Good Life Project - Andy Grammer: Making Music from the Heart.

Episode Date: August 27, 2018

Born in a small town in upstate New York, pop-music phenom, Andy Grammer (http://andygrammer.com/)earned his place in music the hard way. He spent years busking on the 3rd Street Promenade in Santa Monica, honing is voice and skills as a singer, songwriter and also learning what draws attention and makes people feel good.He’s since become the first male pop star in a decade to reach the Top 10 at Adult Pop Radio with “Keep Your Head Up” and “Fine By Me,” from his 2011 self-titled debut. His second album, Magazines or Novels, featured the triple-platinum smash “Honey, I’m Good,” which was one of the best-selling songs of 2015, and the certified gold anthem “Good to be Alive (Hallelujah).”Now, with mega-hits and a successful career, he’s thinking a lot about how to speak his own truth. The concept of honesty—what it means and how to attain it—offers both inspiration and challenge to one of the most successful pop artists to emerge in recent years.You can see this reflected in his recent album, “The Good Parts,” which has racked up over 400 million total streams. He’s also launched a new podcast by the same name, where he sits down with people to explore the stories they often never share publicly.In today’s conversation, we explore where Andy came from, how his parents and his faith have shaped him and how, now as a husband and father, he’s re-examining his life and work. We also dive into how he is paying fierce attention to crafting a career that allows him to be present and also feel fully-expressed and alive and, at the heart of it all, be of service to his audience.-------------Have you discovered your Sparketype yet? Take the Sparketype Assessment™ now. IT’S FREE (https://sparketype.com/) and takes about 7-minutes to complete. At a minimum, it’ll open your eyes in a big way. It also just might change your life.If you enjoyed the show, please share it with a friend. Thank you to our super cool brand partners. If you like the show, please support them - they help make the podcast possible. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Mayday, mayday, we've been compromised. The pilot's a hitman. I knew you were gonna be fun. On January 24th. Tell me how to fly this thing. Mark Wahlberg. You know what the difference between me and you is? You're gonna die.

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And it's the fastest-charging Apple Watch, getting you 8 hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series X. Available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone XS or later required, charge time and actual results will vary. So my guest today, Andy Grammer, you may know his name as somebody who's built a huge name for himself in the music business with giant hits like Honey I'm Good, Keep Your Head Up, that have been listened to hundreds and hundreds of millions of times and had set all sorts of records. What you may not know is that he actually started his career playing on the street, the Third Avenue Promenade in Santa Monica, for years trying to figure out his point of view, his craft, and how and what actually lights people up. In today's conversation, we explore that a

little bit, but we also take a big step back in time to his upbringing, to his relationship with his family, his parents, and his faith. He is what he would call a Baha'i, somebody who practices a unique faith, especially for the small town that he grew up in. And that has informed the way that he's lived his life, the way that he has created, the way that he's built his living in a really powerful way. So we dive into that as well. Really excited to share this conversation with you. Andy also has a pretty new podcast that shares the name with his latest album, The Good Parts, where he goes deep with some really interesting people, very often in the music business. So be sure to check that out. We talk a little bit about one of those conversations in our conversation. I'm Jonathan Fields, and this is Good Life Project.

My mom and my dad wrote songs. So I grew up, my dad's a children's singer. He's a great children's singer. And him and my mom, he was going after like pop music, folk music at the time, like what was hot. My brother was born and him and my mom just started kind of off the cuff writing songs for him. And then they're like, I think this is really good. And my mom kind of played manager a little bit from the stories that I heard. And when my dad would go

have a show somewhere, she would book a school, like an elementary school. And then before they knew it, he was getting more elementary school gigs than he was the other stuff. And so he finally switched to just be like, I'm a children's singer. And he's the best at it. He's amazing. So growing up around that, even though I was pretty like, I get really focused on something and that's all I care about. That was sports pretty much all growing up.

But it was hard because you'd come home and they'd be writing songs. There's always a piano in the center of the house. And my dad would always be leaving and coming back and talking about songs. So you're kind of around it the whole time. Just around it. And I didn't realize how important that was kind of until after things started to take off. And you talk to other artists and not only did they not have that, but they had to fight their family to do this. That's crazy.

Because for me, it was not only I saw my dad, I kind of got a little bit of how this works. And then also just around songwriting all the time. That was really lucky. Yeah, because you're right. I mean, a lot of parents look at the entire career and A, they don't actually see it as a career. They're like, eh, you know what? Yeah, you have to break through that. It's a hobby. If you got to do it on the side, do it on actually see it as a career. They're like, eh, you know what? Yeah, you gotta break through that. It's a hobby.

You know, if you gotta do it on the side, do it on the side to make you happy. But you know, nobody ever makes it. So, and they want for their kid, like to be stable and quote successful. Yeah, and I think that's the big thing is to not have to have broken through the doubt. You know, if your dad's a successful children's singer,

you're like, all right, I could do something. I could do something like that. If you're going to pick a weird career like that and then be successful at it, then I could do art for a living. But also then just to have the conversations about the hook and, well, if that's the pre-chorus, then I don't know if that's – to have those – Did you have those conversations with your dad? I didn't have them, but I was just around them. My dad would – they'd be talking about this. They'd be writing a song, and they'd say, well, that's a good line, but it's the hook. So you're

going to keep saying it. You're going to do it four times, three times. We got to make it better than that. And just understanding those things I thought everybody knew. And then, you know, realizing that that's, that's something you have to learn on your own and go figure out. It was really lucky. This is really interesting though, because when I think about kids, so I'm a parent and when I think about, and like my, our daughter daughter's 17 now but i remember bringing her around when she was younger to like kid singers and stuff like that and i didn't when i think about that i don't think about oh are they really devoting themselves to the bridge and the hook and oh yeah totally

like this on the same level i don't know if all of them are. My dad was. He really, really, really cared about it and did really quality children's music. It's kind of a different form of pop music. Pop is what popular, that word confuses me. The idea is like, how do you take something that is complex and then pair it all the way down to a title or a small, simple melody

that means more than that. So he had kid songs, but they were like, See me beautiful, look for the best in me, is what I really am and all I want to be. It's like, if you take that in, it's really sweet. It's beautiful. And I remember watching him sing it to little kids and so good, so, so good. So there was a quality to it that i remember uh really taking yeah and it also reminds you that

that there's a sense that like our brains are wired to want to hear and like to to hook onto i mean it's called a hook because your brain kind of like your lack there's something about it that your brain is wired to want to latch onto it and that happens at the earliest days yeah translates so when we're adults. You know, me and my manager, when I was street performing, when babies would bounce to a song that I was playing, we'd be like, oh, that's interesting. Yeah, that's so cool.

