An Army of Normal Folks - If You're Not Where You Want to Be In Life… This Is Probably Why | Mike Rowe

Episode Date: September 24, 2026

In this episode, Bill sits down with Dirty Jobs host Mike Rowe for a Supporting Greatness conversation about the three normal men who made him: a grandfather who only went to the seventh grade, a scoutmaster who ran Boy Scout Troop 16 like an organized gang and made a stammering kid sing to 200 people, and a music teacher who told him to stutter on his own time. Mike traces Dirty Jobs to a call from his mother at 42 and the sewer footage that got him fired from CBS. That opens a bigger conversation about who supports greatness: why enduring discomfort is never enough, why a comfort zone becomes a human stop sign, and why one of the smartest men Mike ever met never finished school. Plus faking his way into the Baltimore Opera, three firings from QVC, and work ethic scholarships for people who skip the four-year degree. ARMY ACTIONS Sign up for the newsletter: https://normalfolks.org/#newsletter-cta Join or start a service club: https://normalfolks.org/service-clubs/ Take the 10 Level Challenge, "the hero's journey for service": https://normalfolks.org/10-level-challenge/ Learn about Mike Rowe's work ethic scholarships at mikeroweWORKS: https://mikeroweworks.org/ Have an idea for a Shop Talk or a guest for the show? Write Bill anytime at [e-mail] Follow us on all socials: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/armyofnormalfolks/ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@armyofnormalfolks Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ArmyofNormalFolks X: https://x.com/armynormalfolks LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/an-army-of-normal-folks/ — 0:00 Mike Rowe on Supporting Greatness 2:20 Mike Rowe on His Grandfather and Dirty Jobs 12:57 How Mike Rowe Got Fired From CBS 18:32 Why Mike Rowe Had a Stutter as a Kid 21:23 What Boy Scouts Was Like in 1975 22:41 Why Enduring Discomfort Isn't Enough 30:54 Why Your Comfort Zone Is a Human Stop Sign 32:48 Mike Rowe on Music Teacher Fred King 39:17 The Audition That Ended His Stutter 45:30 How Mike Rowe Faked His Way Into the Opera 54:29 Why Dirty Jobs Never Did a Second Take 59:23 Mike Rowe on Work Ethic Scholarships  Support the show: https://www.normalfolks.us/#joinSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

You've heard the chaos. Now you can see it. Do we want to jump right in? Watch all your favorite podcasts from start to finish right inside the free IHart Radio app. Make some noise. Wooee! Catch every laugh and eye roll on shows like Bestie Listen, Hey Jonas and Los Culturistas. Now with full video. I'll just leave that there.

It's the same hosts and the same chemistry with all the hilarious moments you've been missing right on your screen. Open the free IHard Radio app. Search video podcasts and tap watch. Hi, it's Alec Baldwin. This season on my podcast, here's the thing I'm speaking with more artists, policymakers, and performers like actor Stephen Root. I think for me to be any good

or for any character act to be any good, you've got to put enough of yourself and your empathy for people in it. I'm a people watcher. You see that guy going down the dream and go, yeah, I can use that. Open Igloo co-founder, Alia Muhammad. I love staying on top of what is going on in our city,

what is going on in city policy. What is on renter's minds and taking all of that knowledge to build a platform that hopefully is going to make New York City better in the long run. And actress and singer Melissa Eriko. Partnership took on a whole other meaning when I started making my own work. It's like you with a great actress or actor. It was best to come out of your trailer, full of life, and just face another person who's full of life and don't talk. Listen to Here's the Thing on the IHeart Radio app Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hi, I'm Michael Imperioly. I want to tell you about my new podcast, Underground Zero. It's about what happened in the aftermath of the 9-11 attacks on the World Trade Center in New York. We're looking at the opportunity of a lifetime for us and the other families. While the world was mourning, five powerful New York families saw an opportunity. The debris supposed to go to the city on the side.

And some of it will. They would go on to make millions of dollars. What's in the tunnels? Gold bars, silver ingots. It could be worth half a billion. And they would have made more if it hadn't been for one courageous cop. No, Dad, don't. You're going to need all of us.

I'll call you when I can. Frank, be careful. Underground Zero, starring Steve Sharipa, Ray Abruzzo, and me, Michael Imperio. Would you be willing to see your family go to pieces? Some ways it already has. Listen to Underground Zero on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. A shocking crime and a cover-up at the highest levels of the United States Marine Corps. Someone opened the door and was the primary shooter.

Is it possible you could do that and then suppress the memory? A new podcast series, Faultline Haditha, tells the story the United States government wants to keep buried. How can you not know? There were women and children in there. You're going to tell us here that you don't know what happened that day? Based on thousands of pages of previously classified documents and over 100 hours of secretly filmed video, the truth about one of the most infamous crimes in Marine Corps history

can finally be told. If you've got five players and one of them is guilty of murder at least, and you offer immunity to the other four, you better be right about the fifth. Because if you're not, then you've just given immunity to your killer. Listen to Faultline Haditha on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. My name is Josie Duffy Rice. I'm a journalist who covers the criminal legal system.

And over my career, I've heard account after account of prosecutorial misconduct, story after story of injustice. But I've never heard a story quite like this. The more I kept reading that stuff, I thought, man, there's more red flags that just kept coming up. over and over. We'll hypnotize him to strengthen that memory. So he went into a good france. I really didn't believe any of it was real. And I was like, well, they're going to figure out this is not me.

They're going to do their police job. Listen to Examine the Backfire Effect on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. You broke me. You do not desert happiness. I'm Andrea Gunning. On this season of betrayal, we meet Carl Bryant. Carl thought he was living a normal drama-free life until the messages started. You will have hell to pay. For nine months, someone infiltrated every aspect of Carl's life threatening to ruin him. Cyberstalking, swatting, extortion, impersonation. And then the text threats escalated.

Someone's not going to make it out of this alive. This apartment. It's playing out in real life, not just on the phone. Every piece of evidence pointed to one man. But every piece of evidence was a lie. He was not going to stop unless we stopped him. Listen to Betrayal Season 6 on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What up, y'all?

This your main man, Memphis Bleak right here. host of that Rock Solid podcast. And each week, we bring in you exclusive looks inside music. Everything happening inside the culture. Some of the best conversations were the biggest names in the game. You had a little bit more pressure to be good. And they didn't care if you was a girl. Like, you wasn't getting no points because you was a girl.

If you're not trash, you better be not just good. You better be great. On Rock Silent, we talk in the rap legends, hit-making producers, rising stars from the golden era to the future of this hip-hop. game where we keep it 100% unfiltered and keep it nothing but rock solid yeah the thing about jay my opinion is he's been so great at being seen but mysterious you know what i'm saying he don't got to come talk about nothing you figure it out so it's always a mystique and uh mysteriousness behind them but it ain't like you don't see him listen to rock solid on black effect podcast network i heart

radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you streamed podcast. Welcome back to an army of normal folks. We have an occasional intermission from our normal, normal folks stories, and we will talk to people who aren't so normal. The not so normal people that we talk to, it's not really about them, but it's about who helped them when they were normal. In other words, what normal people help them to their success. And we call these special segments supporting greatness. And today we have a most normal of non-normal people that you could imagine. He's famed for his show Dirty Jobs and lots of other stuff he's done. And his name is Mike Roe. And bro, I can't tell you how much I appreciate you joining us.

