Marcus Mumford

Welcome welcome welcome to armchair expert. I'm Dex Randall Shepard. I'm joined by Monica Lily Padman

Are you excited that your name is very similar to the little boys name in Game of Thrones?

Yeah, one night and seven Kingdom. I do like it

I think that's the name is Dex soul his middle name is so out. Yeah

Makes me think he's got really cool parents

Well, I think he does

We're in love with them so good

This is an intro though. I don't know if this is the place

It's okay. Okay. Okay. Marcus probably loves him. This is an incredible episode. There's fuck we we are we are so happy with this guest

This was so much fun Marcus Mumford

Marcus is a Grammy award-winning singer songwriter musician and record producer is the lead singer of the band Mumford and Sons his albums include

Sino More Babble Wilder Mind Delta Ding Ding Ding Rushmere and is a new Mumford and Sudden's album out now

Called prize fighter listen to it. We're lucky enough to have heard him blast us. Yeah, spoiler live performance

He sings for us. Yeah, he's episode and it's incredible and the album is incredible. Yeah, he sings the shit out of that song

Powerful please enjoy Marcus Mumford this episode of armchair expert is presented by Apple T

V the new US home of formula one starting March 7th

You can watch complete all-access live coverage of every Grand Prix including practice qualifying and sprints all in one place

Watch every race live only on Apple TV

We are supported by Quince. There's something to be said for clothes that just work

Not trendy not flashy just well-made pieces that hold up day after day

That's what Quince gets right they make every day essentials with premium materials organic cotton sweaters polos lighter jackets

The kind of stuff that looks good season after season and here's the thing

They cut out the middlemen by working directly with top factories

So you're not paying brand markup. You're just paying for quality. I really love Quince

It's becoming startling. I've been walking around. I asked people if I like they're close sure

You got to put yourself out there and nine times out at 10 these days. It's from Quince

Yeah, I just got asked by the fashionista herself Nicole what size I work

She's getting her husband something from Quince amazing Quince only partners with factories that meet rigorous standards for

Crasman ship and ethical production

These pieces are built for daily wear the kind of clothing that becomes part of your routine because it's reliable

Refresh your wardrobe with Quince go to quince.com slash stacks for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns now available in Canada

2 that's q-u-i-n-c-e dot com slash DAX free shipping and 365 day returns points dot com slash DAX

This podcast is brought to you by Squarespace the all-in-one website platform designed to help you stand out and succeed online

When we were building the armchair expert website rob actually use Squarespace to get it up and running

Which was a smart choice because they've got everything you need in one place to create something that actually looks

Professional what really stands out is their blueprint AI feature as like having a design assistant that helps you build a site that doesn't look like

Every other cookie cutter template out there answer a few questions about what you're trying to do and it creates something that actually

Fits your vision if you're someone who offers services whether that's coaching consulting creative work whatever

Squarespace handles all the business stuff too payment processing scheduling client management no more juggling five different

Platforms just to get paid for what you do the whole thing is designed so you can focus on your actual work instead of

Wrestling with website tech which let's be honest most of us would rather avoid so head to Squarespace dot com slash DAX for

A free trial and when you're ready to launch use code DAX to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain

Yeah, that's it. Look at that beautiful

It's gorgeous. Yeah, they're the inlay. Where do you guys live? Oh shit? She grew up going to school driving by

Stonehenge. Am I remembering the right person? No, I'm not. Oh, I'm fucking thinking of the gale from

Bears and we're cutting all that relieving it all in. I'm failing in my 50 first year. No, no

That was from Fargo season five and 10. That's so most incredible actress

She's from down there and she used to cross something that John the way that she went to be dails, didn't she?

Is that what it was? School that lots of that. Oh, oh, the Alan went there. Oh, wow. Very in the news right now.

Yes, man. We just had our thousandth episode and I'm pretty good at keeping the details.

But I have conflated to English powerhouse. But Carrie was also zoomed. She was zoomed. And that's harder.

Carrie was zoom. Yeah. Yeah. So that's harder. It's like they happened, but they didn't happen. Yeah. How do you do this?

Well, let me show you what happened through the because I believe this is the only brand of laws. And

I like the other ones give me gas between you and I Marcus because you have to push through a bit of

an indigestion barrier with the gum. Because on the other side is the relation. Yeah. Yeah. The ones

I like only come in two milligram and I need four. No, no, no, no, touch the sides. That's right. It's

not helpful. And so I have to supplement with a spray. So I basically make this a four.

It's an apothecary. Yeah. Fantastic. Are you a nicotine head? Yeah. I just saw the gum in his

mouth. It's my last remaining vice other than pride's sort of general continuous.

Nicerat is my last one. Okay. That's good. Marcus, we should not aim to get rid of it. There's

nothing wrong with it. No, my doctor was like, have at it, bud. Yeah. I don't even know that we

should call it a vice other than we would die without it in that respect. Yeah. Well, that's true.

When are you called a virtue? It's a virtue. Do people ask you like non nicotine users when

they see you consume it compulsively? Do they go like, well, what's it make you feel like? Do

they ask you that? Yeah. I get bit of that. Or I get a bit of like what brand of gum you obsess.

And what's your answer to the feeling you get? Because I have a go to. I only get a feeling with

the lack of it. The feeling is absence of agitation. Not so much more eloquent. Yeah. Yeah. I don't

feel it. Other than the morning, the morning is nice. The first coffee and I'm fucking pop, pop,

pop, pop, pop. You get a buzz? I can't get any buzzes. You know from the first one? No, I get a buzz

from my first coffee. Yes. Yes. And I've taken coffee much more seriously since I stopped drinking.

When did you stop drinking? 19. Oh wow. 2019. Seven years. Good. Yeah. Yeah. Congrats.

Yes. I didn't know that we had that overlap. Yeah. What about you? I haven't drank in 21 years.

Wow. But I had a nice little go around with opiates during COVID. Okay. Bad spell had the detox

in the whole night. Yeah. Don't call it a relapse. I've been here for years.

You're too young to know. No, it's fantastic. No, you know. You know, you guys were the same age.

We are. I didn't know that. It's a lovely age. It's a good age. I like it too. About to hit 40.

Coming into our prime. That's right. How do you feel about it? I feel fantastic. Yeah. Me too.

I like it. We were just talking about it. You know, occupying that space between our kids and

our parents is kind of a nice place to be figuring stuff out in. Don't you feel like it's the

age though, work time is starting to 11 11. Everyone make a wish. Oh.

So don't you feel like it's the age where you start really feeling the passage of time?

That's true. Because your parents are aging and then you have your kids. I feel like a slight shift

in authority. I feel like it's time to sort of know what I think. Interesting. Whereas before

you could kind of rely on the opinions of your elders a little bit and I don't know. A lot of

people go through spaces in their 20s where they're like, really like this is definitely what I

think. I like, I don't have many answers for a while. I have lots of questions. Wisdom seeping in

is what you're feeling. Maybe. Yeah. Maybe. But so if I do the math now, then I think you and I

are on nearly identical trajectories. Did you quit at 29? About 31. I don't actually know. I think

it was 2019. Where are we now? 26. So that's six and a half years and I am 38. My wife and I are

so equally bad at maths on my last birthday. She wrote me my birthday card and she said happy

39th birthday and it took me a full three hours before I went next door with my calculator.

The year is I knew the year minus the year I was born. Sure. Which I thought was quite a

clever way to calculate it. And it turns out I was 38. Yes, that's right. Actually for my birthday

she got me an extra year. I mean, these parallels will they stop January 2nd of this year. I walk

into my bathroom and my lovely bride who's handwritten me a beautiful card and it says happy 52nd

birthday. And I thought, oh, she accidentally wrote a two on the inside. She'll get it straight. No

doubles down on 52 three or four times. Oh my god. Maybe it's actresses. They can't do it.

And then we'll get into other less fun parallels. But hey, you know, I think we got a lot of.

So I think strangely you were born in California. What's indeed strange? Yeah, I was born in

your Belinda route into knowledge county, which is heavy, heavy Christian country. Yes,

sir, which is why I was born now. You know, so mom and dad worked for or leaders in a church,

yeah, in a church called the vineyard church, which weirdly, Bob Dylan and Johnny Mitchell went to

with T-bone Benette in the 17th century. Oh, really? Yeah. Well, then my parents went out

with her for a couple of years and got trained up by the guy who led it called John Wimba,

who's like a grandpa to me. He used to bring me quick silver t-shirts when he used to come and stay.

And sort of this large bearded American, very Californian kind of guy with Hawaiian shirts

to show up in Southwest London at our house and be like a real fish hour water. And

was this amazing guy? He was actually in the righteous brothers. Oh, he was?

Yeah. And I sort of gave up all that and then went west. Was it mega churchy style? No,

well, it's a bit smaller than that. Very community based. It's an amazing church. I mean,

like all churches it has, it's floors, but it was kind of a cool community to grow up in.

We had a real open house. We had always had people through the church bought the house next door

to us and knocked through the wall as a guesthouse. My mom loved hospitality. It was always baking,

cooking stuff. And so I'd sit in the kitchen with her watch her and listen to music and talk.

But what makes me think your parents must be pretty unique in their own writers. My very good friend

from London was just here last week, British automotive journalist, Jeth Rowan. We were in the

hot tub chatting about religion. And he was really saying, you know, it's so different there

than here. Yeah. I mean, even that evangelical kind of strain is so dominant here. And he's really

wrapping his head around it because he's married to an American woman with American parents from

the Bible belt. And he's trying to understand how deep it goes here. So because it's so not

standard there, what took your parents there? My dad was working for the church of England,

which is very traditionalist and, you know, wearing a dog collar and doing lots of kind of

last rights, births, weddings and funerals. That was the jam. The big three. And then went and saw

Wemba speak at Westminster Central Hall in like 85. Both my parents felt like we got to go to

California and understand what this thing is about, which is a real risk at that point in their

careers and their lives. They had one kid. Because the church of England had to have frowned upon that.

