Andy Frasco's World Saving Podcast - EP 193: James Casey (Trey Anastasio Band)
Episode Date: October 18, 2022ANDY & NICK ARE BACK BABYYYYYY See the boys (on youtube). Hear the boys (as they snore the night away). KNOW the boys (thru their excessive use of sfx). And on the Interview Hour we got James Casey: m...ulti-instrumentalist & vocalist for Trey Anastasio Band! This man is walking/talking inspirato. He's got the best attitude, the best solos, and also maybe the best interview this podcast has seen. You be the judge! New album is done AND we got a tour coming up with our buddies, Little Stranger?? Don't forget to catch the band on the road andyfrasco.com/tour Follow us on Instagram @worldsavingpodcast For more information on Andy Frasco, the band and/or the blog, go to: AndyFrasco.com Check out Andy Frasco & The U.N. (Feat Little Stranger)'s new song, "Oh, What A Life" on iTunes, Spotify Don't miss this Dude! jamescaseysax.com Produced by Andy Frasco Joe Angelhow Chris Lorentz Audio mix by Chris Lorentz Featuring: Little Stranger Arno Bakker
Transcript
Discussion (0)
Hey Andy! What's up Andy?
It's your new besties, Lil Stranger, Kevin and Jon.
Hey man, we're super excited for the tour.
Coming up, we're gearing up, we're fucking ready to go.
We did want to talk about one thing though.
We got this email from your tour manager.
Just had a couple requests from the band and just want to make
sure these were like are these true are these things true yeah just wanted to run it by you
because i don't know it felt a little bit weird but yeah just a lot of like they said don't look
you in the eye specifically and that we're yeah we're not allowed to poop till after you're set
and i'm just reading this from the email yeah a lot of poop stuff a lot of poop stuff um apparently we have to feed floyd eight times a day and we we have to
provide the live rest so i don't know man just as fine if that's how you guys run shit on the road
but it's back.
And we're back. We're back from Europe and we're covered.
What?
Just kidding.
Andy Frasco's World Saving Podcast.
I'm Andy Frasco.
Finally back in my home in Denver.
Feels good.
Feels good for the time being.
We can't get into that.
No, I'm not getting into it.
We can't.
But it's some ho shit and you're definitely 100% on the right.
Next topic.
I'm Andy Frasco.
This is my co-host, Nick Gerlach.
How you doing, Nick?
I'm pretty good, actually.
We're back from Europe.
I feel good.
I got to be honest.
I haven't done a ton since we got back.
I kind of made that way.
You got that jet lag, you said.
I did.
Then it went away, and now it's kind of back.
I don't know.
I might just be insomnia again. Who knows with me,'re always this that or the other when we slept in the hotel
together on the way home you're just yeah yeah little sweet little snoring boy the hard time i
have sleeping is when we're on the couch at someone's house and it's like people are partying
six feet away and they're smoking cigarettes inside who us we don't party you weren't partying
you were asleep during the whole party you can sleep through a party i could i yeah that's my my gift now i could sleep through
parties speaking of europe tours did you see animal collective canceled theirs what because
it's like basically i love that band they can't afford to do it basically like they're just they're
like we can't bands like that can't man we're in trouble. This industry's in trouble. That's our second dun-dun-dun in three minutes.
We're fucked.
Oh, yeah.
The music industry is in trouble.
Dude, that band, and it's like, you know what?
Let me say this.
I respect the fact that they're being forthcoming with the reason why they can't do it instead
of lying and say they have COVID or I don't know.
Yeah.
Well, you know, it's the principle of saying no. We're afraid to say no as artists.
Yeah.
Because your managers or your agents are throwing these really amazing offers to you.
Yeah, especially.
You're like, there's a lot of money here.
We should take it.
Because they get 15% whether you make money or not.
Yeah.
So it doesn't matter to them, does it?
No, but it's the idea of like when you're popping, you got to take everything.
You got to take everything. Tiffany Haddish you know that's why i respect sierra
farrow she she had to cancel some days she's like no i get i booked these but fuck that
yeah she's like i'm i'm not doing shows she wasn't feeling good oh well that's different
but yeah when you pull when you blame the covid card to um cancel whole tour that's some ho shit
dude yeah the people have been doing that a lot of your bands are lying to you they don't have When you blame the COVID card to cancel a whole tour, that's some ho shit.
Dude, yeah.
The people have been doing that.
A lot of your bands are lying to you.
They don't have COVID.
They don't want to lose $6,000, okay?
So shout out to Animal Collective for being honest and saying, hey, I can't afford this.
We'll do it when we can afford it.
Yeah, come on the pod and talk about it.
Yeah, Animal Collective, get on the show.
I love the Animal Collective.
They're dope as hell.
When I was into real instrumental stuff like experimental yeah and uh explosions in the sky oh
man that band rules yeah i love all that now they're like peter burb special pet for all his
movies and tv shows they're always doing the soundtrack yeah yeah so we're feeling good um
speaking of um feeling good um we we got um dialed in gummies dial them in i'm We got dialed in gummies.
Dialed them in.
I'm finally eating dialed in gummies again.
Shout out to dialed in gummies.
That was the worst thing about being in Europe.
Yeah, not having the dialed in gummies.
And no ice and drinks.
Yeah, and no ice.
Yeah, what the fuck is up with that?
There's a couple things we should change over there.
Air conditioning, ice, move out of the way when people are walking towards you on the sidewalk.
What's the deal with that over there?
They just don't give a fuck.
They'll go straight.
It's like, I'm from America.
Get the fuck out of my way.
Open a history book.
Oh, man.
So buy some dialed-in gummies.
Yeah, buy some dialed-in gummies.
Homogenous.
Homogenous.
Solventless.
Solventless.
Tastes good.
Tastes great.
You get high.
You get high.
Use them in moderation.
Use them in moderation.
But they're delicious.
Yeah.
And so it's hard to.
Yeah. Man, we just interviewed such a smart guy that's coming out next week you guys need you're gonna love this interview that we did next week and this week this week is fucking heavy fyi we
have james casey the saxophone player and piano player and vocalist he's the genie band i had my
first gig with him i don't, a month or two ago.
He is such a fucking inspiring human being.
I really love the way he just, he's a serious guy. He just came, crushed the gig. He's just
good to people. He's so much better than Neff. I mean, he's just so good. He took the best
solo I've ever heard in my life.
I love when you-
Not on a saxophone, just period.
I love when you gave me my notes for briefing because I barely knew him, but-
Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're like, also, he's the best saxophone player
that ever lived, LOL.
I was like, aw, Nicky.
And I don't just go around saying that about people
because I play saxophone.
And we talk about the fight.
He is fighting for his life with colon cancer.
Yep.
And he's on tour.
Very serious thing.
And he did some World Saving Podcast exclusives. He hasn't really
talked about his cancer and what he's dealing with while he's on tour with Trey Anastasia right now.
So this interview is really heavy. Stick around. You have to listen to it. I hope you will stick
around. Yeah. I don't want to comment on that because he says it all in the interview.
He says it all. And it's so inspiring. Even Bo and I, we finished the recording.
Bo and I looked each other in the eyes like,
that was the most inspiring conversation I've ever had in my life.
He's an inspiring guy, and I only spent a day with him just doing that gig.
