Dan Reynolds: Imagine Dragons | Lex Fridman Podcast #290

00:00:00.000 | When you imagine a song, is it the opening you imagine?

00:00:04.160 | - No, it's kind of a, it's just a,

00:00:07.080 | I never think opening, I never think final.

00:00:10.040 | I think soundscape of how I'm feeling right now.

00:00:14.200 | So it could be the middle of the song for all I know

00:00:16.320 | when I'm, you know, when I'm doing that.

00:00:18.280 | But my process for me is very much lyrics and melody

00:00:22.680 | and music really come at the same time.

00:00:25.480 | Like I, by same time, I mean,

00:00:27.920 | I'm, as I'm expressing maybe, you know,

00:00:32.920 | I'm feeling like.

00:00:33.840 | (beatboxing)

00:00:36.260 | Like, it's not that simple, but it's like,

00:00:42.320 | I'll hear it, like, it's like,

00:00:44.560 | here's all the orchestra and you're kind of just

00:00:46.120 | pressing all the buttons at once.

00:00:47.500 | And melody and my voice is just one of those instruments.

00:00:51.720 | - The following is a conversation with Dan Reynolds,

00:00:56.360 | the lead singer of Imagine Dragons,

00:00:58.680 | one of the most popular bands in the world

00:01:00.920 | with over 75 million records sold

00:01:03.560 | and with four songs being streamed

00:01:05.640 | over a billion times on Spotify.

00:01:08.460 | Given all that, Dan is one of the most down to earth,

00:01:11.520 | kind, thoughtful and fascinating human beings

00:01:14.240 | I've ever met, grounded in part

00:01:17.040 | by his lifelong struggle with mental health.

00:01:20.500 | The darkness, the love and the creative brilliance

00:01:24.200 | are all there in this one humble mind.

00:01:26.920 | For this reason and many others, we became fast friends.

00:01:30.360 | Plus he recently started his journey in programming,

00:01:33.760 | which funny enough is where we start this wide ranging,

00:01:37.340 | deeply personal and fun conversation.

00:01:40.280 | This is the Lex Friedman podcast.

00:01:42.120 | To support it, please check out our sponsors

00:01:44.240 | in the description.

00:01:45.440 | And now dear friends, here's Dan Reynolds.

00:01:49.560 | - So we were talking offline that you're not just getting

00:01:51.960 | into programming.

00:01:53.240 | What's the most beautiful program you've ever written?

00:01:57.400 | Something that brought you joy?

00:01:58.960 | - There's something, I really love completion.

00:02:04.480 | It's the reason that I'm addicted to songwriting.

00:02:07.140 | I like there being nothing

00:02:09.520 | and then having some blocks or tools

00:02:12.600 | and building them into what you want it to look like.

00:02:16.080 | And then I find it incredibly rewarding to stand back

00:02:20.920 | and look at what you did at the end.

00:02:23.200 | It could be anything.

00:02:24.080 | For me, it was as simple to begin with as just,

00:02:28.160 | because it's object oriented, like making a cube move.

00:02:33.240 | Like as simple as that, understanding that

00:02:36.000 | and knowing that I built that and made it do that

00:02:38.440 | is really rewarding.

00:02:41.920 | And I think it's the thing that drew me into

00:02:44.160 | to wanting to learn more.

00:02:46.560 | But as far as what is some grandiose,

00:02:50.400 | like some big piece of code that I've done,

00:02:52.400 | like absolutely not.

00:02:53.680 | It's more, I'm still at a level where it's more like,

00:02:55.520 | what is a tutorial that I followed?

00:02:58.440 | And got, and then, yeah.

00:03:00.960 | Yeah, so I couldn't say I'm at a level

00:03:03.680 | where I've done anything beautiful at all in code.

00:03:06.040 | - But you're also interested in potentially,

00:03:08.720 | like your heart is drawn to creating games.

00:03:11.200 | - Creating anything.

00:03:13.340 | - And completing it.

00:03:15.440 | - Yeah.

00:03:16.280 | - That's the good, the feel good is it's done.

00:03:18.680 | - Yeah, I mean, I've been working over the last two years

00:03:22.840 | with actually a team out of Kiev on,

00:03:27.040 | and we can get into that, it's a whole nother story,

00:03:28.940 | but on a computer game.

00:03:30.680 | And really have kept that kind of under wraps,

00:03:34.040 | but yeah, we're kind of getting to a point now

00:03:37.360 | where we have a prototype that we can play

00:03:39.520 | and it's a lot of fun.

00:03:40.760 | And thankfully all the team members are in safe places now.

00:03:45.360 | Things have obviously been on hold for a little bit,

00:03:47.060 | but when that started is when I really decided,

00:03:50.560 | okay, I need to understand base level coding in C#.

00:03:54.000 | So I'm not an idiot talking to these people.

00:03:56.200 | So yeah, we've been doing that for a couple of years.

00:03:59.280 | - Is there any parallels between the final completion

00:04:02.800 | that you feel with programming,

00:04:05.040 | which I think is a little bit more definitive.

00:04:07.140 | Like there's debugging, the code doesn't work,

00:04:08.960 | it's messy and so on.

00:04:10.020 | There's the early design stages,

00:04:11.480 | you're not sure like how to have functions and classes,

00:04:14.360 | how it's all gonna work.

00:04:15.240 | And then it comes together and it's really done

00:04:17.880 | 'cause it works and there's a cube moving in the screen.

00:04:20.080 | - Right, right.

00:04:21.160 | - Is there any parallels between that and music?

00:04:23.960 | 'Cause are you really ever done done with a song?

00:04:28.000 | - It's exactly the same thing for me,

00:04:30.920 | just in that it's art.

00:04:33.460 | I really believe that we have not fully encapsulated artists.

00:04:38.460 | Like when we say art, I think most people think,

00:04:42.960 | okay, the medium must be painting or drawing

00:04:46.720 | or music or writing.

00:04:50.320 | But I really believe anytime you're creating something,

00:04:53.640 | engineers, for instance,

00:04:56.800 | you're creating something with tools that you have

00:04:59.800 | and it can be incredibly beautiful.

00:05:01.840 | And so yeah, I think, and it's never done.

00:05:07.800 | I feel like I look at songs that I've done

00:05:09.720 | and I never felt, you have to let go

00:05:14.480 | or I have to let go.

00:05:15.600 | And that's all I've, I'm just continually

00:05:17.720 | making myself let go.

00:05:18.920 | But I look at songs that I've done and wish I had done more

00:05:23.920 | or kept going down that road and what would have happened.

00:05:26.640 | And I'm really contained to, because of what our band is

00:05:30.520 | and what our fans expect.

00:05:32.160 | And there's so much more to it that it's like,

00:05:35.160 | I'm fitting in a box always.

00:05:38.320 | It's like this song shouldn't be longer

00:05:41.080 | than three minutes and 30 seconds.

00:05:42.520 | And I don't know if I remember the chorus after I heard it.

00:05:46.080 | Maybe I need to hear the chorus three times

00:05:47.960 | instead of those two times.

00:05:49.120 | It's like, there's certain, especially in pop music,

00:05:52.800 | it's really hard to,

00:05:54.640 | yeah, it feels like there's confines,

00:06:02.320 | even though people are like, well, there's no confines,

00:06:03.920 | but still everybody's writing a pop song

00:06:05.600 | that's a few minutes.

00:06:07.200 | - Are those explicit in your mind

00:06:08.720 | or are they just kind of,

00:06:10.800 | the gut is like you said, chorus.

00:06:12.840 | Should you have chorus once, twice or three times?

00:06:15.400 | Is that a gut thing or is that a rule thing?

00:06:17.520 | - You know, I think it's a rule.

00:06:18.960 | I mean, it's obviously a rule I impose on myself.

00:06:20.920 | Nobody's in my house saying,

00:06:23.600 | "Hey, Dan, if you don't do this, I'm gonna punish you."

00:06:26.800 | There's no major label president that's like,

00:06:29.760 | "Imagine Dragons needs to make pop music, Dan."

00:06:32.520 | You know what I mean?

00:06:33.360 | My manager doesn't even tell me that.

00:06:35.240 | I do it because it's what I perceive to be enjoyable.

00:06:40.680 | I grew up listening to a ton of pop music

00:06:43.640 | and then I ended up being in what is quote unquote,

00:06:46.680 | a rock band, which I've never perceived it as that,

00:06:49.560 | but that's kind of what the world has called it

00:06:53.720 | and that's fine.

00:06:54.560 | - So you're a prisoner of a prison

00:06:58.680 | that you yourself constructed.

00:07:00.680 | There you go.

00:07:01.520 | The confines are yours.

00:07:02.360 | - I'm a happy, I guess what I'm trying to say

00:07:04.600 | is I'm a happy prisoner of the prison

00:07:06.760 | that I have created for myself

00:07:08.400 | and I made that prison thinking that it was a mansion.

00:07:11.200 | - So you worked with Rick Rubin.

00:07:12.520 | What does Rick think about your prison?

00:07:14.840 | - Rick was, you know, it was interesting to hear

00:07:21.240 | his outside opinion when we first met

00:07:25.200 | 'cause my biggest focus for so much of my life,

00:07:30.200 | my biggest fear was, and this stems from, I think,

00:07:34.840 | middle school is when it started,

00:07:36.080 | but everyone being in on a joke except for yourself.

00:07:40.040 | The thought of thinking you're good at something

00:07:45.920 | and really you're terrible at it

00:07:47.840 | and you're surrounded by people who are saying,

00:07:49.320 | yeah, you're good at it, and then by themselves

00:07:50.960 | they're like, he's terrible at this.

00:07:52.760 | Not just in regards to music or art, but anything in life

00:07:57.840 | and I think maybe from having six older brothers,

00:08:01.120 | it stems from that too, always feeling inadequate

00:08:05.440 | and like the annoying younger brother.

00:08:07.280 | But anyway, so Rick's, and that's something

00:08:12.840 | I've learned to let go of as I've gotten older

00:08:14.480 | and had life experiences, but one of the things

00:08:18.800 | that Rick said really early on that has stuck with me

00:08:21.880 | was he said, yeah, we were Zooming the first time we met.

00:08:26.400 | He said, I'd really like to work with you

00:08:27.880 | because I feel like you're not confined to a sound.

00:08:33.920 | You've done a lot of different sounds

00:08:36.040 | and so it's exciting because I feel like your fans

00:08:38.100 | are forgiving more than other rock bands or bands

00:08:41.360 | 'cause most people when they hear,

00:08:43.060 | when they hear a band, it's like,

00:08:45.920 | there's a very specific sound with it.

00:08:47.760 | It's like, they do folk music or they do California rock

00:08:51.800 | or they do surf or they do,

00:08:54.680 | and your fans kind of want that.

00:08:59.160 | They want them to do that thing and then they don't do it

00:09:03.160 | and sometimes that goes well,

00:09:04.280 | but a lot of times it doesn't and people,

00:09:07.120 | critics and everybody is like,

00:09:08.480 | go back to the thing that you did good and do that.

00:09:11.400 | Rick felt whether he was right or wrong

00:09:17.220 | that we could do, we hopped genres so much

00:09:22.220 | and that's been to our benefit and detriment, I think.

00:09:26.180 | - Why detriment?

00:09:28.280 | - Because people want you to be something.

00:09:32.680 | It's more, you can believe it more.

00:09:35.320 | - It's more authentic if you never change.

00:09:40.600 | - I guess, I don't know.

00:09:42.080 | I mean, certainly it's not something I subscribe to

00:09:44.920 | because I create music,

00:09:46.160 | but I also grew up listening to a lot of different genres.

00:09:49.880 | I would listen to Cat Stevens

00:09:53.440 | and the next song would be Biggie

00:09:55.520 | and then the next song would be Nirvana.

00:09:58.160 | It was like, I like a lot of,

00:10:00.720 | and then Billy Joel and then Enya.

00:10:03.480 | It was like, you know what I mean?

00:10:04.400 | I was a product and I was a product of the '90s,

00:10:07.200 | which if you listen to '90s music,

00:10:08.720 | it really was, a lot of reason that people say,

00:10:11.040 | well, '90s were terrible.

00:10:12.560 | Like a lot of people say that.

00:10:14.120 | I love the '90s, they were my favorite decade of music.

00:10:16.720 | Was there was a lot of genre hopping

00:10:22.040 | and I don't know, I love that.

00:10:24.920 | - So you had the '90s, had the boy bands

00:10:27.720 | and it had Pearl Jam and Nirvana.

00:10:30.760 | - And it had a lot of, like women of the '90s

00:10:34.000 | was probably my biggest influence.

00:10:36.640 | Like kind of that like angry rock women of the '90s,

00:10:41.040 | like Lillanus Morsett, Jagged Little Pill

00:10:43.120 | is one of my favorite records of all time.

00:10:45.400 | The lyrics were so intimate

00:10:48.200 | and I don't know if she was angry or not.

00:10:52.240 | Sorry if she wasn't.

00:10:54.160 | - Yeah, but there was an anger to it.

00:10:55.520 | - There was angst.

00:10:56.360 | Yeah, it was like angstiness.

00:10:57.680 | And that in hip hop of the '90s influences me

00:11:01.800 | and then my dad.

00:11:02.800 | So anything my dad listened to,

00:11:04.120 | which my dad didn't listen to any of that.

00:11:05.520 | My dad listened to like Harry Nelson, The Beatles,

00:11:08.400 | Cat Stevens, Bob Dylan, Paul Simon, Billy Joel.

00:11:13.400 | It was very much like singer songwriter.

00:11:15.880 | - Do you mind if we throughout this,

00:11:17.400 | listen to a few songs?

00:11:18.240 | 'Cause you mentioned here in this,

00:11:19.080 | and I was actually yesterday and the day before

00:11:23.640 | listening to a lot of his stuff.

00:11:24.760 | And it's just like, damn, he's good.

00:11:28.520 | And not as known as he should be.

00:11:32.560 | I was getting, do you mind if I play?

00:11:35.960 | - No, please, yeah.

00:11:37.120 | - I don't know, not to open this conversation

00:11:41.360 | with a love song.

00:11:42.320 | - I would like that actually, Lex.

00:11:45.040 | - But Without You is an incredible song.

00:11:49.680 | - Oh man, that's, yeah.

00:11:52.760 | - And the heartbreak and the longing.

00:11:55.960 | ♪ No I can't forget the evening ♪

00:12:00.440 | - What?

00:12:01.280 | - He's the best to do it, in my opinion.

00:12:04.880 | In my opinion, he's the best to do it.

00:12:06.760 | - The vocal range.

00:12:09.240 | - And just the sadness of like,

00:12:13.200 | there's something, I don't even wanna talk over him

00:12:21.320 | because this is one of my favorite songs too,

00:12:23.080 | but I think people have a really good bullshit indicator.

00:12:28.080 | ♪ No I can't forget tomorrow ♪

00:12:30.120 | - And music, in my opinion,

00:12:34.920 | whenever I meet a young artist and say,

00:12:36.520 | well, I'm trying to make a new band

00:12:38.360 | and I wanna do something like, how to be successful,

00:12:40.880 | I really think understanding that people

00:12:44.920 | have a really good bullshit indicator

00:12:47.480 | is the most important part of being an artist.

00:12:50.920 | - And I'll explain what that means, at least to me.

00:12:54.000 | I think that in order to have success

00:13:00.360 | or be a leader or whether it's an art or anything,

00:13:05.920 | people need to believe that you believe what you're doing.

00:13:08.760 | I think the best actors,

00:13:13.840 | really when they're doing their thing,

00:13:15.560 | it's like they, it's not acting.

00:13:18.480 | They're in it and it's how they feel

00:13:22.120 | and they're expressing that sorrow or joy

00:13:24.520 | or whatever it is.

00:13:25.840 | Harry, for me, Harry Nilsson, I just believe it.

00:13:30.840 | He sings that and I feel it.

00:13:33.640 | And whether he's the greatest bullshitter of all time

00:13:36.040 | or I don't think that's the case,

00:13:37.960 | I think he probably was singing that song

00:13:39.560 | and he just could transport himself to wherever he was.

00:13:43.380 | It's what makes a great live act.

00:13:46.880 | It's what makes a great song.

00:13:49.280 | And someone could be the best actor

00:13:51.640 | and sing that in the same timbre,

00:13:54.520 | same EQ, same compression, same everything.

00:13:59.160 | And there's some unknown there that I,

00:14:02.160 | I think hopefully it will be known at some point

00:14:06.040 | and it's some scientific thing,

00:14:07.000 | but there's something there,

00:14:09.000 | the energy or something that people can perceive it

00:14:11.600 | and say true or false.

00:14:14.600 | And if it resonates as true,

00:14:16.580 | it's so much more meaningful and it lives on.

00:14:19.320 | And if it doesn't, that for me is what is good art or bad.

00:14:24.320 | For people to dispute over,

00:14:25.920 | well, Sonics should sound like that, that's silly to me.

00:14:28.000 | It's a song or even a painting.

00:14:31.880 | It's just the truthfulness of it.

00:14:35.980 | - Yeah, the truly great art goes,

00:14:40.440 | has to go to that place where you really are feeling it.

00:14:44.440 | You forget that you're being recorded,

00:14:46.120 | if you get there as an audience,

00:14:47.520 | you really are feeling it.

00:14:48.840 | Yeah, which I totally agree with you.

00:14:53.120 | One of the things that I love about the internet

00:14:56.020 | is it's brought the bullshit detector of the masses

00:15:01.020 | to power, which is beautiful,

00:15:04.920 | because then the masses uplift the really authentic.

00:15:09.000 | - Right.

00:15:09.920 | - And even if you didn't write the song,

00:15:11.800 | I think it helps a lot probably if you wrote the song.

00:15:15.120 | But I was a little bit, maybe a lot,

00:15:18.960 | since we're in Vegas, a little heartbroken

00:15:21.000 | to find out that Elvis didn't write his songs.

00:15:24.440 | But I like, for example, "Rocketman," Elton John.

00:15:29.540 | To find out that Elton John didn't really know

00:15:33.880 | where the words of "Rocketman" came from,

00:15:36.480 | meaning the depths of it, it's interesting.

00:15:39.260 | But nevertheless, he's super authentic

00:15:42.060 | because for Elton John and for Elvis,

00:15:44.760 | there's something in the fun and the darkness

00:15:48.320 | and the entertainment of it.

00:15:49.600 | Like he goes to some place in his mind

00:15:51.720 | that might not be deeply connected

00:15:53.480 | from where the lyrics came from.

00:15:55.720 | - But he relates it.

00:15:56.760 | - He relates it to whatever is in his mind

00:15:59.520 | and goes to that place emotionally.

00:16:01.400 | - Yeah, and that's what I think it is.

00:16:03.200 | And that's why an actor, like I said,

00:16:04.720 | can be completely honest to me.

00:16:07.240 | Maybe they didn't write the script.

00:16:08.980 | But I've always written all my own lyrics.

00:16:12.480 | It's a really personal thing to me.

00:16:15.000 | But I will say, I see people all the time

00:16:18.480 | who are performers like Elton John, for instance,

00:16:22.200 | who didn't write the lyrics that I believe

00:16:26.160 | that it means just as much to them as what I wrote

00:16:29.520 | because they find the meaning in it for themself.

00:16:33.260 | At least the greats do.

00:16:34.540 | And I think that's the difference maker.

00:16:37.600 | And I think you can perceive,

00:16:39.200 | and I'm sure you've seen art that doesn't move you,

00:16:43.120 | and maybe it moves someone else,

00:16:44.280 | but for you, for some reason,

00:16:45.640 | you perceive it to be uninteresting to you.

00:16:50.120 | And I feel like a lot of the time,

00:16:52.040 | I'm not saying that, of course,

00:16:53.240 | sonically maybe it's uninteresting to you,

00:16:54.880 | but I think the majority of the time, for myself,

00:16:58.000 | I can find inspiration in any sonic value or painting

00:17:02.400 | as long as I see it and I feel truth

00:17:04.760 | from the person that created it.

00:17:06.920 | - Yeah, and for me, the lyrics,

00:17:10.400 | maybe not the entirety of the lyrics,

00:17:12.040 | but a few words can do wonders to take you to a place.

00:17:16.120 | And sometimes those words don't need to be connected

00:17:18.240 | with the other words.

00:17:19.600 | That's the beauty of music.

00:17:21.280 | They're allowed to float in the space of mixed metaphors.

00:17:25.560 | They're allowed to just jump around

00:17:27.160 | and somehow it paints a picture without actually,

00:17:29.600 | what is it, glycerine by Bush?

00:17:33.200 | - Right.

00:17:34.040 | But it's also how the person says it, right?

00:17:35.840 | It's like, it's the feeling of exactly,

00:17:39.960 | and the same person could say that word 10 other ways

00:17:42.440 | and you don't care, but someone says glycerine

00:17:45.280 | or whatever it is, and it's like,

00:17:47.840 | oh, you know what, I feel that.

