The Glenn Beck Program - Ep 123 | Why Is a Grammy-Nominated Artist BLACKBALLED by Music Industry? | John Ondrasik | The Glenn Beck Podcast

Episode Date: October 30, 2021

John Ondrasik started playing piano when he was three. Thirty years later, as Five for Fighting, he found himself playing beside his musical heroes at Madison Square Garden after his song “Superman (It’s Not Easy)” became an anthem for the fallen heroes of 9/11. On this episode of the Glenn Beck Podcast, Ondrasik and Glenn chat about music, fame, songwriting, freedom, and the strange power of “Let’s Go Brandon.” He plays “Freedom Never Cries,” “100 Years,” and his latest single, “Blood on My Hands,” which is a protest song, a good one, about Joe Biden’s disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan. “Afghanistan is not a political cause,” Ondrasik tells Glenn. “It’s a moral cause.” Hollywood used to celebrate subversive protest music, so why is one of America's most celebrated ballad artists being ignored by the mainstream?  Sponsor:  Built Bar - The makers of Built Bar understand that flavor comes first. And whether it’s the mint brownie flavor, salted caramel, cookies ’n' cream, or any of their other amazing flavors, you can rest assured that real chocolate and great taste came first. But they’re also healthy. Low-calorie, low-carb, high in protein and high in fiber. BUILT.com Use promo code “BECK15" to save 15% off your first order.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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to the world entire. Trouve of little enterprises like on other. On Amazon.ca. There are a handful of ways that you can find the truth. But music is one of those that speak to our soul.

It's part of our DNA, our experience. It is just, a irremovable part of our human story. It allows us to express something deeper than we can imagine or express in words. Music comes before words. In America, music means something even more special, beginning with Thomas Edison's invention of the phonograph that was here, which allowed music to be recorded for the first time in human history. In the time since, we have given the world Elvis, the Blues, rock and roll.

I would say country music as well, but I think that's more Scottish. But everything else, distinctly American, jazz, distinctly American. Any American cultural landmark, good or bad, is attached to a song or an album. New York, New York, I left my heart in San Francisco. It is also, there were musical movements, the 60s. On September 11th, a little bit of America's innocence died right in front of us, and so much of that day is still inexpressible. But in the quiet days that followed 9-11, a song by today's guests spoke to us. Spoke to us when we needed it most, and it was everywhere.

You heard it. If you lived in those times, you heard it and you know it. And I'm willing to bet at least one of the times you heard it, there were tears. in your eyes. And that's because it connected you to that moment and to America, to America's heroes. When you listen to it, you understand the struggles of the every man and Superman. And I'm not talking about the Superman of 2021, whose struggles as, which outfit should I wear? I'm talking about the Christ-like Superman who inspired us to be more heroic, truth, justice, and the American way.

This puts our guest today into a rare category of musicians willing to express American values, let alone doing it in a memorable way. He is a musician. He began playing the piano at the age three. Since then, he has excelled as a songwriter, a producer and a performer with a Grammy nomination, multi-platinum and gold singles and albums. His songs have appeared in roughly 350 movies, advertisements, TV shows, including the Sopranos.

He has spent a lot of his musical career performing for veterans and active duty military. He wrote his latest single, Blood on My Hands, in response to the tragic suicide bombing in Kabul earlier this year, which left 13 American heroes dead. Today, the man known as

Five for Fighting, John Andrassic. Now, you may not know this about me, but I'm a man of taste, meaning I like to taste a lot of things. And I like to do it a lot, especially if they're made with chocolate. My favorite time of the day is snack time. My two favorite times of the year, Halloween and Christmas. Guess why?

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Get your built bar right now by going to built.com. That's built.com. Use the promo code Beck 15 and you'll save 15% off your first order. It's built.com. promo code Beck 15. I am fascinated by songwriters because you can do something that I can't even imagine. being able to put emotion into music, and then it just lives on forever.

And it affects, I mean, there's a song I asked you to bring. When's the last time you sang it? God, it has to be over five, six years. Okay. And I loved it when I first heard it, and I think it is more appropriate. today and I can't tell you how many times I've listened to the song and you know you never knew but I you were influencing me for the whole time I'm honored thank you so um I'm just play it and I want to

talk about the lyrics because I just think it is so appropriate for today this is freedom never cries I took a flag to a poncher for a broken guitar that guitar I took a flag to a pawn shop I got me that guitar a bagging a pawn shop to me I saw a man on the TV

with a mess and a gun on the TV I saw a man on the TV his son had a gun and he says that he's coming for me culture about tomorrow

to God when somebody's about to die I never cherish freedom because freedom never cried wrote a song for a dead man to settle my soul

for a dead man in the cold when somebody's about to die I never cherished freedom Freedom never cry You can cry for her You can die for her Lay down your life for her

Kiss and wave goodbye to her Anything at all Cry for her and die for her Make up your mind to anything at all There's a baby on the doorstep Whaling away There's a baby on the doorstep for the day.

There's a baby on the doorstep would give his life to take. A flag to a pawn shop. Bled to a pawn shop. May he forget why he is crying? Fantastic. Oh, thanks, Glenn. Just fantastic.

Thank you. I mean, it is. First, tell me when you said, I wrote a song for a dead man and now I'll never die. What does that mean? Well, sometimes to what you just said, I wrote a song for a dead man and now I'll never grow old, the songs last, right? I'll be gone, but the songs last. And I think as artists, your paintings, right, will outlive you. So we can still have an influence when we're gone. Yeah. And I think that's important for artists to realize. Because as you also said, once you write the song, it's not yours anymore. You kind of give it out to the world and the world. world does with it what it wants to. But yeah, I wrote that song kind of after the Iraq war and and then of course after 9-11 when we saw the images of, you know, children with AK-47s, you know,

being brainwashed by their parents. It was so disturbing. And that was the first time I'm like, you know, do we really understand how much we are blessed to have freedom? Because when you grow up with it and it's everything you know, it just becomes a fact of life. And you don't, you don't expect that it could ever go away. So how did you come up with the Freedom Never Cries line? You know, it's funny. People take that many different ways. And sometimes I hesitate about talking about lyrics because some people may have a meaning that has nothing to do with what I wrote it about, which is great. Because people, what they'll do is they'll take music and they'll apply to their lives in the way that's best for them. So for me, um, for you. Um, for you, um, for you. Um, um, for you, um,

freedom never cries is about the fact that freedom doesn't wave its hand and say, hey, I'm in trouble. I'm over here. Something's going wrong. It just kind of is there. And then one day maybe it's shrinking. And maybe one day it's not. And here we are probably 15 years after I wrote that song. And I think we're certainly seeing that reality of freedom shrinking. And the only people crying are folks like, you and and folks that are saying, hey, this is, this is dangerous, us. Yeah. Yeah. The baby on the doorstep. Yeah.

