The Bill Simmons Podcast - Kobe’s Legacy in L.A. w/ J.A. Adande. Plus, the Future of Music w/ Zane Lowe, Nathan Hubbard, and Joe House | The Bill Simmons Podcast

Episode Date: January 29, 2020

HBO and The Ringer's Bill Simmons is joined by J.A. Adande to discuss what Kobe Bryant meant to Los Angeles, sports fans, and a whole generation of basketball players. They also discuss some of their favorite Kobe moments, news coverage of the tragedy, and more (2:05). Then Bill is joined by Zane Lowe, Nathan Hubbard, and Joe House to discuss the future of music, the return of vinyl, today's most popular artists, album structure, and more (58:05). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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That is M-E-R-C-A-R-I, Mercari. The selling app, Super Bowl coming this week. Don't forget to listen to the Ringer NFL show, Against All Odds with Cousin Sal, where I will be making an appearance this week, as well as the Ryan Rosillo podcast, which he'll be in Miami for the last two episodes of that. Check all of it out. Check out TheRinger.com as well, where we'll be covering football and sports and pop culture and a whole lot more.

Coming up, my old ESPN colleague Jay Adande and I are going to talk about Kobe Bryant. He did the Book of Basketball podcast with me. We did two Shaquille O'Neal podcasts about a couple months ago and did not expect that we would be reuniting for this. Unfortunately, we are. So we're doing that. And then after that, talking about music and the future of it with Zane Lowe, Nathan Hubbard, and Joe House. That's all coming up first. Our friends from Pearl Jam. All right, my old friend Adande is on the line. We were together a couple months ago.

We did a couple podcasts for the Book of Basketball 2.0 podcast about Shaquille O'Neal and ended up talking a lot about Shaq and Kobe and never imagined that the next time we would talk, we would be here talking about Kobe in the way we're about to be talking about him. A couple of days have passed. I don't think I've ever seen a sports death like this, the way it's affected a city. We obviously we were young when Roberto Clemente died and how that affected Pittsburgh.

And there's been other really sad examples. But this is unlike anything I've ever seen. And you grew up here, you wrote about the Lakers and covered them a whole bunch of stuff. Just watching from afar here in Illinois right now, the impact that this has had on the city, how would you describe it? It speaks to the community that Kobe built. And that was one of his greatest attributes.

He forged this community. In some ways, it was a subset of Laker fans, because there were some old schoolers who maybe weren't as crazy about Kobe, but those who came up in the Kobe era, people for whom Kobe was the Lakers, and they grew up with Kobe, that passion that went across so many lines, you know, so popular with Latino fans, Asian fans, black, white.

And it just dawned on me today, I don't know if there's another figure who is as beloved in both Orange County and Los Angeles as Kobe Bryant. Those are two, you know, they're next to each other geographically, but two distinctly different zones. And yet, Kobe, partly by virtue of living in Newport Beach, was loved down there just as much as he was in downtown LA. Right. We saw it last summer when the Clippers, they signed their guys and everybody was wondering, what's going to happen?

It's a two basketball team town. Could the Clippers take LA? I was pretty adamant all summer, like get out of here. You're talking seven decades of Laker fans at this point going back to 1959. And they've been able to watch, I don't know, 10 of the best 20 guys ever

in a Laker uniform at some point. I forget the exact number. I think Kobe, who had always wanted to be the best Laker of all time and never a hundred percent got his due from everybody for it. And I still don't know what the answer is, right? Because I think Kareem was the most talented Laker of all time. I think Magic's 12 year arc is better than anything Kobe did. I think Magic's 12-year arc is better than anything Kobe did. I think Kobe had the longevity. And then Jerry West, obviously, he's gone way back and the unbelievable career he had.

And there was never a right answer for it. And I think where we're landing now is that Kobe was the most memorable Laker of all time. He was around long enough and touched all these different parts of the league and the franchise and played with all these different people. And I think when people remember Lakers, as crazy as this sounds, they're now going to remember him first. Do you agree with that? There's the recency.

There's the fact, you know, look, I grew up with Magic Johnson. He's the reason I'm into sports, right? Not just that I got into Lakers. I don't think I would have cared about sports without Magic Johnson. To me, he's the Lakers. Chick Hearn, for generations, the voice of the Lakers. Jerry Buss, the greatest owner of sports. The common thread behind

the 10 championships, the last 10 championships that have been won for the Lakers. Jerry and Magic built the Lakers into something. Showtime made them bigger. But the thing is, Jerry and Magic built the Lakers into something. Showtime made them bigger. But the thing is, Kobe had that platform. Yeah. And he took it to new heights.

And more people watched, right? You know, he came along at a time. There were more people. There were more ways to watch the Lakers. Remember, the first five years of Magic's career, you really couldn't watch the home games. They used to have something called on TV. It was like this thing you attach to your television and you turn it on and you tune it to a certain channel. And they had a few select home games, but it wasn't until around 1985 when Prime Ticket, when now every single

Laker home game, in addition to the road games, was on television. Think about that. But like the first half of Magic's career, most fans weren't watching half of his games. So he just couldn't have as much impact as Kobe, who comes along, you know, on a full-fledged cable and on into the streaming era. You know, so just the platform that Kobe had made him more accessible and I think made him have a greater impact.

So regardless of who was better, the fact that Kobe might have meant more and might have touched more people, that's undeniable. And that's where I landed too. You made the key point. There just weren't as many basketball fans in the 80s. And there was way less ways to watch Magic Johnson.

I'll tell you that much. I was living on the East Coast. I saw him when he was on CBS for the national games. And you saw him during some playoff games, but really until 84, they weren't even, all the playoff games weren't even really available. And then you think about the league's gotten bigger. The league's gotten way bigger globally.

I mean, way, way bigger. That's the understatement of the year. It's 100,000 times bigger. And then the social media reach and Twitter and Instagram and the ways we can connect the players now. And it was just, and again, magic helped it get there, right? True.

He was on the dream team, the first international, but Kobe capitalized. Kobe was so huge in China, for example. I remember the all-star weekend, 2011, we're sitting there in the press room, which was adjacent to the press conference room. And all of a sudden they bring Kobe, and they bring a bunch of Chinese media members in. And it's like off limits to the American press. It's like a Chinese press conference only.

It was Sprite, and they were debuting this new commercial. They played the commercial, Kobe and some pop stars huge in China. And then only questions from the Chinese media. And I was thinking, God, they must be paying him a lot of money for him to be doing this extra. But I mean, it God, they must be paying him a lot of money for him to be doing this extra. But I mean, it spoke to the global popularity of Kobe. And you think, I would have been really interested to know what his reaction would have been to the last two days.

And that's part of the irony of death, right? When you've all these people paying tribute to you. You don't see how loved you are. Yeah, you don't. And the message that kept getting banged home over and over again was the Mamba mentality and just what a ruthless competitor he was and how hard he worked. And this was the stuff that he was trying to tell us for 10 years. And he would do it.

Sometimes it would be a little awkward. Sometimes it seemed contrived. But he really believed it. And I think one of the things that has surprised me in the last 48 hours, and I guess I shouldn't have been surprised because I've talked to enough athletes over the last 10 years to make me realize that I had kind of mis-evaluated some of the stuff about Kobe. But the amount of athletes, even at the Super Bowl, which Kevin Clark wrote about for the Ringer this week, that seemed like they were infected and affected and inspired by Kobe.

I wasn't prepared for that. Did you have any idea that that was the case? Yes, just because I'd seen what they went through with his retirement. And it really took Paul George initially for it to come into perspective for me. So the night Kobe announced his retirement, you know, early on in the 2015-16 season, they had me playing the Pacers that night. And I go up to Paul George afterwards in the locker room.

I asked him what Kobe meant to him. And he said, Kobe was my Jordan. You know, for guys growing up when Paul George in that era grew up, they didn't have access to Michael. You know, he wasn't a daily presence in their lives the way Kobe was. When they turned on to watch NBA basketball, they saw Kobe. And it's hard for us, you know, Generation X guys to consider somebody being more omnipresent or more tangible than

Michael Jordan, right? He was everywhere when we were growing up. And Magic and Bird for us as well. But for these guys, they saw Kobe Bryant, and that was who they wanted to emulate. And so I think it's very easy for somebody 30 and younger to understand and relate. One of my former students wrote to me and said, he played football, he played football in college. He said, I wasn't a basketball player,

but I still took a lot from Kobe. A lot of my attitude and my approach to the sport I took from Kobe. So absolutely. It makes sense that, you know, the Kansas city chiefs and the San Francisco 49ers would be affected by this. Um, you know, and again, it also speaks to, as we talked about the place of basketball, you know, I don't think a football player in the 1980s and certainly not in the 70s would have been, you know, learning anything and watching NBA basketball. But thanks to David Stern and Magic and Michael and Bird, you know, basketball had a once in 2012, where he was just like, guess what? I'm going to be a ruthless motherfucker. And if you're either with me or against me, which I don't know where you knew, you knew him way better than I did. I'm not exactly sure where he modeled that from. I'm sure at least a piece of it. Michael Jordan, like everything. Yeah. run you over, you're going to survive. Kobe seemed like he had some massive, you know, kind of platform that he was developing. Cause remember when, and I wrote about this when he did it, but when he did the Facebook

post, remember in 2012, and it was like his version of the Jerry Maguire mission statement. And it started out leadership is responsibility. Next paragraph, there comes a point when one must make a decision. Are you willing to do what it takes to push the right buttons to elevate those around you? And it keeps going, keeps going. And then he goes, part of leadership is pushing them to find their inner beast, even if they end up resenting you for it at the time. And then he says, I'd rather be perceived as a winner than a good teammate. Blah, blah, blah.

Great things come from hard work and perseverance. This is my way. It might not be right for you, but all I can do is share my thoughts. It's on you to figure out which leadership suits you best. We'll check back with you soon. Blah, blah, blah. But it really seemed like he,

this was somebody that we thought was one of the worst teammates of the 2000s. And he was able to rehabilitate that a lot in 08 and 09 and 2010. And then he reached some sort of higher being of the way he thought about it. And yet everybody was still afraid of him. I just, I can't wrap my head around it.

Well, I never talked to him specifically about the origins of leadership. And again, I know a lot of it came from Michael and his style of play. And the one time that I talked with him, when he kind of willingly made the Michael comparisons, he usually, believe it or not, tried to avoid them and really didn't want to discuss it. But there was one time when he said, you know, Michael and I, we did it differently. And, you know, we were two person. We take on all five guys by ourselves. And a lot of people don't like that and they don't want to see that, but that's just how the way we are. That's our style. So part of his approach to the game and, you know, it's directly linked to Michael in terms of the leadership, again, Michael style, but also I'm sure I know he read

a lot. He actually recommended a book to me one time. It's funny. It's out of the blue. We're up in Salt Lake City. I'm trying to find out if he's going to play in the all-star game because he's been missing games with his ankle. He had an ankle injury. And then he just says, Hey, you should read this book. It was called good to great about business and leadership, but more about business strategy. And he said, I took a lot from it. And then he says, if you tell LeBron and those guys about it, you know, I'll kill you.

Don't tell them. And that just spoke to his competitiveness. Like he really thought that if LeBron read this book, he might gain some type of secret or get an edge on Kobe. So he did not want me to reveal this book to them. So I ordered it off Amazon and I read it and there were some things I thought, okay, I could see Coby taking to this.

And then there were some aspects of it that just seemed the complete opposite of Coby's leadership style and business approach. And I'm thinking like, did he read the same book? Like what, what, but we didn't take, he definitely didn't take this chapter. But that was a little insight that I got into his approach and his methodology. It was just so random. We're standing in a hallway at the Delta center or whatever it's called now. And he just gives me this book recommendation. He wants me to read. You know, I really started to evolve my opinion of him as a basketball player. I would say in 2011,

just having spent, I spent, I wrote a piece about spending a couple hours with Phil Jackson and talked to him a lot about Kobe. And it became clear he didn't want to coach Kobe at the end of his career when Kobe wasn't a superstar anymore. And he basically said that in nine different ways. And I was like, oh man, this, the, the end for Kobe,

these last few years of his playing career are going to be rough. And then I remember I started doing countdown magic and the way magic talked about Kobe and the amount of respect he had for him just as a basketball player, like just, he's one of the greats. That's it. Like, like magic wouldn't even discuss it. And I was a basketball player, like just, he's one of the greats. That's it. Like, like magic wouldn't even discuss it. And I was like, man, I'm, I'm probably, I'm probably taking the L on this one. And then when I did a podcast with Bird and I asked Bird, who's your favorite

player to watch right now? My hero, Larry Bird. And he's like, Kobe Bryant. And I'm like, all right, all right. I'm just missing something here. But then you talk to Durant and all these dudes and it's like the old saying, the other players always know. And the respect that he had as a competitor and just an overachiever and somebody that was just going to work tirelessly. It did feel like that spilled over to the rest of the guys.