The man is taking red eyes back to New York every week
or every couple days to do his chemo treatment.
Yeah, and then going back.
And then going back on tour.
And probably crushing it.
And crushing it.
It's not an easy gig either.
No.
He's playing,
I don't know how many horns
he plays in that gig.
It's at least three, I think.
And he's playing keys
and singing too.
It's a lot.
And that music is hard.
You're going to love that.
But the interview
we're talking about right now,
we just interviewed a guy
who is like a big,
he's a Princeton...
And Harvard educated.
He was a professor at Princeton.
Professor at Princeton talking about drug reform.
He's basically the founder of the National Drug Policy Association.
Drug policy, yeah.
And I got to give it to us, boy.
We were on it.
I'm going to clap for us.
He was smarter than us.
We did good.
Very rarely do I think someone's smarter than me. Yes. But we were i'm gonna clap for us he was smarter than us we did good very rarely do i think someone's
smarter than me yes but i was we were nervous going in like we you know everyone you know like
before we did the interview normally we're like when we're with musicians like whatever whatever
we know let's talk about drugs you want to get high first but like we were on our toes so shout
out to joe um our producer shout out to beau oh yeah shout out to dick we our producer. Shout out to Bo. Hell yeah. Shout out to Nick. We were on our shit.
You're going to love this interview next week with Ethan Nadelman.
I've never heard a guy talk that so much and be interesting and valuable the whole time.
Oh, yeah.
Usually when someone talks that much, it's like, oh, my God.
But this time I was like, all right.
It was like taking a college class on drug policy.
Right.
So that's a great interview.
We got some fucking heaters this month, guys.
And you got tour coming up.
And I got tour next week.
Speaking of the music industry falling apart,
Andy Frasca will be coming to a mid-major Midwest city
near you in the next two months.
Shout out Indianapolis, November 17th.
Yeah, we're doing the whole country
with our boys Little Stranger.
We just put out a music video.
It's going great.
Thanks for the response.
I'm going to start a Little Stranger cover band
called Big Friend. That was pretty good. I'll clap for that.
It was bad on purpose. What was I going to say? Yeah, you're going to Indy. I'm going
to Indy. Tons of people from Indy have been messaging me asking me if we're doing a live
podcast. We will. Calm down, people. Yeah, the people want a live podcast. As soon as
I left Indy, they all gave a shit about
me. So what
do you think now that we're back
from Europe, we could finally be
ourselves again.
No more getting arrested
for being Jewish or American.
People ask me if that was
a true story. I was like, no, we didn't hire
people to play German cops. If
that wasn't a true story, we'd be amazing
liars telling that in our story.
Do you think Andy Frasco can lie that good?
No, I can't. No way. You're not a good liar,
are you? No. You lie to me?
I've lied to you once.
When?
Let me think.
Well, don't tell me.
When I say I agree with you, sometimes I don't agree with you.
Well, that's fair. It's easier just to agree with me sometimes but um yeah so we got a tour we got dialed in
gummies we got james casey um uh how do you think this tour is going to go well i do i think there's
going to be some duds well yeah but it's america it's a touring but you know i'm looking at the
ticket sales and you know even indy had some pre-sales and that is not a pre-sale city i was impressed i'm really impressed actually hard work
is paying off it's a couple like uh really like i was i was like this is gonna be a dud and it's
like then i look at the ticket sales i'm like that it's the biggest one of the big like shout
out to charlottesville virginia we played halloween there last year that was fun as shit
shout out to like north carolina charlottesville virginia home of the uh forbidden podcast that was deleted remember that's where we did it in the lobby of
that gig yeah we deleted it and we're like we were angry i was like depressed and the forgotten
podcast we're yelling at you over my depression it was so awesome we will we'll nft it you're so
bad i was angry um but yeah there's some great um thing and shout out to ashville my
ashville fans and billy strings in town the cult leader and uh no longer signing autographs no
longer signing autographs i think i'm gonna do that too i'm not signing any more autographs
some ringo star vibes is he that famous i guess how do you get that famous plan here's my problem
with blue grasses i can't tell the medium people from the good people.
It sounds the same to me.
Okay, no, no, no.
I'm not allowed to make fun of bluegrass this week?
Don't go there, no.
Why?
Billy's a great musician.
I don't have any problem with Billy Strings.
I just don't understand bluegrass and the culture around it.
Yeah, I mean, the only way I knew about bluegrass at first
was Leftover Salmon and Green Sky. And i knew about bluegrass at first was uh leftover salmon and green sky
and they're both like bluegrass adjacent they're not like straight up i'm talking about the
traditional stuff like why is that still so popular but like bebop isn't and like the blues
is kind of on the wayside it's like weird because it's like a traditional form of music what do you
think it's like a fad no i'm saying it's not a it's like not for some reason but like the other
ones are do you think it's What do you think it is?
I think music has cycles.
Clothes has cycles.
Yeah.
So bluegrass is popping right now.
Yeah.
I feel like it's been popping, though.
Maybe not.
It's hard for me to tell.
The last couple of years, it's really started popping.
Really popping off.
Yeah.
Led by Sir William.
And there's bands that are smaller than Billy Strings,
but fucking killing it.
Kitchen Dwellers are fucking crushing right now.
Infamous String Dusters?
They're an older band, but they're killing it.
Well, they have a hot guy, so it's hard to tell.
The young Bluegrass band.
Coming up.
10th Mound Division, killing it.
Kitchen Dwellers.
Kitchen Dwellers are fucking...
The homie manages them, right?
Yeah, shout out to Dave DeC C. Oni all his bands are killing
every single band he has killing touch my shoulder Dave just touch me. Maybe
I'll get some come on give me some give me the D. C. Oni bump the D. C. Oni
bump. I need it,
but yeah, I go big boys it in last week. Did you see that I did that was dope so
fresh and so clean.
Yeah, it's dope.
Yeah, they're popping.
I love that band, actually.
Yeah, I'm really proud.
All the bands.
You know, Bailey Strings, I'm really proud of.
Fucking Goose, I'm really proud of.
Kitchen Dwellers, I'm proud of. It's bad to see someone doing well.
Yeah.
I mean, you're doing well, but you know what I'm saying?
Am I doing well?
You're doing weller than others.
My brain says I'm not doing well.
Yeah, but your brain will never let you say you're doing well.
Why can I ever be satisfied?
I don't know.
That's the thing.
I need to figure it.
Just say it.
It's because you're Jewish.
I'm just kidding.
I'll clap to that.
That is kind of a thing, though.
All right, we're going to have a great week.
I feel good.
You know, I still have a cold.
You're going to L.A. this weekend.
I'm finishing.
My record is done, and I just have to mix it floyd's done tinkering
on it on his computer in the van his four songs those fucking songs took forever every every other
session i was in took so quick floyd sessions took fucking months to finish i'm like that guy
never has any bro bro can i just get these done and so well
they're done now so shout out the Floyd finally and then I'll charge you just kidding. Yeah,
he was the most expensive producer on the fucking project. Yeah man, Jesus Floyd. Okay,
we're gonna have a great week. James Casey's gonna give he's gonna like cranking out these
records though. Are you yeah every year if Every year. I'm not doing another record for a couple years.
Let it sit for a couple years.
The reason why I did so quickly
because our Spotify numbers have 300%.
