An Army of Normal Folks - The Hidden Crisis Facing 14 Million Single Parent Families (Pt 1)

Episode Date: May 19, 2026

Unannounced, Robert Beeson's ex-wife abandoned him and their 3 young daughters one morning. In this important episode, he vulnerably shares why single parents suffer in silence and how there were almost no resources available to 14 million fellow Americans in his position.  So Robert did what every member of Army of Normal Folks does—he saw a need and he’s filling it. Today, his nonprofit “Solo Parent” has support groups in 18 states, on Army bases, worldwide virtually, a podcast, and they’ve impacted 220,000 families so far!  You will learn about an incredible resource that either you need, or someone you know needs. Because we all know Solo Parents.Support the show: https://www.normalfolks.us/#joinSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

I'm convinced this is why more is not done for single parents is because single parents won't let you know how much they're struggling. I didn't want to let anyone. And I wouldn't let you, coach, know how I was struggling because, A, I felt like, man, I can't run a record company, I can make golden platinum records and number one hits and Grammys. But I can't keep a secure place from my kids. I can't keep a marriage together.

I can't. That's one thing. The other thing is if I tell you how much I'm struggling, I am scared to death that it will be used against me in the court of law, saying that Robert... Oh, now that's interesting. It's going to be litigated against me. And so you keep quiet. You don't talk about it. And so that is why we don't, as single parents, let others know how much we're struggling.

Welcome to an army of normal folks. I'm Bill Courtney. I'm a normal guy. I'm a husband. I'm a father. I'm an entrepreneur. And I'm a football coach in inner city. Memphis and the last part, somehow it led to an Oscar for the film about one of my teams.

That movie's called Undefeated. Guys, I believe our country's problems will never be solved by a bunch of fancy people and nice suits using big words that nobody ever uses on CNN and Fox, but rather by an army of normal folks. That's us. Just you and me deciding, hey, maybe I can help. That's what Robert Beeson, the voice you just said. Hart is done. Robert isn't the most normal person we've ever interviewed as he started a Christian

record label that signed jars of clay and later worked with casting crowns in third day. But he went through something that's far too normal, a divorce that left him as the single parent of three young daughters and not enough resources out there to guide him through it. So he started a support group at his church. And that one group has exploded into an international ministry called Solo Parent that has supported groups in 18 states, the U.S. military, an online community that's impacted 225,000 people across the world, and it's something that all of us can benefit from, whether we're divorced or we have friends, churches, and companies we can share this with.

I genuinely cannot wait for you to meet Robert right after these brief messages from our generous sponsors. Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer Streeter Seidel help an acapella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform?

We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. There are times when the mind becomes a difficult place to live. This is David Eagleman with the Inner Cosmos podcast. And for Mental Health Awareness Month, we're dedicating a series to understanding the mind when it struggles. I'm joined by doctors, researchers, and those with lived experience. We'll talk with singer-songwriter Jewel about anxiety.

I started living in my car and then my car got stolen. I was shoplifting, I was having panic attacks, I was agoraphobic. And making it through hardship. To be present is a learned skill and it's hard to be present. We'll talk with John Nelson about clinical depression and the brain implant that saved his life. What I learned is that procedure made me happy because I'm disease-free. And we'll talk with leading out of the brain implant that saved his life. We'll talk with leading experts like Judd Brewer about anxiety and John Hirschfield about obsessive-compulsive disorder and the science of how the brain can change.

This is a month of deeply personal and honest conversations about what happens when the brain goes off course and what we can do about it. Listen to Inner Cosmos on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This week on Crimless, we're joined by our first ever guest. Sorry, our first ever human guest. I don't think I could be in the same room with Shamrock the pair. I'd be too nervous. That's right. The very funny Will Ferrell joins Rory Scoble and me, Josh Dean,

for an episode dedicated to the many crimes committed by people also named Will Ferrell. They called to his fellow officer for the nippers. What are the nippers? Very good question. No, I was thinking, would that be a good name for like a salad dressing? Simple assault. And it's a play on word, salt? Maybe not.

I say we invest and we see. There's only one way to know. This did not amuse the cops. By the way, normally the cops are amused. But this did not abuse the cops. Will even comes clean about some of his own crimes. I didn't get caught. You know why?

