Mayim Bialik's Breakdown - Moby: Be A Humble, Open & Curious Observer

Episode Date: February 8, 2022

Moby (musician, DJ, photographer, author, animal rights activist) opens up about his unconventional childhood, what sobriety has taught him, and the effectiveness of activism. He discusses his drug and alcohol abuse which began at an early age and being forced to drop out of college due to crippling panic attacks. Moby details the impact his anxiety had on his journey to pursuing a musical career, why being vegan is a core aspect of who he is, and what philosophy can teach us about our sense of self. Mayim and Moby consider the painful journey of getting to know oneself, achieving fulfillment and happiness through being of service to others, and the process of overcoming the fear-driven desire for control.  BialikBreakdown.com YouTube.com/mayimbialik Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In sobriety, I realized, as I mentioned, I was terrible at being an uptight control freak. No good came from that. And so then the question was, okay, if I'm not going to do that, I'm not going to control my physiology and neurochemistry with alcohol and drugs. I'm not going to control my circumstances with career and obsession. I was like, okay, then what to do? And this is where I might sound like an old hippie or, I don't know, Emerson or whomever, but I looked at the natural world.

And I was like, wow, the natural world is so much better at this than we are. Hi, I'm Myambialic and welcome to Mykdown. This is the place where we break things down so you don't have to. It's Mymbialik's Breakdown. She's going to break it down for you because you know she knows a thing or two. I'm smiling because we have a very fun episode today. A very famous person was going to talk to us. But first, the person who most makes us ask, why does my heart feel so bad, Jonathan Cohen?

That was a hint. That was a hint to who the guest is. That's right. Hi, mine. Hi, Jonathan. Why does your heart feel so bad? I don't know. Why does my soul feel so bad?

It's a processed food. We're going to be talking to Moby. My friend and yours. Soon to be my friend. Soon to be your friend. You know, for anyone who doesn't know who Moby is, Google it. For those of you who do know who Moby is, you probably know he has a very, very complicated life that he's actually written about in a series of books. But he's super, super famous for his DJing is actually kind of how.

it started. He's sold over 20 million albums worldwide. His first single, Go, came out in 1991, and was listed as one of Rolling Stone magazine's best records of all time. Wow. He has produced and remixed artists such as David Bowie, Public Enemy, Britney Spears, Ozzy Osbourne, The Beastie Boys, Daft Punk. He's a very well-known and prominent vegan. And he's actually someone who I know. He also has a song titled... He also has a song. entitled, Why Does My Heart Feel So Bad, which is why I made that your intro. That's right. When I met Moby, I didn't really know who he was.

It's kind of a funny story. It's a trumering quality of yours. I don't think you knew who I was. So we were kind of, it was like a perfect, a perfect friendship. Do you have anything you want to talk about? Do you like Moby? I do. You know, I often don't know, like, I know music, but I didn't realize that it was from him.

And when you go through his catalog, you're like, oh my God, that's him, that's him, too. All these songs that are like people know. Like they're just super, super popular. Yeah. A lot of people who like Moby really like Moby. Do you know what I mean? Like there's a set of people very, very devoted to this genre of music. Well, something happens almost every time we sit down for an interview, which is we get a personality that you and I or I have never met before.

And I really have no idea how it's going to go. You don't know what they're going to be like. And this was really a nice surprise. He's quite an interesting character. He's very interesting guy. He had a very unconventional childhood. He's going to talk about very, very early drug and alcohol abuse that started very early in his life before he was even double digits. And sort of his journeys in and out of not only sobriety from drugs and alcohol, but sort of intellectual and emotional sobriety.

And he actually gives a really beautiful description of sort of that journey. Yeah, he's very philosophical. A lot of great moments in this. Yeah, we're really looking forward to sharing this. with you. So let us welcome, Moby. Break it down. Thanks for being here with us. My pleasure. So my first question, because I'm the one asking the questions, obviously,

my first question is, I have a confession to make about the world of podcasts. Wait for it. Are you ready? I'm ready. I've never listened to a podcast. Yes! But there's a really good reason why. Because you're my other half because I too have not a podcast listener. But my reason being is that way when a friend of mine says, hey, listen to my podcast,

I can simply say, no, I've never listened to. I can categorically say I've never listened to any podcast as opposed to specifically saying, no, I don't want to listen to your podcast. So it's kind of like dating. I categorically don't date. that way if someone wants to go on a date with me, I'm like, no, I just don't date. Like, it's not you, it's me. I don't date anyone, human, non-human, whatever. Hold on. I want the full list of things, because I have a list of things I don't do, like, never seen, don't care to. Do you have other things?

I mean, I know a bit about you, but go ahead. I mean, that sort of list, I feel like this is definitely a conversation that we're also going to be having in 30 years on a park bench. Like, just to sit around, be like, oh, here are more things I don't like. Like, at present for me, my list, top of the list would be humans. Let me think. Humans, yeah, that covers a lot of it. Pretty much. Fabriz.

I'm not a big fan of Fabriz. They are not a sponsor. I mean, we could just go on and on. But my, so my podcast question was, because I'm such an ignoramus when it comes to the world of podcasts, are people generally watching podcasts or listening to them. Like, I feel like a grandparent. I'm like, so that Brad Simpson character on the television, is he some sort of, is he a cartoon person?

I'm going to let Jonathan answer that. Because when Jonathan and I started talking about doing this podcast, it was as if I had landed from another planet in having conversations with him. Well, Miami has a YouTube channel, so we put the video out on it. And then the audio goes everywhere. You get audio podcasts, so Apple, Spotify, and people find it elsewhere.

And generally speaking, if you had to break down the percentages of people who listen versus watch, I'm assuming the listening audience is larger than the watching audience. It depends on the guest. So clearly in my case, because I'm so visually compelling, there are going to be so many people watching because who just can't peel their eyes away from a middle-aged bald guy with glasses. And fantastic vegan tattoos. But what I was going to say is a lot of your fanhood does exist in the YouTube world, meaning there are myriad moby things on YouTube.