00:17:49.440 | The way he said that, he meant it to me.

00:17:53.400 | You know what I mean?

00:17:54.400 | - No, I can't forget this evening

00:17:59.160 | or your face as you were leaving,

00:18:00.920 | but I guess that's just the way the story goes.

00:18:03.440 | You always smile, but in your eyes, your sorrow shows.

00:18:07.640 | Yes, it shows.

00:18:09.760 | Let me ask you to analyze this song.

00:18:12.240 | So there's a lady possibly who's leaving him.

00:18:19.200 | Do you think he's leaving her or she's leaving him?

00:18:22.560 | Do you want to?

00:18:23.400 | ♪ When I think of all my sorrow ♪

00:18:27.720 | ♪ And I had you there ♪

00:18:29.720 | ♪ But then I let you go ♪

00:18:34.440 | ♪ And now it's only fair ♪

00:18:37.160 | ♪ That I should let you know ♪

00:18:42.160 | ♪ What you should know ♪

00:18:43.400 | - And the chorus is I can't live if living is without you.

00:18:46.880 | Can't live, I can't give anymore.

00:18:49.000 | He's got a voice on him.

00:18:53.600 | - Yeah, he does, and if you really,

00:18:56.200 | there's been some incredible documentation on his life

00:18:59.320 | and the end of his life, and so my answer to this

00:19:03.880 | is probably skewed based on what I've seen

00:19:05.960 | about his life too, but he was a real alcoholic

00:19:09.280 | at the end of his life, and it destroyed his voice,

00:19:11.960 | and ended up killing him as well.

00:19:15.240 | And so when I hear that, I perceive it as

00:19:22.560 | someone who is destructive and in a destructive place

00:19:28.340 | in life and can't love someone properly,

00:19:30.840 | and so they can't live with them,

00:19:32.120 | but they can't live without them type thing,

00:19:34.120 | which is really something I really identify with

00:19:36.720 | and I think is one of the struggles of life

00:19:41.720 | is loving yourself enough,

00:19:43.860 | it's forgiving yourself for things,

00:19:50.060 | and letting yourself love someone else.

00:19:52.120 | And at least when I listen to Out of Your Hair,

00:19:54.560 | you're being like, and maybe I'm wrong,

00:19:57.040 | but this is how I perceive it at least,

00:19:58.480 | is not loving himself and feeling like he's deserving

00:20:04.480 | of this person, like I have to let you go.

00:20:06.240 | I hear that of course, and people are like,

00:20:07.640 | oh, well, he's breaking up with her,

00:20:09.360 | but there's so much more complexity and nuance

00:20:11.400 | to relationships than that, and my wife and I

00:20:15.320 | went through a really difficult separation,

00:20:17.900 | and that's a story for another day

00:20:22.400 | or a different question or something,

00:20:24.080 | but the nuance of it makes me think of this

00:20:27.840 | when I hear this, which is there's just more

00:20:32.240 | to being with someone or not being with someone

00:20:34.560 | than hey, I think that person's really attractive,

00:20:37.920 | or hey, that person makes me laugh or not,

00:20:40.040 | or I love them and now I don't love them.

00:20:42.420 | Love is such a complex, nuanced thing

00:20:44.680 | that a lot of times there's just more going on

00:20:47.640 | behind the scenes, I think.

00:20:49.520 | - Yeah, on a small tangent on that,

00:20:52.520 | just as a curious question, have you paid any attention

00:20:56.200 | to the Johnny Depp and Amber Heard trials?

00:20:58.840 | - I have watched quite a bit of it

00:21:00.920 | 'cause my wife really loves it

00:21:02.520 | and she watches it in bed at night.

00:21:04.640 | - So it's raw, to me it's really,

00:21:06.600 | 'cause you've mentioned how complicated love can be,

00:21:10.360 | and I've never seen, I don't care

00:21:12.680 | about the celebrity nature of it,

00:21:14.280 | I don't care if it was, I don't care who it is,

00:21:17.880 | but it's just laid out in such raw form.

00:21:20.820 | - For the world to see it.

00:21:23.040 | - For the world to see the toxicity,

00:21:24.840 | but also the passion and the clearly sort of

00:21:29.720 | the drugs and the drinking, but also the longing

00:21:33.880 | and the dreams and I will always be with you,

00:21:36.680 | I will die for you, the places, the rollercoaster of love,

00:21:41.200 | and it's all there at the end, past the end.

00:21:46.200 | So it's like, I've also recently reread

00:21:49.880 | The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich

00:21:51.640 | about Hitler and Nazi Germany, it's the rise and the fall.

00:21:55.800 | And it's interesting to look at the entirety

00:21:57.920 | of that process after it's all over,

00:22:00.360 | many, many decades after it's all over.

00:22:02.440 | That book in particular written by the person

00:22:04.240 | that was actually there, and so here we're seeing

00:22:07.480 | two people in the context of the courtroom

00:22:11.100 | analyzing this rise and fall of a love affair.

00:22:14.100 | It's fascinating.

00:22:16.000 | - You know the truth is, I was telling my wife this

00:22:18.000 | actually just the other day 'cause she was asking

00:22:20.400 | what I thought about it, it makes me really sad.

00:22:24.840 | It's humorous, don't get me wrong,

00:22:26.760 | there's a lot of parts in it that are just really funny.

00:22:30.020 | But I look at it and I also see the internet,

00:22:35.020 | someone's always the villain and someone's the hero,

00:22:38.260 | which is such a funny thing.

00:22:39.360 | And we talked a little about this offline

00:22:41.480 | before we got on this, but I have a real firm belief

00:22:44.040 | in life that it's just more complex than you think,

00:22:47.680 | always, always.

00:22:49.320 | And Johnny, for instance, is very charismatic

00:22:54.120 | and you love him and he's funny and the way he does things

00:22:58.480 | and he looks certain ways and he says things.

00:23:00.680 | You really love him and I feel like,

00:23:04.400 | and maybe I'm wrong on this,

00:23:05.240 | but it looks like the internet has really been like,

00:23:07.740 | Johnny is the winner, Amber is the villain,

00:23:10.840 | and I kinda look at it and I feel like,

00:23:13.980 | were any of you in their bedroom?

00:23:16.980 | Were any of you there for these things?

00:23:19.520 | And I'm not saying one way or the other.

00:23:22.560 | All I see when I look at that is two people

00:23:26.160 | with a lot of deep-seated hurt, anger,

00:23:30.120 | and that anger is so poisonous to both of them

00:23:32.920 | and they're getting through it in the way

00:23:34.720 | that they only know how.

00:23:36.000 | I'm not saying we shouldn't be able to look at parts of it

00:23:40.680 | and laugh about it and stuff and be virtuous or something,

00:23:43.600 | but just that there's not a hero.

00:23:46.720 | - It's more complicated.

00:23:47.840 | - Yeah, I think unless you've been living

00:23:51.320 | with Amber and Johnny, you don't know.

00:23:53.280 | Just 'cause one seems more charismatic in the moment

00:23:55.600 | or funnier or more believable even,

00:23:58.360 | doesn't mean that their truth is the truth.

00:24:01.740 | - And I feel like there's still love there too,

00:24:06.840 | which makes--

00:24:07.660 | - Oh, that's the hardest part.

00:24:08.500 | He won't even look at her.

00:24:09.720 | He looks down the whole time and maybe people say,

00:24:12.680 | well, it's 'cause of anger or hurt or whatever,

00:24:17.000 | but the way that she looks and stuff,

00:24:18.840 | it just feels like there's so much hurt there

00:24:22.160 | that it hurts me to watch it.

00:24:25.160 | I just feel like, oh, my heart just aches for them

00:24:28.120 | and for both of them, and I don't know either of them

00:24:30.640 | personally, and I don't know.

00:24:33.880 | Just hurts.

00:24:34.720 | - But I've never seen love laid out

00:24:37.400 | in this raw kind of way.

00:24:38.840 | It makes me feel better about,

00:24:42.280 | it almost gives you, seeing people

00:24:46.920 | who've gone through a struggle in this sort of

00:24:49.120 | mundane kind of way, gives you room to struggle yourself

00:24:54.120 | about the messiness of love.

00:24:55.400 | - So true.

00:24:56.240 | - You're supposed to, relationship is supposed to be

00:24:59.480 | simple and whatever, but this, oh man, this--

00:25:02.240 | - It's like art.

00:25:03.680 | - Yeah.

00:25:04.520 | - And for the record, I don't feel like

00:25:07.880 | it shouldn't be shown.

00:25:09.280 | I think it's actually really beautiful art,

00:25:11.680 | and I agree there's gonna be a lot of people

00:25:13.040 | who walk away from it and are changed in certain ways

00:25:15.480 | or look at things different.

00:25:16.840 | I'm not saying it's changing the whole world,

00:25:18.040 | the Johnny Depp trial, but it's art.

00:25:19.680 | It's just like you would look at a painting

00:25:21.000 | and it might affect you.

00:25:22.200 | My only commentary is more that there's not,

00:25:27.200 | I think it's silly when people say who's right

00:25:29.240 | and who's wrong and who's the clear villain

00:25:31.000 | and who's the, like we love as humans,

00:25:33.240 | we have to have an answer for everything.

00:25:34.760 | We have to put everything in a box,

00:25:36.080 | and it's like, well, we're looking at this

00:25:37.680 | and we're deciding you're right and you're wrong,

00:25:41.080 | and I just think it's silly unless it's your life.

00:25:44.440 | - So speaking of heroes and villains

00:25:46.200 | and highs and lows, you grew up in Las Vegas,

00:25:49.840 | and you said that Vegas is a performing town,

00:25:52.080 | a town of high stakes, drama and eccentricity.

00:25:55.080 | It's a town of high highs and low lows,

00:25:58.360 | and I'll be damned if my therapist didn't point

00:26:00.480 | that correlation out to me personally a long time ago.

00:26:03.180 | So to me, Vegas, from the outside,

00:26:08.380 | is romanticized by certain movies.

00:26:09.940 | The lows define the beauty of this town,

00:26:14.240 | and certain movies, so to me, "Casino"

00:26:18.000 | with Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci, and Sharon Stone,

00:26:23.120 | "Leaving Las Vegas" with Nicolas Cage,

00:26:26.560 | "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas"

00:26:29.400 | with the Johnny Depp play, Hunter Stompson.

00:26:34.400 | First of all, what's your favorite representation

00:26:38.720 | of Vegas from a darker side,

00:26:41.760 | and do you draw any wisdom in sight

00:26:45.320 | from the darkness, the lows and the highs

00:26:48.920 | in those movies, or is it over-romanticized?

00:26:51.520 | - So I grew up in a really conservative Mormon family,

00:26:56.480 | and Vegas was established by the Mormons and the mob.

00:27:00.960 | Those were like the two very different worlds

00:27:05.060 | that created what Vegas is, and if you live in Vegas,

00:27:08.480 | it really shows in a lot of ways

00:27:09.800 | because Vegas has the strip and the parties

00:27:13.720 | and the craziness, but it also has very neighborhoods

00:27:17.240 | and big families and conservative people

00:27:21.280 | and liberal people living together

00:27:24.680 | in a really interesting way, and for me,

00:27:29.240 | growing up here, for instance, was a lot of driving

00:27:33.560 | on the freeway, my mom being like,

00:27:35.020 | "Children, close your eyes, there's a naked woman

00:27:37.000 | "on that billboard," and everything,

00:27:38.520 | "Okay, Mom," on our way to church,

00:27:40.440 | you know what I mean?

00:27:41.640 | But also being like, "Whoa, this is crazy."

00:27:44.160 | You know what I mean?

00:27:45.000 | Like, taking in whatever I could when I could.

00:27:47.500 | - Yeah, yeah.

00:27:48.340 | - So I saw, and I'm grateful for that.

00:27:53.280 | I really love that I didn't grow up as a Mormon

00:27:55.220 | in, for instance, Utah or something,

00:27:57.040 | like the typical place because I saw both sides

00:28:00.440 | and I appreciated something from both sides,

00:28:03.120 | and now, as a person now who's not religious

00:28:05.600 | but just spiritually minded, I'm grateful

00:28:10.600 | for that divergent character, that juxtaposition,

00:28:14.880 | dual-edged sword that Vegas is, and I try to apply

00:28:18.360 | that to everything in life, which is,

00:28:20.640 | like Johnny Depp in "The Ember,"

00:28:23.160 | it's like there's two sides to every story.

00:28:25.060 | There's always two sides to every coin,

00:28:27.400 | and there's something to be said for both.

00:28:29.480 | Like, I try to see people and even if,

00:28:33.880 | it's just, yeah, I try to apply that to life.

00:28:36.360 | As far as a movie that personifies Vegas

00:28:39.560 | or something in that medium that personifies Vegas

00:28:42.760 | in a way that resonates with me.

00:28:46.120 | - Don't say "Hangover."

00:28:47.560 | - No, no, yeah.

00:28:49.480 | I also, like, I wasn't even allowed

00:28:51.400 | to watch PG-13 movies growing up.

00:28:53.880 | So a lot of the movies that you're saying,

00:28:56.240 | like, I either didn't see, I didn't have cable television.

00:28:59.960 | I wasn't like a pilgrim, but I had a really,

00:29:01.800 | really conservative upbringing.

00:29:03.520 | - So it didn't define your intellectual development.

00:29:08.080 | - No, no, I just, I can't think of any movie

00:29:11.140 | that comes to mind where I'm like,

00:29:12.480 | that's my Vegas movie, you know what I mean?

00:29:14.160 | Like, I'm sure, I've seen some of the movies you've said now

00:29:16.500 | but I can't think of one that I'm like,

00:29:19.320 | actually personifies Vegas in a way that feels honest to me.

00:29:25.180 | Or like, wasn't there a Chevy Chase?

00:29:29.000 | - Yeah, yeah.

00:29:30.320 | - I think that's maybe the only one I thought of

00:29:31.880 | that came to mind where I was like,

00:29:33.240 | 'cause I love Chevy Chase so much

00:29:34.720 | that maybe it's one of his Vegas vacation or something.

00:29:38.200 | - Yeah, but that's more like lighthearted,

00:29:40.920 | absurd, that kind of stuff.

00:29:42.400 | - Right, it's not like, I guess what I would say

00:29:44.400 | is there's no truth that I've seen of Vegas.

00:29:48.120 | 'Cause what I see of Vegas is,

00:29:49.880 | there's obviously like the parties and stuff

00:29:54.040 | and the nightlife, which I'm not a big party person

00:29:56.440 | so I haven't really experienced much of that.

00:29:58.840 | But there's also drugs and I have a strange relationship

00:30:03.680 | with drugs 'cause I've lost a few friends to drug overdoses

00:30:06.320 | and so I don't, that's not romantic to me.

00:30:09.520 | But there's also like, yeah, I mean,

00:30:12.640 | you asked for a dark reflection of it.

00:30:14.480 | I guess I certainly see a dark reflection to Vegas

00:30:17.920 | and I feel like Vegas is typically personified

00:30:20.520 | as like, at the tables and every, this.

00:30:22.760 | But it's also like, I have friends who've lost

00:30:25.600 | all their money to gambling addiction

00:30:27.680 | and so it's like, what I guess--

00:30:29.600 | - A dark underbelly to the whole thing.

00:30:31.120 | - Yeah, somebody maybe needs to make,

00:30:32.880 | maybe that's an open spot, there needs to be

00:30:34.480 | a dark side to Vegas.

00:30:36.840 | And it's about Mormons in Vegas dying of drug overdose

00:30:41.000 | or getting shot by the mob.

00:30:42.560 | - Yeah.

00:30:43.400 | So you mentioned your spirituality.

00:30:48.360 | You've said that having a crisis of faith

00:30:51.840 | or just the philosophical question of asking who is God,

00:30:57.080 | does God exist, and thinking of the flip side of that,

00:31:01.840 | of mortality, what happens when we die,

00:31:04.440 | those kinds of things were extremely difficult,

00:31:07.560 | deep things for you in terms of your development,

00:31:12.560 | the whole process of figuring that out.

00:31:14.840 | Why does it hurt so much to lose faith in God?

00:31:18.480 | - Yeah, I would say that the seeking of God,

00:31:22.960 | let's say that, is an obsession for me

00:31:25.440 | and has been since I was young.

00:31:27.640 | I really feel that I'm a deep, deep, deeply committed

00:31:32.640 | to finding answers in life, and there's some answers

00:31:38.400 | that I don't think there's an answer to,

00:31:39.600 | and I'm also very OCD by nature,

00:31:42.080 | so I just don't give up to that.

00:31:43.920 | I'm like, well, there must be somewhere in Tibet,

00:31:46.960 | there's some teacher, or there's somebody out there

00:31:50.000 | that has the answer, or maybe it's yet to be found,

00:31:53.600 | I'm gonna find it.

00:31:55.420 | I'm really, my life has been to date,

00:31:59.660 | probably unhealthily committed to finding answers

00:32:03.580 | about God, or the lack thereof, and mortality.

00:32:08.580 | It's all I sing about, it's all our records have been about.

00:32:13.820 | - Who do you think is God?

00:32:15.500 | Have you ever gotten a glimpse?

00:32:17.620 | - You know, I will say the closest I feel like I have been

00:32:20.820 | to experiencing God is, and this sounds so,

00:32:25.820 | maybe, I don't know, I don't know how it sounds,

00:32:30.780 | but is through ayahuasca for me.

00:32:33.540 | That's my honest answer for you.

00:32:34.540 | I feel like I had pretty much given up all hope

00:32:38.060 | of there being anything greater than us being,

00:32:41.540 | evolving and being here and then dying,

00:32:47.660 | and you're gone and that's it, and nothingness,

00:32:50.100 | and from nothingness we came and nothingness we go.

00:32:53.180 | To where I am now, which is there are answers to be found.

00:32:57.660 | I don't know them, I don't know what God looks like,

00:33:00.260 | or if God is anything to do with the word God

00:33:02.980 | in the way that we say it, but I do believe,

00:33:06.420 | pretty fervently, that there is more to be found.

00:33:11.380 | - Is it motion sensor, or no?

00:33:13.100 | - I don't know what that was.

00:33:14.140 | - Looked like they have all died, actually.

00:33:16.300 | - Do you know which one is it?

00:33:18.340 | Is it this one right here?

00:33:19.620 | - Why don't I just take it out,

00:33:20.620 | but then we can do Darwin.

00:33:21.980 | - That's fine.

00:33:22.820 | - I'm gonna take it out.

00:33:24.820 | I do wanna hold this chair.

00:33:28.740 | See if I can get it like this, yeah.

00:33:31.580 | I'm almost there.

00:33:37.300 | I really don't know how I'm gonna catch this though.

00:33:39.900 | (laughs)

00:33:42.060 | There's gotta be like some saying about this.

00:33:44.660 | There we go.

00:33:45.500 | (laughs)

00:33:46.860 | - It's no Chinese proverb.

00:33:47.980 | - Yeah, yeah.

00:33:49.820 | - How many people does it take to,

00:33:51.860 | what is it, unscrew a light bulb?

00:33:53.460 | - A light bulb.

00:33:54.300 | It was hot too.

00:33:55.140 | It was like I was doing the two finger technique.

00:33:57.740 | - I'm glad you survived that.

00:34:00.100 | - Thanks.

00:34:01.100 | - That'd be pretty ironic if we're talking about mortality,

00:34:03.380 | and then this would be it for you.

00:34:04.900 | - In that moment.

00:34:06.220 | - I've never done ayahuasca,

00:34:09.660 | so it's a mixture of two plants.

00:34:11.300 | One of them is DMT, but a lot of people I really respect,

00:34:14.980 | very, very intelligent people,

00:34:18.220 | had profound experiences with ayahuasca.

00:34:21.540 | What is that?

00:34:22.380 | Where do you go?

00:34:23.260 | Where does the mind go?

00:34:24.460 | What the heck is up with that?

00:34:26.380 | - I'll first say that I can't even smoke weed.

00:34:29.980 | I really do not enjoy it,

00:34:33.020 | because I hate to let go of control.

00:34:35.540 | If I feel out of control in life,

00:34:39.860 | it's like one of my biggest weaknesses.

00:34:41.920 | It's like very scary for me.

00:34:43.300 | I don't, and some people really enjoy letting go in that way.

00:34:48.420 | I really don't.

00:34:49.260 | I was pretty terrified to make the jump into ayahuasca,

00:34:53.980 | but my wife, who I deeply respect,

00:34:57.140 | made a profound change through ayahuasca, and I saw it.

00:35:04.060 | - She led the way.

00:35:05.060 | - Yeah, and it wasn't a strange,

00:35:07.380 | like I think most, we have a thing in America

00:35:10.620 | that's like a misconception, a stigma on psychedelics

00:35:14.260 | where it's a drug, and it makes some people crazy,

00:35:19.260 | and then you're gonna be on the street,

00:35:22.060 | and you're gonna be out of your mind,

00:35:23.020 | or you're gonna become a crazy person, basically.