If you don't want to be suspected of anything, you whistle as you walk. Woo-hoo. Listen to Crim List on the I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. Here's something that should not be as complicated as it is. Getting a racist statue removed. And here's something that should be a whole lot easier than it is. Getting a new one put up in its place. As long as there's a politics of race in America,

there's going to be a politics of remembering the Civil War. To get to school, I had to go down Robert Lee Boulevard. Get to the grocery store, I had to go down Jefferson Davis Parkway. If you're an historian and you leave out half of what the history is, you're not doing your job. I'm Akila Hughes. in Rebel Spirit Season 2 goes deep on both of those things. The fights, the politics, the people who won,

and my personal campaign to add something to the Kentucky State House that's actually worth the wall space. We are more than our bodies. We contain essence. We contain spirit. How do you represent that? They are just fueling a fire that is really catching. You'll see what I mean. Listen to Rebel Spirit Season 2 on the IHeart Radio app,

Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Robert Beeson is joining us from Franklin, Tennessee. Thanks for being here. It's great to be here. Thanks. Drove down last night. I did. I did indeed.

Stayed off Bill Street. Stayed off Beal Street. Yeah. Had some ribs. That's not a bad guy. I mean, it's Memphis, right? You're supposed to have ribs. You got to do it.

And yeah, it was great. It was, I love coming to Memphis. It was a while. Everybody will know you're a music guy, so I didn't know if maybe you stuck your head in Rumbuggy or somewhere in hurting a lot of music or B.B. I think that's the downside of being in the music. business. That's the last thing I want to do is see live music. I want to be away from it. Well, so here's the deal. This podcast is an army of normal folks, and you're really not

our most normal guest, given the public success that you've had in your past life and especially your specific field of music. I'm sure you feel pretty normal. But the reason we wanted to have you on is that you've both been through something many folks have, and you've created a solution that millions of normal folks across the country could get involved with. And I'm going to say before we even get into the story, I've been married to the same woman for 35 years and have four wonderful children that are 30, 29, 28, 27. And so as we get into your story, you may think because of my particular life, it's hard for me to identify with someone what your story is is going to teach us.

But I'm the son of a mom who's been married and divorced five times. Yeah. So I haven't lived solo as a parent, but I have certainly witnessed it and lived it as a child, which I think is germane to what we're going to talk about later. 100%. So that's a little teaser for our listeners. But first, you started a Christian record label out of your living room, which is cool. You signed a jars of clay, and suddenly you're at Grammy parties with Paris Hilton and the Backstreet Boys,

which I didn't know Paris Hilton and the Backstreet Boys hung out with Christian music labels, but I guess when you're the Grammys, you do. That's right. You're producing the music that millions of Christians listened to, and yet you've said that those years were your most. spiritually bankrupt ones. How did making your living, bringing music to Christians, but being your most spiritually bankrupt time of your life,

how did those two coexist? Well, to kind of understand that, you need to understand a little bit of my backstory. I grew up in South Africa. I was a son of a missionary kid. So for a majority of my childhood, I moved over when I was six, came back when I was 16.

I didn't really have a normal life. I went to boarding school for about half of the time, eight hours away from my parents. Which is what a lot of missionary kids do. A lot of them, yeah. But the other years were in the middle of Zulu land, and so, I mean, I didn't know who Elvis was until after he died.

I didn't, I had no understanding. I had nothing. I mean, we had no radio, no television, no phones, no, I mean, lived off rainwater. Were you like in the middle of nowhere? Yeah, yeah, we were. We were in a tiny little town called Inguivuma, which was between Mozambique and Swaziland,

in South Africa. I know we're Mozambique is, believe it or not. Yeah. Yeah. It's kind of northeast of South Africa. Right. Yes. It's just right above.

Right. And there's a Swazzing land is close to that. So we were in a little stretch of land called Inglevuma. It was Zulu territory. So the point is that I grew up with nothing of American culture, nothing of what you would think would be normal here. And so my childhood was absent of all the American. American way. And so when I came back to America, my parents got divorced. I ended up, you know, being raised by my mom for the last few years of my high school. I kind of made this vow inside my head that, you know, I'm never going to need anyone again. Because, you know, growing up there, all my family were there, all my family, meaning my friends, the boarding school, that's kind of what they become. And so when I was ripped out of there and brought back to America, I'm like, I'm, I just got ambitious. I just went, you know, towards making something of myself. And when it worked,

all of a sudden I had everything that I didn't have before. Like, you know, all kinds of parties, all kinds of recognition, all kinds of money, all the fame, all the success. And I was like a kid in a candy store. So I felt like I was kind of making up for the years that I didn't have any of it. And so while I would say that I was definitely from a Christian's point of view, quote unquote, saved. You still believed. I still believed. But I just bought into the seduction, the excess of it all.

