The Ryan Hanley Show - Rediscovering Authenticity in the Age of Machine Generated Art

Episode Date: July 12, 2024

Became a Master of the Close: https://masteroftheclose.comCan constraints spark creativity? Join us in a fascinating conversation with a seasoned musician as we explore how using only 1970s-era instruments and technology can lead to some of the most soulful and inventive sounds. ✅ 7 Ways to Make Better Decisions Using AI: https://ai.ryanhanley.com/ ✅ For daily insights and ideas on peak performance: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ryanhanley ✅ Find Your Favorite Way to Subscribe to The Show: https://linktr.ee/ryan_hanleyConnect with Patrick LeonardWebsite: https://patrickleonardmusic.com/m/We'll explore personal stories about introducing children to timeless music and discuss how limitations can foster true creative problem-solving. From the analog warmth of vinyl to the digital perfection of modern tracks, we cover it all, offering a heartfelt tribute to the art of making emotionally resonant music.Ever felt overwhelmed by the pressure to conform in the age of social media? Our discussion examines the importance of individuality and self-expression, featuring insights from our guests' experiences with iconic figures like Roger Waters and David Gilmour. We emphasize the value of following your path and setting high standards for yourself. The conversation is a celebration of independent thinking and a call to action to strive for excellence, regardless of external pressures and societal expectations.Rediscover the magic and authenticity of vinyl records with us as we transport you back to the golden age of music. Reflecting on classic albums and the unique, organic experience of vinyl, we highlight how this medium captures the full scope of sound like no digital format can. From setting up a vinyl system to the joy of revisiting old records, this nostalgic journey underscores the timeless nature of vinyl and its ability to touch us on a deeper level. Whether you're a business leader or a creative thinker, this episode promises a rich, multifaceted discussion that celebrates the intersection of technology, creativity, and the human element.

If you're going to take a race across a lake, say a kayak race, for example, when they shout go or they shoot the gun or whatever they're going to do, that's going to tell and the pace so that you complete the thing. If you look left or right, you're going to lose. Let's go. Yeah, make it look, make it look, make it look easy. The goal of this podcast is to share original insights and conversations on the habits, mindsets, and strategies of elite performers that produce exceptional results. Let's go. I have some questions about the business of music, but I also want to talk about creativity, your process, and all that kind of stuff too.

I'm willing to engage anything and wherever you want to start, wherever you're comfortable. Yeah. Awesome. And I it. I love it. Chico Marx. You know, it's funny. I, um, you know, I know if I practice at anything, you'd probably be okay, but it's tough when you like find out you're just not inclined for something. And, uh, I love creativity. I love creating. I've been a writer and I've done a tremendous amount on YouTube and I just love creating and telling stories

and have found over and over and over again that I am sure I could improve if I practiced, but there is not a native musical bone in my entire body. So I just find people who that is something that at least they have a propensity for incredibly. And obviously your career is storied and, and all that. I don't mean it to be so cavalier about it, but I do find it so intriguing. Isn't it fascinating that that's, that's actually, I mean, I find it shocking that it, that there's actually a difference in you you know it that humans can be that different yeah in a way they're wired you know um i mean my my dad was a musician my sister was a musician all my relatives my mom we used to say mom played the iron you know she's like a maestro and she had

no musicality in her whatsoever yeah and it always struck me as odd it's like how can this not what is this and so i think it helps maybe helps shine a little light on the idea that we're we're very different creatures from one another even though we all need the same food water sleep you know um stuff but we're very different i couldn't agree with you more. And I think a lot of why I do this podcast, it's, you know, I, I've been doing it for a long time. Uh, what I've settled on and the reason I keep coming back, the reason that I love doing it, The reason I love having these conversations is I am intoxicated by independent thinking. And, you know, that doesn't necessarily mean contrarian or off the wall or obscure or whatever, just people who have found something that allows them to be uniquely them and dial in

on it. Um, you know, it's funny. I was listening to a show the other day, uh, and, uh, the guy's name is Michael Malice and he was, he was talking about being at parties. And so there's two types of people at parties. You sit down next to somebody, the first type of person sits down next to somebody, ask them what they do. And, uh, they say they handle hamsters. And the first type of person hears that and says, this guy's a weirdo, gets up and walks away. Right. Second type of person sits down and goes, tell me everything about hamsters. And I've found myself to be that second type of person. I could care less what you're interested in. I just am interested in people who love something and are passionate about it.

I'm with you. Yeah. I'm with you on that. You know? Yeah. So being that I'm a terrible interviewer, I'm going to start in what is probably an odd place. I mean, how would you have this gig if you were any good at it? Yeah, right.

