wellRED podcast - #35 - W. Earl Brown pt.2/ "Back In My Day We Made What Was Called Mixtapes!"

Episode Date: October 4, 2017

Y'all, It's been a shit week and that's about all I know to say about that. We decided to go with the encore to one of our favorite episodes because Earl makes us smile and we think everyone could use that about right now. We talk about Good music, good movies, and good people.  Hope you enjoy and I hope you smile. Love ya like chicken.

And we thank them for sponsoring the show. Well, no, I'll just go ahead. I mean, look, I'm money dumb. Y'all know that. I've been money dumb ever, since ever, my whole life. And the modern world makes it even harder to not be money dumb, in my opinion. Because used to, you, like, had to write down everything you spent or you wouldn't know nothing. But now you got apps and stuff on your phone.

It's just like you can just, it makes it easier to lose count of, well, your count, the count every month, how much you're spending. A lot of people don't even know how much they spend on a per month basis. I'm not going to lie, I can be one of those people. Like, let me ask you right now. Skewers out, whatnot, sorry, well-read people. People across the ske universe, I should say. Do you even know how many subscriptions that you actively pay for every month or every year? Do you even know?

Do you know how much you spend on takeout or delivery? Getting a paid chauffeur for your chicken low mane? Because that's a thing that we do in this society. Do you know how much you spend on that? It's probably more than you think. But now there's an app designed to help you manage your money better, and it's called Rocket Money. Rocket Money is a personal finance app

that helps find and cancel your unwanted subscriptions, monitors your spending, and helps lower your bills so you can grow your savings. Rocket Money shows all your expenses in one place, including subscriptions you already forgot about. If you see a subscription, you don't want anymore, Rocket Money will help you cancel it. Their dashboard lays out your whole financial picture,

including the due dates for all your bills and the pay days. In a way that's easier for you to digest, you can even automatically create, custom budgets based on your past spending. Rocket Money's 5 million members have saved a total of $500 million in canceled subscription with members saving up to $740 a year when they use all of the apps. Premium features. I used Rocket Money and realized that I had apparently been paying for two different

language learning services that I just wasn't using. So I was like, I should know Spanish. I'll learn Spanish. and I've just been paying to learn Spanish without practicing any Spanish for, you know, pertinent two years now or something like that. Also, a fun one, I'd said it before, but I got an app,

lovely little app where you could, you know, put your friend's faces onto funny reaction gifts and stuff like that. So obviously I got it so I could put Corey's face on those two, those two like twins from the Tim Burton Alice in Wonderland movies. You know, those weren't a little like the cue ball looking twin fellas. Yeah. So that was money.

What was that a reply gift for? Just when I did something stupid. Something fat, I think, and stupid. Something both fat and stupid. But anyway, that was money well spent at first. But then I quit using it and was still paying for it and forgotten. If it wasn't for Rocket Money, I never would have even figured it out. So shout out to them.

They help. If you're money dumb like me, Rocket Money can help. So cancel your unwanted subscriptions and reach your financial goals faster with Rocket Money. Go to RocketMoney. dot com slash well read today that's rocket money.com slash well r e d rocketmoney.com slash well read and we thank them for sponsoring this episode of the podcast. They're the.

The Popeyes family feast. Why has everybody suddenly family with Popeyes hits the table? Feed all those cousins with six pieces of our boldly seasoned signature chicken, two famous chicken sandwiches, two large mouth watering sides, and four flaky biscuits. That's enough for cuts. Cousin coworker, cousin roommate, cousin neighbor, and all his billion cousin kids. You've got all the cousins coming. Even the ones who aren't really your cousins.

All for $29.99. Love that chicken from Popeye. Limited time to participate in U.S. restaurants. Prices may vary additional terms apply. Hey guys, it's the show. No harping on tour dates this week. Just instead of going to our website for that, go donate to Vegas. This has been a really awful week.

it's still oh god it's just disgusting and um because of that we did not do uh

we normally have a pretty topical intro that we like to discuss but there was really nothing to say I mean I don't we can't there's no way to be funny it ain't funny and I damn sure not gonna try to make it be um

and I mean yeah we could sit here and talk to you about gun control all of mental health issues all you want, but we've, you know, Jesus. Ah, fuck, I wish it just didn't have to be this to make us talk about that sort of shit, but it seems to be. So instead of that, to get off of a, I know it sounds depressing right now, but God dang, I don't know how else to sound, um, this week's episode, I'm so glad that we had this in

the bank because no one on earth makes me feel better than our good pal, W. you Earl Brown. Earl was one of the first dudes I met when I started working in Hollywood. You know him from there's something about Mary Deadwood. He's also, he plays Teddy on I'm dying up here, the new

Showtime show. He's been in so many great things and he's such a great actor and a great guy. Just listen to this episode and hopefully he'll cheer you up because Earl always cheers me up. So anyways, we love you and we'll see you next time. Bye.

Well, well. All right. Hey, everybody. Thanks for joining us. We've got a very exciting episode here because it's our first sequel. It's our first sequel episode. It's the follow-up. When we first last sat down with this fine gentleman,

we had said that we would have to do a follow-up because we felt like we were just barely getting started. And so we're making good on that. Here we are once again in the man cave, the very, very cool office digs of one Mr. W. R. R. Brown, character actor, extraordinary Renaissance man. Hey, man, sorry about the airplane flying right over the fucking house. That never happened. That's okay.

Right during the intro, too. I was looking up like, what? Is Burbank getting them in this late? I had to do that. Now we got a motorcycle. Immediately. I saved the whole shot because we had a plane fly over. You remember the piggyback?

And you looked up. Biggie back right? Yeah. I remember that. The plane literally flew over because that was a really complicated shot. Like we're on the truck and we're walking up the whole block and a three shot. And when the plane came in, I thought, if I'm worn it. But that saved the shot.

I remember you looking up as him. Thank you very much for doing this again. I know we're glad to be here. And I mean, you know, hell, I got coming over here and just hanging out with you. But we said earlier, and I mean, hell, it's funny. we said the exact same thing basically that you said when I texted you about it as far as doing the podcast and it's like well I mean we're going to be sitting there shooting the shit anyway we might as well record it why would it be a problem recording it we know we're just going to just turn the mics on and do what we were going to do anyway

yeah we're going to have to get away from that just so we actually can hang out because I know every time we're hanging out I'm just fucking just let's yeah this is great um yeah now um you actually just reminded me, speaking of hanging out with Earl, we were supposed to hang out one night. We'd made plans to go get a beer, something like that, and then something came up.

And he told me, sorry, something came up. I was like, that's fine, no problem. I mean, I get how it goes.

And then, like, a couple hours later, and so it's like in the morning time, a couple hours later, he was like, actually, you know what? I mean, if you want to come with me,

it's fine, you can. And it was a table read. And I'm not going to get any, like, whatever details about it, but anybody listen doesn't know. A table read is where, uh,

you take a script, whether for a movie or TV show or whatever, and a bunch of actors get together, and they just go through the script while sitting around a table, reading through it. And I knew that was the thing that happened, but I'd never done that. And I was like, yeah, hell, that sounds cool. And that was definitely a true Hollywood moment for your boy.

That was, because I was not, it's not that I wasn't expecting it or whatever. I don't know. there was a lot of pretty supreme hitters there like that and I wasn't expecting there to be they literally just kept walking in to the room and I'm just sitting there the whole time like hey it was right I felt like I felt like literally every person who walked in the door was like what what is that no no no no there were a couplemen what the fuck is he doing yeah it was uh it was very cool but So sort of related to that note

Another thing that Earl has been Well first of all I pester the shit out of him all the time With various questions and advice and stuff He's lucky I don't live here You owe me dinner We had a bet Oh wasn't it over basketball It was over basketball

March Madness not so mad Was it the Sweet 16 game Or was it Gosh who were you? Round of two Tar Hills Not Tar Hills

That was in the regional final Was it? Okay Yeah Yeah Yeah I guess I do owe you food I just wanted to bring up that. It was a big Kentucky.

What was that place we went to? Downtown. I don't remember the name of it even a little bit. It was good, though. Which here in Burbank? Yeah, yeah. We went down there and remember, actually, the waiter was a big fan of mine. Oh, oh, oh, whoa, we were at Granville Cafe.

Grandville Cafe, yeah. That place is good. There's all kinds of good places here. But anyway. Well, I'll let him buy me food. The only reason I brought it up is I just wanted to bring up because I hadn't seen him. I had forgotten. I wanted to celebrate the victory.

Right here. Basketball team and that you had won personally in a bed. I understand that. So, again, I'm always pestering him for, like, advice because I'm a newbie, a total greenhorn rookie. And there's all, you could feel the Grand Canyon with all the shit that I don't know or understand about this business. So I'm always calling Earl with stuff.

And I had this audition. He was like, well, just come over. You know, come over. We'll do it. We'll go into it. And so I came over here, and you were talking to me about, and I had to be. And I had read and heard in podcasts and stuff, heard actors talk about it,

but like the idea of like, you know, listening and being, listening and reacting and taking what the person reading with you, what they give you and going with that instead of, like, like, like, I got this down.

I know how I'm going to do it and then going in there and then just doing that, no matter what that person does, but being reactive to it. Well, I said it's masturbatory because you're stuck in your own world. Right. You're not connected to anybody else, so you're just standing there jacking it. Right.