And so spiritually bankrupt, I would say that it just turned as something that it just, I was driven by my passion to succeed and achieve and all that. And I loved what we did. And I saw amazing things. We had a lot of success and a lot of impact. But personally, I was doing it for the wrong. My motivation was completely off. So how do you start a record label in your...

living room in 1992 with a background in Swahili and not even knowing who Elvis is. How does that work? Well, you know what? That's interesting to me. It is interesting. And because I didn't play it. I mean, honestly, I felt completely unqualified to run a record company because I analyzed this for eight years, but only because it was enforced. It wasn't a love of mine.

But I'd always kind of liked music and sang in, you know, churches and that kind of thing. When I got back to America, I started a marketing company first. California. And that turned into, I was into kind of the music scene in the sense that I liked it, joined a band, and then suddenly kind of my marketing company moved towards music, because that was who I was hanging out with. And I started marketing bands and radio stations and record companies, put together a business plan to start a label and started a label under the umbrella of another organization. I thought, man, this is fun. I had no, I wasn't schooled in it. I didn't know what I was doing. And so when that all fell through and I'm like, okay, well, I built this

marketing company to align with the record company and now that's just all gone. Like, what am I going to do with my life? I'm like, well, I guess I'll just start a record company. Like it was, it wasn't a big part of my plan. And so I'm like, well, I know people. I know producers. I know distributors. And I have a business plan for a record company. I'm just going to start it. And oddly, it was called Essential Records. I got the name from a friend who worked. for a waterbed company in Chicago. They had something called, I mean, literally, this is how random it is. He had a product called Essential Care for the water beds.

You treated the water. And I'm like, well, that's a good name for a record company. So I started Essential Records. And here's what I've learned is that, and you'll relate to this, when you are brought up in a situation that you have to learn how to constantly adapt, which I did, going back and forth between America and South Africa, different cultures, different kinds of people. And then a divorce.

And then a divorce. You create a certain skill, which is really kind of reading the room. And so for me, the record business is less about creativity. And it's more about matchmaking. It's more about I will analyze an audience and go, okay, this is what I think is working with no bias. Because I didn't grow up with Zeppelin. I didn't grow up with any of it. So I could see pretty clearly what was resonating.

and then I would go find an artist that kind of fit that niche with, again, no bias, didn't care if I... I mean, there were artists, and I won't mention any of them that I signed that I wouldn't ever listen to. I wasn't a fan... I was a fan of what they did, but it wasn't like my taste. It didn't matter because the market would listen to it.

The market would listen to it. And so I really, like, built my entire career on being a matchmaker. So, and I think that's what gave me a unique perspective and really helped our success, because it was, not really my creative flair. It was really about trying to meet a need.

So that's the long answer. It's where it's interesting because from my little experience in the movie business, the magic happens when the business and the art can actually come together. It's just a miracle that it ever does.

That's very true. Because the artists are rarely business people and the business people are rarely artists. That's true. And that's the way it is. is in movie making. It is why in movie making 95% of everything

shot will never see a distribution. Right. Is it the same way in music? Absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, that's the thing. I mean, everyone tried to talk me out of game. People don't understand this about the entertainment business. They don't. I mean, and even in a film, if you're making a movie, and I've had the fortune of being on the sideline

of movies and television, I would say, and this is a random step, but I think 70, 80% of what is shot never makes it to the final. Never, never, never, never, never, never seen a can. Right, exactly. So it's the same kind of principle. Some of it doesn't even go to edit. Right. And that's if you're lucky enough to have your film released or your record release. There are many albums that we worked on for months. It never released because it was just for whatever reason. So yes, it is not really understood.

People think that like, well, you get signed and then you record a record and it all comes out. But man, man, there's so much mess in between it. You're very fortunate to have something come out. And now a few messages from our generous sponsors, but first, finally, Alex got off his butt, and our merch store is finally live. We have been asked for well over a year, how can I get buttons and shirts and banners and sweatshirts and t-shirts and all of that? Well, our merch store is live, and you can go buy that stuff now. You go to normalfolks. us, click merch, and you'll see all kinds of awesome options from shirts and hoodies and hats and magnets and all this other stuff. And you can get a generic one for just an army and normal folks, but you can also get some that are labeled with the cities that our six local service clubs are in as well. As well as the student branch, which Bill didn't know about until now, A&F Ole Miss.