Yeah. You can kind of tell when little kids or toddlers would start just bouncing to what you're doing. Yeah. You have this idea that, okay, there's something there. Right. It's like there's something primal that's happening. It's simple enough to reach everybody. Yeah. No, that's so interesting. I mean, it's something there. Right. It's like there's something primal that's happening. It's simple enough to reach everybody.

Yeah. No, that's so interesting. I mean, it's interesting also. I'm a writer. Yeah. And one of the things that you're taught if you want to write to a mass audience, which a lot of writers hate, is that write to a fifth grade level. And there's sort of like a similar, it's like we all need to, like it needs to be really easy to just integrate and assume, like not even have to think about it. Yeah. really easy to just integrate and assume, like not even have to think about it. Like it just goes in. And if you want, you can then kind of talk down

to the fifth grade level or think that it's a lower form of writing. And I would wholeheartedly disagree that the whole art form of trying to reach a mass audience is how do you pack something powerful into something small and simple? That is so hard to do. It's so hard to do until you start to try. So this idea of how do you, you know, a lot of times I'm messing with syllables because I know that the melody sounds

better with only six syllables for some reason in whatever song I'm writing. So now the dance is how much meaning do I give up to keep the syllables? Because I know that's what's going to get into you. And if I just say all the words I want to say, the melody gets a little more complex. And I think I might lose you. So that is my constant battle in what I'm doing. I always tell new songwriters, find the thing that you are the most passionate. Passionate is like a word that's not going to get across.

But like the most hot button issue for you. So say you're, you don't know your dad and you're really pissed off at him. Then like write that song because you will be able to get the most bang for your buck with the least words. So if you write that song and it's called gone, now it matters, right? Now you can just sing Gone. And with that intention behind it, it's huge. And that is the songwriting dance of like, man, how do I keep it? How do I get this simple, but to like hit hard? Yeah, no, that makes so much sense. It's so interesting that like the dance also between the message, the art and and the delivery mechanism. Yeah. Because they got to play together.

And it's like if you get two right, but one is off, it doesn't work. And I've been finding more and more writing that sometimes it's better to just move on. That's so interesting. Because one of those things will be amazing. And you really, really want to keep it and fight for it. And sometimes that'll slow you down. Sometimes it's just like, it's not going to work. I don't have the thing I need. And maybe come back to it.

Maybe like a year or two later. It's like, yeah. That's my new phase right now is if I'm in the room or I'm writing a song. And in about 30 minutes, if I'm not like, oh my God, this is amazing. I switch. Maybe that's like a new thing I'm trying. It seems to be working. Oh, that's kind of interesting.

I don't know. What kind of writer are you? Books. Books. Yeah. Yeah. So how do you, how's kind of interesting. I don't know. What kind of writer are you? Books. Books. Yeah. Yeah. So how do you, how's that? You know, it's interesting.

When I, similar to you, because I was just going to ask, like, how do you know? Like, you know, what is the sign that you get? Is it a visceral feeling, you know, in 30 minutes? Is it, for me, I literally will, like, I'll feel it in my body. I'll feel it embodied. Like, I'll start to shake almost. Oh, how cool. It's like, you just know when,

when it's, it's right. And it doesn't happen all that often. And like a lot of times you're chasing it. Yeah. Mostly chasing. Yeah. To me, it's, it's, it's that it's, you have as a writer, you have your net and you go out and try to catch something that is true that we're all going through. That is the essence of what to me good writing is, is describing something about this place that is true. The more deep it gets while still being simple, that's my favorite. That's where it really lines up for me. Yeah. No. So interesting metaphor, you get a net and you're trying to catch it. Is your experience that there's something out there that's moving through that you're trying to grab? Or is it more generative?

Like it's coming from you. To me, it's like I'm trying to jot it down. The analogy that I overuse is Newton wrote out what gravity was. He was a scientist. He's like experiencing life. There's this thing that is happening to everybody all day long, all the time. And no one has been able to write it down. So he finally scientifically proves it and writes it down. And then everybody reads it and goes like, yes, that is what's happening to me every day,

all day long. Holy crap, you got it. That is songwriting in its best form. It doesn't have to be like super deep. It just means that you caught something that we're all going through. And there's this feeling of unity and shared experience when art is able to actually capture that. And then when you're able to capture it, I don't know. So there's this act, you're just trying to catch it. If you just even catch it, that's cool. But then if you catch it and it has any sort of profound meaning to it, then it's really, really cool. So, you know, a simple, simple song like Keep Your Head Up, we are all going through situations that we need to push through.

So that can be profound. And I've had people send me so many stories throughout my life about like, oh, this was our song. Me and my sister both got diagnosed with cancer at the same time. We played this song every day. Awesome, right? So you have this thing that we all need to go through, and then it actually has a value and a meaning and is of service to other people. That's, that's the best.

Yeah. That is an amazing sweet spot. What's your feeling about creating? So that's, that's sort of like creating something, which is, which is your form of expression, your art. And at the same time, you're tapping into a shared emotion, a shared pain, a shared experience and giving voice to it and like saying, okay, validating it and saying like, we can move through. What's your experience of creating in the name of pushing a conversation forward or pushing like art as tastemaker or art as provocateur, art as like singing, songwriting as a way to push push people to reexamine who they are, who society is, what their role is, what their contribution is. Yeah, I think it does that.

I like to go through what I just said to do that, rather than I'm not the most shock value guy, right? My way is not going to be to say something or to like put a super sexy cover on the art where I'm like half naked to get your attention to then see where we're going. My thing is like, if I can, I think that we are out of touch right now. There's a lot of, like this world is completely unbelievable. It's amazing. It's a gift to be here. And there's magic here. And I think we forget.

So I see my art and my music and my shows. If you come to one of my shows, my main job at my show is to be like, try to remind you how cool this is. And if I can do that, that actually does push you to places that you aren't usually at maybe in your life. Like people need to come, people need music, they need shows.