When I first heard those lyrics, because I couldn't understand them the first couple of times, I listened. And when I understood that the baby is crying and would give anything. Yes. Just to go, sell a flag for a guitar at a pawn shop. Yeah. is so profound. So profound. Yeah, I think, you know, we see so many people in countries who would give their lives

so their children could experience the freedom we have. You had one on your radio show today talking about that. And the fact that we take it so for granted. And there's a reason people want to come here. I mean, we're seeing that in Afghanistan right now. You know, we had, there were people that understood freedom for 20 years and didn't understand a world without it. And now they're smashed back into a time warp of tyranny. That really happens in the world, you know, Cuba, go, you know, Iran.

It's something that I think in the West we just take for granted. And if you don't stand up for it, you may, you may risk losing it. And I see, I see the possibility of that. Isn't it's so bizarre that we're living in a world now where the artists are on the wrong side, it seems to me. Yeah. You have had, we've talked about this before, you have Eric Clapton coming out against these mandates, writing a song, singing a song, and everybody butchering him. Yeah. You know, your song, which we're going to get to blood on my hands in a second.

you're few and far between where, you know, the song by the Beatles Revolution. Yeah. Was the answer to the revolutionaries coming to them and saying, we're this close. We just, if you'll join us, we can overthrow it at all, overthrow all of it. And they said at the time, if you're carrying around a picture of Mow, nobody wants to hear you. Right. Okay. where is that understanding? Where's the culture? Are they, are, do they actually, every artist actually

believes this is the right track? They can't see it. Or are they just afraid? I think it's both. I think certainly the group think and the tribal nature of the arts, it's hard to overcome, especially when you're raised in the art schools where there's only one worldview. It takes a really brave, courageous thinking person to question the orthodoxy. So I think, you know, that kind of reality. And the fact is in that community, everybody's talking to themselves and they don't listen to any outside ideas. But there are people.

Wait, wait, wait, wait. I was lucky enough to meet a very, very famous painter. who his art is not art that I necessarily like. Yeah. It's very modern. Yeah. Peter Max. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Okay. Peter, I was talking about something on the radio and he said, I want to talk to you. Come over to my studio. So I went over to his studio. And he showed me a painting and he said, you like that, don't you? And I said, it's stunning. I mean, it was photographic in its quality. And it was this beautiful.

a woman beautiful beautiful painting and he said i hate that painting and i said why and he said because i could never get it to look the way i wanted it to look everybody else will look at it and say it's beautiful but i only see the flaws yeah then he told me you know peter max is known not for photographic painting right said i used to go to time magazine this is back in the 60s when they never took photographs uh and used them for the cover they were always paintings yeah and he said i would bring my painting every week because the guy at time who was in charge of the cover liked my work but he never bought any of it i never did one he said and then one day uh he said quite honestly it was after a weekend of me getting high and just having fun and i was just doodling stuff yeah he said i was doing

spaceships and a bubble writing and everything else he said uh that monday i went into his office and i had all my artwork ready for him he said and he opens it up and he pulls it out and i'm on the other side and he pulls it up and he looks at it and he says Peter this is genius and he's like what are you talking about I've been showing you the same crap every week right and he said hold on and he goes and he gets all the artists on the floor he said you guys come in here he's like what is there's nothing different it's the same photographic quality he realized when he pulled it out to show all of the artist oh my gosh this is the stuff I did over the weekend just for me Right.

And he said, and the guy said, this is the language of a generation. Wow. And that came to the yellow submarine kind of. Wow. You know, all of that. Wow. And so I wonder, in a, in a world of artists where you're, you should be encouraged to break the mold, encouraged to go another direction.

How does that not translate? You know, again, I think there is a fear. You know, most artists are not financially independent. Many of them have families. And they're afraid that if they go against the status quo, that this passive blackballing, it's never, oh, you're canceled. You just don't get hired. Or people don't, you know, they don't,

give you a showing. And it's a livelihood thing. And it's just, it's scary. I do think folks are getting a little bit more brave when a few more folks speak out. And they understand that it's not just threatening maybe the political worldview, it's threatening their ability to make art.

Because, you know, we've moved from a place where it's about the battle for, the battle of ideas to the battle for us. ideas. And I think so many of us, like I started following all these people on Substack who I don't agree with. Barry Weiss, Matt Taibi, Glenn Greenwald. Why do I agree with what they say? Usually not. But you know what? They've been canceled by their own tribe. And those people need to be able to speak out. And they understand the danger of it. And I have become friends with many of them. Yes. And we don't agree.

on everything, but we found that we agree on a lot more than we ever thought. And we agree that we should have a conversation. And we agree that, you know, to solve issues, we have to have the argument of ideas. And especially Barry Weiss, when the Times, you know, I thought the Times thing with Cotton was an illuminating moment because we've always heard about, you know, the indoctrination of colleges, the indoctrination of colleges. but we really haven't seen it in the real world beyond kind of our kids coming home and, you know, hating their parents. But when we saw the kind of Lord of the Flies take over the New York Times, it was, to me, it was not only scary.