Yeah. And we actually are having an A&F Ole Miss, a campus club, which is kind of awesome. We priced every item at the cost to make them $0 in profit so that the more folks can afford more items and help spread Army and normal folks across the country. So just to be clear, we're not making money on these things. We've costed them at zero profit. just so that you can have it, wear it, share the message. So get yours at normalfolks.com.

Us Today. Help us grow the army in your community and start representing. We'll be right back. Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer, Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform?

We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and friends on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. There are times when the mind becomes a difficult place to live. This is David Eagleman with the Inner Cosmos podcast, and for Mental Health Awareness Month,

we're dedicating a series to understanding the mind when it struggles. I'm joined by doctors, researchers, and those with lived experience. We'll talk with singer-songwriter Jewel about anxiety. I started living in my car, and then my car got stolen. I was shoplifting. I was having panic attacks. I was agoraphobic. And making it through hardship.

To be present is a learned skill, and it's hard to be present. We'll talk with John Nelson about clinical depression and the brain implant that saved his life. What I learned is that, procedure made me happy because I'm disease-free. And we'll talk with leading experts like Judd Brewer about anxiety and John Hirschfield about obsessive-compulsive disorder and the science of how the brain can change. This is a month of deeply personal and honest conversations about what happens when the brain goes off course and what we can do about it.

Listen to Inner Cosmos on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This week on Crimless, we're joined by our first ever guest. Sorry, our first ever human guest. I don't think I could be in the same room with Shamrock the pair. I'd be too nervous. That's right. The very funny Will Ferrell joins Rory Scovel and me, Josh Dean,

for an episode dedicated to the many crimes committed by people also named Will Ferrell. They called to his fellow officer for the nippers. What are the nippers? Very good question. I was thinking, would that be a good name for like a salad dressing? Simple assault. And it's a play on word, salt? Maybe not.

I say we invest and we see. There's only one way to know. This did not amuse the cops. By the way, normally the cops are amused, but this did not abuse the cops. Will even comes clean about some of his own crimes. I didn't get caught. You know why? If you don't want to be suspected of anything, you whistle as you walk.

Woo-hoo-hoo. Listen to crime lists on the I-Heart Radio. Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcast. Here's something that should not be as complicated as it is. Getting a racist statue removed. And here's something that should be a whole lot easier than it is. Getting a new one put up in its place. As long as there's a politics of race in America,

there's going to be a politics of remembering the Civil War. To get to school, I had to go down Robert Lee Boulevard. Get to the grocery store. I had to go down Jefferson Davis Parkway. If you're an historian and you leave out half of what the history is, you're not doing your job. I'm Akila Hughes, and Rebel Spirit Season 2 goes deep on both of those things. The fights, the politics, the people who won, and my personal campaign to add something

to the Kentucky State House that's actually worth the wall space. We are more than our bodies. We contain essence. We contain spirit. How do you represent that? They are just fueling a fire that is really catching. You'll see what I mean. Listen to Rebel Spirit Season 2 on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast.

or wherever you get your podcasts. So you found the business side of it. Yes, I loved. You were matchmaking. I was a matchmaking. So when did you win your first Grammy? How'd that happen? And who was it?

It was jars of clay. Okay. And again, there's an interesting story behind this from a business study. In Christian music, the entire industry is built on what's called AC, adult contemporary. Right? So bands, if you know Christian music, like Point of Grace and For Him and some of these, you know, church kind of groups, they were dominating the charts. They were selling all the records. At exactly the same time in the mainstream market, it was all dominated by alternative rock acts.

Creed, Nirvana. I was going to say Nirvana is the perfect example. Earl Jam. So I did a study going back to my matchmaking thing of like, okay, these are not different countries. is the same households. In America, when you're a Christian, you listen to music, it's assumed that you're just going to listen to AC. But I promise you, people in that same household are listening to Iraq.

I also listen to Nirvana. But there's just not a Christian version of that. There's nothing that appeals to that youth kind of thing. And so I spent time really studying that. And so the first artist that we really put money behind was a band called Jars of Clay. And they were completely different than what was happening in the Christian. So almost alternative Christian.

It was alternative. It was alternative Christian. In fact, we had crossover success. We were on MTV. we got VH1 eventually. And that changed the paradigm of Christian music. That's interesting. Okay, this is something that's different.