I can't think of a time that where somebody has introduced me as abnormal in such a nice way. but thank you. I'll take it. Well, you are abnormal. Our whole podcast is based on the platform that there's normal folks that have financial troubles, family troubles, difficulties in life, and they do extraordinary things at all corners of our culture and society. And those stories are rarely told because we're dominated by the press in New York and the division in D.C. and the social media coming out of your neck of the woods that says,

if you don't look like me, think like me, breathe like me, worship like me or vote like me, you must be my enemy. And this decades-long division that's been percolating in culture, I think can largely be fixed or at least mended by the celebration of normal people doing extraordinary things in their neck of the woods. I want to talk about a few people that I've read about and heard you talk about that did support your greatness. And the first one is your grandfather, which you've touched on. But, you know, I've read that he was kind of a jack of all trades electrician,

could do plumbing. I've read the story of the toilet exploding. And, you know, I'd love for you to tell that story. But more importantly, for me, Mike, is. why did he matter to you so much? You know, not not what he did that makes him an amazing normal guy. But again, the topic is supporting greatness. So what is it that you really deeply defines you that is the piece of him that lasts in your life forever? Yeah. I mean, it's a lot to unpack. But let me first say that as you were describing what your

podcast is I was I was chuckling to myself because it sounded a lot like the pitch I gave to Discovery for Dirty Jobs 20 years ago, which at the time was pretty revolutionary. You know, there was no reality TV on the air per se. And all of the nonfiction stuff that I'd ever been involved in relied on abnormal people, right? Experts with giant. And candidly, spoiler alert, heavily scripted. Oh, heavily. Well, reality TV turned into anything but reality. That's right. That's right.

There was a moment. There was a moment there. Like they call it the Overton window, you know, where my little idea for this show, Forrest Gumped its way onto the air and found a toehold. And the whole pitch was, look, what if we treated normal people the way access Hollywood, treats Brad Pitt, right? That's it. What if we go into a sewer with a full crew and rather than turn the sewer inspector

into the punchline of some joke or rather than just revel in the pure spectacle of wading through people's crap, why don't we let him be the expert and let me learn as his apprentice and just let the cameras be a fly on the wall? And that's really what the show was. And to answer your question, the reason that show looked the way it looked is because that's how I grew up next to my granddad, working as his apprentice, determined to follow in his footsteps.

And of course, the great truth in life, one of many, and I'm sure you've seen this yourself and your exploits. But just because you just because you love something doesn't mean you can't suck at it. And it's so true. And conversely, and maybe even more importantly, just because you don't love something, just because you're not really into something doesn't necessarily mean you might not have a great facility for it, right? How many running backs did you meet in your career that turned out to be a better tight end or maybe this or that, right?

You don't really know necessarily. But when I was 15 or 16, I was pretty sure. I was going to follow in my pop's footsteps, who, to your point, could take apart your watch and put it back together blindfolded, could deconstruct a combine, put it back together, a combustion engine, could build a house without a blueprint. He only went to the seventh grade, but he was a magician, Bill, right? He was a magician in the sense that every day I remember seeing he and my dad, they would, they'd wake up clean, go out into the world to fix some problem, to build a barn to put in a waterline to dig a well, whatever it was, and come home dirty.

And somehow in between magically, a thing got fixed, a problem got corrected. A thing was built, right? How old, how old Mike were you when you woke up to the fact that you should revere your father and grandfather for the hard work they were doing? When did that click for you that they were special? That's a great question. because there's no answer. I never had a realization or a parapitia.

I never had a big aha moment where I suddenly realized my dad and my granddad were each great in their own way. I had a front row seat to their greatness, right? And if the point of this conversation is really to elevate that component, right, then I got to tell you, I got the best cards in the world. We didn't have much money. but one of the genius things my pop did, my grandfather I'm talking about, Carl Noble, was years ago when they put in 95, you know, the big interstate up and down the East Coast, his little farmhouse was right in the way of an off ramp. And so the state gave him the option of either writing him a check or relocating his home, right, someplace of his choosing nearby.

Why? My granddad chose to put his home on the top of a hill, right? An isolated hill that was flanked on one side by Stemmers Run Creek. On the other side, by about 100 acres of lowland marsh and thick woods. And on the third side, the off ramp to 95, which would be built about 100 yards down a steep grade filled with pine tree. trees. It sounded like the ocean. In fact, my mother told me it was for the first 12 years of my life, and I believed her like a fool. But my grandfather very strategically put his home in a place where he knew no one could develop. But he also knew that the power lines back in the woods had to be maintained by the state. So the state put in this gravel road, built a wooden bridge over the creek,

and I wound up growing up next to my grandfather in a place that you just couldn't, well, you couldn't dream up. It was completely isolated. It felt like the middle of Colorado somewhere. We didn't actually own all the land we had access to, but we had access to it exclusively. And so we built barns. Because nobody else could use it as it was landlock. There's no one there. There's no one there.

And the state didn't care. I grew up on a little farm in Baltimore County, Maryland, that most people would never even think of as farmland because it was only three miles from the city line. And so I was in a bubble, Bill, the best kind of bubble, right? Because I had a mom and dad who were devoted to each other and raised my brothers and me with great love and care. But right next to them, I had this second set of parents.

My mom's parents who functioned like this walking proof of every good lesson my dad ever tried to drill into my head. So, you know, I never felt poor. I never felt bored. I had access to deep and endless woods. I had chores. I had crap to pick up every day. had wood to cut. Our home was heated by a wood stove. And I had two men, my earliest memories, two men who were always there, who loved each other, this father, this man and his son-in-law,

right? They were very, very close. And they raised my brothers in me in a way that had so much meaning and so much impact that we didn't have the good sense to know it until decades later when we looked back at it and saw it for the unique situation that it was. I'm a touchy-feely guy. What is the essence of your grandfather that is a part of the definition of who you are today? Humility. That's a great word. First and foremost, it's humility. And look, It's a very weird thing and maybe a little ironic to brag about your humbleness. I would say that that's a definition of irony, bro. Yeah, right.

You know what makes me so great? It's that I'm so humble. Mac Davis had a great song about that. Remember, oh, Lord, it's hard to be humble when you're perfect in every way. Yeah, sure. It's a great song. I could sing it for you, but I'm not. Good. So you don't want to hear it. I promise you.

Well, so what happened to me was my my granddad was the very definition of humility. He affirmatively ran from credit. And yet he was one of the most competent people that I ever, that I ever knew. And juxtaposed to me, you know, once I realized that I wasn't going to follow in his footsteps, once I learned gently in his presence that the handy gene was recessive, And that the things that came easy to him did not come easy to me. This was the guy, by the way, Carl Noble who told me, maybe the best advice I ever got, he said, look, Mike, I get it. You want to be like me.

You want to be a tradesman. You can be a tradesman. Anybody can be a tradesman, but you need a different toolbox. And so I got one. You know, I went to a community college. I learned to do a bunch of things I wasn't really interested in, like acting and writing and singing and so forth. And, you know, that way led on to a way. And, you know, I'm really summing up a couple decades for you.

But to answer your question, I found success in the entertainment business. Not a ton of it, but enough of it to become arrogant. I learned that I could work pretty much whenever I felt like it. I took many months off every year. I took my retirement in early installments. And I felt like I had figured something out that was important. And then one day, when I was 42 years old, working right across the bay there, I can almost see my old office at CBS. My mom called me.

I was sitting in my cubicle hosting a, I'd been hosting a TV show in those days called Evening Magazine. And she called to say, Michael. You know, your grandfather turned 90 years old yesterday. And I was just thinking, wouldn't it be terrific if before he died, he could turn on his television and see you doing something that looked like work? That he actually would respect. Yeah. I mean, it's not that he didn't respect everything that I had done. You know what I mean.