Absolutely. At that time, particularly. And so it was a risk. And they went out and felt like

that's what they're supposed to do with their lives. They felt like that's what God was telling

them to do. And so they went out to Orange County to go spend time with Wemba and learn about how

they did church and then planted the first church of that kind outside of the US in our little

front room in Wimbledon. Okay. Which is Wimbledon the tennis venue we think of. That's right.

Southwest London. Yeah. What kind of kid were you there? Do you have siblings?

Yeah. I have an older brother, six years older than me. My wife's a little sibling as well. And both

are older brothers fiercely intelligent. Both went to Oxford University, double first. And so we grew

up as like the younger kids who had to like juggle in the corner for attention because we couldn't

keep up with the conversation at the dinner table. Yeah. Yeah. So I think let's part of that.

Okay. If you're smart, I'll say. Yeah. Exactly. It was a bit of that. Watch me play the drums on

Source Pants. It's my vibe. And then always had this kind of Californian streak culturally in my

life. So I like, perox, I've blown my hair when I'm 10 when I first met my wife actually.

Where did you guys meet? I mean, Bible camp. Bible camp. Yeah. You met her when you were 10?

Yeah. We were pen pals. What? Yeah. She was about a foot taller than me. She's an absolute giant

at that time. And I was quite small. She's not a giant now. I love that you say she was a giant,

not that you were small. Yeah. She was freakishly massive. And I would go on her shoulders in

the swimming pool. No. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. She wrote on her channel. I met this boy called Marcus.

He's two years younger than me. So definitely not underlined boyfriend material. Oh my god.

I think he was Brented John's diary already. I got a 9 at 10. And my cousin who was her age

gone eight and a half. Oh, really good. Before we keep proceeding, you're married to Curie Mulligan.

I hate to say that. I always hate when people say that when I'm an interview,

but a last interview. Everyone's talking like we should know the why. Right. Now,

that needs to be framed in your house. Yeah. We do have that. It's not framed. We used to

facts. We're special. What kind of facts is pictures or pictures and doodles and anything naughty?

Nothing naughty. No. We were like 11, you know. Yeah. I know. Tell me everything.

Just all my doodling. Generally, I found my way into penis and balls. Cowboys.

Oh, there's a lot of that. But I was trying to press. I was trying not to be in my head.

I'm the me head now. Yeah. It's a beautiful month, but

nothing you got her. Okay. But so, so face to say, you liked her.

I don't remember feelings like that one. Okay. No, she was a friend and we kept in touch

until we were like 14 or something. Then we lost contact. We were both on Facebook for about

six month window. I was a college and she was somehow on Facebook and we got in touch through

that. But then we both quit and we're out of touch. And then I saw her on a billboard for an

education and went and saw it and then was in Los Angeles. Okay. No, back up. Okay. So,

I'm speeding. No, I just want to know because I have this with this girl, Daniel Fox,

who lived at the end of the street in my grandparents house. And I would always spend the summer

at my grandparents house. And I was just wildly in love with her.

If I had been driving around at some point and saw Daniel Fox on a billboard and then I went to

the movie, I would have been fucked up. So, I guess when I'm asking this, when you saw the movie,

where you were like, Oh, God damn. Little bit. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. My wife's one of the most peaceful women of all time. Yeah. Of course.

With respect, I agree. Yeah. Yeah. Also, you were probably like, but I know her, but that's my buddy.

And then eventually when we reconnected, it was like, I know you. You're exactly who I know.

And it was cool. We got married pretty quick, right? Yeah. And I think because of that,

because it's like, yeah, you guys were both at a really interesting moment in time for

yourselves professionally and that it's starting to work for you. And this whole new world,

at least in my experience, was like, it's fun, but it's chaotic. And is it real? Maybe to find at

that moment when life's getting a little hard to kind of comprehend, to plug back into somebody

who is experiencing the same thing and from the same place. So she came down to Nashville.

We were writing our second album. First album just come out. We'd toured it at Gondwell. We were

right in the second one in this rental home. We had lots of friends there that come over and

needed to do picking parties. And then we were playing in someone's basement, the room this size.

A friend of mine in L.A., who I'd been staying with and talked with about Kerry had gone to New York,

seen her called me and was like, we're going to come to Nashville. See you play this basement show.

And they arrive in Nashville at that time. I was stood outside the Starbucks and I could see them

come out. And she runs down and jumps. It was like game over. I'll be married in minutes.

Two days before that, we got the call asking us to play at the Grammys for the first time with Bob Dylan.

So she entered stage left at the moment that was with me. And she had just been nominated for

an Oscar and done the whole thing with an education. So she was a couple years ahead or a year

ahead, whatever. And was so helpful to me in that moment, being like, look, you can be in control

of this. And you can say yes to this. You can also say no to it. And I was not in a phase in my

life. I'm not saying no to anything. For sure. So she was so helpful. And you're absolutely right.

It's just at this moment. We're getting untethered. We left Nashville. She flew to L.A.

to be with me during rehearsals. And it's just like four days after we'd reconnected.

Wow. Yeah. And then she had to leave again. She was shooting shame. But then somehow,

inside of Davis, inside Lewandoo, is that somehow part of this? No, that comes a bit later.

When we played with Dylan at the Grammys, that was the first time I met T-bone Benet,

who has become like a sort of fairy godfather to me in music. And he said, any time from now on,

that I'm doing something interesting or that you're doing something, let's call each other.

That's awesome. So then when the current brother's called him to do inside Lewandoo,

and Davis, he called me and said, you want to come and be my...

Wow. ...the title was Associate Producer or something. And so I just was there and

Kerry was in the movie. Do we start singing in church? Not really.

When's music start? Music starts early, like pots and pans, playing drums, and I was a drummer.

And who was your bottom? Who was your god? Yeah, I was more bottom than star. You were one or the other.

But became star while we're in go later. My guy was a guy called Terrione Gully,

whose jazz drummer played for a guy called Christian McBride. And I went and saw him play

with my skateboard. He signed my skateboard. When I was like 13, a piece to express, so I

heard with my mom. Was mom or dad super into music? They were all very into music. None of them

played anything. They just played it in the house. I'm just curious, did they stick with the church?

Still guy in life. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Because I do think we interview a lot of people,

generally more R&B singers, females who they grew up singing in church. It's such a great

tradition. And I do worry as much as I have my reservations about religion. Most of all of R&B

it starts in church in America. And I just wonder, like as that, fragments, where's the next crop?

Where do all these young kids start learning to sing like that? Yeah. And school quiz? I didn't get

into the main school class. I was in the B team and learned to sing harmony, which was fun and

very helpful. I was going to say that's a good skill probably. Yeah. We wouldn't sing what

tenor parts. We'd sing the alto parts. And my mom was an alto too. So she always sang harmony

in the kitchen, whatever we listened to. And what kit were you playing? Did you have the kit you

wanted? Yes. I did get a Yamaha maple, which is what I wanted to. And it was natural wood.

Let's hear it some. It was great. Very functional. It was a workhorse. Do you collect drum sets?

I do. What's the coolest one you got? I have a Red Sparkle Ludwig 60s kit.

Okay, great. And a champagne sparkle. 60s kit. And I really like these CNC kits that are new.

And then what about guitar? When do we pick up guitar? Towards late teens. And so you were a

skateboarder in the jazz who was going through the church. Yeah. With proxies I blonde hair.

At a public school. Let's just sublime because the Californian influence in my life, no one

else was listening to Neil Young about home. No one else was listening to sublime. So I always had

that little extra cultural lane. Now I was a skateboarder punk rock bleached hair spiked the whole

nine. And really I was just so insecure. I was rejecting the other style. I didn't think I could

nail. But it read is incredible confidence to my peers. Thank God. Did that happen with you?

I got sent home from school. Okay. So I wasn't allowed blonde hair. Which is an incredible wall. So

that was the kind of school I went to. Yeah. Kings college. We researched it.

But it's a public school. I guess I thought a maybe you would have gone do like no religious

school lit public, but it's private. So my parents spent all of their church salary on my education.

Just why then when I left college, it was a responsibility. Yeah. You got to Edinburgh or

university. Yeah. Because we had no other. They spent all of their money on my education. So you

felt like you needed to pay them back. So I felt slightly good. So I in terms of my rest

development felt like I was on sabbatical from university from like most of my career until now.

I feel comfortable on my skin and this new record that we've made is my favorite thing we've

ever done. And I feel like now is the moment where I get to really embrace being an artist.

Wow. Whereas before I was felt like I was kind of moonlighting. Proving yourself? Not so much

that. It was just like I was on a track. You have been feeling like you're supposed to return to

university for 20 years. And now you finally don't feel like you need to return this record.

This price price record is like it for me. But how is it going socially? These interests in this

extreme look? It's going fine. I was always like a slight outsider. I wasn't the best at anything,

but I tried everything. Was it all boy? Yeah. And I went school with Ben in the band from the age of eight.

Were you guys best friends or just you ended up having mutual friends? Yeah. No, we were. Yeah.

It must be so fun to be able to share it with this kid you've known since you were eight.

And now the three of us is close to brotherhood or in deep marriage. Yeah. That's right.

More marriage. Because it is more like marriage really. Because the only other person in the world

who has experienced that is Ben and Ted. Yeah, exactly. We also have to navigate stuff that

normally I don't think you navigate with a coworker. Or a friendship. There's something when

you're both that it takes everything up to a different level of intimacy. Because these natural

things, there's highs and lows. The highs are great to share, but the lows are like no one involved

has a clear head. Because everyone's suffering at that moment. Yeah. It's not a great. You're

communally going through something. Yeah. There's no outsider unaffected by the thing to be objective.

