, so yeah, And I don't know if that's what you thought I would start with, but because it's so fresh on my brain, Yeah, Like, tell me about that experience working with Ringo and what this record is.

Well, Bobby, I'm I'm a ten year old boy in my in my mind and in my attitude about things, and I'm a ten year old boy that loves the Beatles. That's my first it's my first love, that euphoric feeling of that music and it all it all comes from Ringo, you know. So it's a full circle thing. I remember, you know, I grew up in a really musical household and my dad actually toured with the with the Beatles. I don't know if you knew that or not, but you know, they were they loomed large to me as a child. So as an adult to kind of meet this guy, it was really funny when I when I finally did meet him, which we worked on a lot of things before I did get a chance to meet him, but I said, hey, do you remember you know a group called the Remains that you toured with, you know, back in the sixties. And he said, what was the name of them? And I said the Remains and he goes, no, two long ago. He said, it's amazing, I even remember you from five minutes ago. So he didn't remember him. But no, Ringo is everything. I mean, you know, he's just he was also sort of like the sign I went Mark's brother in the in the in the Beatles. He never really like in in Hard Day's Night and stuff like that, Like he didn't have that many lines. He was more like kind of just sort of this silent Buster Keaton kind of character.

You know.

And so as a kid, you really, you really identified with the Silent One because you know, he was just watching everything that was going on.

You know.

I also felt like by watching the documentary on Apple and what I think, I've seen it the Peter Jackson. Yeah thing, I've either seen it all watching it or watching it on TikTok because again they just feed clips to my algorithm. Yeah, I feel like he was a really good glue guy, like and that's a you know, in sports, that's a big term for somebody who make sure the group is together and is like, you know, not demanding or dominating. Like I feel like, what do I know? We weren't even alive back when that was really happening. But yeah, I feel like that's a bit of what he was and meant to that group.

Yeah, I agree with that. I think that's very good observation. And you know, the symbols that he uses on this new album are the same symbols that he used in the Beatles. And he never cleans him, he never wipes the dust off him, so they've got all that vibe and mojo and everything, and you know it's the symbols that you know, T Bowe noticed this and mentioned it, but it's the symbols that make the excitement in the Beatles. If you listen to Beatles records and you hear that splashy buy you anything, it makes you feel all right. If it's just somebody going to it's not exciting. But when he plays that splashy high hat, it just it's like Beatlemania.

What was the first meeting with him? Like just a big build up? Did you know he's driving up? Does quin of flames on it? Like what, like what's happening?

No, he just kind of appeared in the door with it with with with with his h with his wife Barbara, and and she was a bond girl, you know in Doctor No. I think she was in that. I may have that wrong, but but very very low key, very easy going, very youthful. He's you know, he's in his eighties, but he feels like a teenager. His energy is very he's like kind of bops around like a marionette. He's just like very loose and cool. And and he really inspired me. Apparently he eats a ton of broccoli and he goes to the chiropractor all the time, and so as soon as I got back in town, I was like, get some broccoli and we're going to the chiropractor because I want to be like that.

The broccoli or the chiropractor or old and.

Loose, Old and loose.

Yeah, there's a whole part of TikTok. Now that's like a Ringo. Give him his respect.

Oh yeah, I know.

I see a lot of videos of drummers going you don't even know how hard this is. It may sound simple, but it's hard. And they recreate a lot of Ringo's parts, fills and parts. Yeah, yeah, which if you didn't know, which I don't because again, I'm not a drummer. Yeah, and I can barely keep any rhythm at all. But there's this new it's harder than it looks like. There's this new like idea that people don't understand. How good Ringo was.

I get that your parents were both musicians.

Yeah, it was a very musical house.

Yeah what what what were each of their expertise?

Well, my mom, you know, she stayed home when my dad went on the road. But when I was when before I was born, my dad was in a band in Boston in the sixties called The Remains, and they were John Lennon was a big fan of the band and asked him to go open for the Beatles in sixty six. Yeah, and they had a couple of regional hits. You should look them up there called the Remains there on Sony Legacy. But but then after that, after the Beatles tour, the band kind of broke up. They were sort of like a hometown Boston band and they didn't really feel like they were made for international, you know. Move So my dad moved out to California and met a guy that he went to that was around in Cambridge in the sixties called Graham Parsons, and then he did two records with Graham and then through that met Emmy Lou. And that's what brought us uh to Nashville. Is after I was born, Emmy moved to Nashville and we moved here with her. So music's really, you know, taken me everywhere.

Did your mom sing?

My mom did, but she's she was more like home with the kids. And then after Emmylou's sort of hot band disbanded in the nineties, my parents had like a folk duo where they would sing and play together on on rounder records and they and they they toured a lot. When I was in high school, So.

What about your earliest music memory of in the house.

I can tell you exactly what they what they were, if I could only win your love by the Louvin Brothers.

You know.

Fleetwood Mac was on the turntable that Rumors record. My mom loved that record. And Henry Mannsini because you know the Pink Panther was was the cartoon that was on that I love watching, and those are those are probably the big three.

Do you think your dad wanted you to go into music or do you think your dad no.

I don't think you're doing I don't think he did want me to. I think he thought it was tough, and I think he thought it was really difficult. I think he found it difficult. I don't think he liked being on the road and being away from the family. I don't think. I don't think he thought that that was you know, there were a lot of years where I didn't see that much of him, So I don't think he liked that. So I think he thought maybe I should do something else.

What about your You have three kids, right m what is your relationship with them about a career in any creative art.

Well, I just want them to know that they're loved and and and that's really I don't really care what they do. I'm not I'm not like pushing anything really on them. I like, I think personally, my belief is that being having music in your life is a positive thing, whether it's your job or or or not. I think it's good to know how to play.

Would you want them to do like? I would?

Never? I think it's a good choice.

Oh, anything creative? Man, It's it's tough.

Yeah, well, I do think it is. But you could either have your ideas and you'll you'll you'll resonate with this. You can either own your ideas and have your ideas, or you can you can give them someone to sell them to, say, someone else and sort of work for someone else, or you can kind of work for yourself. I mean, don't you enjoy working for yourself? I mean, I look at what you've built, you know. I mean, why would you advocate anything else?

It's not that I would advocate against anything else.

Doing something creative is difficult because everybody wants to do it.

Everybody will do it cheap.

Hmmm mm hmm.

It's hard, and I would compare to sports and art or very much the same in that you don't really make any money doing it until you start to make all.

The money doing it. So there's an extreme class welfare.

Right, There's a big there's a big difference between the top and the bottom.

And for me, I think it's been my success is when other people like me m and I think that is probably the root. And I love what I do and I'm proud of what I've built, but my success has always been not in my own heart, although I think for a lot of time it was, but my success has always been in the data of.

Do people like me?