And so when I talk about a kid in a candy store, I'm not exaggerating. It went from zero to 100, like overnight. Jars like exploded. Double or triple platinum. The first Grammy award was the jars of clay album. What year was that? 94, probably. So from 92 in your living room to the Grammys two years later?

Pretty much. That's a lot. It's a lot. And I got married in that time, too, from a woman that I knew for three months. So that's... How'd that happen? That is, we don't have enough time. But basically, I had met her a long time ago in California.

Was she in the industry? She was in the industry. And I didn't know she was in the industry. And a friend of mine had come to Nashville. It was before a big conference. And I was, I had a dream about this girl that I met in California. I told my friend about her. I said, you'll never guess what I dreamed about.

about last. I haven't, do you know this girl? I didn't even know her name. She had really curly hair. She was whatever. He goes, yeah, her name is Michelle. She actually works in the industry. I bet she'll be at this conference. And that day, I went to the conference. The first reception I went to, she was the first person I saw. Are you kidding? I'm not kidding. And so literally three months later, we were married because I thought it was some, oh, sign from God. Yeah, exactly. I mean, there's a fool. Well, here's the thing. When you start thinking, the same thing happens, this is an interesting case study. Like when an artist happens too quickly,

when they just peek immediately out of the box, it's very hard. It's very hard to wind that back and develop that artist because they have success so quickly. You probably can't tell them anything. You can't tell them anything because what they did work. Same kind of thing for me. I started a label.

It had success very quickly. I know what I'm doing. God is on my side. Like, it's all, you know, it's all good. The first party I went to in Hollywood, and this is before winning the Academy Award, was at R.A. Emmanuel's house. And because I was signed by WMA. And in the backyard, he had a tent and a party that we were invited to. Listen, we were invited to.

Great. Yeah. R. Emmanuel, they got a TV show. called whatever. Ari Gold was the guy. It was after his life. He signed me. This is awesome. You know, movie. And I go to this party, and literally it's a Hussu. It is, it is Costner. It has Ben Stiller. It is, I don't know what Tim Tebow was doing there, but he was. I mean, Steve Martin, I could spend 20 minutes naming the names of the people I was hanging out with, having drinks with, who were celebrating me, who were coming up and saying,

Undefeated is the most amazing we've ever seen. What's your next project? Right. Would you speak at my conference? Yeah. You've got to write a book. All of this stuff. I went from a football coach and a lumber guy in Memphis not paying attention to anything to nine months later hanging out with these folks.

Exactly. Then you know this really well. And if it wasn't for Lisa, I could have seen myself getting caught up. Right. Lisa, however, said, you are the son of a five-time divorced woman from Memphis who has four children who adore you and a lumber company that you're struggling to keep going. And that's who you are. And if all of this is going to make you think that none of that is your reality, I'm out. And so I highted up back to Memphis and left all that behind.

Smart man. Way smarter than me. But I'm saying to you, and I tell this story very infrequently, but it's, I think, apropos here, is that I understand how a 21-year-old kid who gets a $40 million contract playing basketball or some young struggling artist who gets picked up and becomes a sensation overnight, both acting or in music. I understand how they end up looking like McCauley Culkin. Yep. 100%. It is too much, too fast if you do not have the absolute strongest foundation and compass in your life to keep you from getting eaten up by it. So my question is, a dude from South Africa, divorced, doesn't even know Elvis is, starts, apparently starts something that doesn't work out, then starts a label, and then two years later is at the Grammys with Paris Hilton and all.

What did it do to you? Exactly what you're saying. I lost my way. That is where you were fortunate to have Lisa that grounded you. Big time. I'm telling you, she's an anchor. Yeah. Anchors a good word, in a good way.

Yeah. Oh, no. She kept me moored. Absolutely. I did not have that. And, you know, my parents split up when we came back. I was, I was, I guess, in my 20s as well when this all happened, I guess. But I bought into it.

And my wife at the time bought into it too. We traveled all the time. There's plenty of money. There was parties. I mean, we traveled the world. I bought in hook, line, and sinker. I mean, it was, when we talk about spiritual bankruptcy, you couldn't focus on me and say, okay, well, he's out there sleeping around or he's doing this.

It was worse than that. Yeah, I wasn't going to do any of that. It was worse than that. It was a condition of my heart. It was my motivation has changed. And my motivation was galvanized. Like, my motivation was like, I'm going to not need anyone.