Men like that, look, people in the office doing office stuff. but the vast majority of my 130 employees are outside working hard kilns chains conveyors noise ripsaws you know if you have all 100% of all 10 digits you're really not a lumberman you know it's that kind of place and no i get it and and and i have i have an enormous amount of respect for each of my employees that show up every day at 7 a.m. work till 3.30 and any overtime hours, I ask them to help my company be successful because those men, they work. And those men respect people that show up and work. And I assume your grandfather would have had some of the same mentality when I say respect. I mean, they respect. They understand

there's, there's a, there's a shrinking number of people in our culture that understand what eight hours on a jackhammer is. Yeah, there's no way to teach you. There's one way. Get on top of it and pull the handle. That's right. That's it. I mean, it's just experience. But to your point and regarding humility, you know, it was a very, it was a very humbling moment for me because after that phone call from my mother, right, I took a cameraman into

the sewers of San Francisco and I hosted an episode of Evening Magazine down there. And that footage was so shableness. shocking, so inappropriate, and so delightfully hideous that it actually got me fired from CBS, but it became the heart. It became the demo tape that I used to sell dirty jobs. And as dirty jobs found its audience and really began to take hold, two things happened that are relevant to the goal of your podcast. The first is that I got a 11th. of feedback I'd never seen before in TV. Not merely positive feedback.

Not, oh, Mike, that's so funny or that's so interesting. The feedback I got that shocked me was, you think that was dirty? Way do you see what my dad does? Where do you see what my grandfather did? My cousin, my brother, my uncle, my sister, my aunt, my uncle, right? It's like, where do you see the lumberyard where they work? Way do you see this?

Way do you see that? And so I realized that there was a giant world out there of pre-built sets called job sites. And there were a giant number of people out there called real people from which we could learn something. And so once I realized that I, once I realized that I was a better guest than I was a host in the TV world, then everything changed. And to realize that is very humbling. You have to let go of the idea that you're the expert, that you're the host, that you're the person with knowledge,

that you're going to share with your audience. All that goes out the window and you become an apprentice. And if there's a punchline to a joke, if there's a brunt to a joke, it's on you, right? The expert is the man or woman you're working with. Thanks for tuning into an army of normal folks where our mission is to make service easier for all of us and together can change the country. Today, I want to share with you an email received from an army member named Hunter Cowan. Hunter wrote, Good morning, Bill.

I've listened to all of your episodes since the very beginning. They are our light and all of the bad news that comes our way every day. By listening to your shows, y'all have inspired me to try to take part to make a difference in my community. I have started a Sleep and Heavenly Peace chapter. Y'all have inspired me, and I know y'all have inspired many others, at some point that inspiration becomes exponential. And when we're emailing with Hunter, he told us his sleep in in his sleep and Heavenly Peace Chapter already has 60 beds built for kids without them in the Richmond area of Virginia. I am inspired myself that episodes that we share can inspire someone like Hunter to

engage and do good work. I'm inspired that there are 60 kids today that are sleeping in beds rather than piles on clothes because Hunter listened to an episode of an Army of normal folks and decided to act. We always say, together, we can change this country. And Hunter is metaphorically what one member of a massive army of normal folks can do to make better lives for other people. We'll be right back. The music you love.

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Download the free IHard Radio app today. Hi, it's Alec Baldwin. This season on my podcast, here's the thing I'm speaking with more artists, policymakers, and performers like actor Stephen Root. I think for me to be any good or for any character actor be any good, you've got to put enough of yourself and your empathy for people in it. I'm a people watcher. You see that guy going down the dream and go, yeah, I can use that.

Open Igloo co-founder, Alia Mohamed. I love staying on top of what is going on in our city, what is going on in city politics, what is on renter's minds, and taking all of that knowledge to build a platform that hopefully is going to make New York City better in the long run. And actress and singer Melissa Eriko. Partnership took on a whole other. meaning when I started making my own work.

It's like you with a great actress or actor. It was best to come out of your trailer, full of life, and just face another person who's full of life and don't talk. Listen to Here's the Thing on the IHeart Radio app Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, I'm Michael Imperioli. I want to tell you about my new podcast, Underground Zero. It's about what happened in the aftermath of the 9-11 attacks.

on the World Trade Center in New York. We're looking at the opportunity of a lifetime for us and the other families. While the world was mourning, five powerful New York families saw an opportunity. The debris is supposed to go to the city-owned salvageard, and some of it will.

They would go on to make millions of dollars. What's in the tunnels? Gold bars, silver ingots. It could be worth half a billion. And they would have made more if it hadn't been for one courageous cop. No, Dad, don't. You're going to need all of us.

I'll call you when I can. Be careful. Underground Zero, starring Steve Sharipa, Ray Abruzzo, and me, Michael Imperioly. Would you be willing to see your family go to pieces? Some waste it already has. Listen to Underground Zero on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. A shocking crime and a cover-up at the highest levels of the United States Marine Corps. Someone opened the door and was the primary shooter.

Is it possible you could do that? that and then suppress the memory. A new podcast series, Faultline Haditha, tells the story the United States government wants to keep buried. How can you not know? There were women and children in there. You're going to tell us here that you don't know what happened that day? Based on thousands of pages of previously classified documents and over a hundred hours

of secretly filmed video, the truth about one of the most infamous crimes in Marine Corps history can finally be told. If you've got five players and one of them, is guilty of murder at least. And you offer immunity to the other four, you better be right about the fifth. Because if you're not, then you've just given immunity to your killer. Listen to Faultline Haditha on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. My name is Josie Duffy Rice. I'm a journalist who covers the criminal legal system. And over my career, I've heard account after account of prosecutorial misconduct, story after

story of injustice. But I've never heard a story quite like this. The more I kept reading that stuff, I thought, man, there's more red flags that just kept coming up over and over. We'll hypnotize him to strengthen that memory. So he went into a good france. I really didn't believe any of it was real. And I was like, well, they're going to figure out this is not me.

They're going to do their police job. Listen to Examined the Backfire Effect on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. You broke me. You do not deserve happiness. I'm Andrea Gunning. On this season of betrayal, we meet Carl Bryant. Carl thought he was living a normal, drama-free life until the messages started. You will have hell to pay. For nine months, someone infiltrated every aspect of Carl's life. threatening to ruin him.

Cyberstalking, swatting, extortion, impersonation. And then the text threats escalated. Someone's not going to make it out of this alive. It's playing out in real life, not just on the phone. Every piece of evidence pointed to one man. But every piece of evidence was a lie. He was not going to stop unless we stopped him. Listen to Betrayal Season 6 on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

What up, y'all. This your main man, Memphis Bleak right here. Host of that rock solid podcast. And each week, we bring in you exclusive looks inside music. Everything happening inside the culture. Some of the best conversations were the biggest names in the game. You had a little bit more pressure to be good. And they didn't care if you was a girl. Like, you wasn't getting no points because you were the girl. If you're not trash, you better be not just good. You better be great. On rock solid, we're talking to rap legends, hitmaking producers,

rising stars from the golden era to the future of this hip-hop game, where we keep it 100% unfiltered and keep it nothing but rock solid. Yeah. The thing about Jay, my opinion, is he's been so great at being seen but mysterious. You know what I'm saying? He don't got to come talk about anything. You figure it out. So it's always a mystique and mysteriousness behind them,

but it ain't like you don't see them. Listen to Rock Solid on Black Effect Podcast Network, iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you streamed podcasts. It's like, look, I had success in TV. I was doing okay. I was happy. But things didn't really blow up for me until I really kind of reembraced the human. that my pop had demonstrated to me as a boy day after day, week after week,

month after month and year after year. So we can say that what supported the greatness of dirty jobs was the lessons and the work done by your grandfather, who you've now named a whiskey after, which is interesting too. Why not? Okay. So we've had humility from granddad. I got it.