And as we were, and I called you the next day after the audition and told you this, but like we were here in your office doing it and we did it a lot. And I was actually starting to towards the end there, I was starting to like feel that because I was like getting comfortable with you. And I felt like we were, I was actually just responding to you. You know what I mean? Yeah. Instead of just reading the things.

But then the next day I go into the actual audition and like, you know, I wasn't with my buddy doing it for the 15th time or whatever and it was very much so like just getting through it and it was a very big movie that he is can't talk about yeah it was a very big movie that i did not at all get uh for the record but um and yeah and i real as soon as i walked out and i wasn't like i wasn't super beating myself up about it but i was definitely like yeah that's exactly what i was talking about as far as just do you know just going in and doing it the way that I plan instead of like actually being present in there or whatever so how long how long did that take you to get to that point where you're like at a

comfort level with it or whatever and not just kind of expand on that whole idea for people who are listening um about being present and yeah well well first of all you know it it took me a long time to understand it myself but the first time first time you ever went I'm got on Mike. Did you kill? Did you just slay the audience? I did it. Yeah, I did pretty good. I did okay, yeah. Don't give me, the second time was total shit. Agreed. But it's, it's kind of the same thing. The audition process is you got to win the room, you know, which means winning the job, getting the job if you want it. And then when you're on set, there's a little bit of different skill set because you've already gotten the job. Now you've got to do it. But it's hard to describe

to a lay person, you know, unless they're an actor have gone through it. It's hard to describe what it's like of understanding those things, of being in the moment. It's just listening and responding to what's going on around you. We were joking earlier, an example, the something about Mary's story. We went before we started recording, right? Yeah.

Well, there was a shot. Wait. No, we were recording. No, we were recording. We were recording. Because we were recording when the plane went over. Oh, that's right, the plane. That's what brought it up.

Yeah. We can edit that out. No, no, that's fine. What were you going to say about that story? Were you just going to say that story? Just the story of the plane. It's being in that moment. I'm walking.

Okay, so what's literally happening to us is the plane's flown over and kind of messed up our recording our sound. But you can't cut. When you have an outside sound like that, you can't cut away. You have to ditch that soundtrack if you're just using the video part of it. So when planes fly over, we just stop. But in that moment, because I'm Warren, I'm Warren walking home, and there's a really loud noise. Well, you're going to look at the loud noise.

So that sold the shot. So that way, yeah, we can have the sound of a plane messing up the soundtrack because we see Warren responding to it in the background. That's just the being in the moment of what something happened. And I just went with it. There's an old adage in improv, improvisational theater of yes and. You never deny your partner's reality of the grid. You accept it. Yes.

And. Right. So sort of on that note, we were talking earlier when I first got here off mic about how I had another audition yesterday. And I told you I felt way better about it because I felt like I was way more in the moment. Well, but here's the thing, though. I'm pretty sure the reason that that happened. And why I felt that way is because it was an improv audition. Yeah.

Because of nature. So I didn't. I mean, there were lines, but it was very, it was largely improv. So I didn't have as much of a, I didn't have that, like, I didn't have it, I hadn't already decided before I walked in there, this is exactly how I'm going to do this, whatever, because I couldn't. Yeah. Because I don't know what the hell was going to happen until I got in there. You know what I mean. When I started when I was in school.

Right. You have to listen when it's an improv and you don't know what's happening. And so I felt better about it because I felt like I was just. But that's, I used to think of improv and scene studies two different things. And then not long after I got out of school, a acting school, I began to realize they're one and the same. The moment is either alive. You are either connected to the things and the energy around you or it's not. And when you have a written scene, you know, if you're taking a scene of David Mamet, those characters had never spoken those words before.

You've got to be in that moment when you speak those words or they ring false. Let me ask you, because you kind of alluded this earlier when you said, okay, now I've got the job, I got to do it. What do you feel more pressure in, like going into the audition or your first week on work? Well, it's like more, we know what's... Every circumstance is different. And I've gotten to the point I really don't get nervous at all at auditions, practically ever. Unless there's something I really want or there's some element of it. I actually just went back and redid an audition about two weeks ago because I wasn't happy with the first thing I went in and did.

So I just asked, can I come back? They let me come back. But that's, you know, few and far between that it happens. But early on, when I first started, yeah, it's a new process. And yeah, I need, I got to have this job. Well, you know, you're instantly fucked when you enter anything with, oh, I got to have this. Right. Yeah, that's kind of what I felt you were going to say.

Like, early on, you get super nervous about the audition because you need the goddamn word. Yeah. So you bring that in the room with you. Yeah. But, you know, you just got to let it go. There was a great movie. And I don't think we talked about this last time, really. the Dow of Steve.

I've seen that movie. I have a once week. Donald Logue, right? Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Well, Donald, I was, they brought me, and this was right after something about Mary. And I went in to meet the directors and the producer. And it was a meeting because of the success of Mary. Well, I read the script, and I just, I didn't really get it.

And then Donald, you know, the first time I've ever watched something that I was in serious contention for and thought, oh, my God, that guy is so much better than I ever would have been. But there's a great scene in the movie that kind of, explains the audition process and in turn life. But the Steve, the Dow of Steve is Steve McQueen being the coolest man who ever lived, the guy that all men wanted to be and all women wanted to be with, Steve McQueen. Well, Donald's character, the main character, is this slovenly substitute school teacher who teaches, you know, like preschool, but he has all these women.

And his buddies can't figure out how a guy that looks like him is so. successful. Well, he has this speech. He says it's the Tao of Steve, man. Steve McQueen being the coolest, you know, that line. And he said, it's very simple. Rid yourself of desire before approach. A woman can smell a hard on from 100 yards away. Rid yourself of that. I'm paraphrasing here. Number two, be excellent in her presence. It could be anything. It could be your looks. It could be, but look at me. I'm not an attractive man, but I'm a witty man. I can be, witty in her presence and then be gone they will then follow you and as i'm watching it in the movie i'm like that's that's what the audition process is but that's really kind of every

interaction in your life you know read yourself of desire before approach be excellent in her presence and be gone get the fuck out of there yeah yeah well see and i've had this you know go back to what you're saying earlier like you first getting started like i i need this i fucking need and I don't want to sound like I but because I'm a comedian and like that's my full time job as being a comedian and we're on tour and it's going well and all

this stuff like I don't have that level of I need this or I can't pay my fucking win and I got to go back to Tennessee. You know what I mean? I don't have that and so I feel like that you know makes this big difference in terms of like pressure and nerves and stuff but I mean honestly

I get in I when I get in there though I still have the nerves and shit but i mean i'm the more you do brand new to yeah you know like i'm hoping that'll just it will just do more of them it will yeah um uh shit i was gonna ask you something else and now i'm blanking on it you looked at me and grand as if to be like i have a thing that i want to do no i looked at you that's funny you didn't know what i was grinning yes because that he was the dow the dow the chow you're the slovenly yeah the law and the hot check yeah how does this happen That was absolutely always him until he became a kept man.

But I can still do it. I mean, I didn't say you couldn't still do it. But I'm saying. Hell more now if you're listening, Amber, God damn it. Amber, he's not still doing it. He could. Absolutely. He's not.

Dre, you're starting to get into that zone where the harder you defend it, the more Amber's like, why? I wasn't thinking shit. Why they keep saying this? If you for one second think that she's going to listen to this, you lost your goddamn. I'm not. Until everybody, all they're tweeting her.

Did you want you? She don't got a Twitter. She ain't got a Twitter. I think she, she actually, that's not true. I asked her that as like, do you, do you even have a Twitter? She's like, I do. And the last thing I put up was like 2000, which she was in college. I went back and looked.

God damn it, it's hilarious. I actually need to just start tweeting and fucking retweeting all her old shit. She'll be so fucking mysterious. Basic white woman stuff. Oh, yeah. Just like getting drunk with like all ends or whatever. It's like, you know, we're in the A tonight. We're going to smear enough.

You know, like just literally all that shit. Does y'all see where, because it, once somebody went back and figured this out and it went, like, kind of viral when it happened. So the San Diego Chargers have moved, are moving to Los Angeles. And so now they're the Los Angeles Chargers. Some random dude on Twitter or some guy had the Twitter handle, Los Angeles Chargers. And so they bought it from him. You know, I don't know for how much or whatever, but they didn't, they didn't go back and delete any of his old tweets. Oh, that's fantastic.

He wasn't super active on it, and it wasn't anything dirty or offensive or nothing, but people found it and they started to go back and retweeting all these things, and they caught on, so now they're getting retweeted every day, and it looks like the Chargers are tweeting them today. Oh, that's not fine. And it's shit like, uh, fixing to go grab my wife and go to P.F. Chang's. God, we love P.F. Changers. The Los Angeles Chargers.

I love the Internet. Yeah, the Internet is, it's amazing and worst place. It's America. It is America. But yeah, that shit cracked me up so much when I saw it. But yeah, so we didn't touch on any of the music at all last time, and you're a big music guy. Not only are you in a band and play music, but I mean, you also know a great many, very awesome musicians, and you have, I think one of the coolest things is the tribute shows or whatever that you've done to, you've done. to Chris Christopherson.