Which is why when we're making records, a lot to what with producers. Because some people are

wanting to just sell for juice. You guys know you're way around it. Protests. And you produce

all things. Yeah. And you're producing for other people. But I like having the objectivity

of someone else who hasn't looked at the tickets. I got burned on a song you love. Exactly.

This is like that other thing we did that we got for. Yeah. Exactly. So the objectivity of a producer.

And then for us on this new one on prize fighter, we had Aaron Desner, who's known us for 15 years.

Or something helped us with the demo for our third record has been a friend of ours for a long

time. Seen us go through lots. Also happens to be in one of my favorite bands of all time

on the national. I said this production career with people like Taylor Swift and Gracie Amherst.

It's called crazy. And so to have him come in at this point and be that objective voice knows

this all really well. We trust him. He trusts us. The dream. You're also at a stage in your career

that I too am at where it's like all of these kids that we're trying. We're now all at these award

shows, which is bonkers. Yeah. It's like I look around the Golden Globes and I'm like, oh,

Ben and Melissa who we run in theaters and no one came. You're starting to see friends that are

now producing for Taylor Swift or whatever the thing is happening. It's pretty wild. And London,

when we first started as a band, it was amazing for music people that really inspired us

like Laura Marling and they're in the well. But also that time it was Adele and Florence.

And these amazing artists that have obviously. So we've seen a lot of them go. Adele presented

our problem of the year, the Grammys. The only reason I think we got anywhere close to

winning it was because she wasn't like she didn't. But for her to give that to us is so sweet.

Our contemporaries are some of our biggest inspirations, but also we've seen their success

right the way through from very early on, which is kind of a unique thing. Okay. So your plane

drums, when do you start playing not just in your room, but with other people? What age? We play

at weddings and barmets and birthday parties from the age of like 12 to make pocket money.

And then publicly the first time I sang a song I think was for a music exam when I was

16. I did a version of all along the watchtower by Bob Dylan. What was the effect? It went down much

better than I thought it would. Was that the first mini hit? We're like, oh shit. Some people

are looking at me a little different. Yeah. And then I played a bit. I didn't really do very much

until my year out between high school and college. I lived in Denver. Denver, Colorado. Yeah,

because I had a US passport. So I could come and work. Do you want to sit and share soccer coach in

Denver and would play open mics, lots of clothes, cigarettes, and would do open mics. And they

went all right. And then I went to college and amongst my cynical British friends,

when I dropped out to go into music, they were all like, really me? Right.

Because they've been at the open mics. We're not at dropout stage. We're not. So I had a

friend who took me to one side and was like, I'm not sure this is a great decision. Wow.

Is he still a friend? I hope you're out in my range. Yeah. It was really a college that I started

doing open mics. And then I quit to go play drums, because I was a session musician,

to go play drums for Laura Marling. And then she invited me up to come and sing a song in her

encore. At the end of her show, it was like a hoot nanny moment. And that's when her manager

spotted me and was like, you should do this. So how do we assemble Mumford and Sons? 2007?

Two weeks after that, I said to him, like, I think it's a band. I don't think it's a solo project.

I've been doing writing and recording some demos at Ben's house. He lives with his parents

still. And they had an attic with a little studio in that you had to climb through the little

cubby hole to get in carrying fucking equipment up there. Yeah. Yeah. It was the nightmare.

Very hot. No AC and had been doing some demos and then inviting anyone I knew who was playing

in other bands. We were all playing in other bands at that point to come play. The songs with

me. And at times there'd be like 14 of us on stage. But what we noticed was that at that time when

the four of us sang together and played together felt different to when everyone else was in the room.

So I know how you know Ben, obviously, he's been a friend since you were a little kid. How do you

meet the other two guys? Yeah, Winston, I'm at church when we were like 15. You've known him

at that point too. And then Ted, we met in London when I quit college and he was a bass player,

he showed up with a coolest pair of beats and let the jacket out. I've seen him in my life.

And could sing and play double bass. I was like, oh, this guy's triple threat. It's funny how

often when I watch docs on bands, how much of it is that? Like so and so walked in and their

hair was awesome. Yeah. It's like, it's kind of second year to the vibe. But then when he

had his mouth singing, I was like, oh, wow, he's got this really unusual voice and he can sing harmony

and it was cool. Did you watch him? I get loud. That drumming documentary? No. Fuck. No, I didn't.

Oh, it's so great. Okay. They never mind that. And then there's another doc I want to know if

you watched. Oh, did you watch this Zeppelin doc that was out last year? I haven't watched that yet.

Okay. So what is unbelievable about that band is they met and I think six weeks later,

they played that first show we've all seen in black and white, which might be the

still their best show they ever played. I've only inherited other people's views about this

documentary, but it seems that they were all totally obsessed with Bonham. Yeah. And then it was

like Jimmy's band. I don't know that I focused on that as much as just obviously they had all been

working a lot. So it's not like they were green in that sense, but the notion that these

strangers could have come together and played that show in six weeks, it's so mind blowing.

He's kind of got to believe in magic a tiny bit. Oh, I totally believe in magic. I think

writing songs is like trying to catch fairies and nets. No, Gallagher talks about it like

everyone knows songs fall from the sky by magic. And you just have to have your hands out,

ready to catch them. Otherwise, fucking Bono or Chris Martin.

I'm just walking around because he sounds a bit just clearly have their hands out.

Yeah, exactly. He said, I bumped into him in a bar in London a few years ago and we just finished

a tour and he was like, what are you doing? I was like, I'm just chilling out. And he's like,

well, the fuck are you talking about your songwriter? You got to get to work. Write songs. You have

no excuse not to write songs as your job. What are you doing? And there's like, oh, shit, he's

right. Better go and write some songs. How long before the four of you were playing that it was

clicking. You were putting songs down that you thought had merit. Was that a quick process?

It was quite quick. I had a collection of songs I'd written at college sort of naked on my

dorm room floor. The very raw, too raw, indulgent. Yeah. Okay, sure. Yeah. Go try to put T.S. Eliot

to song. It was that kind of indulgence of night. It's hard to be pretentious. Yeah, really.

Are you never made? Yeah. But I had started honing my narcissism. Well enough. It's right

as long as I think. And then we started playing couple shows and then we got asked to support

other bands. And that was helpful because it was like, right, well, we need enough songs to fill

that set. So I remember the day I wrote Little Lion Man, my ex-girlfriend's kitchen, which is

probably a bit rough. But then showed up at the rehearsal studio like three hours before soundcheck

and was like, lads, I think I've got another one for the set and they were like, okay, because we

only had like five at that point. Yeah. What about you expected to play like 35 minutes or something?

Yeah, like half an hour. That's six songs. And you feel half an hour bit chat. Sometimes a bit more

chat. Isn't it funny too? How much of this stuff? There's no science to it, but there is

like the infamous Beatles stuff. They're playing in Germany forever. They're just playing.

They were honing there. Yes. I mean, that documentary is my favorite music documentary.

The Peter, yeah, Peter Jackson one. Yeah. And it's nine hours, which is

shorter than your average day in the studio. Okay. But watching that documentary, I mean,

it's the most beautiful. I think you get an idea of some of the hanging around. You know,

you're watching like Ringo Twiddling. Ringo's always on time. He's always ready to play. He's

always sticks in hand waiting for the moment to carry on a reader drummer. He gets a different tone

out of the drum set to any other drummer in history. And then Jim Keltner who played on all the

Beatles solo records. He's now like 82. I recorded with him a couple years ago. He is one of the

coolest cats of all time and Bob Dylan's drummer and you know, like he gets a different kind of

tone out of the drums to anyone else. And these great drummers, I think, are able to do

things and just hit a drum in a way that no one else can. Admittedly, I didn't like the Beatles.

My mom had positioned it as this house is a Rolling Stones house. Really? I'm talking about

I want to hold your hand. We're talking about I got a girl pregnant. Interesting. You were

fucking gnarly. See, we were in a Waces house, not a blood house. There you go. Yeah. You do

have to appreciate the worrisome. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. But I'm still in the Waces guy. Yeah,

you're right. And I'm a Stung's guy. You can't change that, really. I'm not sure. It's

a swell. It's the tribalism. Yeah, it is. But that comes from growing up in a house where your

parents care. I didn't. So I just like it all. They didn't have their identity infused with

what bands. Exactly. There was no identity connected to it. So you were free. Yeah, free.

You can take it all. So what did it lead you to? Taylor Swift. You.

Taylor. Yeah. I mean, Taylor. No, but as a kid, what did it do? Yeah, exactly. Taylor was a

little later. I'm top top 40. Britney. Britney. Yes. Spice girls. Hands like the big

hands of the never-hands. Love Hanson. Love Hanson. Oh, my God. I'm really. I think I did a cover

of that. Actually, back in the day. Yeah. That was my first CD. Was it mine was pure shores by all

saints? All saints I love. As a single. And then the first record I bought myself, I bought two

from the CD exchange on Wimbledon Broadway. I bought a kind of blue by Mars Davis under

instruction from my drum teacher because he was like, you'll play what you listen to. You got

to play that. And then for myself, I bought Miss Education at Lauren. Oh, amazing. I mean, that's

advanced. I was more in the. You're an imbub. But I'm just saying all saints. TLC. I know.

I love TLC. I loved all saints. Robin. Yeah. All of it. You had a new one. You had a new one.

Sick. But Monica will be the first to admit. Most of her musical tastes came from film and television.

If she saw something on TV, she heard something rather a soundtrack. I was like, I want that song.