And you could see it at the 08 Olympic team, the 2012 Olympic team. And now I feel like LeBron is the torchbearer, at least for that, for just hard work, perseverance, and incredible competitiveness. And I think it spills from him. Does that make sense? Yeah. And I think we talked about that, right? That you think you're among those who believe that LeBron picked up that work ethic from Kobe during the 2008 Olympics.

Yeah. Well, I do think he probably picked up a couple tricks, but it definitely affected all of those guys really positively. Yeah. So spending two Olympic cycles with them, and the flip side of that is that it helped socialize Kobe. Yeah. He was still a little bit socially awkward. You know, he really, more so than a lot of the other guys that went from high school straight to the NBA, he just missed that socialization process. And I think it was doubled down because he had spent so much time in Italy growing up, you know, maybe was kind of isolated or at least separated from American culture.

Right. So he didn't grow up in the same culture as these guys. You know, he can't say he's from the same place that LeBron and Kevin Durant and those guys came from. Right. So he was, he was isolated and distant from them that way. You know, and then never went to college, never, never kind of had that that thing where you're all in the same boat, you're all in a dorm, you know, no matter where you came from, now you guys are living, you're living in a, you know, eight by 10 square foot room. Right. And, um, so I think it wasn't until those Olympic experiences that he got more socialized in the NBA and was able to speak to these other guys as a peer and as a comrade. Yeah. And, and you know, like all-star weekend,

he was standing out. So it's funny. I, I, it's just connected to me now that the two seven, 2007 all-star game was before 2008, um, Olympic experience.

And so he was still a little bit of an outcast. And one thing I remember from that weekend, so remember his Vegas and like the game is Sunday night after 48 hours in Vegas. And everybody was just dragging it was dreadful if you think all-star games have gotten bad now yeah that had to be one of the worst all-star games of all time think about playing an all-star weekend after two days in Vegas and Kobe is going all out he's defending guys picking them up at half court dribbling

playing and you can see all the guys on their faces and then even in after the game and the interviews are kind of like okay Kobe you know if it matters so much to you, okay, have at it. Like this really doesn't matter to me that much. It's just an all-star game. And Cove was like, no, it's not just an all-star game. It's a basketball game. If I'm on the court, I'm playing basketball the way it's supposed to be played all out. I don't know any other way to do it. And that became a big part of the legacy of how people discussed him the past two days. Somebody that went all out at all times and put as much possible into the craft.

And, you know, look, we can go back to the first half of his career. And we talked about on one of the Book of Basketball pods, the 0-4 finals. He's not great and he's shooting too much and he's off the reservation in a lot of different ways. But then you think about the 09 and 2010 titles, which I think are really impressive in retrospect that they were in three finals in a row, all the minutes that he played, especially when you had the 2008 Olympics. And the fact that, you know, his second best teammate was Gasol, who is probably a hall of famer, but it's,

it's certainly maybe once in his career was one of the 10 best guys in the league. And then Odom, who was so up and down over the course of his career and our test, who was just a complete wild card. And you think about, I had watched game seven, 2010 recently. Gasol's the toughest guy in that game, which seemed inconceivable two years ago when he was getting his ass kicked against Celtics. And- Ron Artest is the hero.

Artest is the hero. He takes the biggest shot of the game. And then think about, there's this moment near the end when I think they're up two and there's probably 12 seconds left and they have to inbound the ball and have somebody shoot free throws and the Celtics double team Kobe. And it goes to Sasha and Sasha goes to the line and he makes these two free throws basically

to win the title. But Kobe had spent so much time mentoring that dude and, and, and being like, uh, you know, his, his Mickey and Rocky, that Sasha goes and just nails the two free throws. And then he makes like the Kobe underbite face. And it was like Kobe had created this alternate human being. And Sasha was the same guy who in the 08 finals, you know, was really fell apart in game four and got torched and all that stuff.

But was that the comeback game? Yeah, the comeback game. Yeah. The comeback game. It's just kind of, I don't think he gets enough credit, um, including for myself for winning a title in those two years with the team he had. Cause I don't feel like it was that great of a team.

And, you know, we mock him for, was it seven for 29? I know, you know, six for 24 performance in game seven, six for 24.

Okay. Yeah. I knew you would know the numbers, but, um, you know, and I know you held that against six for 24 performance in game six for 24. Okay. Yeah. I knew you would know the numbers, but, um, you know, and I know you held that against him for a long time, but one thing I will say is that, um, you know, look at the rebounds and assists and, um, you know, he figured he realized he's like, Oh my God, I don't have it. And I remember one of Michael Jordan's sons was tweeting, like, look at this. Don't ever compare this guy to my dad again. You know, my dad would never do this.

And it just became, oh my God, Kobe, just the moment is too big for him. And he said, okay, I'm going to start rebounding. I'm going to pass. I'm going to set other guys up. And he started making some shots in the fourth quarter. But he found a way to win. And that was kind of the old Magic Johnson way. Yeah, he made plays. It's actually a better performance than I remembered when I watched it

because the six for 24, that was what it was, but he is getting rebounds. He draws the biggest foul of the game in the final minute. And it's a really physical, it turned into just like a man's man kind of game. Everything's in the paint. And it's a little reminiscent of the Pacers-Bulls game 798, which just became like a street fight. And I think that game was similar to that. And he rose his energy and made it happen. But it is crazy, though.

You think about, and everybody's been talking about his career. And it's so funny. It's not really different than the whole process we go through when somebody retires. Even Sunday night, you could see ESPN was rerunning a lot of the Kobe retirement stuff because when somebody retires, it almost does feel like a death in a terrible way. But so many of his great moments,

you think about like, it's the 81 point game. It's shooting the, making the two free throws after he tore his Achilles. Um, right. It's the 60 point game in his last game of his career. Um, a lot of them at the end,

you know, they just replay that on ESPN. And at the end of that, he is, he's, uh, he's exhausted. Yeah.

Um, yeah, it's, it's one of those careers that if you made the top 10 Kobe moments, a lot of them aren't actually like, oh yeah, game five of blank finals.

His best playoff games were there was a game one against San Antonio. Two games against the Kings. Oh, those two? Yeah. Yeah, on the road. Shaq goes for 40-20 back-to-back against the Kings. I think I talked about this on the Shaq podcast. Yeah, we did.

And then, yeah, Kobe games three and four just goes nuts. I got to find out the list. So after the 62-point, maybe it's the 81-point game, after one of those games that season, I kind of did. I said, you know what? Neither one of those are my favorite Kobe moments or the biggest Kobe moments. And I went through with him. I got him to comment on each of the moments. I know one of them was the overtime game four against the Pac, but he led them in points, rebounds, assists, block shots. He led them in every major statistical category in that game.

That was another one. Yeah, those Spurs ones, I just watched it again. Kevin Harlan's on the call. It's great. Game two in 2001 where he hits this dagger three. They're up four with a minute and 15 seconds left. It kind of showed

the epitome of how and why Kobe and Shaq were so successful together, right? Yeah. So he's at the top, throws it to the wing, classic triangle offense. They throw the entry pass into Shaq in the low post. And both wing defenders, Kobe's guy and the other guy, come down and collapse on Shaq. So Shaq has three guys around him. Passes back out, top of the key, or, you know, right beyond the three-point line. And Kobe's out there,

and the defender doesn't switch back. So Kobe has time to, like, stutter step, pause, draw himself, and he fires a three and just, boom, dagger. And that was the end of the Spurs that season. They had a better record than the Lakers in the regular season. And the Lakers go on and beat them by 68 points

in the next two games. And it was just a great, great moment. You know, just a dagger shot. Yeah, I would say in the finals, his best moment was that game for Pacers when Shaq fouls out. And that becomes like, then we knew he had it. I think there's one more moment that wasn't in like a finals moment that has to be mentioned in the top five for him was the 08 gold medal game where everybody kind of gets the deer in the headlights in Spain and the Gasols are just crushing everybody. And at some point Kobe's like, I got this guys and takes over during this crucial three to four minute stretch. And from that moment on

all the way through, I would say, uh, until LeBron finally was able to take it in 2012 and become the guy and win a title. It's Kobe's league from that point on, I think. Yeah. I think it's fair to say. Yeah. never, other than the 2006 season where he was just so individually incredible, there was never like that ass-kicking run that I think a lot of the great guys have. I think that's why

people have had trouble placing him historically. He played so many great years when Shaq was the better player. And through no fault of his own, it's not like Kobe wasn't great. He very well might have been 1A, but Shaq was the guy. And Shaq was the focal point of those teams.

But so many great performances came, not even in Shaq's saddle, but alongside Shaq. And some of the ones that we've mentioned. That one where he took over in Game 4 against the Pacers, Shaq fouled out. And then it's up to Kobe in overtime to save the Pacers, Shaq fouled out. And then it's up to Kobe in overtime to save the day. And guess what? He comes through. Let's take a break.

And then I have a couple more things to hit. Hey, if you're one of the 26% of US adults that's online almost constantly, you may want to ask yourself what you are sending and receiving online every day. Even if you only use password protected Wi-Fi, cyber criminals may be able to hack your connection and steal your personal information. That's why you need Norton Secure VPN. It's seamless. Install it once, log in once, let it run in the background, use it with your PC, Mac, or mobile device, whether you're sending or receiving information over Wi-Fi. It uses bank rate encryption to hide what you are doing while connected. Blocks companies from tracking your online activity

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felt like we had to turn the mics on and talk about him. I think I'd kind of forgotten the Achilles, not just for what a kind of moment it was, but also how it probably changed the course of NBA history a little bit because if he doesn't have that injury, I don't think physically he was ever the same after that. The stats back it up, the eye test backs it up, all that stuff. Before that happened, we were talking about 40,000 points for him. And we were talking about, could this person play for 25 years and all that stuff.

And unfortunately he kind of had the, he kept the car in the red, I think a little too long that season. That was when he was playing the 48 minutes and doing all that stuff. And I think his body just finally gave out. But I think if he had managed that a little differently, do you think he would have retired if his body was still going? Because I don't think so. If he could have caught Kareem. You know what else, Bill?

The fact that he missed, he went through two lockouts. I don't know how many other players were around for both lockouts. Dirk Nowitzki, maybe. So he loses 32 games in the 98-99 season, which became just the 99 season. And then he loses,

it was a 66 game season, right? In 2011-12. Yeah. Compressed too. About 50 games. Yeah, that was the 66 game season. 66 game season that felt like 100 games with the schedule. Yeah.

And then another 50 games. So he's one of very few people that were around for both lockouts. And so there's about 50 games right there that he just didn't get to play. Um, injuries. He missed the first month of his rookie year. And then also the fact that he came off the bench his first two seasons. Right.

Right. And, and, and had to play off the bench his first two seasons. Right. Right. And, and, and had to play with Shaq. So by, by the end, by his last year or two, I think starting in 2002, he, he was scoring more points per game than Shaq. So Shaq wasn't a hindrance at that point, but you know, the, the hindrance just in terms of his personal scoring total of Shaq, early injuries, lockout in 98-99. So how many points were lost in that phase? And then the 2011-12 lockout, and then the Achilles injury. So you're not only a Laker watcher and probably the highest level of Laker followers just for knowing the team and knowing the surroundings, the whole thing, but you're also, you're at Northwestern, you're running the sports journalism program there, and you're watching and reading this two days of Kobe coverage. And we kind of know all the beats that are going to happen, right? And we know there's going to be the little backlash stuff and that Colorado is going to become a factor in some of

these pieces and how people talked about it and whether they're dancing around it, how much they feel like they have to mention it. Just from a journalism standpoint, what has it been like watching the last two days and how people are approaching this? It's less journalism and more social media is the problem, you know, and that's, that's kind of been reinforced and, um, people getting in trouble for getting ahead of themselves on social media. Right. Yeah. And so many people were quick to tweet, let's not forget, as we're remembering Kobe Bryant, that he had a sexual assault allegation in 2003 and that he paid a settlement to make the civil suit go away and all that. Well, how about we read the coverage first to see whether or not the coverage has been deficient? I'm sure we're going to get to it. You know, there's going to be a lot of coverage of Kobe Bryant.

