The Bobby Bones Show - Adam Weiner from the band Low Cut Connie-Music History on Foot

Episode Date: August 29, 2023

Buzz Knight is takin' a walk with Adam Weiner from the band Low Cut Connie.  Low Cut Connie is an American Rock n' Roll band from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Adam Weiner is a singer/songwriter, pianist, and frontman for the band, and his spirited performances have captured the hearts of global audiences. "  *****Thank you so much for listening to the TAKIN’ A WALK PODCAST SHOW hosted by Buzz Knight!   Listen to more honest conversations with a compelling mix of guests ranging from musicians, authors, and insiders with their own stories. Get inspired, get motivated, and gain insights from honest conversations every week that can help you with your own journey. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, and be part of this blessed family. Website: https://takinawalk.com/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/thebuzzknight LinkedIn: http://linkedin.com/in/buzzknight  Linkfire: https://lnk.to/takinawalk Please consider subscribing, leaving a review, and sharing it with your friends and family!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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at Apple Podcast, Spotify, podcast Playground, or wherever you get your podcast. On this episode, join Buzz Night as he takes to the streets of South Philly with Adam Weiner from the band Low Cut Connie. They're a band heralded for their amazing

live performances. Everyone from Springsteen, Elton John, has become a fan. And you will also, when Adam from low-cut Connie, joins Buzz next on Taking a Walk. Well, it's so great to be taking a walk here in South Philly. Yeah, right? Oh, yeah, this is definitely South Philly. You can tell from the people, everybody's got an attitude. Look at these people.

Adam, it's so nice to meet you. You too. As I was waiting for you here, you'll dig this. So the guy was walking with a baby in a stroller, and I heard him go, da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da. And I couldn't help myself, because sometimes once in a while I am like the human Shazam.

Yeah. And I went, Birdland. And he goes, yeah, how'd you know that? I said, that's one of my favorites, man. And he started telling me, he said, he goes, I knew Jaco. I said, you knew Jaku, Pastorius? Holy smokes. And we talked for five minutes. So I have always felt the people from Philadelphia are tremendously friendly.

And the one bad rap I think that they deserve is I think they're driving leads a little bit to be desired. Not good at driving. We're the meanest sports fans in the world. You know, we torture. We torture people here. And you know, when you heard the story about that robot that came to Philly that toured the world and the people in Philly killed the robot and mutilated it. It visited like all these different countries and cities and states. But when it got to Philly, our people murdered this robot. But I will say... Draw your own conclusions. Yeah, I mean, but I will say some of this is legacy building, don't you think? Yeah, I mean, people in Philly like to be perceived as tough, if you know what I mean. Where do you think that comes from? An inferiority complex.

To New York, right? To everywhere. To everywhere. Like, you know, that slogan from the Eagles... No one likes us. We don't care. They care. If you have to say it, you care. Right. No, I mean, it's like you've got New York City right there. You've got Washington, D.C. right there. And Philly was the biggest and most important city in the United States in the early part of this country.

And then it wasn't. You know? and that's still thumbprinted on the city. But I also think that, you know, the cities are having a tough time these days, don't you think? Every city, absolutely. And I think Philadelphia, I love it here because it's never the it city. You know, like, if you go to Nashville or Austin or San Francisco, these are places that have completely transformed because they had some sort of moment, you know.

Philly plods along in its dysfunctional way with all of its charms, with all of its soul, with all of its dysfunctions. And people may discover us, they may not. People that live here love it. But it's never like the in-fashioned trendy city. and I'm a-okay with that. Do you think, though, this thing about the cities is a bit of journalistic clickbait these days, or is it really a problem

how the decaying of cities is occurring? I don't know if I'd use the word decay. I wouldn't use the word decay, but changing, and in some ways I think for the better. There's some things, this is the world, but some things are always getting worse and some things are getting better, you know? We get the message that everything is getting worse, but some things are getting better.