00:35:28.020 | I think I really bought into that notion

00:35:31.940 | because, again, I wasn't even raised with cable TV.

00:35:34.740 | You know what I mean?

00:35:35.580 | Ayahuasca is very, I didn't, you know.

00:35:38.700 | You can imagine what that was like for a Mormon kid.

00:35:40.660 | I didn't know anything about it

00:35:41.540 | and never touched drugs at all,

00:35:43.100 | never even touched a cigarette, you know?

00:35:45.140 | Anyway, so I think we have this misconception about it

00:35:50.060 | where Americans are quick to go to their doctor

00:35:52.860 | and take any medication or drug,

00:35:57.860 | but, you know, whoa, when it comes to psychedelics.

00:36:02.860 | Anyway, that being said,

00:36:08.500 | so I had that trepidation going into it,

00:36:10.140 | but I really love and respect my wife,

00:36:11.820 | and I saw it make a profound impact in her life

00:36:13.900 | where she suddenly was able to heal

00:36:18.500 | from a lot of trauma that she had.

00:36:19.780 | She had a really, she went through a lot in her life,

00:36:22.740 | and it really helped her heal,

00:36:24.460 | but it also set her in a new path spiritually

00:36:27.140 | that seemed really like a place that I wanted to be.

00:36:32.140 | So I did it, and I did it twice.

00:36:35.580 | The first time it didn't really have an effect on me,

00:36:37.540 | which happens to a lot of people, I guess.

00:36:40.700 | I drank this little thing,

00:36:42.460 | and there was this shaman who came over from overseas

00:36:45.180 | that was really, had been in the plant world for decades

00:36:50.180 | and was a really incredible,

00:36:53.200 | I don't even know if he likes to be called shaman, but.

00:36:57.420 | - So it's supposed to be like 30, 60 minute to take effect,

00:37:00.300 | and a few hours, the journey lasts--

00:37:05.300 | - About four hours. - Four hours.

00:37:07.500 | - Yeah, so the second time I took it,

00:37:09.660 | I took it in, I would say 20, 30 minutes in, exactly.

00:37:12.460 | I started to feel like I was the dimension

00:37:17.460 | of what is reality, the curtain was pulled open,

00:37:23.900 | and there was a lot more to discover.

00:37:28.900 | And it really blew my mind in a way

00:37:31.620 | that I think it would probably blow anybody's mind

00:37:34.540 | if, for instance, God descended,

00:37:36.420 | or some Christian God or whatever it is,

00:37:38.820 | we all think it'd be this beautiful thing,

00:37:40.180 | but in reality, it would probably make people super fearful

00:37:42.740 | and think that they've lost their mind.

00:37:45.180 | Like I've always, yeah, I've always joked

00:37:48.140 | that if the Mormon God came down and told my mom,

00:37:50.740 | if God himself came down and told my mom,

00:37:53.860 | "Mormonism is incorrect," she would say, "Satan!"

00:37:57.140 | - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - You know?

00:37:59.380 | I think our minds are just not prepared

00:38:01.140 | for a lot of anything that's really extreme,

00:38:05.820 | and it was very extreme.

00:38:07.420 | It was like the curtain of life was cut open,

00:38:10.620 | which scared me, but then I felt very much,

00:38:13.460 | and a lot of people that I've talked to

00:38:15.700 | have a similar thing where I felt very much

00:38:17.620 | like I was either communicating with something

00:38:20.900 | that was perceived as God to me,

00:38:23.620 | or highest sense of self, or mind, or Mother Earth,

00:38:28.260 | or it's called so many different names,

00:38:29.820 | but it's really, it's very,

00:38:32.860 | a lot of people have a very spiritual,

00:38:35.100 | similar experience with ayahuasca,

00:38:37.660 | and just in that it's like this kind of profoundness.

00:38:40.260 | It wasn't like, there was nothing, at least for me,

00:38:43.700 | that felt like just like psychedelic,

00:38:48.180 | funny cartoons or something.

00:38:49.780 | It was like I'm about to go on a journey,

00:38:51.940 | and I'm communicating with something

00:38:55.700 | that feels incredibly wise.

00:38:58.260 | Showed me a lot of things in my life,

00:39:00.820 | kind of almost like from a bird's eye,

00:39:02.300 | almost like I was looking through a video camera

00:39:03.940 | at a younger me.

00:39:05.940 | There was a particular thing that it communicated to me.

00:39:08.700 | I really have a hard time with accepting success

00:39:15.780 | and not feeling,

00:39:16.980 | like feeling undeserving or something.

00:39:21.380 | I can't quite put it into words,

00:39:22.900 | but of my position and what I've been given,

00:39:25.820 | I've been given so much,

00:39:30.580 | and it showed me this thing from when I was young

00:39:32.940 | and explained to me why I am where I am now.

00:39:35.140 | To this day, it did not feel like myself

00:39:40.180 | telling myself that.

00:39:41.180 | That's the only way I can explain it.

00:39:42.940 | And there was a lot more that it showed me

00:39:45.100 | and that was incredibly healing for me.

00:39:47.580 | But just to be,

00:39:49.740 | to put it into a short thing,

00:39:54.260 | 'cause there's so much to this,

00:39:58.420 | I walked away feeling very convinced

00:40:00.700 | that there is more to be known for sure.

00:40:05.700 | And a lot of my deep things that were traumatic for me

00:40:10.900 | didn't feel traumatic anymore,

00:40:14.260 | specifically crisis of faith.

00:40:16.140 | I was very angry at my parents and my community

00:40:20.900 | for raising me in what I perceived to be falsehoods.

00:40:27.220 | And that, I felt like the bedrock of everything I believed

00:40:32.220 | was ripped out for me in my 20s.

00:40:34.020 | And then it was like, good luck in life.

00:40:37.140 | But really my parents had given me everything that they could

00:40:39.780 | and they believe that very much so still.

00:40:43.060 | But a naive young me was angry

00:40:46.060 | and felt like they had been duped

00:40:48.420 | and thus I had been duped.

00:40:50.580 | But ayahuasca really showed me this roadmap of like,

00:40:55.140 | this is truth and you're concerning yourself

00:40:57.460 | about a grain of sand, which is Mormonism or whatever it is.

00:41:01.020 | And there may be some truths in that tiny grain of sand

00:41:03.780 | and there may be falsities.

00:41:05.620 | But so is all these other grains of sand,

00:41:07.300 | like focus on the truth,

00:41:08.900 | stop focusing on these little details that are meaningless

00:41:11.660 | and forgive and let go of people believing

00:41:14.540 | in those things to begin with.

00:41:16.620 | I don't know if that makes sense,

00:41:17.460 | but that was like the core thing I was taught

00:41:20.340 | and to let go of control,

00:41:22.140 | stop needing to control everything.

00:41:24.340 | - And it felt like the wisdom was coming from elsewhere.

00:41:26.740 | - It's really, I do not believe,

00:41:30.260 | at least in my current self,

00:41:31.580 | I don't have the mindfulness that I believe

00:41:36.100 | that exists in me to reach a lot of the conclusions

00:41:38.860 | that I did.

00:41:39.700 | And there was a lot more to it

00:41:41.060 | than it would be for like a late night conversation with you

00:41:43.380 | but it's so hard to put it into,

00:41:46.280 | you feel like a crazy person.

00:41:49.140 | At least anytime I talk about ayahuasca

00:41:50.940 | to someone who hasn't done it,

00:41:51.860 | I'm like, I don't even know where to begin.

00:41:54.140 | How do you explain to someone that you felt like

00:41:56.380 | that a multiple dimension type thing happened

00:42:00.260 | in a way that like putting it into words is,

00:42:03.260 | and none of it was words, by the way,

00:42:04.660 | that was communicated to me.

00:42:05.900 | It was like, you know how people talk about telepathy

00:42:09.980 | and if it existed, it would be like,

00:42:12.220 | I could communicate to you in such a deeper way.

00:42:14.200 | I'm so confined by me having to articulate these words

00:42:17.060 | and put them in a sentence to you, Lex,

00:42:18.620 | and then tell you like, if only I could just be like,

00:42:23.140 | and emotions do that sometimes, right?

00:42:24.620 | You could see my emotions and be like,

00:42:26.620 | oh, that communicates a lot.

00:42:28.440 | So that's what it felt like to me with ayahuasca

00:42:30.860 | is it felt like it was communicating to me

00:42:33.140 | very clear things, but it wasn't like,

00:42:35.580 | Daniel, it's me, mother earth.

00:42:38.580 | Let me relax, sit back, let me show you.

00:42:41.340 | But it was very clear to me what was being said.

00:42:44.540 | And no, it did not feel like me,

00:42:46.700 | but maybe smarter people than me who've done it would say,

00:42:50.120 | well, it was you and blah, blah, blah.

00:42:51.460 | Like, I don't know, but it was very convincing.

00:42:53.540 | - There's a lot of stuff in that subconscious

00:42:55.740 | that we haven't explored.

00:42:59.340 | Like, we haven't explored the depths of the ocean.

00:43:01.660 | We haven't really figured out what's that,

00:43:03.660 | the younging shadow, what's going on underneath

00:43:06.340 | the surface of our conscious mind.

00:43:08.700 | And what is that connecting to?

00:43:10.420 | Is that just inside our mind or is it some kind of,

00:43:13.540 | is there some kind of collective intelligence going on

00:43:15.860 | where all humans are connected to one kind of

00:43:18.940 | greater organism?

00:43:20.940 | Like, what is consciousness?

00:43:22.540 | We have a lot of hubris in thinking we understand

00:43:25.660 | any of it, like how the mind works at all.

00:43:28.660 | Like, what is it, like, where,

00:43:32.180 | what is the origin of consciousness?

00:43:34.940 | What is the origin of intelligence?

00:43:37.500 | There's a lot of hubris about this.

00:43:39.140 | We give each other PhDs and Nobel Prizes

00:43:43.220 | and congratulate ourselves as if we figured it all out.

00:43:46.860 | But humility is helpful here.

00:43:48.780 | Nevertheless, that is the question

00:43:50.340 | that humans have been asking for

00:43:52.020 | ever since humans were humans,

00:43:56.740 | which is the question of mortality, the question of God.

00:43:59.960 | So whether it's Hamlet, to be or not to be,

00:44:06.000 | I think that's the hardest and most important question.

00:44:08.700 | Albert Camus asked, "Why live?"

00:44:13.060 | So in terms of crisis of faith,

00:44:18.740 | in terms of your search for truth,

00:44:20.060 | in terms of some of the dark places

00:44:21.580 | you've gone in your mind,

00:44:23.220 | what's a good answer to this question?

00:44:25.180 | So for Camus with "Myth of Sisyphus,"

00:44:29.580 | it was the question of suicide,

00:44:32.780 | is what's the purpose?

00:44:36.560 | Like, what's a good answer to why I keep going,

00:44:40.780 | especially when you're struggling,

00:44:42.500 | especially when you're not,

00:44:44.240 | when you're feeling hopeless,

00:44:49.800 | when you're feeling like a burden,

00:44:51.520 | in this search for truth,

00:44:54.920 | where you feel like you're surrounded by lies,

00:44:57.320 | what's a good answer to why I live?

00:44:59.120 | - I think-- - You ever found one?

00:45:02.560 | - Well, the simple answer right now is to say for,

00:45:06.360 | it's very easy once you have kids to say,

00:45:09.200 | the right answer is you just,

00:45:10.600 | of course, you brought these kids into the world,

00:45:13.480 | so you have a responsibility

00:45:15.200 | that I feel deeply as a father to them

00:45:18.400 | to always be there for as long as I humanly can,

00:45:21.580 | and to take care of them and protect them.

00:45:23.200 | It's the most innate sense in me.

00:45:26.400 | I'm just, it's wired in my animal existence.

00:45:31.400 | So if I take that away, right,

00:45:33.760 | 'cause that's kind of cheating.

00:45:35.160 | - Let's put that aside, 'cause it is cheating.

00:45:37.240 | - It's cheating.

00:45:38.080 | - There's still some fundamental way in which you're alone.

00:45:41.820 | - Yeah, and to that,

00:45:44.000 | that actually has been a real struggle for me,

00:45:48.080 | for many years.

00:45:49.120 | I had a real turning point early in my career

00:45:52.040 | where we were flying somewhere overseas,

00:45:57.040 | and we were in a really small plane,

00:46:02.120 | and the lights went out,

00:46:04.440 | and all these red lights were flashing,

00:46:06.560 | and the plane just started to dive.

00:46:09.080 | Completely scariest plane experience I've ever been in.

00:46:13.520 | My manager was next to me, who's my brother.

00:46:16.200 | He was crying and texting his wife a goodbye.

00:46:20.640 | That's how crazy this moment was.

00:46:23.360 | - Was it real, like genuine?

00:46:24.800 | - Genuine, like genuine engine went out,

00:46:28.800 | plane is going down, pilots looking crazy in the front,

00:46:33.760 | and it was a really tiny jet.

00:46:35.340 | And like I said, my brother next to me crying,

00:46:39.480 | typing a text to his wife.

00:46:40.800 | Really, really scary.

00:46:42.020 | And I felt nothing.

00:46:45.720 | I genuinely sat there, and I was like,

00:46:48.640 | this might actually be nice.

00:46:52.640 | Like I really felt like this goes down,

00:46:56.800 | and like, oh man, life sucks, and it's hard.

00:47:00.880 | And that sounds so ridiculous, I know, to say,

00:47:02.940 | because again, I'm in a different place now,

00:47:05.640 | and I see my life for what it is.

00:47:07.320 | But at that moment, I did not.

00:47:09.360 | - So life was primarily defined by suffering.

00:47:11.640 | It was a burden, and this is so being burden-lifted.

00:47:14.320 | - I was incredibly depressed.

00:47:16.200 | I had been trying different medications since I was young,

00:47:20.760 | and I just had not found anything that was working for me.

00:47:24.480 | And then I was in a faith crisis, lost all my faith,

00:47:27.680 | started a band that just became,

00:47:31.440 | I wasn't ever thinking that this band,

00:47:33.640 | I was like, when you call your band Imagine Dragons,

00:47:35.960 | you're not thinking that band's gonna be big, okay?

00:47:38.480 | It was like, I was like, this was like a side project

00:47:42.840 | that was fun for me.

00:47:43.800 | It was like art in college.

00:47:45.800 | I was in school, and I was like,

00:47:47.520 | man, I hate this biology class.

00:47:49.040 | I'm gonna write down band names.

00:47:50.360 | Like, you know what I mean?

00:47:51.840 | It was not, hey, put everything aside.

00:47:55.100 | This is my career, let's go.

00:47:56.880 | Like, it just, it happened.

00:48:00.280 | And I'm an introvert by nature.

00:48:03.120 | I'm really not an extroverted person who likes to go out,

00:48:06.120 | and like, I like to be at home with a couple friends

00:48:09.760 | and have a late night conversation over good food.

00:48:12.400 | Like, that to me is a perfect night.

00:48:14.200 | Read a good book, listen to a podcast, go on a walk.

00:48:17.480 | You know, those are things that I really, really enjoy.

00:48:21.580 | And suddenly I'm in this life where I'm like,

00:48:23.120 | supposed to be something that I really don't wanna be,

00:48:26.880 | except for on stage, which is a really fast,

00:48:29.320 | like, strange thing to me, which is on stage,

00:48:31.080 | I feel so free and exuberant and like an extrovert.

00:48:35.840 | And then I come off and I just feel like,

00:48:37.520 | shrivel back into a shell.

00:48:38.840 | Like, it's, music does that for me,

00:48:41.720 | and performing on a stage does that for me.

00:48:43.520 | - Can we take a small tangent on that?

00:48:44.880 | - Yeah, yeah, of course.

00:48:45.720 | - What's the high, can we go through that,

00:48:47.880 | the introvert that wants to cuddle up and read a book.

00:48:52.440 | You're the front man of one of the,

00:48:54.400 | if not the biggest rock bands today,

00:48:59.160 | playing in front of huge crowds.

00:49:01.180 | What's the high of that,

00:49:04.440 | and how can you land back on Earth?

00:49:10.140 | - The high of it, it's incredibly beautiful

00:49:15.140 | to walk on a stage, sing these songs that you wrote,

00:49:20.860 | and see it resonate with people around you

00:49:25.580 | and sing with them.

00:49:27.340 | Different cultures, different places,

00:49:29.620 | celebrate life, it's suddenly the world seems like

00:49:32.420 | a fantastic place.

00:49:34.100 | It feels like we're all on the same team.

00:49:37.380 | - It's like one big hug.

00:49:38.660 | - Yeah, it's like everybody in that room gets it,

00:49:40.820 | and they all, it just,

00:49:43.720 | it feels like what you want the world to be,

00:49:47.820 | which is just this coexisting unit of people,

00:49:50.640 | and it's not even about, it's incredible, for sure,

00:49:55.640 | it's incredible, and I love it,

00:49:57.300 | and I wouldn't do it unless I loved it.

00:49:59.780 | And then you walk off stage and you turn on the news,

00:50:01.620 | and it's like, you see, we're all against each other,

00:50:04.500 | everybody hates each other,

00:50:05.540 | and it feels that way in the world.

00:50:07.340 | So music really, that's why live music

00:50:10.500 | is so important to people.

00:50:11.580 | That's why music is so important to people,

00:50:13.860 | 'cause even if it's just you and that person

00:50:15.540 | that wrote the song, you're listening to it,

00:50:16.980 | and the two of you feel connected,

00:50:18.740 | it's like you're hearing Tracy Chapman sing

00:50:23.820 | Fast Car or something, you're just like,

00:50:25.740 | oh my gosh, yes, I get it,

00:50:27.900 | and you feel connected to that person,

00:50:29.620 | you don't feel alone.

00:50:31.380 | So that's the high of it, for sure.

00:50:33.100 | And then you get off stage, and then,

00:50:36.700 | like my uncle's a heart surgeon,

00:50:39.340 | incredible heart surgeon who writes the book.

00:50:42.980 | He's the guy that the heart surgeons talk to.

00:50:45.260 | He's out of Nashville, Tennessee,

00:50:46.380 | he's just an incredible genius man.

00:50:48.660 | He always worries and always reached out to me.

00:50:53.660 | He's like, musicians die all the time,

00:50:55.860 | and the reason they die, you know,

00:50:58.140 | is because you're getting on stage

00:50:59.300 | and your heart's doing this,

00:51:00.140 | and your cortisone levels are doing this,

00:51:01.340 | you're getting off stage and then you're just doing this.

00:51:03.700 | And it's a really real thing.

00:51:05.460 | You get off stage and you feel like you need drugs,

00:51:07.620 | 'cause you're like, the world feels like,

00:51:11.260 | oh, incredibly daunting.

00:51:12.980 | And it's also, I'm sure, has to do with

00:51:15.300 | some health things in your heart and the cortisone levels

00:51:18.700 | that are so crazy, and then you come off,

00:51:20.700 | and it's like, I know people are like,

00:51:23.780 | well then nothing's enough except meth.

00:51:26.060 | (laughing)

00:51:27.140 | Nothing's enough except heroin.

00:51:28.980 | And that's why a lot of artists turn to that stuff.

00:51:30.660 | And I don't say it in a preachy way,

00:51:33.460 | but I've struggled with drug abuse in my life.

00:51:36.300 | And I really, I understand why artists turn to it.

00:51:41.300 | - But also the fact that you're an introvert.

00:51:46.540 | So the other side of it, the fame.

00:51:49.540 | That's something that you also said

00:51:51.780 | is a double-edged sword for you.

00:51:53.540 | The interesting thing about fame,

00:51:55.980 | is that you also mentioned,

00:51:57.100 | is it something you can't take back.

00:51:59.680 | - Yeah.

00:52:00.520 | - It's the thing, you can't just go on vacation to Hawaii

00:52:04.600 | and just consider, do I like it or not?

00:52:06.280 | No, you're staying in Hawaii for the rest of your life,

00:52:08.600 | and you've never been there before,

00:52:10.840 | whether you like it or not.

00:52:12.600 | So what's that like being loved

00:52:17.600 | by millions and millions and millions of people,

00:52:20.620 | which is perhaps the best kind of fame,

00:52:26.320 | in terms of you have to choose the kinds of fames there are.

00:52:29.480 | And still being an introvert and all that kind of stuff.

00:52:32.720 | So do you feel alone, more alone being famous?

00:52:37.720 | Is there a loneliness to it?

00:52:41.520 | - Yeah, I mean, it's such a funny thing,

00:52:44.200 | 'cause for, okay, if you had asked,

00:52:45.520 | if we were having this conversation a couple years ago,

00:52:47.360 | I'd be incredibly guarded about this,

00:52:49.080 | because the last thing I wanna ever do

00:52:54.080 | is sound ungrateful or unaware of how much I have.

00:52:58.600 | And woe is the famous celebrity with money.