Inevitably, it's going to come up. It's not going to be a lot of coverage of Kobe Bryant. Inevitably, it's going to come up. It's not going to be forgotten. But I feel like if you read, if you take the time to read the full coverage, not remember what story it was. It just, it mentioned it in the context of the Kobe and Shaq feud. It was really weird. It says, you know, and then he started feuding with Shaq, this and that. And then to make matters worse, there was a sexual assault allegation in 2003 or four and onto, you know, and then Shaq was traded and like, Whoa, okay. You can't just, you can't kind of yada, yada, yada that one, right? It's complicated. When we were on Around the Horn yesterday, we said, okay, we want to mention it, but it's very difficult because if you mention it, you can't just say it in passing really, right? And you can't just say, well,

the Colorado thing. You need to talk about it more. But if you talk about it a little, you kind of have to talk about it a lot. Right. So it's, um, and again, I, I, I'm, I, I like the way we wound up addressing it. Just Ramona mentioned it to Ramona mentioned all the bad things. And she did it in the context of when she set up her last interview with Kobe, uh, Ramona Shelburne said, Kobe, if we do this, I'm going to have to ask you about the sexual do this, I'm going to have to ask you about the sexual assault charge. I'm going to have to ask you about the feud with Shaq. I'm going to have to ask you about, you know, all the accusations that you're a selfish teammate and you didn't get along with people. All that's going to have to be part of the story. And the way she mentioned that, guess what?

It like it entered it into the record of our conversation. So yes, you know, for the record, we need to say all of these things. We can't act like Kobe was this saint who was right and did right 100 percent of the time. But to me, it's just about. Are we going to let one year and one incident outweigh the entirety of his career and his life? You know, there has to be a balance. Have your students mentioned it to you and talked to you about it? Yeah, we talked about it in class today, actually in class yesterday,

and then we wound up dedicating the entire 80 minutes with my undergraduates today. A lot of interesting thoughts. I think they were in agreement that it shouldn't have been the priority. They also thought it was a little ridiculous for The Washington Post to suspend the one reporter who just tweeted a headline or tweeted a link to an article about Colorado. But also, that's the case where they were both wrong. And I read one story that criticized The New York Times.

They look at their coverage here. There's no mention of it. Well, if you looked at that, that was kind of a an updating blog. Right. And, you know, Kobe Bryant killed in the crash. And, you know, next update, nine others aboard. And next update, it was foggy that day. And, you know, the LAPD grounded there. So that was just a series of updates. You know, so if you're updating the story, a developing breaking news story, it's not an update to say in 2003, he was accused of sexual... And then later on, on that page I was looking at, they did have a sort of an obituary or a bigger story about Kobe's life. And in that, yes,

it did mention 2003 and the sexual assault charges. So I feel like the coverage has been responsible. I question a little bit the need to jump out and to wave your hand and say, hey, make sure you talk about this. How about you allow people to talk about it? And especially at the appropriate time. Right. The news story of the helicopter crash isn't the time to talk about it. And if you're talking about Kobe, the father and what we've seen of Kobe the last four years, I don't think you need to go out of your way to talk about it. There is an appropriate time to

talk about it. It is something that needs to be talked about if we're discussing the totality of his life. But at the appropriate time and place. What about TMZ reporting that he was dead before the families were even notified? So it's interesting. That one's tough too. I laid that out. Yeah, it's a tough one. And kind of my take is that

it's the journalistic right thing to do. Your obligation is to your readers and to informing them accurately. You know, the problem would have been if they had misinformed, right? And if they said, oh, Kobe's daughter was aboard too, and she wasn't. Actually, I guess they didn't report that. They just initially reported that Kobe Bryant was killed in the helicopter crash. But that was accurate. And that's the most important thing was they, you know, most

importantly, you want to get it right. Ideally, as a competitive news person, you want to get it first. Well, guess what? They had both and they were right. And it was within their rights to do so. If you have accurate information about a story of this magnitude, it is certainly within your right. Now, you would like to think it would be nice if you could allow the family to learn from the authorities. I'm not sure if that makes it any better. Is there a better way to learn that story? No. When you think about it, you know, we think about the fact that, like, oh, they shouldn't have to find out that way.

What is the good way? What is the right way to find out? Yes, I guess there's proper channels for that. And I can't imagine how shocking it would be to see something like that come across your screen. But is there a right way to find out? Is there a way? Would it make it any better if they got a phone call from the sheriff's department or the police department? Does that make it any better? Ultimately, does that change how it is? Would that have alleviated the grief at all? So I'm a little surprised though, that all my students said that they were okay with TMZ

breaking the story before the family had been notified. This was class of about 40 students and they all said, yep. And I tell them, I warn them, hey, if you're being a good journalist, sometimes it means being a bad person or an impolite person at the very least. Yeah. You do have to do things like ask grieving widows, you know, to talk about their husband or, you know, a mother who just lost her son. That's not easy to do. You might have to call somebody at three o'clock in the morning, wake them up and just say, hey, I need comment on you losing your loved one. That's not nice, but it's what the job requires.

And in this case, the job required to inform people of a subject of tremendous interest as we've seen. And they did it right. Might not have been the nicest thing, but they weren't out of bounds for doing it that way. It does feel a little generic. All my students agreed. I was surprised. I'm not as surprised because I do think it's a generational thing. It's like, this just happened. I want to know right away. And it kind of ties into where we are as a society now, right? Where things are on your phone immediately, no matter what it is.

There's no wait. We grew up when they were tape delaying the finals. It was 40 years ago. I was thinking, not only that, you know what's crazy? Imagine this. So, you know, when JFK was assassinated, there were no images of it. Even though the Zapruder I was thinking, not only that, you know, it's crazy. Imagine this. So, you know, when JFK was assassinated, there were no images of it, even though there was a Pruder film was shot. No one saw it publicly until Life magazine released still photos the next week. Right.

And then the video wasn't seen until the moving images weren't seen until like the mid 1970s. Can you imagine a decade after the president was assassinated and you don't see the footage? There's footage that exists and you don't see it until the following decade. That's just impossible. People want it 10 seconds from now. You know, and there was a video of the crash and it got shared with me and I wish I could unsee it. Did you see it? No, I wouldn't click on that.

Somebody sent it to me and my problem was I was a little naive I thought it would just be like after the crash and maybe you see smoke and fire which would have been bad enough and it's actually footage of the crash and I wasn't prepared for that it's awful and I hope I never

see it again did you think they made the right move canceling the game Tuesday night? I think there's no right or wrong. To me, the biggest argument in favor of canceling it was that there's no easier game to reschedule. You've got two teams in LA, and the good thing about this, the fact that it was a Laker-Clipper game, is that I'm sure there are 20 days between now and the good thing about this, the fact that it was a Laker Clipper game is that I'm sure there are 20 days between now and the end of the season where they'll both be in

town and, and, and both be available. So to me, that that's what made the most sense. I don't think they should have canceled games across the league. People don't understand how difficult it is to reschedule the game, statistical challenges and the length the NBA will go to, to get a game in, you know, despite weather or any other circumstances, it's so difficult to reschedule a game that it really wasn't feasible to do so, to cancel games en masse over the weekend or today.

And I could understand this game. Somebody pointed out the Lakers didn't even put out a statement for the first day or two. Teams all around the league, the NBA put out statements. The NBA, they didn't email out a formal statement. And I really think that the organization was just too shaken. I agree. To even sit down and send out a statement.

I think that's why you have to cancel the game. I think it was too profound of a tragedy for that team. And I don't even really have any parallel as a Boston fan. We've had pieces of it, right? Like David Ortiz had an unbelievable run and Larry Bird had an unbelievable run and Brady's had 20 years, but didn't belong to the region

like Kobe belongs to LA and how Kobe has stayed there after he retired. And he's just so omnipresent. I said on Sunday's pod, I always just kind of assumed he would be the one that got the Nicholson seats, right? When Nicholson either stops going or whatever, it just seemed like he was going to be the torch bearer for the next couple of generations of Laker games.

And I think he was conscious of not overshadowing these guys. And yeah, but when you get older, it doesn't. Yeah, I think you care less. Right. Maybe once all the daughters were grown up and out of the house and he doesn't have anything to do, maybe. Yeah, it would come up and gone to the Laker games. Yeah. The last piece I wanted to talk about was the father-daughter stuff, which I think was the most unexpected, I don't know what the right word is, outcome of the last two days. Development, right.

Yeah, just how that resonated with people. And I include myself. And, you know, I have one daughter that I've talked about a bunch of times on this podcast. And it's just a different kind of bond. And especially if they play sports and you go into their games. And, you know, I identified a lot watching him even before what happened the last weekend. I, I definitely identified with how into his daughter's basketball career he was and how he basically builds this Mamba Academy and how much time he spent with her. And there's that great

helicopter interview he gave, uh, that was resurfaced this week where he talked about why he flies helicopters or why he flied helicopters, where he was basically saying, you know, I'm busy. I don't have a ton of free time and I want to be with my kids as much as possible. And I looked at this and I assessed it and this allowed me to spend as much time with my family as I possibly could if I factored helicopters instead of cars. And, you know, I just seeing that stuff and reading that stuff for the last 48 hours, I get it.

I feel the same way. I always want to be at my kids' games. I always want to spend as much time with them as I possibly can. And I think that really resonated with people in a whole different way beyond the death. And I think it's going to be lasting too. It did.

And it makes it even sadder, the fact that he was on his way to his daughter's game, that there were other families, parents and children, teammates on board. It made watching the replay of the 60-point finale game just crushing at the end because they keep cutting the shots of, of his wife and two oldest daughters cheering and applauding their daddy and going crazy. And just thinking that Deanna has gone to really hurt.

And there was a moment when there was a clip of going around of her playing against him. It looks like at their home gym, right? And she kind of bodies him and then shoots a fall away over him. And I was thinking like, yes, that's such a Kobe move. We'll see Kobe continue through her. I had that thought for a moment and then realized, oh no, she's gone too. And so the fact that we don't even get to see the continuation of Kobe, to see Kobe live on, you know, he has other daughters, but she was the one that played basketball. She was the one that elevated him in that way. And we could have seen that as we could, you know, we play for Gina Auriemma. And she doesn't get to live out her dreams. And she just seems so dedicated.

That's the part that really gets to me. Kobe got to do everything he wanted, with the exception of seeing his daughters grow up. Right. But he lived a pretty, more than pretty, a extremely full life in 41 years. The denial of Gianna and the other kids on that helicopter to surface their dreams, the tragedy of him dying and those families dying in the process of being a good parent, right? To die for your desire to parent your children. That's specifically what led to that terrible helicopter crash. It is crushing. And even though I'm not a parent myself, I just see that. And it's one of the reasons this resonates so much. It's not just the loss of a basketball player, as significant as he was in that regard.

It's the loss of a parent with his daughter, and that's the most difficult part to accept. Did you feel the same way I did, that the parallels of finding out about magic in 1991 and just the complete shock and disbelief and thinking it wasn't true and waiting for somebody to tell you that, oh, actually, there's been a mistake. It's fine. Only that never happened. It's only happened a couple times relating to sports. It's happened more times I think outside of sports, but it's so rare to have that feeling in sports, especially with somebody so young, I think was the

real thing that pushed it. The weird thing is that this story won't evolve the way Magic did. It both felt shocking, but as it turns out, it wasn't the end for Magic. Here it is three decades later and he's still going strong with it. It was so shocking because we thought it was the end. You know, we thought we were going to lose Magic Johnson. And then it was also shocking

because it was an abrupt retirement, right? One thing with Kobe is that he had already retired. Magic was still playing. He just played in the NBA finals that year. Right. And so we had the abrupt retirement in addition to the shocking news, which we thought was going to be the end of Magic Johnson. And in this point, yes, I thought immediately back to to Magic. But then I realized, well, this one's different. We thought he was going to die. In this case, Kobe is gone. Right. And so that, that was the twist was that it was just as shocking as the Magic Johnson announcement, except that there's a finality to it, a real and actual tangible finality.

Yeah. But I think that that part's been lost with the Magic announcement, unless you're our age or around the same or older, where it just seemed like he was going to be gone in a year or less, because that's all we knew about that virus at that point is when you got it, you died. And, uh, and so I remember being just as bummed out and sad because it seemed like, well, he's not going to be here a year from now. Um, but yeah, it's same, same sort of just, oh my God, you're going to remember where you were

when you heard it, all that stuff. And it's been just an awful week. I think this is one of the worst sports weeks in my lifetime. And especially... And months. And the fact that the NBA lost David Stern too at the start of the year.

These two top five most important figures, certainly top 10. Top 10 or 12, I would say. Yeah. In the history of the league, and I feel for my friends that work in the league office, I've sent them some messages just to lose two of those such important figures. For a league that has been blessed with having so much of its history, the fact that Bill Russell's around, Kareem and Magic, so much of its history is still alive.

And now we don't have these two figures who weren't active, but yet their presence was still very much felt as a part of the league, right? And now we will no longer be able to consult them and to get their wisdom and their insight and their perspective. That's the loss for us as we go forward publicly. We don't have access to their insight anymore. You know, that's a great point.