There's this really cool welcome address. I think it was the Boston Conservatory of Music from somebody that I read. And they were saying, you really have to be incredible at your craft because people need it. So doctors are really good at their craft because someone's going to come into their ER and they need to know what they're doing to fix them. And lawyers need that. And I take great pride and really intensely work at my craft so that when someone comes to my show, I can give them what they need. But as far as pushing the company, like politically or? Yeah, I mean, it can be in any domain, right? It could be certainly in the world we're living in right now, politically is one space. But even societally, I mean, there's so many things I think people are sort of reconsidering their role in the world right now. Or, you know, like, what's the, you know, how do we contribute to the world? And who are we as people? Like, are we good people? Are we, what might we investigate within ourselves to sort of evolve? And what's our role in helping other people do that?

And it's interesting because I think you see, it almost feels like a lot of artists, whether performing artists or painters, whatever it is, it seems like something that people, whether they deliberately take a stance on it or have a point of view or a lens on it, or whether it just kind of like happens in the background and emerges through the body of work, there is a point of view. Yeah, you have to. Yeah. Yeah. I think that that's what makes it all interesting is what's your take. And I think, you know, you have your point of view, and then you also figure out as an artist, once you start doing art and trying and putting stuff out there,

that you have your own point of view, and also you have things that work from you. You know, I remember hearing Seinfeld explain, someone was like, why don't you curse? He's like, it doesn't work for me. Like, I would, it just doesn't work, you know? And so what I tend to love is this kind of like, try to remind you of your brilliance

and how amazing it is to be here. And that's in a slightly cynical society that can be kind of like, whoa, what are you doing? Why are you saying that? Oh my goodness, this is interesting. You know, when people come to my show for the first time, we're like aggressively optimistic on stage, like having this big, big party.

And I can see some people immediately are in and they're, whoa, this is amazing. Some people are like, what is happening right now? The world kind of sucks. What are you doing? And I think I like that. It's like another edge. It's like the other edge. Yeah.

I mean, it's interesting because as you're saying that, I'm wondering if you could picture your dad saying the exact same thing about what he does. Oh, it's 100%. Yeah, totally. It's like it's moving through you. Yeah. So another really fascinating thing. So you grew up in the city.

Dad is a musician. Mom was involved. One of the other things that is kind of fascinating about you, maybe we can go there, is you grew up in a faith called Baha'i, which I had never heard of, never surfaced until probably a couple of years back. And I don't even remember where it first really came on my radar, but I'm a little bit fascinated now. Tell me a bit about this tradition. Oh man, it's awesome. So the Baha'i faith, I was raised Baha'i. Both my dad became Baha'i and my mom became Baha'i.

That's how they met. So I was raised Baha'i in Chester, New York, which is kind of a funny way. Is that like an enclave? No, 0%. So I was the only, me and my brother, he's about four years older than me,

we're the only Baha'is at our school. That was an interesting thing to be the other. It was like in a small, small, small way. I'm a white guy, right? I'm not the other. I don't have any claim to that. But a little piece of what is that?

You know, there was Christian and there was Jewish and that was it. You know, and at the end of school, everybody went to CCD or they went to temple. And I didn't have any of that. What's really cool, the Baha'i faith is this idea of progressive revelation, which is that there's many world faiths and they all are from the same God and they've all come in succession, which makes a ton of sense to me. So growing up, I was always encouraged to be very open to all faith because it's all from the same God. And it's kind of like if a doctor

throughout your life is, you go to your doctor at different points in your life. So civilization, humanity has had different issues when it was three, right? You take me to the pediatrician and now I'm 34, I go to the doctor, I need new medicine, different things. And so that's kind of how it's explained is that there are different faiths and that have come in different time periods and the latest one being the Baha'i faith. Unity is like the biggest idea of the Baha'i faith. Just that, you know, if I had to,

and I'm not qualified to say this, but if I had to give a word to different faiths, right? I would say Christianity, love, right? Islam is like submission, like this beautiful obedience. And I'd say the Baha'i faith is unity. All the religions are one. So does it, what's the origin of it? So it's, Baha'u'llah is the prophet. He came in the mid 1800s to Persia and he was banished. Much like you look at, it's cool growing up as a Baha'i to be, like, just from the jump of looking into spirituality, be told that they are all from, all the major religions are from God. So, you're like, you're on everybody's team. So, growing up, you go with your friend to church, you're like, totally.

Yeah, Jesus. Awesome. You go to temple, you're like, 100%. This is great. And then you have some Muslim friends. You're like, totally. Yeah, Jesus. Awesome. You go to temple, you're like, 100%. This is great. And then you have some Muslim friends. You're like, awesome. This is amazing. And then Hindu.

So that is a really cool place to come from. And so you just, there's a lot of, it's way more this idea of unity in the world is more one world than it's ever been before with technology. And we're all super interconnected having a faith that is so based on unity is really really sweet yeah okay so how how do your parents hanging out in chester new york get introduced to this good i mean yeah i think my i think they both found it in like in college. Yeah. It was so interesting that they both were drawn to it. And then as I get older and I realize that that was a pretty crazy thing to just flip the script and head that way.

And then they met each other through that. Oh, got it. Okay. So part of it also, from what I understand, I mean, there are, I don't know if you'd call it orthodoxy or I don't know if, you know, like I look at Judaism, like there's reform, there's orthodoxy, there's conservative. Are there sort of schools of, or levels of participation? So the idea is no, there's only one form of it, which is very important because it's all about unity.

So the idea is there were hopefully rules set in place to make sure that it didn't schism, because that would be wholeheartedly against the idea of what the Baha'i faith is. Baha'i faith is all about unity. So even within the tradition, there are no sort of like demarcations or levels. Interesting. You jumped into podcasting recently, which we're going to circle back to. But I was listening to one of your early episodes, which is a pretty deep dive with Dan Reynolds of Imagine Dragons. And you guys went into the deep end of the pool really fast.

Super quick. Right. And it was around his current project, which is this full-length documentary about he grew up Mormon. He's still a Mormon. But he has very conflicted feelings about their take on LGBTQ. So, and it was such an interesting conversation about how he's trying to reconcile these two things. In Baha'i, are there any parts that you just on a personal level struggle with similarly

or not so much? Yeah. I mean, I think there's any, with any faith, you have things that you're like, wait. One of the things that I struggle with is that you're like, wait. One of the things that I struggle with is that from many prophets, I think that it's really difficult to sometimes just even understand them. You read the Bible, right? And why? Okay, God, why did you make it so hard to understand this? Like, I get so much from being close to religion in general and from spirituality. And it's like a huge part of my life.