Personally, personally, in terms of COVID and what it did to cities, there's some positives. There's a lot of negatives, but I think there's some positives too. For me, I'm an artist living in the middle of a crazy city, and when I was growing up in the suburbs in New Jersey, you know, families with kids lived out in the burb. and the freaky-diki people, the artists, queer people, crazy people, people who are just looking to live a different kind of life than you can find in the suburbs come to the city.

Well, over the last generation, that changed, like families are living in the city more and more and more, and artists are getting priced out, and people of color getting. priced out, the neighborhood characters getting lost, but during COVID that changed back. It went backwards again. A lot of the families and stuff went out to the burbs again. And I see a lot more freaky-diki people in Philadelphia these days. And I like that. That's what I want to see.

Let's take a little walk here around this area and see some freaky-diki people. In Yiddish we say dray around. Let's go dray around. Let's dray around. So this is Columbus Square, South Philly. Yeah. And you like to come over here and run once in a while? All the time. Yeah.

All the time. And in fact, you never know who you're going to see in this park. And this neighborhood is kind of like the U.N. You have in that direction, a mostly black neighborhood, in that direction, a Vietnamese neighborhood. In this direction is a Lebanese area. in Cambodian that way, Italian market there, Mexican market there,

and everything in between. You've got the Chinese area down here on Washington. You hear every language spoken. And that is what I love about this neighborhood. Yeah, I love that too. That's sort of, you know, when I think of great places like, where Boston is that way, where I live, Chicago's that way, certainly.

Yeah. It's like when I lived in New York City, I lived in Queens for many years. Queens is like that. It's like the U.N. It's like Greek, Argentinian, people from Africa, Cambodia, Vietnam. It's like everything. That's what I like about the city. So take me back to growing up in the suburbs. What town did you grow up in? Cherry Hill, 20 minutes from here. The most suburby suburb of Philadelphia. Yeah, I mean, before I was born, it was like all farms. And then in my parents' generation, they built all these very new places.

They built the Cherry Hill Mall, which I worked at, I worked at Macy's for years as a perfume and cologne spritzer. You know the people that attack you when you go into the mall and try to spray you. I was one of those people. So I grew up, I was like a mall rat, a Jersey suburb kid. And all I wanted to do was go to a city. And so when I was 18, I went to New York City. Packed up and went. I got into school, which I didn't care about school.

was just an excuse to move to New York. I got a job the first week I was there playing piano in a restaurant, which led to all these other bars and restaurants hiring me to play piano, and I started my gigging life, my performing life, for real at 18. But you must have had a sense before that that you had this intense musical connection. I wanted to be an actor before that. I knew I wanted to be on stage. I was the star of all the plays in high school.

I also had a band. My music, though, the songs that I wrote, that was a secret. I never played my own music for anybody. And I don't think I ever thought that I was ever going to do anything with my songs. That was like my, just for me. And so it's a real twist for me to be out here in the world as a professional songwriter, singer, you know. So who coaxed you to share the music that you had created? I coaxed myself because when I got these gigs playing piano in these places and people, you know, requested songs,

I started to write songs you know for the clientele that was there like if I played in kind of a shit-kickery country place I needed to have country songs right if I played in the very upscale gay piano bar I needed to have that material if I played in an Italian restaurant in Queens which I did for a while I needed to have that repertoire

And so I would start to write material to please the people in the places I was going to be. And that turned into songs that I'm performing in public for people that I wrote. And a lot of times I was kind of paunting my own songs off as cover songs, if that makes sense. I wanted some of the material to sound classic, right? Like if I played in this show tune bar, I would write songs that sounded like old show tunes, right? And I sort of developed a skill, and I realized that probably more than acting or any other artistic pursuit that I was interested in, that writing sort of, songs was probably the thing that I was most naturally good at. And so it kind of went from there.

And did you have somebody that was sort of a mentor at that time? No, not at all. Not really, because song, if you're a piano person, is a very solitary musical endeavor. You know, there's a film actually that I love. It's from 40 plus years ago. It's called Piano Players Never Play Together. Okay.