I think the NBA is the one league where the guys retire, but they live on in a completely different way than any other sport. You know, you think about, I don't know, football, Joe Montana, John Elway, Barry Sanders, whoever, when they kind of show up, they're just like old retired guys, right? In basketball, and I think this is part of Stern's genius and one of the things that he should really get credit for, he really made a concerted effort to embrace the past, recognize the past, appreciate the past, and continually bring those guys out and make

the history of the league part of the present. And then it hits the point with Kobe's generation where those guys are still A-plus list celebrities after they retire because of their social media reach. LeBron's going to retire. He'll be just as famous as he was when he played. But I always appreciated how the NBA embraced that. And they looked at these guys as these people that carried the league to where it was.

They took care of them and use them, as you said, as a resource that you could kind of go to and, and talk about history. And, and I think that's one of the coolest things about the league. I know it's one of the reasons I appreciate it. So to lose that. And they, they found a way to keep them connected, right? So Magic, either television

or his stints with the Lakers. Yep. Bird as a coach and executive. Michael Jordan as an owner. So the fact that all these guys were in the fold. You have Shaq and Barkley on TV all the time,

on TNT. Yeah, the continued presence. And then the genius of having Bill Russell present the, the MVP award every year. And, and just remember that they just had ambassadors. Remember they would just have Bill Russell would just show up at a playoff game or Bill Walton or Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Like, and they'd introduced them on the court for a team that maybe they had no

history with whatsoever. I'd be like, Hey, ladies and gentlemen, here's the Kambi Mutombo. Welcome to Kambi Mutombo. And that was smart too. And, and then they would, they would travel around the world and Stern's global vision. You know,

that's been great. And to think that Kobe, who was, it felt like it was just enough, right? Like he wasn't overbearing, but show up at a couple of Laker games, give LeBron a hug,

you know, sit down and do an interview with Rachel Nichols or something. He was around, and then he certainly made himself available to whatever players wanted to connect with him and learn from him, including a couple of your Celtics, Jason Tatum. So true. Kyrie Irving, when he was a Celtic. So he was still prepping, And that's why it doesn't feel quite like he's gone yet. There's so much video of him. We've seen him on our television continuously the last couple of days. So in that regard, for those of us who, and I hadn't been

around him the last, I don't think I've seen him in person since his last game, actually, but it still felt very much like he's around. And so in a way, that hasn't changed yet. I'm still waiting for the loss to kick in because you think, oh, we're never going to see him. Well, who knows when I was going to see him in person again. And I'm seeing him on television continuously. So in that sense, I think the funeral will change it

when there's something, the funeral will change it. There's something, the finality of it, I don't know if it's going to be televised or if we'll see the casket, but I think something like that will make it seem real and we'll start to get the sense of the loss a little more. Well, it's definitely, we'll be thinking about it during this whole Lakers season. And I'm sure the fans

are not going to let it go and they shouldn't because I think the outpouring that we've seen is completely genuine. Having lived here since 2002, the dude was beloved. And I never totally understood it.

And I always kind of was able to assess it as an outsider, but I never questioned it because they just love the guy, you know, and through thick and thin, I remember going to the 06 that the year he averaged 35 a game and they played Phoenix and he had that steal when he like basically demolished Nash and got the ball and they had the breakaway. And I went to that game with my dad and it was really exciting. We were rooting for the Lakers.

I think it was the only time in my life I ever rooted for the Lakers because everyone was so into it. They were. People just were so into that Kobe comeback season. It was really hard not to get swept up in it. He just clicked with those fans. And he's probably the only player in the league

where it would have made sense for a team to just basically ruin their last two seasons in a row just by overpaying a guy who wasn't a superstar anymore because they felt like they owed him. They felt like they had to do it. I don't know if we'll see that again. And honestly, we probably won't see anyone play 20 years in the same city again

unless Steph Curry does it. I think he would be the last one. Yeah, I was thinking, like, who's even eligible, right, at this point? Who could even potentially be? And Steph Curry, that's it. You know, LeBron's moved around, KD, all these other greats, even Russell Westbrook now. You know, there's no one who is eligible

to be another Kobe Bryant except for Steph Stephen Curry. I think Giannis and Luka, if they stay and the arc of their careers resembles what we're hoping it could be, they have a chance. If Giannis played at Milwaukee for 20 years. You're right. I think it's too early for me, though, to even consider that they haven't even come into free agency yet. No, that's what I mean. It's ludicrous. If they stay and stay, then yeah, I mean. It's ludicrous.

If they hit free agency and stay, then yeah, then we can start to think about that. No, I mean, the recent history of the NBA would say that those guys aren't going to stay there. And that's just the league that we have now

is that nobody wants to stay in the same place for 20 years and the grass is always greener at the next place. Curry's probably our last chance. Jay, this was great. Thank you. Thank you for doing this say hi to all your students for me

and I'm really glad we were able to talk about this you're the only person I really wanted to go deep dive on this I wish I could say you're the only one I talked to I'm trying to do a bunch of podcasts and I wanted to make sure I did yours

A it's a great show and B the last time was so Shaq oriented and I know some Kobe people I know you're being so mean to Kobe it just so happened to be that was the worst finals of Kobe's career and we were talking about those finals but just like

again we shouldn't have the 2003-04 year and everything around it stand out as the only part of Kobe's career we need to look at 2003-04 year and everything around it stand out as the only part of Kobe's career. We need to look at it in totality. And so thank you for having me on so we could address so many other aspects of Kobe's life and career

and provide some balance. I appreciate it. Say hi to the students for us. Thanks, Bill. Take care. All right, we're going to bring Zane Lowe and Joe Haas and Nathan Hubbard in in a second. First, let's talk about Square.

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you sell stuff on Instagram or a website, whether you're in a restaurant or retail boutique, whatever, Square has tools for you. See all the ways Square can take your business from square one to whatever's next at square.com slash go slash BS. Loans subject to credit approval and issued by Celtic Bank member FDIC. Okay, coming up. We taped this about a week ago. We're going to run it Sunday night and then we had to postpone that obviously. So we're running it now. Zane Lowe, Joe House, Nathan Hubbard talking about music with me. Here we go. All right, we're doing a little music round, Nathan Hubbard talking about music with me. Here we go. All right, we're doing a little music roundtable here. It is Martin Luther King Day.

Not sure when this is running. Zane Lowe. Hi. From Apple Music. Yes. Nathan Hubbard, unpaid ringer intern, once upon a time, ran a little company called Ticketmaster. And Joe House, who was once the Friday afternoon DJ at Holy Cross. Not only that, I was head of production. I was a DJ for all four years, and I started on the 9 p.m. to 1 a.m. shift.

We all do, man. That's what you got to do. That's exactly right. It's back in the day. People paid their dues. If you don't, then you're not legit. And you're not serious. I was happy to do it.

Well, you might be serious, but you're not anywhere else. So here's the agenda for today. The first thing, I've wanted to do this for a while on the pod. I am so confused and stupefied by the resurgence of vinyl records and the fact that my son for Christmas wanted a vinyl player and wanted vinyl for Guns N' Roses and Metallica and all the rock music he plays with. And I had seen this happening for years and didn't fully understand it.

But then we went to Newberry Comics in Boston. They completely changed the store. The basement of the store was all vinyl. And they're selling for $35, $40, $45. And there's dozens of people down there combing through and looking for vinyl and bringing it in the cash register. And I'm like, what the fuck is going on? We were putting these in our attic 30 years ago.

Zane, you start. What is going on? Gosh. I mean, it's tactile, and it's collectible, and it's one of a kind. You know, I think we forget that every single bit of vinyl you hold in your hand has been made by hands like you think it's like mass distribution but it's not like someone has to put that glob on there and make that piece of

vinyl and make it happen so I think it's as deep as that and it's as surface as it's just cool and holding it's just cool and when you walk out and you have like four or five copies of something it's perfect size it goes under your arm you walk out. You kind of pick the one you want facing the street and the one on the inside toward the body. And there's a whole language to it. And I think kids are really into showing off, as we know. And so they like the idea of holding on to something that kind of reflects their personality and their taste to some degree. You don't think crack CDs did that for them? I don't think they did. No, I don't think they did. House, do you believe vinyl sounds better? Because that's something a lot of people

feel strongly about. I have no idea. I just know how my ears hear things. I don't know how other people hear things, but I was a DJ at a radio station with vinyl records. I put the needle on the record and played the record and played it loud because this was, you know, the late 80s, early 90s, good era to be a DJ playing, you know, indie music and punk rock music. And I know how those records sound to me and I still have them. I still have my 250 records collected from that era. Yeah, of course. Smart career move. I have a theory about this, which is everyone talks about how vinyl sounds great. And it does.

It sounds nostalgic. And we always long for things to feel and taste and sound a certain way from a certain time, right? But I think that vinyl now, if you're pressing vinyl now, if you're making music in somewhat of an organic environment if you are relying on

tape machines which people still do or soundboards which people still do and you're using that and you're making vinyl then yeah you're going to get a lot of the breath and a lot of the room out of it but I'm not sure, like I have a pristine copy of a little UziVert album on vinyl I'm not sure it's going to make much of a difference

that thing was made and compressed and done on a computer, which is going to squeeze it within an inch of its life. So I don't really know how much room there is for vinyl to kind of do its magic, but I definitely think White Stripes sound great on vinyl because they were made in that environment. There's a physical component to it that's missing. Like with Apple Music and Spotify,

you lose that joy of bringing home that album, opening up the artwork, reading through the liner notes, seeing that artist, the bass player who you didn't know was on this album who played on these other albums. And so there's something physical about that that's cool. There's the audiophile piece for sure. We got the same thing with tickets. As they start to go digital, there's people who are like New York Giants season ticket holders who are like, I want my physical copy. How do I get it? Right. Because it's a piece of merchandise, something they put their hands on.

There's the audiophile camp for sure. And then I think with our kids, it's just a way for the same reason that Forever 21 and Urban Outfitters has Grateful Dead and, you know, Zeppelin t-shirts all over the walls. It's a way for them to connect. For me, I love it because my kids are discovering music that I'm into. We talked about this on New Year's Eve, Zane and I. And I think part of this is the way this digital era has worked. Kids don't actually have anything. Everything is digital and everything's on their phone and everything's through this thing. You don't actually have anything to hold.

When we left Newberry Comics and my son has his three albums and he's holding it and he's showing people. It sounds stupid, but I don't think there's a lot of avenues for kids to do that anymore. Everything is kind of exists in this little imaginary world where like your son, your son's nine. Yeah. Where he's ordering apps on your phone for $2.99 a pop. Roblox. But he's not, he can't show somebody the apps.

No. He can't be like, hey, I bought this new world. It's like a short-term bump of adrenaline or something or joy you get. And, you know,

depending on who you talk to, I have friends of mine who long for this time of everything is this kind of touchable, collectible thing. And I have friends of mine who are my age

who are genuinely like, no, no, no, get with the program, train, lift the station, get over it. And it have friends of mine who are my age who are genuinely like, no, no, no, get with the program, train at the station, get over it. And it makes for an interesting life for me because I can see both. I'm into the efficiency of it. I'm into the time management of it.

I like to get what I want. Actually, as a music fan, and I think what you're saying, Nate, is totally true. But actually, as a music fan, I discover way more streaming services than I ever did before. Me too. I dive in every morning and I'm like,

maybe I don't want to hear what came out last night. Maybe I just want to go and listen to the Grateful Dead for the first time because I never did. So it's all there for me to dive into. But I do think that kids are now starting to further your point. I mean, I don't know, I can only speak for my kids and my kids' friends who happen to be your kids. Yeah. Which is cool. Brings us together to have this conversation. I just think that they are kind of searching for things that um that they can carry with them as you say and hold on to and and i mean you know i was going to give ben some vinyl the other night because i got a little bit stacking around and i was like but the only one that i wanted to give him was never mind because i kind of didn't want to part with him myself so i said to him do you have never mind he was like i

got that one i was like oh well time. That takes care of it. Well, one thing I like about it is it forces our kids to actually listen to albums. Because I was worried that my son's whole generation was going to be the playlist generation. No, they listen to albums if they love the artist. If they buy into the artist, it's the same as it's always been. If you buy it, you either buy it or you buy in. And if you buy it, yeah, you know, I'll listen, I'll throw it away. It is what it is.

We buy stuff all the time we don't love. But if you buy into it, a brand, a designer, an artist, an actor, you'll see every one of their films. You'll buy every one of their records. You'll hunt for the new drop because you bought into it. Can I ask a music professional i'm looking at zane um do do artists in this era still compose albums records the way that in the era that i was growing up where there was a beginning middle and end there was a sort of

uh narrative to it there There's an informing thesis. We want to open this way. Does that still happen? It does. And I mean, I can't say every artist because some artists love the whole modern distribution approach. And sometimes it's both.