Are they downloading the podcast, are extreaming the show? Are they watching my TV shows? And if not, I am not being liked. Therefore I am no longer successful and I no longer have a job. And I think there's a very unhealthy inside of me anyway, feeling of if I'm not being extremely liked there I will not be successful. And I'm not a people pleaser just in general, I'm not a people pleaser, and I think to me, that is the reason if someone were to say, what's the bad part about it?

I think that's it.

It starts to kind of reform, like your guts, like if people don't like you, you're not successful.

And if you're not successful, you're not worthy.

And I've had to go through a lot of a kind of therapy to kind of figure out that that's the case, But I didn't have like a leader like I think what's great for your kids is that you've done it. You've done it at a high level in very much a way that you wanted to do it. You're not a cookie cutter got in any way. But I would say that would be my argument anti argument pro is it's freaking awesome and you get to create something with your own mind and have it exist, and putting something in existence from your brain that people actually enjoy and that you enjoy it, it's the best feeling in the whole world.

Well, you know, I also think you're really only competing with yourself and you if you if you're on a journey of personal self improvement, with which if you're in therapy, you're definitely on that journey, you know. And if you're an artist, you're on that journey. And if you're trying to improve yourself and you're trying to get better, then it doesn't matter what you know. Joe Rogan does with his podcast over here, he maybe he makes makes more, has more listeners or whatever. If you know you're getting better at what you're doing, you know, that's that's the journey. That's it, that's the hero's journey, and that's a journey that's worth going on. I think is a journey of self improvement.

And I've broke for a long time now, I journey. It's hard to be on a journey when you can't pay the bills.

Well, but there's no reason. There's nothing wrong with doing something to make money while you're simultaneously on this other journey of personal you know, growth and discovery through an art form of whatever it is. There's nothing wrong with having another job. But I worked in all kinds of jobs I did. I did bookstores, I did you know food? I did, like bookkeeping, I did well. I guess working on music that I didn't really.

Like, Yeah, yeah, because you felt like that was probably the means, Yeah, I'd get to waste.

I had a guitar in my hand from nine to five.

But what was like at age thirteen? What did you want to do?

Play a drum be a drummer, session drummer.

So but again, that's that's crazy to hear you say session drummer. You knew enough about it, because yeah, yeah, you knew what a session drummer was.

Yeah, for sure. There was a kid, another kid in my class. He moved here from South Africa named Nick Buddha, and he once he got here, like I thought, Okay, I got this. I'm the best drummer of among the kids that I know. But then when Nick got here, he was so uh so good that I was like, shit, man, maybe I don't know if I don't know if I can be a session drummer. This guy's already so good, you know. And he went on to play, you know, for Nathan Chapman, for all the first Taylor Swift stuff, love story, all that stuff. That's all Nick, that's my buddy. So he did go on to be a session drummer.

When you grew up here and there at the talent level is robust. Sure, there's a lot of it.

Sure, absolutely.

As in your formidable years, let's say twelve to nineteen, did you feel like that challenged you to be better at times? Were you disheartened by how good people were and or was it just a wave up and down of that a mixture of that.

I think for me, I've never been a virtuoso of anything or a prodigy or what. I wasn't the kid who was like, damn, that kid's over there shred and look at him, go he should be a guitarist. I was never like that. It was always I have to think of an idea and use my limited musical skills to communicate something that moves people, rather than be a virtuoso in any way. You know, does that make sense?

It does only in the way of like I have. I feel like I don't really have a skill that I can bank on, but I have a lot of things that I'm pretty good at that I've had to like Swiss army knife and develop.

Yeah, and that I'm pretty good at a lot of things.

That allows people to think I'm really good, and I've kind of tricked people into here I am.

Yeah.

So I've never been supernaturally gifted, but I've worked very hard and I've had to learn a lot of things. Yeah, which feels a bit unfair because I have some friends that are still freaking good, but they haven't had to work as hard.

Right, Is that because they are lucky or talented or what do you think.

I think mostly it's talent.

I think what's unlucky sometimes is you're talented. I think you can be so talented. And again if I'm making because the music and music and sports to me run alongside each other. And I know, I've friends that were extremely athletic, so they have to work that hard, so it wasn't.

Built into them. And when they got to the next level that culture, you got a good work ethic.

I sadly had to develop a discipline like crazy.

I think that's better.

I do too now as an adult, I wish I was really talented, but I wish that because that would have been easier for me.

Yeah. Well, I think I definitely coasted on a certain amount of talent for a while. And you know, I mean I was really disorganized. And I had a friend who lived near me, and he was having like number one records, you know, and and he he would look at me and he said one time, he said, I started calling him coach because he said to me, he said, you know, you got all the talent, but we got to work on your finishing. Because I would play him all these songs that I'd started, Like, you know, I got this idea for a song. It'd be like a half song. He'd be like, finish it, make a demo of it, Like it's got to like you got to close it, close it, you know, close the door. And then once I got into finishing, which is where the discipline comes in and what you're talking about, that's when I started to have some success.

Were your creative kid in general?

Oh yeah, man, drawing, painting, guitar, piano, everything. It was all art and all music. Absolutely did that writing.

Was that a struggle then for you know, some of the fundamental history geography, like as a student or were you pretty sure?

Yeah, a little bit, I mean a little bit. But you know I was into sports too. I mean you know, I was into I was in the track, I was into I was into soccer. I was into all kinds of stuff. I really wish I could have played football, but I wasn't. I just didn't like getting knocked in the dirt really that much. I just didn't. But but yeah, you know, pickle back then, huh, I know, I love pickleball.

Pickball back then.

Your brain changes, though, and as a young person, I had quite a fidgety brain. I probably was a d D. But you know, undiagnosed, I just had to figure it out. And and you know what I'm noticing now as my brain is you know, I just turned fifty years old. My brain now I can do math Like I sit with my daughter with tinker Bell in the morning and we do math. And I can't believe this. I did not have this on my Bengo card. But I love doing math now. And we sit there and we solve these fractions. We solve these little equations that she's got in her books. She's ten years old, and we have these euphoric moments where we're like one in three quarters that's the answer. And it's like we both kind of do like a little hop of joy when we figure these little puzzles out. But my brain couldn't do that very much, you know, unless it was something like a story or a painting or a song or something that I was working on. I just didn't want to work that hard.

Why do you think now you have it?

I think your brain as it ages, it changes and you and you and you were able to do things that you couldn't do before.

I wish that were the case with me. A piano lessons, I try to do it as an adult.

You're able to concentrate.

Oh really, yeah, I'm not practicing.

What messed you up?

The playing of the piano, the music part, the fingers on the key is the reading the music, sitting down after I suck for a long time and hating myself.

Here's a lot of that.

Just everything.

Yeah, basically the whole shape of the piano, like all us.

That's like me and the violin.

Yeah, everything violent, that's even that's been crazier.