Talk to me about Glendon Huntington. Wow, you've done some research. Good for you. Thank you. Thank you so much. We can read in Memphis. Glendon Huntington was a colonel in the Army. And he was probably the first man outside of men who were related to me that changed.

the trajectory of my of my life he was a scoutmaster in troop 16 and um i was a weirdly shy kid bill i had a bad stammer when i was 11 12 years old 13 my dad and mom decided that the boy scouts would be good for me they drove me to kenwood united presbyterian church one wednesday night pushed me out of the uh slow rolling station wagon with the fake lumber on the side and sent me into the church basement. The family roads were. That's a family roadster. That's what it was. I think it was a, I think it was a town and country station wagon. A forged station wagon with the wood paneling down the side, probably green or blue. Who knows? At that point, everything was green and beige. I lived in a green and beige world. Mike, you said you had a stammer. Do you mean what is a stammer shy,

and couldn't gather his words or like a real out stutter. I didn't know at the time. I would learn. I would learn over the next couple of years. My condition, whatever it was, was cured partially by Glendon Huntington and partially by another guy. I'm pretty sure you're going to ask me about a high school music teacher. But I didn't, it wasn't a full-on porky pig, a bib-a-bib-da-bib-a-bib-that's-all-folks kind of thing.

It was a nervous tick brought on, I think, by just a weird level of shyness. I didn't like people looking at me. And when they did, I just froze up in a way that made T's and S's problematic. And given your career, that's almost meltyllis. type story. It's like doesn't fit. It's amazing that well, that's what you came from and that's who you are now. That's crazy. Well, look, I mean, you can you can change the road that you're on. You know, I don't think you I don't think people can change the fundamental essence of, of who they are. But you can act like somebody you'd rather be. And sometimes that's a big step in the right direction.

we have role models. That's why we have mentors. You know, you're trying to figure out who you want to be. Glendon Huntington. And by the way, quick sidebar, the Boy Scouts of America in 1975, 1976, at least in Troop 16, was a different Boy Scouts, right? This was not a safe space. This was basically an organized gang run by a former colonel who brought extraordinary discipline, extraordinary political incorrectness, an extraordinary sense of consequence to the proceedings. We were divided into patrols. We had patrol leaders. There was a senior patrol leader.

There was an oath. There were rituals. There were sacred pledges. We took all that stuff very seriously. There was also a boxing ring where, you know, young men settled their differences in a time-honored way. there were shooting lessons, archery lessons. You know, we were all taught how to handle firearms. It was a whole new world for me.

I would be in your Boy Scout troop. I want to be in that. It was kick ass, man. I bet it was awesome. So how did he help you? How did he support you? What did he do? You know, most, most coaches, most,

most men who are really trying to instill some kind of work ethic in their charges will, we'll try and find a way to help the person understand that adversity needs to be confronted, and challenges are not the enemy, and that you have to be willing to be uncomfortable in many, many different ways. What Mr. Huntington showed me was that that's not quite enough. That's not quite where you want to go. That'll get you so far. But if you want to get beyond that, it's not enough to be willing to endure something uncomfortable. You have to find a way to like it. like as the Navy SEALs would say, you have to, you have to embrace the suck. You need to enjoy it.

So, and I didn't know enough at the time. I was just a boy. But when I look around today, you know, most of the people who have truly distinguished themselves in life have found a way to not just welcome adversity, but to look at square in the face and laugh hysterically, even as they. they spit in its eye. And so the first lesson I had in a real world was he knew I stammered, but he also knew you couldn't stammer when you sang.

And for all his machismo, for all of, you know, the boxing and the wrestling and the guns, he loved poetry and he loved music. And the Boy Scouts at these jamborees, we'd have these fires. These big campfires, right? And sometimes parents would come and other troops would come. And 100 people would be gathered around this giant fire. And we would do these skits and we would sing these songs. And Glendon Huntington forced me to sing a song in front of a couple of hundred people.

And when I sang that song, I didn't stutter and I didn't stammer. And it was the first time a little light bulb when I was. off in my head. Now, it was also a deeply inappropriate song that I never should have sung in a Boy Scout uniform at a jamboree in front of a couple hundred people. My question was, what's the song? I got to know what the song was. Do you remember a famous Harvard mathematician and musician named Tom Lira? I'm sorry. I wish I did. I don't. I will when we finished talking. This guy was the ultimate satirist in the 60s and 70s. He made very inappropriate albums.

And he sang like in a Dixieland jazz type style. He wrote all his own compositions. But all the songs were parodies, poisoning pigeons in the park, the Vatican rag, the songs like these. I sang a song, and don't ask me how I went up with this album as a kid, but I had it and I loved it. And I sang a song called Be Prepared. And of course, be prepared is the Boy Scout motto. And so Glendon Huntington insisted that I sing a song. I didn't tell him what I was going to sing, but I walked out there in front of the fire.

I probably don't remember all the words, but it went something like, be prepared. That's the Boy Scout marching song. Be prepared. You won't go wrong. Be prepared to hold your liquor pretty well. Don't write naughty words on walls if you can't. Spelled. Be prepared. To hide that pack of cigarettes, don't make book. If you cannot cover bets, keep that pot well hidden where you're sure that it will not be found. And be careful not to turn on

when the scoutmaster's around. For he only will insist that it be shared. Be prepared. Not just the first verse, right? Micro, everybody would be prepared. Thank you. Take a bow. Mike, that's amazing. So your scoutmaster hazed you out of stuttering. That's pretty much what I'm getting from. Yeah, but in the most loving way. Yeah. Yeah.

He started the process and what he unlocked in me was a realization that music, a thing that I had grown up with but had no interest in, my mom's very musical. You know, I was always around. I just didn't care, you know. But I can carry a tune, right? And so that was the first time I realized, wait a second, that music could be useful for something other than merely enjoying, right? It's a, it transformed the physiology or the physiology of my body. And that was interesting. That combined with the dangerousness of the games that we played and the stakes and the whitewater rafting and the mountaineering in Cimarron C.

in New Mexico. And insane games, Bill, like swing the thing. Have you heard of swing the thing? Mike, this is, you know, this is a family show. Well, look, not that thing. And besides, if you can swing that thing, good for you.

I get, I'm not swinging. I can barely find it. But we played games like Capture the Flag and British bulldog, violent games. And this game called Swing the Thing, you would take a tent bag and you would fill it with wet rags. And then you would take a length of rope about 14 feet long and you'd tie it to the top of the bag. And one guy would hold the other end of the rope and start to swing the bag around right just about maybe a foot off the floor,

no more than that. So he's in the middle. And you jump. So you got 20 guys all stepping in, jumping over this thing that's being swung at about 40 miles an hour, by the way. There's a lot of physics going on. And when that thing hit you in the ankles, you went down like a cheap card table. I'm telling you people.

Yeah, your hills overhead. People went home with contusions, chipped teeth, broken fingers. It was a bloodbath, but, you know, nobody died, right? And so it was just all of that combined is my answer to your question. That's what the Boy Scouts did for me. And I recognized the value early on, and I stayed. I became an Eagle Scout. A couple years later, I became, I think they call it a distinguished Eagle Scout.

And to this day, I, you know, I look back on those experiences as very instructive. So on this one, the same question. If there's one word to sum up the essence of what your scoutmaster buried, built, and, and, and, and, and harvested inside of you, if your grandfather's humility, what is the scoutmaster? Well, if there's only one word, you'll forgive me if I employ the use of hyphens, but I'll go with embrace hyphen the hyphen, hyphen, suck. embrace the suck. Yeah. Or toughness. Embrace discomfort.

Be uncomfortable. If fear of failures, the greatest barrier to success. And if you're unwilling to be uncomfortable and get out of that, you're never going to find any level of growth. Well, you've already gone as far as you're going to go, right? I mean, if you're going to further and your goal is to be comfortable, you're only going to progress through a series of happy. accidents. Yeah, Mike, and you know there's another lesson there, which is, you know, a comfort zone is, I think we all need a comfort zone.

