Jocko Podcast - 243: Finding a Way Back Home. Life, Death, Murder, and Music with The White Buffalo

Episode Date: August 19, 2020

0:00:00 - Opening 0:12:07 - "Wish It Was True", by The White Buffalo. 0:16:23 - Jake Smith, The White Buffalo. 1:41:26 - "No History", by The White Buffalo 1:44:50 - How to stay on THE PATH 2:05:35 - Closing GratitudeSupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/jocko-podcast/exclusive-content

This is Jocko podcast number 243 with Echo Charles and me Jocko Willink. Good evening, Echo. Good evening. It's a different world when you get home. I mean, at some point while you're over there, you accept death. You give away normal life. You give away the normal world, probably just a coping mechanism of some kind. to just accept your fate to accept your fate that the world is war is dirt and blood and pain and

death and you have to accept that at least I did then I'd be lying to you if I said that I didn't want that acceptance that I didn't want that attitude because world the everyday day world is a complicated place. There's all kinds of things going on and friends and mortgage payments and bills to pay and a future to worry about and retirement and savings and the kids. But in war, that's all gone. There really isn't even a future. Nothing else matters.

Nothing but the mission and the men was my concern. Did I think about my family? I had other things to think about. And other things to worry about bullets and bombs and blood and shit and life and death. You get through it. Some of you don't. For those that do make it through one day, just as quickly as it started, it's over. Get on a plane and you fly home.

And on that flight home, I only think about one thing that I didn't bring home all my men. 24 hours of flight time you go from Ramadi Iraq to San Diego, California. More time to come around. But you soon realize that you are alive. And you have a house and a wife and kids and mortgage and a future. You are alive and you are thankful. And you want to live a life that honors your friends that didn't come home. And then it's let's go.

Let's get it on. Surf and fight and drink and eat and play guitar and run and roll and surf some more. Let's go. Let's do this. We're lucky to even be here. For me, much of that time, the surfing and the rolling and the eating and the drinking and the jamming on the git box was spent with Seth Stone. The Delta platoon commander thought a house a mile away from mine. He was like an uncle to my kids part of the family

You know he's a much nicer guy than me much friendlier than me always made friends and before we left on deployment He had Somehow linked up with a guy by the name of Gene Cooper a legendary surfboard shaper and Seth got Gene to make us some boards Some epic boards when we got home we got those boards and we rode them. And through Gene, Seth also linked up with a guy named Mike Black that made a surf movie. If it can even be called, that's kind of a crazy surf movie called Invasion from Planet Sea, the sci-fi surf movie.

It was unique. It was kind of wild and funny and insane and just kind of completely crazy. And maybe that's why we liked it because it had some great. good surfing and it made us laugh also had some good music in it some real good music one song in that movie was called madman was by a band called the white buffalo and we heard the lyrics to the song and they made they made sense to us section of lyrics that says like an animal out of his den you better hide your money you better hide your children you can't keep your fear at bay because the madman's roaming these streets today the madman's coming we understood what that was all about in the white buffalo

songs weren't some other surf movies along the way one called shelter the song called wrong knew some other guys in there joel to do was in that movie so set figured out where the rest of this music came from and we started listening to this white buffalo came like a little soundtrack the music and the lyrics and the sound and the attitude was somehow somehow was about us about what we had seen about what we had been through about what we were going through don't really remember exactly when we went and saw the white buffalo for the first time I know that we saw him one time at UCSD in some kind of cafe and there was probably about 12 people there. Saw him at the Casbah in San Diego, the belly up a few times.

Eventually we saw them at bigger places, like the House of Blues and the Observatory. And we knew that somehow this guy, it got us. And I remember the first time we saw him at the Casbah. It's the last time we saw him when there was a pretty small crowd, but it was a small enough crowd that everyone that was there knew who he was There was no people wandering in they knew they knew who the white buffalo was and they were there to see him People were drinking and people were carrying on And they were talking and la P.A music faded and the lights went dark and then he walked out on stage and he played I do right by you

What you asked me too, I did wrong, and I'm a day again, I make everything. I gave my soul, and I'll fly out of hell. I wish you'd lost outside that. What you say, it's what you do. Just keep wishing you, and there's no man. You just polish the blood. There's just no way. Because a soul, what's your eye on trade.

Now, I'm just a strength. Hanger to you Lace was silent for a second Seth and I were standing there like everybody else Then we looked at each other We smiled The place went crazy We did too

It was a good night It's a good memory And memories are All I have left of Seth now On those songs And those are some powerful songs And it's an honor today to have The man behind those memories

And behind those songs the man himself a man named Jake Smith otherwise known as the white buffalo Jake thanks for coming down man thank you for heavenly no pressure on that set right there that was intense

yeah man tell me about it yeah it's lots of stuff wrapped up in the songs that you write it's um it's kind of crazy when I think about all the time that I spent sitting there listening, playing them, listening to them,

going to your shows, you know, just being some random dude. We almost got into a fight at the belly up one time. Some guy was talking, like, just mad dog and Seth. And Seth was like 6'2, you know? And, you know, I mean, I know I look like a serial killer for sure. Seth not quite as much because he's too nice. But still, he's a strapping dude with a shaved head. and cauliflower ears, right?

That's generally not a go situation for scraps. No, that's a sign. Yeah. So at belly up, we're standing there, and this dude's kind of nudging into Seth, and Seth's kind of looking at him, and I'm standing behind the guy, which in the jiu-jitsu world means I can kill you.

You have zero chance. But it didn't happen. But lots of memories, man. It's awesome to have you come down here. I appreciate it. Yeah, my pleasure. Let's talk a little bit. bit about you, man. Enough about me. I've been talking about myself here for a long time.

Let's hear about you. All right. So you were born where? Up in Oregon. I was born in Eugene, Oregon. And what was that all about? Were your parents working up there? My dad was still going to school. He's a college professor. And he was, I think he was still working on his master's at that point. And we moved down to, he might have been working on his PhD. And then we moved down to Southern California, Huntington Beach, when I was maybe one. Uh-huh. And he continued that at Pepperdine and did some student teaching. And then we were there for maybe since I was one until 20.

Dang. Malibu. Yeah, we didn't live there though. Oh. But we lived in Huntington Beach, which is all as it's, yeah. Well, I think to meet in Malibees cool too, but I mean, let's face it, if you lived in Malibu and you surf Malibu all the time, you probably wouldn't. We didn't.

We probably wouldn't. You'd be a different perspective. So you grew up in Huntington Beach then? I didn't. And what was the situation? Your dad's a college professor at Pepperdine? No, my dad was a college professor at Cal State Dominguez Hills. Oh, I see so.

He did his student teaching or finished his PhD there and then moved on to Cal State Dominguez Hills. What does he teach? He taught public administration. What even is that? Right. Now it's tough to explain, right? I think it's like the study of city budgets. I think a lot of policemen take it, city planners.

It's like in the political science world. Now, what do you think makes a man say to themselves? They're looking at the courses and they're like, there you go, public administration. That's calling my name. Yeah, I don't know. And it, you know, I mean, he's interested by some odd things like that, but it's, it was surprising. Not surprising, but yeah, it is. It's one of the lesser known, you know, pedagogies.

You know, it's not a normal. When you say what that is, most people say what I said. Yeah, exactly. What I said? What about your mom? What was she up? She was a nurse. She was a labor and delivery nurse.

Oh, dang. Brother and a sister. You have a brother and a sister. Correct. Old or younger? I'm the youngest. You're the baby. I'm the baby.

What does that whole thing work out? You know that whole thing? You know what I'm talking about? Yeah. Where you're the, so now you're the, so now you're the, get coddled and everything and you're the spoiled kid it's it was it was part of it it was part of it definitely how far from the beach did you live in Huntington Beach I live we used to take the bus to go surf okay I was young um two miles oh that's not that's

not bad you could beach cruiser that all day long we could but we bust it or got dropped off for the bus was easier than a beach cruiser I don't know why we bust it you know it's a weird Yeah I think it was all BMX So it just wasn't an option to have the rack and whatnot Yeah Did they have them? Did they have them

You had to carry it under your arm back then? I don't even know if they had the racks back then Yeah Now you get all kinds of racks You're good to go BMX or not That's true I think they can

How much were you surfing? I surfed quite a bit But it wasn't something that I picked up super easily It was the age of the small thin board where I'm always been a big dude and and to ride you know Kelly Slater's board right I'm on a six three and I'm six two you know and it's like some way for thin thing that I can't you know I'm sitting out in the lineup and I'm

up to my tits yeah water and it's not gonna float me it took me a while to just go like I mean I should probably get a bigger board yeah something that actually can I can paddle in the waves yeah that's a that's a big mental transition to make man my buddy Josh Hall just made me a board that's 116 and it is the it's the thickest board I think a human could make because my son was telling him what I wanted and and they were doing this like as a secret surprise for me right yeah was that cool like a secret surprise behind my back so my son was telling him hey you know and Josh had some ideas and my son's like no the biggest thickest board you could possibly make and Josh Hall delivered big time you got to try

that board. I got some thick boards too. I got a couple. One of mine looks like a paddleboard, but it's not a paddle board. It's a surfboard for a big for a large man, right? We'll say. So you, and I know you play it. You were freaking hardcore baseball player, right? I was. That was kind of my dream as a child. I ended up playing college baseball, division one baseball, had a scholarship to play baseball. What position did you play? Until I was a senior in high school, I played shortstop. So I was on the more athletic side, especially for a big man.

They thought I was going to be like the next like Cal Ripkin. Like, you know, and he was, you know, big. That's a big statement you just made. They thought I was going to be the next Cal Ripkin. I mean, I don't know. I don't know how many people they were. No, but that was that they were grooming me for that idea. But then we actually had this young kid who came in as a shortstop who was a sophomore

or something. It was just a little phenom. And then I moved over to third base. I didn't I didn't play well I played baseball my dad wanted my dad like really like sports a lot That's why my name is jaco by the way And I didn't like sports as much as him at all I like machine guns, right? So but my you know I would get put into sports randomly. Oh, you know go play little league and I was on the Braves Oh yeah echo gets into this kind of thing

But I just wasn't you know wasn't really wasn't really my thing so years later I went and talked to a professional baseball team. And when I was growing up, I remembered the baseball players, it seemed like most of the baseball players that were pros, they were like these little guys, right? Like little Dominican guys, little Puerto Rican guys that were fast and everything. And when I went and met with this team,

which was just a few years ago, they were freaking monsters. They were all huge, yeah. Oh, they're massive now. I mean, it's a whole different. Is that a new thing? Yeah. I mean, if you look, even if you look at footage from,

you know, the 80s, even early 90s. even early 90s. They were way smaller. How much practice did you play? I mean, are you one of the, because sports was different. Like nowadays, if you're a kid and you're going to play sports, your parents are like, cool, you're going to do that sport. You're going to play it 365 days a year.