Waylon. No, Waylon was first. Okay. That was two years ago as of July 4th. And then Christopherson of April 16 and then Merle Haggard of April this year. Did I tell you? No, I didn't. I don't think I did.

I told him. Oh, yeah, what my friend said. I saw her in the gas station. You had a friend there. I saw it. Yeah, yeah. So you did the Merle thing and my friend. Angela Golden, I'll say your name.

She'd think it's hilarious. I saw her in a gas station. And she'd just come. She's like, oh, I just, hey, what's up? Corey, good to see you. She's like, I just got back from the, the Merrill tribute. And I was like, oh, yeah, yeah, I heard it was great. My buddy, you know, Earl, he was the, you know, he's the guy that hosted it. She's like, oh, yeah, you know that guy?

And I was like, yeah, I was at his house not too long ago. We did a podcast here. She's like, you think you're fucking big shit, don't you? And then just, like, walked off. And I was like, yeah, I do, actually. Too big for his britches. Yeah. Well, that was one that the Jones, or the Haggard one,

I was told, I asked him a month in advance because the Christopherson thing went late. I just texted him. I said, I understand you're doing this haggard thing. I'm going to be in Murray, Kentucky, doing a play at Murray State. I'm alum. So I want to come down to the rehearsals and come to the show. Absolutely, Earl, you're welcome any time.

If you need anything, let me know. So I don't hear nothing. So I'm packing, and I texted the producer, Keith, and I said, okay, if you're going to need me, to do part of the show. I'm going to pack a hat. If you don't, carrying a cowboy hat on a airplane is a pain in the ass. He said, pack your hat. So anyway, I get there. I'm at Murray State. I've been rehearsals for the play. I go down the day of, and I still haven't heard anything, so I get to the rehearsal. And again, added context of this, you've done, this is like the

same group of people that you've done the previous two with. And correct me if I'm wrong, but at least one, if not both of those, was kind of a, kind of last minute thing. But there was text written for those of intros. This is you trying to get out in front of that happening again because it's happened twice already. So anyway, long story short, the day of show, I get a text from the producer. Can you be here at 2 o'clock to discuss? So I got there. He said, here's the deal.

We had three hosts. Clint Eastwood, Jeremy Renner, and you. And he said, Clint got sick. We got a phone call on Thursday. He can't make it. We found out yesterday that Jeremy's producer will not let him out. It's you. I said, all right, mind you, this is 2 o'clock.

The show starts at 7. I said, is there any text? Did David? He goes, nope, it's all you. Literally nothing written at all. Jesus Christ. 30 songs, 30 artists, nothing written. So I wrote, I knew the intro.

I mean, you guys know, you win them or you lose them in the first couple minutes on stage. And so I knew the intro was important. So I literally sat down and remember, you know, they're here to hear music, not hear to talk. Especially in a situation like that because they're there for, right. They're there for this tribute to Marl Hagger. They probably don't even know there's going to be an MC. And then when you walk out, you know, it's like... That's pressure.

They're just trying to get through it. So that's when it's the most important to make it work. That line in Ocean's 11, where they're talking about how Matt Damon needs to play it when he goes to con the boss. He needs to like you immediately and then forget you as soon as you're out of his side. Like, that is often what a host job is. Oh, yeah. Yeah, for sure. Oh, yeah, absolutely.

Well, I knew the... You don't want to fuck up the next guy. Right. Well, the opening, one paragraph introduced myself, relax everybody. Number two, tell them why we're here, because it's Merle's birthday, and he died one year ago on his birthday. So it's his birthday, it's his death day, and it's a tribute. And number three, introduced the strangers and Ben, his son.

So anyway, it did, it went over blessedly well. The opening gag got him, and I knew when they started to laugh, like, all right, I'm in. So, you know, then I was scrambling. I would go and look at the program like, who's coming on next? What song? Luckily, I knew pretty much every song. I knew most of the artists. Like, I knew their music.

There were a couple of more just knew who they were. But hell, I got to introduce Keith fucking Richards, man. Yeah. And it went more than well. You didn't need a script for that. Angela told me you fucking crushed. Like, that you stood out. Well, the, I do remember.

And then told you to go, fuck yourself. But, you know, in a very loving way, because that's who Angela is. Well, at the break. uh skinnerd was the first up when we came back they were doing um oh god uh honky talk nighttime man and they recorded well i just remembered it and i said all right go back to my bedroom as something to this effect you know when i was 12 years old because i had this record call one from the road recorded at the fox theater in Atlanta and i would put it on i would stand in the mirror and the audience would cheer and then you'd hear their pre-recorded music and the audience would cheer and then the guy would say

please welcome our friends leonard skinner And again, it was like being 12, my bedroom, literally doing that shit to the record. Yeah, that's fantastic. So there were, some of those who were like, okay, I've lived this because I fantasized it. This one's easy. And then there was some, who is this?

Who is this? How do I ask, right? So, anyway, it went well. And I'm very pleased to be associated with it, to have those moments. Well, so, sort of on that note, like, do you ever, because I mean, man, you're a seasoned bed at this point. You've been in the entertainment industry for a long time now.

You've known a lot of these people for a long time also. Do you still, like in that, like what you were just describing, I used to do this in my room at 12 years old, and now I'm like literally doing that now. Do you still get, is that, is anything that still like surreal or wild to you? Fuck yes. Okay, so that doesn't ever go away with certain things. I mean, in this room, you got my posters from when I was a kid.

You got a wall-sized kiss and Zeppelin and, okay, Zeppelin, I call them pinch me moments, moments where something's happening in my life that I can't believe this is happening. Please pinch me because I can't believe it. We've had a few of those past year. Zeppelin was my all-time favorite band still is. Well, in October of 07, I get a call from my buddy Fergie in Nashville. Hey, man, didn't you say Zeppelin's your all-time favorite band? Yes.

You want to go see them in London? Fergie talks like that? Yeah, he does. I want to hang out with Fergie. She just left Black-Eyed peace. It'd be so funny if that Fergie talked like that off the mic. Off the mic. My lovely lady lumps.

Check them out. She did fuck with math for a little bit. It would check out. Anyway, Furr, I said, yeah, Ferg, but I don't know where I'd find a fucking ticket. Even if I could, it's going to cost like $10,000. You may have heard my TV show got canceled. This is a couple of years after Deadwood. Ferg goes, well, I know where you can get one.

I said, where? Got her next one. John Paul told me to invite you. John Paul is a big bluegrass nut, and he records a lot in Nashville. told him, Ferg engineers for him. I didn't know that. So he invited a bunch of his bluegrass buddies. Well, Ferg told him that somebody knew he loved Deadwood. And he said, well, Earl is, so I got to go with Ferg to the concert. That's awesome. But the next night, here's the pinch me. Well, that's my favorite band and never got to see him as a kid. We got, like, I'm sitting at the end of the seats

and a dude comes in, not long before lights went down, his hats pulled down low, he's got a fedore and he's looking. I said, no, I think your seats, these are numbered opposite. He goes, oh, thanks. Can I squeeze by you? I said, yeah, sure, James, James Taylor. Oh, shit. And then Brian May was sitting in front of us and the queen. So anyway, all these folks.

Did you say the queen? Brian May of Queen. Oh, Brian May of Queen. Oh, Brian May of Queen. And the queen. But the next night, here's the big pinch me. The next night is John Paul had a picking party, and he invited all the Nashville guys to come out. So I was there with Ronnie and Rob McCory of the Del McCurry band.

and all the girls from Uncle Earl, which he had produced. Riley Boggis, God, Warren Haynes was there. God, Jesus, yeah. So, anyway, it's a big, big, huge picking party. So I'm sitting there like this. We're drinking and smoking. First thing I sit down, and there's Ronnie McCurry at one knee and Bayla Fleck at the other, and they're trading these licks.

And it's like stuff way over my head. I mean, shit. Bayla Fleck is awesome. It's just jazz stuff that I can't even begin to try to play. like when we're, you know, going back and forth in comedy. I understand. Well, at one point, Ronnie says, Earl, sing one. I'm like, no, uh-uh. Y'all just, y'all keep going. So I had many more beers and the party had a lot of folks had left. Um, but they're downstairs at this point. And Ronnie says, Earl, you're going to sing. You're going to do a song. So, all right. So I sat down, I start doing this

song that I had written kind of with Mike Johnstone, uh, from Deadwood. It's kind of about a character in Deadwood, this guy that, um, a civil war veteran who's broken and he thinks he's going to go get rich and it's going to heal him. So that's where all of his dreams are. Anyway, we do the song. And course, they're musician, musician. So as soon as they got the key, they picked up the chord changes. As soon as I sang a melody, they were doing harmonies and stuff. Well, it gets to the instrumental break. And I just said instrumental on verse progression. Well, I got my eyes closed. Well, I hear a dobro solo. And I open my eyes. And well, first of all, Ronnie McCurry is sitting next to me on mandolin.

Robin Hitchcock is sitting across from me on guitar. A woman who I didn't know was sitting next to him. And there was John Paul on Dobro. And John Paul fucking Jones was playing a solo on a song that I had written, co-written. Get the fuck out of here. Yeah, worked on right here in this room as we're writing it coming up with stuff. So that was my real pinch-me moment of like, holy shit. All those years of sitting there with my headphones on staring at my lead.