I went and bought one because I saw Sierra Farrell at the Americano wards her and I was like, I'm going in the next day, I went and I bought a violin. Recent then yeah, and I bought a violin. I went to the violin shop and I came home and I had my violin and I was like playing it, and I told my wife. I was like, I'm gonna go get a violin. I came home, I was playing it, and she was like, can you take that somewhere else? And I was like, okay, I'll go out to the studio. And went out to the studio and then my shoulders started to cramp and I was like it literally sounded so bad. And I'm usually good at music. I mean, I think of my I make sounds that people like. I mean, you know, but this I was not able to make anything sound good. And she made it look so easy watching her, and I was so frustrated. And then finally I called the After about three or four days, I called the violin shop up and I said, he, I gotta ask you all question. Does anybody have or like come in there and buy fiddles and then come and bring him back? And the guy was like, it does happen occasionally. And I said, well, why do they bring him back? And he said because people underestimate how difficult it is to make it sound good. And I said, that's me. I'm bringing it back.

I took it back, and you warned them. At least you save some of the embarrassing. Might have had hat in hand bringing the fiddle back. But piano, to me, I feel like if I started as a kid and when my focus could have been on.

Three or four things, I think I could have focused on the piano.

Hmmm.

I think we like a eighteen jobs and a life. I think it was a little harder. But also I think by there is music, I just can't. I shouldn't say can't, cause I don't say can't for anything.

Music was very difficult for me.

It was like learning an entirely new language, where like I can play guitar, but I don't play, but I'm reading music. Learn to read tab on a poster from Walmart, and I'll do. And that's why I wanted to do piano, is because I'll write comedy songs and I'll go and we'll play these shows. And I thought, well, it'd be nice to be able to play some of these on piano.

Yeah, I know. I hired a piano teacher about like six weeks of lessons.

About two weeks in, I was like, not for me, I'll pay all six out, but I'm gonna not wait.

There's some Yeah, there's some things that you just don't you just you just know, you know yourself, and you're like, I know myself. I'm not gonna. I'm not gonna commit myself to this because commitments, that's that's what you that's your bread and butter right there, there's your discipline. You know, if you're not going to commit to something, you're not gonna you're not gonna do it.

Was on my right hand just sucks.

So left handed yeah, I think if you gave me two left hands on the piano, really interesting.

Yeah, right hand I learned like two tricks. I still do sometimes.

Are you left handed?

I am?

Yeah, okay, that makes sense.

Yeah, so there was no it was all bass I got. There was the right hand ik. That hand was not good.

But I learned a couple of tricks, and so I go places and I'll do it a couple of tricks I learned, and then they'll like play some more, and I'm like, no, I don't feel like interesting. Yeah, I just do that trick. But the party track and a party trick. Yeah, I don't really play at all.

Fair enough you play?

How's your piano?

I'm currently taking lessons, no way, yeah, currently taking lessons. I take from a guy named Jody Nardone who's really good. How good are you well? I mean he didn't he told me last week he said I was doing a good job. I mean it's hard to sort. Humble, don't humble, it's hard to know. Can you play?

Are you play in front of people?

Yeah? I'm not shy. I'll play in front of people. I'll play a song.

Would you play a recital.

If I said we're gonna have a recital, you and you're gonna come and play the recital.

I do one song I'm not gonna do.

I just don't know how much you're sandbagging me here because I know.

But I'm not a pianist in the sense of like I'm fast and and and I do songwriter piano where I play chords and I and I accompany my accompaniment. That's what I do on the piano. You know, I can figure a part out in the studio and play, but I'm not. I'm not like, I'm not gonna sit down and play Chopin or something for you. So what if that's what you want to do.

I actually only want chopin, So I guess we're out. Yeah, that's the demand chopin and only the hits.

Okay, what so.

I mean, let's take away the drums. Like if you're gonna write, are you on guitar?

I write a lot on the piano.

I gotta say, Okay, see, you're stand bagging me.

It's in the kitchen. I got one in the in the breakfast room and it's right there. So I'll put the put the tea water on or the coffee machine going, and I'll get over on the piano and that's all. I get a lot of ideas there.

You melody. You get melodies in your head and concepts in your head, and you chase them furs, which which happens.

Most well, first concept for a song, and then once you've got a concept, that'll be a group of words, right like I don't know, uh, Tuesday morning, and it has a rhythm to it.

In your head, like you've just you've naturally assigned a rhythm.

Well, just the words to Tuesday morning. You know, it's it's it's very even. It's two groups of and then you think, you know, you start to mess around with that, keep.

Talking to me, because you're saying things I can't imagine or picture. It's I'm larnt so I would not think the words Tuesday morning.

Well, it's not gonna sound good if you make a big jump on Tuesday, like Tuesday morning, because it makes when you make a jump, it makes the day stand out more than it should. So then you look around, Okay, that's not gonna work, you know what I mean, finding different notes. I'm listening to my eyes so wide open them.

Well, if you go watch an open heart surgery right now. Don't stop cutting, doc.

Well, if you go Tuesday or if you go morning, it's it's like, no, that's not it. It's more straight than that. Tuesday morning. That's what the Velvet Underground did. But it's Monday morning, Sunday morning or whatever. That's a great song is and they're using it on a lot of NFL ads. Have you seen it? The Monday Sunday morning song Velvet Underground.

I think I just oh, oh, you mean this Velvet Underground.

They're using that specific song. But so yeah, I mean, you can do this. It's not it's not rocket science.

We just do it a different way. We'll just pay somebody in the neck like I did it. You're a ghost writer there you go okay, well good, so okay.

Then kick it out the door. You get it done.

You have pianos were in the house.

I have two pianos a number of keyboards, but I have one in the studio and one in the kitchen.

I'm just trying to feel inspiration here, and let's say, yeah, you're inspired.

You maybe in your sleep you think of something.

Or you keep maybe you'll sit down and just start to kind of clank it out? Do you record while you're while you're clinking?

I'll tell you what the most inspiring is. Yeah, I've got a bunch of voice memos. I mean, you know, And what the most inspiring thing for me is is what I was. I was watching a basketball game the other night and then this ad for Gallatin Ford came on and the lady said, we've re done our dealership. We've now We've now got the power of purpose. And I thought, Okay, that's it. That's the phrase, the of purpose. And what I mean is the best way to write a song is when you need to write a song. So if you've got a comedy thing and you've got a spot and you need a song for it, you'll get it. You'll get it done. And it's the same thing with me. When there's a need for a song, that's the best way to get it.

Give me an example of a song that happened.

With well, I mean anything like okay, just just last you know, a couple of weeks recording some music with Casey Musgraves is like, you know, she needed something in a certain mood and a certain kind of genre and a certain kind of feeling. Yeah, a certain thing, there's a need that arises. So I've got the power of purpose behind me. I'm going to sit down and work within these parameters to try to make something. And that's the way to get it done. That's why those Broadway writers were able to to get so many things done, you know, is they got the purpose without necessity. For a song, I'm lost, I'll I'll just goof off all day if I no one needs anything.

How hard is it?

And maybe hard not the word, but what's the difference in writing We'll call them adult songs and kids songs.