It was like, oh, my God, it's now the fruition of this indoctrination is coming into all of our media powers. And that to me was really scary. And our offices. And our offices. And our government. And the people who give us the news, who we allow. elect to Congress. So I think that to me was a big wake-up call. And how else are we going to fight it? You know, the arts has a way of breaking through that wall. I mean, we saw it today. What have you

been talking about on your show today? Chappelle. Blood on my hands. Let's go Brandon's song. We're not talking about some speech by Pelosi or, you know, whatever, you know, the Republicans are whining about today. We're talking about artists. it transcends. It goes around. It goes over. It goes under. They know that. That's that's the left has cornered that market. Yes. Long time ago. Yes. I was talking to a very famous painter in New York who will remain nameless at least until he decides. Yeah. And he's close. Good. But he's he's one of the best artists known in America today. Yeah. And he said, you know, it has been systematic. He said, there's a reason why conservatives have deer paintings, paintings of tanks, planes, and the American flag.

He said, because that's what you've been dealt. Everything else has been pushed over to the other side. They began to ridicule great masters. Yeah. And that's relegated over here. And they've encouraged all this other. And so this other realm that is the popular art, he said that's all indoctrinated. And if you like realism, you'll generally get the red, white, and blue, and it's all pushed over there.

And he said, that's by design. It is not by chance. Well, let me tell you a story that I think maybe illustrates of you I have. Because you're right, we have seeded the arts. And my dear buddy Andrew Breitbart would always talk about politics being downstream of culture. the Republican Party and the conservative movement, especially the leaders, have zero understanding of the power of the arts. Zero. Zero.

I was asked to play the Republican convention when McCain was running. And this was, you know, when W. was the devil. You know, he was his prove ratings at 12%. But I love McCain. I wrote a song about him, Last Great American. And I said, okay, I'll play. And they said, all right, we want you to play right after W. I'm like, oh, geez, really?

You really want to throw me in the fire? I said, okay. And this was the time that Obama was having. Remember the Greek column rock concerts with every star in the world? And it was just like, you know, the production. It was like the most amazing concert of the decade and just like the biggest stars with the firewood.

works and everything. So I said, okay, guys, I'll do it. I believe in the cause. I'll need a piano. And they came back, the R&C came back, said, well, we have budget for a keyboard. Oh, my gosh. And I said, guys, you're asking me to basically throw my career in the toilet. I'm going to play Freedom Never Cries. I just need a piano because it needs, you know, it needs to have the piano. It can't be sitting at a keyboard. We just came off Obama's like concert for the gods. to say, no, no, we have a budget for a keyboard. And I go, never mind. But that reflects the complete, even with blood on my hands, it's a song that most of the country agrees with. It's a song, frankly, that plays very well to the base of our side. It certainly wouldn't if I wrote about Trump, which I would have. But even our members of Congress,

they don't understand the power of the arts. And they don't understand the tools that we have that can change the narrative. They like to hear themselves talk. They like their brands on Twitter. But when you actually give them content, they wind their whole careers about, oh, we have nobody in the arts, nobody's on our side. Nobody understands a worldview. And when you give it to them, not only they not know what to do with it, they don't understand the power of it. So I think we need to elect people, you know, elect people that understand that nobody wants to hear your speech. They really don't, you know.

They don't really, really, you know, it's great you have two million followers on Twitter. But if you want to move the needle of the culture, you got to embrace. embrace the artist who are willing to sacrifice their careers for your worldview. It's amazing to me because I've always felt that there's front of house and back of house. Yeah. And both are important. If conservatives, generally speaking, were back of house, it'd be a disaster. Right.

Let the artist do what they do. But the artists need to understand if they're running the final. finances, and they're running everything else. It's a disaster. Right. And that's what we've forgotten, the two wings of the eagle, left and right, the back of house, front of house. We're both necessary. Yes. We're both necessary. Yes. And we don't have to seat it to the left, especially now, especially when we see parents rising. We see the country rising up. You know, you get it because you're an artist, right? You're actually an artist. You understand how someone walks in and sees one of your paintings and has a reaction that you could not get by talking to them for 10 years.

Yep. You see that, okay? Our side doesn't get it. I shouldn't say all of them, but most of them don't. And I'm actually having some conversations with some who I think do, but I think that's really a powerful, it's a powerful arm of this culture war is don't seat it to the left. Call them out. Yes.

Call them out. And especially on something like Afghanistan, which we all know in our hearts, I guarantee you, you know, that. The people that write the songs about oppression and civil rights and humanity and write much better songs than I do, they know we're right on Afghanistan. And they need to be encouraged or pushed to join this cause because it is not a political cause. It is a moral cause. And I hope they do. Play the song.

Play this song. Sure. It's amazing. It has given me a great deal of hope that while what I saw. saw on television just horrified me. Yeah. Horrified me. Also at the same time, the response, all of us still know that's dishonorable. Yes. That's dishonorable. And as long as we have that in our hearts and that in common, we can come back together. I think you're right. Got blood on my hands. Got blood on my hands. And I don't understand.

There's blood on these hands. There's still Americans. The left of the Taliban. Mato. Never mind. Got blood on a flag of the Taliban. Afghanistan. Take a drip and hear her scream.

If she's not, she's not, she's not on TV. That way. Behind. Every child who won't know free. Just one American. What's happening? What was the moment? What did you see on TV?

What were you feeling when? Because I know you said you beat on the piano for a while, not intending on writing anything. Did you write a guitar or the piano? I actually wrote it on piano. And what was the thing that pushed you to go? Yeah, I think, you know, when the 13 soldiers were killed, I was so angry because I think we all thought that could have been prevented with better planning and just honesty and running a humanitarian military operation, not a political one.

But it really became a song when I was driving to Mammoth with my wife and my son and we had just left Afghanistan. The last soldier had left. And I got a call from a friend actually who's just called today to talk to you guys. and she's an amazing person. She does incredible humanitarian work around the world. She's kind of my hero. Unsung, nobody will ever know her name. If you can ever convince her, I'd like people to know her name. People should know her name.

And we will tell the stories of the heroes. And she called me, I hadn't talked to where she says, I need a contact. I'm organizing evax of AMSITs from Afghanistan and me being just the singer dude. I'm like, what's an AMSIT? She's like, American citizen.