Zeppelin poster listening to my records and I just a song that that I just so yeah that was that was my probably biggest pinch me moment that I got to see Led Zeppelin I'd like to know what could beat the fuck out of that that's pretty wild I mean again so like as I alluded to it earlier like that table read we went to like that was a Monday for you well like I mean hell that was a pinch me thing for me still like where I'm at you know like that shit was insane the the first one I know for me i think for all of us and i mean probably maybe still the biggest well i don't know i've had a couple good i still get i still pinch myself when i come to your house or i know i'm going to get over it but yeah earlier i was too intimidated to ask you to be in our band gypsy speedboat

but now i'm realizing i need to step up be in our band jimmy speedboat um but the first thing like that with us like real like in person like i had gotten like cool messages on the internet and stuff like like real in-person thing was when the drive-by truckers invited us to come to their show in Lexington and then after that we went on their tour bus and hung out with them and it's like it's almost

weird now I mean it's all weird but like at this point like we've because we're boys we've gotten to know them a little bit and like me me and Patterson text each other and shit and like we've all like kept up some and we've also we've just crossed paths with them a few times since then so yeah

we've gotten like know them some now but like you know, just for context, like, you know, growing up in Salina, Tennessee, being a liberal redneck or whatever, I mean, like, I really honestly can't overstate how important the drive-by truckers were to me when I first heard them. My nickname, my nickname for him is Skinard Cohen, because they play triple guitars really loud, like Leonard Skinnerd, and they write poetry like Leonard Cohen. That's badass. I mean, I'm a teenager and I'm... Yeah, the timing of them for us. Yeah, I was a teenager. I felt like I felt a lot of things.

First of all, you know, I felt out of place and all this shit for a lot of different reasons for being like different in a lot of ways. And also I had this whole chip on my shoulder that I mean I still have about like, man, the rest of the country, the rest of the world thinks that I'm a, you know, dumb ass racist heck or whatever. And I'm not that, man. It's like the only, that whole thing, the only time you ever see a southern accent, you ever hear any kind of southern thing ever, it's always something bad. You know, like, that's how it seemed to me at the time. It's always negative. And so when I first heard the drive-by truckers, it was so huge to me. I was like, this is, this is it.

This is exactly what I'm talking about. It's literate. It's loud. And it's southern. It's so, so southern. And yes, and it's saying it's fucking poetry, too, and it's so, I don't know. and I just, I loved them. I didn't hear him until college, and every time you tell this story,

I get furious that no one introduced me. And I actually, I'll fuck with my middle school. This is a very cool, a very cool moment for me in that story is I got this, and I feel like a dick now, because I can't remember the name of it, but there's this like, alt,

all weekly in Athens, Georgia. You know what I mean? Like, it's like in Nashville's a national state. I should, I should fucking know. Blank is the new one in Knoxville. now. Right, anyway. Shout out to Rusty.

You know, like the cool hip, like weekly paper thing with like art and music scene and shit in it. And they reached out to me when I was going to be opening up for the truckers. And they were like, would you like to write the article for this year's home? Because they do a homecoming show every year in Athens called Heathen's Homecoming. And I was opening up for them, which was already insane. Patterson called me on the phone and asked me to do it, you know, all so nuts. And then they reached out to me and were like, would you? Do you want to write the article that we'll run about, like, in the lead-up to it?

And I was like, yeah, sure, of course I will. And one of the things I put in there was, and this is true, my dad had excellent taste in music. He was rock and roll purist. He was like, I mean, also he saw it. It was flagpole. He saw, flagpole. Yeah. He saw everybody, you know what I mean?

Multiple times. I mean, he, like, I credit my dad for my taste of music and a lot of other things. The very first band. music of any kind of mine. That was my music that I introduced my dad to that he actually liked, and not just liked, but love, was the drive-by truckers. I played them for him, and that's the very first time he was ever like,

hell yeah, I like what they're, but you know, them boys get it, right? And so, anyway, they were a big deal to me, and I wrote that in the article, and Patterson told me later, you know, how awesome he thought that was or whatever but uh well see those guys they were literal heroes of mine yeah and so just even getting to meet them and hang out with them was nuts and then later on opened up for them and then you know we're watching the show they fucking rocked we were there two nights they were unreal obviously and like they're uh you know like talking about me on stage and they dedicated they dedicated the song of the southern thing to me and like that so that i mean right now that shit is still insane and

surreal to me. You know, like that's I don't know. That's pretty, it's a huge deal. When you're accepted as an artist on the level that your heroes accept you as an artist in that way, that is the most reaffirming thing. Yeah. You know, that I felt to, like,

I became really good friends with Chris, Christopherson. When we did, I'd done a movie with him prior, a Western called Last Rights of Ransom Pride, and about two years later, he starred in Bloodworth, the movie that I wrote the adaptation for. And we, hung out for two weeks. Our apartments were next to one another. And it was, I remember the first

night, I had gotten back. It was, I had to produce, was one of the producers on the movie, so I was stressed to all kinds of hell. So I smoked some weed to go to sleep. And believe it or not, I don't smoke a lot of weed, but especially back then, but I found somebody there local. And so anyway, I'm just trying to go to sleep. It's around midnight, and there's a knock on my door. I'm like, what the fuck's my? So I pull my pants on. I go to the door and it's Christopherson. He goes, hey, I just thought maybe we could go out for one or two or three. Let me put some pants on. So, fuck yeah. We went, we'd go to this place called the Blue Post, which had a great jukebox. And we hung out. We hung out on the set. We'd

sit around and play music together. And it was that acceptance of, Shell Silverstein's one of my heroes. Oh, yeah. And, you know, because he wrote a lot of great country music, or a lot of great music. Just a wild cat all the way around. Yeah. Well, I didn't realize how tight. There was a biography had just been published around the time we did the movie, and I had it there in my room.

And I didn't realize until reading it how tight he and Chris were. I didn't realize they had written the taker together, the big Wayland hit. So anyway, he's telling me stories of stuff or not in the book. But as he's going to leave, he said, I got to tell you something. I said, what? He said, you're so enthralled with that scene. in Nashville in the early 70s and Jack. It was an exciting time.

But I got to tell you, I get the same kind of pulse off of you. I get that same sort of that feeling. And that was, you know, those are the guys. Those were my gods. That's who I idolized. Yeah, I mean, like, what do you strive for after that? If Christopherson tells you, I guess you live up to that. Yeah, but just, I don't know, just the passion for what I do.

Of course. And a variety of interests. but music is always centered to me with everything I've done. You know, back in my day, we made what was called mixed tapes, fellas. But I used to make a tape for every film I'd go to do or every play that I was doing. You know, there were a handful of artists that were, Steve Earl was on every single one of them, probably from the beginning. Like you'd make a handout to the other people you're with or you never for yourself to listen to. Something about Mary. I can tell you the two songs I listen to.

I listen to Anthraxes, I'm the man and the Red Hot Chili. Peppers. I had blood sugar sex magic, so I just played the album. But those were the cassettes that were

in my cassette player because I wanted these kind of funky, weird bands with a sense of humor, then those two fit the bill. So Warren was always listening to Anthrax

or Red Hot Chili Peppers. Is you as Warren in the helmet? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Last time we were, you mentioned Steve Earl,

last time we were here, you played the feel all right guitar. And like, I maintained. Now, I may have been drunk and high, I mean, I was like, I can totally tell.

That's the Phil Al-R-R-R-R-I swear. I felt it coursing through my veins. Well, I got to play the feel-all-right guitar, and I was like telling people about it. Of course. I told my buddy Ben, who is a way better musician than me, and he was like, really? It's one of my Desert Island records. You know, you got to pick 10 records for the rest of your life.

It would be one of them. And I became friends with Steve. We met in airport back pre-9-11, and he was writing a play that, I did in Nashville. He wrote this role for me, so we became really good buddies. But I was visiting at the house, his place in Tennessee, he lives in New York now in the city. Got that serious show. But we were at the house and he said, man, I got a luthier built me, a new guitar. You want to come downstairs and see it?

And I said, well, yeah, sure. So we go downstairs. And he had this custom made that I was playing. He ended up, he had a Martin model made kind of like it. It's a thinner body. but my wife comes down the steps and she goes oh well i guess you're going to have to have one of those now and i said yeah i like it but i got my eye set on that gibson j200 steve goes what are you looking at and i said well there's one at sam ash out in lays it's called montana go yeah it's that special edition montana go they only made like 72 of them well there is one but i can't really he goes hang on

he goes to the closet and he brings this out he says it's a one hunter doesn't have the mustache bridge and the fancy inlay but it's essentially the same guitar play it so i'm strumming along and i he goes you won't it i said well yeah sure how much oh you can have it man i said what is is this one of your copperhead road guitars he goes no all three of those had snakes painted on them all three of them went to the pawn shop all three them went up my arm now when i got sober and got out of jail that's the one gibson gave me i wrote a feel all right on it that's it on the record too i said this you this i can't can't take this he said man i'm like harland howard i think only each guitar only gives you so many

songs that one's give me a whole record it ain't gonna give me no more i need to make room you do me a favor so i said twist my arm so yeah that's how i ended up with that guitar so that's like my pride and joy that's what i write on i don't take it anywhere um it's it's safe it's under lock and key we um you just reminded me of a story from patterson we released scott's episode we haven't that we'll probably by the time we release this one and even if we don't it doesn't it doesn't fucking matter i mean we need to put it out there is a good one we know i'm saying even if it hasn't come out by the time this one it doesn't fucking matter and i told you this story when last time we're one of the times we were over here it was when we were all over here

but we weren't we weren't we weren't recording so and it's a thing is this one where cori left all the beer cans on my front porch i'm sorry and a cigarette butts i'm sorry and my wife comes walking into bedroom the next morning how late were you all up. Me and you did sit down and talk for over and men, true. It's good for that, man.