I understand why you did this one
because it's like the iron's a little hot.
Yeah.
But sometimes the iron needs to sit
for so people can enjoy the iron.
Right.
Yeah, anyway.
Or I don't know if I agree with that
because everyone's so ADD,
they forget in like 10 seconds.
That's true.
I'm thinking more from like an artistic standpoint,
but like business wise,
you're kind of right.
The Spotify CEO,
but my songs have,
I mean,
I'm writing fucking dope songs.
Yeah,
you are writing the best songs you've ever written.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So we're going to have a great week.
And that's saying a lot.
I know you don't never compliment my music.
That's your silence.
I mean, I had a good time on the tour plane and i never was like god damn it that's funny tough tempos tough tempos for sex souls i guess you didn't tell that you want to
tell the story quickly how you're how someone broke your sex oh my god this bullshit man just
like guys don't get if no one asked you to get on stage don't get on stage yeah don't be an asshole we hardly want to be on stage so like you know
anyway i'm not complaining people's champ nicholas gerlach that sucked it sucked and if they don't
end up paying for it i'll pay for half of it no that's bullshit i want this guy to pay for i know
but just in case you know socialism doesn't win socialism better Let's say, okay, I'll put it this way.
If this guy doesn't pay, I'm going to vote for Rhonda Sanderson.
Okay, guys.
That's it.
We're done.
We're done.
Have a great day.
Be good to yourself.
Even if the music industry is fucking taking a dump.
Hey, we're all fucked together.
We're all fucked together.
We're all in this.
We're all in denial. We're all in denial.
We're all in denial.
Whatever you say, it ain't going to change.
We're all in denial.
All right.
Have a good day.
Bye.
All right.
Next up on the interview hour, we have saxophonist James Casey.
Yes.
I'm going to be honest with you.
This is probably one of my favorite interviews I've ever done.
The man is going through a lot right now. He's diagnosed with colon cancer.
He's Trey Anastasia's saxophone player.
And he's going through chemo while he is on tour with Trey right now.
And to hear this story of never giving up, staying strong, fighting the good fight, all in between, just doing what he loves, playing music, is such an inspiring story.
And I think you're going to love this one.
So, ladies and gentlemen, please welcome to the interview hour, James Casey. How you doing, buddy?
How you doing?
Let's go.
I love it. I love it.
I want to first talk about what you were like growing up.
Was the church really a big part of your upbringing?
Absolutely.
I just listened to the podcast that you did with Solis.
I've known Solis for a while, but I didn't know that our similarities were so, so, so, so, so much.
So I'm two and my middle child and my mom's a pastor and my dad was a choir director.
So growing up in the house, it was gospel all the time.
So everything was gospel from that was all the music that we were allowed to listen to in the house. But gospel music is basically, I consider it to be the core of every American genre of music.
So gospel is the one style of music that has constantly changed over the years with all the genres.
So, you know, it's not like i felt like i was uh
sheltered from music musically sheltered it was just maybe uh lyrically sheltered and uh yeah
you know uh you know yeah but church church was it so your your mom was a pastor
mm-hmm mom's a pastor uh well she was a pastor for most of my life. And my dad's a choir
director. And my mom also plays piano. So a group in this cute, extremely musical household.
So how hard was it to not cross streams, the business of church with the music of church?
It was pretty easy.
My mom... A lot of churches and a lot of situations with churches,
they have this idea of musicians
should only play
worship music. There should be play worship music.
There should be no secular music that comes from you.
And what my mom's idea of that whole situation was,
is that if you're playing music that is not evil
and is promoting love, then there's nothing wrong with that so i didn't really have
an issue when i started listening to you know other musics as i got older and playing things
my mom was you know she was she was with it everybody else that in her denomination might
not have been so but she she she was with it absolutely That's beautiful I talked to Corey Henry
And he said he was
He had a bad philosophy
Of how they ran
Did you play music for the church?
Or were you just
Were you just part of the church?
Oh yeah
No no no
I started playing drums at churches when I was around three or four. I started playing drums at church professionally when I was nine.
Oh, my God. Are you serious? It's not worse than that. It's like a theater program of musicians. So when you're a kid,
and I don't know about for everybody, but at the church that I was at when I was a kid,
I gravitated toward the music. I was obviously always at the music. And usually at church,
there's usually like five, six, seven kids, depending on how big your church is, who will,
you know, they'll end up, you know, hanging around the musicians because they like it
or whatever so um yeah at my at my
church i was i okay so growing up at that church with my family the way it was i was basically at
church every single day of the week it was monday i was at church for you know church school i was
a little kid tuesday was some sort of bible study wednesday was some sort of rehearsal. Thursday was some sort of rehearsal. Friday was some sort of rehearsal.
Saturday, you definitely had the children's church rehearsal, you know, church choir rehearsal.
Sunday, you had to be there. You had the eight o'clock service choir, 11 o'clock service.
And if you were playing, you had to do it all. So yeah. And so that's basically been, that was my life from the time I was a child to when I went to college every week.
Did you ever resent church because you had to be there every day?
Yeah, well, not church. I love the music so much that I could step away from all the things that, uh, you kind of, I learned to deal with it so I could continue, you know,
to learn from the place that I was.
What did you not agree with, with how the church was running things?
Say that again?
What you said you didn't agree with some of the things that they were doing.
What were the things that you were disagreeing on um things that i didn't necessarily agree it's there's a lot of um um
there are a lot of religious things like religiosity things things that people have
been doing passed down from generations and generations in churches.
And a lot of times they don't necessarily know why they're doing them.
They just have been doing them for years. And it's just what's been done.
So that's what needs to be done. And me being a kid and very curious and inquisitive,
curious and inquisitive, I was always just like, well, a lot of this doesn't really make sense if we're looking at it from a modern perspective of what they were thinking about back then or
back then perspective of what they were thinking about back then.
If we're trying to extrapolate what they were believing into our reality of day-to-day, it day to day is kind of, it kind of doesn't
really work on a lot of levels. So seeing that as a kid, I was like, well, I love music.
So I'm just gonna go ahead and play these drums and, you know, and learn some more about
this stuff over here.
Is music always been your getaway from life?
Is music always been your getaway from life?
Yeah. When I was a kid,
when I was a kid, I just played my dad's records and we would dance around and uh that that uh feeling that i had or just like
bang on pots and pans and that feeling that i had as a kid it's the same feeling i have right now
when i get to create with uh you know in in real in real good situations it's the same
love that i have it's the same excitement it's the same joy that i had when i was a little kid
which is really the only
reason why I do this.
Yeah, because the other shit is bullshit. The other part of this industry is bullshit.
I mean, you know how many red eyes I've taken in the past week?
I feel you, man. I feel you. It drains your body. And especially, I don't know if you
want to talk about this, but you're going through cancer, correct?
Mm-hmm.
So and how hard...
Yeah.
Again, you know, I would love to talk about how it's how straining this music industry
is on your body already, versus how straining it is to go through chemo and go through cancer.
How do you fight through both things to figure out what you want in life?
That is a good question.
How do you fight through things to figure out what you want?
I already know what i want to do and have with you know with the time i have and with the you
know the space i have i know what i want i know what i want to put out into the world
and i want to create you know saying that's that's my thing my thing is creation my thing is like
making things and building things and growing things. And that might be building the solo.