Exactly. I want to start in a place that just something that intrigued me and I was very interested in. I was researching your new album that's coming out. And in there, you were talking about it and you said you wanted the sound to have a 70s sound. So you put rules or you didn't use this word. This is mine. Guardrails around what instruments you could use and i i was intrigued by the idea of rules helping you be more creative because i don't know if people who

would not classically call themselves created would necessarily be able to connect those two things um wow to connect those two things. Wow. I think because I've grown up with this stuff and done it since I was a very little boy and even played with technology from when I was a very little boy, anecdotally, because I would go to music stores with my father while he picked up saxophone reeds and I'd play the piano and some music store owner would have ordered some synthesizer that nobody

knew anything about and he'd hear me playing he'd say do you think you could figure this out and I was nine ten and I'd say I think I could he said okay take it home and bring it out because I don't know how to sell it because I don't know what it does so I was playing with technology far beyond anything I could even consider from a very young age and technology and its evolution

has a big, big effect on how you do things I'm a practicer has a big, big effect on how you do things. I'm a practicer. I've practiced the piano. My sister Mary said when the 10,000-hour thing came up, she said, you had your 10,000 hours before you were nine years old. And I probably did.

Just sitting at that little piano, which is sitting right there, the one I actually grew up with. And so the technology and the work and all of it, I've been able to qualify in some ways the effects it has on the process. to modern technology, it affords many things, but in doing so it eliminates certain demands that when the demand is put on you, you have to straighten your back a little bit more. And so in that, this record, I didn't use any modern synthesizers and I didn't use any sequencing that didn't exist in the 70s. And I just drew a line there, you know. So if it didn't exist then, I didn't use it. And that's what that statement is. So there's no polyphonic synthesizers, there's electric pianos and things

that existed then. And the one place I took a little bit of liberty is that there was modular synthesis. And so I have sitting behind you, I have a Buchla synthesizer which was made in the early 70s and I didn't have one then and this is a reissue of it, but I used it because it did exist. I didn't use it very much, but I did use it. So I think that those things help define a style, but also a process. You know, if you've got a computer that's doing what computers do now you don't have 70s music because they didn't have computers in the 70s yeah and it's not a judgment one way or another it's just a you know so i uh i have indoctrinated my kids to what I would call good music from a very early age, which, which any, I pretty

much say that good music ended like in 2005. Now, granted there have been good songs and good albums since then, but I, I, what I share with them is the idea that like when you used to hear a clap, in many cases it was too bored slapping together next to a microphone, right? Or they were finding a way to tap the side of a drum to get a unique, that the forcing function was the, the limitation was the forcing function for the creativity. And that if you wanted it to be more dynamic, you literally had to invent ways to make the sounds more dynamic,

which is why I believe we connect at a soulful level, so much more to music that was created in that way than let me put, I want a, you know, a four beat over a trap sound with a heavy bass hook 34 seconds in like beep boop. And then it like comes up with 17 different iterations. And now I try to apply it like a voice track to it um not that you can't create great you know good music in that way but it i feel many ways like um the ease in some ways and i don't mean to say that anything anyone does is easy i'm not trying to diminish that but the the you don't have to be politically correct or careful yeah yeah no you turn me loose and you won't even want to know about it yeah so i mean you know and you know i uh and there's no

requirement to being politically correct nor am i trying to be i just i know that people that are in music today they are working i don't mean to but that being said there is a i was listening i'll give you an example the other night um kids were doing something and uh i threw on um pink floyd's dark side of the moon documentary and uh i've seen it half a dozen times i get if it's on or i catch it or whatever i literally can't turn it off the music captures me the way they talk about it, how, you know, and I forget his name, but the saxophonist they brought in who plays in there was a friend of a friend of a friend. And the only reason he's on the track is because he was the only guy available who could literally come at the time when they needed to record them. And then that unique sound comes

from that unique individual in that moment, simply because he's the only guy that was available and you're like you're like holy shit like these are there's so much soul in it and am i wrong i guess where do you stand on that like have we has a lot of music not all because there's a lot of people who whatever but do we feel in general like there was so much soul in that old music i miss it i guess is the best way to put it. Well, I think I'll give you an interesting anecdote and then we'll go. Is this camera moving all around? It's doing all kind of zooming. Which is perfectly fine.

Okay. Yeah. I'm glad that it's involved. I'd hate to feel that the zeros and ones are being left out. We know how offended they get. Just ironically, you mentioned that this record that I did, and I haven't really talked about this at all. It's the first time I'm going to talk about it. I was working on the Dark Side of the Moon redo with Roger, and I backed out of it for my own reasons. But I did a record,

I did Amused to Death with Roger Waters in the early 90s, and I worked on Momentary Lapse of Reason with Gilmore. And I feel the same way you do about Pink Floyd. I was a little boy, you know, 12 years old when Dark Side of the Moon came out or 13 years old. And it was my whole world too. And the architecture and the things that just happen because that's the way they happen. And whatever those things are, whether it's Floyd or anything where you don't necessarily have full control over it, You get a bunch of people in the room. One of my favorite Led Zeppelin tracks is Since I've Been Loving You from Led Zeppelin III. And the bass drum pedal has a squeak in it. And if you have a decent stereo, you can hear the squeak. But they were like, well, but that was the performance.