You're going to get coaching. You're going to get some private whatever. Hitting batting coach that's come and work with you when you're, the kids like, oh, we need a batting coach. You're like, yeah, sure, no problem. Okay, here's my son. He's four. Right.

Was it like that for you? Not so much. I mean, I did do extra stuff and I did, you know, did extra work with hitting coaches and fielding coaches. And it was definitely a big part. I mean, it was a, I wanted to be a major league baseball player when I was a kid. And my dad, I come from kind of a wrestling family. My dad was a wrestler. My brother was a wrestler.

Right? And, but there, he's not a ball sport guy at all. And so he was kind of always blown away by the idea like, how did this? Where did this child come from? You know, that, you know, he used to say that he could throw a ball at me. Like when we were young, my brother's like a year and a half older than me. He could just throw a ball at me when I was like two, and I would just like reach up and snatch it. You know?

I'm probably hit off my, you know, hit off my brother's chest and land on the floor. But they had, you know, they were hard-nosed guys, you know, my dad's a badass, you know. How old were you started playing baseball? Actually, my dad wouldn't let us play. He thought it was too political when I was young, just with all the bullshit. Wait a second. I have no idea what you're talking about. How is baseball political at 19?

What is this? 1985 or something? Probably. I mean, I was born in 74. So, you know, it was just a lot of tension, kids. Oh, you mean political, like the dad with the kid, the mom, the emotions of that. He thought, like, soccer. was a better game, a better family sport, that kind of thing.

So we played soccer. And then he finally, he budged earlier because my brother was older and we always wanted to play baseball. And then he, I mean, I was like minor bees. I was like, I was still quite young when I started playing. How good was your brother? At baseball? Yeah.

He was fast. Damn, bro. Talk about the freaking hammer of destruction. Ouch. I guess the ball was hitting him in the face when the old band threw it to him. No, he was a wrestler. I mean, it was a different. Oh, your brother wrestled.

My brother wrestled too. Oh, okay. Yeah, he did. He wrestled, my dad wrestled in college. He wrestled Oregon State under Dale Thomas. And then coach some at Oregon as well as Oregon State. And my brother, he just wrestled in high school. But he was good in high school.

Yeah, wrestling in California high school is no joke. Yeah, he was good. It's the largest wrestling tournament in the world. I think he was CIF champ, I always say, my brother. Respect. He was good. Props to your brother. So.

at what point what was your, what was you know you're dealing with music? It was late. I mean, it hit me super late. I was probably, I tell the story and I don't even know the actual how What were you listening to when you were a little kid? We were country music fans.

My parents were crazy about country and it was all country all the time in the station wagon and we would go see country music concerts. It was kind of the transition time of country when it was getting not over the top cheesy, but, you know, it was like Alan Jackson was coming in

and it was getting a little more sticky than it was kind of these heartfelt songs of my youth. But yeah, it was all country music. It was odd for, you know, a kid to be, until I really got the high school, was exclusively country music listener and kind of proud of that fact. But then I got Roland a punk when I was in high school.

And where'd that come from? I'm not entirely sure. There wasn't some kid name. There was a whatever. No, there was my, one of my buddies who used to take me to school in the morning. He was more of a metal head. And I don't know exactly how I got.

And so he would listen to, you know, we'd listen to Metallica and Danzig and anthrax. And then I started listening to punk. But it was more of the Southern California stuff. You know, I started kind of getting into hardcore stuff. And then that's when I got a guitar, kind of. But I was more like bad religion, circle jerks, descendants, stuff that was a little more melodic, maybe. Yeah.

You know? And then I got a guitar. We'd go drink beers in my buddy's house. And his dad would play John Prine songs and some of the quirkier kind of Dylan songs. And I was 18, 19, maybe. And I was like, oh, let's go get a guitar. When you talk about music, I don't know if you think this, I think this. When I was younger, like within, when I met someone shook their hands, hey, nice to meet you.

Within the first, let's say, seven to nine minutes of talking to someone, I would say, what kind of music do you like? Because it would be like a straight up indicator. It would tell you a lot about them. And nowadays, like sometimes I meet you. I got four kids and they're all whatever 20 19 17 and 10 and for a while I would say you know What kind of music do you like to these kids and they're just it's so there's so much music Right there's so much music out there that it's you know you know you used to get the weird avoidance answer to that question It's like oh I listen to everything right and I used to say okay so you to me that used to mean to me you have no personality

If you don't say, bro, I like Nordic death metal or whatever, then I know we, I know you. I know who you are. Or, you know, I like the dead. Okay, I know who you are or whatever. You know, I like, uh, whatever, hair metal, Leif Babin. So, so it used to identify kind of like who you are, right? I mean, it was even part of the fashion. Like you, you couldn't really like everything.

If you were into one thing, that's what you look like. You had the big hair or if you were in a punk, you know, maybe look like a skinhead. if you were in you know you wore the the pants if you were in the country you had the pants with the stitching you know or it's like yeah it it's not it was almost a identifier yeah and and then people nowadays there's just so much music and it's so accessible so when I was a kid in order to get music that we wanted to hear we had to go to New York maybe we had to go to a good record store which they just weren't all over the place there's one in waterbury good brass city gets some um but you know we'd go there and and the but the that was part of the inhibitor

the other part was money like it costs 21 dollars for an album and you know we just didn't so i i you know i i love music and i had probably i don't know 30 albums that i just listened to over and over and over again. Then you borrow one from someone. And of course, we got the little, we got tape cassettes, too. You'd get the dubbed tape cassette. But even that was kind of hard to get because they would all sound like crap. Not that we really cared that much.

I mean, let's face it. Nowadays, everybody kind of listens to everything. There's a lot out there. Not to mention all the crossover. You've got country and you got what the Nas kid who's, you know, old town road. You know, we got a lot of crossovers, is what I'm saying. So you could, you're just open. it up even wider.

Even more. Oh yeah. Now you really are listening to everything. You see what I'm saying? Things are getting crazy. Crazy too. It's kind of upsetting though. Really?

Like when they start rapping in country. They do throw you for a loop sometimes. It's just like, this is not. I don't know. You're saying that's upsetting. Echo doesn't seem upset by that. He doesn't. I'm just observing the landscape of music at the time.

At the moment. Let me tell you, look, Echo's a decent guy. Thank you. When we go places, he drives. I ride, which means he gets control of the music situation. Yes. Which is a problem.

For you, I can see how that could be, yes. So, so did you get, so you said you played D1 college, so you get into college. Do you get into college? Where did you go to college? I went two years at a junior college in Huntington Beach, Golden West College, and then I did two years at St. Mary's College, which was in the East Bay in Maraga. same league as at the time at least was like pepper dine Santa Clara loyal Marmont San Diego what you see San Diego okay that league and did you so is that when you were talking that you got a guitar was that still in high school you got a

it was prior to that so probably when I was 19 probably about when I don't know if it was a summer between my senior year in high school oh and college your dad held you back you were old right I was not a long I was not old. Dude, hardcore wrestling, like, families, their kids are going to school. They're, like, starting,

they're graduating when they're 23 years old. That's the way it works. But he's a college professor, so I think education was equally, if not more important to him than our, you know, dominance in sports and wrestling. Dude,

wrestling's crazy, man. I mean, I know. I mean, my kids wrestle and it's like, it's mayhem. It's mayhem. You want to talk about,

political. Your dad's talking about soccer. Come to a freaking wrestling tournament. It's insane, man. It's insane. Go to the state championships in Bakersfield, California. It's insane. It's awesome. Okay. So you're still in high school, and you're 27 years old.

So you're still in high school, and that's when you go, you hear a little bit of acoustic music that you go, yeah, just that my friend's dad would play. We'd just drink beers, and he would hang out, and he would play. just songs and I was like oh it looks easy oh wait oh so he was playing guitar he was playing guitar and singing himself he wasn't playing records he was in spinning record he was actually singing and playing them

samulo damn and uh yeah he wrote down a few chords for me and then I was on my way and kind of didn't I didn't even really learn songs I started writing songs almost immediately with not and not with the agenda to be like I'm gonna be a musician a song write I was still a baseball player that was still the dream, you know. And, uh, I don't know, I just kept writing. Were you feeling any, any of the burn, the baseball burnout at that point? Yeah, totally. I, I had, I had it. No, and I, you had it in fourth grade. No, the reality of it is in high school, I was still super serious about it. Once I hit junior college, I was less serious about it and didn't even, wasn't even that great. I don't think. And actually, uh, what happened to Cal Ripkin over here, bro?

You know, he started, I don't know, he started smoking weed and surfing during the summer, you know? I mean, at that level, at Division I, everyone goes to Alaska or in the area, somewhere, some far off place playing summer ball all the time. And I never did that ever. I would just surf and hang out at 20th Street with my buddies. And then, you know, they go, you know, I come back from summer.

They're like, you're in shape, you know. But, yeah, it wasn't, I had kind of lost the love for it a little bit. But then when they were going to pay for my college education, and they saw me at some All-Star game and I went off, you know, I hit like a home run into doubles or something like that and saw that I was, could move, move well for a big person and I got a scholarship out of that.

And so I was like, well, okay, a couple more years. It's not going to hurt anybody, you know. It was actually really fun. So then you, you, so when you got your guitar, you're still in high school and you're immediately writing songs. Like you had that, you had that thought that, I kind of, from my interpretation of that thought, is it's a pain to try and learn what someone else is doing,

but if I just make something up, then it's a little easier. Was there any of that there? It may have been. That's like the story of my whole existence. It's kind of just the easiest path to something. I'll be like, oh, I didn't really try that hard to be doing that, you know?

And I'm assuming you never took any lessons or anything? No, I never did. I never took any lessons. I mean, the first song I wrote, I wrote a song when I knew, and I knew, like, E minor, and G, and then wrote a song, like about suicide or something. something super but like a narrative about like some guy jumping off a building or something and I was like why is it and I wasn't even that disturbed as a child you know it's like pretty I was pretty

happy go lucky but um yeah it's and he immediately started writing what was the name of the first song it's called the jumper day has it ever been released no and I I was trying to remember the the lyrics and it's I mean they're not they weren't as nearly as crafted as they are today you know Well, you got me beat because I think the first song that my band, we had a bunch of bands when I was a kid. And the name that we've kind of has survived is Bronson's children named after Charles Bronson. And even though we never made an album and even though we did record about 15 songs in the studio. But more important to that, we made cool T-shirts. So we've had these cool T-shirts that we have them on the, we have them on the Jocco store.