So it's possible that we may tap into that. And people might love to look at your middle-aged inbred face. Yeah. Or they could just like blur. their eyes and pretend I'm Michael Stipe or someone. It's a deep cut for those of us who are old enough to know what he means. There's kind of many ways, you know, into this conversation. But usually where we start with people and, you know, for people who have not read any of your writing, you write really, really beautifully and very vulnerably and very deeply about a lot of aspects of your

personal life. But we would love for you to share a little bit. bit, like, where were you born? What was your home life like? Tell us what young Moby was like. Okay. So I was born in 1965 in Harlem, New York, and I was raised by two hyper-intellectual crazy people. We lived in a basement apartment in Harlem. And when I was two-ish, two to three years old, my dad killed himself. He was an alcoholic, and I'm not 100% sure how he died. We're still trying to figure that out. And then my mom and I moved back to Connecticut where she had grown up, and I had a very odd childhood. You know, she was, I don't know where she would fit in the DSM-5. Are they at DSM-5, or have they moved on? I think we're at, well, we've moved on in that

A lot of those kind of specific diagnoses are found to be part of a larger spectrum, but we get your intention. So I don't know where in that nice, fluid, modern DSM spectrum, she would sit, but perhaps in a few different places. So she was very creative, funny, wonderful, but also kind of a drug addict and incredibly mercurial. And so I grew up with a lot of unsafe stuff. You know, like she dated Hell's Angels. There was violence. There were murder attempts. There was substance abuse.

So it was a very confused and confusing childhood. Also, we grew up dirt, poor white trash, like borrowing money to buy food. And to make things even more complicated, I grew up in the wealthiest town in the United States on food stance and welfare while my mom. date at Hell's Angels. So it's given me basically suitcases filled with issues that I hold on to to this. My Ambialx breakdown is supported by Superpower. We all know the feeling of leaving a doctor's office and kind of feeling like we didn't get anything out of the experience that was useful. Maybe they're like, you're fine. Drink more water. There's no real data. There's no game plan. This has happened to me many, many times, especially on the perimenopause journey. That's why we're

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get an additional $20 off with the code break. Head to superpower.com. Use the code break at checkout for $20 off your membership. And after you sign up, they'll ask how you heard about them. Make sure to mention Miami-Biotics Breakdown to help support the show. You were an only child. Okay, so here's what I found out. This is interesting. This is one the many ways in which my life is sort of like a checkoff play. And if you've ever read checkoff plays, spoiler alert, they all end with someone killing themselves. So before I died, before I died, sorry, a little Freudian slip. Shit just got deep in this interview with movie. I don't know how this interview is going to end. Yeah. Oh, we know how his life ends. Okay, go ahead. Sorry.

Like the movie network. Um, so before my mom died, I was going through, through her stuff and I found my birth certificate. And then my birth certificate, it said number of children born alive prior to this one, one. And I asked my mom, she was like, yeah, I never told you, but you have a brother. Oh. So somewhere out there, there's some brother floating around. Okay. Hold on. A funny little story when the Politico website was launched, this was before I got sober.

I got sober about 12 years ago. I was in Washington, D.C. with the Pelosi's, and I got very drunk, and I was talking to a journalist from Politico. And I somehow mentioned that I have a half-brother somewhere out there. And I jokingly said, but who knows, maybe it's Carl Rove, who at the time was the chief of staff of the White House under Bush. the journalist wrote this funny little piece that maybe Carl Rove and I were brothers. Two weeks later, I get a letter on official White House stationary from Carl Rove saying, Dear Mr. Moby, I don't think I'm your brother because I have no musical ability, and I'm 13 years older than you.

Have you considered James Carville because he plays guitar and is bald too, your pal, Carl Rove? That's pretty epic. So I know that's my long-winded way of saying, I know that I have a brother out there and he's probably not Carl Rose. Maybe we'll launch a campaign through this episode. Who is Moby's brother? That's right.

Yeah. With the exclusion of it not being Carl Rove. Do we know how many years older than you? I'm guessing six. So I'm 56, so he would be in his early 60s. Wow. So what is, what's Moby like? in junior high. Also, were you always known as Moby? Yeah. So that's the other, another interesting aspect,

I guess, of my history is my full legal name is Richard Melville Hall because I'm related to Herman Melville. And as a joke, when I was 10 minutes old, my dad started calling me Moby. And now I'm 56 years old and I'm still saddled with my infant joke nickname. Tell us what junior high Moby was like. Well, as I said, we were very poor. So, you know, I was in Derry and Connecticut, this incredibly wealthy, waspy community. And, you know, I was wearing clothes that we bought at Goodwill or Salvation Army and just incredibly uncomfortable, obsessed with girls and music, but never having this sort of like confidence to actually. talk to girls. So a lot of just like sitting in my bedroom playing guitar, listening to records, obsessing over girls I had crushes on. What kind of music were you into at that kind of stage of

your life? Well, I had this wonderful and forgive me because this is sort of like a half-Semitic reference. It's like a Saul on the road to Damascus moment when I was around, I guess 12, I discovered punk rock and new wave, and I embraced them because they were, you know, they were the music of outsiders. You know, it was the music of being dispossessed and not feeling connected to your culture or society. And so I embraced punk rock and new wave

and became an obsessive punk rock New Wave fan. And were you in bands? Like, was that sort of? of the start of like you play in bands in junior high and high school. Were you always kind of on your own musically? No, I mean, I loved being by myself and playing music by myself, but I also started a band in junior high school with some friends. And we were terrible, but it was so much fun.

And we played clash and sex pistols covers. We were called the Vatican Commandos, because we thought that was a really funny name. And when did you find mood-altering substances? Like what was your kind of introduction to that world? Well, I grew up. I mean, my dad had been an alcoholic. My mom was, I don't know if she was addicted,

but she certainly was high every day of her life. So I guess by definition, there might have been some addiction there. My mom and her boyfriend did a lot of drugs. So there were always drugs floating around. And so I started doing drugs and smoking. I was going to say pot, but I guess no one under the age of 56 still calls it pot. So I started smoking marijuana and taking pills and doing things when I was around nine years old. And I actually, my first sobriety date, I was 13 years old.

So I had already sort of bottomed out as an addict by the time I was 13. Of course, I then very quickly rediscovered alcohol and drugs. stayed drunk and high until about 12 years ago. Wow. So what happened sort of in high school for you? Obviously, you're, you know, becoming the young man who we now know as Moby. What was your sort of, what was your trajectory both sort of in terms of what did you think you wanted to do in life? Like, what did it kind of feel like to be you? And also, I guess I'm curious, were you aware of what you were escaping or filling with these kind of recreational drugs, or was it just sort of like, this is what everybody did? That's such a wonderful question. Specifically, like, how much self-awareness

can one ever have, but especially when you're, you know, when you're growing up, because you've only ever known yourself and you've only ever known your circumstances, your family, your culture. And so I didn't even know that I had issues. Like I knew that I was depressed. I knew I was anxious. I knew that I felt uncomfortable. But I thought this was just normal. It was only years, years, years, years later when I actually started going to therapy with a great therapist on the Upper West Side named Shelley Itzkowitz. Because of course, if you're going to start going to therapy, you have to go to a therapist named Shelley Etzkuitz on the Upper West Side. And Shelley Itzkoitz and I were talking one day and he basically enabled me to see that many

aspects of my upbringing were very unconventional. You know, my father killing himself, starting doing drugs when I was nine years old, growing up in very unsafe environments. Like, I just thought it was all normal. So in high school, I was a, you know, self-involved, depressive playing in bands, listening to Joy Division, again, obsessing over girls who I never had the courage to talk to. Yeah, so in high school, in hindsight, it was delightful. Like, it was safe.