Like once it was into buying songs like Napster and stuff like that. So what were the shows that

led you to? Like Grey's Anatomy. One tree hill. I was a little one tree hill. No. Okay. So

Grey's Anatomy. Yes. Obviously. So when Garden State came out, did it change your life? Yeah,

yeah. Okay. Cool. I get you. Yeah. Yeah. I know. I know. Yeah. I see you. What did I change?

I've become cool. I was a sponge. I was a sponge to all of that. The shins. Oh my god. Yeah.

But no, it's great. It was great. I was open to it all. That's cool.

Stay tuned for more armchair expert. If you dare. Thank you to our presenting sponsor,

Apple TV, the new US home of Formula One. You can now watch complete all access,

live coverage of every Grand Prix including practice qualifying and sprints all in one place.

I will be consuming all of those things, Monica. I know you will. I kill for Friday to start

watching practice one following and on a sprint weekend. Oh my gosh. Two races.

And this season brings a ton of new energy to the sport, new teams like Cadillac and Audi

just joining the grid, new drivers stepping into major seats, land on Norris defending,

his first world drivers championship, and all eyes on Lewis Hamilton in a second season with

Ferrari and a brand new circuit in Madrid. Plus a new US home for Formula One. You can watch

every race live only on Apple TV. Watch on Apple devices, Android devices, smart TVs,

streaming devices, gaming consoles, or on the web at tv.apple.com. All part of one Apple TV

subscription alongside hundreds of exclusive shows and movies. Watch the Formula One Australian

Grand Prix live on Saturday, March 7th at 11 p.m. Eastern or watch race replays on demand anytime

only on Apple TV, the new US home of F1. We are supported by all state. Checking all state

first could save you hundreds on car insurance. That's smart. Not checking your phone's battery

before heading out. That'll get you every time. Of course your phone dies on the way to meet

someone leaving you wandering around quietly panicking about being in the wrong spot. Yeah,

checking first is smart. So check all state first for a quote that could save you hundreds.

You're in good hands with all state potential savings vary subject to terms conditions and

availability all state North American insurance code and affiliates North Brook, Illinois.

We are supported by into it turbo tax April 15th is coming up fast. And if you're like most

people, you're probably dreading the whole tax thing. You know the old way sitting in some waiting

room for hours or sending over your tax docs and waiting and waiting for any kind of update.

You want something modern and tech forward, but you also want that human connection.

And this year brings a major upgrade into it turbo tax now has in person locations nationwide.

You can walk into a tech enabled turbo tax location near you and meet face to face with a real

tax expert drop off your documents in the store and see them uploaded to your turbo tax app instantly.

Just like that, you're done. Your new turbo tax expert stays back and works tirelessly to get you

every dollar you deserve while you get real time notifications as you go about your day.

Honestly, it feels like someone finally figured out what we've all been wanting.

It's not some sterile tax office from 1987 and it's not just an app where you're on your own.

It's both the human expertise with smart modern tech. You drop off your stuff,

go about your day and get real time updates as your expert works through everything. That's the

upgrade. Head to TurboTax.com to find a store location near you and get matched with a turbo

tax expert with real time updates in iOS app.

Mine ones I have to like punk rock. I'm going in these shows none of them are melodic. I hated

all but I'm pretending I love it. And then I'm just looking for anything with some melodies.

So I'm just following. So did blink one, I changed your life.

Well, I'm so much older. I saw exploited when I was 11 years old with my brother.

I saw black flag in their trashy.

This teenager I went through post sublime probably. I went through like Papa Roach

and blink one a two. I love blink one a two. Let me be clear.

And then I was starting to go off at some 41 when that started. I loved it. And then I was like,

that was the end of my train here. I'm at my stop.

Yeah. Yeah.

It's actually interesting now that we're talking about it because I think that the reason

there are clubs is I wanted to be like everybody else. You want it to conform?

Exactly. So I'm picking top 40. I'm picking what's on TRL.

You want to be able to talk with your friends about what's top.

I want to be normal. Regular.

That's interesting because I get to like 18. I want to do something no one else is there.

Yeah, you want to be different.

This is our freedom of being white.

Right. Interesting. Yeah. Yeah.

Like I might wait. You guys are nerdy and I want to be opposite.

That's interesting. And she's like, I'm brown. Please don't notice. I'm brown.

I knew all the same shit you do. Yeah.

If you're white, I wonder what your fucking musical taste would be.

You're probably still like Taylor Swift.

Of course. Yeah. Wow. That's the great unifying.

Exactly. That's why she is who she is.

Okay. So I want to jump to you record, sing them more.

It comes out in 2009. And it's a monster.

I mean, you get nominated for two Grammys.

Little white man is enormous.

How do you take that on?

We just play shows. That's the only answer we had.

Just keep your head down and play shows.

Just play shows.

We were probably a bit dismissive of the world's reaction to our music for a long time

because we were like blinkers on head down.

Just play shows. That's the thing we can understand.

I can't understand how our song has suddenly got big in Australia on the radio.

Yeah. I can't get my head around that.

But I can get my head around playing a show in Melbourne.

And so still now, I don't look at streaming numbers.

I don't look at social responses.

I don't look at radio plays.

Are you like healthy?

You didn't care about money.

I care about money so much.

No, yeah.

Our song didn't have expendable money,

but my parents instilled in us a spirit of generosity.

We were taught to tie this kid's thing.

Give away 10% of everything you ever get.

I mean, the belief system is like, it's not ours anyway.

Right.

It's closest to a sort of Native American pure of ownership.

Yeah.

It's due to shit.

But it was like, the picket sales is what we can understand.

Right. You can see that there's

venues are getting bigger.

Yeah.

And we climbed all the rungs on the ladder.

We didn't skip any, but we only did them all once.

And most bands do them 10 times.

How are you making peace with the tension of,

I'm an outsider.

I'm not with you guys.

And this is my R and, uh-oh.

No, it's for everyone.

Everyone likes it.

There's a little bit of tension there now.

Well, I think I probably responded to that

by driving my negative narrative and finding the negatives.

In any review, I would read,

which I did at the beginning.

I'd always read them.

I'd pick out the one line that hurt the most.

And I'd dwell on that.

I knew you didn't really accept me.

You're acting like you accepted me,

but I have the proof I'm not really.

Yeah, exactly.

Yeah.

Everyone thinks I'm actually a come in a car.

Yeah.

So brutal.

Yeah.

So successful.

And you miss so much.

I mean, we had fun,

but I was not present to a lot of the early,

successful band,

because I was either in the negative narrative

or I was like, let's move on quickly,

because this isn't going to last.

So we have to build for the next thing.

You can have this paradox of actively hating parts of it

and then maybe fearful the next ones

and not going to be as good.

You can also still want to keep it, right?

Yeah.

I haven't felt this level of a sense of pride

in our work honestly ever

till this record.

It's really freeing.

I just love it.

And I don't really care if other people

like it or not for the first time.

That's you.

That's everything, really.

I think it's a lot of personal growth

and all that boring stuff,

but I really don't care what people think.

I love it.

And I'm excited to play every night.

If people come along for the ride,

then great,

but if not genuinely for the first time,

I don't think I'll have my feelings.

Wow.

Yeah.

That same extent of like the rawness.

And I think that's the vulnerability of artists.

And that's fine.

But your job is to feel things.

And these are things this is cool

because we just had Staples and on

and Luke Holmes had this moment.

A lot of these musicians

know that we're interviewing

have had these moments where you performed

at the Grammys and then the album

went up 99% sales.

There's very few moments

that are that make it or break it.

I don't think I was aware

to that extent what the Grammys could do

in terms of moving the guitar.

Yeah, exactly.

But I was still shedding myself.

I was still very nervous.

But like I had that feeling

with the first TV appearance we did.

Did you love Lanermen?

We did, I think.

And it was like, where's your drummer?

I was like...

I think he plays drums, maybe.

Does he?

Maybe that's my guess.

But no, our first TV appearance was here

in LA with Craig Ferguson.

Oh, my friend.

And I broke two strings

and forgot all the words.

Oh.

And it was a fucking disaster.

Oh, no.

Oh, yeah, that's horrifying.

That was awful.

And so they were like, we have to move on.

Sorry.

Can we have to play a different song?

Oh.

This is a disaster, sorry.

I'm so sorry.

But was Craig great at helping you?

Yeah, he was sweet.

No one could really help me in that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Well, Jack, I mean, he was gonna help.

It was no help.

But no, the Grammys was made fun

by the fact that Dylan was so weird.

And wonderful.

That first one.

We'd rehearsed for two days.

We'd done all the camera rehearsals.

We were aware that it was going out

to 50 million people or whatever it is.

And we play a song.

We come back behind the curtain.

And Ava brothers play a song.

And then we were all supposed to go on

together and play Maggie's Farm.

So we played Cave.

Ava brothers go on.

We walked behind the curtain.

Bob's there.

And he goes, are you there again?

Oh, no, I went, what?

And I'm still holding my guitar.

And he goes, play there again.

And it was the cave.

So I started playing.

I went to the start playing banjo.

And he was like, I can sing on that.

And we went, what?

And he went, I want to sing on that.

And I sing Maggie's Farm.

And that.

And we're like, we'll do what you want

because you're fucking Bob Dylan.

Right.

But you've already played it.

We just rehearsed it.

And we were already played the cave.

And he wants to change the whole range of it right now.

Oh, my God.

It's only his bass player.

Who's the Bob Whisperer comes over.

It's like, calm down, Bob.

But you can feel it like you're a master.

Okay.

Did you watch the greatest night music?

It's about the recording of We Are the World.

Uh, no, it doesn't see that.

No.

You tell, I don't really watched music documentaries.

I'm learning that.

And I get it.