They're just a picture of Charles Bronson's face. And then underneath and little kids. Kids like a toddler writing. It says Bronson's children, you know, with like a backwards R type thing. But I think the first song that I can remember was there was this weird televangelist dude that was on late night TV.

His name was Dr. Gene Scott. Oh, I remember with the big. Yes, yes, that's him. That's him. But public access. Yeah, public access. He was kind of, He was kind of like one of these people.

He sort of berated the audience kind of, right? Right. I think it was like the gateway between like Donahue or Mori Popovich or whatever or whatever that. I don't even know. But anyways, we would watch me. You kind of berate his, you know, you need to donate now. It was one of those things.

And there's the whatever. And so the first song in Bronson's children was a song called Dr. Scott, get off the air. Yes, and there was a great little chorus where it was get off the air and then someone was in the back going, get him off the air. Get off the air. There it was. So, yeah, so you were beating me, man. You were already going deep early. I went dark super early.

Yeah. And then so at some point during college, so did you play your whole four years of baseball? Yeah. Graduated in four years and played all four years. And then what would you, what did you major in? Or whatever that's called. History was my major. Were you thinking you were, was that any,

was that just the easiest thing to take? I had an inspiring teacher in junior college that made history interesting. And so decided to go that path. I don't really retain much of it. But some of the time they seep into songs and whatnot. There'd be kind of period piece songs that I'll write. But yeah, not with the idea that I was going to be a teacher.

I mean, what do you really do with it, right? I mean, I'm asking you that. Yeah, no. I was still like, oh, I don't know what I'm going to do. You know, now I got this guitar thing. Oh, maybe I'll do that now, you know? How long did it take you to start thinking, oh, man, I can maybe make something work? It took me a long time to even consider myself a musician.

I probably had, I don't know, 30 songs under my belt and would play it, you know, I would play at the pub on campus. How much practice did you do? Not much. Like, what you got the guitar? Did you... Okay, that's awesome. No, I mean, it's still... Well, no, it's still a primitive...

I still have a very primitive style of playing. There's nothing... I don't really dazzle anybody with... With my virtuosity, you know? It's just like, it's the vehicle for the songs and for the voice. And, you know, I know I do have my own style kind of of playing because it's fairly percussive, but it's primitive.

You know, I mean, I probably break strings more than anyone... Maybe, ever. On acoustic guitar, for sure. You can pick up the guitar and you start writing songs, you start playing songs, but you're not one of these people that, like I've known,

I had friends growing up where they got obsessed, and it was, they were just like learning scales and whatever the hell else you learn when you're trying to get good of guitar, which I... Yeah, I never did. I never took lessons or never...

Yeah, and I don't, it still, it took me a while to go like, oh, this is maybe what I want to do, even. And I just kept on writing songs, and I started having kind of a catalog of songs. So when you graduate from college, what did you do? Did you get a job somewhere?

I waited tables. I waited tables. I went back. I lived with my parents for a while to save up some money, waited tables, and then moved to San Francisco and waited tables. And then with kind of the intention that I was going to go and start hitting the clubs

and trying to make some kind of a presence of my songwriting or my performance or whatever it was going to be, you know. and uh... did San Francisco seem like the move for some reason? I don't know if because it was close in proximity to where I went to college. I'm not sure why we chose that. I think my brother had a job

there that was lined up and so we went there and lived together. Me and my brother lived together. And uh... but it was shitty. It was not a good environment. It was when DJ started taking over almost all small clubs. What year is this? This is 98 to

maybe 2002 I lived in San Francisco probably play once a year twice a year in the corner of some shit die bar or like at a coffee shop you know smuggle some tequila and ruin the show on the second second kind of thing but I yeah so 98 to 2002 you're up there you're you're you're playing occasionally in the back of some freaking whatever yeah you know and and waiting tables to survive and uh what were you were you were you but this was your goal your goal was be a musician at this point? Yeah, but it was loose and lazy, kind of, and just not realized.

I mean, I used to not get gigs. I didn't have, I didn't have shit. I didn't have, so I would make cassette tapes on my brothers, through my brother's pioneer dual cassette player, right? Through the PA, through the PA, and I would record, and I would lay down 10 songs, and then I would send them to friends and send them to family for a presents, for like Christmas or for whatever, right?

Right. And I had no press. I'm picturing people opened up. Oh, we got another freaking tape. There we go. Another mixed tape. Oh, yeah. Thank you. This thing's going in the shit can.

Oh, that's painful. So you're thinking, are you thinking that's going to be a hobby? Or you just think, hey, it's fun? I want to do it, but I'm not, I don't have the know-how or maybe the drive really to really know. What I'm doing. My brother was my manager. I saw this one shit.

We found this old tape. And we had this little band in Huntington Beach. Like, right when I had been playing guitar for like six months maybe. And these guys heard me singing. And I'm like, holy shit. Like, let's start a band. And one guy played bass and the other guy played drums. And we started a band called Living Room, right?

Ooh. Very deep. But then it could be started in the living room as well. You know, so there was all this. It was silly. and we're fucking terrible. And, uh, but on the cassette, it says living room and then boom. No, there's no title to the whatever the, the little EP thing.

It's only cassettes by the way. And Matt Smith, my brother's name and his, his, his phone number, big multiple times on the cassette. So it was like, it looks pretty, bro. Those freaking Hollywood people just looking for that number to dial, right? They're like, wow. This is Matt Smith. This guy must have a bunch of clients, probably.

So I'm still trying to figure this out, right? You're in San Francisco. It seems like you are very persistent but not very focused or maybe something like that. Or is it just you just didn't know what to do? I was passionate about writing songs and I would keep writing songs. So these laughable cassettes that I was creating were making their way down. So I actually had a buddy who's in the surf industry. and he was a rep for for some surf companies and these cassette tapes started going to other people.

He would give one to one and then they would make it go to cassette to cassette, you know. Old school viral. Old school viral. Jake Smith. As as much as it could be. And that. But wait a second. I'm just going to confirm this.

We're in 1998 or 2000? This is before that. Oh, okay. This is before that when I was making the cassettes and giving him out. So this was the, this was one, my couple junior college years, I think, that I was. creating these cassettes and they were kind of moving around. But I was unaware that other people were listening to them or other people were making duplicates of this.

And then I got a call from one of the guys' shelter, the guy who made shelter Chris Maloy. Chris Maloy, yeah. When I was living in San Francisco. And he said, hey, I want to use one of your songs in one of my surf films. And I was like, what? Like, how do you know? You didn't know him at the time? I didn't know him.

No. Oh, he just reached out. And this was one of just the cassette went to this. guy to this guy this guy and then he ended up with one and one of the songs he said he wanted to use off this one of these cassettes freaking and I was like why you know because I was used to you know surf films were airs and punk and fast-ass music and they're like he's like you know we're making this kind of more arty thing and it was just me and an acoustic guitar and was wrong yeah it's wrong was a song um and then that yeah because that was that was like that was like a soul

kind of transition and there was story in the shelter flick and the Malloy brothers are all cool guys. So that happens. And then all of a sudden, does that give you a little inspirato like you can make it happen? That didn't even, that didn't give me the, that gave me a little validation and said like, oh yeah, maybe I'm doing the right or doing something. This is maybe something to pursue harder. They asked me to come and play the, um.

All these are just you and your guitar. Oh, yeah. There's no band. No band. Just me solo. And that's partially of why I play guitar the way I do. Because I used to just fill the space with everything, not with noodling, but just with strumming. And there's a lot of up down and percussive stuff.

And then they asked me to play the premiere of the movie down in San Diego. So I come down and I play, whatever, 30 minutes before the movie. And I see people singing along to other songs. of mine from these silly cassettes, right? And I'm like, what is going on? What is this? And I have shit going on in San Francisco. My brother had gone off and was like working at the Olympics or something.

So he had left San Francisco and I had this like drunk-ass roommate. And I packed my shit up and quit my job and then moved down to Southern California and then started kind of fresh. A little more focused but not very focused still. You know? And then that's it was a long road. A lot of couches. Then it was just couches. Then I didn't have another job.

So wait. So then you said, I missed it. You moved to San Diego or you moved to L.A.? I moved to Orange County. To Orange County. Yeah. The surf industry in there. Yeah.

Was that kind of what drew you to it? And it was a weird, I mean, for the variety of songs I write, which many of them are quite dark, or at least emotional or visceral in a way that the surf industry, I thought was an odd kind of place to pick it up and pick up, you know. go like oh yeah this is you know this might make you cry let's put that in the in a surf film you know it was it was an odd place to start I thought

or at least to get kind of a what year was it that you moved down here 2002 oh okay what year did shelter come out um probably around then okay I bet it's at same time it was it was pretty immediate after after that happened I was like oh shit I didn't just nothing was happening and I'd been in San Francisco for four years

nothing was going to happen in San Francisco. You know, I wasn't, I was idle. I was too idle, and I needed something to push myself. And so I needed to make a change. So you get down here, then what's the next step? Now you're not waiting tables anymore? Are you somehow getting by? Hardly, though.

I mean, like playing every other Wednesday at this sushi bar in Seal Beach and playing in the corner, this barbecue restaurant in Santa Ana, and just like, take jar out, tip jar making, you know, between 50 and 300 bucks a pop and sleeping on people's couches, stayed at my buddy's house for like maybe a year and a half in their guest room. Now, that's a buddy. Super. I mean, he's a beautiful man, Scott Marsh.

Yeah, no, I'm grateful for that time because it really allowed me to, I don't know, it allowed me to at least craft what I was doing and at least get some. stage time, performance time before anything was really happening. So how long were you in that situation? When's the first time you went into a studio and recorded? Not on a pioneer tape deck. Yeah, it was after, so it was after Shelter came out. Those same cassettes had gotten to the guy, Bob Hurley,

who owns Hurley, and he paid for me to make my first album and I actually made it with a surfer up in San Diego. Peter King? I don't know. He had a home studio at his house and I made my first album which was Hogtide like a rodeo which I discontinued and redid at some point in my career

because I wasn't totally loving how it turned out because I was super green and I'd have been in the studio. I only knew the pioneer, you know? I didn't know that it was more than a record button. Right. Echo Charles take no. Right. Play and record at the same time.

That's how you have. And play and record at the same time. Okay, there was some complications. You know. What happened to that album? Like, what happened to that album that you felt like you lost control of it a little bit? Did they go and overproduce it or something? I thought so.