Squeak or no squeak. I think that that's vital. And I think that my, I have a funny little thing that I came up with when I used to do some songwriting clinics. And I have my metal keyboard here so I can show you. I would do this. And I'd ask people what it is. And I'd do it again.

And some people with good pitch would say it's it's E I'd say what if I change one note and everybody goes Beethoven and you go okay so the most recognizable musical motif doesn't matter what you play it on it's from one note it's one note that gives you this thing and that to me is far more important than what it's done on or how it's done or who does it. It's the content is form should follow it. Yeah. And so if you're creating sincere content, it doesn't matter how you do it. But with technology being what it is it creates content for you and then you kind of apply

yourself to it and it's a modern age and i understand things change and i'm good with that but i'm not going to listen to it yeah for any reason i would have no reason to listen to any of it and that's not a bias it's just just my choice. Yeah. Why would I? And, and so over the years, when people say you have to hear this occasionally, I'll listen. And I don't, I realize I really don't have to hear it. I don't have to hear it. Yeah. Because for me, it's in the, it's in the composition and the performance and the poetry and the and this thing that's organic and people are composing and they're performing and they're writing lyrics and they're rhyming things and so hence poetry um but you have to connect to it yeah you have to connect to it and if you don't i'm curious why you're 2005 i cut off way earlier

than 2005 so i constitute certain artists in the rap and r&b genre as pulling they pulled some of it through to about that far that might be a little far but um you know that that's about for me when it went from guys who were you know so so you know maybe take that r&b phase in the late 80s to the early to very early 2000s there were guys who were creating music whether you appreciate the rap and hip-hop genre or not which i know a lot of people who are listening, don't, um, they hate when I talk about it,

but, uh, uh, cause no one understands how I can appreciate Wu Tang, um, triumph as much as I appreciate a dark side of the moon. Like, how is that even possible?

I have people saying, it's like, to me, there's, there are people who are creating it because they have to create it. And there are people who have decided that I'm going to make money creating music. And those are two different things. And also, I don't mean to interrupt, but I think it's a note that to me, it's almost a science, and I believe it really is to some degree, that we form, that human beings form your musical fingerprint, if you will, or your musical reflection from about the ages of 9 to about 15.

And that's it. Yeah. What you listen to from age 9 to 15 will always be your portfolio that you'll bring with you when you listen to music. And if there's nothing in it that doesn't touch something that existed in that period, you're not going to care about it at all. And for me as a musician my whole life, and I loved studying music studying music and i do still study but i still there's enough in books that were written in the renaissance age that i don't understand yet yeah so i'm good with learning more about music and not necessarily studying

pop culture i i never studied pop culture yeah um But I think that that's a big part of it. If it, if it, if you weren't a teenager absorbing this stuff in your climate and your peer group, you don't relate to it. Yeah. You know, I mean, it sounds a little lame, but it's true. No, I think, I think that, I think that makes a lot of sense um I will say that my eyes were not opened in to classical until I was much older and I love classical music um and if and have tried to dive deeper into it um I find it to be you know I I love classical that was something I found later in life but but I think it all comes back to, I don't know. I think that people listen to music for different reasons. And I think it depends on why you're

listening to it. Unfortunately today, my take is that the current, the current mainstream music that is shoved down would be if I didn't allow them, if I didn't introduce them to what I would call good music much earlier that would be shoved down my kids throats um is music just to numb you from whatever you're doing it's trap beats and hooks and in and just getting you through to the next to the next you know you know section of the song and it's nonsensical half of of it you can't even understand. You can tell that it's all generated by a computer, not a single person's fingers bled to make it happen. And I don't know how you can connect to that.

And frankly, I don't think that people do. When I see people who will send me songs that are current or on the pop charts or whatever now, they're not sending me the song going like this song is going to change your life. Yet when someone sends you, you know, when someone sends you Led Zeppelin or Pink Floyd or, or Nirvana or, you know, early, early hip hop, Notorious, Tupac, if you're in that age group right like when they those songs some of those songs would literally change you like they would they would hit you

and you would be like i can never unhear that like that is now in me you know what i mean like i can't unhear that song the way that person delivered it how they did it um and and and i'm gonna finish this statement with something that just absolutely, it blew me away understanding that these are the times I think it's what's coming and I hate it. Uh, Alicia Keys at the Superbowl, right? She misses her mark. She misses her mark on a, on a lyric and she, and, and she misses it and she catches herself.