Can you listen to other people's podcasts?

No, and I wouldn't watch the How Many Doc.

But of course, I watch music.

Yeah, right.

What is cool about the doc I think you would appreciate is

we have everyone.

Who do you want?

They're all there, right?

You have Michael Jackson.

You've got Holland notes.

You've got fucking Stevie Wonder, Bob Dylan.

Everyone's there.

So to see them all, it's a really wild thing to observe.

But Bob can't sing like the other folks.

That's what he does, right?

And he is struggling.

And there's a moment where Stevie Wonder

who can do everybody.

He's a crazy mimic.

He says, you want to sing it like this.

And he does Bob Dylan.

And it's on film.

And you can't tell it's not Bob Dylan.

And he uses his voice and his range

to show him how he should do it.

And then Bob's like, okay, and then he does it.

That's such a cool mom.

That's very cool.

All right, you're not going to watch it.

You hate me.

No, I don't.

Do you think you don't like him because it's intimidating?

Or it's just boring, because that's what you do.

That's boring, because that's what I do.

I got you.

Okay.

I think unless it's get back,

unless it's the Beatles,

movies about musicians don't really do that.

I don't watch Springsteen movie yet,

even though I'm obsessed with Bruce Springsteen.

I get that.

Star is born.

I thought it depicted tall life,

the most accurately out of any of them.

Although, you don't know because you've only seen one or two.

Yeah, that's great.

Think of the one I sample.

That's true.

You went to Baskin Robbins.

You tried one flavor here.

You're not the best flavor of the 31 flavors.

Is Vanilla.

That's true, that's true, it's very fair.

Okay, tell me about going to India in 2010.

Or don't, if it's not interesting.

No, we just didn't really have an audience in India.

Yeah.

But we weren't anyway.

Got told to go back to our own country at our last show

in Calcutta.

Oh, really?

Yeah, which I think was fair.

Was fair,

because given, you know,

but it made racism in England the other way around.

It's like, yeah, fair enough,

we probably earned that historically.

But it was amazing.

We like touring in weird ways

and doing things that feel scary.

We've just done this train tour.

That was now.

Yeah, yeah.

So India was awesome.

It was really fun.

I mean, it was very hectic.

It was stupid.

But did you have in the back of your mind

that the Beatles went there?

A little bit.

And it was just an adventure.

We'd done a tour on a narrow boat

at four miles an hour.

That was very fun.

And we were like,

let's go to India and do that.

Yeah.

So the thing I loved about reading

about your history is

I too love when you can take this thing

that you do that your job

and you can figure out a way to leverage it

into a bunch of other crazy experiences

that kind of have nothing to do with it.

Because otherwise,

you can miss it.

It can all go by.

I've read about this.

Railroad tour.

Yeah.

You guys have vintage railroad cars,

you read?

Yeah.

We did one.

We're there to show up in the Magnets Xero

as an old cremets and show in 2011 or 12 or something.

11.

Thank you.

And we were like,

let's do that again.

Now the train thing is fun for the artists.

Yeah.

The audience doesn't really get involved in that

because you can only fit like 100 people on it.

But yeah, tell me about your car.

A bunch of vintage rail cars

all linked together

that go around the country.

So the first one went from Oakland

down the West Coast across

to we ended up in New Orleans.

And the second one we started in

New Orleans and ended in Burlington, Vermont.

And for us, a lot of it is seeing places

we wouldn't otherwise see.

Like I've seen more of this country

than most of my friends who live here.

Sure.

And I'll argue on a train

you're seeing the backyard of everything.

Exactly.

I know.

I know.

You're seeing the front.

Totally.

Yeah, it's amazing.

And I like to stay up in the middle of the night

and sit in the front of the bus

and watch the world go by

particularly in North America.

You can just find it fascinating

like being stuck in an electrical storm in Kansas.

In the middle of the night,

it's exciting.

And it was just seen some tornado.

Yeah.

Nothing like it, right?

Stain's always really fun.

But was the car itself?

Did you have your own car?

No, we had our own room.

And was it from the 40s, 56s, you know?

Was it woodpanel?

This one was woodpanel

then I would say 50s, I think.

It was there like a cocktail.

Like there was there a little bar.

Yeah.

And like the people running the train

were in outfits.

Oh, it's fun.

It's fun.

It was so jealous.

And then we rehearsed every day

because we had these guests come and join us

and so we'd learn their songs on the train

on our way to soundcheck.

And then when we get there, we play it.

We should do that.

I know.

You should do a live show train experience.

It would be a net loss.

I don't know what to do.

Don't do it to make any money.

Yeah.

You're not going to make any money.

Yeah.

Not what.

We had this conversation a lot

managed with a couple of people.

We're like, look, we're not going to make any money.

You're definitely not going to make any money.

For this one, we had a house band

and we paid everyone the same amount of money

like a flat fee, including ourselves.

We're like, look, it's an experience.

This is like a five day vacation

where we're working.

Did you take psychedelics on that train?

No, you don't need to.

Okay.

I would think that would have enhanced it.

I went on this trip down the Grand Canyon

with a bunch of people I didn't know.

And we get to the bottom and it's like eight days

of rafting and staying on the beach.

Unbelievable.

And at the end of it,

we find out they would all be in an acid the whole time.

I was like, this is the one place in the world

you definitely don't need it.

You don't need it.

I said, man.

Exactly.

And those rapids,

we're doing the one kayaks.

They're pretty dangerous.

But no better way to drown.

Oh god.

You've got to drown, man.

You think you're drowning in

like Willy Wonka's chocolate river?

No, I'm still drinking the control

free for that stuff.

Okay.

Is everyone in the band on the same page

for the most part?

Even when we're talking about you guys coming up,

you're like tunnel vision, head down.

Are you all like that?

Yeah, we are.

Ted, our bass player is a bit more chill.

We need that.

Yeah.

Spend an eye like in it on everything.

Our manager recently said to us like,

most artists kind of asked

to just know where they need to be when

they're going to this level of detail.

And we're quite details wanted.

We care about it.

Yeah.

Okay, I need to say, though,

that I will wait came out.

That was enormous.

You won the Grammy.

Fastest selling album in the year.

Things are fucking.

Was it really cranking?

Yeah, that's what I'm told.

600,000 in the first week.

That's bonkers.

And in UK, I think foreign is also

the fastest selling album that you're in the UK.

You can go anywhere without Mumford's sons

at this point.

Right.

I want to go to your solo album,

which is 2022, self titled.

Yeah.

I want to bond with you on this experience,

which is I have four years on here

been acknowledging that I have been

molested.

And that was its own hurdle to just say that.

And I got quite comfortable being able to say that.

That was fine.

And now I'm writing a memoir.

And last year, really, the whole year was about,

do I have the balls to write down the details of this?

Because the details were always going to be mine.

I didn't want anyone to be envisioning me.

It's weird that that was still some wall between my shame.

Interesting.

Like, I can say that happened,

but I don't need you to know anything

that actually happened.

And I bet it took me four months to tell that story.

And when I'm writing it,

just I cannot help but thinking of people knowing this about me

and how still exposed that feels.

And I was pretty emotional during the few months.

I was having really weird kind of spikes of emotions

and moodiness.

And I would forget that's why I was having that.

But I finished it and something about it

existing there feels like a lot of weight is off my shoulders.

But for me, there's still the hurdle of like,

and also I've not put that out.

Yeah, because that wasn't going to be my question.

Why do you put that out?

And I didn't hear that.

Right, so I can understand writing cannibal

because it's about his sexual abuse.

There's details.

Yeah.

Dude.

Yeah, that's what that was like.

Yeah, fuck.

That sounds pretty intense.

What's the gap between writing it and then knowing,

okay, now I'm going to put it in the world

and people will know all this about me.

I mean, I was pretty scared, honestly.

Yeah, yeah.

And yeah, it's pretty detailed.

I mean, I played it to a few people who are very helpful.

I played it to Elton John.

But it's Brandy Carlisle.

Elton was like, I've never heard anything like this.

And I'll do anything to help you if you want to put out.

And Brandy had said exactly the same thing, like I'm with you.

Who the fucking sharkine?

How many of us?

Yeah.

And part of the exhausting process of putting out

is hearing other people's stories.

Yeah, sure.

Because you need to comfort them.

Yeah, yeah.

And it's an absolute privilege.

And my general view on it has been,

all right, I'm going to have boundaries around this.

I'm going to say like, thank you so much for sharing that.

Hope you have what you need.

Yeah, because I'm not your guy.

It'll be fucked up, wouldn't it?

Like, I'm not going to be your guy on this.

Yeah, I can't.

Yeah, I can't.

And that wouldn't serve you.

I mean, obviously wouldn't serve me.

Putting it out was straight.

And then the rest of the record is not really about that.

But because that was the first song,

it got a lot of attention.

I feel like, grateful that I put it out.

I honestly felt glad I have also been able to move on.

And I'd think without it,

I wouldn't have come back to the band as energized

or as joyful or as free.

And I think that's a big part of the freedom

that I now feel in the band.

It's like, I got that.

I moved on.

It's out there.

I taught it.

It was great.

I'm very proud of it.

The whole record.

And it helped my songwriting.

And it certainly helped my ability to accept myself.

Well, my body keeps betraying me.

It's a line.

Yeah.

The body betraying me.

Putting that out of your body to there

is that helping any of that?

Yeah.

Like I've been on a real journey.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And part of that was not feeling like a victim, I think.

And being like, I've got control of this.

I can drive this train.

I'm not just a passenger.

And I won't just be a passive.

My thing is I can intellectually know how ridiculous the statement is.

But emotionally, I don't know it in my body, which is,

I grew up in such a homophobic environment and Detroit in the 80s.