Hey, we're going to bring in Jimmy, you know, Jimmy on the freaking lead guitar and get his fender in here and start cranking out notes. Yeah. I mean, I was raw. And I liked kind of some of the rawness. And it seemed to get a little too. produced in a way I would just leave uh leave town I would go somewhere and visit some people and then they would have musicians would come in and play on it and then they'd be like hey check this out and I'll be

like oh I don't know you know it was it wasn't I wasn't at the command at all that's weird it was out of my hands which is normally which is that was the only time I really made that mistake you know but you live and you learn and in a happenstance to look back and go like you know you discontinue and then you re-recorded it later which seems like it was a moment in time. And even if I was green, I think the songs were still good. Why I re-recorded it

and discontinued to do that other one, I don't know why. But you try to find that one, like there's some, like, Japanese sites and stuff that'll have that CD, which there weren't that many of them because they were just like, that are like 500 bucks or something.

Just stupid, you know, for this. Well, and you could probably get it on the internet. So that's the first album that comes out. Does it come out? Is that the right word? No. even come out or was it just like hey we're making it we're it doesn't come out i sell it it shows that's it you know we have this kind of fictitious label that bob and this guy paul gomez make

and it is uh yeah nothing really happens i'm still playing with the sushi bar um doing that for and i was in that state for quite some time you know like two years two years of sushi bar tip jar sushi bar tip jar then what happened from there that got you away from the sushi bar in the tip jar? It was, I met, I think I moved up because I met my wife and I moved up to Los Angeles and met some people, got kind of a manager, and we went in the studio and recorded my first EP. Is this?

This is just the white buffalo. And it's, yeah, I think it's five, six songs on that, which was super stripped down. Now, was this, who's paying for this? You know, who is running? Who bought you studio time? This was a, my manager at the time was managing Donovan Frankenwriter. Oh, okay. And I, so I would open up for him.

I started opening up for him, and I would get some exposure doing that. And met the keyboard player, this guy who actually played for the, Eels as well. Okay. Rusty. He went by Cool G. murder and he was kind of, he had this like,

he's redhead of that's big ginger beard kind of like wispy, you know, not a whole lot of hair and call himself cool he was cool as she was cool as shit. What was his nickname? Cool G. Murder. It says if you look,

if you had that EP and you looked on produced by it says produced by Cool G. Murder. I will check that out. Hell, yeah. So you record this thing. Are we still pre-like internet, whatever, MP3 situations? Yeah.

Yeah. We're still, sales are still, yeah, I don't even know if we're for digital, yeah, I don't know. Are we, I don't know if it was iTunes and that stuff had been. I don't know either. I don't think so, because I think they date that EP on iTunes is something way later than it actually was. Got it.

You know? So when that album comes out, is it, what happens? Is it freaking, just no factor? I independently release it myself. And it's just me selling it basically at shows. And I think when the digital format comes up, I get it up on there. And I'm, that's it. Nothing is happening.

I ended up doing that for a couple. So you're in that state? Still. And it's still a couple albums. And then I'd put a couple more albums out doing that in that. that state almost. Man. At what point did you start to feel some forward moment?

Like I was saying earlier, man, I went and saw you at UCSD in like a little cafe and there's 15 people in there. And I was actually like me, my wife, her friends, our friends. We're all sitting there. Yeah. And everybody's, I remember that. And everyone's like sitting Indian style on the ground. Yeah.

Yeah. And I'm super stoked. Sure. I'm like, this is so rad. You know? I'm like, yeah. I mean, it's been just this super long haul of. of not too many spikes.

I mean, later, I'm starting, later, I mean, it's not until I get, you know, probably start getting the actual TV licenses where stuff starts getting more serious. And that doesn't come until what year? I was still independent, didn't have, I had Hogtide revisited now under my belt, which was a full-length album and two EPs,

and I didn't have a manager, I didn't have a booking agent anything. And my lawyer asked the music supervisor for Sons of Anarchy to lunch. And said, hey, I got this guy. I think it'll work. He writes murder songs and conflicted emotional songs. You know, that, and. When you're in that state, so you're in this state, like, there's got to be a point.

There's got to be a thought that goes through your mind of, all right, you know, like, This ain't gonna work. I gotta I gotta figure out how I gotta feed my family. I gotta figure out how I'm gonna get a mortgage. I gotta figure out how I'm gonna buy a house. Was that thought in your mind or was it a good, were you getting by enough? Were you having, I mean, you obviously love playing live,

at least as far as I can tell, you freaking love playing live. Is that a good enough time? We're like, hey, this is a cool job right now and I'm good with it. Yeah, I mean, it was very small means and we didn't need that much. much money to survive really at that point. Oh yeah, I remember I got off another surf movie I did. This one from Jason Baffa called Single Thin' Yellow, and I did a little piece off that,

and that was the first time I ever wrote to picture, one of the only times, actually. And I came up with that song and that idea, and then I redid it and recorded it on my first EP. And Crete made it into a more of a song. When before it was just this thing. They used that piece, like Walmart called me for a commercial, had nowhere too.

I didn't have a publisher. They thought I was a publisher and quoted me some money there. He gave me. I was like, holy shit. Chachain. You kidding me? And I was like, Walmart. I was like, no, fuck yeah, Walmart.

And then I want that Walmart money, son. But then I remember I was like, oh, let me, you know, I don't want to shoot myself. in the foot let me pass it on to my manager at the time right who was pretty green he ends up getting less money somehow than I had negotiated initially that's because that's but still but it was more it was more it was it was more money than I'd ever seen and it was like oh okay here's you know I could have lived off that that was more money than I'd made probably in the previous four years wow you know of doing of doing the music so you are getting it's like it's like you're uh you know when you were a kid

and you had some girlfriend and like she would break up with you, but she would string you along, right? You know that? And people say, don't string, don't string people along. It's like you were getting strung along by. Yeah, the little carrot. I mean, there was a lot. You know, another good, I made some good tips tonight.

Then you get the big call from Walmart. It's on like Donkey Kong. Right. So then, so that was from single thing yellow, which is a kick-ass movie. They take this board and they send it around the world, a bunch of different people surf it, a bunch of different wild spots.

But this is still, still you're not, you know, able to just, or are you able to just survive on being a musician at this point? Yeah, and I was. I had been for a bit. I did use my college degree for a little substitute teaching, which was hilarious. Oh, man.

Kind of hilarious, but kind of heartbreaking at the same time. Why do you say that? Just, you know, middle school kids are pretty dangerous, you know, are pretty confused and pissed. And so I ended up breaking up more fights than I was teaching anybody anything. Or, you know, I mean, I wasn't, there's not much of a lesson plan often left for the substitute teacher. So you're showing a movie or you're just trying to keep the kids safe.

I was going to say, don't get thrown out the window. It's the lesson plan. So but I didn't do that that long or very very very often When you're in these when you're in this period of your life, I mean the the songs that you write the music that you write the lyrics that you write I'm projecting my thoughts onto this but you know when you're sitting working in a dive bar somewhere playing a gig and you look over in the corner and you see this character Is does that develop into? Hey, you know, I know what that guy's thinking or I'm thinking about what that person's life is like. Did that add, is it good that you went through this time period of where you were kind of

struggling through and making things happen? Does that incorporate into your, the things you think about? I mean, I honestly think the way that I did it was beneficial to me as a songwriter, as an artist for this long of a time, that if I would have had somebody come in and go like, hey, wow, this guy can say. thing and he writes these pretty good songs, but like we can, why don't we develop this guy into something else, into a country store or something else? And instead, I was able to be 100% true to the songs I write, the artist that I wanted to be, and never had to do anything that I didn't

want to do. It always my vision and always 100% from me, which is super rare these days, especially. I mean, there's like, you know, a song on the radio, you got 15 people wrote it, you know. It's like it's it's kind of unheard of and but I think that this super long haul that it's taken to me and even now I'm still a little secret You know it's not like I'm a superstar or people know I am like walk down the street it's like rare for me to get noticed, you know I'm always kind of like put off by somebody going like hey Are you are you the Oh yeah. I am and then I'll be like oh shit, you know I love people that really like me really like me But most people don't know about me

You know which I'm kind of It's a sweet spot. For me, I mean, I'm not making millions of dollars, but I'm doing okay. I can survive and provide. But I'm not, you know, I can still be me, do what I want to do and not be, you know, not be, you know, afraid to go out in public at all. That's good. So you were just getting to the point where I cut you off and redirected the story in a totally different. direction because that was really cool.

That's fine. But you were talking about the, so you got this manager guy and he knows the musician director from Sons of Anarchy? That was actually post. So I had my first guy and I,

first manager, he's actually my second manager who was managing Donald and Frank Arrider and I ended up touring with him for probably a year and a half when I was with him. it went to Japan went all over the world and this was when he was he peaked

when Donovan was kind of peaking and dude were you just living the dream it was I mean they let me travel on the bus I was like you know we weren't in the sushi bar anymore you don't feel good

bro and just to see the world I mean you're seeing the world and you get perspectives and different you know it really opens your mind traveling when I was in the SEAL teams

I was on deployment when I would be on deployment I would know in my mind like every day I would know that this was like the best you know I was kind of just loving life you know living you know people always say living the dream I was living the dream I was actually doing exactly what I always dreamed of doing for my whole life that's amazing seems like that's what would be you know you being on tour it was I just had low

I didn't have and I maybe that's my been my outlook a lot of the time to kind of have low expectations and then not be really that disappointed. And even when I'm not getting accolades or I'm not getting, you know, playing huge rooms or, or, but making enough money to be okay and feel pretty okay about what I'm doing and still being true to myself, um, was enough and it's always kind of been enough for me. Okay. So you get a pretty good launch. You get a taste of the road. Right. Get a taste of the road, bro. You're there. And, and then did that? When you get done touring with that tour, what's the next step? You know, we started, I don't know where we were at.

Where was I, at that moment, I'm probably, the next big step is getting the Sons of Anarchy stuff for sure. That that put me in a place where now I could go, well, after the show, really. It was like the third season, I think they started using my stuff. And so once again, I can just cut you off randomly and said, hey, let's take this. So how did that come about that you ended up on Sons of Anarchy? No, so as my lawyer, Steve Sessa, who I still have today, invited the music supervisor to lunch and said, listen, I have this guy. He's an unsight artist. Doesn't have any management.