And it's a, it's a tiny little hiccup in an amazing performance that if it were live, no one would have even thought about it. But you cannot find it online. They digitally changed the performance so that she hits it perfectly on mark. And you can't find it online. They changed the recording in the only time. And you're like like what a shame like because to me that imperfection to a to a digital marketer or a big company like the nfl

or whatever they're seeing that as an imperfection and i'm going that makes the performance unique it didn't ruin the song it's alicia keys she's brilliant. Like what are you talking about? Yeah. I mean, I, you know, I spent a lot of years with Leonard Cohen a lot working with Leonard all the time. And there was something that we were working on and there was something that wasn't quite right in it. And I pointed it out. And he said, the beauty's in the flaws. And it's that simple. There was no going back or looking at it again, because that's the truth of it is that simple there was no going back or looking at it again because that's

the truth of it is the beauty is in the thing that's not perfect yeah and if and once you put everything on the grid pitch and time could have fun listening but there's not you're not listening to anything there's nothing there yeah i agree some sense of rhythm and some sense of i don't know you know but look this things things change and and you can you if depending on what you're interested in doing you can focus on it and look at it or you the time trying to come up with something all the time, every day. I don't care what other people are doing, and I don't mean that I'm indifferent to it. I mean, I'm not interested in my own stew that I'm making and what ingredients it has in it and how I feel about it and how it tastes to me. And it sounds a little bit like this couldn't possibly be true.

But once I really like it, I don't care what anybody else thinks. Yeah. At all. I don't care at all. Not even nothing could affect me. I don't care at all. Not even nothing could affect me. I don't care because I'm after this. I'm after my own painting. And once I painted the painting and I feel like I've done it the best that I can and I'm satisfied with it, I'm done. I'm good. And I think that's what it should be. If you're trying to please somebody else, you're kind of screwed before you start.

So what I find very interesting and we deal with this regardless if we are in a purely a pure creative profession like creating music or writing or dance or whatever. We also see this in business and entrepreneurs and I see it all the time. Right. Uh, so, so my, what I do for a living is, uh, executive coaching and startup advising. I've been an entrepreneur for 15 years and I, um, I now try to help people who are stuck or hitting moments or having conversations with themselves that they can't get past and try to break them free. And the thing that, the thing that is often the hardest struggle to get through is when they're stuck because they're worried about what the rest of the market is doing, right? This is the way everyone else does this part of this type of business. Everyone here is going in this direction.

And so what I would love is, you know, and being that you've taught people how to write music and worked with, you know, up and down the chain, celebrities, all different genres, how do you break someone free? And what would be your advice to them or guidance to start to cultivate that mentality of like, whether you're, this is an entrepreneurial endeavor or you're leading a community program,

trying to raise funds or you're creating art. How do you start to do exactly what you just said? See the art as it's ready when, when it's ready for you and not taking in all these opinions and most of which are completely just made up in our head and they're not even real that's right so you know when you said that i get an image and i don't know why i get this image but this is the image that came to mind and i'm probably going to sound like i'm out of my mind, which maybe I am. If you're going to take a race across a lake, say a kayak race, for example, when they shout go, or they shoot the gun or whatever they're going to do, that's going to tell you it's time to row across the lake. If you do anything other than focus on your stroke and your breathing and the pace

so that you complete the thing, if you look left or right, you're going to lose. You're going to lose. And that's it. So when you're, for me, if you want to stand out, and I never set out to stand out. That was not my goal. But I did want to maintain my own musical identity. And the way I did it was by not learning other people's music. I don't learn other people's music. I barely listen to other people's music. I did when I was a kid, but I don't anymore.

And I haven't for decades, really, to be honest. I listen to some things and really almost nothing these days because I'm busy crossing that lake and making sure I don't get distracted. Yeah. And I think that you need to know what the race is. So before the gun goes off, you look up and down and you go, he looks a little scary. And, well, he looks a lot stronger than me. And that's a better boat than I have. But once the gun goes off, if you pay any attention to that, you don't stand a chance.

Yeah. And I think, does that make sense? I think that's a very decent metaphor, right? It makes complete sense. There's a thing that a great man who we've spoken to in another way a few minutes ago. I was doing a show with this man in Spain and he said, let's do the traditional band toast. And it was champagne all the way around and he said, let's do the traditional band toast. And it was champagne all the way around, and he said, fuck them all.

And out we went, you know. And it was like, now everything, his history and all of it, makes perfect sense to me. Because you cannot be concerned with anyone else and do anything unique. The second you absorb someone else's notion of something, you've diminished your own originality. and do anything unique. The second you absorb someone else's notion of something, you've diminished your own originality. And I know this is bad news to a lot of people,

and they can, don't agree with me, I don't care. You hold on to your identity and your beliefs, and if you can make them work for you, you'll have true success. And if you, if you can make them work for you, you'll have true success. And if you believe you can't, and you start to look at someone else, you might get somewhere, but it ain't going to last. It's not going to last because it's not yours. You earn these things, you earn them. You know, I probably sound like some sort of life coach. I'm not a life coach. I'm just, you know, no, I. No, I think you're completely right.

I think this is the challenge of our time because social media has made comparison not just something that you have access to, but literally something that's shoved in your face every single day. It's chronic. Yeah. And what I find interesting,

and I share this a lot with my clients and we talk about it on the podcast too, is all of the examples of people that we hold up as these pinnacles of creativity or innovation or success, all of them have these unique unfollow, followable journeys. All of them. They all, when you look back on all they did this here and this, and this would have never happened. I mean, uh, uh, a big example that just, he just, uh, gave his hall of fame commencement speeches, Tom Brady.