I'm going to prove to the world I can do something. And it's me, me, me, me, me. And not in a selfish, narcissistic, egotistical way, although I'm sure that played a part of it. It was more like, I don't want to hurt again. I don't want to be ripped out from a culture that I loved with no vote in the matter and forced back into a country that I didn't recognize and lose my parents in between, screw that.

I'm never going to be at the mercy of anyone again. That's what drove me. And when I saw that, like, I've arrived. quote unquote, when you go to these parties and exactly what you're talking about. Those are the exact words I've used. Yeah. I've arrived. Exactly.

I went to school with parents who had big houses and stuff when I was living in an apartment. Right. After my mom's picking number, second, third, fourth divorce, right? And all of a sudden, they were back in Memphis, working 40, and I'm hanging out at our Emmanuel's house. Yeah. And I'm telling you, it can be intoxicating. That's the right word.

And it can also be debilitating. Exactly. So you and your wife have kids? Three. We have three girls. In the midst of all this. In the midst of all this. And I will say that those are the moments that I feel like I came up for air and saw reality briefly.

In your book, and I'm going to quote your book here, you ask God to quote, please not hold my transgressions against my child to let her live and to make only me responsible for the wrongdoings of my life. That's heavy. Les Mis is one of my favorite plays, and that's a quote from a song called Bring Him Home. And before my first daughter was born, I mean, I choked up. Somehow I was aware of how destructive I was. And yet something beautiful was happening. I was having a kid. And I can remember listening to that song, Bring Him Home on repeat, and those were the words.

bring him home. Don't hold this against me. This is like, you know, if I die, let me die. Let her live. Like, please. And so, yes, that does come from my book. And it doesn't come from my book. It comes from late miss.

But that you would think that having kids would alter your course. And I would say it did for a week. And then when everyone was safe and everyone is okay and the delivery was fine and everyone is healthy and happy. I went back to the grind. I went back to the seduction of the music business. And listen, I'm not,

not everyone in quote unquote Christian music is like me. There are some really, really good people. And some of my path was changed because of those people in the music industry that were the legit thing. And I'm not saying that what I did was not legit. I'm just saying that my motivation was off. We'll be right back.

Another podcast from some SNL late-night comedy guy, not quite on Humor Me with Robert Smygel and Friends, me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer, Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes.

Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends on the I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. There are times when the mind becomes a difficult place to live. This is David Eagleman with the Inner Cosmos podcast. And for Mental Health Awareness Month, we're dedicating a series to understanding the mind when it struggles. I'm joined by doctors, researchers, and those with lived experience.

We'll talk with singer-songwriter Jewel about anxiety. I started living in my car and then my car got stolen. I was shoplifting, I was having panic attacks, I was agoraphobic. And making it through hardship. To be present is a learned skill, and it's hard to be present. We'll talk with John Nelson about clinical depression and the brain implant that saved his life. What I learned is that procedure made me happy because I'm disease-free. And we'll talk with leading experts like Judd Brewer about anxiety,

and John Hirschfield about obsessive-compulsive disorder. and the science of how the brain can change. This is a month of deeply personal and honest conversations about what happens when the brain goes off course and what we can do about it. Listen to Inner Cosmos on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This week on Crimless, we're joined by our first ever guest.

Sorry, our first ever human guest. I don't think I could be in the same room with Shamrock the parrot. I'd be too nervous. That's right. The very funny Will Ferrell joins Rory Scoble and me, Josh Dean, for an episode dedicated to the many crimes committed by people also named Will Ferrell. They called to his fellow officer for the nippers. What are the nippers?

Very good question. No, I was thinking, would that be a good name for like a salad dressing? Simple assault. And it's a play on word, salt? Maybe not. I say we invest and we see. There's only one way to know. This did not amuse the cops.

By the way, normally the cops are amused, but this did not abuse the cops. Will even comes clean about some of his own crimes. I didn't get caught. You know why? If you don't want to be suspected of anything, you whistle as you walk. Listen to Crimes List on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Keith Giamanka seemed like a mild-mannered suburban dad. But secretly, he became someone else, a master of disguise who went on a crime spree. At the time, did it seem like a crazy idea? It seemed very crazy, but I felt so desperate

that I felt it was the quickest, easiest way out. Did you allow yourself to think about how it could go wrong on what that might look like? No, I didn't want to manifest that. I was trying to manifest success. Every family has its secrets. But what happens when you discover that your dad has been living a double life. That is not the look of an innocent man. This is going to change my life and my family dynamic forever, because everything that had existed prior in my reality is now untrue. Listen to Deep Cover the Family Man on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,

or wherever you get your podcasts. It reminds me, and I wish I could remember, and this is off script, I wish I could remember the movie, but it's from the 70s. And this guy's had it with life, and he decides he's going to commit suicide. And he swims as far out in the ocean as he can, and he lets himself go into the water. And then he pops up and he has this epiphany. I don't want to die. And he looks back to shore, and you can barely see the beach, and he starts swimming.