It doesn't have anything. Put on his own albums. I think he was a big fan of the show of Sons of Anarchy. And he's like, you know, the conflict in these, you know, it's like this show is basically these. emotional men doing kind of terrible shit, you know? And I have a lot of that kind of conflict in some of my songs, too, that it's something that's, this guy,

this guy feels like kind of a badass, but God, he's maybe kind of a sweetheart. Or you feel for this guy who's really, it's a murder song, you know, but he's kind of the hero, though,

at the same time. So it's this conflict to him was perfect for that show. And then he gave him, gave him my whole catalog, basically. And in not that long at all, they were like, okay, we're going to use this in the next, and, you know, in three episodes or something. And, but that was a slow thing as well. You know, that was, they'd use this one song and then they used another song,

but then they ended up using, I think, seven or eight of my own songs that I, that were my own compositions that were already out there. And then they had me come and sing on stuff. So stuff that they would create that was part of the soundtrack. And just how they used music in the, that show. I don't know if you watched it, but it was very, we do these montages at the end that would be, the song would be part of the story. And it would just be these montages, visuals. And they would play the song at full length, at full volume, and it would be like another character. And then I think

people started recognizing my voice and saying, man, what does this? Maybe we should go deeper, you know, into this. And at that point, I hadn't been to Europe on my own as an artist. I'd only opened up for people and you don't really know what kind of legs you have in places. You don't know when you don't have any history in places. And if you just opened up for somebody, you don't really have history. It's really you're just playing for their people. So then

shit's going better and getting better and we go, man, we gotta go, we gotta check out Europe. I don't know what's happening. You know, starting to play bigger rooms all over the country. And nobody will no clubs will want us. They never heard of us. You know?

And they're like, eh, and we're like, well, at least we got a festival somewhere. So we're like, okay, we're going to play this festival in Spain or something. So we got to try to play in London and just see what tickets are like, see what happens. So we play this like a little tiny room. We're going to play like a 200-cap room that sells out like an hour. They're like, oh, shit, well, they're like, what's going on? And then they like, well, let's bump up the room. And then they bump it up to like 700 capacity, which was bigger than I'm playing most of the places in the states.

And then that sells out another hour. And then they're like, wow, what's going on? And then that. So we just went and we. played a couple shows in Europe and then realized like, okay, this is a viable market. Like we can make some money over here and we have a fan base. And I think almost due to the popularity of that show. You know, at that point I signed with a label, you know, small kind of boutique label,

which basically was these two guys that were producers and engineers who produced and engineered four albums. I just have left now. I'm on it with a different. What made you decide to go? Why did you need, you've been doing it yourself. What made you make the transition? It was not,

um, I didn't, I never had any, even though there wasn't a much of a machine behind those other albums and still now, not really. Um, I just wanted to get in the game. You know what I mean?

I'd never been in the game, you know? And I was just like, I'm just an island. I'm still kind of an island. But then I was like, I wasn't in the game, you know?

And they're like, you know, I think somebody was just, It's like, you're getting a game. Like, what are you doing? Like, you know, on the labels, you know, you know, it wasn't like I had the know-how or any of the, anything when I'm independently releasing things. No, it wasn't like it was fucking six months set up to be like, all right, the album's

going to come out May, you know, 20th and we're going to be promoting this thing for, no, it was when it was done. What's our marketing plan looking like for the next album? There was nothing. It would just go up. It would just put it up. It would be, I finished something, and then I would just put it up, you know, digitally. and make CDs.

So then you sign with these guys? Is that the right terminology? Yeah. Yeah. And we did like a three-album, four-album deal with them. Are you the... Is this all your decision-making?

You're the guy. Yeah. I ended up getting my manager right when I was signing. I was looking for somebody else. I was like in between... I think I'd had like three different managers who were all...

I don't want to say hacks, but like they weren't, I just did probably, but they weren't as professional or as right for me. I'll just say that. They weren't maybe right for me to try to get me to another plateau. And now I got Jeff Farner, who's great and smart and political. And also, though, very in my corners for still allowing me to have my vision and, and, you know, do what I want to do musically. So right before that, we do the deal. I sign with him as well.

Or I bring him on as my manager. Been with him ever since. And then you, so now you're officially in the game. Now you're selling out places in Europe. And what does it look like when you get back to the States? Because it's weird. You know, it's weird how that can happen. And I got some other friends and better musicians.

And like overseas, they're freaking massive. And back here, there's just not, not actually. I mean, it's crazy. And I don't even know. Some markets, I mean, we've never been to South America. Like, if you look on my comments, you look on any YouTube thing I have, every other comment has come to Brazil. Or something Brazil. Brazil, we've never been to Brazil.

It's far. It's a little sketchy, right? I don't know when we'll get there. I want to get there. You know, but we're doing better. It's a slow build. We never go down, you know, which I appreciate, but still in places like the South. We haven't had that much touring history.

I've probably done like two or three tours there, and we're still building that. Is it weird because how do you categorize your music? That's part of the issue. That's part of the issue. And that's an issue with labels some of the time, too, because they don't understand it. It doesn't fit in any really category, you know?

Even you have this Americana idea now. It doesn't, it's not. Air quotes. Whatever. It just, it doesn't seem, I don't know, it feels like I don't belong in that genre either. I mean, part of it does. Part of it's kind of this country, there's country elements, there's rock elements, there's some more aggressive, more punk stuff, there's folk stuff, there's ballads, there's,

you know, it's, it belongs in anything, it's organic. Yeah. And it comes from, mostly it comes from three guys playing or, you know, if we put some other stuff on albums. but it's, it's, we're the most stripped down band that, that you'll ever see, really. I mean, other than if it's one guy playing guitar. I mean, it's three guys with no effects. Yeah.

There's no vocal effects. There's no effects on my guitar. There's no, there's no nothing. It's three guys. So that's an issue because you can't say, oh, there's this, you know, this other band that kind of fits in the white buffalo category, and we can play with these four other bands. or we can do a festival or whatever because where do you really fit? At the same time, though,

but you can fit in all other little categories too. There's benefits to that too. Because I can play a rock festival or I can play a country festival, you know? Yeah, because you're kind of like your own, you know, your own little genre. Yeah, I never, hopefully that I have my own sound kind of, you know, which is ultimately.

And not to mention, I think you're the only person that writes murder songs, right? Or at least ones you could dance to. Valids and love songs and murder songs. I guess that's right. I guess I'm leaving out all my deaf metal brothers out there who write 100% murder songs. You're the only one out there doing acoustic folk murder songs. Even though have you ever heard what is it called Viking folk metal?

Have you ever heard that? Viking folk metal? Yes. Yes. No. They play like traditional Viking instruments, but they're playing metal. Really? Yes.

I mean, that's part of what I come from like. Viking blood, so that might be, uh, maybe that's my genre. I was saying, well, at least you can slide in there. You can maybe do some, some Viking folk metal, what are they called? Festivals. I mean, if they exist, absolutely. Probably somewhere in Scandinavia, right? I'm sure there's that going on.

So when you, when you're, do the, do the, where do the songs come from? Like the majority of them, if not all of them come from just silence from nowhere. A lot of them will be gibberish or something they just come in out of being quiet. And they often, I will say something, sing something, and I will recognize what the important part is, or the piece of it that has some validity or worth and expand on that one little idea most of the time. Some of the time I'll sing something that just,

I don't even know where I came from, you know? I can sing a whole verse and a chorus not with an idea that I'm gonna write a song about this I don't even know what they're about initially and then I craft them into things that hopefully have some kind of emotional response so there's some level of you being on the lookout

for a little nugget of goodness that you can grab onto and plant and water I just feel lucky like they're lucky little diamonds that come out of fucking the ether You know what I mean? And I think my gift is recognizing what those little lucky moments are to go like, oh, let me grab that. That's a good idea. You know, and I do, I know that I can craft something off of one very small idea to realize how I can turn that into a whole concept or a whole song pretty quick.

But, yeah, I don't know. I wish I had better stories about it. I was talking to Robert O'Keene to do a podcast with him, and he was like, tell me what, where were you at? What was this, you know, what's the inspiration behind this? I'm like, there's no inspiration. It's just imagined, you know? It's like imagination is. Yeah, it's in the inspiration.

Yeah. But it's not in my head. I'm not like it's not, there's no prethought about it. Rarely. It's born in your head. Yeah. It just comes from your head. Yeah.

That's like the, so I was an English major in college. I'll have you know. So what you're saying right now, what you're saying right now, what you're saying right. Now I'm going to put you on the spot. So what you're saying right now is there was these people and there was all, there's all this controversy. I'm not even going to remember it that well because I really don't remember that much of college.

But there would be people that would say, you know, I wrote this poem. Just it just, I just wrote it. And I'm talking like classical, like real famous literature people. Oh, the word is that this person just wrote this. It just came out. And it's like they didn't have to work for it. That's kind of what you're doing. You're just like, hey, I'm rarely doing that.

I'm over here just freaking, just developing nuggets of gold. I'm rarely doing that. They're rarely that easy. But the inception of them, the beginnings of them are that easy. But some of the time it's a very small little piece of something. And it's not very rarely. Sometimes I have sat down in my lifetime and just something spilled out. And then you're like, holy shit, there it is.

Like love song number one is one kind of like that. that was it off my first EP that just kind of spilled out. And I was like, well, this, like, what was that? What is that about? You know, there's even a moment in the song where I'm still like, what is that even about, you know? And just left it in kind of, you know. Now I edit more stuff now, you know,

and make every word perfect, kind of as perfect as I feel like I can make it, you know? But, and then what's the deal on, you know, what do you owe? In other words, are you like, hey, I better get another album out in another, you know, because you just put out your latest album, what, a few months ago? Yeah, April, April 17th. April 17th.

So now do you start feeling the pressure in your head of, I need to do more because I needed to cut another album? Do you start feel a pressure in your head that you've got ideas in there that need to get out? Do you not even think about it? I don't even think about it. I don't, like I'll write here and there and there and there will be little snippets in my phone, but I don't really think about it. Even this last record, who I did with Shooter Jennings produced it,

that I didn't have, I didn't think I had hardly any songs going into talking with him and meeting with him. And the night before, we went out drinking like the first time and didn't even talk about working together, really. We were just talking about life and just get drunk. We got drunk for like four hours. Where did we get drunk at? Where did we get drunk at?

Uh, frolic room on like Hollywood. Well, I mean randomly? No, no, no. It was set up. It was like a blind date between our managers set us up thinking that this might be a match made in heaven. But, uh, no, I went in. So I went in the first time to meet him to kind of show him what I'd been working on or something, you know, to develop some songs. And I was like, I don't have shit.

I feel like I don't have shit. I woke up the night before. Uh, and, uh, had an idea, sang it into my phone. And was like, okay, well, at least I can show him that tomorrow. And we'll work on that all day and see what happens. I take that to him. I sing him to kind of the idea. It was actually quite realized, but it's like my son was like sleeping.