And so, and it was quiet on the phone. And after a while I said, so you're risking your life to go rescue American citizens we left behind. And she's kind of started choking up and she said, yes, who's going to do it if not us? And so that made me very angry. It became very personal. Yeah. Very personal.

And that night I kind of wrote the blood on my hands. And then I was working on it, again, still wasn't sure I was going to put anything out. I was just writing it for cathartic reasons. And then a few days later, I was driving back from swim, class and I was listening to some of the excerpts from the president's extraordinary success speech. And also, even more impactful for me was Millie and Austin's coming out very soon after that, which I hope they would qualify it. I hope they were going to come out and say, look, this really was an extraordinary success.

And there's things like Bogrom and there's things like the deadline that maybe we should talk about. But they did not. They came out and said, what a great airlift. Can you guys look at the greatest airlift? Greatest book of World Records airlift. And that made me very angry and scared. Scared. Scared.

Why? I've always expected our generals to be the adults in the room. Okay. And our presidents can do kooky things. We saw it with the last president. We see it with this president. And I've always felt if it's really critical, if it's something that risks our natural security, if it's the American promise, if it's something that's to do with honor, our generals will

do the right thing. And they did not. And I'm like, this is an Orwellian exercise. This is an Orwellian movie we're watching. And then I thought, well, yeah, Afghanistan's really a horrible thing, but it's not a geopolitical risk to our survival. But I'm like, if I'm freaking China right now, if I'm Russia right now, if I'm celebrating, I ran right now, I'm going, maybe now's the time. So that night driving home, I was like, I need to write a song. And Blinken, too. You know, Blinking's saying, oh, our allies are with us just the night before. Allies are with us.

We didn't. Biden didn't take the call from the British Prime Minister for 40-some hours. Well, he said that the day after Parliament condemned us. Oh, gosh, crazy. I was literally felt like I was watching Baghdad Bob. You know, remember Baghdad Bob our buddy? I'm literally going, is this really the world we're living in? So driving home, I'm like, I need to write a song calling out Blinking, Millie, and Austin, and the president.

And I'm like, well, maybe it's the same song. So I got home and I wrote the kind of chorus part, and I wrote the lines about Millie, Blinking, and Austin. You know, sometimes songs. Do you remember how it first sounded when you first started writing? Yeah. Can you play that? Yeah. I mean, you know, General Austin is there no honor and shame.

Can you spell Bacharham without the letters in blame? It was very like, very nice. You know, it sounded like... It doesn't sound like that now. It sounds like a nice Fyfer funny song. You know, it sounds like, you know, there's a nice melancholy song, you know. And I knew singing it that it had to have a different tone.

So I started experimenting with some vintage organs. Because to me, I'm like, I want this to have... Like a B3? No. like some old some old kind of sample like an old church organ yeah I was going through my samples

because I wanted the tone of the the first version to reflect Vietnam because this was Vietnam on steroids even though they were trying not to do it so I found an organ and I kind of created this track same chords

with this vibe kind of like a no quarter Led Zeppelin vibe that really kind of you know, the Neil Young songs, Dylan, and all it is in that track is a shaker, shaker, shaker, that organ and a vocal. And I think that's why that initial track was relatively powerful, because it was very slow.

If there was not much instrumentation, it was really all about the words. And I was really happy when folks said, hey, this reminds me of like a 60s protest song. It is. It is. It is. Yeah.

And so that's kind of, and then I... It reminds me of Ohio. Every time I hear it, I think of that song. Well, those, again, I grew up on those artists. And I wanted this song to have that historical, musical tone. So when people hear it, even the folks are like, oh, this is not Vietnam. No, it really is. You know, 10 times, 100 times, thousand times worse.

But so that was kind of my plan there. It's, it was strangely, it was. scary to see the generals act the way they did. Yeah. But really a relief to see how no one broke the chain of command. Yeah. This was not an illegal order. No.

It was just a really bad order. Yes. And you know and I know, because I know a lot of people were there, you probably know a lot of people were there. That was killing them inside. And yet we still held order. It was the generals and the administration, but the average person that was, you know, in our arms forces, they did the right thing. And that, while I was horrified by what the Pentagon was doing, I had hope because I thought, okay, well, they're holding it together. And I know that they're seething about it.

So many in the State Department. You know, when I go out and play this song live, I'll have folks. come up to me after. We've talked a lot about veterans and their response to this song and how it's helping be a voice for their pain and shame. But the active, that's the fascinating thing. The active will come to me and say, you know, thank you for saying this. Many of us agree with your sentiments, but we can't say it because we will be court-martialed. We will be kicked out of the academy. And I understand chain of command. You can't have everybody rising up against against the leadership.

On the other hand, what I expected when the president gave his speech, and this is what a lot of the troops tell me. And again, this is not some singer dude. When this happened, I call Tulsi Gabbard. Because number one, I wanted someone who was not a Republican,

not on the right, and someone who was a former military. And I said, Tulsi, Voice of America just called me. They want me to play the song and they want me to talk to the troops. And I go, I want to make sure when I'm talking to our troops around the world, I'm saying the right thing.

Tell me what they're feeling. Tell me their sentiments. Are they as angry at Millie as I am? Do they think he sold out his honor? And she was very helpful to me. She said, yes, people are very angry at the leadership. They feel that if you're a grunt on the lines and you make a mistake, whether it's your fault or not, you are held accountable. and they feel these guys will probably get $100,000 keynotes and book deals. And they cause this mess. But she said, you know what? You have to tell the troops. Say, this is not your fault. You served with honor.

You served with honor. You protected the soldier next to you. And again, this is not even about giving freedom to Afghanistan. We all want to save the world. We want to save everybody. But the troops' job is to protect the person next to you and follow orders. They served with honor. and the fact that their leaderships did not.

And I, look, it's the first time that I have ever seen in my lifetime. I know we've been dishonorable in the past. But the first time in my lifetime to where I saw dishonor. And it was like a punch in the face over and over and over again. I was so humiliated and so sad. for what we were showing the rest of the world. We were suddenly the people that the left says we are. Yes.