And where we lived in Connecticut, we were 40 minutes away from Manhattan. So my punk rock friends and I would sneak into New York on the Metro North train and go to punk rock shows and, you know, sit around St. Mark's Place watching cool people with cool haircuts walk by. So at the time, I was miserable, but in hindsight, high school was fantastic. I imagine a lot of people can relate to that sentiment. Like, I hated high school when I was going through it. And now I have nothing but just sort of like sweetness and fondness when I think about it. I'm curious about the obsession because, you know, when you talk about being obsessed with girls, that type of obsession leads both into drug use and it also leads into productivity.

So I'm curious to sort of like go back to that. What did it look like? What did it feel like for you sort of those early days of feeling obsessed? And what does that mean for you? Well, one of my biggest, biggest crushes was on a woman named Louise. she was two years older than me, and I was a sophomore in high school. She was a senior. She was going off to Brown to study semiotics. She was really into Taoism, and she was just the most perfect woman I'd ever met. Of course, I was two years younger than her, and I was awkward,

so she had no interest in me romantically. But I used to like, so the way it manifested itself was I would write poems where is it an acrostic? I forget, there's a name for this where like the first letter of each lines. So I would write poems where like the first letter of each line would spell out her name. I would put Joy Division cassettes on my Walkman and ride my bike by her house, hoping maybe she would come out and confess her love to me, writing songs that were thinly veiled, you know, just descriptions of how much I love. loved her. Did you date at all? Did you date in junior higher high school can kind of go either way with

the personality you described? Sometimes those people are real late blooms and sometimes those people are, you know, sexually precocious as a way to try and, you know, figure things out. Oh, I would have loved to have been sexually precocious, but that was not in the realm of possibility. Yeah, in junior high school, I had a girlfriend for three days and she broke up with me because I didn't know how to kiss. I No one told me that you were supposed to kiss with your mouth open. And so I thought you just kissed the way they kissed in movies from the 1940s. And after three days, she broke up with me and went out with my friend Tom because he knew how to kiss. Where's Tom now?

I think he has hair down below his butt and he's a forest ranger somewhere in the Pacific Northwest. Well, he showed us. Yeah. And then in high school, I dated a few. people, but largely, I mean, like my, my longest relationship in high school was completely platonic. And I don't even know how you manage that. Like, how is it even possible to have a nine month relationship in high school, like two people like consumed with hormones and nothing happened? Although I did lose my virginity in a blackout to a complete stranger when I was, I think 16.

I somehow managed to lose my virginity, blind drunk, but then my girlfriend, who I started dating after that, we for nine months, didn't even touch each other's skin, basically. Huh. Was there like anxiety on your part that, like, maybe she wanted to? Like, how did you navigate, or just not talked about? Like, how did you navigate that? Yeah.

I mean, we just, we never, ever talked. We were dating. I'm trying to remember because it seems so weird now. But to put it in context, I remember at the time reading an article with Dr. Ruth, little Dr. Ruth Westheimer. If you're, is it, Dr. Westheimer, I think that was her last name. I don't remember her last name, but. Yeah. In the interview, she said that couples should always be open to talking about sex and talking about what they like.

and I think I laughed out loud. I was like, no, no one does that. That's impossible. No one, people don't talk about sex. People don't talk about feelings. They don't talk about what they like. Like, are you out of your mind, you tiny crazy person? Oh, for those who don't know, Dr. Ruth Westheimer was a tiny person.

She was not crazy. Turns out she was right. I was crazy. Before we get too far away from it, do we want to talk at all about like what the impacts of starting substances was at nine and how you sort of hit a bottom at 13? Because that seems pretty profound. Sure. I mean, I'm happy to talk about anything. Yeah. So I discovered drugs when I was nine. And the truth is, I didn't like drugs that much. I did them because I thought, like, well, this is a way to hang out with cooler, older kids. What I really liked was out.

alcohol. Oh boy. Like, you know, I'm just an old-timey alcoholic. Like years later, like I would just be drinking 20 drinks a day, 25 drinks a day. And I tell people that number and they look at me like, are you, no one could drink 20 drinks a day. And I was like, have you read the memoirs of Winston Churchill? Like, alcoholics can drink a lot of alcohol. But I loved drugs, but like alcohol was my, my God. I mean, it did everything for me. So then when I was around 13, I had this crazy night with a friend of mine and it ended up with him in a coma being intubated with EMTs working on him. And that's what led me to get sober at 13, seeing my friend almost die because we had had so much to drink and done so many drugs. And now I think back, like, we were 12 or 13 years

old. I don't think that's normal. So when I think of, I mean, you know, I have a 13 year old and a 16 year old. And when I think of them at nine, like they, they, you know, you're, you're still a little kid, you know, like it's still a little tiny person. Sometimes they still have a lovy or a blankie. You know, obviously your experience and your, um, your circumstances probably caused you to have to confront a lot of things. Most children do not. Do you remember feeling? kind of old for your age and therefore it felt kind of appropriate to be doing these kind of adult things had you sort of discarded you know the folly of youth already uh no i think paradoxically i mean i was an underdeveloped kid like when i was nine i probably looked like i was seven

you know so i was not like tall and shaving you know like you see these 12 year olds who look like they should be 26. I was not that. I was a 12-year-old who looked like he was 10. And I still loved kid stuff, but I was so ashamed of every aspect of who I actually was. You know, I was ashamed of the fact that we were very poor, that my mom dated Hells Angels, that I didn't have a father, that I didn't know how to interact with people. And so on my own, I was profoundly comfortable being a little kid. But I assumed that to interact with other people, I would have to become something else.