No difference. They got to be they got to be good, and they got to be simple for everybody.

When you're writing kids songs full Just a little disclosure here. I did a kid's record that the Cracker Broil bought. It's pretty good. Yeah, pretty good. I mean yeah, it's only eleven albums.

Is awesome.

That's like, that's so cool that you did that.

And so I started to struggle after I had written a couple I wrote like a rap at first by accident, right, it was like about the planets, and.

I'm like, this would be cool. But then I started like second guessing.

How simple it should or shouldn't be based on the kid, based on the age.

Did it with the kid's book too, And I got in my head going, I don't know a four year nine, like, I didn't really know.

I was lost in that space where I have friends that have that are and they know exactly who they're writing to. H I just felt like in that kid world there was such a distinct difference in a four and a eight year old.

Maybe, but I always felt like I was underestimated, Like you know, like I never wanted to have like a little kiddie plate with like little dividers for all the food and a little sippy cup or anything like that. I wanted to have the china and the I just a kid that didn't want to be demeaned in that way. You know. I was a pretty I considered myself to be a thinking, feeling, sensitive person and I didn't want to be treated like a baby. So when I make things for children, I make things for myself as a child, which I still feel like I am in my heart. And they're they're like Henry Mancini, They're sophisticated in a certain way. They are you know, I realize I price myself out of stuff. But I don't like stuff that's pandering or kind of demeaning to kids.

Really say more by that, you realize you price yourself out of stuff.

What do you mean, Well, I just mean sometimes I think the things I did well, we did get nominated for a Grammy for the first first kids thing that I did. But I think, you know, some of the things you listen to that are there in that space that are supposed to be for kids, they're kind of stupid and and I don't I'm not into that.

See.

I kind of felt the challenge because I didn't know. And I think one of the great things about making that kids album was we did we were doing.

I think there's a beauty to that.

Sure, Sure, when you're naive, Yeah, that's the way to do it, right, Yeah, I don't know the rules, that's the way to do it.

Absolutely.

I think once we kind of got involved and started, we'd written six or seven songs and we started to have people to be a little bit interested, then we started doing the opposite.

Interesting. Yeah, we're like.

Then trying to guess and speculate and why and let's get dumber.

And that was the wrong thing for us to do, right, We did exactly what you just said, and I think we learned a lot from it.

But that's what we did. We were like, we need to make this dumber.

Well, when you talk about sports and music parallels, one thing that stands out to me is the psychological hurdles that athletes have to get over in order to get out and perform. And it's the same thing that creative people have to You have to kind of get through the second guessing thing. If you're a kicker, you know, you got to just do what you do, you know, and you can't get in your head.

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Getting in your head that's tough, I mean, especially when you live in your head, right, Yeah, hard to say don't And I do it too, Like, don't get in my head when I literally depend on whatever is in my head. But do you ever create something and you're in it so long or just so intensely mm hmm that you start to go, I don't know if this is good anymore, just because I'm no in it.

I don't like that. I personally don't I like to move fast. I really do. I like to get the thought out and complete it as much as I can, and if it's not useful or good, I like to get onto something else. I don't I don't like to do you. I mean, I don't like to work on stuff for a really long time. I don't like that at all.

I will write a joke or a set of jokes, and then I will go and it's so funny to me when I'm writing it, and then I'm like, I don't know if this is funny anymore.

Oh, you hit it in a different well, one parallel that I can you know, relate on. That is, sometimes the tempo of a song will hit you different ways. So like you work on something at one twenty two and then you come in listen to it later and it feels so slow, so you got to bump it up, or or it feels too fast and you got to pull it down a little bit because it doesn't have the swagger or something, you know. So tempos are funny that way. But I imagine jokes are kind of like tempo in the sense that depending on your mood, it can hit you in a different way.

Yeah, and depending on I mean literally the tempo of the words and how you're saying them.

Yeah, for sure, give me a joke. You wrote it lately, so that's the absolute word. The answer to that is no.

Because I am so fascinated, because I mean, I can't.

Pull voice memos. So this is what I could. This is what you would do if I were to go pull up songs. Let me see what I have here.

So like, I cannot imagine trying to sit down and write a joke. That seems super super hard.

It is.

I'd rather try to pull vault.

What sucks about writing jokes is that you can't practice them unless you do it in front of people.

Can't practice with your with your wife or your friends or anybody.

Like, especially not my wife. He's funnier than I am. But even then, if you tell a joke to one person, if I were to play, like, I'll play guitar in my act a little bit, but I can practice guitar all day and get better at it. I do not know if a joke works until I do it in front of people and they judge me live, and I know it's not going to work the perfect way the first time I do it, So you kind of have to go into it and go, well, I'm gonna go and deliver this, and I'm not going to get the response I want, but please don't let it be an terrible total. I'll give you an example of something I just did. This is so like, this is vulnerable here, Daniel, I like it, because let's go.

And I have a lot of these. So we went.

I went and I hosted a thing called the Marconi Awards in New York and Dan Patrick was there, the sports guy. And I love Dan Patrick. Loved one on Sports Center when I was a kid. And so what's really hard about writing for events is you only get to the jokes one time, and you can't practice in front of anybody. So all that practicing out the window because it is very specific to that occasion. Yeah, and I said, he was in the crowd and I recognized him. I was like, hey, Dan Patrick's here, said, I'm a massive Dan Patrick fan. Said three things that I am amazed by with Dan. Number One, he changed the landscape of sports and pop culture, melded them together. Number Two, he's turned what he's doing now into one of the most entertaining radio shows, the most trusted voices in sports radio and three and what I'm amazed by the most and what I aspire to do. He charges two hundred bucks for a cameo and so okay. And so in that, you know, I read you on that. I know what's your work because in that room it worked worked.

Yeah, and you put the you kind of gave the three and you numbered them the three.

That's that's the simple. That is one.

And in music there are a lot of formulas that you can work inside the formula for sure, ten million ways.

But do jokes one, two.

Three, yep?

You know wow that so that would be a joke that I okay.

So again you've got the power of purpose because you knew you're going to see this guy and you you know, you had to have something something.

But I bet you have in your notes a lot of half written concepts that if you just read it to somebody that would be like what planet is your mind on?

Totally okay? And that is that is that where jokes come for you.

I have so many like half written jokes that I don't even understand, you know how. Sometimes you'll write something in your handwriting and you're like, what did I even write there? That's what some of my jokes are.

What's a half one half baked?

You're the fact that you want me to do this is crazy, Like I can't because I do this to Pan all the time.

I cannot imagine.

What do you have to pull your phone out? Well, and here some concepts. Then we'll go, we'll go match for match a little bit.

Here. I even have like some I keep new book ideas.

I don't even know what I've got in here. But what if somebody listened to this and then they went and they took one of my concepts and they wrote a song with it. That would be the only.

Thing that might Well, don't give us with your best that might don't give us.