You know, we all of a sudden were people that just cared about getting out, and we don't care about anything else. And it was so dishonorable. I didn't even know how to deal with it at first. I still don't. I mean, I wrote a song, right? You get on the air and you cry and you talk about it. We're all trying to deal with it in our own way.

But again, the dishonor to me is Austin and Millie not resigning. I remember when Cotton asked Millie, why didn't you resign? If you gave all these suggestions that were ignored. I mean, how many generals resigned in the Trump administration? 270? If you gave all these orders and you were ignored and this historical disaster, the greatest American shame is on your watch, Why didn't you resign? And you know what Millie said?

He said, because that would be a political act. And I almost fell off my couch laughing. The guy's been the biggest political actor for 20 years. He was the one that came out and said, what a great airlift. He was the one who's been leaking to the press during the Trump administration. There's even an article in the Wall Street Journal about he was suppressing Iraq investigations. So this guy's been a political hack for 20 years. And for him to come out and say, I wouldn't resign.

because it was a political act, I think is so disgusting. And to me, talking to the troops and people doing Evax, I think more than anybody, they are disgusted with Millie and his kind of behavior and his lack of honor. And our troops are too. But I always tell the troops, I go, look, he may not be held accountable by the Biden administration, but history will hold him accountable.

Oh, this is going to be remembered. Yep. It will be remembered. Let me, how long did this, take you a night? Once I had the kind of milly lines and then frankly we haven't talked about the most important lines of the song and the most important lines of the song which are more relevant now than ever are the I can't hear her scream if she's not on TV.

Because I saw already when I was writing, finishing the song that the media, as soon as our last soldier left, the media basically decided to move on. So let me ask you, what that, because I've thought about this a lot. Yeah. What the hell is wrong with us? We are paying the highest prices in gas we have paid, and I don't know how long. When Bush was in, you know, the media would talk about the price of gas and everyone on the planet was that's all they were talking about was the price of gas. If the media, which nobody trusts, nobody really is even watching.

If they don't bring it up, we don't talk about it. Yeah. And it can just disappear. What is what is that? It's dangerous. It's not a democracy. When one wing of the mainstream media, when one powerful media organization,

which is everybody but talk radio and Fox and Blaze, has the narrative. It's incredibly dangerous for a democracy. And I hate to do the what aboutism, but we know if Trump was president. Oh my gosh. CNN, you know what? I'm proud to say,

And I think I can say the same for you. You would have reacted exactly the same way as you did, and I know I would have. Oh, yeah. If Donald Trump did exactly the same thing, I would have lost my mind. The names would, the song would remain the same. Only the names would change. And here's another thing. Beyond CNN having there how many Americans trapped in Afghanistan counter 24-7 that they'd be running,

Donald Trump would have been impeached and removed. Yes. He would have been impeached deservedly so. Yes. And that is, again, and removed. And removed. He would have been removed. I feel very confident about that, you know, talking to many of our Republican senators who are, especially the veteran senators who are just incensed.

And that is not healthy for this country when everything is decided about what tribe you're in, whether it's the music, the media. And I don't, I think, you know, Breitbart said this 20 years ago. He's like, the media is the great danger to our Republicans. public. It is. And I would say the same thing if we had 90% of Republicans teaching our kids and 90% of Republican talking points on every television station. That is the biggest threat to this country. And you do a great job trying to fight that. Other folks do. But it's tough for folks who don't, you know, they're at the airport. There's one TV and they get nobody. I mean, the CNN Town Hall the other day, not one question on Afghanistan. Not one.

So that tells me they're an arm of the Democratic Party, which, again, it's just disturbing and scary, but that's where the arts come in. Yeah. Let me take you to another song, because I've heard you talk about it took you 30 minutes to write Superman. I don't know if that's true. Is that true? I would say 45 for the most. And I know that other songs have taken months to write. Didn't the 100 years?

Yeah. Took you months to write. The riddle took a year. Yeah. Yeah. What's the different? What happens? I guess if you could explain that, you would solve it.

Yeah, I think Superman, I look at it as a gift. It wasn't blood on my hands the same kind of gift. Blood of my hands came very quickly. it almost felt like I didn't write it because it was also a very different kind of song for me right it doesn't sound necessarily like you it doesn't fit into like the hundred years Superman guy

but that that came quickly too I think it does and I want to get to this later it does fit the guy who has written I mean you're one of the only people that I know that's writing popular music that is American you know I think the greatest

the only one that does PR for the American way of life is Ralph Lauren. I think he is the best advertisement for America. Yeah. He still believes in it. Yeah. He doesn't run from it. Right. He's not ashamed of it.

Right. He knows it. Right. And you have something, and we'll get into it with your childhood and growing up, but you have something in you that is very American. Well, my first record was America Town. You know, I've written Last Great American, two lights. I mean, I do write a lot about the country and our troops and freedom.

I guess that's just what I care about. You know, Superman. I always say, you know, I'm not a very religious man, but that was a gift from God. Somebody gave that to me. Where did it start? You know, it was just, you know, it was a time in my life I was writing thousands of songs and I sat down one night like I did every night and I kind of, you know, as songwriters and artists, we like to have kind of symbolism and play off them. And I was feeling, you know,

down in the dumps like most artists, young artists who are not being heard and woe was me, nobody wants to, I'm not David Lee Roth kicking, you know, doing backflips at the forum. And so it was kind of a, I wouldn't call it a selfish song, but a song about a young person, afraid to be heard. It's not easy to be me. And with this thought of, you know, what if Superman, you know, was human? And, you know, it's hard to be the rock for everybody, you know.

And at the end of the day, we're just doing the best we can. So I kind of took that symbolism and wrote Superman as a human being. and I think that kind of iconic kind of hero who I guess Superman does not fight the American way anymore, but I guess fights about tomorrow, which again disgust me. He fights the American way. Yeah, he does fight the American way. But then so I wrote the song and people, I think, took that sentiment in. Yeah, the Superman we have now is an imposter.