But sometimes I'm like, I feel like you could have made this a little bit simpler. Like, I don't know why I have to fight so hard to get the kernels out. I feel like sometimes spirituality, religion, like we just had crab the other day. And you're like, I have a cut on my finger here. Like I had to fight so hard to open this little crab and get this little piece of meat. That's my question. One of my big questions is like, why? Why can't it be like a burger?

Why can't you just give it to me? You know what I mean? I mean, why do you think that is though? Because it's so interesting, right? Especially in the context of the conversation we were just having about music and trying to figure out how to take these really complex ideas, powerful ideas, and distill them when they're sort of transmitted into the simplest thing where people just visually get it. Why do you think music, or you strive for that in music, and I think a lot of people strive for that in music, but as you pointed out, really, I think rightly so, when you

look at a lot of the scripture and the text across almost every faith-based tradition, it's complex. It's almost like it's built into it that part of the job is to do, you have to commit yourself to the work to try and understand. Yeah, and one of the things of being, trying to be, the word scholar is hilarious. I'm nowhere near that. But having a scholarly attitude towards trying to learn the Baha'i faith and all religion. Because once you dig into the Baha'i faith, they're quoting all the other, you know, the latest, the Baha'is believe the latest prophet is Baha'i faith and all religion. Because once you dig into the Baha'i faith, they're quoting all the other, you know, the latest, the Baha'is believe the latest prophet is Baha'u'llah.

And he quotes Jesus and he quotes the Old Testament and he quotes the Quran. So then when you're reading it, you're like, okay, I'm going to read four pages today so that I can move forward. And you read it and he quotes something from another text. And I'm like, okay, well, I don't know what that is. So I got to go read that. And now you're going to read that. And you're like that, there's, okay, well, I don't know what that is. So I got to go read that.

And now you're going to read that. And you're like that. There's all these people here that I don't know. So now I got to follow these people down. I enjoy it. But I also am sometimes a little perplexed at why it's so difficult. Yeah. But the fact that it's that way.

And maybe a lot of it's man coming in there. But even when I just try to read the text, I'm like, man, this is hard. Yeah. This is hard to get the freaking little piece of crap out. I agree. And if you go back to like the oldest things that I've ever read, I mean, someone like the Yoga Sutras, thousands of years old. Yeah. It can be really short little threads, but it might take you months to try and work into it and understand.

Yeah, really. What does that actually mean? Yeah, it's so interesting. Yeah. So when you grow up around this tradition is when you think about the way that you bring yourself to the world as a musician now, clearly it informs so much of what you do and so much of what you write in the lens. But at the same time, it seems like there's also a really clear dividing line. Like I don't see you on stage or like bringing it or bringing your faith in a very overt way to you as a performer.

Yeah. Have you thought about, is that a conscious decision? Yeah. Cause it's such a big part of who you are. It's a big part of who I am. I just, I don't ever want,

and maybe too much so, but I don't ever want anyone to feel like faith is such an interesting piece because it informs a lot of who you are. And if it's felt through something, it's beautiful. And the second that it even comes close to the line of manipulation or trying to sell something or coming across in any way like that, proselytizing, anything like that happens, I think you lose a lot of people. And you lose me. So it's not even I'm afraid of, I'm just like, if I feel like someone is trying to sell me something,

especially around faith or God or religion, you lost me when it comes to art. I'm out. Sometimes I love a lot of Christian rock music. And then other times you hear Christian rock music and you're like, I'm out. I feel like this isn't made for me. I feel like this is made for somebody else, and I'm not in the club. And so I'm very, very conscious of not wanting to do that. I don't want to draw a strict line that people feel like they have to either be a part of it or not. It's I want everyone.

I just think we're so, so much the same spiritually and we create a lot of divisions. So I wouldn't want to put another division in the way of you hearing me. Yeah. I mean, in an interesting way, I'm curious how this lands with you. It almost feels like if you listen to the words of your songs, if you feel the energy of you on stage, that you're fundamentally preaching the core tenets of your faith without ever actually sort of like preaching the core tenets of your faith in a direct way. It's like, no, there's a lot of universality in where you come from. And you're sort of, you're embodying it. You're putting into the words and the music that you put out there as a vibe almost and people can rather than saying okay so like here's where this came from and here's and you

buy into it or you don't you're just like like this is this informs everything that i do so it's almost like channeling going back to the the the newton thing this is my truth yeah so if my truth aligns with if that if i if i sing my truth and then you're like, oh, that's my truth too. Cool. Let's do that. Rather than me in that, in that situation, try to tell you exactly where it's from and therefore get into the conversation. You know, it's, it's such an interesting, it's such an interesting dynamic. You know, I have other friends, my friend, Justin Baldoni, who's a Baha'i as well. I don't know if you've heard of him.

He's on Jane the Virgin. He's incredible. He is much more open about it, about the Baha'i faith. His Instagram is all about Baha'i faith. And he'll post quotes and stuff. And it's so interesting how everybody has their own way with it. And this has just kind of been mine so far. Who knows?

It might change sometime. You just kind of ride the line. You feel what feels right, what feels wrong. In no way am I embarrassed. I think you can see me talking about it. I'm like, I love it. It's like such a part of my life. I was reading just this morning, you know, it's like a ritual. Every morning I read prayers. I read stories. I read, it keeps me, it's like a big fuel of who I am. Yeah. Up to this point so far, it's been like, if you want to dig deeper, you can find out about that. I'm not going to push it. Yeah, and I think we all have seasons too.

Like who knows what the next season may be for you. So growing up, it sounds like your parents were huge influences on you. You're 34 now. And in your mid-20s, I know you lost your mom. Yeah. And that was something that it seemed like she was such a force in your life. Yeah. She was a serious force in a lot of people's lives.

She was a pretty incredible woman. Great mom, you know, just an incredible mom who was always looking in all of my ways that I would develop to make sure that I had what I needed in all those areas. Sports-wise, physically, you physically, health-wise, spiritually, just an incredible gardener of sons, I would say. So when she passed away, it was a lot of different feelings. She passed away from breast cancer, and it just kind of shook up my world in a lot of gnarly ways, a lot of cool ways.