It might be building a business.
It's just some sort of thing that I get to do.
And that does it for me.
And because that does it for me, I have to make that happen in my life. So the first, I haven't actually talked to anybody
about this outside of, you know, family or whatever,
but the first round of chemo that I was doing,
what I was doing, it didn't particularly go well.
And it was a really, really difficult type of chemotherapy
that I had to take.
And the side effects were rough, were really, really bad.
I mean, the side effects were so bad that I couldn't, to open up the refrigerator, I literally had to put on gloves.
The cold sensitivity was such that when I went outside, and it was like 50 degrees when I went outside,
I'd have to put on a mask
because like it was too cold for my mouth to be outside in that situation um and it was I was
miserable I was miserable because I couldn't play because of where my port was and it was I was I
couldn't do anything and I was trying to navigate how to deal with this chemo thing and then deal with the fact that I,
you know, had just been diagnosed with cancer. The whole thing and everything was just being
piled on. And within all that, I found little nuggets of things that worked for me. And it was
always going back to, you know, making something, you know,
like maybe I had like a little melody that I just like,
it would take all day for me to go into my little studio
and put it down on a, you know, just just to play a little bit.
But that would be it.
And that would be the thing that I did for that day.
You know, and that was kind of how it was
for the first
the first
the first brown chemo, the first situation.
And like I said, unfortunately
when I finished
that, we found out that
that didn't quite go as well as
the doctors had hoped.
Doctors had believed at the time at the place that I was at.
So when I had to switch doctors and go back on chemo,
there was a couple of things that I could do in talks with the hospital
to make it so that it would be slightly easier for me.
I was able to move the entry port for the chemotherapy out by about three centimeters.
And that doesn't sound like anything to you or me. I mean, to them. But I was apparently the
first person ever asked for it because it was literally right where my neck strap was.
And it was just banging up against it. It was like pushing up against it. It's basically
this thing is going into my heart and I can't play out. It's just pushing up. And. It was like pushing up against it. It's basically this thing is going into my heart
and I can't play else.
It's just pushing up.
And so I'm like,
can we move it out just like three inches?
And they're like, yeah.
So something like,
something that small created such,
I mean, now I can play.
Now I can practice.
Like I couldn't for like the first five months of this.
Like, all right, now I can do a little bit
to, you know, to get back to at least square one. And then with this new chemotherapy that I'm all right now i can do a little bit to you know to get back to at least square one
and then uh with this new chemotherapy that i'm on right now uh we've been able to dial things in so
precisely with a whole lot of you know very very very specific what they call body hacks um
that i've been able to do what i've what i've been able to do while I'm still going through chemo.
So are you, tell me, do you mind talking about the chemo process?
Like, is it every week?
Are you on tour and you have to do chemo like before shows and stuff?
Yeah.
Hopefully you can see.
Yeah.
I am on a two-week chemo uh and it's a two-week cycle that i'm on and it's
um i'm actually on chemo i'm actually literally attached to a bag for 48 hours oh my god yeah so um uh for instance so when i uh we just we just did this
this tour and in the middle of the tour uh the second night of phoenix uh i took a red eye uh
halfway through the show we i left and i took a red red-eye back to New York, got here, and, you know, they do the blood work and whatever before you go through the chemo.
And then they give me, like, their cocktail of this and then that, and it's a whole bunch of things.
the chair for about three hours and then at the end of all those that cocktail of drugs or whatever they attach the chemotherapy bag which or the rest of the chemotherapy bag and then so
i take that and i take it home and i basically crash for two days straight literally literally
like 18 to 20 hours a day and just sleep. And then I take it off.
I took it off
because I detached it.
And we literally went to the airport
and flew on a red-eye
to California
so I could play the Greek theaters next day.
With Trey and nostalgia.
What?
I got to clap to you. You are a fucking legend, dude.
That shit is hot.
I mean,
people don't realize
like
everyone should be checked
on cancer, right?
Everyone should have their...
Honestly, man.
Look, look, look.
Colon cancer
is 100% preventable if you get tested early.
And the thing is, anyone can get tested early if your insurance allows it.
It's just that they don't start allowing colonoscopies.
They don't start testing for men for colonoscopies until they're 45.
And it used to be 50.
They just changed it to 45.
I'm not 40. i mean
i'm i'm nowhere near where i'm supposed to be before i start to be able to even get tested so um yeah if i'd have gotten tested 10 years ago they'd have found a small pop and i'd have
been a fine but that's how long it takes for those things to grow and that's how long you know
yeah if you get tested early they can they can get it out and this it's not even the thing
so every single person here go get your your colon tested just go get a colonoscopy it's real real
it's not simple it's real it's not easy go get a colonoscopy. The prep sucks, but it's quick and easy. And
your peace of mind, you will know and you'll be fine if it's nothing. And if you do it,
if it is something you can, you'd be like me and be fighting it. We're good, but you got to get
tested. You got to get tested. How did you know you had it if you weren't getting tested?
You got to get tested. How did you know you had it if you weren't getting tested?
So, yeah, I guess I haven't really delved into the story anyway.
You're getting exclusive.
Let's go.
Let's go.
Okay, so I just gotten back from Hawaii, and we just did, we were in Denver for the Billy and the Kids shows.
And while I was out there, it was like my stomach felt a little off.
Like someone was gasping, something like that.
Maybe it's the altitude.
I always have issues up there.
So I was like, maybe something's going on.
So I thought it, maybe something's going on.
So I thought it was nothing of it.
Ended up playing those shows.
You know, had a great time.
I came back home to New York.
And a week later, it was so bad.
I was like, all right, I think I might have appendicitis. Like, something's really, really wrong.
It's like, I feel like there's like a balloon in my, in my, in my abdomen.
Like maybe, maybe it's like, all right, let's go to the hospital.
Went to the ER and, you know, they, they did a bunch of tests and the ER doctor said, we think you have a thing called colitis.
So we're going to send you home with some antibiotics.
And we need you to go see a specialist.
Oh, okay.
All right.
Then go home.
Then the ER doctor actually called me while I was at home.
She said, James, I need you to go to get a colonoscopy.
I need you to go to get a colonoscopy. I need you to go to get a colonoscopy.
I've never heard of an ER doctor calling a patient later, the next morning.
No, no, no.
Okay, James, I need you to go get a colonoscopy.
I'm like, okay, okay, okay.
So I call to get a colonoscopy.
They signed me up for one the next week.
All right, whatever.
The next day, I call up.
I'm so glad I had that lady's number.
So I called her back.
I was like, I'm sorry, man.
I'm starting to be in a lot more pain.
And it doesn't, I don't know,
like the antibiotics are doing anything.
She's like, yeah, yeah.
You come back in.
Come back in right now.
The antibiotics aren't doing anything.
If you're still in pain, come back.
I go back into the hospital. She literally calls the doctors that are at the hospital to let them know that i'm
coming through i get there the er doctor they the the er doctors take the charge to the er surgeon
this is two days after i was there the first time they take the er surgeon the er surgeon comes back
and says you all overread the chart.
This is nothing I would have told him to do to go home anyway. I tell him I'm in a lot of pain.