That's right. He's an imposter. Yes, yes. All right. Can you play it? Take us through it. Superman that does fight for the American way. I can't stand a fly.

I'm not that night. I'm just out more than a bird and some pretty face beside a train and it's not he. It may sound absurd. Don't be not he. It's not he. I'm not crazy or anything. I can't stand a fly looking for special things and not.

inside of me. It's not easy. 45 minutes of work. Thank you, God. Just amazing. And the idea of Superman digging for kryptonite. Yeah, he just wants to feel. You know, he wants to feel something. Sometimes I think we try to be the rock for everybody and

take care of everyone else but ourselves, especially those of us who are kind of ambitious and like to win. But if you don't, you know, if you don't care of take care of yourself first. It's hard to take care of everyone else. And I think that has been what's so many, I think, have found in Superman, especially men. So did you know that was a hit? No. No. I, I, it wasn't. So do you have that sense when it's a hit? No. I mean, I knew, it wasn't even our first single. I had a song called Easy Tonight, which was kind of a guitar rock song that was a number one song on AAA radio, but didn't cross. So,

10,000 records, which is nothing in the business. But it gave me a chance for one more song. And the label said, all right, you get one more. And I'm like, well, if I'm going over the cliff, I noticed that when I played Superman, people listened. In a way, they didn't listen to the other songs. I go, well, if I'm going to go off the cliff, let's go with Superman. And they're like, no, it's too slow.

The radio's not playing piano singer-songwriters. That's why we had you call yourself five for fighting. because the male singer-songwriter is dead. It's the age of Lilith Fair, boy bands, grunge music. And I said, well, if I'm going to, you know, if this is it, I'm going to go with Superman. And they're like, all right, it's your career. Sorry. And radio did not want to play it initially.

It didn't fit their formats. But a few, back in the day, there were a few program directors that could take a chance. And it started reacting. People started calling. But even then, it was kind of hit a tipping point. But it could have gone away in a week. but a few people stuck with it and then once it once it kind of started to be heard it became what it became yeah I was a I was a

programmer for years and years yeah yeah yeah and uh it used to you know pick hits yeah in the days when that actually yeah happen and uh it's weird because I don't have this ability anymore but back then I could hear a song ago hit yeah hit hit hit yeah and it must be frustrating as a writer because you you must write things and go, oh my gosh, this is just everything to me. And it goes nowhere. Is there a song that you, is there anything that is like that that you're like, if anything could be a hit, it would be this one for me? It's funny because after Superman, how do you follow that too?

Yeah. You have this song that's concert for New York, this kind of impact on the country. You'll never have anything like that again. Hang on just a second. Let's go there for a second. How did that happen? Wasn't there a paramedic that contacted you about Superman from 9-11? Well, I was in London on 9-11.

I was over there. Actually, we're going to start to launch Superman. I just got in there. When the first plane hit, I was like everybody else stunned. And when the second plane hit, I started calling everybody I knew in New York to see if they were okay. But, you know, you might remember there were no flights for a week. Everybody was trapped. I canceled all my concerts.

I sat in my hotel room. I was just, you know, numb like everyone. And I got a sense that people were starting to use Superman to play on their news programs to pay tribute to the firefighters and first responders. but I didn't get a sense until I landed at O'Hare. I literally kissed the tarmac. I was so happy to be home. And I did start getting emails from our families who lost loved ones. And I kind of saw especially in New York with Scott Shannon and some of those folks really

embraced Superman. And a few weeks later, I got a call from my friend Rick Crim, who was the head of VH1, an old friend of mine. And he said, hey, we're doing this concert for New York. And I'm like, oh, that's amazing. and McCartney's doing it. I'm like, that's great. He's like, we'd like you to play.

I'm like, really? I just like a ticket. Can I just have a ticket? And I was scared to death, but then I was like, yeah, I mean, the song is kind of reflecting a lot of that. And I remember that the day I went to Madison Square Garden, you know, any other day in my life, it would have been heaven on earth.

Like all my living influences were there. You know, McCartney, Townsend, Elton, Billy. And I expected, it's funny, I expected to be like really early. I'm like one of the new guys. There was a four-hour concert, right? So I kept, I opened the itinerary, and I kept paging looking for me. And there was only like two pages left.

And I'm like, oh, thank God they forgot me. I'll just like sit there. And I turned to the last page and it's like, John Cougar, five for fighting, Elton, John, Janet Jackson, show over. Oh my gosh. Or Paul McCartney. And then the nerves really started. I go, this can't be, this can't be.

So I kind of sat around for three hours and the Hoos trailer was next to me. And that was bouncing up and down. I thought that was cool. And so I remember walking out there. And funny story, I really never talked about this. So I got out there. And as you remember, it was a live show, 27 million people watching. Everybody who was everybody.

And they'd had a lot of technical problems because it's a live show. put it together last minute. So I had these in ears in, and I had my cello player, Vic, sitting here, and I'm sitting at the piano, you know, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, you know, and they couldn't get any sound in my ears. So I finally, and they were filling, you know, I forget who was introduced to me. You know, five for fighting and this, they're filling, fill, fill, fill, fill, and then I'm playing, and I hit a chord, they go, oh, it's in there, and they go, all right, five for finding, boom. and I hit the first chord and 100 decibels of white noise in each ear.

Oh my gosh. And I'm talking about moments of truth in your life. So it's true what they say, how time slows down. So I'm playing the intro to Superman. I can't even hear it. I'm just watching my fingers. And I have two choices. I can stop, take my ears out, start over,

which would be kind of lame and embarrassing, or I could keep going. And I looked out into the crowd, and there was this huge burly union worker, you know. And all the folks at Madison Square Garden, they'd been down at Ground Zero for 30 days, just picking through the rubble. Just I can't imagine.