00:53:01.960 | Oh, is your life hard?

00:53:03.000 | Is it really, tell me about how hard it is.

00:53:05.360 | But I'm also at a place in life now

00:53:06.600 | where I just, I'm gonna always just speak my truth,

00:53:08.700 | because that's the only reason I'm here,

00:53:10.100 | is I'm here to speak my truth to you,

00:53:11.560 | so I'm gonna tell you my truth,

00:53:12.560 | whether it's, whatever it is.

00:53:14.400 | - Well, you're human, and feelings are real.

00:53:17.480 | And so, that's the interesting thing.

00:53:20.000 | You win a lottery, what's that gonna feel like?

00:53:22.320 | It's not about complaining, oh, it's so hard

00:53:24.320 | to win a lottery 'cause you get a lot of money.

00:53:25.920 | No, it's still, you're human,

00:53:27.920 | and you get to experience these feelings,

00:53:29.560 | and it's fascinating.

00:53:30.760 | You put humans in different situations,

00:53:33.200 | and it's also fascinating because a lot of people think,

00:53:35.680 | well, I would like to be famous.

00:53:38.060 | That's a big thing now on social media,

00:53:39.800 | on Instagram and so on.

00:53:40.640 | - The whole world wants to be famous.

00:53:42.120 | - Or rich or famous, and then it's very interesting

00:53:44.360 | to think, all right, well, once you arrive,

00:53:47.200 | are all the problems solved?

00:53:49.680 | - No, yeah, so I will tell you, according to me,

00:53:52.480 | what the pitfalls are, whether it's fear or not.

00:53:54.760 | And there are certainly some pitfalls.

00:53:56.240 | One, it's once you're there, you can't go back.

00:53:58.920 | Whatever, maybe that's fine 'cause maybe you love it.

00:54:02.920 | But the real pitfall for me is that you're now, you're Lex,

00:54:07.920 | and you're what everybody's perception is that Lex is,

00:54:13.320 | and that's what you are.

00:54:15.240 | Now, Lex is probably a lot more complex and complicated

00:54:20.080 | and has a lot more to Lex than the Lex that is the celebrity.

00:54:25.480 | So, but anybody who meets you, that's who you are to them.

00:54:30.480 | And you may not feel this way, but you may feel confined

00:54:36.400 | to actually have to be that person to that person.

00:54:39.280 | Like I've, early in my career, for a long time,

00:54:41.800 | anytime I met someone, I suddenly felt like I had

00:54:44.160 | to be Dan Reynolds from Imagine Dragons

00:54:46.400 | anytime I met someone, including my family now,

00:54:48.800 | who are also like, whoa, this is crazy.

00:54:50.600 | You're like Dan Reynolds from Imagine Dragons.

00:54:52.920 | And I wanted to just be the goofball

00:54:55.560 | that I have been my whole life with my brothers and family,

00:54:58.680 | but suddenly I found myself feeling like,

00:55:00.720 | no, I have to be this, 'cause that's who this is.

00:55:05.240 | So you're almost like playing a role.

00:55:06.720 | And it's like, I've heard a lot of actors talk about this

00:55:08.760 | where they'll take on a role, and then it's like,

00:55:10.320 | they feel like they have to, they become that.

00:55:12.440 | And it's a really scary thing.

00:55:14.680 | You alter who you are almost to fit the notion

00:55:18.800 | of other people, 'cause especially if a lot of artists

00:55:22.500 | are empaths, a lot of people who get into art

00:55:26.360 | in a deep way are empaths, and so you feel a lot

00:55:29.000 | of what people are feeling, and you're never wanting

00:55:32.320 | to burden people, and you're always wanting

00:55:34.160 | to deliver to that person what they want.

00:55:37.480 | It's like people-pleasing.

00:55:39.240 | It goes hand-in-hand with a lot of these famous people,

00:55:42.960 | and they get to where they were

00:55:44.200 | because they know how to do that.

00:55:45.880 | They know how to be in a room with someone

00:55:47.080 | and look 'em in the eye and make them feel

00:55:49.220 | like they're the only person in the room.

00:55:51.120 | And then now they got that role in that movie

00:55:52.980 | because they sat with the casting director,

00:55:54.760 | and they were like, oh, you're so funny.

00:55:57.860 | Anybody put on the charisma, do it all.

00:55:59.960 | And it's like, anyway, I'm going on a different tangent here,

00:56:03.960 | but long story short, there's a lot of things

00:56:07.200 | that are really unhealthy about it.

00:56:08.760 | And then a lot of people who want the fame,

00:56:11.280 | then the second it starts to go away,

00:56:12.800 | then they're like, who am I anymore?

00:56:15.360 | That was everything, now I'm on the down,

00:56:17.440 | now I'm not a famous person anymore,

00:56:19.320 | and now I hate myself, now I'm gonna do drugs.

00:56:21.760 | And it's like this vicious cycle.

00:56:24.280 | You can never be famous enough.

00:56:25.840 | You're always gonna get, there's just so much to it

00:56:29.040 | that I've just, and again, I've lost friends

00:56:33.240 | in this career to that, for sure.

00:56:35.920 | - And there's a certain element to,

00:56:38.280 | sort of just on the losing fame.

00:56:40.920 | I've interacted with a lot of folks,

00:56:43.000 | especially young folks, like on YouTube.

00:56:47.200 | Fame is a thing that has levels.

00:56:51.000 | You're always trying to be a little more famous.

00:56:52.840 | A lot of folks who are chasing fame,

00:56:54.320 | it doesn't matter how famous you are,

00:56:55.160 | you're always trying to chase more.

00:56:56.680 | And when you start to lose it,

00:56:58.440 | interesting things can happen if you're not self-aware,

00:57:01.080 | which is like, like you mentioned,

00:57:03.920 | you might be trying to grasp back at where you were

00:57:08.840 | by leaning into the formula that got you there.

00:57:11.440 | And so the constraints of the image that you mentioned

00:57:15.600 | becomes the thing that you're now trying to lean into.

00:57:19.440 | And that's actually walking away from who you really are.

00:57:22.760 | You lean further into being that person.

00:57:25.840 | That's true for acting, that's true for,

00:57:28.720 | even on YouTube, which is people acting,

00:57:31.680 | they have a role, they got them to the table somehow.

00:57:34.560 | Yeah, it's dark, but I think those are,

00:57:37.680 | that's just put for everybody to see,

00:57:43.920 | but that's a very human struggle,

00:57:45.400 | even when you're not famous,

00:57:47.080 | of finding yourself, of being yourself,

00:57:49.320 | of not letting, not doing the people pleasing at any scale

00:57:54.320 | and being trapped by that.

00:57:56.280 | - Yeah, and also feeling like it's never enough.

00:57:58.940 | I think that's something all,

00:58:00.400 | it's not just a famous thing, but it's like,

00:58:04.960 | everybody deals with feeling like,

00:58:06.400 | when I'm here, I'll be happy.

00:58:08.680 | When I get that job, I'll be happy.

00:58:10.120 | When I have that money, then I'll be happy.

00:58:12.800 | When I get that surgery and my nose looks like this,

00:58:16.080 | I will be happy then.

00:58:17.300 | It's like a constant chase of happiness

00:58:21.280 | instead of happiness.

00:58:25.360 | It's like the opposite, it's opposite of self-love,

00:58:27.720 | it's the opposite of happiness.

00:58:29.560 | There's no presence to it.

00:58:32.000 | You're constant, you're never going to find it.

00:58:34.280 | You're never gonna arrive,

00:58:36.000 | and you're just gonna live your life,

00:58:37.280 | and then you're gonna be on your deathbed and be like,

00:58:39.120 | I was chasing the wrong thing my whole life.

00:58:42.500 | - I should say that podcasts are interesting in that way.

00:58:46.320 | So for me personally, because you just talk a lot,

00:58:49.320 | you can't, people that meet you, they know you,

00:58:52.760 | and they know the evolution of you.

00:58:54.960 | And that's the same thing for you right now,

00:58:58.800 | Dan of Imagine Dragons.

00:59:00.280 | Just being on a podcast, long form,

00:59:03.520 | reveals a side that liberates you more,

00:59:07.840 | to be yourself, to, like, people see, oh, there's a human.

00:59:11.500 | 'Cause they, you know, music,

00:59:14.280 | they have a deep connection with you,

00:59:15.840 | they have experiences with you the way they experienced it,

00:59:20.040 | and that's who you are with them through the songs.

00:59:22.800 | But now you get to see, oh, there's a human being.

00:59:26.080 | He probably gets angry, he gets sad, he gets excited,

00:59:29.400 | he's hopeful, you know, and there's a core,

00:59:32.240 | there's a good human being,

00:59:33.240 | but the whole rollercoaster of emotions all there,

00:59:36.200 | it's a giant, beautiful mess,

00:59:37.560 | and podcasts reveal that.

00:59:38.920 | That's why I love podcasts, like, long form.

00:59:41.240 | You get to hear some artists and actors and so on,

00:59:45.000 | and some of them, you get to see,

00:59:47.060 | oh, you've lost yourself in the surface.

00:59:52.060 | That's a tragedy with some actors, some great actors.

00:59:57.180 | They've left so much of themselves

01:00:00.520 | in the roles they've played,

01:00:02.520 | that they can no longer be the thing they were before,

01:00:07.040 | those great roles.

01:00:08.400 | - That's for sure.

01:00:10.000 | - It's hard to see.

01:00:11.760 | So you get to see that with Johnny Depp,

01:00:13.240 | with, I don't know, Pirates.

01:00:14.280 | He was talking about that with Pirates of the Caribbean.

01:00:16.640 | That was a shift.

01:00:18.480 | - Right.

01:00:19.320 | - Like, he's not that guy.

01:00:20.140 | - Right.

01:00:20.980 | - He's forever, forever that guy.

01:00:24.200 | But the point is to remember that you're not,

01:00:27.440 | and to your family, which is interesting,

01:00:28.840 | you said with your family.

01:00:30.320 | When I see people close to me,

01:00:31.600 | they also, there is an element like that,

01:00:34.840 | while you're that, they start treating you

01:00:37.400 | like the famous person.

01:00:38.840 | - Yeah, I'm fortunate to have my manager,

01:00:42.880 | who's my brother, my older brother,

01:00:45.680 | and my lawyer is my other older brother.

01:00:47.820 | And that's been helpful because,

01:00:51.640 | it's weird, it gets weird with everyone, no matter what.

01:00:55.400 | One of the best advice I was given was by Charlie Sheen.

01:00:59.440 | - You got advice from Charlie Sheen?

01:01:00.600 | - Yeah, we were playing--

01:01:02.160 | - The wise sage of our generation.

01:01:04.160 | - The wise sage, Charlie Sheen, but it was,

01:01:07.040 | it was really wise.

01:01:08.000 | I was sitting next to him,

01:01:09.080 | and we were playing some late night television,

01:01:12.280 | and he said, this was right at the beginning,

01:01:14.120 | and he just said, "Boys, just mark my words,

01:01:17.800 | "your life is about to get really weird."

01:01:20.500 | That's all he said.

01:01:21.340 | But it stuck with me forever,

01:01:22.180 | and it's Charlie Sheen, so of course it sticks with you.

01:01:25.040 | And I remember being like, right, okay, Charlie Sheen,

01:01:27.280 | I'm not Charlie Sheen, it's not gonna get weird.

01:01:31.320 | But it got really, really weird, really quick,

01:01:34.480 | because suddenly, you've existed your whole life

01:01:37.680 | in this way where everybody just,

01:01:39.960 | everything you get, you achieved,

01:01:42.480 | it was because you got it.

01:01:44.560 | And every conversation you had,

01:01:47.240 | if someone liked you at the end of that conversation,

01:01:49.680 | well, it's 'cause they liked you.

01:01:51.120 | If they didn't like you, it's 'cause they didn't like you.

01:01:53.600 | And you can make complete peace with that.

01:01:55.320 | At least I could my whole life.

01:01:56.540 | I was like, life is a challenge,

01:01:58.640 | and be myself, and I'm gonna go through it,

01:02:01.920 | and find some people along the way that I connect with,

01:02:04.280 | and others, no.

01:02:05.200 | And that social integrity is so important to us.

01:02:10.200 | And we think it would be nice to have this,

01:02:13.880 | and this is going back to the pitfalls of fame.

01:02:16.260 | We think it would be nice to walk into a room

01:02:18.940 | and have everyone be like,

01:02:20.360 | and you could be like, "Dumpster fire."

01:02:24.960 | And everybody's like, "Oh my gosh, dumpster fire,

01:02:26.760 | "that was amazing, you said dumpster fire was amazing."

01:02:30.360 | It's like, it's incredibly, incredibly lonely.

01:02:34.920 | And it just breaks everything that you knew about humanness.

01:02:39.000 | And it sucks.

01:02:39.840 | So then you're seeking out people who,

01:02:42.800 | that it doesn't exist with.

01:02:44.200 | And families, the closest you can get to that, for sure.

01:02:46.120 | But even your family, it's gonna take a little bit

01:02:47.760 | where they're like, "Oh, this is a little weird.

01:02:49.280 | "All my friends at work are now asking about you,

01:02:51.760 | "and you're my young, stupid brother."

01:02:53.120 | But now you're suddenly the young, stupid brother

01:02:55.200 | that they want an autograph from and stuff.

01:02:56.640 | And it still makes, they have to get over that

01:02:59.200 | and figure that out.

01:03:00.240 | And then you meet people too

01:03:04.280 | who know about this whole concept,

01:03:05.880 | and they're like, "Well, I'm gonna be an asshole to him

01:03:08.080 | "to show him that I don't subscribe."

01:03:11.720 | And you're dealing with people who are like,

01:03:13.940 | "Dumpster fire," the person who's like,

01:03:15.880 | you could say something actually profound and nice,

01:03:19.440 | and they'd be like, "That's stupid, and you're an idiot."

01:03:22.640 | 'Cause it's an actual attempt to show you

01:03:25.640 | how much they don't care.

01:03:27.240 | So you live in this very like--

01:03:29.560 | - And still, nevertheless, even when nobody knew you,

01:03:32.160 | you were seeking for deep human connection

01:03:35.040 | with a small number of people.

01:03:36.960 | And now, when a lot of people know you,

01:03:39.160 | you're still looking for deep connection

01:03:41.160 | with a small number of people.

01:03:43.240 | The struggle is the same.

01:03:44.980 | Can you speak to, 'cause you mentioned

01:03:48.040 | some of the dark moments, what advice would you give

01:03:50.800 | to people who are struggling with depression?

01:03:53.600 | And maybe for the people who love

01:03:55.840 | the people who are struggling with depression.

01:03:59.340 | - So what I have found to be most successful for me,

01:04:03.580 | it's back to the basics of everything

01:04:09.160 | that the therapist or psychologist will tell you,

01:04:12.280 | psychiatrist will tell you right when you meet them,

01:04:13.760 | which is exercise every day,

01:04:17.420 | eat healthy for sure,

01:04:22.480 | find time, make time every day to do something

01:04:24.760 | that you love, whatever that may be,

01:04:27.820 | whatever brings you joy.

01:04:29.200 | And when you're really depressed,

01:04:32.560 | that actually feels like nothing.

01:04:34.440 | 'Cause the things that brought you joy

01:04:36.400 | don't bring you joy anymore,

01:04:37.740 | when I'm really in the thick of it.

01:04:39.920 | But for me, this is the cycle that I'll go through

01:04:44.880 | is I'll look at my life and I'll say,

01:04:46.320 | okay, what can I clean up?

01:04:48.400 | All right, well, for me, it was cutting out alcohol

01:04:51.960 | actually helped me a lot.

01:04:53.200 | I know that sounds like a big,

01:04:56.240 | I'm not judging anybody for that.

01:04:59.240 | And I still drink on occasion,

01:05:01.060 | but I have felt like alcohol has been very unhelpful

01:05:03.840 | to my mental state.

01:05:05.140 | Feel less drive and less happiness the next day

01:05:09.320 | for things that I wanna do.

01:05:10.340 | I feel like it plays a lot with your serotonin.

01:05:12.760 | - So look for stuff to change.

01:05:14.680 | - Clean living, yeah, clean living.

01:05:16.600 | But also understanding that sometimes it just is.

01:05:22.240 | And you just keep breathing.

01:05:24.040 | And it will get better with time.

01:05:26.000 | - This too shall pass.

01:05:27.120 | - This too shall pass.

01:05:27.960 | Like I really think that in the winter,

01:05:31.120 | I'm pretty sure, I mean, I've had a lot of,

01:05:33.760 | I've seen a lot of therapists

01:05:34.720 | and all of them say the same thing,

01:05:35.800 | which is like, you have major depressive disorder

01:05:37.820 | and this is what it is.

01:05:38.660 | But it's certainly worse for me in the winter months.

01:05:41.360 | So I know there's like, I can't think of the term for it,

01:05:44.780 | but there's a term for like seasonal depression,

01:05:47.120 | there it is.

01:05:47.960 | So I'll get to the winter and suddenly I'm like,

01:05:51.040 | geez, everything really sucks on a deeper level.

01:05:55.120 | And then, so it's like this too shall pass is another thing.

01:05:58.240 | It's like, just practice those things.

01:06:01.080 | Absolutely see a therapist.

01:06:02.760 | That's my biggest emphasis of life is to like on stage,

01:06:06.640 | like my goal, like I have a few things

01:06:08.320 | that I really, really care about.

01:06:09.480 | One is mental health and destigmatizing therapy.

01:06:13.640 | 'Cause for me, I didn't go to therapy for a long time

01:06:15.640 | because I felt that it would be admitting that I was broken.

01:06:18.680 | It'd be admitting that I was weaker than Lex,

01:06:22.320 | who doesn't have to go to a therapist

01:06:23.840 | because Lex is stronger.

01:06:25.460 | So be strong like Lex.

01:06:27.640 | You know, I would like look at all my older brothers

01:06:29.360 | and I looked up to them so much

01:06:30.560 | and there were all these incredibly successful people.

01:06:32.840 | Plastic surgeon, an anesthesiologist, a dentist,

01:06:35.920 | two attorneys, Stanford, NYU,

01:06:38.200 | like just like incredible high standards,

01:06:41.680 | Eagle Scouts, you know, like they, valedictorians,

01:06:45.380 | like they just did it all.

01:06:47.360 | So for me, I was very, really did not want to admit,

01:06:52.360 | and none of them went to therapy.

01:06:55.320 | So it was like, what are you gonna be?

01:06:56.640 | Are you, are you broken?

01:06:57.960 | Are you like the weak one who can't hack life?

01:07:01.140 | And I think that's incredibly dangerous.

01:07:03.560 | And I feel like it almost cost me my life

01:07:05.560 | because I took so long to finally go to therapy.

01:07:08.600 | So I really want kids to know, hey,

01:07:11.240 | like the great people that achieve great things

01:07:14.440 | that are doing amazing things,

01:07:16.120 | they probably have help, almost all of them.

01:07:18.720 | - It's like going to the gym, but it's a mental gym.

01:07:21.320 | What, so I, unfortunately,

01:07:23.440 | I wanted to be a psychiatrist when I was growing up.

01:07:26.040 | Maybe that's why I like podcasts.

01:07:29.040 | Maybe that's-- - I think you'd be a good one.

01:07:30.600 | - Maybe, I would--

01:07:32.280 | - I think you are a psychiatrist, pretty much, right?

01:07:35.360 | Sounds like you're a psychiatrist.

01:07:36.200 | - I think I need more, I think,

01:07:38.200 | I think actually to be a good psychiatrist,

01:07:41.200 | you also need to be seeking therapy from the,

01:07:44.480 | like you also need to be,

01:07:46.560 | have some stuff to work through in your mind.

01:07:50.040 | I think, yeah, you have to have gone to some dark places.

01:07:53.900 | - The empathize.

01:07:57.160 | - The empathy, it's this ability to empathize,

01:07:59.240 | and especially if you've directly experienced it,

01:08:02.200 | you can go to those places in your mind.

01:08:05.120 | Like you said, it's with the music.

01:08:06.760 | To be authentic, you have to really go there.

01:08:08.600 | What, why did therapy help so much?

01:08:12.720 | What is the process of therapy,

01:08:14.640 | if you can just educate a little more?

01:08:16.840 | Is it, are you basically bringing to the surface

01:08:20.740 | and talking through things that you,

01:08:24.540 | because of the momentum of life,

01:08:27.800 | you just never allow yourself to speak through,

01:08:31.280 | to think through?

01:08:32.480 | Is that what therapy is?

01:08:33.720 | Or is it just a more systematic thing?

01:08:36.320 | - So I've been to a lot of strange,

01:08:38.800 | different kinds of therapy.

01:08:39.880 | So I'll tell you, my first therapist--

01:08:41.760 | - If I could interrupt, how hard is it to find

01:08:45.520 | a therapist that connected with you?

01:08:47.800 | - It is, it's actually pretty hard, I think.