It's a New Orleans piano film. And it really captures just in the title that, you know, guitar players, they like jam together, drummers kind of like woodshed together, etc. But piano, we're very solitary, you know. There's never two pianos together. And if you play piano, you're trying to kind of be the whole band, right? you got to be the rhythm section and everything. So, no, I didn't really have anybody I can think of

that was like a musical mentor that I knew in person. Until, you know, the one person that comes to mind who I only spoke to one time, I went to Memphis, Tennessee. I went to Memphis, Tennessee in 2001. I did a semester at the University of Memphis just because I wanted to go to Memphis and listen to blues and country and Elvis and just be there. And I got an internship at a radio station there. I just wanted to be in Memphis. And I met this guy named Moses Vincent, who at the time was probably close to 90 at that point.

and he was a piano player that had been playing and recording all the way back to the 1940s. He played piano on a bunch of early Sun Records sessions, early 50s pre-Elvis. And he had a gig at this place called Center for Southern Folklore. I think it was every Friday night he would play piano. This was like the very end of his life. He had lost one eye. He was like not well. And he just completely knocked me out, like his piano playing.

And I talked to him and told him I was a piano player. I'd come down from New York. I wanted to talk to him, meet him, and see what he did. And he said, all right, just stick with me. So I would go and watch him. But that's the only time I ever spoke to him. But his, I would say watching him was probably the closest thing. to like a mentorship, because I really learned a lot from watching him.

But I think you're a historian of sorts when you talk about music and influences. So who were some of the other piano players that have had a big impact on you? You know what's funny is a few years ago when I got, had the privilege of hanging out with Elton John, he was talking about piano stuff and how he liked my piano playing, et cetera, and he said, you know Adam, my heroes were Little Richard, Jerry Lee Lewis, Fats Domino. And he said, I learned everything from them.

And I said, me too plus you, right? So, um, I love, Fats Domino. Jerry Lee, I mean, these are the great rock and roll piano players, but also I would say Professor Longhair, James Booker. He's probably the greatest of the New Orleans piano players, you know, on paper. So many, but I listen to a lot of guitar music and try to interpret it on piano, if that makes sense. Sure. So I am just as much influenced by Keith Richards as a piano player, if that makes sense. Yes.

Because Keith, the way that he plays guitar, the way that everything has to do with feel and the riff and the meat and potatoes of the song, not the showiosity of it, like a, like a Jimmy Hendrix type of guitar player, that's been very influential on me. So when Elton called you out on stage at the concert, it was in Philly, right? Yes, it was. What was your reaction? Well, I'm sad to say I wasn't there. You weren't there.

So what happened was I met him before the show. I went backstage. We hung out for a while. I met Bernie Toppin was there the same night, so I got to meet Bernie. And actually, you know, it's an interesting story. timely story because we just lost Robbie Robertson and the conversation was a lot about the band because the first show that Elton ever did here in Philly was at the electric factory and the same time that he was here the band was playing at the spectrum I think he was brand new this must

have been 1970, right? And so my friend Larry Magid, who started the electric factory, I think it was him who brought the band to check out this young kid from England named Elton John. And Elton told me this story, and he said that he idolized the band. He loved their first couple records, and they came, and they came to talk to him. and he said it was such an amazing experience meeting them that he and Bernie then wrote a song, Leavon, after meeting Leavon. And then he said,

eventually Elton, one of his son's middle name is Leve-on. That's how much the band meant to him. But anyway, he's telling me that story backstage in Philly, and it's wonderful, and he's saying all kinds of encouraging things about low-cut Connie and everything. He goes to do the show. I'm watching the show. I am texting a million people.