Staying up or leaving shit. Both. Yeah. Together. Both in concert. Yeah. But what you just said about Steve Earl saying,

no, man, you only get so many songs out of a, and that one's giving me as as it's going to get me. We met and did an interview with this Luthier in Athens, Georgia named Scott Baxendale, who's made guitars for. all kinds of guys and he makes all the truckers

guitars and uh he was very interesting awesome dude super super liberal you know living there in georgia whatever and i i'd never i'd never heard that before and uh and he said he started telling us about that about that idea of it and the story he told was that patterson had said to him like yeah you know i've always heard that like oh there's a lot of songs and guitar whatever but i don't really you know i've never really, I've never really felt that or whatever myself. And then he got this guitar from Scott, and Scott said that Patterson came back later and told

him, he's like, you know what, I fucking get it now. He's like, there are so many songs in that goddamn guitar. And that's the first time I ever heard that. And I thought that was cool. But then I remember we came over here, and you said, Steve Earle said the same shit. Well, he attributed it to Harlan Howard. Well, I mean, what I'm saying is, apparently, it's just, it's a thing. It's a thing among musicians.

And I just, I think that's cool as hell. That is cool. Because I didn't know that before the past, you know, a few months or whatever. And then I just like that. I think it's just the tone and the feel of a different instrument, a new instrument, kind of put you, lead you in a different direction. It just makes me jealous because I wish that I could look at a pen that romantically. You know, and I just be like, well, you've done all you can. Fucking throw it out.

I need a new pen. I've got all the jokes out of this one. Do you write a little napkin and then accidentally come on it later and then that's jokes gone forever? Sometimes. I jot The phone is the thing Take a lot of notes in that What I do is I take notes

You don't write Yes I do I have several notebooks at home But it's all like You know that you were seeing him with a notebook? Yes I don't yeah absolutely For a new material No not on the road

No no because that's not my process My process is It goes from phone to notebook later When I'm I jot everything I don't write anything down long form I jot notes down on my phone Throughout the week

Then when I feel like I have enough time where I'm inspired to like, hey, let's really get out. I go through my phone and go, that's good, what the fuck is that, go away? And then if there's something worth exploring, then I write it down pen to paper and I add tags

in like a little bracket and shit like that. Are you silent this whole time? Like, you're writing it down and it's like, but if someone else was in the room with you, they would hear nothing but pen on paper. There would be nobody else in the room. Like, I would only do that. I'm asking if you talk out loud. Oh, without a doubt. Hips, don't hit.

Like all that shit. Yeah. No, my heads, don't head. Do what? Yes, yes, I would ask. Because what I've always done is still this day do, and I never had to think about it. It's just the way that I approached it. But, like, I do the same thing.

I have an idea for a bit, write a note down in my phone, just a few words remind me of it. But when I go to write it, me writing it is, okay, here we go. And I go in a room by myself where I used to when I lived in Tennessee, I drive around in the car. I don't do that shit here. In a shower. I can't focus on nothing but driving out of here.

but like and I just I literally just start talking out loud well first off let me let me explain this I don't write the full thing out long like what I do is I go through my phone I make kind of a note then I'll write that and then I'll do a little tag well this would be good this would be good but it's never like in full sentences or whatever and then I just take okay this is how I want to start it this is how I want to end it this part I don't really know and then I just go to the stage and fuck around yeah what I do is I make a note in my phone you know like what I want like this idea I have for a joke or whatever. And then like a week later I come back to it and convince myself it's stupid. Nothing matters. The void is all that is real. And hate myself. Right.

On stage and tell a bunch of open micers give up. But sincerely, I think my process is more like yours, Corey. Yeah, I write everything out. I mean, on stage, I'm like, it's never really fleshed out in the notebook. But I do, like, I kind of romanticize the old school. I like a notebook. I like seeing this. I like, my handwriting is the shittiest.

handwriting in the world, I like seeing it for some reason. Like I like looking at, like I make these little brackets and these arrows, put this here and do that stuff. And I like seeing how... I've tried it your way, Trey, like talking into my phone and stuff. I just never go back and listen to them. Because even though you said you like the way you write, I can't stand here in my own voice if it ain't doing jokes.

I don't record them. Oh, you just do it and then that way you can remember. And I just keep it in my head, then I go up there and do it. And I've found that like I do that when I'm working on a script, too. I'll do the same. not always. If I'm sitting there writing and I'm in a rhythm

and it's going and I'm just sitting there writing but if I'm about to start writing a scene... Do the characters talk to you? I'll do them all. It's not like I fully act them out but like I'm saying

I'll do the same thing. I'll talk out like I'll just start talking as whatever characters like back and forth until I get myself started. What do you do? You write shit.

You wrote and I told you this and this is I'm not blowing smoke up your ass. This is the genuine truth. your credited episode of Deadwood is my personal favorite of the entire series. Again, not just saying that. It's fucking amazing. What is it? Season 3, 10, right?

Yeah. Season 3 episode 10, I ain't got there yet. Because I ain't finished it. I'm on just the beginning of season 3. And by the way, you're a treasure. It's unreal, man. You haven't seen the fight yet either. No.

You know what? Actually, I can't remember if I told you this or not, but one of the very first things me and Jason Isbell talked about, which by the way another pinched me moment for me and it goes back to the truckers because you know that's where he started with the truckers I've loved him ever since then and so that was another huge deal

to me and one of the very first things we talked about was was Debwood and you and then and that same that fucking fight scene Jesus Christ that's probably the best fight scene well maybe ever

across all of like sent TV and cinema or whatever that I've ever seen, and again, not just bullshit, and I mean, it's fucking... Well, I really want to discuss that, but I ain't there yet. Well, you can't really, like, spoil. I mean, we can't spoil it with who wins, but outside of doing that, I just know that the fight scene... Well, I could tell you the background the way the fight happened.

Well, you talked about it last time we're here, and I had just started, Deadwood. I wanted to ask you, like, when you are writing, writing scenes and screw stuff, I wanted to ask how you go about it. But I also, I absolutely want to hear the backstory behind that fight scene. Before you do that, let me give you one example, like I said. of an idea. I just looked on my phone. I thought this was funny.

And I said, well, that's clearly not going to work. Here's a note I made. I have zero idea what I was trying to say. It just says, when I'm cold,

my dick looks like an ardvark who just saw an Applebee's commercial. No fucking idea. Anyways, go on with what you were saying. I don't know why. If you're going the absurdist route. Yeah,

and I normally don't. I'm sorry. The process, I hear the voices in my head. sometimes depending on the word combination I'll say it out loud if the words fall trippingly

from the tongue but usually it's I hear it in my head and I'll go back over and back over and back over and back over hell if you even see a Facebook post I make I'll edit to some bitches

10 times because I want you say that differently I don't know what it is I just I have to actually hear it like even whether it's characters I mean even a female character nothing like me it's not the actual voice

it's not my voice like I just have to hear it Well, for me, for the most part, I do hear it out loud because whenever I have an idea, it's because I randomly just said something to one of y'all or my buddy Robbie. Like, he'll have said something. I'll quip something back on a subject. It'll be hilarious. I'm like, oh, shit.

And I'll write that down. And it's already test. Like, I've heard myself say it. And I was, that's why I wrote it the fuck down, you know? Yeah. Yeah. Sometimes I guess I have to hear the rhythm out loud, but usually I hear it in my head. Yeah.

And I have a distinct voice, and I try to do that when capturing the way the different people talk, of listening to the rhythm of that character. Right. And that's why I said I go back over and back over and back over and change lines. Now, I have to give full credit. On Deadwood, David Milch was kind of the alpha and the omega. You know, David was the genius behind the show. We all wrote on every show. Right.

You'd pitch him ideas, and he would rewrite you. And, you know, there might be eight or ten lines in that script or actually what I wrote. as I wrote them sitting here. David rewrote most of it. And then the scenes with the Joni and Calamity Jane at the end, Regina Corrado wrote that. So anyway, just giving credit

where credits do. There's stuff that I conceived and wrote that kind of got filtered into other things. But still, I have to lay all the credit for the genius of that show at Dave's feet. Well, that's what a lot of people may not realize, and again, not that they all worked the way you just described

where you have, you know, the, like the creative driving force and like David Milch or whatever and a lot of shows are that way but like with writers rooms and stuff like you're watching episodes especially of a sitcom and in the opening credits that episode it'll say written by Corey right forster or whatever well it was Corey's week or whatever or it was on the board that plot line was Corey's idea or it's just his turn and so Corey gets the credit but yep they're all everybody wrote group after the room it's in the writer's room and that's where it gets written and then yeah Corey may have actually in the draft, and by the time he's just down to write the draft, the writer's room has basically

produced the whole thing, but again, it was his turn, so that's the one he's credited with, and that's just kind of the way it works. And it's, you know, it's equitable because it goes around the room that way. Yeah, it's fine. Every writer, depending on their seniority, gets X amount of episodes, you know, from an order. Right. But so what were you going to say about that fight saying? Oh, the fight came about, it was Al Graf, who played Captain Turner, was our original stunt coordinator, the first season, and then he left to go to Friday Night Lights to the movie. He's a football specialist.