And alcohol and drugs was just a very expedient way of accomplishing that. Well, and that's sort of, you know, very classic, you know, big book language is the problem is not the drinking. It's being sober. Meaning the issue is that whatever it is about us, you know, in our state, that feels so, you know, fill in the word, unacceptable, unlovable, you know, unwanted, alone, you know, sad, broken, just using my words,

that that feels so unbearable that we seek something, this sort of crutch, right? I mean, as humans, we do this. We seek something that makes us not feel the way we feel. Like, that's it. Yeah. And it, you know, it's going to vary by person, you know, in terms of what we fill that, the God-shaped hole, you know, is what it's called with. Yep.

Yeah, I mean, that's, that was when I, I mean, I mean, jumping ahead until 12 years ago, when I finally got sober for real, because I'd gotten sober many, many times, but when I finally got, like, in my mind, real sobriety, like with a sponsor, doing the steps, going to meetings. And by the way, if anyone's listening and they're considering sobriety or they have their own sobriety, when I talk about going to 12-step meetings, that works for me. It doesn't have to work for everybody. Like, you know, it's not like there's one way to get sober. For me, A.A. and 12, doing 12 steps, it worked for me. But by all means, whatever anyone finds that works for them is great. Absolutely.

But to that point, like when I first finally got sober, I thought, okay, I'm going to go sit in a church basement with a bunch of sad alcoholics. And my life is going to be sad because I'm going to give up alcohol and drugs. And the point of A.A. is to be sober. And then I realized, oh, no, it's a bait and switch. Like, they bring you in to get you sober. But the whole idea is sobriety is the first step, you know. And it's such a phenomenal program for, like, if it's worked correctly, as you sort of what you're alluding to, for true learning about yourself in the most profound ways.

And then, yeah, recognizing that, you know, alcohol is, and drug addiction, like these are symptoms. You know, they're blocks and symptoms. I don't want to jump ahead too much from your chronology that you're politely and kindly walking me through. But it's the idea of like the Youngian shadow self. When the pandemic started, I gave myself a bunch of sort of like new tasks.

And one of them was to go back and reread a lot of the stuff that I had read when I was a philosophy major in college. college and I didn't really remember. Like Kant and Wittgenstein and Chopinauer. Chopinauer hasn't aged all that well with him being a Nazi. And Spinoza. And like then a lot of people I'd never actually read like Carl Jung. And it dovetails perfectly because Carl Young was, you know, vaguely and, well,

sort of instrumental in helping Bill W set up AA. I became obsessed with the way in which we sort of traditional. conventionally perceived the idea of a shadow self and what it actually might mean. Because the way in which we think of it is like, if you ask anybody, if they're familiar with the idea of a shadow self, they'll be like, oh yeah, the id, you know, the darkness, the part of me that wants to like stab people for smelling like Fabriz, the, you know, the part of me that wants like have sex with the neighbor, like, the dark. I don't think that's it. I think that's too easy.

That's too, like, cinematic and powerful. I think the shadow self is the self that we're ashamed of. You know, it's not the tough self. It's the awkward 13-year-old. You know, it's the uncomfortable self. And part of sobriety or any great spiritual practice or therapeutic practice, I think, is encountering that awkward self, the self that you genuinely don't like

and connecting with it. So that's my, sorry, that's my spiel. I'll be quiet now. No, no, no. It actually kind of, it leads nicely to where I was going to kind of have you take us next, which is that, you know, you went to college. Tell us where you went to college and kind of what those years were like. I went to a few different schools.

I went to the University of Connecticut, and then I had to drop out because I had crippling panic attacks. You know, panic attacks that just basically prevented me from functioning in any capacity. So I dropped out and then moved home and I was sleeping on my mom's couch. And if you ever want to feel really cool, be a 19-year-old, unemployed having panic attacks sleeping on your mom's couch while all of your friends are at Ivy League schools living perfect lives. Yeah, that was a dark time. But that's also what led me to become a professional musician.

Because my goal when I was at college was to be, I was going to study philosophy. I was going to teach philosophy. Maybe if I was lucky, write some philosophy books that no one would read. And that was my goal, you know, play music in my spare time and be a full-time philosophy professor. And by the anxiety driving me away from college, it forced me to do music full-time. time. So then I went back to SUNY Purchase, State University of New York at Purchase, and I went back to Yukon again, never quite graduating and studying philosophy and filmmaking and photography. And my dear obsession that they no longer call by this term, it's semiotics. Like my dream had

always been to go to Brown to study semiotics because they were the only college in the United States that had a semiotics program. What is that? Oh, semiotics. And the reason you might not know what it is, I don't think they call it that anymore. But here's my ignorance. I don't know what they call it now. Broadly speaking, it's the relationship between symbols and meaning. Oh, yes. I think they call it media studies now, but I don't think it, I think that's cheap. So I'm just going to stick with, I'm an old person.

I'm allowed to still call it semiotics. Word of the day, semiotics. So this might sound weird, or maybe it's weird to phrase it this way. When did that Moby turn into the Moby that everyone sort of came to know as this really, I mean, I know you're not a huge fan of lots of compliments and talking about you as I'm looking at you, but I have to say that your musical legacy is incredibly salient. It is a very, very specific reach that you have. and many people who think they don't know you actually do.

You know, that is how, you know, lovely and pervasive a lot of your influence is. But how do you, how did you become that person? I'm curious. Well, I guess I'm curious musically, you know, because like, for example, I've been a musician my whole life. I never entered this. Most people don't enter this realm of being, you know, like, innovative. like creators of the type that you are. How did you get there?

Well, okay, so I dropped out of college because of panic attacks, sleeping on my mom's couch, broke, panicking, and I started hanging out in this wonderful dive bar in Portchester, New York, called The Beat. And the beat was, it was my home away from home. it was such a shithole and it was like the local drug addicts hung out there, the methadone addicts hung out there, the artists hung out there, the homeless people hung out there. Like it was this, you know, just this phenomenal place. And I was there five or six nights a week. And the owner,

Tom, felt sorry for me. And he let me start DJing on Monday nights. And I only had about 10 records to my name. So I would show up on Monday nights and play records to like the 15 people in the bar and got paid $25 a night, which was works out. I played for six hours. So that's what like $3.20 an hour. And DJing, because up until that point, I had grown up studying classical music and I played in punk rock bands. I played jazz. And I thought I was going to sort of focus on being a singer-songwriter. Like, I really loved a lot, you know, like old singer-songwriters like Kat Stevens, up to Morrissey.