I was just hanging out with Elton John, whatever. And I was hungry, and I decided to leave because I had just seen Elton's show like a month prior in Vegas, and I had a 6 a.m. flight to L.A. So I left the show halfway through, I'm embarrassed to say, and then I'm sitting at the fucking Penrose Diner. across from the Phillies game

I was eating a grilled chicken palm and all of a sudden my phone is ringing crazy and Elton is talking about me on stage

and dedicating his encore to me and everybody is texting are you here are you here are you here and I wasn't there so I wasn't there

I'm embarrassed to say is that a moment you would like to get back well there's a 2% chance 2% is the number I think that when he came off stage before the encore he asked

can we get Adam out here and when they said we can't find him he dedicated the song instead there's a 2% chance that he would have brought me out on stage for that reason I would like to have a do-over just to find out But hey, what are you going to do?

It's the way it goes. It's the way it goes. Well, back to the band for a second. One of the things about the band that I think was always intriguing was the fact that especially early on, they were really hard to categorize. You couldn't really put them in a particular box. We hadn't heard anything really like the band at that point.

Is that something when people describe Locke Connie that you'd say, that you sort of like when people go, I don't know really how to, I know you guys are rock and roll, but I'm not sure how to categorize you. I've been called so many different things. I always just say rock and roll. I think there is a correlation with the band because even though you say when they first came out, you couldn't categorize them. At the same time, their music was very classic and familiar.

Like when you hear the weight or Cripple Creek or their early songs, it sounds like it could have been written 100 years ago or 100 years from now. It's that classic, you know, but at the same time, new and a flavor that certainly isn't popular at that time, right? That's what I hear about low-cut county all the time is that my songs and the way we present. they seem very familiar. Like, it's not experimental music, but it's also a little bit uncategorizable because it falls between the cracks. And I know this, I know the bad side of this

because the industry, the music industry, not the music, but the industry, is obsessed with categorization and genre and algorithm. And so matching to other people's sound gets you further in an algorithmic industry than doing something unique, right? Because people who listen to Mumford and Sons a lot, if you make music that sounds very similar to Mumford and Sons, the algorithm will service you to those listeners, right? my music, again, it's not experimental, but it does fall between the cracks and people have trouble

comparing it to something current. And that works against me in the industry, if that makes sense. I'll throw another band at you that defied categorization. I wonder how you feel about them, the little feet. You're in this kind of area music that I love, like Credence Clearwater, where little feet, where, again, it's very familiar and draws on classic American things, but does it in a modern way. And that's sort of where I live, but those kinds of approaches tend to not be commercially successful.

like I've got my audience, but I'm not on the pop charts or anything. I can't compete with that. So how do you feel about all that? I don't care at all. I'm glad that I'm not in that. What a terrible pressure and lifestyle it is to be in pop music. Oh, my God. I mean, I have friends that are in that world.

and I've sort of flirted with it here and there. And it is just a very unforgiving industry to be in. I have, for me, there are artists like Lou Reed, Tom Waits, Patty Smith, you know, people that I really, really admire what they did in their music, and they did it for decades and decades and decades. That's where I live, you know, cult artists, basically. Carving your own path. Yeah.

And you've had these moments of... Or even, like, when you talk about prints or James Brown, people who are iconic and were commercially massively successful, popular artists, but they were also cult artists at the same time, because most of their music that they put out was not for pop audiences and was focused on the music, the art, and the audience. It really wasn't geared towards the industry, if you know what I mean. But you've had these moments, these serendipitous moments that have occurred in your career to date,

the Elton one you just talked about there's this little event that happened with Barack Obama tell me about how you discovered that that had happened just like everybody else I woke up I actually just moved to Philly and I was sleeping on an air mattress

in our house we didn't have furniture yet and we didn't have air conditioning it was like 10,000 degrees because it was August and I woke up and my phone had a million messages and They all said POTUS playlist, and I didn't know what that was. I didn't have my contact lenses in, and I just ignored it and went through my day. And then a little while later, I investigated it, and I realized something crazy had happened.

And then when I saw the Obama, there's a photograph that Pete Sousa took of Obama's hand writing the list. He's looking at his iPad through his iTunes, and he's choosing the songs and writing them. And under his hand, you can see O-Cut Connie, Boozophilia. Then I knew something crazy had just happened. And you got to go to the White House. I did. 2016. I did.