He played in the NFL. He was OJ's pulling guard at USC. No shit. Yep. I didn't know that. So Mike Watson took over season two. So I knew the fight was going to happen. Oh, three weeks before David came to me in the writer's room. He said, all right, what's going to happen is building up

this tension between Sangeren and Hurst's and you and the captain, Hurst man, are going to have a fight to the death in the middle of the street. People are going to think you're going to die. But at the last second, we're going to turn it, you live. So, A, that gets my fat ass on a treadmill every day, because I knew nothing would be worse than just be completely winded in front of everybody.

So we had three days of rehearsal. And we would all suggest things. Dan Menehan, the director, Mike, stunt coordinator, me and Al. And, like, Dan said, we've never shot, we need to land in the meat in the butcher shop area at some point. I had the idea of the drowning in horse piss and the bite on the cheek. and we just tried a bunch of different things. Well, David, on that first day, that morning, he said, I have three rules. Number one, I want everything realistic.

I don't want any big cowboy roundhouses flying through plate glass bullshit. That's one of the things that makes it so great is that it feels real. It feels like a real fight. It's not this like hyper-stylyzed, like, you know, karate type shit. It's like a fucking street brawl. And he said my second rule, every time that the audience thinks it's going to ebb, I want it to escalate. I don't want the audience to be able to draw their fucking breath for five minutes. And number three, most important, I want something I ain't ever seen before.

Make it up. So that's when we started. So Dave would come at the end of the day. The only thing he nullified is they were going to do a stunt at the beginning where Al and I are rolling. We're going to roll underneath a moving horse. But he said, that'll take too much time. So there's a shot. You see us through the horse's feet.

But that was the only thing that David nixed that we had created. But we didn't have an ending after the second day. and Dave says, you know, it's got to look like you're dying, would you turn to tables? I don't know how we're going to end this fucking thing. And I had written a thing in season two, a script. I called it son of a bitch. My grandfather would not allow anyone to call him a son of a bitch. My mother's first husband, my sister's dad abandoned them, didn't pay child support, long story short.

He calls my grandfather son of a bitch. My grandfather hit him so hard that his eyeball popped out of his skull. My uncle was nine years old, witnessed it. My granddad picked up a chunk of coal was about to kill him, though my nine-year-old. old uncle grabbed his daddy by the chest so he couldn't swing it down. So I wrote that of Dan Doherty because my granddaddy's rules, son, don't ever let nobody call you a son of a bitch. They can say anything in the world they want to say to me, but they call me that word there's going to be trouble because anybody calls you that's calling your mama a bitch. Nobody called my mama

bitch. So I wrote that as Dan Doherty's philosophy and with Soapy to soap seller. Soapy's, you know, so anyway, we never used it. So we're the fight a year later. He says that thing you wrote last year that son of a bitch story that's not going to work because it's got to look like you're dying i there was a guy who i shall not name but he worked on the show as an advisor and he used to be benny benyon's enforcer in Vegas and his thing was he he took people's eyeballs he didn't break your knees he would hold you down use his thumb and relieve you um but i got to know him and and he was a tough dude and he said that and you don't say his thing He was an older fellow.

He'd gone through cancer at this point. But Milton said, and the thing with, say the name, he said, that's not going to work. I don't know how we're going to get out of this fucking thing. So then I'm playing poker at Jerry Cantrell's house, my buddy, the musician of Allison Chains. And he's big into Deadwood, and I was a huge fan of his band. He's asked me what's going on in the show, and I tell him about this fight. I said, we're actually, you know, we're rehearsing. We shoot day after tomorrow.

I tell him the story. He goes, that happened to my brother. I said what? He goes, my brother Dave in a biker bar in Oklahoma, this biker had him on the pool table by the ears, and he's cracking his head. And he said, Dave said it was lights out. He was going tunnel vision. And he was afraid that if he passed out, they'd kill him. So he said, just in desperation, he's trying to push the guy off of him. He felt his ring finger hit soft tissue, and he just instinctively knew it was an eyeball. Oh, God. So he jammed his ring finger in the guy's skull and pulled his eye out. And Dave lived to see another day. I think the other guy only saw half a day So anyway, I go to work Chemistry I love so much Dave, Dave, I've got an ending

So I lay it out Dad fuck, dad works Makeup, makeup Can we do an eyeball gag on the graph here Can we like a dangling eyeball? Yeah, we got, okay, dangling, all right, so That was your idea? Yeah, and the day

We're going to shoot it the next day We rehearsed three days and we shot for two days on it So it was a, Jerry Cantrell's brother's idea. Well, yeah. Well, it really happened to save his own goddamn life. It happened to David Cantrell, and I kind of, I borrowed it. I wasn't on a pool table.

I didn't mean, his idea to not die. Right. Well, so we are rehearsing, and they've got the eyeball gag for Al. We're doing that section. And Graf says, I wonder what would happen if you really lost your eyes. I said, well, I bet all the capillaries would burst. Blood would probably flood your good eye. If you could see anything, if the nerve is still contact.

the dangling eye. Well, I see the advisor down the way. And I go, I got an answer. So I go jogging down to him. He's leaning up against his post. And I said, hey, I got a question. Yeah. I said, when somebody loses their eyeball, what do they do?

He looks at me. His eyes drift off into the sky. And he says, they scream. They scream a lot. And there was this chill down my spine of like, oh, I'm not pretend talking to a tough guy. So I go back down. This is a real son of a bitch. Yeah.

Tough, tough man. So I go to Keller, who's a tough man in his own right. And he goes, what do you say? I said, you're, you, he's supposed to scream. So that was how the eyeball came about because of based on son of a bitch. And then hearing the story of Dave. Well, when I, when me and Isbel were talking and that scene, and we were talking about Dan and everything,

and I was like, I was like, man, what about that, what about that fucking fight scene? And Isbel didn't even say anything. He just goes, he puts his finger up by his eye and he goes, like that. Like, the first thing he was panama, popping eye out. And I was like, I know, right? And he's like, yeah, it's fucking intense or whatever. But, yeah, that was the very first thing he brought up.

But, dude, it's so, it's so good. I first saw it. Dusty and Billy of Zizi Top came out and played Cowboy, and it was just edited when they were there to shoot their scene during the finale episode, Hawkeyes Guns. I had Lemmy Kilmister of Motorhead, Scotty Inn of Anthrax, Jerry Cantrell, Rex Brown of Pantera. Rodney Crowell came and visited the set, but there wasn't really anything he could play Cowboy in that day. Nice. Sean Camp and Fergie Ferguson, they all came, so we all sit around and make music, you know. But getting to meet Dusty and Billy, that's a story. With Deadwood, I had ordered a custom pair of boots for my wife at BootStar here on Sunset.

I'd stop to pick them up. And they had a stack of Billy had a book, Rock and Roll Gearhead. And I said, oh, I got to have one. I love Zizi. It's autographed. I said, these are signing. He goes, Billy hangs out here. His mailbox is next door.

He lives just up the hill. So I said, well, you know, what's Zizi doing? He goes, well, they're kind of on hiatus at the moment. Billy's been doing some TV stuff for fun. I said, well, you tell him if he ever wants to do Deadwood, man. If he wants to come out and play Cowboy, so I don't think nothing of it. A month later, it was Super Bowl Sunday, the Super Bowl, the Rolling Stones played the halftime show.

Because as soon as the Stones finished, my home phone rings, I thought, who in the hell is calling me in the middle of the Super Bowl private number? Almost didn't answer. I did, hello. Yeah, my mouth speak to Earl, please. I said, yeah, this is Earl. This is Billy F. Gibbons. So I'm here over at Bootstar gave me your number.

Like, hey, Billy. So then I go running to the back of the house. Long story, he said, I would love. Would it be all right if I bring my bass player? I like that show. Dusty quotes it like it's the Bible. And so I said, yeah, tell Dusty Frank. And I don't think Frank watches it.

So, yeah. Couldn't even bullshit. He's just like, no, I don't know. So they came out for the day. and played cowboy. And it's still, it's so funny. Because every time I see Dust, you know, he brings it up. He had a special hat made.

And he saved. That's his Deadwood hat. Somebody stole it from a roadbox when they were on the road. And his wife sent out on the internet. This was Dusty's favorite hat. He used it and some fan brought it back. But yeah, that's, those were pinch me moments of sitting there with those guys. Yeah.