He's like, well, I mean, I guess, you know, we could keep you here for, you know, pain management,
but that's all it would be. You know, it just, just, just take some aspirin and ibuprofen.
Just take some aspirin and ibuprofen.
I was like, what?
Okay.
That's what he said.
The other doctors, it looked like they were paid.
So I go home.
The same ER doctor from before calls me again and says, James, I just want to make sure that you were going to go get a colonoscopy.
I said, I am. She called the doctors to make sure that I could get an appointment with
it. All right. Two days later, my stomach is distended. So the right side of my stomach is
out by at least five inches. I am in so much pain that I can't really I can't do anything anymore.
I go back to the ER.
This is three days later.
And now my colon is completely blocked.
The tumor that I didn't know that I had had pierced through the other side of my colon and was like everything.
Everything had gone bad right then.
So I'm in the most pain
that i've ever been in in my entire life like thriving agonizing so i have to get emergency
surgery they cut a fifth of my colon oh my god what the because they had the tumor and
yeah they had to cut they cut a fifth of my colon. And I'm in the hospital for eight, nine days.
And then a couple of weeks later, start chemo.
So that was that I went into the hospital on August 1st.
What was your mind?
I mean, that was when I finally got, yeah, that was emergency surgery that day.
What was your mind going through when you knew something was wrong,
but the doctors are telling you nothing is wrong?
And also, how did it happen so quickly?
Everything happened so fucking quickly since you got out of the hospital.
Yeah.
Everything happened fast because it was a problem.
Like I said before, colon cancer, it takes about five to 10 years to actually form and
mature.
It starts with a little polyp and it connects and matures over time.
I had no clue.
I had no idea.
And then when you go to the... I mean, looking back on it,
the ER doctor saved my life. She, she, and she was trying her best, but she couldn't tell me
that it wasn't like what the actual problem was, even though they knew at the time,
because if they did a CT scan when I first got there, but it wasn't an emergency, technical emergency.
So if it's not an emergency and I'm in the emergency room,
they can't tell me what that issue is.
That's against the hospital.
The protocol.
So I had to end up going back there three times,
going through all this mess, just for them to to end up having to do emergency
emergency surgery like you're about to die we need to cut you open but two days ago you sent
me home because it was nothing what's going through your head there man and uh to be honest
with you the only thing going through my head right that time was like i i have to
get through this yeah i gotta get through this i don't know what this is because like i you
was was once they start saying things like tumor like all the rest of the stuff in your head just
kind of goes away it's like it's like all a sudden, the only thing that's loud is that word, tumor, tumor, or cancer, or this, or...
It wasn't cancer. It was tumor. It was growth.
It was these things. You've heard these things before.
Everything's getting louder and louder and louder.
And then you find out that they could have done something.
While I'm thriving in pain, they could have done something while i'm thriving in pain they could have done something
they knew what the problem is they could have at least at least done more than what they did
and they couldn't because of protocols in the in the way the system works and i
i don't know what to do but i'm going to try to find a way to do something, like find a way to
talk to somebody, to have some sort of advocacy work with that.
Because the way that my hospital interaction happened, I should have died. Yeah. It was in the pipeline for me to go because had I not had his service, I'd have been gone.
Yeah. Had I not thought about getting, I thought
about and I didn't right before there is just because we were in Hawaii. So I came back
and I had to re up with the Obamacare right before it. I mean, literally like days before
I was like, hey, I think I need to go to the hospital.
Like, all right, let's make sure that you just got back in town.
Cool, you did.
It'll retroactively work starting on the first.
Go, go to the hospital, please.
Went for Obamacare if you did.
That was that one.
And then got the rest of my insurance and everything.
Man, yeah, it's a lot.
Do you believe in serendipitous moments like that?
I'll say this, man.
There are things that I don't understand
and there are things that I don't...
I will never be able to, you know, it might not be something I can be like, oh, it was this, it was that.
Like it's something, but I keep telling people I'm in the best of the worst case scenario because I'm still here.
I'm still here I'm in the best of the worst case scenario
I'm in a situation where
I have the means
to at least right now
take care of myself
I have the means to be able to
I can go to the hospital
an amazing hospital
and if that one didn't work I could have gone down the street
to another amazing hospital because I'm in New York
that
it wouldn't have happened if i wasn't here like that i i play with
people who who understand what i'm going through and they're doing their best to make sure that
if i'm going to be able to do this that it's going to be
as easy as possible like all that they they the the crew the the crew trey's crew uh they all need
awards man yeah it's it's it's amazing it's amazing man they i mean anything that i they they
they're the type of people who would think about things
so far in advance that you didn't even...
I didn't even know that I would have this problem.
I didn't know that this possibility...
They're just the best.
So, yeah, man.
Let's clap it up for Trey's crew.
Let's go.
Let's fucking go.
Let's go, let's go, let's go, let's go.
Absolutely.
Absolutely. A hundred percent. You got to take care of the people who take care of you
A couple more questions
About this situation
This is fucking
Nuts, James
This is crazy
I'm here for you, bro
Jenny Hartwick is one of my close friends
And I
You know, friend I want close friends. I want to be
team James, too.
Have you ever had...
Was there any situation
when you're doing the chemo and you're just
too weak to perform and you still performed?
Okay. Yeah.
Yes. Okay. So the first couple times I started playing was Touch and Go. So I started the second round of chemo and made those posts, whatever. And then I don't remember exactly which show it was,
but I do remember Red Rocks.
And I remember just being at Red Rocks
and being so tired.
I mean, I already have asthma.
Playing in altitude is already going to be
an issue for me yeah but i was so tired man i it was just everything i was so drained and the thing
that happens with chemo is that you know you always like have some reserves you know we've
always in life like you know like you're running like i'm tired but i can still do a little bit
more there's no more there's no reserves like when there's when you're done you're done when
you're finished you're finished when your energy's gone it's gone and there's nothing you can do
so um because it took so long to start playing again and getting back to it um my stamina
obviously even with uh even under normal circumstances as for playing and singing
is just as has been drastically cut by maybe like like like in half twice it's it's pretty it's
pretty low yeah so um i've had to uh learn how to conserve energy in a way that's really, really difficult.
I mean, well, not difficult, just different.
So the things that I would normally put on autopilot, I can't put on autopilot anymore because I have to keep focusing on my body all the time.
all the time so uh like let's say if we're playing uh we're playing a song and i have and i'm playing shaker in one hand um and i'm singing something and i'm rocking or you know something like that
there's there's three different things i'm thinking that's happening at the time normally
there's nothing on my mind i'm maybe thinking about you know some some ridiculous person
dancing doing flips or something like that that's that's what i'm not thinking about anything like
that and i would like i would i'll there would be there was times during that band where I would be
playing congas in my left hand, you know, shaker in my right singing something while playing like
a clave in my foot and something like that, like just doing all those things and not think about
it because that's just that's just what I do now i gotta focus on everything man so like all right i mean even even even singing singing and and playing
uh percussion with with different different parts that we haven't had before like i have to focus
and it's not the same and when you don't have any energy and you gotta focus
and it's not the same and when you don't have any energy and you gotta focus
a lot of times you'll see me sit down yeah a lot of times lately you see me sit down uh like oh andre's been on the keyboard uh sit down and and and play and play some and play some keys parts
or play or make up some sense stuff uh until i feel like i can get back up and get back to it
and uh like i said man we've i've adapted and they've adapted right along with me so
i can't um best of the worst case scenario your brain the mental you know you seem like you're
a fighter and you've been a fighter and you're doing this this is fucking insane that you're doing all this stuff
just so you could
find happiness
just to keep going with happiness
how hard is it
to have this brain
that is so powerful
when your body's giving out
on you
does it beat you up or do you just
accept it you up or do you just accept it?