And he came out. Adam. Great to meet him. Did you get a tour? Did they give you some food? Oh my God. And I was like, and I don't typically get starstruck, but I was a little bit stammering. I was. Mr. President, thank you. Thank you so much, you know. And he said, hey, when's your new album coming out? I said, I'm working on it right now. He said, okay, well, you gotta let me know. I like what you're doing. I like your

keep it up. Yeah, it was cool. That's awesome. And then let's just get to the other moment too, which was, let's call it the Springsteen moment. Oh man. Well, listen, I grew up in New Jersey in the 80s, so do the math, right? Getting blessed by Bruce is like, it's like the Pope drove by and blessed you, you know. I went to see the Broadway show. I think it was 2018, and he first did it, and I sat down in my seat. I got a ticket like everybody else,

and this guy came out and said, are you at him? I said, yeah, he said, low-cut Connie, right? I said, hold on. And this other woman from Bruce's management team comes out, and she said, you know, he liked to meet you after the show. And this is like 30 seconds before the curtain.

And I was like, oh, okay, shit. Really? And she said, yeah, go to this door right when the lights come up. Go to that door. So we went in and Max Weinberg happened to be there the same night. So I meet Max Weinberg. We're in Bruce's like little waiting area outside his dressing room. And I had to take a piss so bad.

I hadn't peed in like two hours. And I'm like, but if I pee right now, I might miss him, whatever. So I was like, fuck it. I'm just going to go in his bathroom. And I saw I go and I come out. And as I'm coming out, he's coming in the room. And he hugs Max. And then I go, I put my hand out.

And I was like, hey, Bruce, I'm Adam, the band Loca. And he said, I know. I know. Come here. He gives me a big hug and a kiss. He's like, you guys are fabulous. You're from Philly, right? And I said, yeah, yeah.

He said, you guys are everywhere. I've got to come see you guys. I hear your live show is incredible. I said, wow, I learned it from watching you. You know, so it was amazing. Matt Patty hung out for a while. He was extremely encouraging. Because the thing with Bruce Springsteen is, like, the records,

he's got a lot of classic records, but it's his live show. It's him as a live performer that I think is his true, gift and his legacy really and that is kind of like me as well I I have developed over the years tried to turn myself into this performer that people remember you know and give something to people live that they take home with them and talk about and want to see again you know what's the first Bruce show that you saw 1999 or 90 the first reunion of the

somebody smarter than me can look up the date of when the East Street band first got back together. It was 98 or 99, right? And I was 18. That's when I first started going to concert, so. Was it New York? I saw him in

New Jersey, in the Meadowlands, I think it was. And that was earth-shattering. Not that long after that, I saw Iggy Pop, reunited with the Stooges, and that was earth-shattering. Saw James Brown right here in Philly on the waterfront. That was earth-shattering. I remember James Brown did a song about the Columbine shooting had just happened.

He had a song, Killing is out. School is in. Come back tomorrow and try it again. Killing his out. He was writing about gun violence. And as an older legacy artist, he was something else. You know, he was the real thing, James Brown. Who first inspired you musically as far as having a social conscience about what you write about? I guess I would say Bob Dylan because I remember I grew up on pop music like everybody else. Madonna, you know, and I love pop music. in the 80s.

But I remember being about 15 years old and hearing a cassette tape and it was probably Bob Dylan greatest hits volume one and it completely stopped me in my tracks because it expanded my thinking about what a song could do. He has that song,

The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll that is not only socially conscious, politically, you know, potent. But it's an incredible character study. It's so evocative. You can picture what's happening, who this person is, what the feeling in the room is. And it's like a mini movie.