I mean, Coldplay are like, we want to do it this way this time. And the next time they're like, we might want to make an album. By the way, Coldplay are like a deceptively creative, like forward-thinking band. Like the biggest trick

they played on everybody is that they're this meat and potatoes experience. They're actually quite adventurous. So they'll try all sorts of things, but then more artists that I'll speak to than not will approach an album still with that framework that is timeless, right? And that kind of speaks to that whole argument of, is the album dead? Like, all right, cool. So you can get your music and distribute it however you want. That's great. I want to make playlists all day long. But as long as artists want to make a body of work that lasts 20, 30, 40, 50 minutes long, because that's what they have to say, then the album will get made. And if it doesn't exist in its own format as the only way

to hear it, like it used to, maybe it's less of a meal and more of a meze. So it used to be a meal would be like, eat what's on the plate. Now it's like, here's like a wooden board with a whole lot of food and you can pick and choose what you put in your pita bread, but the artist wants to put all the food on the board.

Does that make sense? The length of albums kind of went sideways. I feel like that was like an analogy to it. No, I like it. The point you made resonates in the context

of Nevermind, for instance, right? Because that record that came out in 91 92 no okay 92

for sure still to me has a cohesion to it yeah it has a beginning middle and end that all makes sense

and they all all the songs play off of each other but so does Billie Eilish and trust me her and Phineas made that album from A

to Z with the designed for us to consume it in that environment. Oh, wow. Is that going to win Album of the Year? I think it is. I think she'll be the first, and man, I don't want to get this wrong, I think she'll be the first debut album artist

to win Album of the Year at the Grammys since. Anyone? Toto. Close. Super close. Christopher Cross? Yes. Your guy.

Christopher Cross. Nathan's guy. I bought his house you know how I know that because I was nominated for an album of the year once I wouldn't have been now they've changed the rules I had one song on the album so I qualified back in the day and uh we didn't win because I looked it up I was like it was Sam Smith was his debut album and it was like no one's won a Grammy for album of the year since Christopher Cross I was like we're fucked yeah there's no way we're winning this

well they want him to be the last one it's like when Michael Jordan you know you want him to be the last guy I was looking for some Christopher Cross

to play as we talked oh has to be yeah always always I mean this is why we call it yacht rock right

yeah cause it sounds like you're on a yacht yeah it's beautiful but the problem is probably illegal to play that you blew it when you start that song you probably illegal to play that. You blew it. You blew it.

When you start that song, you can't not play that whole song. I know. I want to hear it. So I think starting the mid-90s album start to go sideways with The Link

because I remember like, all right, so we go to Counting Crows, 94, right? That was an album that really had

a beginning, middle, and end and a feel and I felt like I was going to a place, and they were trying to tell me something. And then we were talking about the Smashing Pumpkins,

their second album, or the second big album, Melancholy, which was a double album and was really two different albums, and they put way too many songs on it. But as the years pass, everybody has their own version of the best eight or nine songs on that album or whatever. But that was when the wheels started to come off and you could see it with rappers too where they would just do these double albums

but there's so much crap on there and you'd have to find the four and we lost our way I would love to see the concept of 10 to 12 songs I put some thought into why I put these together really come back maybe Billie Eilish will bring it back yeah I mean she kind of did and I think you know Frank Ocean did

I mean his album was pretty tight and there are artists who like to keep things Watch the Throne I felt like was like that that was perfect yeah

that was perfect that record was perfect and even 444 right the Jay-Z album was kind of like you could get what you needed everything was set up it needed to be set

was that the one that's the one that came out that was the last one that was the masterpiece and you're like the biggest fan of that one and you feel like it's the last well i just feel like i feel like that is the first that i would own that on vinyl for sure because i feel like that is the first real rap album that addresses life outside of i need a banger or i need a smasher or where's just blaze

or where's metro boom and i need a hit jay-z was's Just Blaze, or where's Metro Boomin', I need a hit. Jay-Z was like, hmm, so my wife's made this album that talks a lot of truth about our situation. I need to make that version myself. But to do that, he had to take rap music into like Bob Dylan territory, you know. So to me, that is like a here, my dear, or a sort of like blood on the tracks for hip hop. And he didn't really bend over or try to sort of patronize anyone by putting a hit in the middle of it. It was just like, love this or don't, I have to make it. Is it available on vinyl?

Should be if it's not. Is there any doubt that right now, the best writers in the world are huddled in a garage trying to figure out how to get Beyonce album of the year? Either that or Rihanna. What's it going to take? Yeah, I know. It's true. It's crazy how she hasn't got that. It's absolutely bonkers. And I think every year she doesn't win it.

Not only does it put pressure on, I'm sure, her and her team, but it puts huge pressure on every artist that wins it. Right. Because, I mean, there'd be a great montage of artists who've gone up on one album of the year the same year as Beyonce and apologized. I mean, that's a montage. That's a four and a half minute exceptional montage to watch. Usually for good reason.

Of course. The albums are always phenomenal. Lemonade is, in my opinion, her best record. It's like when golfers win a major that Tiger finishes second. And they just feel bad

they robbed America of a great moment. I'm sorry I did this. Sorry I took this from Avi. So, where does vinyl go, Nathan? Does it gain steam or is this a fad? I don't. I'm in Zane's friend group that

just says digitization changed my life musically. Subscription changed my life musically. I think it's not a fad, but I just think it's an example of how artists can and get to find ways to create physical productions and representations of their

art, whether that's through merchandise, whether that's through vinyl itself. I think for the younger generation, it's just a badge. It's a physical present badge. Yeah, that's a good point. You know, I think there's a few facts kicking around about vinyl. Everyone's talking about it right now. I mean, you know, this is the perfect time to have this conversation. And there was a fact I heard the other day, which was that sales had crossed a million copies in one week at Christmas for the first time in a long time, like a very, very long time. And I thought about that for a second. And first of all, it was like Harry Styles was manufacturing, Billie Eilish was manufacturing. So these young artists were manufacturing for young fans. You think about it, it makes total sense it's christmas time so you know parents get that harry styles vinyl

exactly on vinyl for their kids right and it's like oh cool so there's that that's positive the other positive thing is they're saying that it's going to outdo cds eventually which because cds are just falling off a cliff as vinyl finds its thing which is the ultimate kind of fuck you from vinyl's point of view if vinyl was a human and CD was a human vinyl's been sitting waiting for a long time

for this moment to get the revenge to get the revenge but then you know I think everything's going to slow to a degree so we'll see I never collected vinyl

I was when I started buying music in 82 there was an 8 track year that's the main tracks did you own 8 tracks? I did what did you own? I remember the first one I ever bought When I started buying music in 82, there was an 8-track year. Did you own 8-tracks? I did. What did you own?

I remember the first one I ever bought, I was like 11, was Hall & Oates H2O. What did 8-tracks sound like? I had sticks. Not great. I had sticks. I don't remember. Great band. The first 6th record. But then the CDs kind of took over.

Hang on, there was a huge era in between 8-track and CDs just as an FYI. Like, I'm not sure what you were focused on, but there was a lot. No, but there was cassettes, but I forget when The Walkman came out. It was probably somewhere in the 80s. The Walkman had a decent run. Yeah. I had about 12 of them throughout my life, so, you know. I don't mind it existing as a format because it's a constraint, right?

One of the cool things about Twitter with 140 280 characters is it it forces you to condense and edit yes and vinyl because of just the physical nature of it means you can't put an 18

you can't criticize the Taylor record probably but if it was four songs shorter it would be even better than it is in my opinion

I'd agree with that you know I think why can't he criticize the Taylor maybe he can't no but listen again the subscription service allows you to put out an 18-song record

without really having to get, but which one am I going to drop and what am I actually trying to say? So I like it as a format there because Harry Styles just made, I think, a great record. It's short, it's concise, and it fits on vinyl. Yeah, I mean, you know, that's what happens when you release your first solo single and it's a 21-minute prog rock meandering slow song. You learn your lesson pretty fast. You come back with some punchy tunes that come clocking about 40 minutes in total.

You can still be David Bowie, just not like that. Exactly, exactly. I wonder if there was a way you could have CD and vinyl in the same kind of album. Because you just make the big-ass vinyl, but also just stick the CD, like, press it on the corner so you could have either or. Well,

you slide it inside the vinyl thing? Because, like, you got mad at me on New Year's. Like a retro tufa? Right. You got mad at me

when I was saying how CD actually just needs to copy vinyl albums how they look, but then just put the CD in it. And you're like, no, that's bullshit.

I've drunk a lot of tequila by that point but yeah I know we're drinking with Bill he remembers what you don't drink enough isn't drinking no I know but he acts like he's keeping up with you but he's not that first of all not true second 100% true second it did make me think, like, you could increase and improve the CD packaging. Why do you want the CD to grow? You're really lining in on that. I hate CDs. I'm trying to save CDs.

Why do you want CDs? The record player is just a piece of art for my daughter's room. That's really what it is. The CD was never art. In the same way, yeah, the vinyl. What's the cool thing about, like, my parents' Barry Manilow vinyl album? it's that when you put it on it's just this big ass face rotating around and around and around and around I could watch that for hours and crack up like it's a piece of art that's all it is the CD isn't think about when the CD came through I remember when my dad for Christmas got

me a CD player and it was like a huge deal right and I think I love my dad to death but it was probably around the divorce so he's feeling bad so so he really shelled out. So he got me something rad for Christmas, and it was one of the first portable CD players on the market. It was literally like it was as heavy as a breeze block. But it was small, but it was very heavy. So there's a lot of tech packed into this little compact thing. And I remember I said to him, I don't really know what, I've heard of this, I'm excited.

What is it? And he just would not stop going on about the sound quality, the sound quality. So the CD was the sound quality revolution, right? It was the moment when all the other formats that had tried to improve the sound quality, someone decided, somebody probably, not to be all conspiratorial, but somebody probably decided that, you know what, we need format change here. We need everybody to buy their Led Zeppelin records again. And what's the biggest way to get people off vinyl? Well, we can make something sound better. And we can get more music on it.

So those were the selling points for the CD. And it lasted for a long time. You missed two crucial parts. Which one? Cars. Yes. Good point. Could throw it in the car.

Yes. And I'm going to say maybe later 80s was the first time cars started having those. And it was like, holy shit. And then you started buying the CD albums. I feel and it was like, holy shit. And then you started buying the CD-Opti-Bones. I feel like that was like, oh yeah, we can do that too.

Yeah, but that was a couple years after. Yeah, that was one. It was meaningful though. Like the sound quality inside of an automobile. Oh yeah.

It's like unbelievable. And then skipping and being like in our room in college and put the CD in and be like, I'm going to play songs one,

four, seven, 10, 11. It was like the early playlist. Both exceptionally good points. He never mentioned those to me at Christmas. He just went, this is not quality. I wasn't in the right frame of mind. But I was like, I don't know, man. I never looked at a CD and went, yes.

Even when it was like multiple gatefold, like Tool. Tool made a lot of the CDs. They probably spent a huge amount of money making the cover of the CD serrated so that it would do like, with three different images or two different images depending on how you held the CD and what angle, right?

That's an expense. That's like cutting into your profit margin. They did that because they tried to make the CD something artistic and something creative. Still cracked. Still broke apart cd still got scratched it's much easier to steal might have stolen a couple cds from sam goodies what is this confession before they did before they did the big long case over the cd and they were just in there

come on especially during the winter in boston it was Connecticut right yeah but that vinyl you can't steal where are you taking that up your shirt do you think it's weird to see hip hop like

Ben has Juice WRLD as one of his favorite vinyls it's weird and it's just like that I get it it's just strange

it's look I mean Ben has Juice WRLD on vinyl because Ben wants Juice WRLD on every format because Juice WRLD's like, and same with Lucci, Juice WRLD's like the artist. Juice WRLD's death was like a huge thing with our kids. My son did an Instagram post littered with spellings about it.

Same with Lucci. I mean, look, at the end of the day, they're too young to be able to spell the big words required to really express how they feel on an emotional level. But they're not too young to feel it. So they felt it. I don't want to, like, throw my kid out in the open on his feelings, but it was a big moment. And not the first one either.

No, I'm not. Because you're looking at a bunch of these dudes have gone in the last year. It's really bad. And I mean, as someone who is fortunate enough to still have conversations with exciting contemporary artists who are on the way up, more exciting than ever to do that, by the way, because it happens real fast. You know, Juice WRLD went from a SoundCloud cult artist to Apple Music's breakout artist of the year in the same year. And he was, I thought he was legit talented. Oh, yeah. I was a huge fan.