You can't do...
You have to accept what you can't control.
I can't
control
anything that's happening
with my body right now.
Well, that's not true. I can do what I can do
but
the overwhelming forces that I have to deal with are just overwhelming forces.
I got to deal with the chemo. I got to deal with the nausea. I got to deal with the fog. I got to deal with these things it's just what it is so either you i mean it's
if there's a problem right in front of you you can either fold under it or you can figure out
a way through and that's kind of how i've been my whole life and so with with chemo i mean
things is rough but you you find a way through. Like, I mean, you see me drinking coconut water.
I drink like five of these a day because we need crazy electrolytes during the chemo process.
Like, I don't know.
I don't know.
And to be honest with you, I literally forgot the question again.
So I hope I'm answering the right question.
No, you totally are.
No, that's, it's basically it.
It's, you know, you kind of, you briefed on it.
You've had to fight your whole life, you said.
What was the other things when you're a kid
that trained your brain to fight?
Oh man, I mean, okay.
So one, we're from DC. I'm from DC. And DC is an interesting place. I love it. It's home. But DC in the 80s was a real interesting place. It was a lot of crack, a lot of violence, and a lot of whatever.
But it was still love at home.
And my parents shielded a lot of that from us because my mom being a pastor and all.
But then we moved to Arizona.
But then we moved to Arizona and Arizona was like a wake up call of a wake up calls going from being, you know, in D.C. was all like 80 percent black at the time and moved from there to Arizona, which was two, literally, literally two percent black.
That that whole time was just an eye-opening experience but uh like i would experience that i would experience that i was like dealing with teachers who don't like you teachers who
are racist students who are racist teachers who don't believe the students i mean who are racing
you know like also like getting into fights with you know gang fights in in the in the suburbs. It was like, it was a lot.
Suburb, like it was like suburban
gangs. It was crazy.
Anyway.
We're in Phoenix.
Was it Phoenix?
Yeah, it's in Phoenix.
This is an area called
Ahwatukee. It was really, really
weird because it was a whole bunch of...
So we moved to Arizona.
My mom got a job at Intel.
So we went from being...
When I was a kid, we were very, very, very poor.
Me and Nigel, we have a whole lot in common
because we were from a few miles down the street from each other.
Yeah, Nassau Hall.
No, we were very, very, very poor.
Not at all. Yeah.
But my mom is a genius.
She also used to work for the CIA and NASA and, you know, Lockheed and all that stuff.
So she got a job at Intel.
So we moved out there.
So we went from being extremely poor when I was a kid to moving into a middle class situation like a suburb.
And the problems that we were dealing with in the city of D.C. are not the same.
We're not the same problems that these kids are dealing with in the suburbs.
And I just like having to navigate that was crazy at that time.
Like, in the 90s.
Like, here's how crazy Arizona was at the time.
In D.C., I, you know, by that time, I mean, by the time I got to Arizona,
I knew about Go-Go.
I knew about, you know, hip-hop.
You know, Tribe was one of my favorite
groups you know, De La Soul earth they like I knew about all that stuff that was going on
musically at the time. I was 10. Right? I get to Arizona, Arizona. They literally the movie Friday,
they they waited six months before it will come out in theaters in Arizona because of you know,
They waited six months before it would come out in theaters in Arizona because of gang violence.
Yeah.
They literally wouldn't play.
I don't know if y'all know that there's a version of This Is How We Do It without the
rap that they would play.
That's the only thing they would play on the radio in Arizona because they wouldn't play
rap music because, you know, I mean, literally.
That's fucking racist.
Yes.
Yeah. The whole state. No, I mean, literally, literally. That's fucking- That was it. Racist. Yes.
Yeah, the whole state.
It was a lot.
So were you dealing-
How hard was the race?
I'm going, I'm going, I'm going.
What was the racism like out there?
Were you dealing with racism every day at your high school?
Absolutely. Were you dealing with racism every day at your high school? Absolutely, but there wasn't a whole lot of overt racism from the administration.
There was a lot of, that's not true.
I definitely had a teacher in 11th grade who literally told other students in the class that James, James is always high.
James, you know, like literally just like James, like this wrote me off as a student.
When at the time I had never smoked weed, I was literally just tired.
I was tired because I was always in band practice.
Like I was in band practice.
We had band practice at like five in the morning. And by that time in class, I was literally just tired. I was tired because I was always in band practice. Like I was in band practice.
We had band practice at like five in the morning.
And by that time in class, I was tired.
So I was just, I'll be in touch.
James is just high.
So I was the high kid.
I was assumed, me the church kid at the time was assumed to be, you know, something.
And so that was just written off.
I mean, but that's simple stuff. I mean, I used to be in all the AP classes.
I was in all the honors classes, all the talented classes before I got to
Arizona. And then when I got to Arizona, I tried to test into all of them. They're like,
you know what, maybe you shouldn't be in there. I literally had to force myself
into the higher classes, into the AP stuff because they just didn't see it as you know vibe but you
know play football yeah uh it's so up that is so up dude they'll make you play football but
they won't it so easily but you getting into ap classes was a pain in the ass. That's some bullshit, dude.
I didn't
really enjoy it, but I had a
really, really, really, really good
band teacher because
I had an extremely good band teacher.
Unfortunately, he passed
actually
four years after I graduated.
Three years after I graduated.
But he,
you know, when you, you know, some, you know, sometimes you, I'm sure teachers get a student
where they see their potential. Yeah. Where with me, if they saw potential, they just saw a whole
bunch of like, just mess. Like that was, I was a dude, I was a kid who was just like, I would be
in class bored. So I would pick up another instrument. He'd be like, James, can you please just sit down with the saxophone? I was like, nah, nah, man.
I mean, I know how to play this song. I know how to play this song on all these instruments. I'm
gonna go learn it on tuba this week. And that's what I would do. And he was like, you know what,
fine, fine. Go do you, do you, it's fine. And he allowed me to explore in a place, in a situation where I was really just kind of ostracized from even being there.
So he's one of the catalysts for me getting to where I am.
That's Mr. Holton.
Well, shout out to Mr. Holton. Let's fucking go. Let's Mr. Holton. Yeah. Well, shout out to Mr. Holton.
Let's fucking go.
Let's go.
Shout out.
Absolutely.
Yes, sir.
Yeah.
Did you have friends in high school
or did you just practice your instrument all day?
Did I have fun?
Yeah, I had fun.
I had fun.
I had fun.
No, I had fun.
There was, I mean, music in the beginning in high school, while I loved music, that wasn't necessarily a focus like that.
It was sports.
And then I tore my ACL freshman year.
And yeah.
What was your sport? I tore my ACL and my. And yeah. What was your support?
I tore my ACL and my football.
Cool.
And I ran track.
I could jump pretty high, but I was fast.
Yeah.