And that's one of those moments, and I've had a few in my life, where I heard music that made all other music sound dumb, you know? Yeah, what a way to put it. It was hard, after that, it was hard to go back to listening

to, I don't know, the Backstreet Boys, or whatever was on the radio at that time. I remember hearing the Velvet Underground for the first time when I was about 20, and hearing that first Velvet Underground album and then absolutely devouring,

all of their four albums and then devouring all of Lou Reed solo. It made a lot of other music sound very trite. Very trite, you know. And I was like, well, I guess I'm going to throw a lot of my records away and start over. But yeah, there's certain people that can cut through with a song. and make you really feel something and maybe understand something. And the most powerful is when a song, like you're talking about socially conscious songs,

instead of teaching you something, it's just showing you something you already knew instinctually. That is when something I think really is nailing it in a song. Do you prefer the subtle approach or the, hit you over the head with a two by four approach? I don't know. You could go both ways, but everything has to come from the music first. See, I'm a musician first, and the lyric side, I've gotten better, but I wake up every day with music in my head more than words, if that makes sense.

and I think that if the music isn't strong, then the song's not going to be good. So from a lyrical perspective, it kind of doesn't, you could be subtle, you could be aggressive, but it has to really match the music. That's what songs are there for. You know, whether it's the melody or the rhythm, it's got to be something that you can feel instantly. Because otherwise you have a poem, you know, which is something else. Let's saunter a little bit more and take us through the evolution of low-cut Connie. Because it's really kind of gone through both the personnel side of evolving. What are you talking about? I've only had 13 drummers.

Isn't it spinal tapings? Oh, man. The day explode? I don't know. A few of them possibly. I don't know. No, I mean, yeah, we've had 25 plus people in the band, and I'm the only consistent through line.

Although I've got to give props to Will Donnelly. My guitar player has been with me for 10 years this fall. He's been with me since the third album. I don't know, Buzz, like things, I just think that you've got to grow and change all the time. I don't like when I hear a musician put music out that's the same thing as they did before. I want to hear a new thing, and it might not be their best, but I like artists that try, you know. Prince was somebody that always changing David Bowie was always changing

Madonna always changing Neil Young you know he's always doing things and every other thing is good and every other thing is terrible but he's always trying something you know I like that so

I guess I have a restless thing with my performance and my music, and so it is always changing and evolving, and I think that's fun. And the fans, most of the fans are stuck with me, so. But it also stems from you tour an awful lot. Yeah, oh yeah. And you always have these performances that are memorable and that people want to come back for more on.

I hope so. initially we were a recording band that couldn't tour because we had the one guy in England and then the two guys in Florida and we would get together a few times a year and the record was being reviewed in Rolling Stone and NPR and USA Today and Guitar World and New York Times,

but we'd only play five shows a year in the beginning. Then the whole script flipped, and we became a live band and built this whole other reputation in the sort of the second chapter. and that's why I really relate to people like Springsteen because initially it was this Columbia Records singer-songwriter identity that he had but then it was this powerful rock and roll show that he toured the country with

over and over and over and over again which I can really relate to that. How difficult was it these COVID years? recorded the quarantine sessions there? I thought the COVID years were fantastic. I am, no, I mean, it was a horrible time, but creatively it was fantastic because Will and I did 100 plus live stream shows with this thing called Tough Cookies. And I became a TV host for a year and a half. and I absolutely

fucking loved it. So I actually really cherish that time because I really I felt like what we were doing was really reaching people and was meaningful to people.

And when you're a musician or an artist, you never know if it means anything to anybody. That was a time I knew it meant something to people. When I saw nurses showing it in the hospitals and the ICU's our show when I saw very ill people sending us messages you know thank you you're keeping me going you're keeping my

spirits up it was fantastic and I decided to just keep doing it until we could tour again which took a year and a half so and you like interviewing I do yeah which is another thing I started doing during the pandemic that I'd never done before. Yeah, I got to interview, oh man, Dion, Frankie Valley. I got one of the last interviews with Mike Nesmith from the monkeys. I interviewed most of the members of Sly and a Family Stone, Larry Graham, Nancy Wilson from Hart, on and on and on.