And he starts saying, God, if you will just get me back to the beach, I will do this. I will do that. I will straighten my life up. I will never think this way. And then as he starts getting close to the beach, and he says, and I promise to do it within the next couple of years. And then when he gets to the beach, he's like, you know, we're going to talk later about all these deals.

Yes, exactly. That sounds like. That's exactly right. Everything about your child, when I'm my child's healthy. Well, I got to provide for this child. I've got to give him a good life. I've got to like, yes.

So, well, yeah. That's well said. So you end up with three. And you're still living the dream. And one morning you woke up and your wife's 86th. Yeah. She's out. What is that?

All I know is that. I don't know what that is. So prior to that moment, I did have a few things happen. It was around 9-11 when, you know, 9-11 happened. And a few things happened in my life that got my attention. And I'm like, I've got it. So I changed. But she did not.

And we tried to work out our marriage for a few years. Was she having, I'm sorry, was she having success in the business too? No, no. She had left. She was just staying home mom. Okay. But she was living the trappings of all of it. All of it.

Digging it. Which, again, not incriminating her. She's just being a human, but just setting the stage. She had said to me, you've had your fun talking about my dysfunctional life. Once this child is born, my youngest, I'm going to have my fun. And it's time for you to be the responsible adult. Oh, boy. And I remember my counselor, this was in a counseling session going, I can't, is that facetia?

Are you just kidding? And she's like, no, I'm sick of him having all the fun. I'm going to have some fun. We've got money. And so she started dabbling and addiction eventually got the best of her. And so fast forward a few years, we had, I'm not saying this came out of the blue, but when something like this happens, it almost feels like it is. It's like you're building this powder keg and everyone else sees you're building it. And then it goes off and you're surprised if it's going off and everyone else is going, well, you were sitting on a powder keg. So when I walked down, that morning, there was already history of dysfunction.

She had been to rehab four times. We renewed our vows in Rome at a basilica. We had done everything. I had done everything I could, but her addiction just got rampant. So one morning I walked downstairs, I believe it was spring, and I had moved upstairs. She was downstairs in our master bedroom,

and the door to our master bedroom was open, which it was always closed in the morning. And it's so weird. Like there was something in me that was like, this is different. Like there's something, something's not right. And so I went into the room. She wasn't there. There was no note.

There was no nothing. It was just, pastor calls it. A pastor friend called it the presence of an absence. Like there was just this awareness that like everything has shifted. And honestly, we didn't know where she was for about two and a half weeks. she didn't contact us she didn't like and so right after I

I mean it's one thing to abandon your husband it's another thing she had no idea the girls had no idea she totally checked out so I had to explain to girls like I don't know really what's what were your emotions

it's it's really hard to describe because it was it was panic I think the the primary emotion that came up besides the oak

or probably a more profound word to use there I won't say it but was just my girls are about ready to come down and what am I going to do? So I stuffed my feelings I mean other than the panic and the you know it wasn't about I'm hurt I'm betrayed and whatever because I found out after the fact that

you know she had left and actually moved in with my brother like and that that was another betrayal. But the bigger thing at the moment... In an intimate relationship? Yeah. Oh, gosh.

And the only reason I found out is two weeks later, I got a call from the police department at like two in the morning, and they're like, and during this time, I was, I didn't know where she was. So I was talking to my brother and going, can you help me find Michelle? I don't know where she is. And the whole time he was lying to me, he was like just, yeah, yeah, but he knew exactly she was living with him. They had designed this whole thing.

But I knew that my girls were going to come running down and I didn't know what to tell them. Oh, the reason I found out is because the cops called me and said, hey, we have a vehicle that's registered to you that we had to incarcerate the person driving it. They were driving under the influence. And so the person driving it and the person with them were both intoxicated.