Your best, give us like a just like a generic. I don't you have nothing? Let me see, this is my favorite thing. I'll give you some of my stuff here. So and so this is gonna be bad. But my wife and I wrote this. I wrote watching Batman logic. So my wife doesn't watch superhero movies. Really, she doesn't hate them, but.

She never watches them. By the way, this is my favorite thing I've ever done in an interview where we do because it feels so.

Vulnerable, I tell you, and that might be more vulnerable, but go on about Batman.

So because this is not going to be that funny when I explain it to you. But you can see how the clay that.

I'm cutting right, uh huh.

My wife and I were watching Batman. It's Robert Pattinson version of it. She's like, I dont get it. Yeah, and I'm like what.

She's like what what? What even is he? And I'm like, what do you mean? She goes, he's not he can't fly, yeah, he can't run fast, Yeah, he's rich. What's super about him? Except he's super? And and I'm like, no, no, you don't understand. Like he has like the Batmobile. She's like, okay, well you have you have a tesla?

Yeah?

Like why And so her whole logic she totally crushed Batman to me, like, took all these years of childhood loving Batan right and now about thirty seconds, Yeah, showed me why I'm an idiot and Batman's a loser.

Or why it doesn't resonate for her. Yeah yeah why then?

Yeah, mostly I just cried.

So the whole thing was she took all my childhood in about thirty seconds to why I was ridiculous. Yeah, yeah, So like I wrote, yes, like watching Batman. Another one is asked my wife, but it was like having a period, like I'm pastor. I was like, tell me, like, explain to me what it's like having Yeah.

And she said, look at the last thing that you googled, and so I did, and it was something like autographed Saints helmet of Alvin Kamara. And then she goes, look the last thing I googled, and it said, uh, does Uber Eats delivered diet coke or something like that? Right?

And I just remembered that. So I wrote that little concept down and from that.

The last thing you googled is funny?

Yeah, And I can make that funny.

Of what she did, it could be like does you know do they deliver cookie dough ice cream at whatever the case is. But that would be the concepts that I write down for jokes that I then go out and try to work until I can make them funny.

You mean you workshop them, yes, but you have to workshop live.

You have to workshop live. Yeah, and you do them fast though, so if one bombs, you're on.

The bombs as great as as that, because sometimes my jokes are so bad. People don't know their jokes.

They don't even know. No, I just keep going, keep going.

People will be like, no, he didn't miss a joke all night, No, I do.

So stand up is what what sort of slice of the pie of your life is.

That in different seasons it's up to like thirty to forty percent. Yeah, because I will tour and do thirty theaters. Yeah, and then I'll not I'll go do a sports show or a TV show. Yeah, So at times it is very significant. Yeah, I feel like I'm writing all the time. I'm doing the radio show and I'm writing jokes all the time. Right now, I'm not in that space because I got a couple of sports shows that we're doing. Yeah, but when I'm on it is really all I focus on. Yeah, what about songwriting for you versus producing? Like, what what's what's your pie?

Kind of go hand in hand. I mean I'm always writing songs. I mean I'm just I'm just just always doing.

You gotta give me something vulnerable though, because.

Yeah, I'm going to I'll just play you, uh something I just started playing this morning. I went to the piano. I knew I was going to see somebody today. So that person I'm playing.

So, is that you placing a holder for for word?

Yeah?

The melody with the music?

Yeah?

Would that be more for you to remember or to send us somebody to go? This is kind of what I have going.

But see, I don't really highly rate that, Like I don't value that. That's just that's just nothing. Really, it's nothing until it's got the right words with it. And the words are the most important thing.

And and and you know, it's like it's just a bit of melody that I like, you know, so but with that, but really I got a hundred thousand of those and really don't They are not worth anything if you don't put any any words with them.

They're just but.

You've got placeholders there for words that the melody that you're god like.

I'm just.

Yeah, do you it's hooky to me?

Do you create that so you can reassign lyrics, or so you can together reassigne Like, what's the next step with something like that? Doesn't have to be that one specifically, what's the next step, Well, find some words to put.

To it, and and do you do that or do you do it with another writer?

Could be with that with another writer or by myself depending on what you know, where we're at. You know, with someone like Casey Musgraves, like she has so many great words and so many great titles that it's just it's awesome to work with somebody that's that that good.

Casey's one of my with words top five favorite artists ever. Yeah, I think you know, obviously you guys did Golden Hour and we'll go through all that. But Casey has a couple of like perfect albums to me sure which there may be four that I can think of in my life that are like no skips, yeah for sure, Like Licensed Ills one for sure, like those that are from like that.

But you know, Casey as a writer, extremely prolific. Yeah, but I don't.

Get to work with her on a level like you do. I get I could world no level. I mean I just listen. Yeah, what makes her special as.

A writer observation, You know, I think she is very observant, and she listens to things people say, and she's able to catch those titles from from out things that people are saying, you know, and and then she's got just instincts. It's just that simple. It's like a boxer. She's just got int thinks about how to make a knockout? Uh and wind it, you know, and I just I just love her slow Burn, slow Burn, It's great.

Damn.

I was thinking of of the songs that you wrote.

I was going through them ranking in my head.

Thanks, I know, but they're all yours though, so that you went and you lose. And I think one that that the first time I listened, I was like, Okay, it's pretty good. The one that really grew on me and I think just melodically was Lonely Weekend.

Lonely Weekend. Yeah, I'm proud that one.

Because I listened to it and I think it was But the more I heard it, the more I like again, appreciated how the melody of it, and I guess maybe I didn't feel the lyrics as much.

Sure, but but yeah, melodically, like I love that song now.

That melody, Yeah me too, I do too.

Tell me about that song specifically.

Well, I was up at my publisher, Big Yellow Big Yellow Dog, and I needed to have some little tracks for like I don't know if people wanted to come through like some of these songs, like artists like I don't know who it would have been, but you know, I remember Brad Tercy people like that were kind of around. I was writing with some of these people that were kind of bubbling up at that point, you know, and and I just needed to have some tracks backing tracks if somebody came in and they wanted to So I made the made that backing track and then I showed it to Casey. I was like, I was thinking in my mind it was sort of like Eric Clapton ish or something like uh. And I showed it to her and she was like, Yeah, turn that guitar, trying that electric guitar that sounds like Eric Clapton off. Turn that off and let's beat it up and I'm gonna sing you know something over it. And I said, what if you're saying Lonely Weekend over it? And she was like yeah, And then we kind of had a concept.

So that was that with Casey Goldenaur Star Cross Deeper. Well, what that's That's a lot of working together mm hmm.

A lot of times you work with somebody once and it's great mm hmm, maybe twice, but yet three times there's something there that's like the magic and the stew with the two What is.

It about you two guys working together.