You lived all day long in fear that someone might think

you were gay.

Yeah.

And now I've done this thing that does make me gay in my mind.

And now I have this fucking secret that I know

if it were to be revealed on the playground.

I'm just fucking dead.

I'm a pariah.

I know intellectually that's insane at 51

with a family and all these things.

But that fear of the whole world going back to elementary

is still alive in me.

In just crazy way.

It's shocking to me.

And so what's your process now having written it?

I felt that wave of relief that you're talking about.

And then I have fear of people reading it.

And then even more, I have the fear of what I'm doing to you right now,

which is like, I want to be able to put it out.

And I don't ever want to have to talk to you about it.

Yeah, that's not going to happen.

You've done baby steps.

Like, was this the first time anyone's ever known about that?

Yeah, yeah.

And the second song in the record is about the first is playing my mother, the first song.

Wow.

Well, how should we proceed without this getting too heavy?

Is the first line of the second song on the record?

Wow. Yeah.

Yeah.

But we talk about it on here.

You are very open.

I mean, not with the details, but with that something you've gone through.

But I mean, control of it, right?

Yeah.

You're not going, well, why didn't you blank?

Or why didn't you tell your mom or why?

You were about the types of questions.

So yeah, it's just the loss of control of me being able to say exactly how.

So while me and you waited through, what happened to me,

I got really lucky in a sense, which is I was in high school.

I've been carrying it for, I guess, 10 years or whatever.

And I was talking with a girl.

I went to school, who I liked so much.

I was just a friend.

This is Danielle again.

It's not.

No, Danielle fall.

I would never risk her thinking I was gay.

But this girl was vulnerable enough to tell me that she had been right there before her.

Wow.

And I'm kind of sitting there with that really special trust

that she just extended to me in my lap.

And I just kind of felt myself saying it out loud.

Honest to God is stupid as this is

to look at her face in the fact she didn't say, oh, so you're gay.

I went, oh, my God, this whole story, I think I'm telling myself might be wrong.

She doesn't think I'm damaged.

I mean, that's certainly my experience as women led me through.

Of course.

You know, it's so interesting and probably quite common that as a man,

if you allow yourself to be vulnerable enough to a woman,

often you'll find them can't lead you to the promised land.

You know, yeah.

And that's certainly my experience as people like my wife and Brandy and Phoebe Bridges.

Yeah, it's powerful, man.

It's pretty life-changing.

I mean, it was also quite funny playing my mum, that's all right.

Like, how long did take her to put together what the song was?

Was it immediate for her?

Yeah.

I'm painful for her.

Of course.

You have children?

Yeah.

And just the sense that like, she's spent all this time not being able to support me in some of the hours.

Exactly.

But I'm fucked up to tell your mum through so long.

So, I'm playing you a new thing.

Yeah, yeah, you want me a demo?

Yeah.

It's quite funny.

Glessa, she's a legend of my parents.

Stay tuned for more armchair expert.

If you dare.

Why the gap?

I mean, obviously you did your solo album there, but why the seven-year gap?

COVID, Winston left the band.

Uh-huh.

I made a solo record, then we're in the studio for two years.

And now, really quick, because last year, March,

yeah.

So, we got back in together in the studio like January 20th.

In fact, I was on my solo tour.

I was playing at the Rhyman and Nashville,

and the boys, Ted and Ben came out for that show.

And I said, Lads, should we sing a song to be saying,

I'll wait together for the first time in a few years?

And it felt magic.

Yeah.

Just a guitar, and then two, and three of us singing together,

this very special place to us.

And that was the moment where we were like, let's do this.

And I think healthily, everyone had a bit of a break,

a bit of a reset.

Was there any sense that you would not come back together?

No, I don't think so.

It was just matter of timing.

But then January 23th, we were here, and Los Angeles, actually,

we met up the three of us at my house down the road when we had it.

And we played a few ideas that have been kicking around.

They turned into a rush man, but then we felt like we weren't done.

While we were mixing rush man,

Aaron Dessner was next door working, and came in and played us a couple things.

He'd been working on that didn't have lyrics or melody yet,

and we responded to it and started making price fire like right there.

Oh wow.

And I think the freeing experience for me

of getting solo record, then rush man out,

meant that when we came to sit down to do price fighter,

we're there in this long-term friend.

We were just ready.

Hands were out, ready to catch the songs.

We were in shape, and the muscles were all working.

There were no injuries, and we were in like our prime.

And that's why we called it price fighter.

We felt like we were just ready.

We'd also spent a summer with Ferrell, Williams,

and Paris writing songs and hanging out,

and he's like a therapist.

He was like, sit down.

It certainly me, gave me a lot of pep talks,

which was super helpful.

So by the time we came to Aaron, we were just in a good spot.

And so these songs just poured out of us.

And then the closest to source,

tells the writing and the recording, we've ever done.

We'd like write it in the morning and record it in the afternoon and be done.

And walk away.

He has a very live feel.

The feeling you get as a vocalist, for sure.

The closer you can record a vocal to when you wrote it, the better.

But on the first record, we did a demo at Ben's house that I played

and recorded at his house and his parents' attic.

And then when we came to record Sino More, 18 months later,

we couldn't get the same emotion in that vocalist.

We just used the demo.

Oh, yeah.

On a white-blank page, that's on the crashing out song.

Why acting so similar?

He got grabbed the emotion while it's there,

and then when it's gone, it's catching ferries, man.

Better actors is no problem.

My wife being like, oh, yeah, I do that.

It's no longer rough.

I could have done that in the back of a spaceship if you needed me to.

That's how you can really tell when someone can just show up

and be perfect every time.

Acting wise, we call them acting robots.

It's like, yeah, I don't know how they're doing this.

Yeah, it's really annoying, isn't it?

It is annoying, I don't like them.

Okay, no, I want to extend a compliment and ask her if you feel it.

When we had Seth Roganon and we were talking about the studio,

did you watch the studio?

I did, yeah.

Okay, great.

You've seen one thing to get out of here.

You want to say, well, that's not in music.

Yeah, it's not in music.

That movie is, that's fine.

But what I see is not just an incredible show.

I see the results of an incredibly generous life

that every one of these people would have shown up to party in this thing.

There's a lot of successful actors

that they couldn't assemble five other ex-co-stars.

Yeah, right.

So you think his humanity and the way he walks through the world

has had a real effect?

Yeah, that show is a result of who he is as a spirit.

It's really undisplained.

It's really cool.

And I would argue that prize fighter,

do you feel that at all the fact that you can call Chris Stapleton

or however that works?

I do feel that.

You know, our band has always loved music

and being at shows and watching our contemporaries

and being inspired by them.

We spent a lot of time investing into the community.

And it's not just so that we can then drop a bit of that as well.

Are you friends with the Abuts?

I'm really good friends with Seth guys.

They're such inspiration for us.

They're bad motherfuckers.

If you haven't seen the Abuts play.

Yeah, they're amazing.

I'm doing a thing for them on Monday.

The Muppets.

Yeah, the Muppets do.

Yeah, I'm excited.

So we've invested a lot into musical relationships.

You know, stayed in touch with people.

And then weirdly, as a headlining,

you go out and you do your shows

and you're a bit insulated from the community.

Festivals are always fun because you bump into other people

and sometimes those awardy things can be cool

because you see people you wouldn't otherwise see.

But on this record, we've never opened the door.

Our band basically has always been collaborative

and we've never really represented our record.

And so on this record, we were like,

we want to cool in our friends

and actually Gracie Abrams

has been like the fairy godmother of this record.

She's been behind the scenes with her magic wand.

She heard the demo of Bad Joe song

before I'd written anything on it

and was like, he got fucking right, something on that.

So I text her lyrics as we were going and voice memos.

I mean, what do you think of this?

What do you think of this?

And she was always behind the scenes just cheerleading and being.

Oh, that's awesome.

In a way like Brandy was from my solo record,

Gracie has been for a prize fighter.

And so then we called her up and said,

we sing on Badlands.

And I thought she was going to just do some harm.

She turned that song into a duet.

It's like my favorite song in the record is amazing.

And the same with Gigi,

who'd we've done some shows with Gigi Perez.

Hoseo, we've known for a really long time.

Like, I don't need to know you to look at the list

and go like, oh, yeah, this is a guy who's clearly

been benevolent and generous with his peers

because they show up.

I feel deeply honored by the people that said yes.

And Chris, I didn't know.

Chris, I just called.

Cole Cole.

Hey, bud.

A big fat.

I think he's a generational talent.

He's like my favorite voice,

male voice in America.

Do you know heaven sent by steel drivers?

No, I cannot stop listening to this fucking song,

since I interviewed him.

That was his first band.

It's my end.

No, I don't know.

Back shit.

Heaven sent.

Heaven sent.

I listened to it probably 40 times the day after.

If I'm not working, I'm listening to that song.

It's unreal.

Well, I think he's amazing.

And of course, he completely killed the assignment

because I sent him the song.

I sent him here.

We all fell in the band that he would be perfect on it

because it's like a kind of cowboy suicide.

Yeah.

He is perfect for that.

And again, he's a dude who does not need to answer the phone

and doesn't need to show up for people.

And it does it like endlessly.

Yeah, calm that out.

And then I tested him said,

this is our break-back moment as well.

Don't wait for the video.

Okay, so you're going on tour

and you kind of just nodded at it.

You're doing a lot of festivals.

Is that by choice?

There's no one that's been announced.

Oh, okay.

Big gaps in that diary that I'm going to stay gaps.

But we haven't announced them yet.

But I park on July 4th,

that's an important day for you guys.

And half of me.

Yeah.

I bet you're really conflicted on joy for it.

Yeah.

July 4th at High Park is the one that I'm looking for to the most.