It was absolutely fantastic. I would imagine as somebody who enjoys being a student of things and always trying to improve upon it, that just like your music with your interviewing approach, you've always kind of gone back and said, well, maybe next time let me tackle it this way or this way. Oh, yeah, you learn. You learn, for sure. and I'd like a redo on a few of those interviews, but you learn. Yeah, I mean, like, that's the thing about any kind of performance you can't, you have to learn by doing,

which means you have to bomb before you can hit, you know? What would you tell somebody now who's a musician on the way up, or trying to be on the the way up? What advice would you give them? You know, it sounds harsh, but it's what I was told when I first started. If you can do anything else, do it. Meaning, it's the people that have such a drive and passion for their, the art life, that they will put themselves in a lifestyle that will be very, very, very, difficult, be very challenging. Most people can't hack that. So you got to really want it bad and be willing to look in the mirror in order to get better at what you do, which is what the real

task is. The hardest part, I don't care if you're a dancer, an actor, a writer, a painter, a singer, whatever you are. The hardest part that people don't want to say is you've got to look in the mirror and self-correct.

You've got to admit when that song is just not good enough, when the show is just not good enough, when you're singing isn't that good, I've got to make it get better, when every aspect of it, you've got to be truthful,

about. If you have the belief that you're as good as you're ever going to be, you should probably quit. That's my Philadelphia attitude, by the way. Somebody else would give you different advice that would be a little more hippie-dippy. That's not me. I came up the hard way, and I think it's fair to tell young, performers, writers, musicians, go out there and do it, and do it over and over again, and fail at it, and then correct. Steve Martin has a book called Born Standing Up that's all about his

stand-up comedy career before he was a movie star, and read that book. It's one of my favorite books about becoming a performer, how many times and in how many different ways did he bomb? And for how long? He tried to do magic, he tried to be a folk singer, he tried to be an impressionist, he tried to be an actor, he tried to be a writer, he tried to do it all, and he did not succeed until he realized what his actual performance should be, which was to combine all of them. Right? Yep.

And the guy's a master now of everything. He became a master. He became a master. He wasn't a born genius. He became a master of his craft. Through a lot of work and a lot of failure. And it's so valuable to go out on stage and feel confident because you know exactly what you're doing and that takes a long time.

So what do you got planned for the rest of the year? Man, I got a new album coming out in three weeks, Art Dealers, September 8th. We're doing a long tour, September October, Eastern U.S. tour. And then I have a film coming out. I made a movie, also called Art Dealers. the film is going to be showing at the Richmond International Film Festival and the Sound Unseen Film Festival. We're going to start doing screenings of it

for the public this winter, and then we'll see what happens with it. And then I'm very excited to say I've got a radio show that I'm going to be doing next year. I'm busy. I don't know what to tell you. What's the radio show going to be? The Connie Club. I did it in 2019.

I did a little quick pilot month that got completely derailed by COVID. And now it's coming back. It's going to be on a radio station here in Philadelphia called WXPN. And I'm going to be live streaming and doing all these fantastic tapings with live guests. It's a variety show. but the whole point of it is that you're getting a live audio broadcast from this fictional dive bar called the Connie Club where all kinds of crazy people hang out and fucked up things happen and it's a crazy Saturday night at the Connie Club. That's great.

WXPN, legendary radio station for sure. and I know radio has some significance to you certainly we talked offline about this a little bit but even on your Jerry Blavitt

tribute if you will yeah well you lived in Philly long enough to know who Jerry is sure some of your listeners probably don't know well I think so I think I think the East Coast word travels yeah you know well if you're listening to this and you don't

I don't know who Jerry Blavitt, aka the Geeter with the Heater, was, look it up. He was the ultimate, ultimate DJ, the ultimate exciter in the room. And I don't think it's wrong to say he was an absolute icon in Philadelphia, like one of the most famous people in the city, if you know what I mean? Everybody knew him. I would say so. All through his radio. Yeah. Yeah.