I think it was really important for someone who is going to go sing about being happy a lot and how cool the world is to have a strong dose of compassion for how hard life can be. I think that without that, I might be a little ungrounded. If you're perceived as the positive, positive happy guy the world is hard so if you're not coming from a place of like i know the world's hard still these it can be awesome that is something that people will believe just like happy dandelions that's like too much it's not grounded i think a lot of really good positive art is grounded in pain. So that was like really important for me. Also, my mom, you know, I have an incredible relationship with her now.

I remember right when she passed away, I hated when people would say crap like that, that had lost somebody like, oh, you don't even get it. You're gonna have a great, I have a great relationship with my mom now, 10 years later. And I'm like, I don't know what you're talking about. You're actually kind of pissing me off by even saying that. So we'll deal with that later. But I do. And that is now when I'm like, we were talking about my podcast. And one of my favorite things to get into is afterlife. I have you had any experiences where you can somehow for some reason feel somebody or are there anything cool like that? I love stuff like that. Yeah. She was, she was an amazing woman,

an amazing mother. She was like really big on making sure that women, the equality of men and women. So she would have women over in our house, kind of lead them in. It's hard to describe it, but me and my dad and my brother would get kicked out and all the women in the community would come over and she would tell them stories and she would remind them how powerful they were and just be like laying bricks into this equality of men and women. And when you do something like that for your community, people really, really, really respect you and love you. So she was deeply loved. I mean, it's so amazing for you to be exposed to that at a really young age also. I mean, both of your moms taking on a really, you know, it's almost like a social activism role and a leadership role and an empowerment role. And then also watching it

and realizing that that doesn't get fame. So you're young and you watch how important it is to you, how important it is to everybody in your community. And then Kobe Bryant is the one that gets all the fame. So that right off the jump, you're like, whoa, this is interesting. What our society puts super high and what is almost invisible, right? Someone who wakes up, does incredible work, is the best mom ever and really impacts the community, doesn't really blip on the radar of this idea of fame or money. And so that kind of puts those two into an interesting place in my sphere. Yeah. Well, especially because you do have a certain amount of actual fame now for the work that you're doing in the world.

So does that inform the way that you process this thing called fame? A little bit. Just hopefully staying grounded to what is important, what matters. Does any of this even, you know, does anybody, do any of these points count? Right. I think that when you have, like in the Baha'i faith, the belief is that there is an afterlife and you move on. And that we're here to develop qualities that will be used there. Much like in the womb, you develop arms and legs and eyes

to come here and use those. Here, you're developing spiritual qualities, patience, love, generosity, selflessness, service. These are all things you develop, and then you'll use those later. So when you believe that, then the points are different, right? If you think that this is it, then, I don't know, it's just a different point scale. Yeah, it was so interesting. And it's interesting in the context, too. And by the way, we'll link to your podcast episode because I keep referring it to the one with Dan Reynolds. Oh, sure.

Of course. Yeah, totally. But I remember your conversation with Dan Reynolds also where he's talking about in Mormon tradition, they have like three levels of heaven. Levels of heaven. And I was like, wow, I've never heard of that before. So interesting. Dude, tell me what the levels are. This is amazing. Yeah. And it's kind of fascinating to see how different faith traditions process the idea of an afterlife

or even reincarnation or things like this. I think I'm kind of fascinated with Buddhist belief on sort of like cycles where you keep coming back and keep coming back. These are my favorite. Like, I love having conversations like this. We just had a little group meeting with my management team because it was a couple new clients and we all got together and hung out and did the obligatory, like, go around, say what your name is and where you're from. And then I speak up and I'm like, also, where do you think you go when we die?

And it makes for so, like, way more interesting conversation when you just are constantly throwing in these types of questions. That's really the whole idea about the podcast is that I'm hanging out with all these people that I find incredibly inspiring. So I'm backstage with someone that's amazing. And by the luck of what I do, I get to have a conversation with them and hang out with them. And that's all I want to do is just go there.

Not only there, but also, okay, so you have money. So how is that for you? Because I know that the standard current of what culture will tell you is more money, great, always better, always could have more, just keep it going. But you have some and you have actually a lot. How does it, give me the best thing about money, give me the worst thing about money. These types of questions, these ideas are my favorite. And I also, you know, you've done, how many have you done? I actually kind of lost count.

We're probably somewhere around 400. Oh, so awesome. I'm so jealous of you. I'm at like nine. And I love, I just love it. I just, I just, having deep, long conversations is one of my favorite things.

Yeah, no doubt. Do you find, does it nourish you in a similar way as being on stage or not so much? It's very different. What it does is I love it so much, these questions and I'm getting to talk with inspiring people inspires me that I don't mind all like the work that comes with it. Same. It's so much work to get to a place where you're on stage in front of thousands of people singing. That is the ultimate slog. Right. But it's not if you love it.

And so I found that with social media, I was like, I don't know if I want to do all these things. Right. I am not someone who loves to just be on social media all the time, but I love to have conversations and I will flag Ross country to have a great hour conversation with someone. So that was what let me know. Okay, cool. Then I do want to do this.

This is my favorite. I'll do this. Yeah. Yeah. No, I'm a similar way. I'm like, this is one of my absolute favorite things to do.

And people are like, and it takes a lot of prep work and it takes like, yeah, but just be able to hang out and have like a deep dive conversation and go in it's kind of the anti social media yeah

it's like we're going long yeah the Twitter thing I'm not I would consider myself a relatively funny person but I'm not the quickest

to like see what happened on TV and get it get the right funny quip immediately I usually if it's only 15 seconds,

I don't know what to do with it. I'm someone who loves to really go long. You have a public profile. You have a certain level of fame. You have, you know, significant social media profiles. You're out there, you're on stage, you're traveling around the world. You're a public person. What are you not an open book about? I don't know. I feel really lucky that I have reached wherever I am, whatever level of success by just being kind of who I am. So I'm rarely in situations where I feel like I have to put something on. That would be a lot of work. If you were not, if your persona was not who you are. As far as being open book, I'm trying to think.

Is there anything that I – I don't know. Honestly, nothing's really coming to mind. I mean, I guess what we were talking about before is I love to talk about the Baha'i Faith in the right context. But I don't come out and shout about it if it's not necessary. It more informs everything that you do rather than let's have a deliberate conversation about it. And we kind of jumped into that. We should probably fill in like a few gaps along the way here because we kind of left your journey in Binghamton.