01:08:50.920 | I think it, for, well, actually,

01:08:54.060 | I have a skewed view of that,

01:08:55.120 | because going back to the beginning of my therapy

01:08:59.480 | was with a Mormon therapist.

01:09:02.000 | So it was very much like, well,

01:09:04.360 | are you reading your Book of Mormon?

01:09:05.920 | And are you praying at night?

01:09:07.480 | You know what I mean?

01:09:08.320 | Like that was a big focus of my therapy

01:09:10.120 | to begin with. - And you're having--

01:09:11.560 | - Yeah.

01:09:12.400 | - A faith crisis in the distance.

01:09:13.760 | - Yes, I was like, well, and then--

01:09:17.080 | - You're making it worse.

01:09:18.120 | - Yes, the next therapist I went to

01:09:20.680 | was a Scientology therapist.

01:09:25.320 | I met my wife, and she was Scientologist at the time,

01:09:28.140 | and she's not anymore.

01:09:29.640 | She's like, it's such a funny thing to look back on,

01:09:33.920 | because we met, and I was like this Mormon missionary

01:09:36.960 | who had just got home from his mission,

01:09:38.240 | and I met her, and she's a Scientologist.

01:09:40.160 | I was like, wow, that's batshit crazy.

01:09:42.120 | Like that stuff's crazy.

01:09:43.880 | And she's like, what are you talking about?

01:09:44.800 | That's your crazy.

01:09:45.800 | (laughing)

01:09:46.640 | You're a Mormon.

01:09:47.460 | That's batshit crazy.

01:09:48.760 | And the two of us were like, huh,

01:09:51.760 | maybe there's something to this, to both of us here.

01:09:54.320 | - Yeah, the tension actually forces you to think through

01:09:56.480 | like, oh, well, what is true?

01:09:58.280 | What is true? - Yeah, yeah.

01:09:59.120 | And we really fell in love through that,

01:10:01.560 | which was like maybe we're both on the wrong track.

01:10:05.240 | Let's figure this out.

01:10:06.240 | But before that happened,

01:10:07.560 | we went to a Scientologist therapist

01:10:12.320 | who that therapy consisted of,

01:10:14.640 | what have you done wrong to Asia?

01:10:17.800 | And they would ask me that question

01:10:19.280 | over and over and over and over.

01:10:20.920 | And so I'm like thinking of the deepest, darkest things

01:10:23.480 | that were in the recesses of my mind.

01:10:25.680 | This was marriage therapy.

01:10:28.320 | Anyway, I'm not gonna get into that,

01:10:30.240 | but it was Scientology therapy,

01:10:32.400 | so that was a different thing.

01:10:33.520 | And then I went to therapy therapy.

01:10:36.660 | Like, no, it's not attached to any religion.

01:10:39.040 | And that was a really great experience for me.

01:10:40.960 | And since then,

01:10:41.800 | I've been through a couple different therapists,

01:10:43.100 | but that was more because where I was

01:10:45.680 | and moving and things like that.

01:10:47.680 | So is it that hard to find a great therapist?

01:10:50.120 | Probably not, but maybe don't go

01:10:51.800 | to your Mormon therapist person,

01:10:53.200 | that's Scientology therapist.

01:10:55.440 | Or maybe that's the route for you.

01:10:57.760 | Maybe it's the route for you, I don't know.

01:10:59.080 | - Yeah, but what is,

01:11:00.320 | so is it bringing stuff to the surface basically?

01:11:02.600 | - Oh, yeah, so I didn't even answer your question.

01:11:04.400 | - What's the effect?

01:11:05.320 | Why is it so effective?

01:11:06.620 | Is there something you could put words to?

01:11:10.220 | - Yeah, I mean, I think it's,

01:11:11.300 | obviously there's the common things you would think of,

01:11:13.180 | which is like, oh, I've been holding these things in

01:11:15.100 | that I don't wanna tell anybody,

01:11:16.140 | and then I tell this person,

01:11:17.260 | and oh, there's relief in that.

01:11:19.220 | But that's really not where the real work comes from.

01:11:21.460 | I think the real work is meeting with someone

01:11:24.580 | who is well-versed and educated and understands.

01:11:29.020 | It's like coding.

01:11:30.720 | It really is.

01:11:31.560 | It's like someone who, they listen to you,

01:11:33.500 | and they're like, well, that was a trigger,

01:11:34.780 | and then this became this trigger.

01:11:36.240 | And you're probably, every time you're hearing that,

01:11:38.280 | thinking of this thing that happened earlier in your life,

01:11:41.340 | and they just will walk you through scenarios.

01:11:43.120 | And maybe some of them aren't right,

01:11:44.520 | but some of them you'll be like,

01:11:45.640 | it'll resonate sometimes.

01:11:46.520 | You're like, wow, I am feeling that because of that,

01:11:50.080 | and that did happen.

01:11:51.360 | And maybe if I call my mom and say this to her,

01:11:53.360 | it will make me feel better.

01:11:54.520 | Hey, Mom, this happened.

01:11:55.720 | It's like work.

01:11:56.560 | You put in work, and you have hard conversations

01:11:59.080 | and do difficult things.

01:12:00.600 | And so if your therapy's not difficult,

01:12:03.440 | I actually think that's not good therapy.

01:12:05.580 | Good therapy is, it's gonna be a little difficult.

01:12:08.300 | It's work.

01:12:09.140 | - During and after.

01:12:11.580 | - Yes, I had this incredible therapist who,

01:12:15.360 | I told him when I was gonna do ayahuasca,

01:12:16.820 | he was like, geez, he actually was a doctor before

01:12:20.300 | and a really well-educated, studied person

01:12:22.520 | who had walked away from a brain doctor.

01:12:26.540 | What's the word for that?

01:12:27.660 | Brain doctor.

01:12:28.500 | - Brain surgeon?

01:12:29.320 | - Neurologist.

01:12:30.160 | - Oh, yeah, neurologist, yep.

01:12:31.000 | And he said, well, basically, his belief was that

01:12:35.440 | ayahuasca was like basically doing therapy 50 sessions.

01:12:39.740 | He was like, it's really intensive.

01:12:41.980 | He was like, I don't know if you wanna do that.

01:12:44.300 | If you do, you can make some big steps forward,

01:12:47.540 | but I prefer just to do one session at a time.

01:12:50.980 | And so yeah, it's hard work.

01:12:53.900 | And I typically, it's really hard for me

01:12:56.980 | to even talk about ayahuasca, by the way,

01:12:58.300 | going back to that, because I'm not looking

01:12:59.820 | to tell everybody to go do ayahuasca.

01:13:01.820 | It's incredibly hard.

01:13:03.780 | It was the scariest experience of my entire life.

01:13:07.100 | It felt like I went to heaven,

01:13:08.540 | but it also felt like I went to the darkest,

01:13:10.620 | deepest hell that was incredibly scary.

01:13:14.100 | Incredibly scary, yeah.

01:13:17.780 | - He told the story of how you wrote the song "Believer,"

01:13:22.220 | or like your childhood friend, I guess,

01:13:27.220 | Donald, like bullying and that kind of stuff.

01:13:30.360 | This song, I mean, a lot of your songs

01:13:34.060 | are super interesting, sort of,

01:13:35.660 | just the percussion, super interesting,

01:13:39.140 | super interesting lyrically, just how it flows.

01:13:41.860 | And also, pain is at the center of it.

01:13:45.540 | I mean, a lot of, like you said, the crisis of faith,

01:13:49.200 | some of these existential questions are basically

01:13:51.820 | behind a lot of your songs, funny enough.

01:13:55.500 | Maybe they're covered in metaphor, so it's hard to see,

01:13:59.420 | but it's there.

01:14:01.180 | And this song is really,

01:14:02.540 | it's really interesting in that way that it puts,

01:14:06.660 | pain, you made me a believer.

01:14:11.900 | You break me down, you build me up, believer.

01:14:16.380 | That's so interesting.

01:14:17.520 | Maybe can you tell the story of how the song came to be?

01:14:22.140 | I'd love to listen to it, too.

01:14:23.220 | I have some questions musically about it, too.

01:14:25.220 | - Yeah.

01:14:26.060 | Yeah, I mean,

01:14:27.660 | it's exactly what we're talking about with therapy.

01:14:30.900 | I just feel like the greatest things in my life

01:14:34.860 | have come from the deepest hurt.

01:14:39.860 | Like, losing someone that you love

01:14:45.580 | is maybe the hardest part of the human path for me,

01:14:49.420 | at least thus far.

01:14:51.300 | When I think of, okay, what was the hardest thing?

01:14:52.860 | There's like, you think of physical pain,

01:14:55.780 | or maybe going through financial pain, or whatever.

01:14:58.580 | I think losing someone that you really love to death

01:15:02.180 | is one of the hardest.

01:15:04.780 | For me, I would say it was the hardest.

01:15:06.820 | But it also makes you look at your life

01:15:10.100 | completely differently, and alter your life,

01:15:13.180 | at least for me, in ways that were really healthy.

01:15:15.680 | Being more present, letting go of things

01:15:19.340 | that were meaningless, trying to control

01:15:21.220 | what other people think about you.

01:15:23.020 | Wasting your time on things like that,

01:15:25.340 | and you suddenly see, wow, time.

01:15:27.860 | I got a small amount of time.

01:15:30.300 | How do I wanna spend it?

01:15:31.200 | I'm gonna spend it in the best way I know how,

01:15:32.940 | and that's it.

01:15:34.180 | So, yeah, it's a basic concept

01:15:37.940 | that's been said a million times over

01:15:39.140 | in a million different ways.

01:15:39.980 | But that's pretty much what I was trying to say

01:15:42.420 | with Believer, which is, I lost faith in everything

01:15:46.340 | at that time period, or previous to that time period,

01:15:51.060 | and then I was rebuilding my faith,

01:15:53.220 | or my spiritual thought process.

01:15:57.220 | And it was after ayahuasca, and it was like,

01:15:59.420 | finding, being a believer, and that's not necessarily

01:16:05.340 | like a believer in God, or a believer in heaven and hell,

01:16:09.260 | or anything like that, but a believer in more.

01:16:12.900 | Believing in goodness, believing that there is some light.

01:16:18.580 | And again, those words, they're just words,

01:16:22.780 | and I wish there were better words

01:16:24.060 | to formulate the thought that I'm trying to express,

01:16:25.940 | but just more.

01:16:27.780 | The thought of me dying, for me, I don't fear it.

01:16:33.900 | I don't fear it, but actually,

01:16:40.060 | I really fear not seeing my kids again.

01:16:42.580 | I'll say that.

01:16:43.400 | That is fearful for me.

01:16:44.860 | I feel like I love so deeply these children

01:16:48.100 | that the thought of leaving them, for me,

01:16:51.500 | is a scary thought, or something.

01:16:55.300 | - They're kind of a good reminder

01:16:58.180 | how much you love life, actually.

01:16:59.980 | - Yeah.

01:17:00.820 | - And you don't always remember that.

01:17:04.140 | - Yeah, and I think having kids is not for everyone,

01:17:07.460 | absolutely for sure.

01:17:08.380 | But for me, and especially, you shouldn't be having kids

01:17:11.420 | to give yourself a reason to live.

01:17:13.060 | (laughing)

01:17:13.900 | I mean, I feel like dying, I'm gonna have a kid.

01:17:16.980 | You might feel more like dying after having a kid,

01:17:19.140 | actually, you know?

01:17:20.540 | - It's pretty stressful.

01:17:22.100 | But it is a place to, like,

01:17:23.900 | I've changed a lot of people that I've known,

01:17:26.480 | that it gave them a new intensity

01:17:29.660 | of gratitude for life, for sure.

01:17:32.700 | Guy, do you mind if we,

01:17:33.740 | I'll return to the pain of the believer.

01:17:36.180 | Do you mind if we listen to a little bit of the songs?

01:17:38.140 | - No, it's fine.

01:17:44.820 | - Do you write the music first or the words first?

01:17:47.380 | - Uh, it's same time, which is very typical for me.

01:17:51.620 | - By the way, just the way it opens,

01:17:53.740 | like how, you know, intensity of openings.

01:17:56.980 | You ever think about, like,

01:17:57.940 | what the first few seconds sound like?

01:18:00.100 | Is that something that, like, when you imagine a song,

01:18:03.880 | is it the opening you imagine?

01:18:06.200 | - No, it's kind of a, it's just a,

01:18:09.100 | I never think opening, I never think final.

01:18:12.100 | I think soundscape of how I'm feeling right now.

01:18:16.260 | So it could be the middle of the song for all I know

01:18:18.380 | when I'm, you know, when I'm doing that.

01:18:20.340 | But my process for me is very much lyrics

01:18:23.940 | and melody and music really come at the same time.

01:18:27.540 | Like, by same time, I mean,

01:18:30.020 | I'm, as I'm expressing, maybe, you know,

01:18:35.020 | I'm feeling like.

01:18:35.860 | (beatboxing)

01:18:38.280 | Like, it's not that simple, but it's like,

01:18:44.340 | I'll hear it, like, it's like, here's all the orchestra

01:18:47.540 | and you're kind of just pressing all the buttons at once.

01:18:49.540 | And melody and my voice is just one of those instruments.

01:18:53.600 | You know what I mean?

01:18:54.440 | It's just utilizing one instrument.

01:18:56.020 | - So you've seen the landscape

01:18:57.220 | and that landscape includes melody,

01:18:58.620 | includes percussion, lyrics a little bit, or lyrics?

01:19:02.220 | - It would be words to begin with,

01:19:03.660 | like a word here and there.

01:19:05.140 | Like, I'll be like.

01:19:05.980 | (beatboxing)

01:19:08.320 | You know, I'm like, what's a word that I'm thinking of

01:19:12.820 | when I'm feeling this soundscape?

01:19:14.780 | And I always create with no theme in mind.

01:19:19.260 | I'm never, for better or for worse,

01:19:21.720 | just my process is I'm sitting down

01:19:24.380 | and I'm writing a journal entry.

01:19:26.580 | Simple as that.

01:19:27.400 | It's like, when you sit down to write a journal entry,

01:19:29.480 | are you sitting down and you're like,

01:19:31.500 | okay, I've had all these words here

01:19:32.900 | that I'm gonna put on the page

01:19:33.980 | and I'm gonna order it in this way.

01:19:35.860 | My theme for my journal entry today is gonna be this.

01:19:38.300 | Maybe some people do, but I don't.

01:19:39.400 | My journal entry is, I don't know what I'm gonna say.

01:19:42.100 | Oh, how was today?

01:19:43.060 | Well, man, today was this and feeling this.

01:19:45.540 | And now that I think about that, I'm really angry about that.

01:19:47.680 | That hurt my feelings when this happened.

01:19:49.460 | You're like, you're formulating it as you go

01:19:51.940 | and that's the joy of it.

01:19:53.140 | And for me, that's what music is.

01:19:55.380 | So I'll sit down, not thinking,

01:19:57.860 | hey, I've been wanting to write a song that has a hard beat,

01:20:00.580 | or I've been wanting to write a song that's anthemic,

01:20:02.260 | I've been wanting to write a song that's,

01:20:03.860 | it's like, how am I feeling right now?

01:20:06.100 | - And is joyful, is the feeling joyful to you

01:20:09.140 | or is it struggle?

01:20:10.980 | 'Cause you just made it sound like it's joyful.

01:20:14.460 | Or at least fulfilling.

01:20:17.780 | - Yeah, fulfilling is the word I was kinda looking for.

01:20:20.660 | - 'Cause a lot of artists talk about really,

01:20:22.980 | like, talk about writers.

01:20:24.500 | - Cathartic, that's the word I was looking for.

01:20:26.420 | It feels like having a good moment with a therapist

01:20:30.420 | where you're like, okay, I'm expressing this thing

01:20:34.520 | that I just need to express.

01:20:36.060 | For whatever reason, I need to express this.

01:20:38.940 | The majority of the songs I write for the record

01:20:40.700 | are never heard.

01:20:41.540 | I write over 100 songs a year.

01:20:43.780 | I release 20 songs every three years.

01:20:47.900 | So I don't know, what's that percent?

01:20:49.780 | 20 out of 300.

01:20:51.100 | Come on, Lex.

01:20:51.940 | It's less than 10%.

01:20:55.620 | - Less than 10%, yeah.

01:20:56.460 | - Like eight, seven or something?

01:20:57.780 | - Yeah.

01:20:59.460 | Anyway, so it's--

01:21:01.100 | - And then getting together with a band

01:21:02.700 | and getting them selected down

01:21:04.740 | is really what the process of.

01:21:06.740 | So you're really writing a song per one to three days,

01:21:11.740 | kinda maybe a song that you can't quite figure out

01:21:16.380 | the puzzle of that's gonna last a little longer.

01:21:19.660 | Where's the struggle? - I finish every idea.

01:21:22.100 | - Yeah, you finish every idea.

01:21:23.940 | - I do, I finish every idea.

01:21:25.140 | - So it's not just laying completely unfinished--

01:21:28.100 | - I could open my computer for you right now

01:21:30.020 | and I would show you hundreds and hundreds of songs

01:21:33.300 | that you would listen to and think,

01:21:35.340 | that sounds like a song.

01:21:36.460 | It's like there's rhythm, there's melody,

01:21:38.380 | there's multiple instruments, there's lyrics.

01:21:40.580 | It's the same thing as for coding for me,

01:21:45.060 | which is music, which is I can't walk away

01:21:47.700 | until I've completed it.

01:21:48.540 | - But it's finished.

01:21:50.180 | - Well, finished is--

01:21:51.500 | - Yeah, yeah, but it sounds like a song--

01:21:52.900 | - I certainly do a lot more with it

01:21:54.660 | after with the band where we pulled it apart.

01:21:56.780 | But it's a song, it'll be like, you know,

01:21:59.660 | you'll listen to it and say, okay, that was a song.

01:22:01.340 | I get, you understand what it is, for sure.

01:22:05.820 | - Do you think, this is a painful question

01:22:08.380 | from a fan perspective, do you think there's genius

01:22:12.980 | on your computer that you walked away from

01:22:17.020 | that you just didn't notice it?

01:22:19.580 | Like, do you think there's truly great songs

01:22:22.060 | that you've written that you just didn't notice

01:22:25.980 | how great they are?

01:22:26.940 | - I think greatness is something that I feel I'm,

01:22:31.300 | I don't feel like I've achieved greatness, genuine.

01:22:35.220 | I'm not saying that to you in a way of like humility.

01:22:37.940 | - It's like Michael Jordan time.

01:22:39.700 | - No, genuinely I feel like I am on a journey right now

01:22:44.700 | to find who I am.

01:22:46.300 | And I'm 34 and it's like, I don't even,

01:22:48.980 | I haven't begun that journey.

01:22:50.900 | I feel like I'm just starting that.

01:22:52.980 | But that being said, I certainly don't know

01:22:57.980 | the right answer to what songs are beloved

01:23:02.820 | or good to the masses.

01:23:04.140 | Like Imagine Dragons is such a massive entity.

01:23:06.620 | It's like, there have been, I will say this,

01:23:09.500 | there are a couple times where I fought really hard

01:23:12.220 | to decide on the single, really hard.

01:23:15.180 | Or I always fight for what goes on the record, always.

01:23:17.900 | I always put the record together

01:23:19.180 | and that's the record that I want it to be

01:23:20.780 | and me and the guys come up with that.

01:23:22.500 | And it's nobody else has influence, no manager, no label.

01:23:25.740 | The single, everybody wants to have a say in.

01:23:29.180 | Your label wants to have a say in it.

01:23:30.620 | Your manager wants to have a say in it.

01:23:32.820 | And I have fought really hard over that.

01:23:35.220 | And I've been wrong before and I've been right before.

01:23:37.700 | But as far as songs that I haven't put out, I mean.

01:23:42.140 | - 'Cause you can imagine so many songs.

01:23:44.540 | You think of so many Beatles songs

01:23:47.780 | that are like some of their greats,

01:23:49.420 | While My Guitar Gently Weeps.

01:23:52.180 | I'm trying to imagine weird sounding,

01:23:55.340 | not that interesting possibly songs that turn out.

01:23:57.460 | - The majority of what we put, honestly,

01:23:59.540 | it may be our best stuff is that we don't put out,

01:24:03.060 | for instance, because our band is such a,

01:24:05.300 | it's such a complex question.

01:24:09.860 | I really don't know actually.

01:24:11.260 | I don't know, maybe one day I'll die

01:24:12.540 | and people will look and be like,

01:24:13.900 | I hated Imagine Dragons, but now I listen to that song,

01:24:16.020 | I really like that, wish they would put that out.

01:24:17.660 | Or maybe they'll be like, oh, it all sounds like shit.

01:24:19.380 | I don't really know.

01:24:21.420 | - Well, that's, sorry, it is a tragic thing.