Well, I tell you, and it's this, I don't know if I've ever shared this one with you. but when we were getting times for them to come out I'm on the phone with Billy and Nokia Edwards walks by the Ventures I said oh nokey lived there on the set he has a bus when he was in L.A. He would park it there because he knew the owners of the ranch so I got to know him he created surf guitar

Nokia Edwards and Dick Dale created that style of guitar playing anyway I see Nokia I said there's another guitar hero here did you ever listen to The Ventures Nokey? Nokey, you know Nokia Edwards? I said, well, he's standing about 10 feet away from me right outside my trailer door, yeah. Oh, I got, so anyway, they're there a week or so later.

And I said, did you, I think Nokey's here? Did you want to? Yeah, I'd love to. So I go up and I bring him down. Noki was in his mid-80s at this point. He knew who Zizi Top was. He didn't really know the music. But he comes down, no, and Billy is like fan boy.

Sure. He's like, he said, I remember sitting there with Walk, Don't Run. I had the 45. And, oh, my God, that snare shot, that clean pop when it, what microphone do you remember? Were you guys using, you know, all this technical recording chart? Yeah. And at one point, Billy's just lit up and he says, it's got to be something to be that the point that you are in your life and look back at your work and realize what an impact you've had. Well, I'm sitting there thinking, dude, you're that guy to me.

I had your poster on my wall. I wanted it to be you. Yeah, you're watching like grandpa and great grandpa like right. while right in front of you and you're just like, y'all are both fucking awesome. Well, a few weeks later, we were out to dinner and I brought it up of that. And Billy said, strokes his beard. And he said, well, Earl, like everything in life, it's all perspective. Now, I remind myself, and I hear that voice in my head, like everything in life, it's all perspective.

Well, that's quite a quote. No shit. What's wrong? What happened by him? He'd spewed a beer. Well, it's happened here before. Did you get it on my bag? Did you get on my my my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, cow rug.

Sure is how, I hope not. No, no, no, no, cow rugs hit, no, it wasn't. It was over here. We're good. Cow rugs fine. I plugged it pretty quick. Shit. Yeah, what's your, okay?

Oh, I thought you were like, nothing. Yeah, no, I'm fine. I mean, that was just. Well, Jason, you mentioned Jason. I know I've told you the story. I don't know if we shared it in the last one. but I had seen one of the redneck videos or two of them or so and I'd gotten the book well yeah we did talk about it I remember you talked about it

yeah yeah and that was that was a that was a pretty good pinch me moment well that's what I called Isbell first I called Isbell about him I said I see you know you guys got a gig he goes I don't really know Trey we just emailed and sent a few texts but you know come on down in April I'll I'll introduce you well I'm still thinking well shit I'll just I'll like find his manager I'll call his manager and put on the dog like, you know, he's supposed to know who I am. And then it was a couple of days, and I'm reading the book. I read the article, the bit about your granny, Granny Bain.

Yep. And I tweeted you. Yeah. And then it was, God, it was that afternoon that Pat called me. And, and, well, I'd called him. That's right, because I didn't know they were on Conan until the day they were doing it. And I had something going around that time. And I'd called him or text him.

Sorry, I missed you. He's, well, actually, I got a buddy this. just moved Burbank, man. His family, I don't know anybody. You know, it'd be all right. It's you. Yeah, I know. It was while he had, uh, Corey had actually mentioned to me that you guys had, you know,

corresponding on Twitter or whatever. And so. You thought I was faking though, right? You thought I was not Earl Brown like that's any big deal? No, well, at first, no, I mean, I did, but like that I was, I was like, what? Really? Like, really?

Like, and that was like, I told, I text my, my buddy, Robbie, who's a huge, uh, something about Mary fan. And I was like, you ain't going to believe who likes my goddamn buck. And it was a great experience. But like, it was, it was so genuine. And like, and I tell you what I didn't know is I didn't know where you were from. I didn't know that. So when I found that out, I was like, fuck yes.

Yeah, this is validation in its truest goddamn form from someone I respect and I respect even more because he, game recognized game. I understand. Yeah, now the, now the Isbel thing was, again, another absolutely insane thing. I can't remember if it was Anaheim or Vegas when y'all were there. And he said something similar to it both nights. But I know one night he came out there and he was like, I heard it in Vegas. Again, he started talking about me. And he's like, you know, I come out here.

He's like, well, I come out here. You'll give it up. Trey Crater one more time. My guys. I got the band. I got the, you know, we got our instruments. We got the songs or whatever else and everything. He was like, I don't know.

He's like, I don't know how in the hell, you know. Trey or guys like him could come out there with just nothing, just him in a microphone and just put on a show. You know, it's like that that shit just blows my mind. You know what I mean? And then one of those two Nazis also says like, you know, and Trey calls himself the liberal redneck. And he's like, well, let me tell you something, buddy. You're a liberal redneck. I want to tell you that right now.

And yeah, again, that's one of those things that's like it's just absolutely surreal. When he said that about I don't know how these comedians go out. there with just one mic and do all this shit that blows my mind as soon as he said that i was looking like i don't see how y'all told all that bullshit around that sounds like a whole god damn thing well i mean no i feel the exact same way yeah yeah yeah for sure yeah for sure yeah hell jason isbell does what he does it blows my mind yeah hell hell what he does well see we had that at 19 at the wayland show um i was standing side stage and i i know lisa and christopherson and Chris, and I help him out some.

And I was helping her with the guitar cases and whatnot. Anyway, I'm standing there on the side as Chris does his gig. And Jason's standing right next to me. And I forget which song Chris had finished. Jason was choked up. And he goes, my God, those songs. Fucking genius, those songs. Well, Chris finishes.

And I turned to Jason. I said, well, you do know that you're this generation's version of that, right? And he got him, no, he got flushed. He's like, no, no, I'm not. I said, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, you are. You're the guy that's writing songs at that level. You may not be as big a star as Chris was in 1975 yet.

But as an artist, yeah, you are. And he was so, so humble by it. And it's just a different era. It's not that he, I mean, he's on that level. Like the level of stardom Chris had. Oh, few people are ever. It's not something somebody. The people that are at that level now are not people making music like Christopperson.

No, somebody that profound. That profound is not going to get also that level of fucking... But imagine, I mean, Chris in 1975, as I explained to my daughter, I said if it was like Kanye and Tom Cruise were the same person. Oh, fuck yeah. Because he was a huge music star. Because Anna just knew him as dad's buddy, the older funny guy. Because, you know, she was still a little girl with that bright. Movie star, country star, Dayton, Janice, Joplin, all sorts of...

I mean, the guy was everything. I mean, you know, what else? I want to ask you a couple of... things. I just looked at the clock and I cannot believe how long we've been tied. Have we already? We've already filled an hour. Yeah, no. Unbelievably to me. And yeah, we do. We've got to get up and more and take a flight.

So we're going to get out of your hair in a minute. But I wanted to ask you a couple closing questions. And they're kind of, whatever. They're kind of hacky, honestly. But you're such a phenomenal storyteller that I still think they're worth asking. What's like the most, and you ain't out of name names or not like that. even as far as the production or whatever, but, like, the most, like, hellish or nightmare or shitty or difficult, any and all of the above situation

you've ever been in as an actor, whether it's just one scene or a whole production or whatever, like one thing you just went, you know, it's just as shitty as it's ever been in doing this job. And then the second thing is the polar opposite of that. Not necessarily like a pinch-me moment, and if it is one, then, you know, great. but like, I don't know, the most, just the best or rewarding or fulfilling or whatever experience as an actor you've had.

Well, you know, every production is different and some are that kind of thrilling. You can't wait to get there. And some you wake up a morning like, oh, I don't want to go to work. Yeah. And everyone's different. You know, one of the most disappointing, I had this scene with an actor who I admire incredibly as an actor. He's a wonderful actor. As a human being, he leaves a little wanting.

And I had one big payoff scene in the movie with him, just me and him. He could not have been more difficult to deal with, toward me. Just antagonistic. He didn't know my work, didn't trust it, and he was a dick. And that was your first ever interaction with that person? Yeah. I had worked with one of his brothers, I knew, but I did that. not know him until we i'm at the table read and i said hello and he was standoffish then

how common or rare is that by the way like guys that are super talented or girls are super talented you look up to a lot or whatever and then they end up being divas or just shitheads or whatever like usually usually that behavior comes from actors who aren't is they're so insecure about their abilities that they lash out that way right um that's how true is when we're on set Well, there have been a couple of guys, though, that, that, again, I don't want to name names. No, no. But both of them have been gargantuan stars who kind of blew their careers by behavior. One has recovered.

One hasn't. But there was just no, like, they're incredibly talented. There's no need to be that big a dick toward people. Right. And to be that difficult. And the difficulties weren't about, like we were talking earlier, but I'm doing, I'm dying up here. and Melissa Leo, she's a very demanding actor, you know, and very specific about her rehearsal process. And so working with her is a challenge because she challenges you.

I loved it. Don't get me wrong. You know, when we got into the scene, I was thrilled. But her, it was all about the work. It was about the scene. The behavior I've seen of a couple of those guys, it wasn't about scenes, it was about their egos being stroked. And so, you know, that's the negative. The only part of my career that I just really do not care for is like the red carpet kind of stuff.

Yeah. Why? What is it about that? Because I love sitting around talking and having a conversation with anybody. But that shit's all about they want to sound bite. And it's who's more famous. It's just this kind of symbiotic thing that makes me uncomfortable because it makes me self-contract. And that's kind of the antithesis of what we do.