And I listened to the speech. I I I'm a lifetime Buffalo bills fan. So rooting for Tom Brady was incredibly difficult until he left the Patriots. Now I love him because he's, he seems like a pretty decent guy, very unique and hardworking. But when you look at his career, right? I mean, this is a guy who, who was a ho-hum quarterback in college for most of his career. Didn't have great measurables. He was never the number one on everything. He gets drafted in the sixth round of the NFL draft. He barely, barely makes it onto the traveling squad for the Patriots. He sits behind a quarterback, Andrew Bledsoe,

who had been a perennial pro bowler. I mean, there were a million reasons this guy gives up, a million reasons why he doesn't ever get to be this thing. Yet he played the game in a way that no one has ever duplicated. Right. This short, direct the way he goes about his business. Okay. So if you follow Tom Brady's path, right?

One, that's Tom Brady's life, not your life. One. Two, the number of serendipitous moments that took place for him to have the thing that he has, you can never recreate. That's right. So the idea, even at face value, not that you can't learn some best practices or some training tips or whatever. I mean, there's things that you can learn from people. But at the end of the day, I, I, I cannot agree with you more in this. And I did this whole episode in a couple of weeks ago around, I think the fear of failure is bullshit. I think it's absolute bullshit. It's marketing copy. It's meant to sell you stuff. I said, what you're scared of is status. And this is the problem. I, this is the problem i this is what i believe the problem is the reason i do not follow

my art or my my what i want the reason i try to become patrick is because i'm so worried if i go down my path right or and i decide to play hip-hop banjo? Because that's what I love doing, you know, and however that would work, right? Like, because if I follow that path and it's unsuccessful, what is everyone going to say? Well, geez, you could have been a successful traveling banjo guy if you had just learned these chords and hooked up with these bands and da, da, da, da, da,

and got this agent. And it's like, you don't want to be that thing. You want to be a hip hop banjo guy. So forget about what people think. Forget about about the status and be your own person but it is such a struggle for people to break free today with that yeah i mean i i think um i see it only in the tiny bit that i see what the media actually contains because I can't look at it. And certainly reflecting back to my generation, which is a long time ago now, but everyone was completely individual. There was no, why would you want your bands to be similar? Why would you ever?

And the other thing is, you know, I think it's not okay these days for someone to be better than somebody else. I think that's kind of, and that's bullshit, man. That's bullshit. You know, you need that. I think I've always said that where I set my bar for what I wanted out of my musical life, I will never get there. And because of that, I'm still working. Yeah. I'm still trying. I'm still experimenting. I'm still searching. I'm still intrigued by it because the bar is way out of my reach.

Yeah. And that's the only way to do it. And this idea that you can't have something that's greater than something else because you can offend somebody with that. Oh, that's just sad. That's sad. So applying this to say a lot of the people listening and I'll give people just a little bit of context. The way that I do my podcast podcast the fact that i don't just ask the next follow-up question and shut the fuck up the fact that i put a lot of context for my own life in between questions i get hate i get people to if only you did this you'd be here whatever which we do pretty well but um my point and and saying that is, I have a podcast and people want to tell me all the ways that I should do the show.

Right. And it's hard sometimes because, you know, you have ups and downs and this interview goes well. This one doesn't go as well as you want. You're always trying to improve and I'm always trying to improve. But there's like this little voice that's over here saying maybe they're right. Maybe if you did just ask questions this way or maybe if you did just ask questions this way, or maybe if you did keep your interviews to 20 minutes, or maybe if you did do this, right? And I-

There's no place to go to hell. Yeah, yeah. Well, so I have learned, and I don't know what it is about my disposition. Maybe it's my Irish heritage or whatever the fuck. I was born in a tiny little shithole town that I couldn't wait to get out of and have done everything I could. Who knows what it is in my life, my past, or my DNA that I just have this ability to be like, don't care. Here you don't care. However, so many people who want to be unique,

who want to be individuals, they fall, they can only hold out for so long. And then eventually they start to fall prey to all these voices so as someone who has been able to maintain your voice work on your craft know what your art is and keep pushing for it and and not allow as much as possible those voices to get in how would you what would you say or what guidance would you give to people to to to stay in their box or I don't mean their box. To stay in their lane. Yeah, to stay in themselves. How can they do that? I mean, I think this is, I'm going to say this

and then I'm going to figure out a way to unsay it. Okay. You're either born that way or you're not. Now I'm going to find a way to unsay it. I think that you need your own set of goals. I don't like the word goals, your own marks that you're going to hit, right? So here, I'll give you an example. These are scales. So you get a metronome and it goes tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick.