You know, it may be a church group. It may be a foursome of golf. It may be a group of people you play bridge with. It may be a little cafe corner table where you share a coffee or glass of wine where you kind of recharge your batteries and and share. your most intimate secrets when the world's hit you in the mouth. I have one. It's my leather chair. And I'm not kidding. If I die in a fiery accident today and they cannot identify my body by dental records, they could match my ass to the cushion on that chair and they'd know who I was because it's my chair. That's forensic science right there, Bill. That's what it is. Kids don't sit in at nothing. And it's my comfort zone. But, you know, the thing about my time in that chair, Nothing profound has ever happened in my life or the lives of anybody around me while I was sitting in it.

And I think metaphorically, that is the problem with the comfort zone is if you're unwilling to, if you have fear of failure, or you're unwilling to embrace a suck or you're unwilling to get out of those comfortable places, you have hit a human stop sign. Like you say, I think that's absolutely true. And so embracing the suck makes a lot of sense. Well, there's a paradox in it, too. You know, as much as you love the comfort of your chair, if you never leave it, you'll grow to hate it. You'll get that. That's good, right? That's profound, Mike.

That's really good. You have to get up and leave the thing that makes you comfortable, not because it builds character, but simply because you can't even define what comfortable is until or unless you've been uncomfortable. We'll be right back. The music you love. I heart radio. Your favorite radio stations. Everywhere you go. The podcasts everyone's talking about.

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Download the free. I. app today. Hi, it's Alec Baldwin. This season on my podcast, here's the thing I'm speaking with more artists, policymakers, and performers like actor Stephen Root. I think for me to be any good or for any character actor to be any good, you've got to put enough of yourself and your empathy for people in it. I'm a people watcher. You see that guy going down the dream and go, yeah, I can use that. Open Igloo co-founder, Alia Muhammad. I love staying on top of what is going on and our city, what is going on in city politics, what is on renter's minds, and taking all of that

knowledge to build a platform that hopefully is going to make New York City better in the long run. And actress and singer Melissa Eriko. Partnership took on a whole other meaning when I started making my own work. It's like you with a great actress or actor. It was best to come out of your trailer, full of life, and just face another person who's full of life and don't talk. Listen to Here's the Thing on the IHeart Radio app Apple Podcasts

or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, I'm Michael Imperioly. I want to tell you about my new podcast, Underground Zero. It's about what happened in the aftermath of the 9-11 attacks on the World Trade Center in New York. We're looking at the opportunity of a lifetime for us and the other families. While the world was mourning, five powerful New York families saw an opportunity. The debris is supposed to go to the city on South.

And some of it will. They would go on to make millions of dollars. What's in the tunnels? Gold bars, silver ingots. It could be worth half a billion. And they would have made more if it hadn't been for one courageous cop. No, Dad, don't. You're going to need all of us.

I'll call you when I can. Frank, be careful. Underground Zero, starring Steve Sharipa, Ray Abruzzo, and me, Michael Imperio. Would you be willing to see your family go to pieces? Some waste it already has. Listen to Underground Zero on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. A shocking crime and a cover-up at the highest levels of the United States Marine Corps. Someone opened the door and was the primary shooter.

Is it possible you could do that and then suppress the memory? A new podcast series, Faultline Haditha, tells the story the United States government wants to keep buried. How can you not know? There were women and children in there. You're going to tell us here that you don't know what happened that day? Based on thousands of pages of previously classified documents and over 100 hours of secretly filmed video, the truth about one of the most infamous crimes in Marine Corps history can finally be told. If you've got five players and one of them is guilty of murder at least, and you offer immunity to the other four,

you better be right about the fifth. Because if you're not, then you've just given immunity to your killer. Listen to Faultline Haditha on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. My name is Josie Duffy Rice. I'm a journalist who covers the criminal legal system. And over my career, I've heard account after account of prosecutorial misconduct, story after story of injustice. But I've never heard a story quite like this. The more I kept reading that stuff, I thought, man, there's more red flags that just kept coming up.

over and over. We'll hypnotize him to strengthen that memory. So he went into a good france. I really didn't believe any of it was real. And I was like, well, they're going to figure out this is not me. They're going to do their police job. Listen to Examine the Backfire Effect on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

You broke me. You do not deserve happiness. I'm Andre Gunning. On this season of betrayal, we meet Carl Bryant. Carl thought he was living a normal, drama-free life until the messages started. You will have hell to pay. For nine months, someone infiltrated every aspect of Carl's life, threatening to ruin him. Cyberstalking, swatting, extortion, impersonation.

And then the text threats escalated. Someone's not going to make it out of this alive. It's a barbant. It's playing out in real life, not just on the phone. Every piece of evidence pointed to one man. But every piece of evidence was a lie. He was not going to stop unless we stopped him. Listen to Betrayal Season 6 on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

What up, y'all? This your main man, Memphis Bleak right here. Host of that Rock Solid podcast. And each week, we bring in you exclusive looks inside music, everything happening inside the culture. Some of the best conversations were the biggest names in the game. You had a little bit more pressure to be good. And they didn't care if you was a girl. Like, you wasn't getting no points because you were a girl.

If you're not trash, you better be not just good. You better be great. On rock silent, we talk in the rap legends, hit-making producers, rising stars from the golden era to the future of this hip-hop game, where we keep it 100% unfiltered and keep it nothing but rock solid. Yeah. The thing about Jay, my opinion, is he's been so great

at being seen but mysterious. You know what I'm saying? He don't got to come talk about nothing. You figure it out. So it's always a mystique and mysteriousness behind them, but it ain't like you don't see him. Listen to Rock Solid on Black Effect Podcast Network, iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

or wherever you should. stream podcast. Tell me about Fred King. He is a big one man. This is, you know, it's funny. I didn't know what we were going to talk about, but it's a, and just to be clear, there are women in my life who have been transformatively influential. In fact, with the exception of my producer Chuck, I only hire women. My business partner is a woman. I like women. Let's be clear. Growing up, My mom, of course, was always there, but it was men. It was men who grabbed me periodically by the scruff of the neck and said, no, not that way, this way, not there, here. And Fred King was the one who did that in a most meaningful way.

He was my high school music teacher. If you saw Mr. Holland's opus, you know, that's the kind of guy he was. He changed the barometric pressure in a room when he walked into it. He was just a force, you know. He looked like Don Rickles. He had false teeth. He lost all his teeth boxing and playing football when he was in the Navy. But he was also the most gifted musician I ever knew.

He was known as the king of the barbershoppers. He was a... Oh, that's where that comes from in your world. That's where that whole thing that you do comes from. That's why I sing four-part harmony on all the commercials on my podcast because I, A, I can, B, it amuses me. Sometimes it makes me uncomfortable. And it's an homage to Fred King.

Fred, he started teaching at overly senior high the same year I became a freshman there. And I still had my stammer, but I knew I could sing, thanks to Mr. Huntington. And so I signed up for all the choruses. And my chorus teacher, my choir teacher, was this freak named Fred King, who would, he would challenge students in ways that no teacher could do today. Just like Mr. Huntington did in the Boy Scouts, Fred King occupied that part of the map that says, here be dragons. he did things very, very differently. And he turned my high school inside out, right? I mean, you're a football guy, right?

I am. So you'll appreciate this. In his first year during the homecoming weekend at Overly, Fred King went into the band, the giant band room and took a snare drum and put it around his neck. And with me and about a dozen other people following him, he started marching up and down the halls, playing. I mean, a real, like a charge into battle cadence. Yeah, yeah, that's like a march beat.