You've got to be alive. And in the moment, you can't be outside yourself. And that experience makes me feel that way. That's why I'm usually drunk at them. Yeah, hell yeah. My wife and I were talking about this the other day. She goes, the only one I've ever think you enjoyed was the American crime. And that's true because those people that were assigned it, because we weren't a big, huge

marquee show, they had watched it. And they had questions about the show. Like it, you know, challenged your assumptions. So anyway, when I can have a real conversation with anybody, I love it. But the fake showbizzy part of it's the worst. But the flip to it, the best, is when you're in those moments where the creative juices are just flowing and this stuff's just happening and it works, you can feel it working. It's just like when you're on stage, when you're in that moment, when the notes go away, when you're not even thinking when new material is coming to you in that moment with that energy exchange with the audience. You know, you don't really get that from film TV work because your audience, their crew's there.

Usually, if you can make the crew laugh or get a crew member choked up and something, you know, okay, because they've seen it, you know. What about other actors? What about them? Do you not ever have any sort of, obviously it wouldn't be like us with a crowd, but some sort of experience. Oh, yes, absolutely. the energy that you and the other actors exchanging is a great moment. Absolutely. You really made that person cry, or they really made you cry.

Well, here's one. And I use this to illustrate to young actors just starting in this. I did the pilot of Bates Motel, the TV series. And the Keith Summers arc with the first six episodes, even though I'm only in two scenes in the pilot as Keith Summers. Well, the rape scene where I rape Vera, I break into the house, attack her, handcuff her to the kitchen table, and it's very, very violent. We didn't know how much the network would let us show as far as nudity or any of that stuff.

So the way the thing's choreographed, she looks in the window, I bust through the glass, open the door, come in, she grabs a butcher knife. I kick her in the chest, spinning her, spinning across the floor, I pull out a box cutter from my hand. I reach over, she's trying to push her hand away, and I slice open her palm. with the box cutter. Then as she's screaming that, I drag her, handcuff her. Anyway, we're shooting the first section of this.

And my line, oh, we're shooting the first, and that's what we end up back in the position. Her son comes in, catches me mid-act, beans me with a cast iron iron, knocks me out. Then she takes the handcuffs off. They cuff me. When he leaves the room, I'm supposed to get up to my knees with my pants down at my ankles and say, so what now? So what now? And then she takes the butcher knife and stabs me,

stabs me, stas me, stads me, 20-some odd times. So we did the first take. And the camera's on her. And you can see this. If you watch it again, you'll see it. It's just supposed to be, so what, so what do we do now? Stab. Well, the second time, Freddie hit me pretty hard in the temple. And so I was kind of got my bell wrung. So when I'm laying there knocked out, my head was spinning. So it's my cue. So I get up to my knees and I'm like face to face with her. And I couldn't remember what I was supposed to say. And I just looked her in the eye and I went, you liked it.

And what you saw was three distinct thoughts crossed her eyes. Shock of what did he say? Oh my God, I kind of did. He saw my true self. He has to die. Those three thoughts happen. And that's what makes that character. So any character is when you find multiple facets to them.

In that, just the expression in her eyes told you three very distinct things about Norma, that, oh, she pretends to be prim improper, oh, she's shocked. She really did get off on the sexual violence and she's murderous. But it was just because Vera is so phenomenally talented and so in the moment. and that was one of those little magic moments. And it stayed. It's in there. That's what you see.

So when things like that happened, that's the thrilling, because you're creating something completely, you know, creating this unique moment. And again, it's with, I keep going back to it. When you have those, and you know it's not every night you go up. I know we talked about this before with comedy. You know, my buddy who dreamt of doing what you guys have done, A guy that I grew up with, Ben Brumley, he's been on stage, he's done a little bit, but it's that you've got to get used to the nights when it does work and when it doesn't. But you've got to be in a place of when it's not happening to be able to find the rhythm with the audience and make it happen.

But when you're lost in that moment and new material is coming to you, you know, you've got a new twist on a phrase or you've got a code of sentence, you know, to a joke. Oh, yeah, there's a pulse. Absolutely. I don't know if I've ever felt better in my life, and I'm not entirely sure that. healthy but I don't care. When I I'm like in the moment and I'm watching myself talk to this audience

and the materials flowing in and part of my brain is saying to me this is the next line. Wait a second. Say it now. That crushed. What about this? Yep.

It's the best. I sincerely feel weightless from time to time. Like I'm ice skating or floating around the stage and like every, you know, it's a euphoria. Well, Drew said it. Not to jack us off. That just that is how it feels.

Oh, absolutely. Well, Earl and Drew both mentioned, like, being, you know, in that moment or whatever, I actually feel like I almost, it's super hard to explain, but I almost feel like I'm, like, not even there. Right. You know what I mean? Like, like, I don't know. Because you're so in the moment, you're not aware of anything else.

Like, I almost feel like, I have to say, I mean, on the one hand, I'm completely and totally in command. That's why it's happening. Right. On the other hand, I feel like it's almost just happening. Well, that's what I mean about the floating. Like, it's like, I'm not, I'm walking around, but like, I don't even feel my fucking feet. Like, I'm just, you know, here I go.

And that's why I say, unless somebody else shares it, I mean, it's that way with music, it's that way with painters. When you get lost, when you lose track of everything else, you lose track of time, you know, it's just the light and the shadow and the focus. And how am I going to smear the paint to do that? Or it's the, you know, the chord progression. or it's those moments. And I found, I don't know, this is a conversation. My wife and I just had, too. The one that put her to sleep?

She was asleep on a couch and you got. We traveled all day. I'm fucking with you. But when I'm going to sleep or waking up, when I'm in that semi-conscious state, I mean, a good chunk of the stuff that I write comes then. For sure. When I wake up in the morning, that's the best time I have. Oh, really?

Shower. I'm envious to y'all. No, dude. I'm straight up. I'm worried up. I'm Warren when I'm in that state. But not at night. But not, not.

No, man. If I can get up, if I can discipline myself to get up at like six, because my fiancee's a teacher and she gets up super early. And it would just, even though I'm on a comic schedule, it'll knock me up from time to time. If I can just get the fuck up and just go for it, the best. Get in the shower, I got, I go, oh, shit, shit's going, man. I'm usually much more productive because I'm so lazy.

of a morning. I'm much more productive if I get up and do that. Sure. I did that when I did Cat on a Hot Tin roof back at Murray State in the spring. And I was worried because I had 85 pages of dialogue. I haven't memorized that much dialogue in 20 years. I don't even want to hear

that makes me want to throw up. Like four or five pages a day max and I do that morning. Right. Right. And what I found And you can still go, okay. Yeah. Right. But I kind of, it's not a, I guess I do photograph it in my brain because if I get lost, can literally look in my brain at what the page looks like.

Yeah, right. Where the line is. Same way. But with learning cat, because I played that role 34 years ago. I saw that post, man. That was very inspiring. That was wild as hell. Yeah.

But I found what was happening at moms. I was there by myself, my mom, my wife, or daughter weren't there. I was waking up before the sun comp and could not go back to sleep. And I would go sit with a cup of coffee on mom's back porch with the play. Within a week, I had it all. Yeah. I had all 85 pages. Sure.

And it was that. So I know if it takes self-discipline for me to get my ass up and get out here in my office and actually work. But I'm much more productive. For me, it's because there ain't another goddamn thing going on. Like at 6 o'clock in the morning. I think also your brain's fresh too. It is. Just woke up.

But there ain't like at 6 o'clock in the morning, there ain't no other buddy I could be hanging out with. Because either they're at work or what? Well, no, I'm just, again, I mean, hell, I'm envious of y'all. for the fact that's true for you because Well, you know I do it, man. You have young children. I'll text his ass at that early. He won't wake up and hear my text.

Like, yeah, yes, I have young children. So when I am up in the morning, I'm just getting them ready to go, like, you know, their preschool or whatever. But, like, even before I'll, I'm just, I'm the absolute antithesis of a morning person. Like, I'm not worth a damn in the morning. Like, if I had kids, I might be different. Creatively, performance-wise, like, I had to do we're in Huntsville, Alabama. for this whole past weekend. I had to get up at 6 a.m.,

which is 3 a.m. on my body, well, 4 a.m. on my body. Because I just got in the day before, and I had to go do local TV. I had to go do a local TV spot on a morning, Huntsville Morning Show. I mean, you know, I mean, it was fine, but, dude, I was like, it was nothing. You know what I mean? Like, I was, it wasn't, I wasn't, you know, my normal, effusive, super charismatic self. Oh, yeah. that anybody knows and loves.

But anyway, yes, we do have to go and get out of your hair, but Vogam 2 was awesome. I'm looking forward to Vogam 3. We got to do that soon because we didn't dive enough into music. We got to do it again. This guy, we could do. We're just going to keep teasing it. We do all seasons, worse than that.

Yeah. Whatever the hell that even means. Yeah, we'll do Earl Town. Earl Town, baby. Earl, seriously, thank you so much. As always, we appreciate it. And, yeah, I don't know. We'll see you next time, man.

All right. Thank you, buddy. All right. Scoo. Thank you all for listening to The Well Red Show. We'd love to stick around longer, but we got to go. Tune in next week if you got nothing to do. Thank you, God.

Bless you, good night and skew.