So you end up at some point taking off from Binghamton, going out to LA and committing yourself to music. Why? What happened there? Really goes back to the idea that I just really loved writing. And I wanted to, that was such a huge part of what excites me and gets me going is this idea of taking ideas and, and putting them into simple forms, like big, big ideas and trying to get them into a singable form. And while I was doing, I love art of all forms, but I was acting and I'm like, man,

I don't think I want to write screenplays though. So while you're acting, you're thinking, what's the writing part of this? No, I'm just thinking, I don't want to read your words. I don't want to do your words. What are the chances that we're going to find the role or the play or the thing that I like as much as if I had written it? And it's hard to get roles anyway. So then you have to take so many roles that you don't even like. And I just, if you're going to do art for a career, the level of intensity that it takes to make it a commodity for someone is so high, right?

But there are other things you can do for work that are already commodities. Art, I always say if you get an entry-level job in banking or in some other thing, you go in in, you learn kind of on the job and you're getting paid while you're learning to do it badly or whatever. In art, you only get a paycheck. You only get money if it's an A triple plus. And everybody's like, oh my God, that's amazing. I need that. All the time spent where you're figuring it out. Oh, that's a B.

That's pretty good. No one cares. Also, no money. That was an A. Still, I don't need it. It has to be. So that was a really great lesson of street performing is someone's walking by. What level of impression do you need to make on them for them to stop going to get jeans,

pull out their wallet, and pay $10 for a CD? That's high. You really have to have an effect on someone. Whether your voice has to be so good that they're like, holy crap, that was amazing, or a line has to hit them in the chest from a song where they want to hear it again. That is just such a high bar.

And so that was a really good, you know, street performer for four years was kind of the school of hard knocks of how good something has to be to actually move the needle. So you end up in LA, and you're in school for music. And at the same time, you're out on the third street promenade in Santa Monica, just playing on pretty much a daily basis for years. Think about giving up along the way? No, because it's so fun.

Even the little pieces along the way of, oh man, I had you until the chorus and then I lost you. But I know I had you. I had you with the first verse and then the chorus hit and I lost you and you left. So that doesn't make me think I want to give up. That makes me go, if I have, if I know I can get you, I'm here. It's like getting a little bite when you're fishing. And rather than taking all the bite, it's all how you look at it, right? You can be like, ah, I only get nibbles here. It's like getting a little bite when you're fishing. And rather than taking all the bite, it's all how you look at it, right? You can be like, ah, I only get nibbles here. Nothing ever comes. Or like, I'm getting so many nibbles. There's like, I believe that this is possible.

Plus I've always, I've always been so lucky to the level of success that I've been at is like two clicks higher than what my expectation was. It seems to always be that way. I hope it keeps going like that. So my expectation was low. And for five minutes today, there was a traveling Japanese volleyball team and they were all super into it. And they really liked me. So for five minutes, I was a rock star on the street. And it felt very similar to how it is right now, because people are into what you're doing. They really love what you're doing and you got them. And then they leave. And that was all you got for maybe three or four days. But you're like, that felt really good. That's just, there were these little treats that kept me going the whole time. Yeah. I mean, it's so interesting too, because you sound fiercely attuned, not just to,

how do I express this thing that's in my head in a way that is like true and pure to me but also how do I how do I move people like what is the science yeah like you're you're so outward focused and I've heard you talk about this actually that there there are moments where like you can be up on stage saying but you're also kind of there's a little bit of a split personality thing going on where you're out there sort of scanning the audience saying, how does this land? How does this land? Yeah. And it's always funny because there's other people that I watch who don't care. Right. And sometimes that really works too. And it seems like that's a vocal part of performing.

I feel like you go to a Radiohead show and that guy doesn't care. That guy's going to do what he does. Yeah. He's in his own place. And if you don't like it, then like, screw you, you know, or you shouldn't have come. I aspire to get there. I definitely have arrived where I am now by a lot of trial and error and just being, you know, everything. One of the big things about it is all about service. So like, how are you of service to someone else?

And when you start performing, they are doing you the service because you're bad and your music isn't great and your songs aren't great. So we've all felt the service of I'm giving this person attention right now. They're not earning it. I'm giving them a gift of me paying attention to them. Anyone who's been to an open mic knows exactly what I'm talking about. I'm giving to you right now. And so with a lot of understanding and almost scientifically diagnosing every single song you're doing and taking stock of what's happening, you can start the slow process of turning it, turning that to where now someone's not giving you their attention, you're giving them an experience. And that is a really hard thing to actually turn. It takes a lot of work.

And yeah, I kind of scientifically did it. here's this song am i giving you attention are you giving me attention and oh yeah i mean but do you and it's just interesting you just said like yes i aspire to that place where it's just pure expression i don't think you do i i mean you're so driven by i know you're such a student of human behavior and you're so driven by service i had a i had a really good one of the guys in the podcast was Hunter Hayes, who's this incredible country artist. And I was asking him, what's it like for you on stage? When are you the happiest?

What restores your soul? And he goes, when I'm lost in the music on stage. I was like, whoa, dude. I don't know if I'm lost. Do you ever feel that? I have been experimenting with it now more on stage. There's solo sections or there's different parts, and I've been messing with it.

And I think you can probably have a little bit of both. It doesn't have to be one way. But for me, I'm on stage, and I'm the happiest when you're happy. So it's less about being lost and more about how do I give you everything that you, not just everything you, you expected, but I want to leave you feeling like you got more than you. Yeah. So it sounds like for you, it's, it's more. And that makes me so happy. Yeah. Yeah. It's more about elevation than expression. Sometimes. Well, the expression is already baked in. The expression is all the songs all the the

you know for each album it's usually about 115 songs that i write to get the expression right that that that is my expression time to make sure that when i get on stage i'm singing things that i fully believe in and then once those are are, once the track's laid out, then it's like, okay, how do I go ride this? How do I take you somewhere and make sure it's great for you? And I'm singing things that, I'm already singing things I believe in that I love, that mean the world to me, you know? So are there, I have to imagine then there are moments

where you're like, all right, I have written something that is my 100% truth. This is like, this is literally like, I just, you is literally like I opened my heart. I opened a vein, poured it onto the page. This is my essence coming out through me. And then you put it onto the world and nothing. Or it just doesn't land. So what do you do?