But I think, yeah, the East Coast words, I remember first before I was doing work down in Philadelphia, another person who I think you and your performance remind me of is Pete Wolf, the Wolf of Goofa. I remember him talking about the heater, the heater with the Geter. Yeah, I mean, that's from a generation of DJs that were really entertainers. They weren't just the people that hit play. they were the entertainers themselves, you know. So in closing, do you have any concept of where our society would be if music wasn't such an active part of it?

Well, it's trite, but I think it's true. Even in my kind of pessimistic view of things, music really is the connecting glue between people. There's every reason you can think of now that people would be divided and antagonistic and disconnected, right? In a very acrimonious way. Like we're going through something now in the United States that we don't understand the changes that are happening right now in the United States culturally,

that other countries with longer histories have gone through before. They've gone through periods of time with, you know, fascist regimes and neighbors, you know, ratting on each other to the government and all kinds of terrible things that other countries have gone through, and now we're just starting to go through this really increased period of animosity between people, culturally. It's a sad thing. Music is probably the only thing we have, maybe sports, but music, but that's team versus team. Music is a thing that absolutely unites people. And I know this firsthand, because I do shows. I do these free shows in the summer where I go to towns and counties and do these public events

where anyone can show up. Black, white, gay, straight, Republican Democrat, old, young, whatever, you get everybody at these shows. And the scene is set for animosity. Let me tell you, I've walked down on stage in situations where people were already screaming at each other. And it's my job to try to find a pathway through music that I can actually get them all together. It's challenging, but you can do it. Without music, you can't. It's a fundamental need that we have is the need for music in our society.

I wish it was valued more. I wish it was valued more in our society, in our schools, and in our public sphere, but I see it firsthand the power of music. I have fans, people that come to my shows and follow me who are absolutely on the opposite side of the political spectrum for me, and they let me know it. And I work hard to try to keep them at the table. Maybe I'll change.

their perspective, maybe I won't, but I still welcome them into the room on the offhand chance that they might see a broader spectrum in our society. Right? It's a lot of work, but it's worth it, I think. I think it's definitely worth it, and I'm so grateful we got to put some steps on in Columbus Square Playground. playground. We draught around the park. Yeah. It was a sorter at times. We debated going in the pool over there, but I think that would have gotten a little strange with the kids. I look too good for that. I can't. Adam, thanks for taking a walk. I appreciate it, man. My man. Taking a walk with Buzz Night is available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

When a group of women discover they've all dated the same. prolific con artist. They take matters into their own hands. I vowed. I will be his last target. He is not going to get away with this. He's going to get what he deserves. We always say that trust your girlfriends.

Listen to the girlfriends. Trust me, babe. On the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. In 2023, Bachelor star Clayton Eckerd was accused of fathering twins. But the pregnancy appeared to be a hoax. You doctored this particular test twice, Ms. Owens, correct? I doctored the test once. It took an army of internet detectives to uncover a disturbing pattern.

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Listen to a love trapped podcast on the EyeHour Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What's up, everyone? I'm Ego Vodam. My next guest, it's Will Ferrell. Woo, woo, woo, woo. My dad gave me the best advice ever. He goes, just give it a shot.

But if you ever reach a point where you're banging your head against the wall and it doesn't feel fun anymore, it's okay to quit. If you saw it written down, it would not be an inspiration. It would not be on a calendar of, you know, The cat, just hang in there. Yeah, it would not be. Right, it wouldn't be that. There's a lot of luck.

Listen to Thanks, Dad, on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, I'm Bob Pittman, Chairman and CEO of IHeart Media, and I'm kicking off a brand new season of my podcast, Math and Magic, stories from the Frontiers of Marketing. Math and Magic takes you behind the scenes of the biggest businesses and industries while sharing insights from the smartest minds in marketing. Coming up this season on Math and Magic, CEO, of Liquid Death Mike Cesario. People think that creative ideas are like these light bulb moments that happen when you're in the shower. It's really like a stone sculpture. You're constantly just chipping away and refining.

Take to Interactive CEO Strauss Selnick and our own chief business officer, Lisa Coffey. Listen to Math and Magic on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. This is an IHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human.