Well, And I would put Ian in there with us too, because he's always sort of we I think we've got to the point now where we can read each other without really a lot of words being exchanged. There's a little bit of a telepathic communication thing going on now. We've done so many songs together that we can know what the other person is thinking. And you know how when you have an idea and then someone else is there in the room listening, you kind of listen through their ears, you know, like if you played me a demo, it would something would become obvious to you that you couldn't hear if I wasn't there, you know, something about showing it to someone else, it's like and yeah, And so I think there's some of that going on where we kind of learned to listen through each others a little bit, and we just we just we trust her, you know, and she's she's got the instinct of where she wants to navigate herself too, in terms of what where she's going and what's what's pulling her, what's her north star is, And so we just have to kind of follow that because it's a cultural north star for her, you know, it's like when we're working on Deeper Well, she's just listening to all this all this folky stuff, and she's like, you know, what's the guy who did you know operate Jim Crochey, Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell. These type of things, you know, are what are her north Star? And so we're just following that.

Yeah, I was gonna ask you and I was gonna go to Deeper World next, because all three the projects have been different. But you don't want to repeat yourself. But it feels like you're not going to repeat yourself because she's coming in and going, as.

You said, to use your reference the north Star.

It feels like the north Star, even though you guys are the same back the north Stars in a slightly different place.

So you're able to create differently because of that.

Mm hmm, I think so. And I just think you never step in the same river twice, you know, it's.

Almost remember and over successful.

Well me too, me too, absolutely absolutely, and I relate to that absolutely. I like cheeseburgers. I mean, there's a reason that there's a reason that it works, you know, and and I'm with you on that, but but no, I mean lives, change, moves change. When we were working on Golden Hours, she had just met this guy that she wound up marrying, marrying not long after that, but she was so enamored and and kind of all those type of falling in love kind of songs were just kind of pouring out, and she was just feeling that way, just very not ground down into the nitty gritty of a relationship and the hardness of you know, those moments like you're talking about when your wife kind of kind of burst your bubble about Batman and stuff like. There was none of that. It was all you know, it was all just just uh, rainbows and you know, butterflies and all those kind of things.

The longer I sit with you, the more I think how intimidating must be for your piano teacher to give you piano lessons.

Oh no, no, he's a beast. No, Jody is a beast. And and and what I do, and you might enjoy this too, is that I want to figure a song out, so I'll bring a song in. So it's song based. It's not based on okay, now do these scales or whatever. It's song based, and the songs contain the musical lessons, So you would say, okay, Rocketman by Elton John, I want to play that, and you bring it to him and then you'll just put your hand here and you put this one there and go like this and you're playing Rocketman.

With Is there an understanding though that you want to learn a bit of why Rocketman exists at the same time, Like.

Yeah, you want to look, You're you're getting under the hood. You're looking at what makes it work, what's the engine, what's the mechanism, Why does the melody work, what's the bass doing? You know, and you learn those things and that's what as a songwriter. That's why I like I like piano lessons.

Does your dad teach a guitar?

He showed me couple chords, you know, Like he showed me there were a couple of chords I couldn't figure out, Like one like that song Michelle by the Beatles. It has a couple of jazz chords in it. And he said, well, I would play it like this. He showed me, like an augmented chord and a diminished chord and stuff like that, Like.

Did you feel and asking him for help if you needed it? Uh? Yeah, sure, So it's not no, no, but if there was something.

Yeah, and then you know, he showed me. I remember one time he said to me when I was playing lead guitar. I was just kind of soloing and I kept going and soloing, and he said, you got to put brakes in it. He said, make each phrase like a little snapshot, like there's a polaroid, like dun dun dun't. Then stop and then dun dun dun't dun't. You don't run it all together, you know, and because then all the images get on top of each other, and you know, you want to just put space in between the licks. And that was pretty helpful.

Is your dad still alive now?

Yes, he is. He's he's he's got Alzheimer's, so he's he's. His memory is not is not in good shape, but he's he's a sweet guy.

Before he got sick.

Was he.

Proud of your success? Did he expect your success?

Like?

What was that relationship?

You know?

I think that he was a dreamer. I think he had a lot of unrealized dreams. Even with all the things that he did and all the places that he was as a musician from the sixties up through the nineties. I mean, even everything that he in those three or four decades that he was he was working. Even as all the things that he did, I think he wished he'd been able to do more. He never had like a big hit or anything really that he was associated and performed in a lot of amazing places and with you know, with Emmy, he was Emmy's Emmy Lou Harris's harmony singer for a long time. So they sang together and it was it was pretty thrilling to hear them sing together. You know, it's like pretty amazing thing to do. But he never really got in there and like said, all right, let's write some stuff. All right, let's produce a record here, let's make that. He never sort of like took kind of like I don't know, it just wasn't like as much of a thing I think at that time. I don't know, or maybe he just didn't have the kind of He's not a dominant kind of person or or really a leader really that much so much as like he's kind of a quiet, more introverted person. So you know a lot of times that people who end up sort of capitalizing on certain situations, they find themselves in tend to be those more outgoing kind of people.

Right, how was your mom in that respect? Was she a little more outgoing?

Well? She was, and also she was sort of home with with me and my brother when my dad was on the road, So she was pretty much a mom.

She does she run things. Where do you get I guess, yeah, just wondering how you got yours?

Yeah, my mom's the boss. Yeah, she sort of she made you know, she was sort of the you know, she set the tone I think in that house. You know, my dad was more of a moody kind of atmospheric presence.

Interesting to me. I don't know if you want to answer, But how do you come up with your kids' names?

Oh?

Well, we wanted them. This is funny. We wanted them all to be from peter Pan because you know, that was just the trip that we were on at that point. But we got Tiger Lily, and then we had tinker Bell, and then we needed we were gonna name Matilda Wendy because then they would all be from peter Pan. But right the week before the twins were born, a woman at our church had a baby and had it christened Wendy. So we couldn't be like, you know, the next week and this week we have another Wendy which is dumb, which we should have gone anyway.

But yeah, when you your ten year old Tinkerbell, Yeah, Tinkerbell.

You say that is tinker Bell her name?

Yeah, that's her name name, tinker Bell.

Yeah, that's so cool.

Well, I mean, I don't know if it is or it to me.

To me, that is so cool, that's cool.

Well, she's she's very much herself, you know, I mean she she really people grow into their names, I think, and she really has. She's you get you're around her and you're like, yep, your Tingerbell. Yeah my name.

I always thought it was like a young guy named yeah, Bobby.

Yeah.

I told my wife that once. I was like, I got a pretty young name. She was like what. I was like, Bob, because like Bob, Like that's what I yeah, like Bobby, that's like from that's what old men were named. You just write a young version of an old man.

And I'm like, no, no, no, we looked it up most popular in nineteen thirty eight. I was like, what, no, I did your name was an old man name.

Do you get a lot of jokes from your wife, My wife's This is what's the source of a lot of humor.

Yes, and very much, yes, but mostly because I'm so challenged by her. She is so much better at what I do, yet she has no interest in interest in doing it. No, she does not want to. She does not want to tell jokes. She is so funny that I at times get resentful that she has such.

A gift and doesn't use it. And I'm over here, I'm begging for scraps, just just begging, just trying.