If you really do feel that way, then there probably is a home for it. The home might not be a number one worldwide hit, but it might be a live song that people really feel in love when you do it live. It might be that it bangs in stadiums at sports stadiums, and that song does that. It might be that it's like crushing in movie trailers. There's all these different forms of hits and there's all these homes. And one thing that's been hard to learn is that when you write something, sometimes the home that it's supposed to go to is a smaller audience of people that it will blow their minds. And that's okay. What are

you not going to write that? loved it too the fact that you love it doesn't matter that you know this dance of what's in what's worth it what are you shooting for when you sit down to write a song is yeah you had you had elizabeth gilbert on here right oh she's like the queen man have you read her book big magic man that was i love stuff like that and i passed that on to a lot of people ask me about writing or some young songwriters. I always give that. That's one of my books that I give all the time. And she's someone,

and she says in that book also, and she's spoken about it where she is like, I forgot her exact words, but I hate like quoting people who write and where I just love their language because I know I'm going to butcher it. But the fundamental thought was, she's like, you know, please don't write this book because you want to in some way help somebody

else write it because it's the thing you can't not write. And that's why, that's kind of what I was getting at with the song. Like there's gotta be some things where it's like, yes, there's a sweet spot between me being truthful and also putting a lot of work and engineering and art into how do we, how do we put this together? How do we, how do we go into the studio, you know, and engineer it so that we really feel like it's going to land for a lot of people? And there are going to be those moments where it's like, it's got to be what it's got to be because this is how it has to come out of me and represent it. And maybe it lands in a vastly smaller audience, but that's my truth. This is what it has to be.

That's my truth. That is my truth. Yeah. And when they align in a big way, that's really exciting. And I don't know if you can, at least for me, the constant battle of trying to only shoot for the big audience because that doesn't always land anyway. So I think I would rather shoot for what feels great to me and what feels like my truth most authentically,

and then some of those hopefully will land with a big audience. Because when you go the other way and you start really trying to chase what will work at a big audience, man, it is a sad, sad road. Yeah, that can get soulless really fast. I know there's a writer also. Yeah, it gets really, it gets lame. And I think that what people, what has always worked for me, the biggest songs I've had are the ones that are the most unique.

You know, a song like Honey, I'm Good. Right. That was completely. That's so weird. Yeah. That was not anything that was happening on the radio at the time. It still isn't really. It's like a really weird.

I don't even, I don't consider myself a country artist in the least. And that's like got some country vibes to it. Yeah. So I think that going, it's a little scary, but you consistently have to just like chase some country vibes to it. Yeah. So I think that going, it's a little scary, but you consistently have to just like chase what is true to you. How do you feel about keeping yourself uncomfortable in your work? Yeah, I like that. I think that a lot of good things can come from that. Yeah. It's tough to, when you want to sing your truth, sometimes it's like, well, why don't you write about sex?

Like, well, I don't know. That's uncomfortable. But I just don't know. I don't know if that works for me. So I do. I try. I'll do. That's what part of the 115 songs is.

I'll write in every way possible and then see what lands, what feels right, what have I caught with my net. Yeah. And also the business. It's like you wake up and the music industry has transformed. So it's, you know, when you go back to the days where you're hanging out and every day you're showing up and you're on third street promenade and you're in front of people for like five, eight, 10 hours a day, you can look at their eyes, you can see their bodies, you can see their faces and you have immediate visceral embodied feedback about what's landing, what's not landing, and you can change things on the fly.

It's like you can run a million experiments. But it's very similar. That's like a long period of time you get the feedback, which I think is similar to like a Spotify playlist now. Who are the people that are listening to this? So who are all the people that walk by you today on a Tuesday? Were those even people that would like your music anyway so there's still there's similarities there too where if you just take you know if i play a song and nobody likes it on that specific day is that conclusive evidence that that's not a hit no right so sometimes same thing if you're if your

song doesn't go bonkers right in the first minute, well, has it reached the audience that it needs to reach? So the data thing right now is so interesting. I don't know. I don't know. Right. As an artist, how do you deal with that? Because it's like something on Spotify, like one particular type of song is going to hit on Spotify. And it's going to hit totally different on radio and totally different in a stadium, totally different in a small theater.

It's like, who do you write to? Or do you just ignore it all? When there are that many things, then I think you consistently, it's kind of like you do want to have your ear, like I do a lot of listening to what's working, right? Almost so that you can either try to get close to it or push far, far away from it so that you can either try to get close to it or push far, far away from it

so that you can maybe penetrate into it while then just being true to what you love and authentic to yourself. To say that I'm someone who only does the authentic to myself thing would be lying. I love listening. I have super FOMO about every pop culture thing that happens. I love to be up on everything. But yeah, I think I do know what it feels like to write a song or to be on stage singing a song that you're not super, super connected to.

That is not worth it. That's not fun. Yeah, because it brings it full circle back to some of the stuff we talked about earlier. You can get that in any job where you show up and it's luxury about the paycheck. Totally. You know? So why bother?

So you recently, you're married five years now, four years? Yeah, six. We just had our sixth anniversary. Wow. Congratulations. Thank you. And not too long ago, you became a dad. How has it changed you just personally?

And you're a father of a daughter also. So I'm a father of a daughter. Oh, you are, yeah. Which is the most beautiful thing on the planet. How do you think about it? Like now that you're, okay, so you're a dad. You're, you know, you and your wife are raising a little girl and a woman, and you know, who's going to become a woman and move into this world.

And when you think about the way the world is now, you think about a lot of what's happening in our society right now, raising, you know, like how do you sort of process all of this? The number one, the coolest thing about having a kid is in a daughter, especially is that I feel so much more connected to everyone. There's this, it's such an intense experience. And, you know, if it was, if something as intense as I was a Navy a navy seal and then i met you and you were a navy seal like dude navy seals right like amazing we've been through something together and i i i am constantly hit now maybe because it's still fresh you know she's going to turn one this week

every woman i see i'm like whoa you got a dad and he he was either good or not that good to you. And I feel connected to you, every woman. I bring it up all the time. I'll ask waitresses. I'll be like, yo, give me one good thing your dad did, one thing he could have done better. And now we're in. Now it's way more interesting. The conversation is more interesting.