So I thought in the early 80s, I was like, I'd really like to focus on being a singer-songwriter. But then DJing at this place called The Beat, I started playing electronic music. And that's what really got me interested in what electronic music could do, whether it was hip hop or what was called industrial music at the time and house music when it was invented. And so I sort of left being a singer-songwriter behind to focus on electronic music. So I guess that would be the, if I was writing a script about the story of my life, that would be a very seminal turning point. Like that would be another Saul on the road to Damascus, like knocked off your horse moment.

when I fell in love with electronic music. And then, because I was so close to New York, as the 80s progressed, I left home and I was living in an abandoned factory, which was so wonderful. And it's so hard to explain why it was wonderful. It was an abandoned factory in a crack neighborhood. And I had no running water, so I had to pee in a bottle. And there was a bathroom like a few hundred yards away that barely worked. and I loved living in this abandoned factory, and that enabled me to experiment with music and to

collect old pieces of equipment and start making my own electronic music. And then eventually, in 1988 or 89, a little tiny record label in New York signed me, and I started making records for them. So there's another weird aspect to that, which is in 1987, I became a weird Christian. So how old were you? You were 22. 21 or 22. And because up until that point, I had been either, you know, like, I was a philosophy major. So I, you know, was a big fan of Wittgenstein. And, you know, and then when I became a Christian, I liked to sort of define myself as a Kierkegaardian Christian because I'm pretentious. But the truth is, I was just an uptight, judgmental dickhead. And were you, did you get clean at this time?

Yeah, until 1987 I began a Christian. I stopped drinking. I stopped doing drugs. I started volunteering at soup kitchens. I went on Christian retreats. Yeah, I was awful. And did you believe the tenets of Christianity, as it were, that Jesus died for your sins, like the full? I mainly believed that I had found a way to feel superior to other people and judge them.

Like, I really loved judging other people. Yeah. Like, I really, but also around that time, I became a vegan as well. And I said that the veganism is the music and veganism are the two constant. You know, I've been a vegan now for 34 years, and I've never once questioned that. So the Christianity has definitely fallen by the wayside at any sort of conventional way. How did you get into the Christianity? I was DJing at an all-age of club in an Episcop.

church because I'm cool. Because nothing says cool like DJing at an all-ages club in an Episcopal church in Greenwich, Connecticut. Oh, wow. If you're looking for another level of cool, it's the Bush family church. It's the Episcopal church that the bushes belong to.

Wow. And they made you become Christian? Like, how did you adopt it to be like, okay, this is something that I'm into? I'm a joiner. Like if you, you know, like I wanted to fit in and like there were some cute girls who went to Bible studies. I was like, oh, I'm kind of into this. And then also I will say to in a very sincere way, there are some aspects of both the Old and the New Testament that I still think are profound.

You know, like some of the teachings of Christ are phenomenal, not Christianity, but you know, the radical forgiveness, the radical. the radical compassion, the radical self-denial, the radical anti-materialism. Like, I'm still in love with those ideas. I just have no, I mean, how, and I know I'm not the first person say this, but it's just mind-boggling how this idea of like radical anti-materialism, radical forgiveness, radical compassion taught by a brown-skinned Jewish man in Palestine, has been turned into the foundation for vicious, unforgiving white racist capitalism. Like, it's kind of like the idea of Burger King calling itself a vegan restaurant,

like Christianity in the United States in the 21st century. You know what? It's been a heck of a 2,000 years. That's, it's been a lot. How long did that phase of your life last, the Christian superiority complex years? I love that. Yeah, the CSE. That lasted until about 1995. So in the late 80s and the early 90s, I was DJing at raves and I was surrounded by all this debauchery and degeneracy.

And I started making records and touring, but I was also going to Bible studies and called myself a Christian. And then in 1995, I had yet another Saul on the road to Damascus moment where, and can I tell you the details of it, even though it might sound insane? Yes. But then again, I think I've already plumbed the depths of insanity in this conversation. We're just getting started. We're having a great time. Okay. So it's 1995.

and I was on the corner of Bleeker and Lafayette Street in New York. And I for some reason saw these ants on the sidewalk. And I squatted down to look at the ants. And all of a sudden, in an instant, I realized like, okay, I am incapable of understanding one ant. you know, the complexity within a single ant is so outside my realm of, I couldn't even begin to comprehend that complexity. I couldn't even understand the complexity of a cell in the retina of an ant. And at that moment, it was almost like a Job or Jonah moment. I get the one more

confused, where it's like, it was almost like this voice said, look, if you couldn't begin to understand a cell, an individual cell in an ant, who are you to make grand pronouncements about the architect of the universe? And at that moment, I was like, okay, I guess I'm not a Christian anymore, because to be a Christian, you kind of have to make grand pronouncements about the architect of the universe. And I at that point just became like, I don't know what you would even call it, just like a fascinated, curious observer of what might actually be going on. Would you say that that's sort of a phase that has continued? Oh, yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, from then until now, it's just this sort of recognition that in the human form, like so many of our belief systems are designed to give us that, you know, a sense of comfort and control. And, you know, the idea that somehow we're right and the other people are wrong. And I just categorically reject every single aspect of that. As much as I want to be right and as much as I want to judge other people, like in the universe it's 15 billion years old, like we know nothing. So besides music,

You do have a very devout sense of obligation to this planet and particularly the creatures that inhabit it. I would say in knowing you a bit besides this conversation, I'd say it's one of the most kind of religious things about you is your devotion to animals and, you know, educating people to a certain extent, but also living a life that is really exemplary. You know, you are one of those for us in the vegan community who, you know, you are, you are one of those for us in the vegan community who, you know, we do point to, not just because you have it tattooed all over your neck and arms and body. No, but because of kind of the, you know, the consistency with which you have delivered a very, very direct message. Where and when did that sort of evolve? And I guess what role does it fill for you? Because in many ways, I do see it as a really, you know, a kind of a core aspect of you. Yeah. I mean, I would say that's from, for me, that's the single,

most important part of my life. And I guess it started the way it starts with a lot of people. When I was a, when I was very young, we had a lot of rescued animals in our apartment and in the, you know, the house where we lived. And the animals always just made more sense to me than the humans.

Like they were, you could predict them. They were, you know, they were not mercurial. And I think I just had an early age decided like, okay, like humans are weird. Humans are confusing.

Humans are threatening. An animals simply are not. You know, like if they're threatening, it's for a good reason as opposed to humans. Like an animal is not going to kill another animal over a parking space. There's almost like just like a bedrock logic and rash. and rationality that animals have that at an early age, I was like, oh, that makes so much sense to me.