01:24:24.380 | That's why I ask it, which is like,

01:24:27.060 | there could be some great, incredible things

01:24:31.060 | that will take you a long time to rediscover,

01:24:35.380 | to realize how great they are.

01:24:36.940 | And it's also the tragic aspect of being an artist

01:24:40.820 | is you don't know, forget fame or all that kind of stuff.

01:24:45.020 | You don't know what's going to really move people.

01:24:46.900 | 'Cause ultimately what you want is to connect with people

01:24:51.220 | and you don't know what that's going to be.

01:24:53.380 | It's hard, I mean, to me it's, to me it's tragic,

01:24:57.260 | just as a fan of yours to see,

01:24:58.460 | maybe I wonder if there's like incredible stuff there.

01:25:01.740 | Just as it is tragic to see great artists throughout history

01:25:04.380 | who didn't get recognition until they died.

01:25:06.900 | It's like, 'cause they basically held on,

01:25:09.860 | Franz Kafka was extremely self-critical.

01:25:14.140 | A lot of these folks had an idea of what's good and not,

01:25:17.580 | and they were wrong.

01:25:19.860 | They had genius, they weren't entirely wrong

01:25:23.420 | 'cause they became sufficiently popular,

01:25:25.300 | but it's interesting.

01:25:27.220 | - I try to genuinely to release the songs

01:25:29.820 | that move me the most.

01:25:31.100 | - Got it. - I'll say that.

01:25:32.260 | - You're your own audience.

01:25:33.940 | - Yeah, I try to put out the songs

01:25:35.780 | that make me feel the most.

01:25:38.980 | Like I feel that, that's my only gauge.

01:25:42.620 | Because it's so subjective of like, what is good?

01:25:45.540 | Nobody knows the song that the masses are gonna like.

01:25:48.900 | Nobody knows that formula, nobody knows it.

01:25:50.980 | So for me, it's always what makes me feel something.

01:25:53.380 | One of the main lessons Rick Rubin taught me

01:25:54.980 | when we worked with him on this record was he would say,

01:25:57.820 | he would, his main point that he would continually

01:26:01.900 | bring up when, like, 'cause he's not the type of person

01:26:04.820 | to be like, "That's a bad song," or "That's good."

01:26:06.660 | It's just not who Rick Rubin is.

01:26:07.780 | It's more like, there's more nuance to it.

01:26:09.740 | He would say, "I don't really believe you on that song."

01:26:14.740 | (Rick laughs)

01:26:15.860 | That's what he would say, he would say.

01:26:17.540 | And I knew that was like, that song's a no-go.

01:26:21.260 | He'd say, and I would genuinely,

01:26:23.220 | there was a time he said it and it was about a song

01:26:24.900 | that I really, like, I really felt it

01:26:27.740 | and meant it when I said it.

01:26:29.320 | But he didn't believe it when he heard it.

01:26:32.260 | And that was enough for, I was like, man, well,

01:26:34.540 | at the end of the day, like, I can believe it all I want.

01:26:36.380 | But if the listener doesn't feel the honesty in it,

01:26:39.340 | just like we were talking about earlier,

01:26:40.340 | I think the most important ingredient is,

01:26:42.460 | is this truth, perceived as truth, to someone else?

01:26:45.860 | And if it's not, the bullshit indicator goes,

01:26:48.100 | and you're like, I don't care, I don't,

01:26:49.380 | throw it away, I don't care about it.

01:26:50.380 | - Well, you said that he made you go through,

01:26:54.220 | like, line by line, the lyrics.

01:26:56.380 | - Every single, that was excruciating for me.

01:26:58.680 | - Why was that excruciating?

01:27:02.280 | - Well, first of all, it's Rick Rubin.

01:27:03.920 | So you're in the room with, like, Rick Rubin,

01:27:06.540 | who's done a lot of the greatest of all time.

01:27:09.820 | And so I had to first just put that aside and be like,

01:27:13.820 | okay, well, you've done a lot of my favorite records,

01:27:15.600 | but still, you're human,

01:27:17.740 | and not everything you say is gonna be right.

01:27:20.300 | And I'm a strongly opinionated person, and so is Rick.

01:27:23.220 | And so when the two of us were sitting down in a room

01:27:24.980 | together, it was, you know.

01:27:27.040 | - But the lyrics, which is interesting.

01:27:30.160 | So it's not the entire composition,

01:27:32.380 | but just like, let's look at the lyrics.

01:27:34.260 | What do you mean here?

01:27:35.380 | - Yeah, oh yeah, 'cause he would look over every,

01:27:37.700 | there was like,

01:27:38.540 | and there were battles he won,

01:27:42.140 | battles that he didn't win, and maybe he was right.

01:27:45.760 | I don't know.

01:27:46.600 | I mean, there was, for instance, I'll give you an example.

01:27:48.120 | There's a song on the record called "Number One."

01:27:50.780 | Rick will probably laugh when he hears this.

01:27:52.920 | 'Cause this was a big one

01:27:55.120 | that we kept going back and forth on.

01:27:57.120 | But this will give you a good insight

01:27:58.440 | of what it was like.

01:28:01.120 | And there's a line in it that says,

01:28:02.820 | ♪ I don't know ♪

01:28:04.640 | The chorus is, ♪ I don't know what I'm meant to be ♪

01:28:06.320 | ♪ I don't need no one to believe ♪

01:28:08.320 | ♪ When it's all been said and done ♪

01:28:10.120 | ♪ I'm still my number one ♪

01:28:12.300 | And he was like, "Nah, it just makes me cringe

01:28:14.280 | "when I hear that."

01:28:15.200 | (laughing)

01:28:17.000 | He's like, "I just, do you have to be like,

01:28:19.720 | "can it not be like, you're still my number one?"

01:28:21.840 | I was like, "No, it's not about anybody else.

01:28:24.340 | "It's about self-love."

01:28:25.560 | He's like, "Yeah, but do you need to talk

01:28:28.040 | "about self-love like that?"

01:28:29.400 | And I was like, "Well, I feel like I need to."

01:28:31.680 | He's like, "Well, but there's something else

01:28:33.600 | "we could say there."

01:28:34.440 | We just kept coming back to this song, okay?

01:28:39.400 | And I changed it.

01:28:40.280 | I tried changing it.

01:28:41.720 | What did I change it to?

01:28:42.560 | It was like, it wasn't, "You're still my number one,"

01:28:44.600 | 'cause it just made no sense.

01:28:45.600 | It wasn't about some love thing or someone else.

01:28:49.760 | I changed it to something else.

01:28:50.960 | And it just, it was the one thing that I was like,

01:28:53.320 | "I'm really sorry, Rick.

01:28:55.340 | "I get it.

01:28:56.920 | "And if it sounds cringey to you,

01:28:58.080 | "it's definitely sounding cringey to other people too,

01:28:59.680 | "and that sucks, but I don't know how else to say this

01:29:02.480 | "in a way that I wanna put that song out anymore."

01:29:05.800 | But there were other songs, for sure,

01:29:07.440 | where Rick was like, "That or this, that word,

01:29:10.880 | "mm, feels a little trite.

01:29:11.900 | "You already said that once.

01:29:12.960 | "Can you say it in a different way?"

01:29:14.640 | It was really helpful.

01:29:15.760 | - It's really interesting, 'cause you're trying

01:29:18.960 | to say something so simply, and yet not make it cringe.

01:29:23.960 | - And that's really hard.

01:29:25.400 | - That's a strange art form, because you want to say

01:29:28.960 | some of the greatest love songs.

01:29:30.720 | I mean, we looked at the "Without You" song.

01:29:33.480 | I mean, the whole thing is cringey.

01:29:35.620 | If you just read it on paper, like it's a court report

01:29:40.620 | or something, but yet it's not, especially when sung, maybe.

01:29:45.560 | But no, there's something about, yeah, maybe--

01:29:49.440 | - Sung in a way you believe it.

01:29:50.960 | - When you believe it, but also written in a way

01:29:53.300 | that's singable in the way you believe it.

01:29:56.120 | So it's like--

01:29:56.960 | - Right, it rolls off, it just comes out in a way

01:30:01.040 | that just feels silky.

01:30:02.560 | - No word catches your mind as cringey.

01:30:05.940 | - Yes.

01:30:06.780 | - It's just, but then music, I think great speeches

01:30:11.780 | are like that, too, or just conveying,

01:30:16.020 | communicating ideas simply.

01:30:19.140 | That's the art form, is to not be cringey.

01:30:22.380 | So interesting, and then yet, 'cause when you're raw

01:30:26.460 | and real, it might at first feel cringey,

01:30:32.280 | but the battle there, and that's where you see people fail,

01:30:37.280 | like just regular artists, like, I don't know,

01:30:41.760 | at open mic, I go to open mic, so I just listen

01:30:45.040 | to musicians, like when they write songs,

01:30:46.880 | like they fail that test.

01:30:48.960 | They write simple stuff, but it's cringey, why?

01:30:51.600 | I wonder why was that, like what is that?

01:30:53.640 | - I'm telling you, Lex, I tried to explain this

01:30:55.280 | to my brother the other day, 'cause it's the same thing

01:30:58.800 | with a live performance.

01:31:00.840 | If I'm not in my right head space and I walk on stage,

01:31:03.980 | and I walk up and let's say I say something and I do this,

01:31:06.880 | 'cause I'm like, this is the move, right?

01:31:10.160 | I'm like, this is the move.

01:31:12.180 | The crowd doesn't care.

01:31:13.480 | In fact, the crowd's like, that's cringey when you do this.

01:31:16.640 | But if I wasn't thinking about doing this,

01:31:19.400 | and I went up there and I said something

01:31:21.480 | and I really meant it and my body was like,

01:31:24.240 | I can't explain this to you, it's so silly to say out loud,

01:31:28.320 | but people will resonate to it when it's real.

01:31:33.320 | And when it's acted, you could do it the exact,

01:31:36.520 | the motion could look the same, your eyes look the same,

01:31:39.000 | but there's something about the energy that people know.

01:31:42.560 | They know if it's real or not.

01:31:43.960 | - Yeah, people, like you said,

01:31:45.400 | incredible bullshit detectors.

01:31:46.720 | - 100%, I'll go on a stage and if I'm not

01:31:49.320 | in the right head space to be real,

01:31:51.240 | it won't be a good show.

01:31:52.560 | If I'm real, then it's a good show, it's as simple as that.

01:31:55.400 | - Let's go through the song.

01:31:57.640 | (upbeat music)

01:31:59.160 | Like I said, great opener.

01:32:00.760 | So you had this in your mind, this landscape?

01:32:04.000 | - Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:32:05.440 | ♪ First things first ♪

01:32:06.760 | ♪ I'ma say all the words inside my head ♪

01:32:09.640 | ♪ I'm fired up and tired of waiting ♪

01:32:11.400 | - The beat was first on this.

01:32:13.800 | - What about the first and the second,

01:32:16.120 | like first things first, second things--

01:32:17.920 | - The first line I wrote was, first things first.

01:32:21.160 | I don't know why, it just was like,

01:32:23.320 | and then I was like, oh, that principle of, you know.

01:32:25.360 | ♪ I'm the one at the sail ♪

01:32:27.080 | - Great line, second things second,

01:32:30.240 | don't you tell me what you think that I could be.

01:32:33.640 | I'm the one at the sail, I'm the master of my sea.

01:32:35.920 | I'm the master of my sea.

01:32:37.440 | Such a great-- - My dad had that

01:32:38.360 | in his office.

01:32:39.360 | He had this saying that was something about the sailor

01:32:44.360 | and being the master of the sea that I always loved.

01:32:47.120 | - There you go, simple statement.

01:32:49.840 | - Yeah. - Zero cringing.

01:32:51.840 | It's so powerful, it's so simple.

01:32:55.280 | I'm the master of my sea.

01:32:56.240 | This whole song is just trivial,

01:32:59.600 | but in terms of lyrically,

01:33:03.760 | but extremely powerful and original, unique sounding,

01:33:06.920 | something about the words.

01:33:08.400 | Just even, you don't have to actually sing them,

01:33:10.080 | you just read them.

01:33:11.120 | And then raw, I was broken from a young age,

01:33:14.960 | dug myself into the masses,

01:33:16.360 | writing my poems for the few that look at me,

01:33:18.680 | took to me, shook at me,

01:33:20.640 | feeling me singing from the heartache, from the pain,

01:33:23.000 | taking my message from the vein.

01:33:24.760 | I can't, why am I reciting your words to you?

01:33:27.520 | But the percussionist throughout it,

01:33:30.640 | and that was there in the beginning.

01:33:34.360 | - The percussion is almost in the lyrics, yeah.

01:33:36.280 | And I'm a very percussive singer

01:33:37.640 | because I was a drummer first before I,

01:33:40.800 | I think same with Dave Grohl, probably a similar thing,

01:33:44.120 | which is I think in percussive sense a lot when I'm writing,

01:33:49.120 | 'cause I, and I also was,

01:33:50.960 | before I could play an instrument, I would beatbox.

01:33:54.160 | And I think Michael Jackson did this too, actually.

01:33:56.320 | I've heard in the studio that he was very similar.

01:33:58.520 | But a lot of what I do is percussive

01:34:02.360 | 'cause my brain thinks in, percussively first.

01:34:06.520 | - A little more 'cause it's so good.

01:34:08.680 | - It's almost like a drum, like,

01:34:09.760 | (imitates drum beat)

01:34:12.840 | - And then you lay words on that.

01:34:16.040 | - Yeah.

01:34:18.960 | - Yeah, this.

01:34:22.640 | It's building.

01:34:23.560 | - It's almost like drums.

01:34:26.120 | (imitates drum beat)

01:34:29.200 | - It's all building to the chorus.

01:34:32.560 | What about the word pain?

01:34:44.400 | When did that come to you?

01:34:46.760 | Pain, you made me, you made me a believer.

01:34:51.440 | - Yeah, just the idea of,

01:34:53.080 | I just wanted to, I really,

01:34:57.440 | one of the things that a lot of the songs that I like,

01:35:00.440 | I like divisiveness, for instance.

01:35:04.800 | Not always, but there's times where I want someone

01:35:06.840 | to hear a song and I want them to either love it or hate it.

01:35:09.160 | I really don't want them to be in the middle ground.

01:35:11.640 | A lot of the songs that,

01:35:13.400 | like a lot of my favorite songs are divisive songs.

01:35:19.320 | And so for instance, with pain,

01:35:22.520 | I want you to hear that and almost like,

01:35:25.320 | it's like, whoa, you know what I mean?

01:35:26.920 | And it's something either somebody's gonna hear

01:35:29.360 | and they'll be like,

01:35:30.200 | man, I just don't wanna hear that like that.

01:35:31.480 | Or it's like, oh, I felt that so deeply

01:35:33.400 | when he said that in that way, because it sounded like this.

01:35:35.680 | And when you think of the word pain, it's like,

01:35:38.560 | that's a,

01:35:39.400 | at least for me, when I hear that word,

01:35:45.400 | it carries a lot of weight, carries a lot of weight.

01:35:48.200 | So I wanted to sing it with a lot of weight

01:35:50.560 | and to come into that chorus with like,

01:35:52.800 | like it's a striking moment.

01:35:55.160 | And I'm also a tenor singing as,

01:35:58.560 | sorry, I'm a baritone singing as a tenor.

01:36:01.320 | So that's where that natural, like gruffness comes from

01:36:05.280 | is I'm singing out of my range, really,

01:36:07.280 | up in my head voice and it carries a lot of weight with it

01:36:10.120 | because of the baritone.

01:36:11.360 | - Can I ask you a specific sort of,

01:36:14.320 | the pause before the pain?

01:36:16.000 | - Mm-hmm.

01:36:17.600 | - It's really interesting, 'cause it's like a double.

01:36:20.040 | How much work does that take to get that right?

01:36:28.200 | That's incredible.

01:36:29.760 | 'Cause it's like a,

01:36:31.000 | so you're kind of seeing the beauty through that

01:36:34.320 | and then that, whatever that sound is, the--

01:36:36.520 | - Right, the bass being rolled off.

01:36:38.000 | - Yeah, but, yeah.

01:36:39.480 | - Yeah, I actually, when I first was approaching the chorus,

01:36:43.240 | it was actually,

01:36:45.480 | ♪ I took a missing heartache from the pain ♪

01:36:47.600 | ♪ Taking my message from the vein ♪

01:36:48.640 | ♪ Speaking my lesson from the vein ♪

01:36:49.800 | ♪ Seeing the beauty through the ♪

01:36:51.880 | ♪ Seeing the beauty through the pain ♪

01:36:53.960 | ♪ You made me a, you ♪

01:36:55.200 | Like it came in on one.

01:36:56.280 | I'm not singing it right right now, but it did not wait.

01:36:59.080 | And it felt like it didn't hit

01:37:02.440 | in the way that it was supposed to hit

01:37:04.000 | because you predict that, right?

01:37:07.320 | You're like, you're waiting to hear,

01:37:08.560 | ♪ Seeing the beauty through the pain ♪

01:37:10.080 | ♪ You made me a ♪

01:37:10.920 | Right, it was like,

01:37:11.760 | ♪ Seeing the beauty through the pain ♪

01:37:13.320 | ♪ You made me a, made me ♪

01:37:15.200 | So I wanted it to feel a little more striking.

01:37:18.120 | Again, it's like that thing that makes you

01:37:20.000 | kind of do this a little bit.

01:37:21.000 | You're like, huh?

01:37:22.200 | But once you hear it a few times, you're like, ah, ah.

01:37:25.200 | And you predict, you know what I mean?

01:37:26.360 | It's like, I'd rather someone hear our song

01:37:28.600 | the first time and be confused by it,

01:37:31.360 | so they play it the second time.

01:37:33.160 | And then they're like, oh, okay.

01:37:34.480 | You know what I mean?

01:37:35.320 | I really don't want,

01:37:36.520 | I'd rather turn some people off along the way,

01:37:41.840 | and then the people who come along for you

01:37:43.600 | are gonna feel more committed, I think.

01:37:46.960 | - It's just an interesting,

01:37:49.120 | it feels gutsy to insert silence, you know?

01:37:53.080 | - Yeah, that's what makes it,

01:37:54.880 | the greatest speakers of all time are like,

01:37:57.080 | and I told you.

01:37:58.280 | - Right.

01:38:00.760 | - You would know.

01:38:01.800 | You know what I mean?

01:38:02.640 | It's like, you're like, oh.

01:38:04.320 | - Yeah, what is that?

01:38:05.840 | Yeah, that's so interesting,

01:38:07.280 | to do that just at the right time.

01:38:09.080 | And then pain, right?

01:38:13.480 | Man, it's a brilliant song.

01:38:15.880 | Did you know it was a good song when you wrote it?

01:38:18.680 | Out of the thousands of songs you've written?

01:38:20.800 | - You know, it's always the same thing for me,

01:38:23.040 | which is like, if I wanna listen to the song,

01:38:27.160 | and I wanna listen to it a lot of times,

01:38:29.680 | then those are the songs we put out.

01:38:31.800 | And I only wanna listen to the songs

01:38:33.520 | that make me feel something.

01:38:35.000 | Whether or not it's,

01:38:36.600 | our single that did the very worst of all our singles

01:38:39.920 | was the song that I wanted to listen to the least.

01:38:42.880 | But it made the most sense as a single,

01:38:44.960 | which was all the wrong reason to choose it, right?

01:38:46.640 | It was, "I Bet My Life,"

01:38:48.400 | is the single off our second album.

01:38:50.520 | And that song was originally written,

01:38:51.800 | it was just a guitar and a vocal,

01:38:53.200 | and it was very just quiet and laid back.

01:38:56.280 | And we were like, well, let's try to dial it up,

01:38:59.120 | let's try to produce it, and we overproduced that song.

01:39:01.960 | We self-produced it as a band, and we overproduced.

01:39:05.400 | And that song, I mean, it did good, you know,

01:39:09.640 | in terms of a song, but for us, it did not do good.

01:39:12.920 | Compared to our other songs.

01:39:14.200 | And I really look back at that

01:39:15.960 | and learned a lesson from that.

01:39:17.160 | It's like, if I don't wanna listen to the song,

01:39:19.560 | that's a sign already.

01:39:21.880 | If you don't wanna listen to your own song,

01:39:23.840 | it's probably not a good song.

01:39:25.040 | - Yeah.

01:39:26.560 | You said your dad, elsewhere and today,

01:39:30.320 | just said that your dad early on was a kind of

01:39:34.320 | the early Rick Rubin.

01:39:37.160 | So when you were starting out,

01:39:39.760 | he gave you feedback, you listened.

01:39:42.680 | What did you learn about music, about life from your dad?

01:39:47.000 | - My dad is a really quiet farm, grew up on a farm,

01:39:53.040 | very humble.

01:39:54.240 | I think he starts every sentence by saying,

01:40:00.600 | "This is just my two cents," pretty much.

01:40:02.840 | You know what I mean?

01:40:03.680 | It's like, take it or leave it.