And all you got to do is listen to the artist coming now and see how far his influence is going to continue to spread. So, you know, it's exciting, but it's super sad. And like, you know, you're watching people like that pass away. And it's like, man, you know, it's just crazy. I mean, obviously this weekend when we're recording this, Mac's albums just dropped, you know. And that's a different kind of tragedy because Mac struggled with things,

but he was in good form, at least to my experience, and the people who knew him, he was in a great space. He had a bad moment. You just lose these great artists, and it's like, wow, but, you know. We had the same kind of parental thing when both of our sons got into X, and they were really sad when he died, and he was like not a great guy, but he made music that they really liked, and they were 11. They were like, he was like not a great guy but he made music that they really liked

and they were 11 and they were like I don't care if he's a good guy or not I just like his songs I'm not here to morally judge people well they care they knew

they knew but they didn't they knew and they were aware and they were aware that morally there was some stuff going on there that they didn't buy into

so it was important that like we don't censor the music in our house to the degree outside of key cornerstone bad shit, like racism, homophobia. You know, if it's really abusive and really aggressive,

like it's like, nah, we check that. Making fun of New Zealanders. We don't stand for that shit. You know what I mean? But, you know, so we try to be responsible. We try to be open-minded. With X, it was like, look, I acknowledge the quality of that music.

And I had to separate myself from the individual that was being written about that had supposedly done these things versus the music that I was hearing. And those two things are often interconnected as well. Well, this has been going on for decades. Right. We had to rewrite the David Bowie. The Michael Jackson story. There's a lot.

Michael Jackson, what happened? That so you know Michael Jackson what happened that was in between eight tracks and CDs bro you missed it missed it something wrong it was the car

so that's a tough one you know and not to get caught up in that because it's a complicated conversation and depending on who you talk to

that can get intense but you know the kids our kids recognized he wasn't someone to follow as an individual but as an artist the music really moved them

really moved them and I think that that was a confusing place for them to be and then when he was taken so violently that's heavy for kids that's hard to imagine in this day and age where that imagery is flowing around the internet and showing videos of him in the car

and all this sort of stuff that you gain access to now it's just very, very, you've got to keep a really close eye on kids at moments like that because they don't forget that stuff. They don't lose those images. It's rough. It's rough. Or they've just been desensitized since they were like seven.

God, I hope not. God damn it. I hope not. I hope not. The Billie Eilish thing, I think, has been the most surprising thing for me the last 12 months. Not just that the songs are good, but she kind of fits the era.

And they really, they really respect things about her. Like, I don't remember respecting the people who made the music when I was a kid. Maybe I was just raised poorly. We grew up with a lot of terrible music. Well, that's true.

What decade are we talking about? We're talking, yeah. 80s. Late 70s, early 80s. No, but like, 80s is ferocious what the radio was populated with

when I was you know well I mean it was both it was a combination we grew up with Michael Jackson and Prince which are both

pretty fucking good but you know there was a whole kid band thing I'm going the other way I think 84 was really kind of legendary it's a great time

if you look at all the great it's a great time I think we lucked out I'm talking about at least from a pop music standpoint you had on one hand you had the Smiths but then you had the

then you had Prince but then you had Simple Minds who were huge yeah like one of the biggest bands in the world like it's weird to go back

and think that New Gold Dream was a massive album because that is a strange very strange synth heavy record you know I may or may not have watched the entire 1986 Prince's Trust concert

on YouTube what? a couple days ago. That's a random one. And Level 42 is something about you. It's like— Big song. It's just really good. That song could come out now, and it would kill.

And Howard Jones comes out and plays No One Is to Blame with— Like, Phil Collins is on the drums. Unbelievable. It's basically all the best people from the mid-80s. I'm talking about just a class of music that was popular music. Debbie Gibson. I mean, I'll kill new kids. I don't give a shit.

Fuck new kids on the block. Well, that's later, though. That was the 80s. Late 80s. Late 80s. 87, 88. Late 80s, the wheels came off. And that's when House dyed his hair purple.

Oh, what? And got into the DC punk scene and that's how I met House 83, 84 thank god with the Fugazi shows yeah I mean

87 was Fugazi we used to make fun of House because he loved Fugazi and Nirvana in like 89 and we were like what the fuck

is this stuff House had the last laugh you were so wrong you know my Fugazi used to love New Zealand they would tour there quite a lot and they would

they would take my friends band Salad Days out on the road with them the name of the band was Salad Days which is an iconic minor threat song they would take my friend's band Salad Days out on the road with them the name of the band was Salad Days which is an iconic

minor threat song yeah that's right so of course Salad Days and so they would take them out on the road and my friend Karen tells me stories about how you know

they would go around to the motel where Fugazi was staying because it's all legit like super independent like they're the only real band that could truly claim independence in that era

they're the only one who truly can. Like to this day, literally everything was coming out of their own pocket and they would cook. You wouldn't say R.E.M.? I mean, R.E.M. is like a free agent.

one of the biggest record deals of all time. But that was in like 94. It was like $90 million. Yeah, but that was at the end though. In the 80s, they were pretty independent. They were still on

Copeland's record label. I'm talking Fugazi were like they had their own label. They drove themselves. They booked's record label. I'm talking Fugazi were like, they had their own label. They drove themselves. They booked their own tours. Everything was a cottage industry, right? And they would cook for Salad Days. They would cook for the support bands.

They'd say, come around, we'll cook you a vegan meal. I mean, it's amazing. That's why we called House the Vegetarian Communist. You didn't put that on my door. That's true. Take it as a compliment. I mean, I rolled with it.

We didn't, we left it up. Let's take a break. Talk about Crown Royal. Last year, Crown Royal launched the first off the field water break to encourage fans of the game to monitor and hydrate, stay in the game,

whether you're watching in the stadium, watching at home or in a bar. Have a great time. Enjoy some Crown. Don't be that person that ruins it for everyone. Make the right call and take a water break.

All right. So who made the right call this week or not? I am going to go with somebody in this podcast. Zane Lowe predicts during this whole conversation we had more than a week ago that Billie Eilish was going to annihilate at the Grammys and win everything. And in fact, she won five trophies. and her career soared, her album scored. She also, she made Grammy history as the first woman and second artist ever to win the top four categories

in the same year. So there you go. Zane Lowe. It's almost like he knows something about music. Crown Royal reminds everyone this football season and music season to take a water break and moderate to stay in the game. Back to the big conversation about music. Here we go. Come back to Billie Eilish, though, because the thing about her for me that I'm still trying to figure out is the source of her creative art and inspiration. There's so many artists who you see who've had, even at a young age, I mean, we know what we know about Bieber now

and some of the things that drove him from a family perspective. With her, she comes from such a good home. It's just astonishing to see someone so young with such just given from above that creative talent. It just hasn't seemed to be spurred by her life experiences. It's just something innate to her. It's crazy. And I mean, that's the magic.

That's the magic you'll never truly be able to kind of see. That's the real stuff. You know, and you can paint the picture to a point. You can see it like, okay, homeschooled, focus on music and the arts, really great parents who get them focused on taking it seriously so it wasn't just a hobby, natural born talent, brother, sister, great chemistry.

All that stuff is perfect, yeah? In fact, they're in that they're like of an age with a generation of an age that are exposed to more information than ever before. And I think that like when I was growing up, I used to look, the hardest thing, okay, check this out. We get to a point now, we're all about the same age, where our heroes are only five to 10 years older than us, right? It's crazy. You're making that realization lately.

I'm like, oh, wow, you're only 52. When I was a kid, you seemed like the most grown-up human being on the planet. And the reason for that is because that five to 10-year gap was the life experience they told us through their music. We didn't have access to it because we didn't have phones, computers. All we had was NME. And for me, that arrived six weeks late because it had to be shipped over on a boat. So it's like, I'm learning everything through these records. Kids now know everything Billie Eilish knows. So she's connecting in a very real

way with people going through the same thing. The stuff you can't put in the picture, the stuff you won't get on that montage on the board is that the black area, the space you won't be able to fill is that stuff you talk about, which is where it comes from and how she's able to be so eloquent and paint these pictures. Because the pictures that they paint and that allow the performance to be as amazing as it is, that's the good stuff. That's why we all buy into it and our kids buy into it. I think she actually – there's some genius elements there that are going on. And there's a pain that she's tapping into that's unclear how she's even feeling pain when she's had a pretty great life. But obviously, she has some stuff going on.

I love what Dave Grohl said. You know, he was so smart when he said it, when he was like, she's Nirvana. Now, he didn't say she's Kurt. Right. In fact, I have to be careful what I say here when he was like, she's Nirvana. Now, he didn't say she's Kurt. Right. In fact, I have to be careful what I say here because he asked like the comment to be paraphrased properly. He was very specific. So I'll preface this by saying I'm kind of paraphrasing Dave

and what he said. But the general gist of his comment was like, she's tapping into the same generational movement that Nirvana did, which is so many factors at play. And you can't bring Kurt into it because Kurt is Kurt. Kurt's not Nirvana. Kurt is Kurt. Kurt wrote, sang those songs from Kurt's perspective, and he's just so unique. But what Nirvana represented was those two, three, four years where the whole world was moved by that music. And that's what Billy and Phineas have tapped

into, I think, in a big way. And there's one other piece to it that I think is really fascinating. The way that our kids see gender and sexuality and what they're growing up with. She embodies that. She's basically wearing a potato sack when she's out. She doesn't want sexuality to be anything about how people see her. Doesn't want to be seen that way. She almost wants to be amorphous. And that is what we're

seeing. I mean, granted, we're in LA, maybe things move a little faster here, but the way that my kids talk about this stuff as matter of factly is constantly amazing to me. They don't see anything. They don't want the pressure of it, right? It's a lot of pressure, you know, to try to live up to your peers, the expectations that even your peers set for you now, that kids your own age set for you now. And they don't want it. Like a lot of kids don't want it. And what Billie said was, I don't want it either. I just want to get up there and jump around and rage. And everyone's like, hell yeah, I'm down with that. Let's do that. And I mean, watching her come out of Coachella, that was the craziest thing, watching her come

out like 45 minutes late. It was the biggest show of her career. The album came out that week. It's going to go to number one. It's the first weekend at Coachella. It's like 50,000 people in front of the second stage headliner. This is pressure shit. And they're trying to clean. This is the first time they've rolled this stage out.

They're like cleaning these like digital squares. And one of them goes down and they fix that one. Another one goes down and it goes five minutes, 10 minutes, 15 minutes, 20 minutes. And the people around us who are in a circle have gone from like, it's fine to it should be fine to like on the phone pacing what's going on. The crowd is chanting, fix the screen, fix the screen. It's just amazing. And then when they, when there was one that was out They were trying to fix They were going

One more cube One more cube It was the most amazing reaction And all I can think of 40 minutes into this delay Is what's going through this teenage kid's head You know And she comes out

She's like 16 at this point Yeah, something like that She comes out Crowd goes crazy Bad guy starts, goes for it, doesn't mention it, doesn't apologize for it,

doesn't look shook, doesn't look rattled, doesn't look like any of it. And that's when I was like, man, I would say if you put a hundred performers from the most schooled and experienced

right through to the newest up in that same environment as some kind of crazy test, she'd be the only one who wouldn't freak out. It was ridiculous. There might be some LeBron James shit going on here.

Because if you look back at all the hype and pressure LeBron was under basically from junior year on. Yeah, we talked about that. And then as a senior, he's basically a child celebrity. Yeah.

And he's being graded on some higher curve than anybody who's ever been in that position and he handled his business the whole time the only really dumb thing he ever did was the decision um maybe she's wired that way all i know is when my kids started listening to her and i can't tell you how many hours of shitty music i've listened to in my car because of my daughter and because of your daughter and my and, and no, just like the pop, when she started listening

to the stuff starting four or five years ago or six years ago, whenever we started driving to soccer games, I'm like, oh man, this sucks.

Yeah, it was a rough few years there for sure. It's definitely a few years. It's mostly bad. And then, when she started playing Billie Eilish,

and it was like, who is this? And then she's like, oh, she's this girl, she's 15 or 16, and I'm like, is this yeah and then she's like oh she's this girl she's 15 or 16 and like what yeah and they quote who what's going on you and then it was just so far out of whack for any other type of music she was listening to I mean I don't know even the last song they put out right and they came out with that Lucy at the end of the year it's like the best Billie Eilish song yet so that's the scary thing is like the album

is one thing but that new song is like, oh God, like that's, way to take one of the most overused, oversaturated,

boring cliches in the music business which is, I got everything I wanted now I don't know what to do with it. How many people have tried to write that

in a hotel room before they play the Continental American Airlines Burger King Arena, right? And failed. It's almost like the stepping stone to the end. It's like a step to what's over.

And they somehow made that into some kind of yearning universal moment. I don't know how they did it. That was the podcast we had always talked about that we should do. Yeah, we should do that. The musician grappling with success song slash album is fascinating for everyone who goes through it. Yeah. And the precursor for creative death, usually. It's usually the beginning of the end.