And so I, but then I had the weird paradox that so many, that I'd say the majority of people on the planet have, which is I grew up loving our rescued dogs and cats, but also loving going to Burger King and eating hamburgers and eating hot dogs, eating pepperoni pizza. And then when I was 19, I was petting this one rescued cat that we had. had named Tucker. And I just suddenly realized, I was like, okay, ontologically, Tucker has two eyes, from my perspective, two eyes, a central nervous system and a very rich life and a desire to avoid pain and suffering. And I sort of extrapolated and realized, oh, every being with two eyes and a central nervous system has a rich life and a desire to avoid pain and suffering. How can I ever

and good conscience contribute to or cause the suffering or, you know, cause pain or suffering to any sentient being. And that was when I was 19, so I became a vegetarian then and a vegan a few years later. Another thing I've been fascinated with lately is looking at the beginning of Genesis in the Old Testament on a metaphoric level. I had this amazing Old Testament teacher years ago, this old Israeli woman, and she very much looked at things, you know, a lot of the stories metaphorically. And the story in the beginning of the Old Testament looked at through a lens of metaphor is so accurate and fascinating, where all of creation is connected to the divine. We are not. We are so many, and I think this is one of the defining aspects of our

species is like we are somehow the only species, the only thing that has ever been separated from the divine. Whatever the divine might be, we'll call that nature, the source. And so all of our problems come from this, this war, you know, this lack of connection. So we punish the environment. We punish each other. We punish ourselves. We punish animals. Like we're just at war with everything. And I feel like for humanity to even have a chance of surviving, that war has to stop. Like we have to figure out how do we live in a way where we're connected to whatever this divinity might be? We were looking at, I think it was on YouTube, we looked at a little video that you had done. You were in a cow suit.

Yeah. I'm classy. Yeah. Well, we were saying acting is not your first passion, which is possibly for the best. But what it was was a kind of, you know, he was viable as a believable as a cow to me. Very believable as a cow, adorable. No, but the notion being that, you know, the litany of issues and concerns that our planet is tackling, has been tackling, and will continue to tackle.

There is a very large component that we vegans have what to say about. And what was being addressed in the cowsuit video is sort of what you've mentioned, that there are all these ostensibly disparate issues that are actually caused by using animals for food. Right. You know, whether it's deforestation, whether it's ocean acidification, methane emissions, heart disease, cancer, diabetes, obesity. And here's a really tricky one. And I'm almost hesitant to mention it because this is what gets stuff pulled down. I mentioned this on Twitter and I got crucified.

is I was like, oh, in a vegan world, pandemics wouldn't happen. Yeah, that's a tough one. And the reason, and when I said, and these scientists, these people attacked me. Yeah. Because they thought I was talking about a vegan diet. And I said, no, what I mean is a vegan world is one where animals are no longer used by and for humans. They're allowed to live their own lives in environments that we do not control. What does my mask say, that one that I wear?

Tofu never. It says tofu never caused a pandemic. Yeah. And all of these people attacking me and I was like, and I learned a fantastic new word, which is ideology, which is the origin of a, rather the progression of a pandemic. And every pandemic has a zoonotic ideology. All of them forever. They all come from animals. They all, you know, whether it's SARS, MERS, etc. All. All. pandemics have a zoonotic ideology meaning they're caused by us trying to use animals for food by encroaching on animal habitat so that long-winded thing of like you know like rainforest deforestation climate change methane emissions human health water use antibiotic resistance and pandemics all these things are caused by our ridiculous cruel barbaric use of animals for food. So no, no, this is not a not a rebuttal by any means, but because humans are very difficult to change, how do you go from, if this is the absolute solution, how do you get there?

That's a wonderful question. And I'm going to name drop a little bit. When Cory Booker, who I've known forever, was elected to the Senate, he called me up and he said, one of the first things he said was how do we help animals, which made me love him even more. But that was his question. You know, and we were talking about this and we were like, well, humans have actually done much harder things, like slavery as an economic engine was much more ingrained in every aspect of the West. And we got rid of slavery. Took a civil war. Yeah. So, I mean, I feel like I don't have a good answer. answer to that question because is it looking at it from a policy perspective? Is it looking at it from a media perspective? I don't know.

Okay. Well, I have an answer as well. Okay. Let's hear yours. No, no. There's a quote that I'm specifically looking for. Also, while you're looking up the quote, there's one core thing that can be addressed, which is subsidies. You know, because the truth is, like, a family of four going to Burger King without their meal being subsidized, it'd be a $90 meal. You know, a gallon of milk without subsidies is $25. A pound of beef without subsidies is $50. Like, so I almost feel like it's a way to apply free market principles to food. Like, let meat and dairy cost what it actually costs. Like, stop subsidizing these industries that are destroying us and the only home.

we have and a trillion animals here. Well, the kind of, I mean, the way things change is very, very slowly. And there's a very famous Talmudic story about Rabbi Akiva, who was a shepherd who didn't learn Hebrew until he was in his 40s and he became one of the greatest rabbis of that era, Jesus' era, as it were. And, you know, he wasn't sure he should start studying at 40 because, obviously, like, he was a shepherd and, you know, and it was his wife, of course, it was his wife. who encouraged him and believed in him.

And she was from a very wealthy family, but she stood by him while he studied. And what happened, he was one day looking at a brook, you know, and like a little waterfall trickle. And he noticed that there was a place where there was a steady drip from one of these, you know, one of the aspects of the waterfall. And it had started to carve a hole over time.

And the idea was if something like a rock with persistent pressure, even bit by bit, can change, you know, we can as well. So yeah, this is, it's slow change. And also, there have been many times in history when we've said, how is this ever going to change? We are still saying that about many aspects. And, you know, it is those who believe in something and continue to, you know, to pursue it that, you know, eventually, hopefully will make that happen. And I do believe that of not only veganism, but of shifting, you know, just, our perspectives on health, on diet, on nutrition, on all of these things. Can you talk a little bit

about sort of sobriety this time around? What feels different? Why, how? What's, what is it done for, let's say, your mental health, you know, meaning did you figure it out in ways that have done more for you and kind of keep you going one day at a time? Yeah, I mean, I really liked the way you were talking about sobriety in 12 steps, you know, about 40 minutes ago. when you mentioned it. And as I mentioned, when I first got sober, I thought it was just giving up alcohol and drugs. And I had no idea that AA especially is this weird, wonderful amalgam

of so many different spiritual and therapeutic practices. Like there's the Jungian elements, there's Emersonian elements. I mean, they just borrowed from everyone. There's a lot of CBT also, replacing negative thoughts with positive ones. Like, yeah. CBT is what really helped me get past my panic attack. So, like, Dr. Barry Lubetkin in New York, my CBT practitioner. He actually studied with Albert Ellis, who I think, did he die recently?