01:40:05.240 | Like, you know what I mean?

01:40:06.080 | He's that kind of a sense.

01:40:07.440 | Like, there's humility in everything,

01:40:09.000 | and it's real for him.

01:40:09.960 | It's not like false humility.

01:40:12.400 | I really feel like when he's saying things,

01:40:14.160 | he really is like, "Maybe this isn't any worth to you, son,"

01:40:17.480 | and he means it.

01:40:18.640 | But here it is, and it's always gold.

01:40:20.240 | And I'm like, "Wow, Dad, that's incredible."

01:40:22.600 | - So what, in those early days,

01:40:24.080 | have you like, so you were like 12 or something like that,

01:40:26.480 | like starting to write songs?

01:40:27.320 | - I was 12.

01:40:28.400 | I wasn't showing my music to anyone.

01:40:30.040 | I started writing right when I was 12,

01:40:31.320 | and I probably wrote for at least,

01:40:33.120 | let's say six months or something.

01:40:34.520 | And I had written probably, I don't know,

01:40:36.280 | like a lot of songs during that time.

01:40:38.560 | - What was the topic, by the way?

01:40:39.680 | Love, anger? - It was all sad.

01:40:42.000 | No, it was, the first song I ever wrote went,

01:40:44.400 | (scatting)

01:40:46.640 | And it was like a bluesy thing.

01:40:54.360 | It was like, there was my voice doing that,

01:40:55.800 | and then it was like,

01:40:56.640 | ♪ All by himself ♪

01:40:58.720 | ♪ No other one around ♪

01:41:01.880 | ♪ And he stood all alone ♪

01:41:04.560 | ♪ When would he be found ♪

01:41:07.800 | ♪ Did he want company ♪

01:41:10.360 | ♪ Or was he found on his own ♪

01:41:13.680 | ♪ Everyone needs a friend ♪

01:41:16.160 | ♪ So why was he all alone ♪

01:41:19.640 | (scatting)

01:41:21.240 | You know what I mean?

01:41:22.080 | It was like, but I was like a 12-year-old with,

01:41:24.920 | I just felt like depressed for the first time.

01:41:29.040 | And I was, and I just was like so--

01:41:31.760 | - I think you discovered the blues as a 12-year-old.

01:41:33.200 | - Yeah, right, right.

01:41:34.480 | It really was.

01:41:35.320 | It was like my sense of the blues at that time, for sure.

01:41:37.040 | Like bad version of the blues,

01:41:38.200 | but it was like 12-year-old kid with a bunch of acne.

01:41:41.040 | And like, I just like, I hated going to school.

01:41:44.000 | I felt like that I just had not found myself.

01:41:46.840 | - Sounds like a great song, by the way.

01:41:48.120 | But anyway, I wanted to keep listening.

01:41:49.600 | I forgot I was--

01:41:50.440 | (laughing)

01:41:52.040 | - I don't know about that, but yeah.

01:41:55.280 | - What was your dad,

01:41:56.520 | which point did you begin to share it with your dad?

01:41:58.680 | - A lot of the songs that I wrote in the beginning

01:42:00.240 | were very much like Bobby McFerrin, like that,

01:42:02.240 | because our mic was in a part of the house

01:42:05.340 | where I couldn't bring over the piano,

01:42:06.580 | and the only instrument I played at the time was the piano.

01:42:09.600 | So I would do everything with my voice.

01:42:11.200 | But then I started to teach myself the guitar

01:42:13.280 | in that beginning six-month period,

01:42:15.320 | just watching my brothers play in their garage bands

01:42:17.160 | in the basement.

01:42:18.440 | And then I started to write songs

01:42:19.360 | a little more like Enya vibes,

01:42:20.800 | like stack my voice like 20, 30 times.

01:42:23.040 | And like Enya meets like Jarre,

01:42:26.440 | which is who my dad would listen to a lot,

01:42:28.480 | John Michael Jarre.

01:42:29.560 | He's an incredible synth genius.

01:42:31.400 | But anyway, so I finally got my gall up enough

01:42:36.560 | to show it to my dad one day after work.

01:42:38.580 | And I got very little of my dad

01:42:40.100 | 'cause there were nine kids,

01:42:41.020 | and he worked from 8 a.m. till 6 p.m.

01:42:43.980 | Well, come on, very tired,

01:42:44.940 | and here's nine kids that are like, "Dad!"

01:42:47.620 | And you're the young one, you're not,

01:42:48.860 | you're just gonna miss,

01:42:49.780 | I was in the middle kind of too,

01:42:50.980 | so it's even, you know, middle child thing.

01:42:53.660 | But I sat him down, and I was like,

01:42:54.700 | "Hey, Dad, I just wanna like kinda show you a song."

01:42:57.660 | And he was like, "Oh," you know,

01:42:59.140 | he didn't know I was writing anything,

01:43:00.580 | and I showed it to him, and he listened.

01:43:03.020 | And he took it off, and he really looked at me,

01:43:04.500 | and he was like, "That was really good."

01:43:06.960 | He was like, "I thought, and this, when you said this,

01:43:09.640 | it made me feel this."

01:43:10.480 | He was like, and that did it.

01:43:12.080 | I probably would've given up music.

01:43:14.360 | Like, I look back, that was a very pivotal moment for me.

01:43:17.540 | I was like in a place where I was like,

01:43:19.720 | "Is this good, bad, I don't know,

01:43:21.600 | maybe it's so embarrassing and terrible."

01:43:24.000 | And I was already writing lyrics

01:43:25.200 | that were a little like overly metaphorical to hide

01:43:27.540 | that I was dealing with faith crisis,

01:43:29.240 | 'cause I thought, "Okay, I'm gonna show this to Dad.

01:43:31.280 | I don't want my dad to know I'm like

01:43:32.920 | questioning the truthfulness of Joseph Smith."

01:43:35.580 | So I'm not gonna be like,

01:43:36.920 | ♪ Is Joseph Smith a real prophet ♪

01:43:38.620 | ♪ Is Mormonism true, I don't really know ♪

01:43:40.660 | Like, you know what I mean?

01:43:41.500 | I was like writing way overly metaphorical.

01:43:43.500 | But because my dad really validated it,

01:43:46.020 | and he was a no-bullshit person,

01:43:47.860 | so I knew when my dad said that, I was like,

01:43:49.580 | "You know what, at least my dad

01:43:50.820 | really actually thinks this is cool."

01:43:52.420 | And I really trusted my dad's taste,

01:43:54.220 | and thought everything he listened to was cool,

01:43:56.880 | so I was like, "Wow, I'm gonna keep doing this."

01:43:59.160 | And I just showed it to my dad for years and years.

01:44:01.100 | And still to this day, I send every song to my dad.

01:44:03.200 | - So he, underneath it, with the feedback,

01:44:05.480 | is always like, "Ooh, I like this idea, I like this."

01:44:07.960 | It's just a positive, like a--

01:44:09.200 | - Not always positive, no.

01:44:10.480 | - But like underneath it, do you sense the positivity?

01:44:13.040 | 'Cause I think that's-- - Always.

01:44:15.120 | Never mean, never malicious.

01:44:18.460 | You know, there's two types of criticism.

01:44:21.480 | There's like criticism that's just like

01:44:22.880 | you're looking to be hurtful to someone,

01:44:24.720 | and then there's criticism that's like

01:44:26.600 | really important for art.

01:44:28.640 | It's the type of criticism that's like

01:44:30.740 | you see the value in what's happening,

01:44:32.520 | and if it's honest, then you maybe communicate

01:44:35.440 | with that person like, "I see what you're trying to do

01:44:38.560 | "with that."

01:44:39.400 | It's not even like you have to say that or whatever,

01:44:41.280 | like butter it up, but it's like,

01:44:43.520 | my dad would just give me this honest criticism

01:44:46.520 | that would be like, you know,

01:44:49.360 | it certainly wasn't always good,

01:44:51.800 | but I knew it was always well-intentioned.

01:44:53.600 | I guess that's how I would say.

01:44:55.200 | - So you mentioned, maybe you re-listened to,

01:44:57.280 | I'm a big fan of Cass Stevens.

01:44:58.640 | You maybe re-listened to "Father and Son."

01:45:01.660 | I probably, all sons have issues

01:45:04.180 | to work through with their fathers.

01:45:05.980 | And you said that you connect with this song in particular.

01:45:10.580 | I think, so you're a father now.

01:45:13.220 | What is it about the song that connects with you?

01:45:16.220 | For people, let me play it.

01:45:18.380 | Let me play it a little bit.

01:45:19.580 | People should educate themselves on Cass Stevens.

01:45:21.980 | - Oh my gosh.

01:45:22.820 | - "Ride on the Peace Train."

01:45:23.640 | - The best, the best piece.

01:45:25.060 | ♪ Ride on the peace train ♪

01:45:27.020 | - You think this is a hopeful or sad song?

01:45:29.860 | - I hear it as hopeful.

01:45:31.180 | I hear it as a loving father

01:45:33.140 | saying just what his son needs to hear.

01:45:34.700 | ♪ It's not time to make a change ♪

01:45:38.260 | ♪ Just relax, take it easy ♪

01:45:42.020 | ♪ You're still young, that's your fault ♪

01:45:45.740 | ♪ There's so much you have to do ♪

01:45:47.700 | - It's like that calm wisdom.

01:45:49.400 | - Yeah. - There's time.

01:45:51.940 | - It's wise.

01:45:52.980 | ♪ If you want, you can marry ♪

01:45:56.460 | ♪ Look at me, I am old but I'm happy ♪

01:46:01.460 | - And just the way he says that,

01:46:02.380 | that should be a corny line, but it's not corny at all.

01:46:04.340 | It's like, yeah.

01:46:05.180 | ♪ Once like you are now ♪

01:46:07.100 | - Look at me, I'm old but I'm happy.

01:46:09.020 | ♪ It's not easy to be calm ♪

01:46:13.180 | ♪ When you found something going on ♪

01:46:15.900 | - Yeah, I mean, the simplicity there.

01:46:17.660 | And it, yeah, but it's such a contrast with,

01:46:20.980 | what's his name?

01:46:24.060 | Harry Chapman with "Cats in the Cradle,"

01:46:26.460 | which is like the sadness of,

01:46:32.460 | so this feels like there's a wise, calm connection

01:46:38.540 | between father and son, right?

01:46:42.140 | With "Cats in the Cradle,"

01:46:44.580 | I don't know if you remember that song.

01:46:46.540 | He learned to walk while I was away

01:46:49.460 | and he was talking before I knew it.

01:46:51.900 | And as he grew, he'd say, "I'm gonna be like you, dad.

01:46:54.660 | You know, I'm gonna be like you."

01:46:56.020 | And the idea of that song is

01:46:58.620 | that he does become like his dad,

01:47:00.300 | which is funny, you know, something you've said.

01:47:03.980 | But in a different way,

01:47:06.420 | you become too busy to make that connection.

01:47:09.260 | His dad was too busy to make a connection with his son.

01:47:12.380 | And in a, not a dramatic way,

01:47:14.380 | in a very kind of calm, natural way.

01:47:16.340 | Like you don't, you just don't have time.

01:47:19.660 | You're busy at work,

01:47:20.900 | you're providing for the family and so on.

01:47:22.580 | There's connection,

01:47:23.420 | but you don't really get, form that depth of connection.

01:47:27.100 | And then the father, when the son shows up from college

01:47:31.060 | and all that kind of stuff,

01:47:31.900 | he doesn't spend any time with the father.

01:47:34.060 | All that, and just the calm sadness of that,

01:47:37.300 | that we can live parallel lives and never quite connect.

01:47:42.100 | - And there is a little bit of that

01:47:43.420 | in "Father and Son" with Cat Stevens too, you know?

01:47:45.580 | Like when the son is saying,

01:47:48.380 | "From the moment that I could talk,

01:47:49.780 | I was ordered to listen."

01:47:51.580 | I always remember listening to that line,

01:47:54.100 | feeling like that really moved me.

01:47:57.020 | But the beauty of that song is it shows,

01:47:59.740 | it's kind of like the theme of what I feel like

01:48:01.900 | we've talked about since the second you got here,

01:48:03.540 | which is something I really like,

01:48:05.060 | I don't know why it's such an important theme

01:48:06.580 | in my life right now,

01:48:07.400 | but the duality of just understanding

01:48:11.380 | that you don't understand someone else's situation.

01:48:14.620 | And there's truth to both sides.

01:48:16.660 | Like there's truth to what the father is saying to the son.

01:48:19.180 | He's like saying these things and he's like,

01:48:20.680 | "I'm looking out for you.

01:48:22.220 | I love you.

01:48:23.420 | Take your time with these things.

01:48:24.500 | If you wanna get married, you can.

01:48:26.060 | Like these things will bring you happiness."

01:48:27.060 | And then the son saying,

01:48:28.880 | "Listen, I wanna pave my own path.

01:48:31.240 | I wanna do this.

01:48:32.080 | Like, why are you telling me this?"

01:48:33.780 | The son's not wrong,

01:48:36.220 | 'cause there's a lot of parents who tell their kids

01:48:37.580 | what to do and they're wrong.

01:48:38.580 | (laughs)

01:48:39.420 | And you know what I mean?

01:48:41.060 | And they don't let the kid form the path that they need to.

01:48:45.220 | But should you not be a parent?

01:48:47.420 | Like, you know what I mean?

01:48:48.260 | There's just two sides to everything.

01:48:49.100 | - Yeah, there's a thing.

01:48:51.420 | It is annoying when you're older,

01:48:54.860 | you get to see people do all the same things.

01:48:58.260 | You could say, "Well, this is a phase."

01:49:03.260 | And you'll see that this actually will end up in this way.

01:49:08.260 | You can like predict how the life unrolls.

01:49:10.240 | And it's very annoying for young people to hear,

01:49:12.380 | especially 'cause it's probably going to be true.

01:49:14.020 | It's like, "No, it's not gonna be like this.

01:49:16.340 | No, I'm gonna be different."

01:49:17.260 | But then you become that person.

01:49:18.900 | But that doesn't mean they also let them live that life,

01:49:22.620 | let them make the mistakes.

01:49:24.740 | But they're not mistakes, actually.

01:49:26.300 | They're like beautiful deviations

01:49:30.660 | from the path that they end up on.

01:49:34.460 | And those make the path.

01:49:36.600 | Do you have advice for young folks today?

01:49:43.020 | You've had an incredible dark journey

01:49:48.020 | and a successful one, a loving one,

01:49:51.340 | and one of the most successful artists in the world.

01:49:55.900 | Is there advice you can give to young people today

01:49:58.380 | that would like to find themselves to that way,

01:50:01.100 | especially if they're struggling?

01:50:02.540 | - I thought you said device at first.

01:50:04.020 | And I was like, "Honestly,

01:50:05.740 | I feel like that device is not helping."

01:50:07.700 | (laughing)

01:50:09.580 | Maybe everybody should throw away their devices.

01:50:12.820 | Advice.

01:50:13.820 | I would just say what I emphasize to my kids is

01:50:21.180 | I really, really want my kids to just learn

01:50:25.380 | to love themself.

01:50:27.260 | It's easier said than done.

01:50:29.840 | It's really easy to pick on yourself in life.

01:50:32.280 | It's really easy to look in the mirror

01:50:35.860 | and wish you looked different,

01:50:37.540 | wish you were more successful like that person over there,

01:50:41.300 | wish a lot of things.

01:50:44.680 | And people that I see that really succeed at life

01:50:50.580 | really succeed truly.

01:50:53.580 | And that doesn't mean they're making money necessarily

01:50:55.740 | or they're succeeding.

01:50:56.620 | And they're talking to a lot of people.

01:50:59.140 | Their success to me is like happy.

01:51:03.300 | And they have real self-love.

01:51:06.140 | You know when you meet someone, you meet Rick, for instance.

01:51:09.020 | You meet Rick Rubin.

01:51:10.660 | Rick has a calmness about him.

01:51:12.180 | And it's funny 'cause everybody sees him as this zen master.

01:51:16.580 | Rick is just a really loving person

01:51:22.460 | who also loves himself and has self-confidence

01:51:24.820 | because you just see it and it resonates.

01:51:26.940 | And that's why he draws people.

01:51:28.060 | And that's why he's so great in the studio

01:51:29.380 | because you know his intentions, always.

01:51:31.740 | As an artist, when a producer comes in, you're like,

01:51:33.780 | "Whoa, whoa, whoa, what are your intentions?

01:51:35.900 | "What are you trying to do?

01:51:36.740 | "Are you trying to get a hit out of me for the label?

01:51:38.380 | "Are you trying to make me something?

01:51:39.940 | "Are you trying to make me this

01:51:41.220 | "so you can prove this about yourself?"

01:51:42.860 | There's a lot in that dynamic.

01:51:44.740 | And the reason that Rick is so good

01:51:46.040 | is because you know his intentions.

01:51:49.420 | And his intentions come because Rick has that self-love.

01:51:52.000 | So for me, find the things about yourself,

01:51:56.280 | 'cause they're there, that you love,

01:51:58.660 | and really focus in on them.

01:52:01.700 | And it's not selfish.

01:52:02.980 | I feel like I was brought up in a family, too,

01:52:05.120 | where it was like, never look inward.

01:52:08.940 | Be selfless, serve, serve, serve.

01:52:11.340 | Which, by the way, is a true principle of life.

01:52:14.260 | I think you love yourself more when you serve more.

01:52:16.440 | I think that's really evident in life.

01:52:19.140 | But also, spend time doing the things that make you happy.

01:52:22.660 | Take time every day to go on that walk

01:52:24.400 | that you need to go on.

01:52:25.660 | Listen to that book tape that you need to listen to.

01:52:28.460 | For me, that's something I need.

01:52:29.960 | I know if I do that, I'm gonna be a better dad

01:52:31.700 | because I gave myself some love back in life.

01:52:37.420 | And just forgive yourself, I think.

01:52:40.300 | Forgive yourself 'cause everybody messes up.

01:52:42.060 | Everybody hurts others.

01:52:43.380 | Everybody says unkind words at times.

01:52:45.580 | Everybody fails all the time.

01:52:49.780 | And if you think that you're gonna not, you're wrong.

01:52:52.980 | And you're eventually going to,

01:52:54.060 | and you're either gonna punish yourself for it every day

01:52:56.740 | and be a lesser version of what you could be,

01:52:59.420 | or you're gonna forgive yourself for it.

01:53:01.580 | And if you learned that that's not something you want,

01:53:03.420 | then try not to do it again.

01:53:04.480 | If you do it again, and you're probably gonna do it again,

01:53:06.660 | whatever that is, you're gonna gossip about that person.

01:53:09.300 | You're gonna feel bad because then you gossiped about someone

01:53:12.380 | - Is there something you could say in terms of self-love?

01:53:15.020 | Is there a role for being critical?

01:53:17.660 | Like those demons of self-criticism,

01:53:20.580 | do you need a little bit of that?

01:53:21.820 | Tom Waits talks about,

01:53:23.100 | I like my Tom with a little drop of poison.

01:53:25.140 | - Right. - You need a little poison?

01:53:27.460 | Or is that silly or a manifestation of poison?

01:53:31.060 | - Look, my biggest thing in life

01:53:34.300 | has been the thing that I've worked on

01:53:36.220 | the hardest for the last few years

01:53:38.380 | is to not be overly critical

01:53:40.100 | and to let go of control.

01:53:45.900 | I think it's really easy to kill an artist.

01:53:50.900 | It's really easy to kill an artist.

01:53:55.140 | Like if my dad would have sat down with me that day,

01:53:58.060 | and even if he would have just sat down and been like,

01:54:01.460 | good job son, okay.

01:54:02.780 | It sounds silly, right?

01:54:03.620 | Like I don't, I didn't, not everybody has a dad

01:54:05.660 | who's gonna ever do something

01:54:07.220 | or put in the time or whatever.

01:54:09.260 | But that might've altered everything for me.

01:54:14.260 | Like my dad taking the extra time to just give me

01:54:17.460 | a thoughtful response opposed to, kids know.

01:54:20.260 | Kids know when you're just like trying

01:54:21.820 | to get out of the room or whatever.

01:54:23.060 | I knew he wasn't and that did a lot.

01:54:25.860 | So yeah.

01:54:27.140 | - But is that a huge, is that what makes the artist?

01:54:30.740 | Is the fragility of it that like,

01:54:34.720 | would you have it any other way?

01:54:36.320 | - No, no, I agree with you.

01:54:40.100 | I think that that's what, that's the beauty of art.

01:54:45.100 | But I think also on the same token, it's like,

01:54:48.760 | I went to Music Cares recently,

01:54:54.500 | which is a charity for musicians

01:54:56.900 | that are down on their luck.

01:54:58.380 | That maybe were successful at one point

01:54:59.780 | or have never been successful

01:55:00.980 | and they can't even pay the bills.

01:55:02.420 | And this charity contributes money to these artists,

01:55:05.440 | aspiring artists or artists who've had drug issues.