That's what it does. Just ticks, right? Yeah. And mine's sitting over there and it's still one of these. I don't use my phone. I have a metronome. It goes tick, tick, made of wood. When I was a kid, I wanted to be able to do these things at the bottom setting of the metronome. So the metronome's going tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick,

which is this. And you don't just do that. You start slow and you work and you work and you work and it takes freaking years to be able to do it so to put those things out in front of yourself that you believe you need to paint your painting and to have your palette to put them out in front of you and to achieve them even something like as as that seems as menial as that it's not menial because it's exercising your your command of your own efforts is this am i is this cryptic and bizarre do you understand no clear no i know i understand

so there's there's that kind of dexterity and then then there's, and I'll use musical stuff, there's harmony, there's melody, there's rhythm, there's all these things that if you don't know them, if you don't have the vocabulary, what can you expect? What can you expect to accomplish if you don't know the vocabulary? Yeah. So you can choose to learn the vocabulary even if no one else around you is learning the vocabulary. Because if you want to play that chord, you got to know something to play that chord. Yeah. You might stumble on it in a million years, but you're probably not going to. So to see those things out there and to go, what was that?

And I need to know what that is. Not I need to learn that thing. I need to know what it's made of. So it becomes part of my colors. And I think in a sideways way, back to what I said, you're either born with this quest built into you or you're not. But if you're not built with it, what I'm saying is the truth. And there's no fucking shortcut yeah okay if you want this thing where you your body and your mind feels like you're achieving something

beyond yourself and so you can emulate somehow this notion of greatness if you don't bleed you're not there i don't give a shit i don't bleed, you're not there. I don't give a shit. I don't care. You're just not. And so bad news, maybe, but that's it. There's no other way. There's no other way. And that's what I would say. I'd tell people, look, if you want this first you have to look out there where is it look out there somewhere and see what it is that you hear or that you see that you feel is worth the journey upwards because the bar has to be way up above your head or what's the point in running in a straight line yeah everybody can run in a straight line you only need legs to run on a fucking straight line so set it way up there and spend the rest of your life going for it and you'll always be satisfied and you may be good at

it and you may not be good at it but the second you follow you're fucking dead you're dead what are you doing who gives a shit if it's been done a million times and you can do it too? I'm sorry. I mean, that's as harsh as I'll get. But I really believe that there's truth in that. And when I look out and see what's going on, it breaks my heart. Because I know there's people out there that have this in them. And because they're doing this all day and whatever else they're doing, they're not even looking there. Yeah. And it's not here. It's not here. It's not here. It's not out there. It's this and this and these and ours. Yeah.

I, uh, so, so I, my kids, I told you, I get, I get two kids, 10 and eight, two boys, and, um, they play video games, which in a, I don't have a problem with done regulated in certain amounts of time. That being said, sometimes they'll tell me about their video games and I have this hiccup that they hate when I say this, but I think it's sinking in. I tell them, video games are fine. Optimize your real life, not your fake life. Optimize your real life. Your real life is out here.

Your real life is out here. I think it's fine that you enjoy this video game. You want to tell me about it. It's all good. It's fun. You're kids. No problem. That being said, do not over-optimizing. That life is meaningless. This life out here is what's important. But I want to just surmise what you said. And then I have one more topic that I want

to dive into here with our time together. What I heard you say there, and tell me if you think this is wrong or I'm misstating what you said, is that we, our guiding star, guiding destination should be where our curiosity takes us. Because if we're curious about something, we will, we'll, we'll walk through the swamp. We'll chop down the tree. We'll climb the mountain because we have to know, we have to know how to play this chord, play this chord on this rhythm, play this chord on this rhythm with this type of beat behind or whatever. Right? Like we have to know because we're curious about it. We can't get enough of it where, and what happens is instead what we, what we're taught is go do this thing, make this money.

This is what your life should be. Someone who's from this town or this background or this class of person goes and does this thing. And then we end up 40 years old looking, looking at our life going, Oh my God, maybe I'm making enough money. Maybe I'm not, but either way, I got a case of the fucking Mondays. And I, I, if I tell my, I told my team all the time, uh, when I, when I have my company, if you put in, I have a case of the Mondays, it's hump day, or thank God it's Friday. And to any of our communication channels, you and I are going to have a one-on-one talk after this, because this might not be the career for you. Because if you are showing up and the first thing you say to everyone is happy

hump day, this is not the place for you. Like, and I don't mean that in a negative way. It means that you don't enjoy being here. Like there's something about this is not grabbing you and pulling you in and capturing your attention and making you interested. And I feel so, I've made this mistake. I've had parts of my career where I was places that I didn't enjoy going, but I feel like now I wake up every day and I love what I do, but it's because I'm curious about people like you.

And I get to wake up every day and have conversations like this and hear you and listen to the cadence of your voice and the topics that bring you passion. And I just wish more people had the balls to follow their curiosity and not let what their community or their family or their spouse or society tells them supposed to be. And obviously we all have obligations we have to take care of. I'm not saying that, but like, even if it's a hobby, be curious about something. Yeah. Well, you know, I think something, something you just said made me made me think something too,

is that if I was born right now, who knows? Yeah. It's when I was born and where I was born and who I was around. And I think it's just such a different generation. So to look at it and go, you know, it's when I was born and where I was born and who I was around. And I think it's just such a different generation. So to look at it and go, you know, accolades or accomplishments or whatever you want to call them. If I was born now, I might have gone right to a video game and, you know, the porn channel and stayed there for the rest of my life. Yeah. Who knows? I mean, I was obsessive

about what there was. So maybe it's a little bit of a, uh, a little bit of an indictment of the times more than the people. Yeah. I think that's true. I do think that's true. I don't think that humans have changed. I don't, I don't think that I don't think they've changed at all. I think that's true. I do think that's true. I don't think that humans have changed. I don't think that. I don't think they've changed at all. I think that technology and society has changed. And I don't know if it's a net positive. Certainly not, in my opinion, for most aspects of creativity and general joy day to day. But I do. I want to ask you.