Someone, some original CBT guy died recently. But in any case, what happened with sobriety, I'm going to try and truncated a little bit, boy, oh boy, could I ramble on about this? Basically, for almost all of my life, I felt out of control. And I felt that happiness and well-being would come with control.

You know, whether that meant controlling, how, you know, making sure that people loved me, making sure that, you know, I had money, making sure, like just this control, this almost feral, fear-driven control. And sobriety specifically, the 12 steps made me realize a couple things. One, that I'm really bad at being controlling. You know, like, I'm just, I'm, even when it works out, like, even when I'm, when I

accomplish control, it's bad. Like, I just, you know, like the more controlling I was, the less happy I was. You know, the most miserable I was, the most suicidal I've ever been, was at the pinnacle of my success. And so luckily, I had this empirical data. I could say like, oh, well, boy, when I was controlling and when my career was going as well as it possibly could, I was anxious and depressed and suicidal. so clearly that didn't work. And then the underlying aspect, so that was kind of nice,

realizing that like control is not my strong suit and it's very destructive for me. And then the other side is like, okay, well, what's the universe doing? Like what's the opposite of me trying to control everything? You know, is it just apathy? is it nihilistic indifference or is it uh and i'm going to start i i don't even know who can we quote anymore who hasn't been canceled in the world of quotes nobody you can't quote anybody

anymore i was going to quote john muir and i was like oh boy that's a minefield now um so um so basically i guess we have to come up with our own quotes um so i started in some sobriety, I realized, as I mentioned, I was terrible at being an uptight control freak. You know, it's no good came from that. And so then the question was, okay, if I'm not going to do that, I'm not going to control my physiology and neurochemistry with alcohol and drugs. I'm not going to control my circumstances with career and obsession. I was like, okay, then what to do?

And this is where I might sound like an old hippie or, I don't know, Emerson or whomever, but I looked at the natural world and I was like, wow, the natural world is so much better at this than we are. You know, it's so much better at sustaining things, at growing, at using death as a part of the cycle. And it basically turned, I became so fascinated with how the natural world worked. And it gave me this sadness and contempt for the world of humans. You know, and our materialism and our, and I'm not saying materialism is bad. I'm saying it's idiotic and counterintuitive. You know, like, it doesn't work.

Like this system just, it doesn't work. But we're so in the middle of it, no one can sort of say like, hey, categorically, like, this just doesn't work. You know, like it's not sustainable. It's not healthy. You know, we're burning through all these resources and we're miserable. The more money we have, the more unhappy we are. Like, it's just, it's so ridiculous that it just, all the evidence is that no, all these aspects of modern life are just terrible, but we're not willing to look at them

and rationally modify them or replace them. And I think what's interesting is that this is your answer to, sort of us, me asking about sobriety. Because what, no, but. Because I'm a long-winded middle-aged guy who likes to ramble up. No, but what I'm kind of hearing is that like, this is you. Meaning like, this is Mobe. These are the things you think about.

These are the things you care about. These are the things that you devote your time, energy, money, resources to as opposed to the way you were Moby in the past, right? meaning there are all these things that we do until we actually get to know ourselves. And some people spend their whole lives, in my opinion, really not kind of knowing themselves. And this is a very rigorous and painful and not easy path. I, yeah, I mean, and I love it. Like, I'm so grateful for all the adversity I've had in the past.

I don't want to have more, but the past adversity has been fantastic. bottoming out as an alcoholic, without that, I would never have been forced to sort of like take that step back and figure out what works and what doesn't. You know, having panic attacks and dropping out of college, it would be miserable. But without that, I would not have discovered electronic music. I mean, there's so many examples of that where like adversity is the worst thing that becomes the greatest thing. One last thing about that, is another huge aspect

of, I think, for me, well-being is service. And I remember when I, and I don't know if you guys have had this experience, but when I first got sober, I had a lot of people say like, oh, you know, like, to be happy to have a good life,

you need to be of service. Take a commitment. You know, I was like, I don't want to be of service. I want to be self. I love being selfish. I'm an only child. I'm so good at being selfish. Please just let me be selfish. And then I read an interview with the Dalai Lama and he was talking about how service is the key to well-being. And I was so annoyed. I was like, no, stop it. You know, shut up everybody. I just want to be a selfish idiot. And as time passed, I realized the more I focus on service, the more I focus on the the needs of others, the more I focus on causes outside of myself, paradoxically, the happier I am.

And I'm almost sad for the Donald Trump's and Donald Trump juniors of the world who are just live in this cult of selfishness. Like, because it's not working. They're miserable. They're sick and sad and unhappy. And like, why do they keep doing it? So it's like, I'm grateful to have been broken. from that path.

As we've been talking, I've been outlining the movie version of your life, which I don't know if you've done before, but I have a whole structure here. And I guess what I'm missing a little bit is, well, we have a trajectory of success and emotional sadness going in opposite directions. And I'm wondering, like, can you give us a little bit of the sketch of like, what was it like to sort of be at the height of your music? you know, selling arenas and like having massive audiences for your music and that not feeling good. And what was that realization like? Well, I mean, to be fair, it felt real. It's kind of like

alcohol and drugs. Like it felt really good for a minute. Yeah, fair. And to put it in perspective, when I was making music in the 80s, I just simply, I never expected to have a record deal. I never expect. I never thought anyone would listen to the music that I made. And then in 1990, I put out my first single and it sold, I think, 1,200 copies. And I couldn't believe it. I was like, I'm the biggest rock star in the world because 1,200 people who I probably don't know have bought this single. I was like, wow, this is amazing. And that to me was like the pinnacle of success. And then fast forward to like albums selling in the millions, you know, and playing concerts to tens of thousands of people, then to hundreds of thousands of people, to going on tour with David Bowie

and working on music with him and like meeting my heroes. And it was all phenomenal because none of it was great. It was great because it wasn't great. Like it's so it and and this is something I'm like almost crippled with gratitude for is probably similar experiences that you guys have had. It's like we've been to those parties. We've been to the mountaintop and it's not great. You know, like I've had those moments where like you're at a party and you're talking with Bill Clinton and a whole bunch of other, you know, Jeff Bezos is there and Elon Musk is there and there are these conversations. I'm like, you people just aren't that interesting. Like, like it's so, You can't glorify it.