And he had two beers. And I started singing Superman, and he started singing with me. And I just looked at him and we sang together. And I never heard a thing. I just sang it with him. And he started crying. And I'm like, just get through the song,

don't choke up. So I never heard a word. of my performance. I watched the garden sing it, and it was the most moving, surreal experience of my life to this day, and nothing will ever top it. Do you ever talk to him? Did you ever find him? Do you ever tell that story? No, I've told a couple of times. I mean, I've talked to a lot of, I still keep in touch with a lot of the firefighters and the stations. When I go to New York, I'll pop in. I don't know who it is. I'm so grateful. He got me through probably the most important moment of my life. He saved me, singing the song with me. I'd like to find the tape.

Yeah. I wonder if it's, I wonder if you can see him. See him. Yeah. But just to talk about the concert for New York, because I'm talking about me a lot, what really kind of changed my worldview about music was watching The Who play that night. Because when they came out, all these people who had not been able to release, when they played Bob O'Reilly, and people were just singing and screaming and crying and hugging. I'm like, okay, this is why it matters. Charts, nice. Ticket sales, nice.

Fame and fortune, nice. But it really showed me why music matters and how a song can transcend and provide solace and cure to a nation. And that night, the Who did and the rest of those performers as well. Which is harder for you? The song or the lyrics? lyrics lyrics

I mean I know Cohen is your favorite lyricist Oh Leonard Cohen Yeah well I mean he's He's a master You know lyrics

I think melodies will get you on the radio lyrics will keep you there for 30 years Yeah I mean I think My favorite lyricist is Bernie Topin Well I was just going to talk about Bernie Yeah I mean Elton John would have been a jingle singer

Yes Without those lyrics Well, you've heard some of his latest songs without Bernie. And Elton is my hero. I wouldn't be here without Elton. No, Bernie, Bernie's great. All those 70s, Joni Mitchell, even James Taylor, even some of the Beatles songs. You know, I just heard a song, Where to Hell My Phone?

I don't know if you've heard that yet. I have not heard that. Oh, you need to look at it out. I will. Where the hell my phone? And I thought to myself, is this really where we're at now? Where are those lyricists? I don't know.

I mean, it's easy for, you know, over the hill of rock guys to be curmudgins and say, oh, the music was great when I was making it. Yeah. But, yeah, I do think, I ask myself, what songs of this age are we going to hear 10, 20 years from now that define these times? And maybe... Have you heard the AJR? I have not. I don't know much of...

I just hear from my kids. And there's some good music out there. There's some good songwriters. There are. You know, good singers. You should look up AJR because it's, it's interesting because my son is a big fan of AJR.

And so I, to figure out my son and my daughter, I listen to their music. Yeah, me too. And they're profound. They really are some really great lyrics. Cool. Great lyrics. So you did Superman.

Yeah. It was a huge hit. Yeah. And now the pressure is on to, follow it up. Yep. And this one I've heard you say took months. I spent two years,

made a record, realized I didn't have the song to follow Superman, and also understood that the tendency for one hit wonders was to regurgitate the song, your first song. And I didn't want to write Superman to. We saw that movie. How do you mean? Give me an example of somebody regurgitating their song. I don't want to embarrass people,

but there are bands that have had a hit and the record company pressures them too into that, it's like, all right, it needs to have the same tempo, it needs to have the same key, it needs to be the same thing. It's just a B version of their hit song. So I knew I had to have a song that would stand alone if Superman never existed, but also be the same guy. It's hard. If you go too far away from what people are familiar with,

you lose your audience, but if you just give them the same song, they'll just go listen to Superman again. So I wrote three or four hundred songs, and I made a record, and the record company was not happy. You know, they were ready to drop me. And I'd been doodling with ideas. And you talked about, do songs come from, you know, lyrics or melodies?

Sometimes they come from concepts, just ideas, post-it notes. And a hundred years was that. It was a time I was sitting there at my house, and life was pretty good, Glenn. I kind of realized my dream of having a hit song. I had two little babies, a wonderful wife and life. But I, like many, I don't know about you, sometimes like to dwell on the past or obsessed on the future.

I have a hard time recognizing where I am. The now. Yeah. I think many people that do what we do have that challenge. Yeah. So I kind of just said, What if I have a song that's kind of a wish is never better than this and recognize the moment, even when it's not great, and the verses are stages of our lives.

And that really was the epiphany for the song. You know, creativity usually comes in sparks, and you have to be able to recognize when that comes. And you can go for months, months, months, grind, grind, grind, grind, grind, grind, grind, grind, grind. And then here comes the spark. And the spark was, okay, here's this concept. Say it in a way nobody said it before. let the verses be the years of our lives, stages of our lives. And then it was about writing it down.

And that was the work ethic part. So you know, it's the only song I've ever heard that is even in this category is, gosh, it's a Frank Sinatra song, you know, when I was 25. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And it's interesting because I remember hearing that song when I was young. Yeah. And I didn't really understand all of it. Yeah. You know what I mean?

Because I wasn't that age. And this song has the same kind of combination to it that I think if you're 15, you don't really understand the rest of the song. Well, and again, I wrote the song when I was my early 30s. I'm kind of the top of the second verse, the family on my mind guy. And I had no idea about the rest. You know, the 45 midlife crisis, you know, I wrote that. Turns out I was right. But I had, you know, in the bridge.

But the nice thing about 100 years as opposed to Superman, you know, Superman I could not write now. I could not write that song. It's pretty damn easy to be me. It's pretty damn easy to be you, most of us, right, when you see people with real challenges. So Superman, I couldn't write. But 100 years, we're always somewhere in that song. And every night when I play it, I, you know, I kind of giggle when I hit my spot, which is now the bridge and pretty soon it'll be the vamp and hopefully I'll make it to the end.

But it's, uh, it did. It took three, you know, three or four months to get the 30 lines to get each, you know, the key to art is making it seem simple. It's so hard to make things seem simple. And it seems like, oh yeah, you could have written that in 10 minutes. It's just, you know, but for most of us, unless we're prodigy writers like, you know, Bernie and Leonard Cohen, we have to go through, you know, hundreds of pieces of paper and trash cans and to get the 30 songs if we're fortunate enough to get them right. Yeah, I was told once by somebody I really admired, he said, the difference between a professional and somebody who will never, will always be an amateur is we make it look easy. Yeah. But it's because we did all of the hard work for so long.