So you have the new album coming out. I wrote down, you know, just preparing for this. And I tend not to prepare too much. Cause I like to be very in the moment with you, but having no, as we talked about at the very jump, very little, if not any zero musicality. When do you know you have a song in you? Like, what is that like to someone who has never woken up in the morning and gone, you know what? I have a song in me, right?

Or whatever. What does that, how do you know you have that in you? Or is it always in you and it's the discipline and it's just always coming out? Like as an artist, how do you know you have that in you or is it always in you and it's the discipline and it's just always coming out? Like, like as an artist, how, how do you know you have a song or an album in you? That's, that should be packaged up that there's a narrative that there's a story to

tell. How do you know when it's that time? Well, that's a good question. That's a, that's a, that's a lot of question. Yeah. Me, me specifically, I have my own template my own paradigm for this somebody else how do they know I I wrote two songs this morning before eight o'clock for a musical I'm working on with someone. Two, finished, recorded them, sent them off. I've been practicing for playing live and looking at stuff I wrote with other people.

A couple of Madonna songs, a couple of Leonard Cohen songs. If right now... Here, we'll just do this just for the fuck of it. I'm just going to improvise. Yeah. I'm just going to improvise. Love it. Thank you. And if I kept going, I might get into something. So I might find a rhythm.

I might. And I can do this all day. Yeah. I've done it all day, my whole life. And so I'm never at a loss for what to do. If you right now put some words up on the screen, I could write a song to it because that's what I'm an expert at. So I think what it comes down to is you acquire the tools so that you're an expert in your field.

And if you're going to be a songwriter and a piano player, if you can't sit down and just play whatever there is and just make music without any notion of what it's going to be and let yourself and your fingers and your ears and your heart and your experiences guide you through this then i wouldn't do it you know what i mean yeah you know what's wild is you were playing that riffing and um what what what was going on in my head was a young man walking through the woods. And then when you hit that beat change, it was like he stepped onto a city block. And like that visual was going on in my head when I was listening to you. And I was like, man, this sounds like I'm walking through the woods. And I was wondering, like, when you're playing, because your fingers at this point have have become just uh uh

you're obviously not thinking about your fingers you're thinking about the sounds that you want to make i'm assuming i'm not thinking about anything yeah yeah like are you picturing a scene in your head and this is the song that goes along with the scene or i'm not doing anything i mean i could talk and do this it doesn't matter matter. I'm not doing anything. I'm just... Yeah. I mean I can do it all day long, but it's... It's only music when you make music out of it. Yeah. So as an example of something, because there's a couple things that I've done that are fairly recognizable.

I would sit down in the morning and I would do this... All the time. And then one morning you sit down and you go and you go oh that's nice and that's live to tell the Madonna song or you know and these are things are you know and they're just these things that occur and then you grab them as they go by but they only occur if you have vocabulary yeah they only occur if you have enough skill to be free in what you're doing right yeah it's um you know there's um this is a meme and i don't it sounds trite but i don't mean it to be because i honestly think it's some of this most sage wisdom that's uh come out of our modern society um it's it's kind of like walk around around and find out. Like, get out there and mess around and see what happens when you push this button, pull this lever,

make this decision, take this action. Like, and we just, I feel like so many of us, so many people, we wake up every day and it's just like, tell me the answer. I don't want to do the work. I just want to get the answer. Just give me the answer. I don't want to do the work. I just want to get the answer. Just give me the answer. I don't really want to do the work.

And it's like, yeah, but you don't really own the answer or how to apply the answer if you don't, if you haven't actually done the work to acquire the skill and the knowledge. And like you said, if you haven't, if you're not bleeding, what are you doing? You know? Well, also you need a skillset and you need a vocabulary.