But the thing is, my dad, and so I tore my ACL, so I'm out.
I'm laid up.
I have nothing else to do.
I'm out. I'm laid up. I have nothing else to do.
And so my band teacher at school, during that time, he started the jazz band.
So I didn't know anything about jazz. So he let me borrow a Buddy Rich CD.
Also at that time, my dad had this music program called Music Time, which is like the precursor to Finale and Sibelius or whatever. Yeah. It was basically like an input thing.
You put music notes in and it'll play back in MIDI.
Oh, yeah.
So I had taken band classes up until some time.
So in 10th grade, I was laid up because of my ACL after getting hurt.
I transcribed the whole album. Note for note, it was a Buddy Rich big band CD. And like, I liked it so much.
I just slightly it's a, you know, a big band CD. So there's no 20 parts. And so I transcribed it
within that music program. And I left my mom here. I was like, mom, I played it for her.
She's like, oh, that's amazing.
So where'd you write it?
I mean, can I see the C music?
No, I just played it.
I played the CD and then I played what I transcribed.
And she was like, oh, oh, oh, I see.
That's a little odd.
Like I didn't, I thought that was normal.
She was like, no, no, no, no, that's not normal. That's a little odd. Like, I thought that was normal. She's like, no, no, no. No, that's not normal.
That's a little odd.
And at the time, I had gotten some literature from Berkeley to attend their five-week program.
And I really wanted to do it.
And my mom, you know, we didn't have any money.
We didn't have the money for that stuff. But after she saw that,
that transcript and thing, she the next day
she went and cashed in her 401k
so I could go to the summer program at Berkeley.
She got $5,000 so I could do the summer program when I was 15.
Oh my. Yeah.
Oh my God.
Your mom was is the reason why you're a musician right now
yep that's beautiful man she saw it yeah yeah did you not see it before your mom did
i got a lot of stories like that did your mom did your mom not did you not see it before your mom
did did you knew you're going to be this, this super, super awesome musician?
Super virtuoso, not super.
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, I auditioned for Berkeley. I got a partial scholarship.
I didn't actually even get into the school the first time I auditioned.
I didn't make it.
I had to loop around and do it again.
I'm sorry, bro.
I just came up with,
what's the question?
All right,
like, yeah,
your motivation to be a musician,
like, did you know
you're going to be this good?
And you said you lost your...
Oh, no, bro.
No, no, no.
No, no, no.
I wanted to be,
I really wanted to just be good.
My goal was to be,
like, to get better.
At every stage of my life,
my whole goal was to get better.
So my goal at Berklee wasn't just to be like, I'm going to beat people, I'm going to do this. I'm like, no, no, no. I just want to get better at every stage of my life my whole goal was to get better so my goal at berkeley wasn't
just to be like i'm gonna beat people i'm gonna do this i'm like no no i just want to get better
i'm not good i got to berkeley being not good at all and like i just wanted to get better i
wanted to get better i wanted to improve i wanted to improve so i was just always trying to prove
like i got to new york like all right beth oh there's a whole lot going on here and a lot of
a lot of a lot of things that I don't necessarily like.
When I first moved to New York, I wanted to be the next big jazz saxophone player, but I saw the
lifestyle of all the big jazz saxophone players and that wasn't necessarily what I wanted. Plus,
I loved other types of music. So I was like, all right, let's just get better.
Let's just get better and see what happens.
Let's improve on like, let's learn about rock.
Let's learn about funk.
Let's learn about all this and improve and get better.
Learn more information and then grow from there.
What didn't you like about the jazz lifestyle?
What didn't I like about that?
Yeah, that you said is not for me.
Hmm. What didn't I like about that? Yeah, that you said A is not for me. The Chasing Ghosts.
Basically,
jazz
in the way that we think about it,
it had its heyday, and it was an amazing thing,
a counter-cultural thing.
Things have progressed from there and grown into many different genres of music and styles
and beautiful things.
But unfortunately, it seems like with jazz, the gatekeepers have made it such that you have to do this like this before we are even accepting of you and your musicality.
You have to be able to play train better than train before we're like, okay, then maybe you're good enough to be you.
I think that's foolish.
Yeah.
I think that's that's foolish yeah i think that's ridiculous and i think i think if you're going to
if you're going to gatekeep a whole genre of music then i mean then that's fine but i'ma just
like keep my musicality to myself and and whatever wherever wherever else i wanna you know show it
yeah and do you think do you think competition in music is good or bad?
I think competition is always good.
But I think healthy competition is good.
I think if you're trying to compare yourself to somebody,
you've already failed.
Right.
When you start comparing yourself're already you've already failed right like comparison when you when you
start comparing yourself and like what you have and what you've done to other people's stuff and
things and you're you're already done i unfortunately you've lost so it's not about
oh man uh it's not it's not i'm sorry comparison what was what what was the question competition
competition or like competition yeah competition all right yes all right all right all right so
i think competition is healthy especially when you're growing you you need you need people to
to sharpen you you know you need like like my mom would say iron
sharpens iron but basically like at berkeley it was it was a sink or swim sink or swim situation
and i think that was great to foster some really really talented people unfortunately in that
situation because it fosters the talented like a lot of other things get you
know get get pushed away a lot of people who weren't as talented or weren't as fast or weren't
who didn't get it you know may may have decided to go in another route because they didn't get it
as fast and because they didn't get as fast they didn't get all the things that might have come with them being at berkeley um but
no there's a club called wallace i'm sure you've heard of it uh wallace is a single swim club and
anybody who ever came out of boston goes through wallace and i swear to god if you go through
wallace you want to cut everybody you want to go there and everybody who comes through gotta come
through mute because it's like young it's yeah so all right so that's actually how that's interesting
this is a good job man that's how i actually got into this whole jam scene in the first place so
sam kenninger had a night at wallace uh he had um he had tuesday nights when i first got to berkeley and curtis warren is a
saxophone player he had sunday nights and i'm 18. i i don't know anybody and curtis also from he's
from he's from baltimore but you know we you know baltimore dc is 45 minutes from each other
he he took me under his wings like yo bro come down, come down to Wally's. While I'm 18, they had me standing in the front, right next to the bar, holding the
water, making sure that I wouldn't do nothing, just because they let people in, they let
musicians in, but it's other age.
And I walk in there, and the first person I meet is Nicky Glassby.
So Nicky's in the corner, Nicky's above me. Nicky's older than I am. I walk in there and the first person I meet is Nikki Glassby. Oh yeah.
So Nikki's in the corner.
Nikki's above me.
Nikki's older than I am.
Nikki was ahead of me in school by a year.
So I see she's in the corner with my friend Rachel Lloyd and I've just met them and me
and Thomas got there at the same time.
Thomas Pridgen got there at the same time.
Because me and Thomas got to school at the same time.
We both walk in.
Charlie Dawes playing the
drums and I guess Steve Jenkins was there. All these people who right now are amazing and huge
in what they were doing, they're all just in this little tiny hole in the wall club trying to bash
and be better than the next person. That incub that incubation place was was necessary you know
what i'm saying you got to have competition but it's got to be healthy you don't say we all we
all wanted to get better and you know improve together we weren't just like i'm only better
than you and like bash you no it was like we were all trying to get better in new york it's a little
different yeah because that wasn't like a college setting and whatnot.