That's the, yeah, that's exactly what it was. And of course, Fred played in a marching band for years. He played every instrument. We didn't know any of this at the time. We just saw this crazy Pied Piper, marching. up and down the normally sedate halls of overly and people would come out of the classrooms. He'd march into the classrooms, disrupted the class. He got the whole school to follow him out to the football field where the overly Falcons

were preparing to get their ass kicked again because we didn't win a lot. But it didn't matter. It didn't matter. He got like the whole student body out there and taught us the overly falcons. school song. We didn't even know he had a school song, but he taught it to us and he made us sing it, like with great pride. And he was another one of those guys, very macho, very manly and masculine in all the traditional ways. But he would, he'd look you square in the face and weep as he was singing, God bless America, or some old song about sweethearts and mothers and wars and all these

things. It was such a, he was such an interesting dude. And over that first year, I, I formed a relationship with him rooted in the kind of trust that really, I think can only be fostered through, through music and, and a certain level of sacrilege. You know, he was just so compelling that I was really, I was just enamored of the guy. And one day I found an album in his office called the Oriole 4, and that's when I learned that he was the baritone and a world champion barbershop quartet. And that's when I learned that he conducted this amazing group of men called the Course of the Chesapeake who had won international gold medals singing. This was a world that I didn't know existed, right?

I took the album home and I realized after listening to it that I could hear all of the parts and I could sing them and I could kind of make sense of them like a puzzle. And when I told him about it, he took, he found three other boys in my class, one of whom you know, Chuck, the guy who produces my podcast. And he taught us how to sing, four-part harmony. And then he brought us into this course of the Chesapeake where an army of men, not all of whom were normal, but many of whom served in the army, many of whom fought in the Second World War in Korea. These old guys would take us out after rehearsals for a beer at a place called Johnny Jones. And they would teach us old songs.

And we would, they called it woodshedding, you know, the kind of singing you should probably do in a woodshed where nobody can hear you. But it's how you learn to harmonize and how you learn to. figure out these parts. And so suddenly every Tuesday night, I'm getting a, I'm getting a lesson in in music and history from men with gold stars and all kinds of medals for meritorious service in the Marines and in the Army. And through it all was Fred, you know, he was always there for that. But the thing he did, Bill, honestly, that changed everything, later that year, he made me audition for a play, for the school play. And it was a musical.

What part? So I was, what part? It was curly in Oklahoma. Wow. He made me audition for this thing. And my problem wasn't the music. I could sing. I could hit the notes.

I was all right. But there's a lot of talking in that musical. And I really didn't want to do my Porky Pig routine in front of, you know, 1100 students. but he made me audition. He made me do a monologue. And I got maybe 20 seconds into it. I was doing a monologue from a play called The Rainmaker, a character called Starbuck.

And I'm getting through it. So, yeah, Bert Lancaster did the part. Yeah, that's right. Moving once upon a time. So I'm stammering and making a hash of it about 20 seconds in. And I look out and Fred sitting out there in the audience with maybe, you know, four or five other teachers and 20 other kids. who were going to be auditioning.

And he held up his hand and he said, Mikey, hey, I like what you're doing with the character here. But the character you're auditioning for doesn't stutter. So do me a favor. Stutter on your own time.

And just do it once without all that porky pig. Okay? That's how he talked to. He really said it that way. He said it just like that. Just like that. Very matter of fact. Did you feel undressed?

No. standing up there in front of everybody like that? Well, yes, I was nervous, but I wasn't, I didn't feel disrespected in spite of the way he talked to me because I trusted him. And I knew that, right? And so I didn't like without thinking, without questioning the glibness of what he had just suggested I do, right? I did it without the stammer. And 25, 30 seconds into it, he looks at me from the audience and he makes this gesture. He goes, this kind of shrugs his shoulders as if to say, was that so hard?

And I remember, Bill, it was a sound like this. In my head, something clicked. And I thought, well, I don't want to oversimplify it, but I think maybe. I'm going to just try for a while to act like somebody who doesn't stutter. And that was that. You know, to answer your earlier question, as it turns out, I didn't have a physiological problem. And I don't want people to hear stories like this and think that it's all in their mind. There are people stutter and stammer for all sorts of different reasons.

Mel Tillis had a different problem than I did. I was just shy. And I was just trapped in a version of. myself that had limitations. And guys like my granddad and my dad and Mr. Huntington and Mr. King, they weren't having any of that. You know, my pop told me the truth about my limitations. Get a different toolbox, right? Mr. Huntington told me the truth about this comfort. Don't, don't just endure it. Embrace it. And Fred King told me the truth, showed me the truth of about what's possible in the world if you act like somebody who has a temperament different than the one you were born with.

Two things. I lettered in six sports in high school. So that's what I did. And my freshman year, I tore up my shoulder during football season and my favorite teacher was Dale Flickinger, who was the math teacher. He also did the... Yeah, Flickinger from North Dakota. He also did the stats for the football team. And I later learned that he was the starting center on a football team who hadn't lost,

who didn't lose a single game from his freshman and senior year for state championships, which just doesn't really, yeah, you know. And then I found out that he's an amazing artist, musician. and he also happened to be the chess team coach. Four years later, I found myself at the national championships in high school wearing my letter jacket with all my stripes all over playing chess against a bunch of kids that don't look anything like me. Because Dale Flickinger taught me to think about myself in different ways than I had before.

And Mike, one of the reasons I thought about myself the way I had before is because my father left home when I was four. And my mother was married and divorced five times. So I had five fathers in my life by the time I was 18 years old, none of which were worth assault. And it was my coaches and men like Dale Flickinger, who largely defined who I am today. So when I hear your stories, despite the fact that we grew up much different ways from our family standpoint, I really do identify with how great people do support greatness and that I don't think I'm anything, I'm not just like any of my coaches or any of my teachers or any of the men that I'm not exactly like any of them, but I'm 100% like pieces of each of them.

So in some, I represent a piece of all these people. So the question then is from Fred, if the grandfather's humility and the scoutmaster taught you how to embrace the suck, what Fred teach you? What's that word? Let's go with the reverse commute. Because really, when I got out of high school and then went into a community college to to really try and apply all of these lessons. You know, the road into my industry is just paved with IEDs and landmines.

Yeah, it's very, very difficult. It's brutal for sure. But there's always another path. There's always another way to skin the cat. And when I learned that I could get my. union card, my screen actors guild card, which is something I really wanted to get in my mid-20s, because without that, you can't audition for union work. And if you can't audition for union work, you can't get an agent. And no agent will represent you unless you have your union card,

but you can't get your union card unless you do union work. And so it was a closed system. Well, miserable. The loophole was totally miserable. So the loophole was, Wait, if you really need to get into the Screen Actors Guild, you could get into the sister union, one of the sister unions. And this one was called Agma. It was the American Guild of Musical artists. And it oversaw the opera. And the opera, the national opera and the Baltimore Opera and all these other opera houses around the country held zero interest for me. the last thing in the world I ever imagined I would do for money was singing the opera.

But if you could get in and get your Agma card, you could then buy your Screen Actors Guild card because they're sister unions. And so that was my way in. I thought if I can somehow fake my way into the Baltimore Opera, I will be able to buy my membership into the Screen Act. Actors Guild and then go about the business of becoming a famous television personality. I mean, how hard can it be, right? So I went to the library armed with all the lessons that Fred and Glendon and Carl Noble had taught me.

And I got a recording of Lobo M. And I memorized the shortest aria ever written by Giacomo Puccini called the Cote Aria. It's less than three minutes long. It's an Italian. And I walked around the streets of Baltimore for weeks with a Sony Walkman on, listening to Samuel Wamey, make these sounds, these Italian sounds over and over and over. And then I went to an open call and I auditioned. And somehow, somehow I got in. They were looking for young men with low voices.

I checked both of those boxes in 1984. And suddenly, just like that, I'm in the American Guild of Musical Artist, and I'm able to buy my union card for the Screen Actors Guild. But then, you know, proving once again that just when you think you have a plan figured out or a commute mapped out, it's the reverse commute that winds up being interesting.