I had this little tiny studio fucking place we're sleeping in. And my son's sleeping on the, so he'll like, oh, son. Like I can't even make out what I'm saying, but I'm trying to be quiet. It doesn't not wake him. And I show him this thing the next day. And then I sing it and we work it out. in like 20 minutes. And then I already have it kind of realized.

And he's like, well, what else do you have? I was like, oh, I have, oh, this. And he's like, well, that's amazing. Explore that. I said, well, what else you have? And I was like, oh, how about this? And he's like, yeah, do that. Like, explore that.

And I would just, and then we just went down. And I was like, okay. And then after that little meeting, I went on just a, like a, I go on little writing tears, little benders. And then I just basically wrote the whole album in about a week, a week and a half. and before I was like, you know, I have little snippets that are coming in, you know,

but then to realize and then finish them really fast. Sometimes, and sometimes, you know, it's like added, sometimes it's out of just inspiration and desperation. So the little pressure can maybe squeeze something out of you? Have you ever been in a point where you were feeling pressure, but just nothing was coming out? I had another album, Love and the Death of Damnation,

that I remember I used to with the old producers I would go and I would sing I would have all these ideas and I would come in and then we'd like okay yeah let's explore that one let's do that work on that one and a lot of time it would be like everyone but I'd have like 20 ideas

25 ideas or something like that right and for that album I had like you know it was about time to record and I had maybe six ideas that I played in and they're all kind of like on all of them you know and then I was like fuck it let's just start Wednesday

I'm like what is we gonna do Wednesday I was like, I'll be ready Wednesday. I'll be ready Wednesday. And then we just did that one like that, but that was completely out of desperation. And then hit a lucky, prolific time. Little lucky streak. Yeah.

Freaking great album. How did you link up with Matt and Christopher? So Matt has been drumming. Who's a freaking animal, by the way? He's a freaking animal. I mean, as far as, I don't think I would be the performer I am today without Matt. No, you guys, you guys look at each other and you guys just go off. It's freaking savage.

It's awesome. I mean, especially for like an acoustic trio, who do you think wouldn't be terribly aggressive, you know? And he's just sticks are flying and breaking and shards of wood or, you know, getting pulled out of women and children. At some point, I realized that you called him the machine, right? Yeah. And then I would, every show I'd go to and I'd be like, machine, I would get all crazy. But, and then like the last couple times I've gone, other people were yelling it. I was kind of disappointed.

I kind of felt like all that. Well, maybe you started it. I don't know, man. It was just kind of cut. Yeah, because he just goes nuts. So I'm sorry, how did you link up with him? That was actually the first album I did for the Hurley guy, Hogtide, like a rodeo. I've had Matt since then.

No way. He wasn't on that album, but there was a guy Tommy Andrews, who's from San Diego. as well, who was my bass player for the first 10 years of my career, played guitar on that album, and knew Matt and this guy, Russell Hayden, who played banjo and Dobro, like the most evil fucking banjo ever you heard. But it was perfect for it was creepy.

Evil banjo, bring it. And he'd like wear it. He would, like, just like Liza Minnelli and, like, to know any eyebrows, and he'd be like, like, fucking awesome banjo player. But anyways, but I met Matt through this guy, Tommy Andrews, and we all did it. It was the first time I ever felt before that I'd only played by myself. Yeah.

Really. Never played, never performed. Even when I'm in the corner of any place, was always by myself. And that was the first time I was like, whoa, this is what it feels like to really feel and feed off of other people's energy and playing. And Matt's played with me ever since. And Christopher's been with us for maybe Matt and Christopher are like best buddies. and Hoffie's not even a

wasn't even a bass player he's a producer and engineer so he can play everything right it's one of those guys yeah but now he's a really good bass player yeah um what's when look I try and explain this to people

you gotta get the albums for sure and then you gotta go see you gotta go see the live shows it's freaking insane I think yeah I mean I don't know I mean we just go fucking go ape shit I mean we don't know

No, and I just think it's very visceral in the way that we approach, like it's like the last show of our lives, you know, and we do that every night, and I don't know any other way to do it, you know, and Matt does it and Christopher, we're just like, you know, a few wild animals up there, you know. Is it, do you feel it, do you feel frustration that you, I mean, are you going to, do you, you don't have a live album? No, we don't.

Are you going to do that? Do you think it would get it done? Do you think you'd be able to capture it? I think so. I think we could. I mean, the hardest part is really acoustic guitar live. It's a difficult thing to kind of capture that, make that sound like an acoustic guitar.

But yeah, I think we could capture it live. People ask that all the time. Because it is such a different animal. I mean, I think, I mean, it's a high compliment when people are like, oh, it's better than the albums, you know. It's, I think it's more of an experience. I mean, to get people during parts of the show that, you know, the people want to fight during this time, people are crying, you know, and you'll see, right? You'll see like a military guy and a fucking hippie in there and, you know, and then some guy from some other completely different background.

But somehow they found this secret band, you know, that's like, this is our band, this is my band. But, oh, it's a guy's band too, but that's okay. Well, fuck it. We're in this together. We're bros. Right. Bikers, hippies, surfers. I mean, it's like, let's all go get some.

Right? That's freaking, yeah, no, it's awesome. If people get a chance to see that, it's like, yeah, you got to go check it out. Dude, what's the Matador about? The Matador? Yeah. Matador was, or that was actually the first song they used on Sons of Manorkey. But it was off of my first EP.

It was already recorded. I wanted to do a song that you couldn't tell if it was a man killing people or a man killing or a matador. And I just liked that kind of loose thing where you can't tell, really. And I want to leave it up to the listener

where they decide, is this a man killing people in the light of day in the public in front of people? or is you talking about a bullfighter? Yeah. You know? That's kind of a wild concept. Kind of. And I don't know whether they, right?

How about carnage? Carnage is another dark one. That one, my idea, was some kind of warfare comes to where you live, some kind of, either it's nuclear, viral or something, and you have to take your family and go hide down in the basement. And it's kind of a narrative, so it starts. and we all just go hide down in the basement. And I feel like the main character is kind of the father figure. And then you don't know what's happening outside. Everyone was just hiding.

And it just gets darker and darker. And people start kind of losing their minds. The Madman. Madman's just, you're going all murder songs. You know what? I just thought to myself, I'm like, well, that's all murder songs. And like you said earlier, you got the sweetest songs. you've got the most romantic songs

and you've definitely provided some very nice evenings for me and my wife to hang out and have a very pleasant time. You've also provided me with like nice soundtracks for the darkness. Yeah, I mean, I love that. I mean, the thing is, I don't know why people don't dive

into the fucking dark side of the pool, you know? It's like there's so much. Welcome to Junko podcast. But there's so much, you know, in those shadowy parts, like movies like that and stuff like that. Like that's a powerful primal thing that I think is cool

that should be explored. I think I'm lucky that I can sing in the way I can that I can be tender at some moments when I when I love song or I have something that needs to be and then on the other side of the hand to be more aggressive and loud and howling.

But yeah, the madman's another just serial killer kind of murder song that it's just like you can't, he's undeniable. He's just all powerful and he's coming after you. It's just scary. You know, I never have thought about the fact that you write murder songs before until you said it today. I was like, oh, yeah, that's the whole thing.

There's a bunch of those murder songs. Every album at least has at least one. Yeah. I mean, I'm looking at my list. I'm like, oh, yeah, yeah. That's, oh, darling, what have I done? Oh, yeah, that's an absolute freaking. That one's fucking twisted.

Oh, totally. That one's about a man who thinks. I don't know I come up with this bullshit but like how who thinks in order to get the affection of his woman and that he starts killing people and collecting basically collecting these lives and he's killing these people

as like a sign of like the ultimate gift to give to this woman kind of in his mind thinking that she's going he's going to win his her affection due to whatever the solution how about the pilot The pilot feels like I love this song

The High Women by Jimmy Webb And it wasn't it wasn't off that thing But it's it's that one's just kind of just about Kicking ass kind of like Kicking ass and tag your names Right Is that part?

Yeah that's part of the pilot I mean that one's I like how it starts You know you start with the pilot and basically it kind of just sets a Sets a table for just a pilot And then it goes fighter pilot And then it goes outlawed And then it's just like, what is it the one? Yeah, kicking us, taking it, go town to town, killing dreams.

Yes. Man. You know, you did the album with the Joey White theme throughout it. And that's, so that's like a, what is it a rock opera? What is it? Is it a concept album, I guess, is what we call it? Yeah, yeah. Where you've got this whole story, this whole thread of, of a couple.

Yeah. Right. And, you know, it sounds like they meet when they're young. You've got some freaking great lines, man. Just great, great stuff. What made you decide to go, hey, I'm going concept album? I've always wanted to. I mean, I always look at my songs as little movies, little mini movies,

and the idea of building a whole narrative around those, linking those also. It's a linear thing, which I don't even know. Most concept albums seem really loose. Like even if you listen to the Dark Side of the Moon or something that's not like you jump from one thing to another, you know, and that's this guy's whole road. I don't know.

I've always been fascinated by war and soldiers and people going off to war and then coming back and all this thing. And so I had some songs already. And I was like, I want to do a concept album. And then I said, oh, and I'd do it now. And I thought, oh, I could put this song here or this kind of start changing names, put this song over here,

and then build this whole arc of this guy's lifetime. You know, it's basically a love story. I think it's a love story, but it's... In a white buffalo kind of way. Right, in a murderous sort of way. A dark thing. So they start off, they meet each other. They fall in love, but it's kind of this forbidden love.

And so they have to go leave the small town they're from. And he finds out pretty quickly that he cannot provide for his family. so he joins the military, goes off to war, kills, feels like kind of a killing machine, and then comes back, still kind of bloodthirsty and not assimilating, kills again at home, and then it skews back into a love story, kind of, or at least his road to redemption, kind of, and the idea that, and the one thing is the power of love, but the power of his woman is what makes him feel human. or halfway human again.

And it basically goes the whole arc to his life at the end. He's going to die and he's kind of questioning God and wondering after all this bad shit I've done in my life. Like, am I in there? Are you up there? You know, just still kind of confused and conflicted, but trying to figure out. Man, freaking all just great stuff, man. Wherever you're getting it from, I hope those little magic nuggets that go.

into your brain, or enter your brain or are produced in your brain. I hope they just freaking keep on coming, man. Hey, did your son play lead guitar for you one time at House of Blues? He did many times. Okay. My oldest son, Tanner, who is, we've tried to add a fourth guy sometimes, you know. We've always like this power trio kind of thing with an acoustic guitar is ridiculous, really. But we would try to add a fourth guy, but it always would always.

felt like it kind of took away from, I mean, all we were kind of dynamics, you know, is we get really big and we get really quiet, we get really big. And with three, that seems to work really well. And you add another thing. But Tanner is, when he's at his game and at his best, has been maybe my favorite fourth kind of member during it. Yeah, he's an animal. Right on what, so what's up next? What's the future hold? It's a weird time. I mean, you know, it's like, I had an album come, come out during this You know, the COVID and the pandemic. And touring stopped.