And it's so easy to just sort of let it go. Because you guys, us, we've all experienced it firsthand. It's never great. And as a result, we can go hiking or spend time with animals or with friends or listen to music or do things that are like so much more powerful and rewarding than desperately trying to go to a party with Elon Musk. Okay, now I've got big beef. Who else hates me? I mean, like, I don't even know what to say. Also, before we wrap up, I do want to say that I think it is worth mentioning.

You have a restaurant. Oh, I used to. I don't own it anymore. Right. But you had a restaurant where you also, you would donate your proceeds to charity, correct? Like, this is one of the ways that you... To be fair, it was a little restaurant, and it didn't really make a lot of money, so it barely broke even. but the idea, every aspect of the restaurant,

I considered it bricks and mortar activism. Traditional philanthropy, traditional activism takes a few different forms. And I think, like, if you really care about your cause, if you care about your activism, you have to be willing to look at the effectiveness of it. And a lot of traditional philanthropy, traditional activism is not that effective.

And so I started thinking, like, well, what is effective as a climate activist, as an animal activist? And a big part of animal activism is food. And I was like, well, then I'm going to open a restaurant. And it's going to be the physical representation of activism. It's not, you know, so it's entrepreneurial, even though I could never, in good conscience, take a penny from anything that I did entrepreneurial in the service of activists. Well, I literally think we may have kept you in business single-handedly.

We had some cookies, yeah. There were things. I mean, this was like the one place my children would drop everything if we could go to Little Pine anyway. Oh, and just as a fun aside, one time you were in Little Pine with your kids. Yes. And I was there with my aunt who was visiting from Connecticut. And she couldn't believe that she was in the same restaurant as you. She was so, like she was so obsessed. like she was like yeah she was beside herself like it was it was it was the pinnacle possibly of

her entire life but especially of her Los Angeles trip I'm glad that we could share that Moby you are a really really I hate to call you a refreshing person but I've met a lot of people in my years in the industry and you are absolutely one of my favorite people that I really really I look up to I really do admire you and I've so enjoyed our time we with you here today. And it's just really, really a delight to get to peek into the brain of this guy. Well, this has been wonderful. And maybe when the apocalypse abates, we can actually meet up and be social. Because what I've learned is I have pretty much contempt for most people, but there are a few people you included who actually appreciate and enjoy spending time with.

Yeah, I would say, you know, it's funny. I've, I've missed very much people like you who mostly don't like other people. Yeah. Because our time together is often spent, you know, back in the day, you know, kind of feeling good about being part of the no friends club, as it were. Yeah. Oh, I love it. It's a very exclusive club. It's a very exclusive club.

Thank you so much, Moby. I have a friend. If you think you're Moby's brother, write us. Me? Oh. I just, I feel like there's someone who, like, got all of Moby's jeans. None of the, whoever the dad was. And I just want to believe, like, he was a dime.

He's adopted to Switzerland or something. Like, he lives somewhere else, but he's Moby. They look identical, but the other Moby is an accountant. Or he works at a grocery store as the manager. I'm going to go ahead and say... He lives the most regular life. I'm going to go ahead and say something pretty bold. I think that's one of the most intelligent people that I know.

I mean, his... He has a lot of knowledge of things. You like someone with a lot of knowledge and references. You love it. Well, who doesn't. I mean. Library in there. So you're kind of like them.

Yeah, we are. We have very, we do. We have a very similar kind of, yeah, mechanics in there. Where did you first meet? We met at a, it was a celebrity thing to get people to vote when Trump first ran. It's not that long ago. No, right. I mean, Elizabeth Banks, she was organizing it and it was like a bunch of us.

And, you know, back then being vegan, was still kind of like, oh, so it was nice to meet, you know, a fellow vegan. And then anyway, very, very, very intelligent person. I mean, you know, just like drops Kierkegaard, like it's, you know, a lot of philosophy in there. I mean, also, what a story. And to be able to have that perspective on suffering, you know, and those kinds of challenges. And yeah, I really, there's something very enlightened about him, meaning he seems to have come to a place. I'm not saying that he has to be your sense of enlightenment.

But there is something about him that really he has come to a place of real acceptance about a lot of things. And he's very unapologetic. You know, for me, like I always have been like, I'm sorry, I don't like to do things. I don't really like to go to part. Oh, I feel so bad. I don't go to the party. He's just like, I don't do parties in people. Oh, okay.

He's in acceptance of himself. He is. Let's play a little game. Okay. It's called, what minute point is that in the screenplay of Moby's life? I don't like that game. I mean, his book, he's written beautiful memoirs. I mean, the details of his life are really, really, are you literally making me play this game?

Yeah, we're going to see how aligned we are in screenplay structure. Jonathan, you have an MFA. You studied film. I don't know anything about this. You are literally a screenwriter. We worked on it together. You have an intuitive sense of storytelling. In what minute mark of the screenplay in Moby's life, or guess page mark, does he drop out of college with panic attacks and live on his mom's couch?

Here's a clue. It's in the first act. Yeah, I was going to say, is that the act one break? So this is very good. It's either act one break or it's the inciting incident at the 12 minute mark. Oh, okay, fine. Oh, my. Very good.

Next plot point, he gets the job. playing records at the bar and falls in love with electronic music, what minute mark? 45. So if we're at 12 minute mark, then it would be the first act break would be he gets,

he thinks that his life is really low because he's dropped out of school, he's having these panic attacks, but then he finds his passion. And he has... I didn't even really know what electronic music is. You've heard his music, though.

It's like that. Yeah, it's like that. All that mixed up. All that mixed up. Yes, that's how he describes it. Now, this is a little bit rough because we don't 100% know. We didn't flesh out the full second act and third act of this movie, which I was trying to get to. Yeah.

Which it's great because he has two divergent plots. One is the success which goes up and the emotions go down. Very good. Which leads to a second act break where he has ultimately. bit success. Yeah. But crashes. Exactly.

See, you know what's up. So where does Christian superiority come in? That could be the 45-minute mark. You know what? I'm done with this game. We just got to talk to Moby about really, really deep things. We made him laugh. I love his teeth.

He's got great teeth. He's got great smile. All right. I'll go with that. I'm really into this screenplay. I'm going to work on it when we get off this episode. Is there anything else we need to tell people? Please follow us on Instagram.

Check out Moby's music if you don't know about it. And that's it. That's it. From our breakdown to the one we hope you never have, we will see you next time. It's my and Bialyx breakdown. She's going to break it down for you. She's got a neuroscience PhD or two. One, fiction.

And now she's going to break down. It's a breakdown.