Like in this case case the thing of noodling around on the piano you need a musical vocabulary and you're not born with one you don't come with the vocabulary you have to put it in so however you do that if you if this is going to be your expression then you should do that if you're going to be a lyricist, you need to be able to read and you need to be able to process what you're reading. Otherwise that's what are you, how good are you going to be at this? And the idea that your tech, the technology can give you the rhymes you need and the computer can play

chord changes for you and that you can be the artist on top of that. You can call it art if you want to, but I wouldn't. I wouldn't be able to, not with a clear conscience. And I know that that pisses a lot of people off. And there's probably a lot of people who actually have very artistic hearts. And this is exactly their process. And I'm not going to say they're not artists. It's just that they're not going to create something that's theirs. Theirs. All they're really doing is manipulating other people's notions. And a very unpopular thing I'm saying right now, and people don't like, I really go there. Because I just as soon leave everybody alone to do whatever they want to do. And I'm fine with it. And the truth of it is,

I am fine with it. You know why? I don't have to listen to it yeah and i won't listen to it because why would i and not that what i'm doing is any better and maybe it's worse as far as they're concerned but it but i'm okay with it and just like they're okay with what they're doing you know i think i'm i think i'm copping out of everything right now but you know you're good you're good patrick um the new album is a walk in the woods no this has been one right new album is called it all comes down to mood oh the single the single is a walk in the single is a walk in the woods i had it backwards i'm sorry i had it backwards i'm sorry yeah yeah um i dude this has been one of my favorite conversations I've had in a long time. I'm so glad to have met you. I can't wait to dig in.

It's funny. In research, I started listening to your stuff. I was like, oh, shit, he was involved in that? I just didn't know. I dig what you're doing. I dig your mindset. I think, I hope what the audience has taken from this is obviously the application to pure arts, but that these concepts, these ideas,

this idea of owning exactly who you are and making your art could be your coffee shop or it could be how you just execute your task inside an organization. But I think, I it could be, you know, how you just execute your task inside an organization. But I think I love this idea that you shared of having, of understanding the vocabulary of understanding the core pieces, the, the, the ones and zeros of what you do so that you can, you make it unique to your own. Um, I appreciate you. I appreciate your your time where can people go to uh get the album uh where can people go to learn more about you connect with you follow along with what you have going on

um you know that there's there's a little social media starting now that i i won't be managing because yeah i tried instagram about seven years ago and i did it for a little while and went this is distracting me so i stopped yeah but now there's somebody who will do it. The album is coming out on vinyl in July, at the latter part of July, I think the 27th or 28th. A Walk in the Woods is coming out digitally, I think on the 28th of June. Okay. And the album will be available digitally after it's released on the vinyl,

or I think it may even all be the same day. Um, you know, it, it, it's, it's an old school thing. It's an old school record. And, and I really designed it to be a vinyl. Um, but I think it's a good listen either way. And, you know, I like it. I'll leave you, I'll leave you the audience with this so um my dad uh gave me about a hundred of his original prints from the 70s and and and 60s uh vinyl records and i have uh um queen um a night at the opera so i have bohemian rhapsody on original print and and i played the spotify version of the song and my kids love it you know who doesn't love

bohemian rhapsody yeah and then i said okay so you've heard that version now listen to this on because i have some old school speakers they're not you know old old school but they're less digitized and less compressed than a lot of the new shit and um i said now listen to this which has to be it had to be pushed through a you know a receiver which most don't anymore you know and i go and they're like it was like blowing their little minds like that you could tell even at that age you know know, and we're just, we're not a musical family, but like, you could just see them reacting more to how the vinyl captures the full scope of the music. And we don't have to get into the technicalities of it. I just think, you know, the technicalities of it. I mean,

I don't want to keep you, but do you know bits? No, explain it. No, I would love to hear it. We can finish with this. No, I love it. It's so simple. And it's beautiful. When you, when you have a vinyl, you have grooves that were cut into this material, this plastic vinyl. And when you put the needle in it, the needle is moved back and forth. It's vibrated by those grooves. And then that goes into an amplifier that vibrates the speakers in an extreme way, in an amplified version of what the needle is doing. So this is 100%

physical. When you're listening to music that's on your phone or digitally, you're listening to zeros and ones that are telling your brain this is music. It's the same zeros and ones that are telling you your movie is a movie. It's the same zeros and ones that are telling you your pictures are pictures. There is no, there's only zeros and ones, and it's how fast they go, and it's how they scramble, and your brain registers them like that. Vinyl is an organic reality, and your body feels that right away so one is out here and the other one goes in and i don't i mean i just listen to vinyl these days i once once i set up the vinyl and decided to make a vinyl and went back and listened a lot of my old vinyls and re-bought a lot of them because

they're they go back to the 70s and they don't really play anymore on their warm up. And I sat and listened. It's like, oh, yeah, that's right. That's right. This is a whole nother thing. And, you know, it's certainly not a contemporary notion, but it's a great way to consume it. And, you know, so why not? If I can do it, I'm going to do it and you know so why not if i if i you know if i can do it i'm gonna do it i love it i'm right with there with you patrick i wish you nothing but the best i appreciate it i appreciate you sharing your time with us and uh pleasure we'll see you down the road thank you

be good man thank you let's go every week we share, stories, and insights of elite performers that you can use in your business and life. Be sure to subscribe wherever you're listening or watching and leave a comment on YouTube to keep the conversation going. This is The Way. close twice as many deals by this time next week sound impossible it's not with the one call close system you'll stop chasing leads and start closing deals in one call this is the exact method we use to close 1,200 clients under three years during the pandemic. No fluff, no endless follow-ups, just results fast. Based in behavioral

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