We had, I mean, a shitload of shows, you know, shows going all of 2020 and beyond, you know. We were going to go all the way around the world, all over the world, you know, at least places that we'd have some history. And it's just, that just all stopped. That all dried up. And so there's nothing, that's all being postponed to hopefully when we do it. I mean, our first tour that we were going to do in April. that's going to be a whole year. We're going to go back to Europe in April,

and then hopefully stuff will start opening up. And I don't know, really. The futures is unknown, for sure, to say the least. But, yeah, I mean, I'm going to continue. I was really proud of this recent piece of work that I did, which almost was going to start out as a concept as well. What was the concept going to be? This one was, one time we were touring, traveling,

and we were on the eastern seaboard, And I keep seeing these rooftop decks up on top of these kind of Victorian houses. And I'm like, what are those? You know? And the drummer was like, oh, those are called Widows Walks. And those are the wives or significant others of captains and whatever, fishermen whalers or stuff. You know, their husbands would leave and go do their jobs, but not returned for many months or many weeks. and the wives would go up kind of scouting, looking, longing for their husbands to come home.

And I just thought like, oh, that's a, you got it, it's all right there, right? I mean, you have the romance, you have the drama, you have the sea, the power, you know. And just the story was already there. I was like, oh, it's going to be easy. And so I started writing some of those, which is a song called Widows Walk. There's another one that's Sycamore that made the album. There's a couple that are still on there. But then I have these other songs that I was like, because it's confining.

You know, if you're like, especially when I think of a concept album as a narrative to be like, oh, well, there's this song about the fires in California in 2018 or this song about that. It wouldn't really fit in the construct of that. So I kind of abandoned the idea without not entirely, kind of. Some of the songs made it. And then inadvertently, other songs would have other. angles and concepts and water and longing and lost loves

and all kinds of stuff that ended up kind of getting into there and being part of the writing but way looser you know well it's a freaking it's another another great album and you know I always talk about there's there's not too many bands in my opinion that can do five awesome albums in a row like black sabbath they did it zeppelin they did it metallica close but they did it right

there's not too many bands that can do five awesome albums in a row and part of it is i think what you said earlier you know you were at this level where you know if if you would have done that first demo and gotten picked up by whatever big record company and had a big bus and all this nice stuff and you probably didn't you probably wouldn't even else squeeze out even two more good albums but man you were there and you're knocking out every album that you found out what number you're on right now but it's it's more than five and you're still freaking putting out awesome work and I don't know what the future holds but I do know this when you're back on the road we will be there well thank you kindly you got any last thoughts man no I just appreciate you I appreciate you you know I appreciate that I'm a part of so many people's lives and often the terrible parts of their lives that that I get people's you know I appreciate people coming up to me saying how I helped them through this moment a divorce or or being in the military or death of somebody super close to them.

And I'm proud to be that, you know, for a while it's odd because I'm actually not that serious of a dude, you know? I'm pretty, like if you went drinking with me, you're like, that guy? Really? You know? But there's like a, I guess there's like a Jekylln Hyde thing, right? It kind of is. You might do these silly episodes, these things called In the Garage.

I've ever seen that shit? Yeah, yeah. So I do it. It's just me in my garage and I make some stupid entrance where I'm spinning and twirling or something. And then I kind of bullshit for two, three, five minutes about nothing. I'm just kind of rambling. And then, but it's kind of comedic. And then I just go into something probably dark and heavy, some song that I have that's in my catalog.

And I'll play a song and then that's it. But it is kind of the duality of my personality of my person. or my, not my persona, just who I am, that there's, but it's just like everything, I suppose. There's, you know, laughter and there's love and there's, you know, different sides of the coin. There's the light and the dark. And so I have that and I explore that and I explore that in music as well. Well, thanks for taking us on the road with you down that, down that path. Like I said, look, I know I'm coming out dark because that's sort of, that's sort of where I tend to go but man there's you know a bunch of beautiful songs on there um the best music for

you can apply it to just about every part of your life so thanks for coming on man friggin awesome thank you for having me do you think maybe take it out with one mow a jam shit you got it something off the new album yeah this is off the new album this one's called no history yeah um get some i threw my dreams in the wishing well It seems they all get lost in time. Time don't fight fair. It's simply unaware. I write myself a different story.

One that's filled with twisting turns and life is on fire. Where I might get burned. Ride it off to a lesson learned. I feel crashing it. Awesome, man. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for having me.

And with that, Jake, the White Buffalo. Smith has left the building. By the way, I forgot to mention this. You can find him on the interwebs at the white buffalo.com on Facebook at the white buffalo. Instagram. Buffaloco. Buffalo.

Maybe crazy Buffalo? Is it, I think you was. B-U-F-F-A-L-O-C-O. Buffalo. Yes. Twitter, Blanco Buffalo. Yeah, that's the one of you. Right, so and then YouTube and there's also YouTube channel the white buffalo he puts out those little videos he was talking about

That's that man. I'm awesome to have him down Jake thanks for coming down and Echo Yes sir. There is some darkness Yeah And some light in the world It is true I think it was interesting to come and bring you know for For those of us that didn't go deep because you mentioned white buffalo a lot

the Buffalo Blanco. You mentioned them. Yeah. From time to time. So those of us that didn't go deep into, you know, exploring like who this was that you'd mentioned from time to time, it was good to kind of bring them to light. I understand now.

Yeah. Kind of recognize. I recognize. I recognize. I recognize. Don't you? Yeah. At what point,

at what point did you go, damn? Before we started recording and he was sorted. Sorting out as a little test. Yeah. I was like, okay. actually when he rolled in and you know when someone starts talking especially a big guy like him i think they start talking you're like oh you have a singing voice right now maybe i know what is you know why though i think because you know like i used to when i used to make like more um like how should

say like narrative type videos and i i would hire a lot of voiceover people and i did some voiceovers for echo charles sure yes so a lot of these professional voiceover people like you listen to their demo or some of the guys like I'd call up on the phone and when they answer the phone I'm like I see what you're working with there already just them talking one guy one guy was like he put on you could tell he put it on to answer the phone he's like hello and you're like yeah I'm looking for Mike Jacobs the voice actor and he's like one second please hello yeah actually that's essentially what happened except he just out the gate he was performing. He was auditioning straight out on his own but the thing is I emailed him so he knew I was going to call so of course but nonetheless

when I heard Jake talk out it's like oh it hit me like oh okay I see you got some pipes. Yes sir and then that's why I was going to ask him like so you didn't take any voice lessons or anything but you just got the talent out of the gate just good

So yes, so is at that point, I think, is when it started to hit me. And then, yeah, the first song was really, really good. And then the second song was really, really good. That's just the absolute tip of the iceberg, man. They're gold all throughout those albums, man. Yeah. Legit. I'm looking into it.

Well, there's darkness in the world, as we heard. Yes, it's true. Also some light. Yes. We talk about the darkness, but we want to move towards the light. What do you got? How can we move towards the light? light is always be moving towards the light you got to embrace the darkness

every once in a while but at the end of the day you don't want to just hang out in darkness the whole time that's why we're writing songs called carnage check and so what are we doing keeping ourselves capable mm-hmm as opposed to incapable we are keeping ourselves healthy which allows us to be capable which allows us to get out of the darkness if need be so this is what we're doing We're working out. We're reading. You read a lot.

I read way more than I did before. Who was I just talking to? Somebody. I think it was Daryl Cooper about like, I didn't grow up just, oh, there's a book. Let me start reading books.

Yeah. But now I'm sort of like that. Like, oh, that looks like that. Yeah, well, he said, where'd you grow up?

And you said, Kauai. He said, I wouldn't have read, even if I grew up in Kauaii. More stuff to do. Which, that was a good point,

for sure. Not that San Diego sucks, though. I think I'm just more mature and understand the value more. You know how like when you read a lot of times it's like, I'm reading, you know, I guess. As far as reading goes, anyway, we're doing a lot of stuff to keep ourselves capable. Look, through, okay, let's go back to working out. Through workouts, our bodies take a beating.

It's the nature of working out, really. True. You work out, take a beating. True. Then you recover from that beating. Those are called gains. And we want to perpetuate gains. But you got to perpetuate beatings as well.

The beatings are the light. The gains are the light. Exactly. Exactly, exactly, exactly, right. Anyway, so your joints will take a beating, so no worries. We got some good supplementation for those joints and for other stuff. So, Jocko, fuel. This is a line high quality, tip, top, top tier, quality supplementation.

Anyway, joint warfare, joints. Keep your joints in the game, 100%. Super krill oil, same deal. some antioxidants in there too. Super healthy for us. It's just a healthy situation, the grill oil. Vitamin D. And I'm going down the line, not in particular order.

I'm going down the line in the order that I take them straight up. Every single morning, by the way, back on the disciplined routine. Thanks for the suggestion, too, by the way. Unless, okay, vitamin D, immunity, keep the immunity up. Also, cold war for immunity. These are critical in staying in the game. And if you don't bully me, try. Not take them.

I don't try and not take them, but I'm just saying theoretically. If you want to test echoes theories, go ahead and try it. We don't recommend it. Yeah. Especially if you took them for a long time and then stopped taking them. That's when you get you see, you know. It's kind of like, it's kind of like if you stop drinking. If you've been drinking for a long time, you stop drinking how like how much energy you have the next day.

It's kind of like that. I mean, you know, in a matter of speaking. Anyway, you know what I'm talking about. Also, discipline the supplement. Okay. It's like a whole thing. It is a whole. Multiple choices.

Yes. Multiple choice. Wait, what is? Discipline. Yes. Because you can have discipline pills, capsules. You can have discipline powder and you can have discipline in the cans. Yes.

The whole line of discipline is true. And it sorted itself out and it makes sense to be like, okay, so discipline powder I take pretty much every day, pretty much. Take it before a workout. That's mainly the thing. But if I don't work out that day, just take it. ticket in the morning, boom, kind of get off to a good sort of start, you know. The can, I use it as essentially an energy drink. Except for you don't feel like junk.

Yeah, and it's like more refreshing than an energy drink. So it's kind of like a, I don't know, a refreshing energy drink. Okay. Multiple flavors, by the way. And then the pills, that's sort of like on the go. I only took the pills one time. Really? Yeah, it doesn't.