01:55:08.440 | And like, there's a lot that they do.

01:55:09.800 | But, and there was a statistic that they told

01:55:11.920 | it was staggering to me, which is,

01:55:13.240 | I think it was 75% of artists, musicians,

01:55:17.880 | say they struggle with severe depression.

01:55:20.600 | That's really high.

01:55:22.240 | I don't know what the national average is,

01:55:24.320 | but I would guess that that's higher

01:55:26.380 | than the national average per occupation.

01:55:29.200 | So I just think there's a tricky balance.

01:55:33.060 | There's a tricky balance in art.

01:55:36.340 | So yeah, of course, like it's a necessary thing,

01:55:42.020 | the fragility of it all.

01:55:43.900 | But...

01:55:44.740 | - Yeah, I wonder, 'cause I'm extremely self-critical

01:55:49.740 | and I sometimes ask myself the question,

01:55:52.080 | I've romanticized it, or rather I've learned to be,

01:55:58.500 | for it to be productive, to channel it into productivity.

01:56:01.860 | But I wonder if there's better ways to do that.

01:56:05.340 | And I also wonder if it's eventually

01:56:07.380 | the thing that destroys me.

01:56:08.820 | Like if long-term, if it's a healthy thing,

01:56:11.660 | it might be useful when you're in sort of

01:56:14.820 | actively fighting the battles of the day.

01:56:21.020 | For me, it's engineering challenges

01:56:22.460 | and all that kind of stuff.

01:56:23.820 | But then when you're sitting back

01:56:26.260 | and enjoying life with family and so on,

01:56:29.300 | is that going to be, like, do you need to find that self-love

01:56:32.900 | like ability to kind of silence

01:56:37.660 | the voice of criticism in your head?

01:56:39.520 | - You know what, I really, you're making a good point.

01:56:42.540 | And I think that the middle ground is you need,

01:56:47.540 | you need self-doubt to push you to be better.

01:56:55.980 | I do believe that, for instance, if I believed,

01:57:00.980 | I've hit my, like when you're like,

01:57:02.860 | is there a song on there that you think is genius?

01:57:05.020 | If I think I've written a genius song ever,

01:57:07.420 | I think I'd probably stop.

01:57:09.460 | I think I'd be like, you know what, did it, I wrote,

01:57:13.020 | what's that perfect song?

01:57:16.380 | - "Stairway to Heaven"?

01:57:18.660 | - If I'd done one in, "Imagine."

01:57:21.500 | - "Imagine," yeah.

01:57:22.320 | - Okay, if I'd written "Imagine,"

01:57:24.380 | I'd probably be like, that's it, did it, all right,

01:57:27.980 | perfect song's been written,

01:57:28.980 | that's the best thing I'll ever do.

01:57:31.220 | So the fact that there is self-criticism

01:57:36.220 | and criticism outside, I think is necessary.

01:57:39.820 | 100% for sure, it pushes you, it pushes you, it pushes you.

01:57:44.220 | It's just finding the right middle ground

01:57:47.700 | for that young aspiring artist to also not feel squashed

01:57:51.700 | and to be heard and to love, not even to feel squashed,

01:57:55.340 | just to love themself so that when they're in the room

01:57:58.300 | playing the song, they'll believe it

01:58:01.020 | because they believe themself.

01:58:03.300 | They love themself enough that they believe it

01:58:05.140 | and then they'll do a great,

01:58:06.080 | and then the song will come out great

01:58:07.540 | and they'll do a great performance.

01:58:10.060 | - I have to ask, it's one of the very interesting aspects

01:58:15.000 | of your life, of the way you put love out there in the world,

01:58:18.540 | what is at the core of your support for the LGBT community?

01:58:22.500 | - A couple things, so one, growing up in,

01:58:28.060 | from a young age in the artist community,

01:58:30.760 | a lot of my closest friends were LGBTQ,

01:58:34.980 | starting in middle school.

01:58:36.280 | And I think a lot of the best artists in the world

01:58:41.340 | are LGBTQ and that's just, it's not a secret,

01:58:44.660 | like it's just, it's like the artist community

01:58:47.100 | is filled with lots of LGBTQ people.

01:58:50.900 | So I think being raised in that community,

01:58:53.740 | in that my friends struggled with their faith

01:58:58.140 | and their sexuality, really opened up my eyes

01:59:03.140 | to how incredibly hard that path is.

01:59:08.340 | For instance, okay, when I was in high school,

01:59:11.020 | there was someone who went in front of,

01:59:15.380 | who was LGBTQ and was Mormon,

01:59:17.940 | and felt like there was not a place for them in the church.

01:59:21.660 | They felt like the path, you know,

01:59:22.900 | when you're being told that it's evil and you believe it,

01:59:26.660 | because you believe in your faith,

01:59:28.700 | and you feel like it's unchangeable,

01:59:31.340 | you're putting a kid in a situation

01:59:33.020 | where there's really no good resolution.

01:59:36.100 | It's either be alone for the rest of your life,

01:59:39.060 | or marry outside your sexual preference,

01:59:41.340 | which I don't wanna marry a man.

01:59:43.020 | Like if I was forced to marry a man,

01:59:44.180 | I'm like, I don't want to.

01:59:45.500 | I don't wanna be married to a man,

01:59:47.500 | because I'm heterosexual.

01:59:49.500 | So you're forcing a kid into a situation

01:59:51.940 | where it's very dangerous.

01:59:54.180 | Long story short, this kid went in front

01:59:55.340 | of the Las Vegas Mormon temple and shot himself.

01:59:58.380 | Killed himself.

01:59:59.220 | That impacted our community.

02:00:01.740 | And not just that, but it was like severe bullying

02:00:06.860 | to LGBTQ kids.

02:00:08.420 | In the '90s, it was especially different.

02:00:11.380 | There's still bullying, don't get me wrong,

02:00:12.580 | but man, like bullying in school,

02:00:14.180 | I don't really know actually what it's like in schools now.

02:00:16.380 | Maybe the bullying's just as bad as it was in the '90s,

02:00:18.740 | but there was like, it was like,

02:00:23.100 | I would hear all the time, like the F slur being slung out

02:00:27.540 | at people who were LGBTQ all the time.

02:00:31.020 | And I wasn't even LGBTQ.

02:00:33.980 | So, you know, it's just seeing that,

02:00:39.300 | I think that every,

02:00:41.260 | any social justice issue takes all sides.

02:00:48.860 | It takes all pieces of the puzzle.

02:00:50.460 | If only the pieces of the puzzle contributed

02:00:53.020 | are from the side that is affected,

02:00:54.700 | I don't believe that we'll ever have resolution.

02:00:57.260 | We're doing a shit job and we need to do better.

02:01:01.020 | And that's just, that's the reality of it.

02:01:05.580 | So that's part of the reason I also have family

02:01:07.260 | who's LGBTQ and it's just something

02:01:09.980 | that's been part of my path.

02:01:12.500 | And I feel like I'm a big believer

02:01:14.540 | in take the path that is presented to you.

02:01:16.940 | And this was just something that came up in my life a lot.

02:01:18.980 | When I met my wife, she was living with her two best friends

02:01:21.140 | who were LGBTQ, who really didn't want her to marry me

02:01:24.420 | because I was Mormon.

02:01:25.340 | And at the time it was Prop 8,

02:01:27.180 | which was Mormons were fighting against LGBT, gay marriage.

02:01:31.700 | And so that, then they didn't come to our wedding

02:01:35.900 | and that really broke my wife's heart.

02:01:37.980 | So it was just like, because Mormonism represented

02:01:41.460 | everything that was against their community.

02:01:45.820 | So--

02:01:46.660 | - So you felt you had to say something.

02:01:48.260 | - Yeah, I felt like by not saying anything,

02:01:50.700 | I was saying everything.

02:01:52.220 | I felt like by not speaking up and being like,

02:01:55.380 | hey, Dan Reynolds is a Mormon singer.

02:01:58.220 | Here's this new band, Imagine Dragons, and they're Mormons.

02:02:01.100 | It was like, okay, well, what do Mormons represent?

02:02:03.500 | They represent Prop 8.

02:02:04.860 | What does Prop 8 represent?

02:02:06.300 | Bigotry towards the LGBTQ community.

02:02:09.460 | So what do I do?

02:02:10.300 | Okay, I can speak in every interview and be like,

02:02:12.180 | well, that's not me, I don't believe that too.

02:02:15.140 | Or I could just be more active about it.

02:02:17.740 | And especially when it was affecting my family

02:02:19.780 | and friends throughout my entire life, it was like,

02:02:21.620 | all right, this seems like a path that you need to go down.

02:02:25.020 | So long story short, it was a path that just presented itself

02:02:29.220 | through things in my life.

02:02:30.700 | - So just on that topic, religion and God

02:02:33.460 | give a lot of meaning to a lot of people.

02:02:35.820 | It gives tradition that brings people together

02:02:40.060 | across the generations, but it also can hurt people.

02:02:46.180 | What do you make about that tension?

02:02:50.540 | So a source of meaning, but also a source of pain for people.

02:02:54.740 | - The reality is, at least to me,

02:02:58.420 | again, this is just my reality.

02:03:00.620 | I feel like I'm doing my dad's thing

02:03:01.860 | every time I'm talking to him.

02:03:03.100 | I'm like, I don't really know.

02:03:04.340 | - My two cents. - Here's my two cents.

02:03:05.700 | - You have become your father.

02:03:07.300 | - The reality, and it's my reality,

02:03:11.660 | and it is the reality for sure, is,

02:03:14.420 | I think that religion has brought a lot of hurt

02:03:21.380 | and pain to a lot of people.

02:03:24.420 | Absolutely it has.

02:03:26.340 | I don't think anybody can dispute that on either side.

02:03:30.580 | Whether it's war, whether it's slaughtering

02:03:35.580 | of entire peoples, there's been a lot of pain

02:03:40.820 | and suffering that has come from religion.

02:03:42.900 | So my little thing that has been hard for me

02:03:46.660 | is a faith crisis.

02:03:47.860 | I had religion, and then I lost it, and then I had nothing.

02:03:50.900 | So for me, I was like, well, religion did that to me.

02:03:53.620 | But then at one point, it's kind of like,

02:03:58.100 | how much of my life am I just gonna complain

02:03:59.980 | about being raised Mormon or being depressed?

02:04:04.500 | As I get older, I'm like, okay, so what?

02:04:07.940 | Okay, it's really hurt me, but were there any good things

02:04:11.740 | that came out of Mormonism?

02:04:12.820 | Well, yeah, there's a lot of good things

02:04:14.220 | that have come to my family through Mormonism.

02:04:16.780 | Closeness, we're really, really close.

02:04:18.560 | Mormon culture is that you live together forever.

02:04:21.620 | The teaching is that your families are forever.

02:04:24.340 | We die, and then we go to heaven together,

02:04:25.860 | and we're together forever.

02:04:27.040 | My family really believes that principle.

02:04:29.200 | All of them do.

02:04:30.120 | And that instills a certain way of living

02:04:35.320 | that's kind of beautiful, even if it's naivety.

02:04:38.180 | There's something kind of beautiful about believing

02:04:41.660 | that we're forming these bonds together as a family

02:04:43.540 | and that we're gonna be together forever.

02:04:46.260 | It brings a lot of comfort to a kid, too.

02:04:48.180 | When I was little, I was like, wow,

02:04:50.620 | it's gonna be okay if I die

02:04:51.740 | because I get to see my mom again.

02:04:53.220 | You know what I mean?

02:04:54.060 | I really believed that.

02:04:55.980 | Is the right answer that you tell that kid,

02:04:58.300 | actually, when you die,

02:05:00.040 | you're not gonna see your mom again?

02:05:02.040 | Maybe, it might be, I don't know.

02:05:04.480 | And anybody who has a kid is gonna face that moment.

02:05:08.400 | I've already faced it, where you sit down,

02:05:10.120 | and my kid was like, hey, Dad, when you die,

02:05:12.680 | am I gonna see you again?

02:05:14.360 | That was actually a really hard moment for me

02:05:16.760 | because I was suddenly faced with,

02:05:19.040 | okay, do I give the answer that I thought was bullshit,

02:05:22.920 | or do I give the answer of what I think it is,

02:05:25.200 | or do I give the real answer, which is I don't know?

02:05:29.220 | And that's what I chose,

02:05:30.700 | which as a father, that's not always the easiest answer

02:05:33.220 | because your kid, it's a wonderful thing

02:05:35.300 | that you feel like you can give your kid the comfort of,

02:05:37.620 | hey, your parents are gonna take care of everything,

02:05:40.080 | we know everything, we've been around,

02:05:42.000 | my kid's always like, are you the strongest?

02:05:43.540 | I'm like, yeah, I am the strongest.

02:05:45.100 | You're stronger than everybody?

02:05:46.340 | - Yeah. - Yeah,

02:05:47.180 | I'm stronger than everybody.

02:05:48.000 | You know what I mean?

02:05:48.920 | So when you're faced with that moment,

02:05:51.180 | it's like, it kinda sucks to tell your kid,

02:05:54.020 | you know what, I don't know if you're gonna see me

02:05:56.440 | after I die, but I hope.

02:05:59.840 | That's why I said, I was like, I don't know, but I hope.

02:06:01.960 | I really hope, 'cause that would be awesome

02:06:03.920 | if we can hang out forever.

02:06:06.320 | And if there's any way for it to happen,

02:06:07.880 | I'll make it happen.

02:06:09.020 | You know what I mean?

02:06:09.860 | That's kind of what my answer was.

02:06:11.700 | So long story short, sorry,

02:06:13.680 | I know that I'm being lengthy on this.

02:06:15.760 | Is there, what is my thought on religion?

02:06:18.280 | It just is.

02:06:19.280 | It's been here forever, it's coping.

02:06:22.120 | Maybe it's, I can't say whether it's true or false.

02:06:25.020 | How the hell am I supposed to know?

02:06:26.840 | You know what I mean?

02:06:28.600 | I've lived 34 years on this planet.

02:06:32.020 | A lot of people have been around a lot longer than me,

02:06:34.140 | and they really believe very deeply,

02:06:35.940 | and a lot of them are smarter than me.

02:06:37.940 | You know what I mean?

02:06:38.780 | I look at my older brothers, for instance,

02:06:40.220 | who are very practicing Mormons.

02:06:43.180 | These guys are hyper-intelligent.

02:06:45.460 | My younger sister, hyper-intelligent.

02:06:47.700 | All of them start smarter than me.

02:06:49.340 | They all believe it still.

02:06:50.380 | So what am I supposed to say?

02:06:52.520 | Well, you're all stupid.

02:06:53.880 | You know what I mean?

02:06:54.720 | You're all wrong.

02:06:55.800 | I don't know.

02:06:57.020 | Maybe it's the South Park episode where everybody dies,

02:06:59.180 | and then they're like,

02:07:00.540 | well, the right answer was Mormonism,

02:07:02.580 | and everybody's like, aw.

02:07:03.880 | (laughing)

02:07:05.660 | Mormons love that moment in South Park.

02:07:08.260 | They're like, hey, that day may come.

02:07:10.060 | (laughing)

02:07:11.100 | That day may come.

02:07:12.180 | - Yeah, so maybe I don't know is the honest answer

02:07:16.760 | for everybody around the table.

02:07:19.040 | But the biggest question for which I don't know

02:07:22.060 | is the right answer is what's the meaning

02:07:25.380 | of this whole thing?

02:07:26.420 | What's the meaning of life?

02:07:27.780 | Now, you're not allowed to say I don't know.

02:07:32.260 | - Okay.

02:07:33.460 | - You can be just like your dad and say,

02:07:36.580 | let me just give my two cents.

02:07:38.780 | - Take it, whatever it's worth, take it or leave it.

02:07:41.740 | It's probably worth nothing,

02:07:42.740 | just piddle on the ground.

02:07:48.680 | - Why are we here?

02:07:49.720 | It's just busily creating all these kinds of things,

02:07:55.520 | worrying about things, having kids.

02:07:57.880 | - My purpose, at least right now,

02:08:01.640 | is to wake up and try to

02:08:08.160 | bring light love to the world,

02:08:14.760 | light love to myself and have integrity.

02:08:18.840 | That's my purpose.

02:08:21.180 | The ultimate purpose of life,

02:08:27.120 | I guess that's my ultimate purpose of life.

02:08:29.320 | I don't know what happens when I die.

02:08:32.680 | Ayahuasca gave me some sense that there's more to be known.

02:08:37.160 | I'm sure there are other things in life

02:08:38.680 | that would give me that, and I'm looking for it.

02:08:41.180 | I'm a seeker.

02:08:42.020 | I'm always looking for the next something

02:08:46.040 | to give me hope in something more,

02:08:48.640 | even if so I could just not bullshit my kids

02:08:51.480 | when they ask me that question and be like, you know what?

02:08:53.980 | I really don't know.

02:08:56.160 | I wanna not know more, if that makes sense.

02:08:59.880 | I don't wanna, I want to see things that make me confused,

02:09:04.880 | that make me question what I already knew.

02:09:11.960 | When I meet an atheist who comes up to me

02:09:13.560 | and they're like, atheism, atheism, atheism,

02:09:16.520 | it's just as laughable to me as when I meet

02:09:19.280 | the Mormon who comes up and they're like,

02:09:20.720 | Mormonism, Mormonism, Mormonism.

02:09:22.200 | I'm like, how do anyone, how do you guys know?

02:09:27.200 | - So you feel like you're doing some,

02:09:34.640 | through all your travels, through all the people you meet,

02:09:36.980 | you feel like you're still keeping your eyes open

02:09:38.960 | and your heart open to discover something new,

02:09:43.960 | like the Ayahuasca experience,

02:09:47.000 | that there might be deeper truths out there.

02:09:50.560 | - Yeah, and I wanna find 'em,

02:09:52.460 | and I wanna surround myself with people

02:09:54.040 | who are just looking for it.

02:09:55.240 | I'm not interested in people who are just looking

02:09:57.940 | to point fingers at each, life is so short.

02:10:00.520 | I'm looking for, it's one of the reasons

02:10:02.980 | that I wanna meet with you, is I was like, wow,

02:10:05.760 | Lex really seems like he's on a journey to find truth,

02:10:08.040 | and that humility for me, it's same thing with Rick.

02:10:10.360 | It drew me to Rick, it was like, I really,

02:10:12.680 | I see that and I identify with it,

02:10:15.120 | and that's what I'm looking for.

02:10:16.280 | There's the final song on our record,

02:10:18.120 | our new record that's coming out.

02:10:19.840 | The chorus goes, and this is like,

02:10:24.440 | this is my best answer to what you're asking.

02:10:27.240 | The chorus goes, ♪ Take it easy on me ♪

02:10:33.300 | ♪ I need some lullaby ♪

02:10:35.800 | ♪ They tell me heaven's just a lie ♪

02:10:38.600 | ♪ Well, I'm not surprised ♪

02:10:40.520 | ♪ Tell me that you know ♪

02:10:42.360 | ♪ No, you don't ♪

02:10:43.680 | ♪ Yeah, you're just like me ♪

02:10:45.640 | ♪ Can we just all hope for the best ♪

02:10:48.720 | ♪ Take it easy ♪

02:10:51.440 | So that's it for me.

02:10:52.280 | It's like, I'm in a place where I'm like,

02:10:54.360 | I don't know, tell me that you know.

02:10:58.240 | I'm not gonna believe you, maybe you do.

02:11:00.200 | I'm not gonna believe it, but,

02:11:01.640 | like, let's just be easier on each other,

02:11:04.360 | and try to find truth wherever it may lie,

02:11:07.440 | but above all, know that we don't know jack shit.

02:11:11.280 | - I think that's a mic drop moment.

02:11:13.040 | Dan, thank you so much.

02:11:14.140 | You're an incredible human.

02:11:15.300 | I love that you share with the world

02:11:17.520 | the darkness of your mind, of your life experience,

02:11:21.040 | and the beautiful light that you've shown to the world.

02:11:23.400 | So it's a huge honor,

02:11:25.280 | and thank you for spending your valuable time.

02:11:27.120 | Good luck on the tour.

02:11:28.160 | - Thanks, man.

02:11:29.000 | Thanks for having me.

02:11:30.520 | - Thanks for listening to this conversation

02:11:32.000 | with Dan Reynolds.

02:11:33.060 | To support this podcast,

02:11:34.320 | please check out our sponsors in the description.

02:11:37.000 | And now, let me leave you with some words

02:11:39.000 | from Aldous Huxley.

02:11:40.360 | After silence, that which comes nearest

02:11:44.280 | to expressing the inexpressible is music.

02:11:48.520 | Thank you for listening, and hope to see you next time.

02:11:51.480 | (upbeat music)

02:11:54.060 | (upbeat music)

02:11:56.640 | [BLANK_AUDIO]

Dan Reynolds: Imagine Dragons | Lex Fridman Podcast #290

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