Because the opera, turned out to be hell of a lot more fun than I thought it would be. The music was amazing. It was a whole new world to me, right? Just like Barbershop was, just like the boy scy. I'd never heard of such a thing. But suddenly I'm dressed as a Viking, standing in a repertory company with 70 other people singing, right? Singing along in a production of Wagner's Dering to Snibel Lundgen.

And just having the time of my life. I mean, it was just such a kick. Pavarotti was on the stage. Domingo came through that stage. You know, James Morris, some of the greatest singers of the 20th century were standing five feet from me. And I'm a 22-year-old kid dressed as a pirate

singing in a language he doesn't even understand because Fred King said, hey, do me a favor. Try it once without the stutter. Stutter on your own time. Because Glendon Huntington said, no, dude, it's not enough just to endure it, figure out a way to love it. Right? So yeah, I mean, I hadn't really thought about it, but when you start looking back at those, I mean, isn't it funny

how the moments in your life that turn out to be the most pivotal, you don't, you don't recognize when you're in the middle of it. It's only when you look back and you can start to get that 30,000 foot view that you really, you really. for instance that you never really did have a dad. You had five dads, but none of them were really the guy that you were supposed to have until the universe gets together and says, okay, we're going to send him a Fleckinger. We'll send him at Del Fleckinger. We'll send him this.

You send him that. Yeah. It's a hell of a thing. Mike, it's true. We'll be right back. You've heard the chaos. Now you can see it. want to jump right in.

Watch all your favorite podcasts from start to finish right inside the free IHard Radio app. Make some noise. Wooee! Catch every laugh and eye roll on shows like Bestie Listen, Hey Jonas, and Las Culturistas. Now with full video. I'll just leave that there. It's the same hosts and the same chemistry with all the hilarious moments you've been missing right on your screen. Open the free IHR radio app.

Search video podcasts and tap watch. Hi, it's Alec Baldwin this season on my podcast. Here's the thing I'm speaking with more artists, policymakers, and performers like actor Stephen Root. I think for me to be any good or for any character actor to be any good, you've got to put enough of yourself and your empathy for people in it.

I'm a people watcher. You see that guy going down the dream and go, yeah, I can use that. Open Igloo co-founder Alia Muhammad. I love staying on top of what is going on in our city, what is going on in city politics, what is on renter's minds, and taking all of that knowledge to build a platform

that hopefully is going to make New York City better in the long run. And actress and singer Melissa Eriko. Partnership took on a whole other meaning when I started making my own work. It's like you with a great actress or actor. It was best to come out of your trailer, full of life, and just face another person who's full of life and don't talk. Listen to Here's the Thing on the IHeart Radio app Apple Podcasts,

or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, I'm Michael Imperioly. I want to tell you about my new podcast, Underground Zero. It's about what happened in the aftermath of the 9-11 attacks on the World Trade Center in New York. We're looking at the opportunity of a lifetime for us and the other families. While the world was mourning, five powerful New York families saw an opportunity. The debris is supposed to go to the city-owned salvage yard, and some of it will. They would go on to make millions of dollars.

What's in the tunnels? What's in the tunnels? Gold Bar, Shavangich. It could be worth half a billion. And they would have made more if it hadn't been for one courageous cop. No, Dad, don't. You're going to need all of us.

I'll call you when I can. Frank, be careful. Underground Zero, starring Steve Sharipa, Ray Abruzzo, and me, Michael Imperioly. Would you be willing to see your family go to pieces? Some ways it already has. Listen to Underground Zero on the IHeart Radio app,

Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. A shocking crime and a cover-up at the highest levels of the United States Marine Corps. Someone opened the door and was the primary shooter. Is it possible you could do that and then suppress the memory? A new podcast series, Faultline Haditha, tells the story the United States government wants to keep buried. How can you not know? There were women and children in there.

You're going to tell us here that you don't know what happened that day? Based on thousands of pages of previously classified documents and o'clock documents and over a hundred hours of secretly filmed video, the truth about one of the most infamous crimes in Marine Corps history can finally be told. If you've got five players and one of them is guilty of murder at least, and you offer immunity to the other four, you better be right about the fifth. Because if you're not, then you've just given immunity to your killer. Listen to Faultline Haditha on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

My name is Josie Duffy Rice. I'm a journalist who covers the criminal legal system. And over my career, I've heard account after account of prosecutorial misconduct, story after story of injustice. But I've never heard a story quite like this. The more I kept reading this stuff, I thought, man, there's more red flags that just kept coming up over and over. We'll hypnotize them to strengthen that memory. So he went into a good France. I really didn't believe any of it was real.

And I was like, well, they're going to figure out this is not me. They're going to do their police job. Listen to Examine the Backfire Effect on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. You broke me. You do not desert of happiness. I'm Andrea Gunning. On this season of betrayal, we meet Carl Bryant. Carl thought he was living a normal, drama-free life.

until the messages started. You will have hell to pay. For nine months, someone infiltrated every aspect of Carl's life, threatening to ruin him. Cyberstalking, swatting, extortion, impersonation. And then the text threats escalated. Someone's not going to make it out of this alive. It's playing out in real life, not just on the phone. Every piece of evidence pointed to one man.

But every piece of evidence was a lie. He was not going to stop unless we stopped him. Listen to Betrayal Season 6 on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What up, y'all, this your main man, Memphis Bleak right here, host of that rock solid podcast. And each week, we bring in you exclusive looks inside music, everything happening inside the culture. Some of the best conversations were the biggest names in the game. You had a little bit more pressure to be good. And they didn't care if you was a girl.

Like, you wasn't getting no points because you were the girl. If you're not trash, you better be not just good. You better be great. On rock solid, we're talking to rap legends, hit-making producers, rising stars from the golden era to the future of this hip-hop game, where we keep it 100% unfiltered and keep it nothing but rock-solid. The thing about Jay, my opinion, is he's been so great at being seen but mysterious. You know what I'm saying?

He don't got to come talk about anything. You figure it out. So it's always a mystique and mysteriousness behind them, but it ain't like you don't see him. Listen to Rock Solid on Black Effect Podcast Network, iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you streamed podcast. We're producing a show called an army of normal folks to. highlight normal folks in our communities that do amazing things despite the difficulties they overcome. And inside that,

occasionally we're talking to people like you who have reached really great levels, but we're talking about the people that supported how you've reached that level. And the irony of ironies is, you've told me that you revere your grandfather and he taught you humility. You revered your scoutmaster and he taught you to embrace the suck. and you revered a music teacher who taught you how to reverse commute and the most valuable supportive lessons in your life that make up the essence of what you are came from the very most normal people on earth, a carpenter and a hardworking grandfather and a scoutmaster who

was a former military guy and a music teacher in a high school. normal people that people would walk past every day and not give two thoughts about them as something special who are in fact the most special people in the life of a man who's done amazing things, which to me speaks to every interaction and every opportunity we have in our communities can matter if we make them count. It occurs to me too, listening to you talk, that one of the things that Del Fleckinger and Fred King and my pop and all these people had in common that that is in short supply today is a is a generalist approach to living like a general practitioner as opposed to a specialist i think maybe we've we've entered the realm of

speciality where we give such great deference to people who have mastered one thing but life right well lived anyway, requires lots of different competencies. And this was a big lesson in dirty jobs. Again, I didn't know it when I was learning it. But looking back, especially farmers, you know, what is a farmer really? Like, what's the skill? Well, he's got to be a weatherman and he's got to be a geologist. And he's got to be, oh, he's got to be a businessman for sure.

Yeah. I mean, I saw the show on the artificial and some with the cow. That was crazy. Was that fun? Yeah, that cow still calls me. The cow, dude, I'll tell you. I think the bull had a pretty good time, too, to be honest with you.