And so, but the car's registered to you, so you need to come pick it up. And I'm like, okay, who is the passenger? It was your wife. okay who's the driver i'm like it was it was your brother and i remember telling the cop i'm like oh good he's founder like i it still didn't register still didn't register and he goes well yeah but they're both living in the same apartment that's their address and i was i i'm like oh my lord this is like two in the morning and so that that was just the whole other level of it so not only did

she just disappear and I didn't know what to tell the girls, but then I didn't know how to deal with. Like the only family I had in Nashville was my brother, and I thought he was on my side, quote unquote, and the whole time they had been planning to move on in life together. And so then kind of fast forward a little bit, and I don't want to jump too far ahead, but the first six months of custody, you know,

custody of shared custody once I found out where she lived, I would have to go and drive my kids to my brother, and Michelle's apartment for the weekend or custody and, you know, for the week. And it was awful. What did anger come into play? Where did it? Like, how did it? Were you not pissed?

Incredibly pissed. But it was a piss that was almost more, it wasn't rageful. It was so, I was so devastated and hurt. And the anger was almost looking at myself a little bit. I mean, you know when people go through traumatic things, they look at how they're at fault. I should have known better. My brother has always kind of been this.

And you just go all through the end. Like, how could I be so stupid? I was pissed at him, but I couldn't do anything about that. So my anger turned towards myself for a bit. But I think, and this is getting ahead a little bit, but one of the things that single parents deal with the most is they don't have the luxury of processing their own feelings because they have to keep things going.

They have to keep things going. have to keep going, which has led me to everything that I do now, and we'll get to that. But in that moment, it was just, it was more about I've got to provide stability for my girls. And so that was job number one. So our audiences on a chronological path, had you, at one point you sold the business to Sony of all places, which had to have been a great thing few financially and business-wise. If I would have held out two more years, it would have been even better.

Okay, but still, was this before or after? This was after. So I sold to Sony prior to the divorce or prior to her leaving. So a majority of the success I experienced was not when it was my label. It was, I worked for, it wasn't Sony at the time, but it eventually became Sony. It's just the easiest way to explain. I get it. He sold and you became an exec with whatever the label was. But still... And that could continue to grow and became part of Sony. And yeah, so...

Got it. Yeah. And then this happens. After the sale, after Jars' success, then this happened. This was 2006. Yeah, it was a 13-year run at the label before this happened. The interesting, that thing that happened is that prior to her leaving, my contract with Sony was up. I just turned 40. And I'm like, I got into the point where we had bought other labels and everything I dreamed of. You know, I eventually became not just the president of my label, but the senior vice president for Sony developing all these other labels and all these other artists. And I didn't like it.

It was, I like getting my hands dirty. I like building things. I like doing, doing, not just dreaming. And so I had made plans once my contract was up to move on and start. I was 40 years old, young enough. Now I knew a whole lot more. And I had a lot more people that I could pull from. Yeah, you had chops.

I had chops. I had track record. And so I decided to leave Sony. I left Sony. Three months after that is when my wife left me. So I went from this executive. Everything at home is not great, but it's intact to no job, no wife, raising three girls who were nine, seven, and four at the time.

and within four or five, maybe six months, I had full custody of all three girls and she had supervised visitation only, which tells you enough about our situation to tell you that it was a bad situation, that they awarded dad. Especially when they give three girls to a father in lieu of a mother.

Correct. Wow. And that concludes part one of our conversation with Robert Beeson. You don't want to miss part two. that's now available to listen to, which you can listen to right after you go get your merch. Together, guys, we can change this country. It starts with you.

I'll see in part two. Another podcast from some SNL late-night comedy guide, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer, Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter.

Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This week on Crimless, Rory and I welcome a very special guest. When I did podcasts, I wear my sleep mask. I like where this is going. So if you guys will indulge me.

That's right. The incredibly talented and hilarious Will Ferrell. On an episode dedicated to crimes committed by people named Will Ferrell. You're good for 300 crimes? Yeah. We got two. I'm ready to go right up to present day. Listen to Crimless on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.

Every family has its secrets. But what happens when you discover that your dad has been living a double life? That is not the look of an innocent man. Is everyone lying to me about who they are? I felt such desperation. I felt it was what I had to do. Listen to Deep Cover, The Family Man, on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Here's something that should not be as complicated as it is, getting a racist statue removed. And here's something that should be a whole lot easier than it is, getting a new one put up in its place. I'm Akela Hughes, and Rebel Spirit. Season 2 is about both of those things. As I was watching these statues come down, and I was thinking about what it meant

that I grew up in a majority black city, in which there were more homages to enslavers than there were to enslave people. Listen to Rebel Spirit Season 2 on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.