I've taken the bills many times. Yeah, it hasn't rolled into my routine as seamlessly as maybe in your situation. Nice to get that little hitter. Yep, it's true. It's nice to get that little hitter, boy. I would imagine so, yes. But. Jocka White Tea, we got that as well.

We also got Molk, so look, you need supplementation. We talked about, we talked about the gains being the light. Well, you need something to build the light with. It's true. From a physics point of view. Sure. When you want to make gains, you need protein. You might as well have protein that tastes like a dessert.

It's true. Get yourself some milk. Yeah, it's true. So my son, he's four, he'll be four this month, goes into the closet. This was not yesterday the day before, day before yesterday. Goes into the closet, gets the peanut butter milk. Not the kid, don't wear your kid one. And he says, can we make some milk shakes?

Straight out. Isn't it awesome that your son wants something as, much as you want him to have it. Yes. Here, go. Like, how often you get to say to your kid, yes, they're begging you to do something that's going to make them healthier, stronger, and a better person. Yeah, exactly right.

Go. Have some milk. I'll make all the milk you want. How's that sound? Yeah. Perfect. It's like them asking you, hey, can I go outside and do some push-ups? Like, do you mind if I do that?

Do you mind if I go outside and do a bunch of eight-count bodybuilders just to get some? And you're like, absolutely. Oh, can I have some milk? Yes, you can. Let me mix it up for you. Let me throw it in the blender, throw it in the shaker and just make one up for you. Yeah, exactly right.

It's like, okay, you know how we play, you know, where we want to be playing, we want to be playing the long game, right? Strategic over tactical. Yes. So every once in a while, and I've said this before, it's true. Every once in a while you get one of those golden diamond nuggets

that is beneficial, short-term and long-term. They're rare. They're not every day. They're not every day at every corner. They're not. They're rare, but they're there. And mulk is one of them.

Straight up one of them. Salmins sashimi is another one. That's my opinion. Jock white tea. Did we say jaccom white tea? You mentioned it, sure. Certified organic, refreshing jockey white tea in the tea bags and in cans too.

By the way, my wife is on those on that kick still for the last like you. You can get this stuff at origin, origin, maine.com. Or you can get at the vitamin shop around the corner. Yes. The vitamin. shop around the corner you have to wait go get some it's true speaking to origin main dot com other stuff on there notably jeans American made denim straight up

from the fabric that is fabricated yep jeans are available t-shirts are available geese are available rash guards are available anything that you basically you need to cover your body boots you need to cover your body otherwise it's going to get scraped it's going to get cold and you're going to be naked yeah which is not good in many cases so get some clothes get some american made clothes get some american made clothes that are functional functional and that's where my judgment stops you have to judge the other part you speaking of clothes and representing and wearing things jocco has a store straight up represent on the path.

T-shirts, discipline. Discipline equals freedom. Discipline equals freedom. And it does, by the way, in case you didn't know. Shirts, hoodies, hats, beanies. You know what else? Hardcore ricondo T-shirts.

Hardcore recondo T-shirts. One of a kind. That I happen to be wearing right now. We're wearing right now. Totally legit. Oh, big time. I haven't, I just got this, what, a week ago. Yeah.

And so I've worn it maybe two, three times, two of which we were recording, not going, I don't really go out in public that much, but no one's recognized it. Get mobbed, do you? When you go out in public. Well, you know, the moment someone recognizes this shirt, that's going to be a level of respect. That's a little bit above the normal level of respect. You got to be in the game and on the path. Yes, sir.

To get on board with that. also what else on there uh anyway a lot of good stuff um i was going to mention yes shorts board shorts functional i'm gonna do a whole thing i might even make a video about the shorts because they're good they're functional and look good and they're like double functional board shorts they are you should that sounds like a marketing campaign double functional they are nonetheless jocco store You can also get some warrior kid soap there, right? Yes, sir. There you can.

Warrior kid soap, go get some of that. Also, subscribe to this podcast if you haven't yet, which if you haven't yet, maybe you shouldn't. Maybe you should just move on with your life. I don't know. Leave a review, whatever. We also have some other podcast. We have the Jockle unraveling podcast, which used to be called the thread.

It's back. It's in its full glory. We have, we re-released or are we releasing the threads that we were, we, we we're removed now we have the unraveling we have some new unravelings coming right now they're out yeah grounded podcast haven't done one of those a little while we owe you warrior kid podcast haven't done one of those a little while we owe you but you know there's a lot of lessons you need to hear multiple times kids so jump on them we also have a YouTube channel where Echo takes and he he enhances some videos

especially if it's a video that's very short and you could easily pay attention to, then he puts a bunch of enhancement in there to make sure you can watch it for two minutes and 30 seconds. But when he does a three-hour video, he doesn't put any enhancements in there. It's just a plain black and white video of two heads or three heads people talking.

And for some reason, that's the way Echoes organized it, which is his call, you know. But if you want to see what Jake Smith, the white buffalo looks like, if you want to figure out why they call him the white buffalo, because he kind of represents that in a visual kind of way

come and check it out subscribe to the YouTube to the YouTube channel hit like smash the like I don't think people I wore out that joke a few months ago What the smash the light button?

Smash the subscribe Yeah Like comment and subscribe That's so weird Yeah there's a new one out there Is there a new way of saying it? A new thing? trend, they say

hit the like button and leave a comment to help out the algorithm. Something along those lines. Because there's like an algorithm that if it has likes and engagement or whatever, interactions or whatever, it's sort of like, oh, this is a significant video.

So let's sort of push it or whatever. Okay. Well, we're not doing this big campaign to get you to fix the algorithm. You know what? If you like the videos, watch them. Subscribe to the YouTube. channel check it out that way echo can get in your head with his little videos yeah it won't

be me getting in your head though obviously I know we think we know in whose head no less yes YouTube video version all good people are agreeing with me I think you don't put effects on a podcast or on this particular podcast but I'm not talking to mass but I'm talking on occasional little Easter egg rolling and maybe a thump that blows up over there maybe just smoke Maybe there's smoke. Some smoke coming out of Jake's guitar. Oh, yeah. Maybe.

Yeah, okay. Actually, there's one thing that doesn't need it. Effects, it's Jake. Yeah, no. It did need it effects today. It could be cool, though. I don't know, Jerusalem. Unless yes, YouTube.

Also, Psychological Warfare. It's an album. Not like White Buffalo album. No. Different. More like, well, we'll just call it psychological warfare for now. So what it is is a spoken word album. Yes.

Spoken word. Yeah. And those words are speaking to you on your moments of weakness. So if you're about to skip the workout, but I came close to skipping workout, too, by the way, yesterday. That's why you're looking skinny? You have a fun now? Anyway, almost skip the workout.

You think if I'm annoyed while we're doing this right now, do you think everyone's annoyed? Or do you think it's just me? It's very possible. Yeah, it's very possible. Everyone's annoyed. But, nonetheless, I think this is a moment. moment of value in my opinion.

Okay. I was about to skip the workout. I didn't listen to psychological warfare. So yesterday. You know why? Didn't have to. I listened to it so many times before when I really needed it, that it was like, it was sort of in the rollad decks back there, sort of playing. So I listened to it virtually in my mind.

And you did the workout? Did the workout straight up 100%? That's awesome, man. Good job. Still looking scary. I do. I do play that game. Play that game, that one that you play or we were talking about that.

It's like, hey, if you have those moments of like, oh, yeah, like, man, I really should hurry up and get to what I was going to do. You know, any excuse you come up with your head that you're going to skip the last part of the workout of the workout, you punish yourself with extra work. Yeah. You know, for even thinking that, I play that game 100%. Check. Also, if you want to have a visual representation to kind of keep you squared away, go to flipside

canvas.com by my brother, Dakota. making cool graphical art to hang on your wall graphical also you know pick up some of Jake's music you don't go download the music or order it or whatever however you're gonna get that music go get it man go get it Jake's out there making it happen also got some books the code the evaluation the protocols leadership strategy and tactics field manual where are your kids One, two, and three, Mikey in the Dragons, discipline equals freedom field manual, extreme ownership and the dichotomy of leadership.

Pick up some of those books if you like what we talk about on here. Also have a leadership consultancy called Eschalonfront. If you need help with leadership inside your organization, go to echelonfront.com. If you want to get engaged in the online brigade that we have where I talk about leadership, I interact. You want to ask me a question? You're thinking, oh, I wish I could ask Chonko a question. You can.

You can literally come on there and ask me a question. Doing two to three times a week, I'm on there, live interaction, go to EFonline.com. Leadership is not something that you just get and now you're good. And you know what? Maybe you don't want to, maybe you want to ask me about jujitsu. Maybe you want to ask me about some relationship that you're in. Whatever you want to ask me, come and ask me. EFonline.com.

We have the muster. The next muster is in Phoenix, Arizona, September 16th and 17th. Then we're going to be in Dallas, Texas, December 3rd and 4th. Go to Extreme Ownership.com. For details, we've sold out all these things that we've done. These ones are less seating because of social distancing. So they're going to sell out even quicker. We have EF. Overwatch.

If you need leadership inside your organization, you want experience leadership, go to EFoverwatch.com where we have candidates that are, proven leaders from the military that understand the principles we talk about go there and hire someone eF overwatch.com we also have america's mighty warriors.org that is mama lee mark lee's mom who is on a mission to do good to help service members to help their families to help gold star families to help people that are deployed around the world if you want to get involved or donate go to america's mighty warriors dot org and if you enjoy overdoing things and you want to hear my more of my conspicuous questions or you feel like you just can't live

without a little bit more of echoes illogical inquiries that you can find us on the interwebs on twitter on instagram and on the facebook echo is at echo Charles and I am at jocco willing and Jake the white buffalo can be found on the interwebs at the white buffalo.com Facebook the white buffalo Instagram buffaloco Twitter Blanco Buffalo and his YouTube channel is the white buffalo and thanks again to Jake for coming on the show for sharing your vision your voice with us thanks for taking care of our veterans and thanks for adding a soundtrack to my life and to all the veterans out there.

Thanks for stepping up into the madness, into the darkness, and thanks for not backing down. And to the police and law enforcement and firefighters and paramedics and EMTs and dispatchers and correctional officers and border patrol and secret service and all the first responders out there,

thanks for keeping the darkness at bay on the home front. and everyone else out there the words from a white buffalo song called When I'm Gone He says I feel it closing in on me I got to be all I can be

In this life there ain't no guarantee You don't get no shit for free What does that mean It means you gotta get out there And get after it And until next time This is Echo and Jocko Out.