Because there's been a decade since you guys played

for 10 years and that's like hometown show.

It's massive.

Yeah.

Two seconds on Nashville.

And then I want to hear you sing

a few oblige us.

Now that I've ruined your voice in a few hours of chat.

Nashville, very special place now.

Yeah, it really is.

We spent a lot of time there.

And we were invited there.

When we first went to tell you our bluegrass festival,

up in Colorado,

we knew that Alice and Kraus and Robert Plant were on the bill.

We knew that people at Oklahoma's

and show would be kicking around.

Jerry Douglas, who's the greatest slide guitar player of all time?

Well, Dobra player of all time.

And we walked in and they all were there

and all stoked that we were there.

Oh, and coming in is this kind of like,

nerdy kids with more Americana instrumentation.

They were just amazing.

And Jerry became a really amazing friend to our band.

We felt invited in and then they invited us to Nashville

and they were all around.

And we've spent a lot of time in Nashville.

I love it.

I've been shocked to be in that town,

which is also a creative town.

And just hear a story after a story of how

available everyone is for each other.

Yeah, Laney Wilson has become a friend of ours.

And I'm just obsessed with her.

She's so generous.

She's so down.

Yeah.

We've got her on the train tour.

She's like, yeah, cool.

That's what they haven't forgotten that they love the art form.

Yeah, a lot of them, I think.

Chris is like that.

No, a con is there now.

And he's like that.

Super generous people.

There's a real sense of community there,

which I think still exists in this cool.

One of our closest friends is this young artist, Hannah Anderson.

She's a musician.

She's lived in Portland and in LA and from Houston.

And they just went to Nashville a year and a half ago.

And they've just never been happy.

So even if they're not like successful and thriving

at every level there,

she's like, oh my gosh, they've been here my whole life.

I lived in West Hollywood and it drove my

shame narrative crazy.

It did.

Yeah, because I'd look around, be like, look,

all these amazingly beautiful, successful people.

No, I'm not doing any billboards.

You underestimate the impact

of these billboards for every five feet.

He really do.

They have an impact on you.

Especially if you have like a competitive spirit

or an artistic one, like a slightly vulnerable

and if you have both.

Yeah, you're fucked.

And he's not like competitive where I'm envious,

but you're ambitious.

Yes.

You've just to have ambition and see that you're not there.

Is a bad reminder.

Yeah.

Every time you walk out and you walk out of a restaurant

and there's paparazzi there and they just like put

their cameras down when it's so wild.

Mindful.

Oh, I got to tell you one of my funniest moments in life.

The first time I did Letterman,

which I was so excited to do.

He's my hero.

He facomics is like, he's number else.

Him and Bill Murray.

Those are gods.

So I couldn't be more excited.

I'm in the back of a SUV.

And Tom Cruise is also the guest that night.

So he's first and I'm second.

And I pull up to the theater.

They've got the whole street shut down

and there are saw horses so that the crowd doesn't move in.

And as my SUV pulls up, they believe Tom Cruise

is about to get out.

In this audience, the people is like,

Oh, the cameras are all like,

I'm going to get out of here.

And I step out and you just use this collective,

like literally 15 hurt people like,

save your family.

I'm not here.

And put your cameras away.

I was like, oh my god.

What a way to walk into this theater.

For my dream come true.

Started with save your film.

Maybe that should be the time to love your man.

Save your film.

So with so much gratitude,

you've agreed to sing.

And I cannot wait to see that.

So if we may, I try.

You're a party.

I like you a ton.

Thanks for coming.

You guys make this quite weird thing.

Feel non-wear to tool.

Oh, good.

That's the goal.

Very comfortable.

Do you know Mark Ronson?

I see me do.

You guys have a similar vibe.

Oh, really?

I'll take that.

He's a generous, spirited man.

He's a wonderful collaborator.

Yeah, yeah.

You know, some of those people like Frel

is like that.

And Aaron Dessons like that.

They just get joy in seeing other people shine.

Frel's definitely like that.

He's in his happiest place

when he's helping elevate someone up to their true self.

It's really cool.

It's a cool spirit.

Mark's like that too.

I had a therapist tell me that as a man,

your journey is you try to conquer

and try to get yours.

And then if you're a healthy man,

the next phase of your life

is to try to give that to as many people as you can.

And I have entered that phase of my life,

where it's like you got to now do that.

And that's the spirit of generosity

rather than the spirit of poverty.

Yeah.

It's not like this has got to be mine.

I can't give it away.

It's like I do better when you do better.

Yeah.

Yeah.

The scarcity.

Mentality.

Yeah, exactly.

Forged in.

All right, let's do it.

Let's do it.

Girl dogs is our compromise.

Can you hold on my secret.

That's all on.

Can you hold on my secrets?

Can we swear that we'll forget?

Oh.

OK, yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, you're gonna tell you this

and then I don't know if you want to hear about it.

Yeah.

Exactly.

I'm gonna get it.

There's so much stuff just for me.

I can't carry this anymore by myself,

but also we can't ever speak

Well, if that's you diminished, you know, fuck you, I guess.

Yes, I agree. I'm mad.

Yeah, that's you at 70%.

We had Taylor was doing that in the dog.

You won't make him tell us now.

Yeah, later.

All right, then.

Okay.

There it is.

Do that guy, should we?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Here's my fine serenade.

Here's the gun and here's the blade.

Here's the picture that I saved for too long.

Here's my credit card and keys.

And the reason I won't find it.

Here's my credit card and keys.

And the reason I won't find peace.

Here's a song I could not complete for too long.

Here's my pride and here's my shape.

Here's the trophy that bears my name.

Here's all the mistakes I made for too long.

Here's the answers I never gave.

Here's the cause I should have made.

Here's the substance that I create all along.

Here's my vision.

Here's my aim.

Here's my suspect and the ones I blame.

Whilst you're sitting taking names.

I just want to belong.

Here's my lonely serenade.

Here's the gun and here's the blade.

Here's the picture that I saved for you.

Here's my pride and here's my shape.

Here's the trophy that bears my name.

Here's all the mistakes I made for too long.

Here's the answers I never gave.

Here's the cause I should have made.

Here's the substance that I create all along.

Can you hold on my secret?

Can we swear we can forget?

I had lies like you wouldn't believe.

Butch my knee.

That's good.

No water carries horny for you.

I know I almost flew into the bookshelf a couple of times.

That was at the Memorex moment.

The privilege of being a room this tiny with him let it rip.

The whole time I was like, how's this our job?

Thank you guys.

Normally come play.

Which one did they do?

They did trussle.

Did a few.

As you know, when those two fucking lock spirits,

like there's something yeah, those two,

what do they call it blood harmony?

Yeah, right.

There's something real about blood.

It's not about this playing so cut together as well.

Yeah.

Oh, this was so spectacular.

Thanks guys.

Well, Marcus, this is a delight.

Thank you so much.

We'll come back.

Yes, please.

Also, I really want to double date maybe.

Yeah, lovely.

Yeah, lovely.

Okay, great.

I'm going to give you my facts number.

That would be dope, wouldn't it?

Only two facts.

Like, sharing with his iPad.

I'm not sure about that.

But the facts only.

Say you get a Lion Lion, I'll draw you some cock and balls pictures

and we'll get this thing going.

Alright, be well.

Thank you guys.

Stay tuned for the facts check so you can hear all the facts that were wrong.

Hi.

Hi.

Hi.

Sup.

How are you?

Go to the headache.

It's going to go away.

It's going to go away.

Did you take an ad bill or something?

So the power of thinking.

Why are you going to hear that?

No, I will.

But should I?

Yeah, come on.

Yeah, I guess if people want to see my pharmacy real.

Travelling pharmacy.

Yeah.

It's here.

This is it.

Oh, it's like in one of those videos like a what's in my bag.

Oh, sure.

Like a Vogue.

Exactly.

Yeah.

This is great.

What's in my pharmacy?

You've always wanted to do this.

I'm avid.

Oh.

What do you select?

Exactly.

What won't I?

Oh.

This isn't good.

Oh.

This is a hand sanny.

I really like it.

This one's vulnerable.

Pepto.

Puppy problem.

Yeah.

If I have muscle and or joint issues in order.

I prefer an elite.

I know.

We've done that.

And then I have your profan.

Never Tylenol for body pain.

Right.

But if I have a headache.

I know.

I love a Tylenol.

I know.

You know what I have not tried though?

Have you tried because it's so old fashioned?

I bet it works the best.

You ever fuck with an aspirin?

No.

Look.

aspirin.

Oh my god.

Do you know why I got this?

Why?

An accident.

No.

An accident.

I got it on purpose.

When I thought my finger was going to explode on the plane.

Okay.

I forget why probably a Google or maybe I asked someone.

And they said take an aspirin.

I think maybe for the sweat.

Like make sure my heart didn't explode on the plane.

Did you take an aspirin?

I'm sure.

I took everything they told me to take.

Sure.

So yeah, I've got some aspirin in here for the plane.

Someone should correct me if I'm wrong.

But my understanding of the difference between all these.

Aspirin actually thins your blood.

Yeah, it does.

That's why, because that's why on planes it's good for instead of clotting.

Yeah.

So when you have pressure, you have your blood moving through a constricted area.

And you can either attack the blood side aspirin or the constriction side, which is the other options.

That's right.

Why can't you take both as my crush?

No.

Oh, why?

Just you're always going to take both.

Yeah.

One's good.

Two's better.

Two kinds of D.

I have a leave D.

Ding, ding, ding, a leave.

And I observe tech deep.

Oh, wow.

So I just have a lot of stuff.

You've really got to going on in there.

I do.

Do you need that box still?

Are you going to get into that box?

No, I like it.

Don't you know?

Do you know?

Uh, okay.