Sometimes it works out well, though. I love the Nirvana reference because that band was an expression of how hard it was to be young at that time. And Billie Eilish is a voice of what's hard about being a kid right now. And that song indicates that she's not just in that box. She can make the step to something because she can't do that when she's 29, right? Can she evolve as an artist? I mean, what about that line in that song where she's like, I'm not somebody's daughter,

where she's just like, how dare you abuse me? Like, I'm not, I'm not like a daughter to somebody. I'm not a human being. I don't have a mom or a dad or like, that's just like, my God, first time I heard that, man, I was just like, oh, like, whoa, where, where do you get this from? Like, how do you just put it like that? Well, the fear is that you make your money doing this stuff by going on tour. And she's been on tour for, what, three straight years? She's about to give out again. And that's how you burn somebody. We've had almost no teenage artists who've made it through an extended period like this.

And by the way, what you said at the beginning of this pod is that she might be the first person since Christopher Cross to be Best New Artist and Album of the Year. Yeah, man. We've had no one in the last 25 years come out mentally healthy out of that situation almost no one maybe timberlake's okay ax wait axl rose right oh no no no and and so so it's great that she's surrounded by her family and her brother and but like this is that critical moment where

she's gonna have a ton of pressure on the next record like you said she's playing an arena tour which it doesn't seem like she feels that pressure which which is maybe what's unique about her. I don't get it. I don't feel it. I don't get it. But the messianic sort of complex that gets, I don't know if the human brain at that age is built to handle the attention that she's getting. So I wonder like with actors where I just had Claire, we haven't run yet, but I had Claire Danes on a podcast and she was talking about how she went to Yale for good flex, by the way.

Wow. That's good. You're on fire right now. It's like someone just like you fucking go to Montana to interview Kanye upside down like I'm not

topping your interviews no but I'm saying every time I go to my gram and I refresh my feed you stay in there you do get jealous a couple times dude I've called you

a few times and just been like fuck dude I'm on Bruce Springsteen's private jet doing a 45th anniversary of Born to Run where you going you gotta get better on this new album you sidetracked me now what were we just talking about 16's Private Jet. 45th anniversary of Born to Run.

Where are you going? You got to get Vitter on this new album. You got to get Vitter on this new album. That would be incredible. You got to get Vitter on this new album. Oh, Claire Danes. Yes. I have that. Hold on.

So she was saying how she was in my so-called life. She made a bunch of movies. She made Romeo and Juliet with Leo and all these different things. And then she just went to college for three, four years. And Jodie Foster did the same thing when she did it. And we've seen actors do that sometimes. And they usually come out of it really well when they step out of the chaos.

You know who did that, really, was Alanis. That's why everyone's looking at Alanis right now. It's another great one. And it's like really, like Alanis is, trust me, she's riding a wave right now. Like Alanis is, she was trending on Friday because of the Halsey record. Like it's on fire.

Her Broadway shit's great everyone's stoked and and that's because you know she was Billie right Jagged Little Pill

was that album every kid her own age 30 plus million albums she was that young yeah she was 21 she was 19, 20 yeah which is basically like

the equivalent of Billie now remember everything was a bit older then yeah and so you know she came out, she crushed it, killed it, and then,

you know, put out that song, Thank You, which I think is one of her best, and the next album, and they're just kind of like, cool. Well,

I could see Billy, I could see Billy doing this for one more year, and then, it's like going to college. Like, she's super quirky. She is.

It could happen. But you know, one of the great things about now is that when artists walk away, as long as they walk away on their own terms, then, you know, it's so much more exciting when they choose to come back. And, you know, one of the great things about now is that when artists walk away, as long as they walk away on their own terms, then, you know, it's so much more exciting when they choose to come back. And, you know, I love the control. That's the thing I think one of the best things that's come out of this era is artists get to control the pace a lot more. I think it was like if you don't keep your foot to the floor, you're going to lose it. You're going to lose the audience. You're going to lose it. And the same can be said now to a degree if you're not, if you haven't done the work or you haven't teed it up right. But, you know, I feel like

I mean, Drake had a quiet year last year and I think he's got himself back into a pretty good frame for this year with the future thing and everything else. I mean, you can control it a little more. Well, Nathan's the world's world's leading Taylor Swift expert. So you thought the album was over long? Well, she put the pedal to the metal, but

she also would step back every once in a while. But she definitely was driving, driving, driving a little too much. She does make long albums, though. I think every album of hers, and I don't mind saying it at all, is at least a couple of songs shy of being kind of perfect. Or too long, I should say. But she also understands pace better than anybody, right? And so she knows when to go away and when to come back.

And what you're going to see from her now is to try to reinvent the touring model this summer. That's right. She's focusing on that as much as she is from an album that I think was great. Reputation wasn't my favorite. I think there's some great cuts on there. I love Getaway Car.

I love some others. But Lover, I think, is great if you added it down four songs. That's not really what matters now. She's thinking about how you extend the career of an artist, how you take control of your rights as an artist. She's really working on the business side more than I think most people appreciate.

Well, she's got a lot of other things going on than just chasing the elusive energy of success, right? And we talked about the short-term kind of bump you get from that. She's got other things going on in her life she has to focus on. Do you think that Taylor, let me ask the you clearly are a fan let me let me ask you a question about her do you think that um the conversation that is always dancing around her albeit from a safe distance which is like when are you going to get up to shangri-la and sit in the room with a microphone on and a couple of just great players, like Rick's players or Mark's players, Ronson, and just record that timeless sounding singer-songwriter Beck mutations moment.

Because every person I talk to about Taylor, we almost say it in a hushed way in case we're going to offend her, pop sensibilities by suggesting it. We all want it. It's that or the country album is the other one. It's like lover times country album is the other one. It's like Lover x 12. I agree. And I keep waiting for it, but

you know what she does with almost every song and she did this with this album is she shows us how it's created from start to finish using her social channels. She actually shows us what the Max Martinize song sounded like when it was just her on the piano from the beginning.

So I would love for her to do that as an album. It feels like she is inspired by the creative process of taking it from that inception to the color that she turns the music into. I know. I think she's got 10 in the canon that are just like crushes and you just get that like that dryness and that bass is just so warm and rich you just want to sleep in it and it's just like and then the guitars just sound amazing and that voice and it's just

I mean that would just be like She's a good enough singer for it now. She probably wasn't 5-10 years ago Can I have a counter? I think musicians are like athletes. And I think it becomes tougher and tougher to do the best thing of your life when you've been at it for like 15 years. Yeah. At some point you are who you are. Yeah. Now I agree with you. I think. Or you've said all you have to say. And people are used to your voice. I think that's a big thing. I think people get used to sound and the familiarity of it. And in some used to your voice. I think that's a big thing. I think people get used

to sound and the familiarity of it and in some cases... Good. So are you excited for this Pearl Jam record? Well, so that one,

they're mixing it up and really experimenting, which is something... They are? That's the word in the street. There's some experimentation. I mean,

it's funny, you know, I remember when Vitality came out and everyone was like, what the fuck is this street. There's some experimentation. I mean, it's funny, you know, I remember when Vitality came out, everyone was like, what the fuck is this? Yeah, there was anger. You know, it was people were just like, what's the rat song?

What's the rat, what's this? And with the song on there, which he's just murmuring incoherently like he's drunk with his weird out of tune thing. And now I look back on that record is probably my favorite. So it's like, you know,

there's a lot of purpose behind that album too. It was basically like, there's too many people on this boat right now. Yeah, I feel like Eddie you know, there's a lot of purpose behind that album too. It was basically like, there's too many people on this boat right now. Yeah. I feel like Eddie. I'd like to knock some of the people out of the boat. Please leave.

Yeah. I mean, I think, I think we're saying the same thing. I think, yeah, I think just Eddie Wynn is my band. Yeah.

I think he just sort of went like, thanks Stone. Thanks everybody. We're in the same band, but I'm going to run this show from this point of view from here. At least that's what it sounded like to me. The documentary that Cameron Crowe did, which I think is really good,

it's 80% where I wanted it to get to, but it really dives into that. Band had a key moment where they brought Eddie in. It wasn't his band. He was just a singer. He should have been lucky to be there, basically. And then at some point, every band kind of looks at each other

and there's going to be an alpha dog fight. And Eddie was like, I'm the alpha dog. And those guys were like, we brought you in. What the fuck is going on? And they had,

and sometimes that can break a band up. In that case, they fought through it. But I love when bands, every band, and I think some bands have had this point

multiple times, but they always hit a point where they're either going to break up or stay together. Yeah, totally. It's like a marriage. Totally. Absolutely.

And it's going to happen. Like, even U2 had it. Definitely. They've had it multiple times, I think. They've had it in fucking Germany. Probably times we don't even know about, they probably had those moments. There's a documentary about it.

It's a great one. About when they were making the Octung Baby album, but about how they kind of hit the tail end and they started going in different directions well i think that they're notorious for making it very difficult for themselves i think they're notorious for like really putting them through the process when they make an album of like in the defiant ones they talk about how radlin hum broke jimmy like basically sent jimmy off to run a record industry because it's like i can't do this anymore you guys are insane and so i think

that they have a work ethic which is like second to none almost, you know? Whereas Pearl Jam, I feel like somewhere along the line, just hit this sweet spot where they just went like, well, we own our own building. Everything we need is here. We've got everybody on staff. Made enough money now to keep this rolling for the rest of our lives.

We know where the surf beaches are. Our families are happy. We're just going to get on with making music. And if we decide to put it out, great. And if not, we'll just go do 12 stadiums this year. Anybody? Hey, when is, what's the one in Boston called where the Red Sox play? Fenway.

Yeah. Can we get three nights of Fenway next year? It's like, yeah, you can get them in these nights. Cool. Book them. Sold out. Done. Go home.

Cook dinner for the family the next day. I mean, they've kind of worked it out. Well, you know, the thing, I didn't even tell you this, House. I went to, Flea had his, you know, he's got his music school here, and he had the charity event. So we went, and Eddie was there. And Eddie sang Better Man with like 12 kids from the school. And he was so thrilled and delighted by it.

Like, he was just beaming. He just loves it. And I think those are the people that keep going. Yeah and delighted by it. Like you could just, he was like just beaming. He just loves it. I think those are the people that keep going. Yeah, he loves it. The ones that truly love it are the ones that can maybe hang around 30 years. He wanted to have control from the day it went crazy. And what you hear in those first- Time Magazine cover.

What you hear in those crazy heady times, first half of the 90s, madness. Madness for so many reasons and then you hear in those first four albums Eddie is just one step at a time dragging it back into the band

dragging it back into the band and then they got to a point where it's like cool now we have complete control Eddie's like that's all I ever wanted

it's funny as you describe that it sounds to me a little bit of Foo Fighter with Dave, with Foo Fighters with Dave. But he was always been in charge. When you said Foo Fighter, I thought they broke up and like there was a rogue Foo Fighter. Again, they did as well. He is the Foo Fighter.

He is. But it was always, he started as a one-man band. Yeah. And then, you know, so there was never an alpha dog debate. There was never any question whose band it was. That's right. Ever. Ever.

But I think he has realized now that it is his and Taylor's band. I think he knows it's a band. He doesn't want Pat to leave. And sure as hell can't take Nate out of the equation. He's been there from day one. But I think he knows that there's a dynamic between him and Taylor. Look, if you're Dave Grohl and you're that drummer

the first thing you want to know when you go in the studio is that you're not looking at your drummer going oh god I want to just redo that right and so to have Taylor

in the band where he trusts him loves his playing more than his own that's why we have Foo Fighters yeah otherwise it would just be the Dave Grohl solo show again

you know who's the biggest band in the world right now? Band, band? Yeah. Band, band. Are we talking contemporary? Are we talking ticket sales? Biggest band in the world right now.

You asked me this last time and I got myself in trouble. Well, now it's 2020. We're in a new decade. BTS? Yeah, probably. Good answer. Good answer. Is that the Korean kids?

Yeah. Oh, out of here. I have no idea. I have no idea. I mean, I don't know. I think we're all individual now. You know what the biggest tour last year was? It was probably some band that's been around 25 years. Rolling Stones.

Pink? Ed Sheeran's Pink. Oh, Pink. Yeah, Pink. But really it was Ed Sheeran. Yeah. From McGross. You know, on a contemporary level,

I'm going to throw a couple of names out there that do very well still. I mean, you know, 21 Pilots do really well. Like they're actually on an ascent. Like they continue to stream really well. They continue to sell more tickets. Like they're headed that way. In terms of stadiums, probably Foo Fighters is the truth. I mean, they could play any stadium in the world now,

whether it's, you know, Europe. I mean, they just do stadiums. So, I mean, I'd say Foo Fighters are probably the biggest band in the world. That's an amazing second act for that, dude. And it's been going on for a long time. 20 plus years. Yeah. But you know why, right?