To hard grinding, and if I can get her to laugh a real life because she will not pity laughing, Yeah, for sure.

If I get a real life laugh, it's the greatest.

It's better than a full theater because it just she's so much better than me what I'm celebrated for, so it's crazy too. I think my answer is yes, But I think it's because I'm so challenged by her at this point that I want to.

Does she ever? Does she ever resent being spoken of in a comedy context? She does, she resents it. You ever get off stage and she's like, oh boy, oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you're getting ready to You got.

To get especially way early on not not as much anymore, because I I know why she has her boundaries that she has. She just does not enjoy people knowing things about her. She does not want to be in public.

I didn't know that at first. I'm like, guess what happened to me?

I'm walking naked in.

The mid so all this and it was never like me and ra Anger.

But do you know early in a relationship there's there are boundaries that are said. I mean, I said some, she said some. We then we end up loving each other, we get married. But even on the radio, you know, there are certain personal things Yeah does like about her. I can talk about me whatever I want, but there's certain things she's like, I would rather.

Like own my story at times. So yes to that.

This sounds very familiar to me and very and and I resonate with that very much. And one thing that I feel like when I know I'm I'm about to be in in the doghouse or not in a bad in a bad situation with her, there's four words that and I'm getting into numbers here, which I'm now learning as part of crafting a joke, but the four words are just so you know, when I hear that yeah, I know I'm in trouble.

It's not Youah the rest. You can go in and hold your body the way it needs to be held. It doesn't matter what's said next. Yes, yeah, yeah. My wife has been extremely beneficial for me creatively because I have only ever just wanted.

To be good for me. Now it's like I want to impress her.

You want to make her laugh. Absolutely, it's yeah.

And she's the hardest person to make laugh. But she's also the absolute funniest person.

I know.

That's a good north Star.

It's a sport that absolutely it is.

But it's really hard and sometimes I get, like I said, I get resembled this.

She doesn't like anything. And my wife doesn't like any songs. She doesn't like anything.

She's she's heard them all and I hear your she goes, I hear her sen dreamor all the time.

You make these jokes all the time.

I know where you're going before you go. You're having to laugh at this stuff because other people may give you laughs. They don't you know you twenty hours a yeah, yeah, that's funny.

No, I mean, yeah, it's hard. That's a good that's a good choice for for for a north star and and I know certain things I can do in a song that will make it more possible that she will like it. But still a lot of times I just pretty much fall flat. She's like, Eh, it's not Paradise City by guns and roses.

That's the thing. What is? How did you meet your wife? You don't mind sharing that.

We met at a party at my house where I was living on Belmont, and she came and I was sort of being ubiquitously ubiquitously obsequious. I was just kind of like, would you like some more and want I wanted to know more about her, and so I kind of blew it at the beginning, and then but we stayed in touch, and then yeah, we just kind of found ourselves kind of hanging out. She was up in the Hamptons and I went up there, and then we just I just had this feeling like that I just felt really good when I would be around her, and then when I would leave and not see her, I was like, I was kind of I don't know, just didn't feel didn't feel I just there was something about us. And I remember early on we both had our laptops and we were both like sitting at a table kind of working, and she was in grad school at the time, and I was kind of like writing emails to I don't know, my weed dealer or something. I don't know what was happening, but I loved the feeling of being across the table from her, typing on our laptops and just being in her orbit was just something I wanted to And then she cooked me this incredible We started dating and then she cooked me this unbelievable gourmet meal one night and I said, I got really inspired and I was like, I'm gonna propose. I'm gonna propose tonight. I went into I got up from the table, I sa, I'll be right back, and I went into her. I just didn't I needed a ring, and I needed it right then, and I hadn't thought it out, so so I went and grabbed one of her rings, and I came back into the room and I got down on one knee and I said, will you marry me? And she said wow. And that was and she did say yes. And that was the last meal that she cooked for me.

She got you, h the Bobby cast, will be right back.

This is the Bobby Cast.

I remember my wife being a little offended that I was surprised she could cook so well. Yeah, but I mean it as a company. My wife's a great cook. And my wife also has multiple advanced degrees, right, yeah, and so I remember she cooked, and she's consistently really good. She can make stuff out of nothing, it seems like. And I was like, I can't believe you can cook so well.

And she's like why.

I was like, because you're pretty. Oh wow, maybe not. I thought there's a compliment.

Maybe not the best thing to say, though, They're like, well, if you're only pretty, that's all you can do.

Yeah, And so beauty is a form of intelligence.

Yeah, yes, and so it was intelligence. Yeah, And I was just shocked, shocked.

But she does everything so well. And I think when you mentioned that you just like being around her. I think for me.

And my wife. I didn't get married till I was thirty forty. I was forty.

Yeah, I was pretty late late bloomer.

Like I didn't believe.

I just didn't believe this stuff, yeah, because I never has never engaged her in serious relationship or anything. But then when I met her, it wasn't that like I was run over by the love truck.

It was it just felt easy.

Yeah.

Yeah, not to say that life is easy, because being in a relationship, if you want to be right, it's hard. Yeah, But it just felt easy, or that I wanted to put in the effort to make it feel easy.

I wanted that before.

Yeah. I resonated with that for sure, and also with the other thing you were saying about the difficulty of impressing. If you marry someone that it's hard to impress, it makes you better.

Yes, And I think that's a good place. Well I am.

I Well in this last kids before the Kids book, the last adult book I wrote, I wrote a whole thing about and I do believe it.

But it's really hard to live.

Like, find somebody that you trust and you love to tell you that you suck, and I mean that, and it's funny to say you suck, But find somebody that you trust enough and you can still love after they tell you suck.

That way, you can trust when they tell you that something's good.

And with her, like I have that in the greatest way because and she doesn't do it out of meanness at all, and she does it's completely healthy and she's very honest and up front. But if something is not good or it's not to the standard that she thinks it is, and I bring it to her because she won't just come be like I heard this it sucks because she knows sometimes I'm not done with it. But if I bring it to her and I'm like, what do you think, she will give me her absolute, nothing held back opinion of whatever I've created. But when she says, man, that's really good, that's it.

That's that is.

That's the win.

And I would not believe her if she didn't give me the rest.

And all that value is her being able to tell me I suck sometimes, and that.

Means ever wrong, like I'm never wrong.

She often will admit to being wrong whenever she's really not that wrong, like she has the ability to have she.

Ever say like that's not very good, and then it's.

Like, oh, you mean about my creative stuff?

Yeah?

And then sometimes the Joe kills or something.

Yes, but this is her argument there, because she'll be like, ah, this is the funny.

I'm like, I've done joke five times. It kills. She goes, well, they just don't know.

Humor, so she's still right. But sometimes she'll nail me for a low hanging fruit. Yeah, yeah, She'll like, yeah, of course they're laughing. Yeah, she goes, you're just ripping the low hanging fruit off the tree. You can do so much better, And I'm like, I don't need to. So she's never wrong in that way. She still holds on to how she feels about it. Yeah, but I love whenever she's I feel like she's wrong, and I'm like five times when I've done this.