I'm not carrying one of those.

Yeah.

In my backpack.

They're helpful.

They're very helpful.

Well, there's a lot of good free ads for all these companies.

I know.

It's just.

It's true.

Can you hear?

Oh, there's like not much left.

But that's okay.

There's enough to get.

It's probably enough.

I'm taking three.

It's one team.

Take them all once.

God, you had never been a good drug addict.

You had a sucked up being a drug addict.

So I never did.

I only do things I'm good at.

My character in chips is very much how I, as chew them all up and swaps, get over it.

All of is disgusting.

I remember the first time I had to swallow a pill.

You remember the first time?

Yeah.

I couldn't do it.

And my parents were trying to help me.

You currently look 15.

I'm dead.

Really?

Yeah.

Cause my hair's up.

I guess.

I was probably nine or 10.

I lived in my.

How could you've made it all the way to nine before you took a pill?

Oh, we didn't have those in my day.

Oh, really?

No.

I wasn't taking Advil, I guess, as taking chewable, those flinstone vitamins, datinging

from last week.

I was taking those.

And they worked.

They kept me healthy.

But then I had to take some sort of pill, probably an antibiotic or something.

And in my head, it was this big, you know, enormous relative to your head, it might have

been true.

Anyway, my parents were trying to help me and then they were getting frustrated, obviously,

because I couldn't do it.

Sure.

And you needed to take it.

I had to take it.

And I don't, I think eventually we probably cut it up into like teeny tiny pieces.

Yeah.

Made it dust of it.

Turn it into a milkshake.

Mom.

Yeah, we should have done that.

Yeah.

Why not?

Mortar pestle?

Yeah.

Could have done that.

Anyway, so that was a hard day for me.

I'm sorry that happened.

I had wanted last week, I forgot to bring it up, but I had attended a concert that I wanted

to talk about.

That was quite special.

Okay.

Let's hear about it.

I give, I, I, I attack social media so much, but I need to also acknowledge I have discovered

so many interesting things via Instagram.

Okay.

One of them is Alfredo Rodriguez, who is a Cuban pianist.

He makes these so exciting these songs he does.

He'll do like thriller, but he puts it through the Latin conversion.

Yeah.

So cool.

And it just tackled.

He did Star Wars.

Like what it would sound like if it had been written in Cuba.

Yeah.

And he's an insane piano player.

And he's on stage with just a percussionist who he's been making music with for like 15

years.

And these two are like, they're sharing a brain.

They're like David Brothers.

Yeah.

And this percussionist is only using his hands, but he is making so much sound.

He's got the bongos.

He's got everything you could imagine all, and his story, which was so great was he was

living in Cuba, and he got invited to this fancy jazz festival in Switzerland.

Okay.

And he went there and there was like all these legends there, like George Benson and

all these different incredible people.

So he plays piano on the stage.

And Quincy Jones is in the audience.

He goes back to Cuba, Quincy Jones comes home, and Quincy Jones calls his manager and

he said, I just saw the best pianist of this generation.

I have to work with him.

We've got to figure out how I can work with him.

So this management team spends the next few months trying to find him.

He's in Cuba 18 years ago.

Yeah.

Not the easy.

They start this process of trying to get him to be able to come record.

He ends up having to go to Mexico and defect and come over the border.

And he then starts working with Quincy Jones.

Oh, that's so cool.

Non-stop does three albums with Quincy Jones.

They become like, you know, mentor, he meant tea.

It's so beautiful.

I love that.

He's now a citizen.

He lives in Miami.

He's got a family.

It's just a wonderful story.

I love that.

And I've never seen someone play the piano with this kind of speed and pizzeria.

I mean, it's kind of mind bending to watch someone play like that.

That's fine.

So I encourage everyone if you could see Alfredo Rodriguez.

I know that they're having a jazz festival in Miami right now-ish, I think.

And I think John Batista is also playing at that festival.

Oh, you guys go.

I want to go so bad, but I was just there on the damn flight.

I really still have my complaints about the length of the flight.

Okay, it's too long.

Okay.

So three-day commitment to see anything, okay?

So yeah, check him out.

Yeah.

That's awesome.

We also, we went to another, I guess we're already now, because you went to a play, a

theater play.

Oh, we did.

We went to a theater production musical.

Every month's later that Kristen was in started and it was great.

It was so great.

It was impossibly good, given the fact that those people had come together a couple weeks

before-

To do rehearsals and stuff.

To start from scratch.

It was so, so funny and sweet and great.

Life affirming.

I loved it.

Yeah.

I loved it.

And it was extra fun for me.

Because?

It was a lot of worlds colliding for me, obviously Kristen.

And then to a very wonderful people who wrote the play, are you CBP?

Oh, you knew them.

Yes.

And-

I thought they were terrific.

Not only have they written this incredible thing, but they, as performers, were faint past

it.

Yes.

And one of my very good friends who I did improv with, we were on an improv team together.

Zeke was in it as well.

Which one was he?

He played the flight attendant, the co-pilot.

Oh, okay.

Wonderful.

Yes, yes, yes.

I met him.

The tall gentleman.

He's fantastic and he was so good in it and it was so fun because I hadn't seen him

in so long.

And it's one of those really fun things where like, you know, in this world, like you,

you, especially in the impromptu comedy world, you have these people and these teams and

you're around them non-stop and they're your family, you're making things together and

it's like such a beautiful time.

And then your life, sometimes your, your life goes into another direction as mine did and

I don't see any of those people anymore.

And it, um, it was so like, it made me feel so happy to see him up there.

Warm and fuzzy.

Made me feel warm and fuzzy.

And we were talking after the show and he, he said rightly, he was like, I feel like

that team was, he was like, I just have such strong memories of practicing at your house

in my apartment.

It was like right before we all sort of became adults.

It's like, we were adults, but like, a lot, everyone's lives, adults started taking off

right after that.

And so it was kind of like the last, the last phase of innocence.

Okay.

Now, I want to take this moment to discuss something that I think was potentially awkward

that we, we haven't, um, debriefed on.

Oh, okay.

And this likely was all from my own perspective and I imagined all this.

Okay.

But here's what happened.

We're watching this play.

Three of the characters are gamers, they're young boys and they're gamers.

So funny.

And they're matching outfits and they're in a gaming troop and whatever.

Mind you, I've not seen the play.

I have no idea.

I'm seeing it for the very first time.

But these three boys start dancing and singing and it's so adorable.

I just have this moment where I'm certain this is going to be making you smile so much.

Oh.

I'm thinking like she must love these boys right now.

I did.

And so I turn around and when you were with her or whole pot.

Yeah.

And so I turn around and I look at you directly to see if, like, I'm right.

Like, are you, are you used to be smiling ear to ear watching these boys being expressive

and dancing and singing?

Yeah.

I did love it.

Yeah.

But it's very obvious.

I turn around and I look at you and then you look at me and you're just like, I'm sure

you're like, what is he?

Do you remember this moment?

No.

Oh my God.

Not at all.

Well, then I see, like, I see Molly and Eric and then they, they've seen me turn around and

like lock eyes with you.

And then I turn back around.

You weren't smiling ear to ear.

So I'm like, oh, she's not as tickled by these boys as I was thinking she was, you were,

you just weren't showing it.

Oh.

That's not the point.

Don't even worry.

That has nothing to do with where I'm going with the story.

So I made this big show of turning around and everyone's behind me.

So they just saw me turn around and like, lock eyes with you and then then the song takes

off right after that moment.

And the whole song is about them loving double D's and the princess with big titties and

the whole song becomes about titties and double D's.

And then I started panicking thinking, is everyone just see that when I turned around

and stared at Monica, they think I've already seen this.

Oh my God.

You're selling your head.

No one thought that.

I don't think.

You can see the math of that.

No.

I can.

Like, hey, Monica, check this out.

And then the whole song right after I do that turns into a whole song about double D's.

Well, that is something you would do.

Well, I don't think I would.

You literally said double D's last week on the fact check because you had what ADHDD,

what was the thing?

I don't remember.

You said it.

I didn't say that.

I just said there was double D in the acronym.

No.

It was the math medicine, right?

What was it?

The medicine you were taking, the math.

The you're two doses, double D.

Yes.

Is that what it was?

Maybe.

And then you said, aren't you conflating it?

Yeah, you made a reference to my boobs.

You do this.

We do this.

So I don't know.

Well, anyways, I felt really pervy all of a sudden.

I guess, let's say this, if I turned around like, oh my God, look, they're about to sing

about big boobs.

That's not me.

Right.

Okay.

I'm pervy.

Whatever the line is.

That's not me.

I'm not turning around.

I think about boobs.

That's crazy.

I wouldn't do that.

You don't do that noise, but.

But that was what I was afraid the vibe all of sudden was like, oh my God, do they think

that?

I don't think so.

But I was just turning around to see like, oh my God, I bet she loves these cute boys dancing.

I did.

Yeah.

But then they immediately were letting rip about boobs.

And I'm like, oh boy, they think.

I don't think.

Monica.

Yeah.

I don't think anyone thought that.

Is that why you kept looking at your kids, too, because you were like trying to like combat

it.

Like, I'm not a perv.

I'm here with my sweet children.

Of course not.

I was looking at my kids to see how excited they were.

Their mom was so cute.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That was really cute.

They had friends with them.

The girls.

Yeah.

I was just trying to imagine.

I said, if I was 12 and I took Aaron and my dad was like, I'd to make it one for

one.

And if my dad was doing backflips on motorcycles, like they're all into musical theater and their

mom is like crushing it on stage and I was like, I wonder if they're feeling pride for

their mom.

Oh God, I hope so.

I hope so.

Yeah.

That's what I was trying to check in on.

Yeah.

I love it.

Yeah.