Yeah, are you kidding, man? Dirty Jobs showed people the truth of work. You know, the first season was a rumination on feces from every species, right? We just showed you the reality of cleaning up all the stuff the world makes. And season two was artificial insemination and the miracle of modern agriculture. And, you know, we put things on TV that nobody had ever done before. And we did it with humor and honesty. You know, that show, and this goes to humility, too, we never did a second take.

everything you saw on dirty jobs was happening in in real time. And so if you're not humble and you're making a TV show that doesn't do a second take, you're going to be because you are not going to be at your best ever. But you'll always be at your most actual. I was going to say, you'll be the most real. You'll be the most authentic. You know, I get that. I get that because Undefeated, when those guys left Memphis with 550 hours of film to make undefeated,

you know, the first time I saw the hour and 50-minute movie that came a result of those 550 hours of film, it dawned on me. I was never asked to say anything or repeat anything or stand in any one place or anything. And they cropped together an hour and 50 minutes. minute movie out of 550 hours of film. And I will tell you something, when you see yourself in the most authentic space on film for everybody to see, you better have some humility because it's, it's a, it's a, it's an eye-opening thing to see yourself in those type of positions when you sound and act and react and look and feel differently than you think you present.

yourself to the world. And it is an eye-opener and you will get the humility from it. Yeah, you know what? I mean, it's funny. Every time you think you've really learned that lesson, you relearn it in a new way, at least I do. And I spent three years after the opera selling things in the middle of the night on the QVC cable shopping channel.

And it was another world. It was a strange world. It was another experience that came about as the result of a last-minute audition. It was probably the best training I ever got for the industry I'm in today. And the funny thing was, they fired me three times from that gig, all justifiably. The third time, it stuck in 1993. And so when I left, Bill, I didn't talk about my time at QVC. it wasn't a thing I even put on my resume.

But years later, like I'd say 1999, 2000, maybe eight years later, to my horror, when the internet first became a thing, I found this thing called YouTube. And on YouTube, somebody had started posting clips of me selling things in the middle of the night on QVC, right? when I was like 27, 28 years old, like the health team infrared pain reliever and the AMCorp negative ion generator and collectible dolls and Diamondique and all this stuff. And the sensation of watching yourself on a computer screen just like this one, doing something years before that you have absolutely no recollection of doing, but nevertheless can't deny

having done because you're watching yourself do it, that's chilling. Very instructive and very humbling. It is, it is chilling. Mike, I want to tell you how much I really appreciate you joining me and taking the time. And most importantly, you know, tell us a little bit about what did support the things you've done great. I know that Dirty Jobs is just completed. I think season 10.

I guess you're back for season 11, right? I don't know. Honestly, the thing's been on 20 years. Deadliest catch has been on 20 years. No. Unbelievable. And, you know, you got your whiskey. You got everything going on.

But ultimately, what defines you is none of that. Ultimately, what defines you is your grandfather's humility, your scoutmaster's toughness, and your music teachers challenge of, challenge of you to think of yourself in a different way. And I think I think that can't be a better example and illustration of what it takes to support greatness is take the best of all the people that have a positive impact on your life and culminate them into who you are. And you sharing that story with us is really cool. Well, thanks. With your permission, I'd like to share one more thing. It's real quick.

I don't know who in your audience that this might pertain to, but I run a foundation today and we award work ethic scholarships every year. In fact, we do it twice a year. We'll be giving away a million bucks in a couple of months for people who want to pursue a skill that doesn't require a four-year degree. This was the real legacy of dirty jobs and the real legacy of my granddad. It's the foundation's called MicroWorks. We started it on Labor Day in 2008.

And we've helped about 2,000 people so far get meaningful careers in the skilled trades. So it's something I'm passionate about and it's something that's actually moving the needle. So if you or anybody listening wants to pursue a career that's actually in demand that won't require you to sign on to a mountain of debt, then think about a career in the trades. If that's for you, we can help at microworks.org. Microworks.org, do they just go on that thing and apply or tell you about themselves or raise their hand virtually? Yeah, you've got to jump through some hoops, right?

Yeah, look, full disclosure. And this ultimately is the best tribute I can pay to all the men we've discussed. Our scholarship program is called work ethic scholarships. Right. So yeah, I need to see some references. I ask you to write an essay. I ask you to make a videotape and make a persuasive case for yourself and tell us why we should spend the money that we raise on you. But I'll tell you something, Bill. The success stories are amazing. So many people now. Because we've been doing it a while. I circle back now and I see how people are doing. And I hear from welders and steam fitters and pipe fitters and and electricians and plumbers and so forth. And they're all making six figures. They're all leading balanced lives. And they're all without $180,000 in student loans.

Correct. So look, I mean, if you really want to land the plane back with Noble, that's where it was for me. My pop went to the seventh grade, wound up being one of the smartest people I ever met, one of the most competent people you'd ever want to know. And so my foundation today is, you know, that evolved from him just as surely as dirty jobs did. And it's nice of you to bring it up and let me talk about it. I appreciate it. If your listeners can benefit from it, that's why it's there.

Well, I tell you what, I hope one day you and I can meet up and toast a couple of noble Manhattans to your grandfather. That would be a very civilized way to spend a warm afternoon in Memphis. The invitation always stands, my friend. Thank you so much for joining us. And we will continue to watch what you do and continue to listen to and appreciate who supported your greatness, Mike. Appreciate it.

Thanks. Hi, I'm Michael Imperioli. I want to tell you about my new podcast, Underground Zero. We're looking at the opportunity of a lifetime for us and the other families. It's about the aftermath of the 9-11 attacks. What's in the tunnels? Gold bars, Silver Inge, it could be worth half a billion. Starring Steve Sharippa, Ray Abruzzo, and me, Michael Imperioly.

How far you're prepared to go? Depends how far you are. Listen to Underground Zero on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, it's Alec Baldwin. This season on my podcast, here's the thing. I talk to actor Stephen Root. I'm a people watcher. You see that guy going down the dream, go.

Yeah, I can use that. and Open Igloo co-founder Alia Mohamed. I love staying on top of what is going on in our city, what is on renter's minds, and taking all of that knowledge to build a platform that hopefully is going to make New York City better in the long run. Listen to Here's the Thing on the Iheart Radio app Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.

In 1986, a man named Scott Macklem was killed in broad daylight. Police quickly found their suspect. Prosecutors convicted him. But now, almost 40 years later, I'm re-examining this case. I really didn't believe any of it was real. And I was like, well, they're going to figure out this is not me. They're going to do their police job. Has the wrong man been in prison this whole time?

Listen to examined the backfire effect on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. You broke me. You do not desert happiness. I'm Andre Gunning. this season of betrayal, Carl thought he was living a normal drama-free life until the messages started. Someone's not going to make it out of this alive. Every piece of evidence pointed to the wrong guy.

He was not going to stop unless we stopped him. Listen to Betrayal Season 6 on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey everybody, it's me, Debbie Kama Bell. This season on my podcast, who's with me. I speak with Bruce Lee's daughter, Brandon Lee's sister, and my friend, Shannon Lee. Back to your initial point of stewarding my father's legacy and giving my energy to that. You're lending your life to stewarding somebody else's life. Listen to Who's With Me with Debbie Chmobel on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Did you think you were the only one? Like no matter what you did, it was never good enough for your mother. I'm Jennifer Arnese, and this is the Black Mother Wound podcast, where we unpack and heal from the very first relationship that shaped us. We rush to accommodate other people when we have been hurt, and our hurt has not been healed. Listen to the Black Mother Woon podcast from the Black Effect Podcast Network on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast,

and wherever you get your podcast. I believe that whoever was in that room and did that was a murderer. A new podcast, series, Faultline Haditha, tells the story of a shocking crime and a cover-up at the highest levels of the United States Marine Corps. If you've got five players and you offer immunity to four, you better be right about the fifth. Because if you're not, then you've just given immunity to your killer. Listen to Faultline Haditha on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.