Oh, it's suffering. It's being willing to suffer. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. All right. 100. 15 for a moment, caught in between 10 and 20 and I'm just dreaming. Counting the ways to where you are. Only two for a moment.

And she feels better than ever where wrong. Making our way back from us. There's never a wish. Better than this When you only got a hundred years to live I'm still the man You see I'm a day a kid on the way A family on my mind

Forty-five for a moment The sea is high We're heading into a crisis Chasing the years of our lives Your sail Within a morning star There's never a wish Better than it

When you only got a hundred years To live half time goes by Suddenly a whiz another blink of an eye 67's gone The sun is getting high We're moving on Always moving on For just another moment

And I'm just dreaming counting the ways to where you are. 22, I feel you two. 30th. Now, it's a new... There's never a wish better than this. You only got a hundred years to live. Fantastic.

Thank you. Fantastic. Let me just address... Can I have... Would you come back? Anytime. Okay. Yes.

Because we are already an hour into this, and I still have a lot more to talk to you about. I do want to talk about your childhood. Yeah. Your dad. Yeah. It was amazing. I know.

Amazing. Yes. And if you ever go to, what is it, a Costco. Yes. And you're pushing the card around. Thank you. Yes. That's you guys, right?

Here's my precision wire products hoodie that I wear proudly. Yeah. Actually give it to you. That's great. I love it. That's the family business. Shopping cards. Yeah, my dad was an astrophysicist. He worked at the...

What? Yes, he worked at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in the golden age of spaceflight in the 70s. Wow. And went to UCLA, went to Pomona, and I had the greatest childhood. I would go down to the JPL mainframe on Sundays, and I'd play Star Trek on their computer, putting the punch cards in, while he would go work on the navigation. of the mariner spacecrafts. Holy cow. And bring home like, oh, here's the latest pictures of Titan from Saturn's moons.

It was amazing. And it's kind of where I got my science bug. And when my grandfather passed away, relatively young in his 60s, my dad left JPL to go run this kind of down and dirty welding business in Watts, right by the Watts Towers in L.A. And we had about 30 people at the time. And I would go down there and bend wire. you'd pay me a penny, we called them hairpins.

I could sue them now for that, minimum wage, definitely. Get some lawyers. I know my dad, too. And he kind of used his engineering skills to not just redesign things like shopping carts, but more importantly, the machines to make them. He was building computers on our dinner table when Gates was building them in his garage. And I've always thought, wow, if he just marketed the computers instead of shopping carts, this may be a different conversation.

But there wouldn't be a conversation. Yeah. But I've worked at precision my whole life. It's a great example of the American dream. You know, we have about 300 employees. Are you still in Los Angeles? We're in commerce, believe it or not, one of the few manufacturers left in California. Why?

Well, part of it is my dad's in his 80s. And the moving a business that big is challenging. We are actually... Is he still running it? He didn't run it during COVID. I took over and ran it. I mean, he worked from home, but he still comes in now that he's got his vaccines. He's 83, coming in six days a week, still running the show.

And I've been much more involved the last five years because it's really not so much about our family. You know, we have 300 employees. Many of them have been with us 30, 40 years. And there's no other jobs for them than this. And during the pandemic, it was really my mission to just keep the business alive for them. And it's great. You see, as I said, we get people that start at minimum wage. Many of them can't speak English.

And we have this tradition that every year we have a Christmas party. And for kids, if they get a B average, we give them gift cards. And the kids will line up and they'll get their gift cards. And now we have kids 25 years later coming back from Stanford, from Princeton. Their parents, you know, these immigrants, very low income are now putting their kids through Ivy League schools. And they are driving ram trucks. And they have a middle class life because they're in America. And the American dream happens at precision wire every day.

So it's been a great grounding mechanism for me when all this entertainment gobbly gooks going on when I go back there. And I smell the wood. So, yeah, I'll be back and doing that with Grandpa next week. So I was just, I just had dinner with the head of Toyota, North America. Okay. And he's the guy who moved them out of. Los Angeles and moved them to Texas. Yes. And he said, one of the reasons was, he said, it wasn't for me.

He wasn't for, you know, any of us fat cats at the top. He said, my wife and I talked about it. And he said, they're sitting in traffic for two hours. Yeah. You know, that's four hours out of your day. They're going to work. They can't afford anything closer. He said, it's just, it was wrong for the workers to have them there. Well, I will be going looking at real estate. after our little chat here today. Oh, here in Texas? Yes. He moved to the, they, being Toyota moved here too.

Well, I think California is so toxic, and it's not a blue or red state, it's a litigious state. And they think that business is evil and that all they do is basically take advantage of the worker. And I do think there are a lot of folks who would want to get out just for affordable housing. But some have family there, right? And so they're not going to leave their family. It's a hard challenge, but I think for the business to sustain it, we will certainly have to have another location out of California and we're working on that. You just can't, you know, when you said it exactly right, they are hostile to business.

Yes. And, you know, I am generally hostile towards unions because of what they've turned into. Right. However, unions are so important when the corporation has become hostile to the worker. You know what I mean? There's this balance that when it's really balanced. between everything, that's when everything works. Yes.

And we just keep going from one end to the other. It's a mutually beneficial operation, you know. But Marx doesn't teach that. Well, and I think most of the politicians that come from that worldview have never run a business. They've never seen the American dream in front of their eyes, which is sad. And it's so sad to see what's happened to California. I love the state. It's so beautiful.

It was such an artistic bastion of creativity in the 70s to see what happened to California. It's really depressing. But as you said, for businesses, it's not a choice. If you want to survive, especially in manufacturing, you cannot exist there. And I fear it's just going to be kind of like Hawaii, a state of, you know, government officials and tourism. And there'll be little left besides big boxes of, you know, warehouses. That's really sad. Really sad.

Really sad. Really sad. Yeah. John, so good to see you. You're the best book. God bless. All right, man. You bet.

Thank you. Just a reminder, I'd love you to rate and subscribe to the podcast and pass this on to a friend so it can be discovered by other people. We'll say, all the world

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