But also I just feel the unity that I feel with the whole world after having this little girl is more. I feel closer to everyone. And then as far as raising her, yeah, I think the world is always tough, has always been tough. It might be tougher right now than it's been,

or it might not have been. So I think, uh, I'm going to raise her to be the best she can be. And, uh, I think we'll be all right. Yeah.

What do you, if there's like one thing in your mind where you're like, this is, I would like to share with her as she grows. There's a couple things. So one is persistence. I think that is probably maybe the most important as far as being successful in this world is just being persistent. What is success? I mean, when you say success. To get to actually do the things you love and have success in your life, in your business, in your art, in your relationship,

in this idea of you are persistent, that is more important than talent. That is something that I see can be a game changer, is if you are raised to push through the hard times. And then the other thing that I think that I really want to get across to her is this idea of a rhythm of service that I've found in my life, that being of service is what makes you happy. Much like going to the gym makes you feel good, being of service to others makes you happy. And if someone who's really good at the gym, which I'm not necessarily, wakes up and doesn't

want to go to the gym early, the alarm clock goes off and they're like, ugh. And if you get it where it's a habit to push through that moment to then still go to the gym, then you leave the gym and you love it. And if you have enough of that as a rhythm, then the alarm clock doesn't hurt as much because you are already associating the feeling that you're going to get from it. And I think that is really special. My parents did a lot of that for me. I want to make sure she has that to know that when you feel like crap, the most important thing you can do is go be of service to somebody else and that will take you out of it. So that that is a quick math that happens in your head and just becomes a part of your life. I mean, it's a beautiful sentiment. So as we're hanging out here,

you are in the not too distant future and you're bopping around doing shows right now, but I think you're about to go on a much more sort of like intense extended tour in the in the fall this year now doing that knowing that you've got a daughter who's about to turn one and your wife how do you think about making commitments like that differently and how do you navigate wanting to be a president of all father and husband with an intense intense scheduling i know you you figure out how to get her out as much as you possibly can. And then you also kind of know that there is no perfect way. So if I just stayed home, that's not great. That's not good for me.

I'm not happy that way. And also it heightens how good your art has to be so that when you are on stage, you're getting what you need. And it is inspiring. It's not just a job. So I put so much energy and intention into what I'm writing so that when I get somewhere, when I'm on stage, it's not, we're not just showing up to play a show here. We're like, this is my favorite thing to do. And I want to take you all somewhere. And when that happens, it's a little bit, not easier, but there's a reason to leave your daughter.

It's not when I'm not just a door-to-door salesman who has to leave and then I'll come back because I need to get money. That's not what we're doing here. There's way more of a purpose and a beauty to this. Like I'm on stage, one of my favorite songs to sing right now is a song called 85,

which is like I don't want to off the new record yeah and when you have a whole crowd rocking like I don't want to be

85 singing oh no I think I missed it I was chasing money I just did that at the Grove in Los Angeles

like in the middle of all these shopping malls and everybody's like rocking with me you know and that is that psychs me up

and it feels incredible and I need my daughter if I'm raising her I need her to know that, that I need her to come to shows and be like, Oh, that's what my dad does. That's why he's gone. That's why all this. So I think it's a, hopefully it's a figure eight where it leads back into each other rather than just like some sort of break apart. Yeah. I mean, it sounds like also for you, you're wired in a way where I'm guessing you're a pretty extroverted person where being around large numbers of people, it gives you energy rather than it takes you energy. So when you come back from that. It's so amazing that it doesn't do that for everybody.

Right. Isn't that so funny? What are you? I'm an introvert. You're an introvert. Right. So I love being on stage for an hour. Like I'll go keynote somewhere and then I just want to be walking alone in the woods.

That's so funny. Because I need to refill. You know, like I love it in the moment, but then I'm empty at the end. Whereas for you, it's like, it gives you energy. One of my favorite things to do, I love to be with people for so much. And then my wife always makes fun of me. I love to fall asleep in the middle of a party. I love that.

I genuinely love that. And I've set up my whole life to where I'll be on tour, which is literally a bus of 12 friends, and you're sleeping with all of them. So sometimes I have to be really aware that even with my band members or whatever, that everybody needs some time. I'm like, so what are we going to do now? And they're like, geez, dude, chill. Just breathe. I need a minute. But it's good because it seems like that's what gives you that figure eight that you're talking about.

Because it lets you come back home energized rather than depleted. And it's not like, okay, so now I need to just sort of like. Yeah, and it was really important when my daughter was coming. I took around two months off to just be there before she was born, make sure that I was there when she was born and then some time after. It was hard for me and my wife to just be home every single day all the time. And it was an interesting piece. Like, oh, the answer is not just don't do it. There is no good place to land here.

We have to figure out what the best way is for us to be filling ourselves and then being present. Being present with my daughter is not going to be a problem for me as being in the same state as her. We'll have to figure that out. Yeah. And I think it's about how physically and emotionally and spiritually present you are, not just having a body in front of another body. When you're there, you're really there. Yeah. Yeah.

So it feels like a good place for us to come full circle also. So we're hanging out here, and it's called the Good Life Project. So if I offer the phrase, to live a good life, what comes up? To live a good life. I was reading this quote this morning that was like, all of the rivers flow to the ocean because the ocean lowers itself. So to live a good life is to be of service. And I love that because it sounds kind of monkish or super spiritual when you say it just like that. But when you think of it like business, why does a business work?

Why is Apple so big? Because it's a massive service. It makes people so happy. It gives them what they need and you're being of service to them. Why is Cardi B smashing? She's a massive service to a lot of people right now. Why is Bruno Mars? So why is this song so good? Because it is of service to your ears, to your soul, all that. So I love to say it so much that it becomes sexy. Yeah. Thank you.

Cool, man. Thank you so much for listening to this episode. And thanks also to our fantastic sponsors who help make the show possible. You can check them out in the links that we have included in today's show notes. And while you're at it, be sure to click on the subscribe button in your listening app so you never miss an episode. And then share the Good Life Project love with friends. When ideas become conversations that lead to action, that is when real change takes hold. See you next time. The Apple Watch Series 10 is here.

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Charge time and actual results will vary. Mayday, mayday. We've been compromised. The pilot's a hitman. I knew you were going to be fun. On January 24th. Tell me how to fly this thing. Mark Wahlberg.

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