Joke, like they love it, and she's like, well they're stupid.

Yeah, so and not that mean, but no, I really I really enjoyed talking with you.

This has been super cool for me. I appreciate you coming over. Yeah, thanks for having What I like about you is that like you're just like you and that.

Is not something that isn't heavy commodities here. There's a lot of people that present themselves as a creative product, but it's tough to find somebody you feel like like, no, that's literally just them and it's a little quirky and it's a little and I liked I really liked that about you and what you do because I believe it.

Well, I appreciate that, and you know, I don't have a career. You know, I mean you said that earlier. It's like career. A career is for somebody like a doctor or a lawyer, or a politician, or somebody that's got like a ladder stability, that's got a ladder to climb, that's looking for somebody over here. It's like, oh, if I make this move, because if you do music as a career, you got to make a lot of bad choices.

You're right, you do.

You have to go, well, this is what's selling. So I've got to go over here and do this because I'm working on my career, and so I'm very proud of the fact that I don't have a career. Really, I just have my work, which goes on twenty four hours a day of.

That, and I feel like to do great work you have to make even more wrong choices to actually figure out who you are and what is important to you. Because I think I've done things very very wrong. But I don't think had I not, I wouldn't know what I feel like is right because I wouldn't know what was wrong. It's like Mark Twain wrote that Damned Human Race, and it's one of my favorite essays because it's not a full book or anything.

But he talks about if we didn't.

Have morals, there would be without right, without wrong. There is no right without right, there is no wrong. So if we didn't assign things to have these this great moral value, there wouldn't be a moral thing right.

And in a way, it's like.

Had I not done everything wrong, I wouldn't know what is right. And I'm glad I did, but it sucked and I wouldn't do it again. But I'm very thankful for it. And so I tried to have a career.

Oh me too. I try to have a deep voice.

I tried to be the everybody welcome, this is the show, early radio. Yeah, I was gonna be the greatest deep voice interesting DJ.

Ever, so you now somebody call me a DG. I get pissed off.

You would get on there and go, hey, everybody.

I'm not even that good.

Yeah.

It sound like.

A puberty, that puberty, because the deep voice is what you wanted at that point. It was the standard or a good announcer, and that's what at one point you had to be to be considered successful in an industry's talking.

Do you think do you you probably do this and I don't know, but do you think you could do sports commentary like like NFL games.

Or I don't do that. I mean I did when I was younger.

I did Division two football.

So do I think I could?

Yes?

Do I think I could be the greatest of all time at it? Yes? Uh huh am I probably wrong.

Yes, But did you see they had what's the guy Patriots Tom Brady? They see I had Tom Brady? They were trotting him out there.

He's the he's making He's not one hundred million dollars deal?

Was he?

Did you feel like he was?

He was legit?

What I This is what I love about Tom tom Brady.

He sucked his first time. It was worse. They didn't have the right processing on his voice.

He was way nervous, did not know where to talk.

Between week one and.

Week two, he's got dramatically better.

And he wasn't great in week two, but he was so much better.

Yeah that Like that inspired me watching a six out of ten tom.

Brady week two.

Yeah wow, because now he's probably a seven point five or a seven point and in we're nine weeks in the season. But you're watching a guy go oh, this is why he's great? Like he continues to just want to get better.

Yeah, he's on a journey of self improvement.

Because he was terrible week one and everybody told him, it was everywhere. But it was so cool to watch him come back week two and crush it. And yeah it was and that like that's.

In stuff, Okay, inspiring to me.

Wow.

So man, I'm gonna steal your song. We're gonna record that, and you're gonna hear me.

I'm ready to go. I sta all that, Daniel, Thanks man, thanks for.

Coming, Thanks for having me.

You know, before you got here, we talked a lot about you, and you know, talked about Silver Seas and you know, I didn't know where I really wanted to go with this, but the one I sat with you, I just kind of wanted to have you ted talked me.

Well, and that's what I got. You've been ted talked.

I didn't even I.

Didn't even did the burn backrock stuff. And I think of Burt and so I love rain dropsky falling on my head like all like, and I like you and not and like when Ben Folds covered and I like a lot of that piano based mmmmmm, we'll call it piano based pop. That is all derived from old like Bert. So yeah, yeah, yeah, when we started with the Ringo almost started with Bert.

I'm glad we started with the Ringo.

Yeah, that was good.

And thank you for the time, massive fan. Yeah, congrats on everything.

Thanks man, and uh yeah, I just really admire how you do stuff.

And your kid's names. That's the coolest thing. That is loadly the coolest thing, Mike, you have anything.

How did the waffle House song come together? That's really a great one.

I was in Seaside and was down there on vacation with the family, and I always bring music stuff with me when I go on vacation because I just I gotta have something to fiddle with. It's like my knitting. And I made this little beat and put some chords to it, and I sent it to my buddy Edo in LA and he said, hey, I think I want to send this to Jonas brothers. And so that's how that came together. But it was music. My contribution to that song was the music. I didn't write any of the lyrics.

When you heard like, that's that's so amazingly quirky, it's awesome.

Yeah, I felt that. Yeah, I felt that.

I love that t bone Burnett t Bone see it.

What's his dear friend mentor he was my producer when I was an artist when I was nineteen. Kind of we kind of parted, we kind of lost touch with with each other, and then through Ringo and a couple other things that we're working on, we kind of came back together. And I just love that man.

Is he math based? Like when he produces like it is he like his math based meaning.

I would hear a stories of people working with him and everything was so specific, I mean, like especially percussion.

I think he's just a brilliant artist himself. And you can hear on his new record how good he really is. What a good singer he is. He's in his seventies. He sings so is so pure and just so the songs are so good. I think he's just really a great artist. So really, I think he just is helping artists be like try to be better.

I probably had a friend of AA drummer. Then that's what I hear when you say that, because it was like no way to be exactly.

It sounds like, oh, you're saying is rhythm, yeah, oh you must have.

Yeah, very distinct ideas about the way that that stuff should interact. But you know, just a just a love lovely guy, very bright, very like yourself. You would find him, you know, quoting Mark Twain, you'd find him. You know, he'll say, can I read you a poem? If you know? He really likes to say you can ever have a biography or an autobiography or something like that? He said decidedly no. You know, so there's a mystery about him, and he speaks a lot in metaphors, and there's a lot of you know, he'd be more likely to tell you like an allegory or or or a fable in something, and then you'd sort of extrapolate from that, like what it means about your problem for your situation. Last question, but I look up to him a lot.

Did you get ready to sign anything or no off limit?

I didn't, but I made him take a picture with me.

He knew he was in the picture.

Right, Yeah, that's right, he did.

Okay, good, because thank you, thank you for the time.

Really appreciate right man, thanks for listening to a Bobby Cast production