Work. That guy works. The project he did, was it at the end of last year? Where he did a 12-minute instrumental where he played every instrument and they filmed it. Yeah. And they show him. It was awesome. They combined the video

of him playing each of the instruments and it's a band of eight of him. It's eight Grohl's. Eight Dave Grohl's. So, and the intensity

of the process. Yeah. It's what Zane's talking about. Yeah. It's almost like an insight into how he did the first record,

which I still remember the day that I got a Foo Fighters cassette in New Zealand. And I didn't know what it was. No one told me what it was. It just arrived from the record label, obviously by design. Don't tell anyone who did this.

And it was four songs on it. And it was like weenie beanie. This is a call. I'll stick around. Maybe ecstatic. So it was good. It was like four good ones. And I put it in. I was just like, what the fuck is this?

This is amazing. And then like two days later, the label was like, all right, we can tell you now. It's Dave Grohl. And I was just like, oh, shit. It's about to get real. And that was my favorite album for a long, long time. You know, yeah, I think he's incredible. He's a real one. I don't think there's incredible he's a real one I don't think

there's an answer to biggest band you've rethought it no I just I think everyone would come up with a different thing but it's so funny that was like the the heavyweight boxing championship you know forever where it'd be like who's that boy champ outside would you remember when I went on stage and he claimed it he was like I'm taking it back in London when Oasis were the biggest I was stunned it's so funny watching my son

really get into music and you know he's been playing the bass and the guitar the last year and his influences and it's all the stuff we listen to

it's probably the most modern ones Metallica but when he was playing new stuff it was all stuff from our generation

yeah right the most modern was Metallica he played Nirvana. He played Guns N' Roses. ACDC. You didn't see him. These things are fucking timeless.

They're never going to go away. Listen, him and Lucci, our kid, and their band, during a performance, they were to write an original song at school the other day, and their one was called… It was pretty good. It was amazing. You were there? No, I saw the video.

Oh, dude, then you'll know. They did a song called Marjorie, which was great. But what was even greater was that Ben, midway through the song while he's playing bass, which was like a legit heavy bass. It's a heavy, heavy bass. The strap comes off. Now I've watched pros throw their bass at the tech

and fix it for me and bring it back and is what it is. Ben, I have to get up for this. So if you're listening to this, you have to use your imagination. Ben puts his foot on a chair that was there, rests the bass on his knee and plays it while the guy comes up

and puts the Strat back around. Nice. Yeah, he never stopped. He never stopped. And I said to him afterwards, that was single-handedly the best moment of the whole night because it just showed

that he was like willing, the show must go on. I'm serious about this. This isn't like, I'm not playing here. It is funny because his son and my son, they both really genuinely love music. And you can see how this stuff goes. It's like their favorite thing to do is,

they just had to sleep over two nights ago. They just make music into the early hours. In the bedroom, just making shit. And I think that will never go away. It's just the question for me is the individual versus the band and the whole concept of if I'm going to do this, well, I should just do it all myself. Not with them.

I'm just talking in general. But what you're saying now. The Taylor Swift model is always the easier model to understand, I think, for this generation. Selfie narcissist. That, but also accessibility, convenience of making music. Get a laptop, get some cheap software, get in there, make your own shit. Oh, I'll just demo it myself.

Oh, it sounds pretty good. I'll put it on SoundCloud. Oh, a million people liked it. Oh, record label's calling me. Oh, I'm an artist now? That happens all the time. And so before you even think about sharing, you're not even there yet. You're like, oh my God.

You're like, what happens to Cobain? Let's put him in a time machine. Tough. And you throw him into 2020. Does he have a band? You can't even go there. He doesn't exist. Is he by himself?

He had demons that, you know, you can't process. I'm not even talking about the demons part. I'm just saying like- No, but House is right. He makes a good- That's the point. That's why he did it. He would have done it now the way he did it then

because he had to do it. It wasn't- He didn't want to do it. He didn't wake up one day and go, I'm going to be a superstar. There's probably an element of that. It's pretty well documented that he was an ambitious guy. People don't like to think of him as somebody who was. Would he have wanted band members or would he have just soloed it

and just used all the devices we have now and cut out everybody else? That's a good question. I don't know. He would have gotten it out. Yeah. He would have gotten it out. I think he would have used the devices. I think he would have found people.

I think at the guts of it. I mean, you know, I just was observing it as an intense fan and a contemporary. I mean, he's only a little bit older than us. Yeah. But check this out. We're about to enter into this.

This is super epic. Billy Corgan definitely wouldn't have... He would have been like, fuck that. I'm not using anybody. I'm playing every instrument. I'll just fuse it together. Fuck everybody.

I'm going to get Insta-famous. If the height of Smashing Pumpkins, he was probably going, eh, no. I don't know, man. I think, I know this. I think the day and age

of a Nirvana or whatever coming out, this agitated rock and roll, we got to stop pretending like that's due a comeback. Like, things go forward. They don't really go around.

We like to think that they go around in circles, but everything just goes one way and that's forward, right? And if it happens to be a similar experience than it was, but it didn't go back to go around. We like to think that they go around in circles, but everything just goes one way and that's forward, right? And if it happens to be a similar experience than it was, but it didn't go back to go there. It went forward. And so if things are going forward, guitars are definitely a part of the equation right now. If you look at Muramasa, who's this cool underground, very credible producer who makes a lot of noise in the UK, his comment in his latest article in the NME is like, if you're not making music with guitars right now,

you're an idiot. And, you know, got Slow Tie and all these really cool things in the UK, which just represent this very agitated time. And you've got these hip hop producers, like Internet Money, wanting to bring guitars in. And so it's starting to factor in. But the idea of like the Strokes coming back

and Skinny Jeans and playing music that sounds like the MC5 mix with Guided By Voices, I don't know anymore. That was so funny, the point, because Nate and I were talking about Lizzo earlier. Yeah.

The performance on Saturday Night Live blew my mind. The composition of Truth Hurts with a band of women playing SG guitars.

And going hard. I loved it. Going hard. It blew my mind. It was so, I earned such a respect. I mean, that's just like, if you get to a point where you can play SNL

or Headliner Festival and you've got all these brilliantly constructed pop songs, and you really want to perform, like you really want to be in the pantheon of great performers, right? You don't want to bring the thing that you had when you were struggling, which is your PA back up.

Right. You've done that. You get to a point where you finish your song Truth Hurts and it's like... You know, that classic ending that they do on the live things every time where the band is just like going crazy. I mean, I got chills just now and I got chills watching it a month ago.

Beyonce's made an entire modern career out of every one of her pop songs. She will let the band rinse it when it's live. You know, rinse it. One thing we established the last time we were together was what the first song on a Smashing Pumpkins playlist should be. I got mine. No, you were right. Muzzle.

The playlist has to start with this song. It has to. It's so perfect. It's like Billy's entire life in three minutes. And the ending is just like the end. It's like the beginning of the concert and the end of the concert in three and a half minutes. It starts at the beginning of the concert and it ends with the end of the concert in one song. It's perfect.

How do we fix the Grammys? And make people care about it again. It's coming up. Why aren't there great iconic Grammy music performances anymore? Because they throw everybody together like it's a giant wedding band. It's still like a giant stage, though, for the nation. So you're saying like Neil Diamond, Barbra Streisand. You want that again.

I'm fine with that. That was a that again. I'm fine with that. That was a great moment. I am fine with that. It was really great. Why can't it happen? Well, I will say this about award shows in general. That when we were growing up watching the MTV Awards and the Grammys and the Oscars and all these things, again, to refer to our age, it was a big deal. It was like once a year, everyone's in one room,

and the adrenaline and the ego and the winning and losing all came together, and crazy shit happened, right? Yes. And people forgot there were even cameras on them, and it was madness. Now, that happens all day, every day on the phone. Kids are getting that adrenaline of that controversy that beef that smoke all that stuff they want is there there's countless podcasts too many to mention that focus on the drama you know let alone youtube videos and it's all available

so the idea of bringing an award show in now to people's lives as something that should be scheduled like a sporting match because we all know that sporting events are the only things outside of major news issues that people really only focus on in sports

because it has to happen in that moment. There needs to be some, we need to feel like we're adding value to the experience everyone already gets because there isn't

the window anymore of like, this is our shot, we got three hours and you're going to watch it because it's the only time you get to see it. So you're going to watch it anyway. So odds are in our favor.

Odds aren't in any award show's favor anymore. I don't care what they're giving away because it's every day, all day. So how do you make it successful or relevant or whatever? It's going to require soul searching. It's going to require maybe you have to look at the award show

as an actual experience. Rather than focusing on one versus the other, you can't say like, why are the Grammys irrelevant? Why are the Oscars irrelevant? Why are these awards irrelevant? Why are the Brits irrelevant? You know, like it's all much of a muchness to me. It's all a big prize giving.

I don't think the Grammys are irrelevant. I think they don't really capture what happened in the year. I think the Oscars are about as good as we're going to do with an award show where it doesn't get it right all the time, but at least if you look back and you go through different years, you can look at all the nominees, and you can look at who won for maybe two out of every three times and say, all right, that's a pretty good snapshot.

We can't do that with the Grammys. In part because now the biggest albums all get released in the fourth quarter and they're not eligible. So you got to wait a full year to come back to the album to see what happens. And at that point, especially this day and age,

you're on to the next one. The only thing I was going to say about the shows is like 90% of an artist's income, 85 comes from the road now. So maybe, just maybe, you don't want to give up the goods and shoot your shot on national television. You want to hold that back for where you make your income, right? Beyonce's Coachella show, an example of that, you could have done that on

national television, holding that back for what she goes and takes on the road, keep the money for yourself. I don't know. That's a cynical way to think about it. No, I don't think it's cynical at all. I think those are both really excellent points good insider points you know I also think it depends on how far it travels

and how much impact it has on your career right math doesn't lie you know Post Malone's back at number one right now with Circles

because he played on the Rock and Eve thing with Ryan Seacrest alright Ryan Seacrest's booking strategy just got better right

it just got easier for him next year you know so it's like, it's all about the reflection after the fact and you know, I just think award shows in general need to start taking a look at what they mean

as a whole. It's too late for the Grammys. I don't see how they bounce back. Where, in a way that I would actually take the awards seriously. Feels like that point passed 15 years ago. But if it was an entertaining television show with acts, they were incented and felt motivated to go do something slightly unique musically.

Well, that's the idea it goes. I mean, aside from what you said before, which is, you know, absolutely. I think, you know, they've got Billy and they've got Lizzo and they got Nas X. They got the three artists that matter. Yeah. And those are the three artists that galvanized the youth last year. They got all three of them pretty invested this year from a performance and a nominations point of view. And I think, you know, we'll see how that resonates.

And if that resonates and if kids actually go, yeah, I see these things all the time, but it's nice seeing my favorite artist in a big environment and like, oh, wow, this is the prize giving. Cool. Let's see how Billy handles it. You might see a bump. And if you see a bump, then you've got your answer, right? More relevance, less retrospective celebration. I think they're a little bit retrospect. It's a bit like, we celebrate, we celebrate this, we celebrate this, this legendary, the legendary, the legends. And it's like, all right, cool. There's a lot of young legends being built all the time right now you know this is fun thanks for doing this i think i'm done i'm out of topics unless you have any more nathan i'm done i think taylor swift should call up ian mckay and ask about building your own independent who would you who would you get to produce the next Taylor Swift record?

Nathan. Not Jack Antonoff. Country person. She should try to make the best country album in the last 20 years. Who would you pick? Me? I've always wanted a room with Rick just because he's a performance producer. He likes to get the sound of the room and the performance right,

and then he's like, done, print it. You know what I mean? And I love that. But I also think that she would be i'd love the sound of those back albums that he does with nigel godrich i think nigel godrich would be to get him into his own when he pulls out the analog all those beautiful mics that analog processing i just want it to sound rich and warm i don't want you know what i mean like i want it to sound like like like okay i don't want to compare taylor to another artist of her circle so i'm just comparing apples and oranges but also they're in the fruit bowl their songs right i like like slow burn like the first time you hear slow burn on the casey out in that first song you're like

oh i'm in Like I'm so in because it sounds so amazing. It just sounds like you want to listen to it over and over and over and over again. Like it's good for your soul. Zane Lowe, what do you have to plug? None. I just came here for the fun.

This was great. Zane Lowe, Nathan Hubbard, Joe Haas. A pleasure. Thanks to ZipRecruiter. Thanks to Jay Adande and Zane Lowe, Nathan Hubbard, and Joe Haas. Thanks to Norton Secure VPN. Thanks to Jay Adande and Zane Lone, Nathan Hubbard and Joe House. Thanks to Norton Secure VPN. If you're one of the 26% of US adults that's online almost constantly, you need Norton

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I don't have feelings with them on the wayside On the wayside never on the same I don't have feelings with them on the wayside