New York, the stakes are higher because it's your livelihood.
Right.
So things are more cutthroat.
And while there's still...
It's a different type of competition.
And...
Do you like it?
I would rather...
I like...
Nah. Nah, not in the same way. I like the competition of growth. I don't like the
competition of this. There's room for everybody. Yeah. There's room for everybody. And like,
there's like a lot of people want like the whole idea of being the best or being better than you,
or like my album sales
mean more than yours like okay that's good whatever like nah man your music is great great
if you if you've gotten to the point of being excellent fantastic if i've gotten to the point
of being absolutely fantastic there's room for everybody's music there's room for everybody's art
it does not have to be a competition yeah it goes back to your theory about chasing ghosts.
So the idea of comparing,
do you think what's helping you fight cancer right now is taking that idea of comparing your world of cancer
with someone else's world with cancer?
Do you think that gives you a better
mind state?
Oh, no, no, no.
I mean,
I'm sure that helps other people, but
that doesn't really do it for me.
For me, it's,
like I said before, it's just me seeing
the problem ahead of me.
And I'm a problem solver.
Right.
That's just my nature to solve problems and and build so they they presented the problems they showed me what I
have to deal with and they showed me the parameters of what I can do um and what i can do is you know change my diet taste my habits
change my health like do what i can do on my side and i'm just doing everything that i possibly can
and if that's all i can do then that's all i can do but i'm going to do it i'm going to do it as
much you know i'm going to do this with the same excellence that I go with anything else in my life. So the same amount of focus that I deal with playing the saxophone,
I'm going to deal with trying to make sure that my body is at least okay right now,
you know what I'm saying, to do what I need to do.
So I don't really know how to approach it any other way.
I guess you could just fall,
but I don't have that either.
It's a,
I'm a big,
I'm,
I'm from LA.
My hero is Kobe Bryant.
And that man played through bad knees,
broken fingers,
everything.
He had to change it, how he everything. He had to change
how he shot. He had to shoot with his
left hand when his right arm
was broken. It's that same
philosophy of figuring out
what the problem is and trying to
just
approach the problem the way
you've always taught
yourself through your whole life.
Because of that, you're an inspiration, James.
I'm blown away by who you are as a person,
and I'm blown away by the determination of
no matter what happens in this present moment,
I'm going to keep on trying to be on the path of happiness,
and that is music.
And I just want to say, I'm about to keep on trying to be on the path of happiness. And that is music. And I just want to say,
I'm,
I'm,
I'm fucking,
I'm about you,
bro.
No joke.
I'm about you.
Thank you.
Appreciate it,
man.
Thank you very much.
Yeah,
this is,
we're in this,
life is hard.
And the only,
and it just gets harder.
And the only thing that's important is trying to find inner happiness
through all the bullshit.
And I feel like you're doing the best you fucking can.
And it's awesome.
Appreciate it, man.
Thank you very much.
There's a lot of people who make make this possible and just make there's there's a the whole group of
people who make it so that i can just even be okay to walk outside every day you know right and i
just i want to just give a real like a good appreciation for them just a shout to everybody
like the the team that i have around me. Just thank you. Yep.
Thank you.
Cause it ain't easy,
man.
No,
I mean,
first of all,
artists,
artists are difficult enough to deal with.
We got problems,
man.
We got,
we got,
we got,
we got things to think about.
I mean,
yeah,
we fucked up.
We fucked up,
but,
um,
okay.
Does happiness keep us alive oh absolutely okay oh yeah all right all right all
right all right all right so at berkeley i had a teacher his name is phil wilson phil got to be 130.
i don't know how old phil is he he's a he's a trombone player. He's got like 13 Grammys. He literally wrote big band charts from the
20s till now. He's still pinning them up. Now, all the folks who came through the Rainbow
Band in Berkeley know exactly what I'm talking about. But he's an old, old, old man. He'd be in a band room, like, in the front with little airplane bottles of Scope,
sipping it while we're doing, like, big band rehearsal.
I guess he was, like, his whole little drinks, whatever.
But, no, he told me that, no, the reason why I still do this is because you all keep me young.
Like the music keeps me young and the young players, you all keep me young.
Y'all keep me doing this.
And that's what it is, man.
No, no, no.
It's the love, bro.
Like it's, it's, it, the love of it and being around people who love it more. And it's just like a, it feeds the energy of it and being around people who love it more.
And it's just like a,
it feeds the energy of it.
And that's what,
that's what it is.
It is that,
that,
yeah,
it feeds you and it keeps you young and it keeps you healthy and it keeps,
and it keeps you going.
Yeah.
God bless you.
God bless you,
James Casey.
Thank you.
Thanks for being here.
Appreciate it,
bro.
Really? Thank you. God bless you, James Casey. Thank you. Thanks for being here. Appreciate it, bro. Really.
Thank you.
Appreciate you, man.
You're dealing with a lot.
Man, I can't wait to meet you in person.
One of these days, I'm going to come visit you.
We have a lot of similar friends, but mostly Jenny speaks so highly of you.
And I'm just honored to have some time with you, bro.
So thanks for being on the show.
Man, appreciate it man
thanks for having me and you know keep doing what you do you too bro keep
fighting keep fighting keep fighting um my final final final question is when
it's all said and done and you beat cancer and you're you're 110 years old
what do you want to be remembered by?
I want to have left this place better than it was when I got here.
In some way.
I've never released any music under my own name. and I'm in the process of doing that right now.
And so I guess this is the first time that's out too.
And that's, I mean, it might be just my upbringing, but just be a better person, like be better, like be better and just
leave the place better than I got.
I mean, because there's enough negativity everywhere.
Like it's easy to be negative and it's easy to be bad.
It's easy to jump on like all the stuff.
And we live in a in a in a day where it's kind of
not only is it expected, it's lauded for you to be negative.
It's lauded for you to be bad.
It's loved and appreciated for you to jump on people.
Like, just, it's enough.
Everybody's going through everything, man.
Let's just be better.
Be better.
So, my whole thing is like trying
to trying to trying to be better than i was yesterday trying to leave this place better than
i will be you know better than better than better than i got here and you know maybe like leave some
music behind and hopefully it's something that like is is positive for somebody that's that's it
that's it well yeah i know you're leaving a mark on me and i just met you bud so
thank you thank you man thank you again yeah man well have a great day go enjoy the day go do
whatever the fuck you want your day off okay hopefully there's no chemo today you could just
go man i gotta what do you gotta do i gotta get the ct scan in two hours c CT scan in two hours.
Jesus.
CT scan in two hours.
Fucking A.
Well, keep fighting, buddy.
I'm here for you.
Thanks for being on the show, James.
Appreciate you.
Thank you very much again.
Yeah.
We're in this, bro.
I'm a musician too, and we're in this shit together.
How hard it is just to be a musician and for you to fight being a musician and have chemo.
Goddamn. God damn.
God damn.
Thank you.
Man, I appreciate you.
And the fact that you actually talked to the people and let them, you know,
get in the voice for, you know, a lot of us,
we really appreciate what you're doing.
We're in this together.
Keep it going.
Always and forever.
You tuned in to the World Cypher Podcast with Andy Fresco.
Thank you for listening to this episode produced by Andy Fresco,
Joe Angelo and Chris Lawrence.
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