Maren Morris
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Wondery Plus subscribers can listen to Armchair Expert early and ad-free right now. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Or you can listen for free wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome, welcome, welcome to Armchair Expert, Experts on Expert. I'm Dan Shepard and I'm joined by Monica, Duchess of Duluth Padman. Hello. This was outrageously fun. So fun. We have a pattern of these young singers come on and every time they're so much fun.

It's a good group. Yeah, it is. She's young. Yeah. Oh, she doesn't qualify as young. What do you say is young? What do you think is young? Anything under 40. Oh, great. So I'm still young? Yes. Oh. You're a tiny little person. My God, great. Even when you're old as hell, you'll be young. Oh.

Oh, that's nice. I hope so. You're miniature. Yeah. Which shaves off a decade at least. Yeah, but witches are miniature and they do age. Well, they're old as fuck though. They're like four or 500 years old. That's true. That's true. And so in that way, they look incredibly young. You're right. Maybe for the first 200 years, they look 20. You're not calling Maren a witch though. No, me. Okay. You're calling yourself a witch. I think. I don't remember how. I think you're a witch because you're nasty. I can see that.

You're fucking nasty, you know? In a witchy way? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. Which is cool, too. I'll take it. It's very punk rock to be a witch. I'll take it. Okay. Maren is a Grammy award-winning singer and songwriter. Fucking the middle. We just, I don't know that we've ever indulged in a song as much as the

Yeah, it was one of our songs on a trip, as you'll hear. Yes. And three great albums, Hero, Girl, Humble Quest. And she has a new EP out right now called Intermission. And she helps us learn about the music industry, which is we have her as an expert to sort of teach us some stuff.

Yes, absolutely. I actually was quite fascinated by all the different things I learned about the music industry in this. But I also want to add, just for a tasty tidbit of nothing. Yeah. After the interview, we were chatting with her. And as it turns out, for anyone who heard the Huey episode where Huey Estes was on the fact check, and we were talking about country clubs. Country clubs.

We got into it. We got into it. And your position was a little, you were anti-country club. And I was like, well, truth be told, I am too. But I went and I have to say, I had a really great time, blah, blah, blah. And she said, yeah, we're a member of a country club in Nashville. And it's not like stuffy. It's really cool, blah, blah, blah. And I'm like, this sounds a lot like you. So then I said, what's the name of the country club? She told me. Then I text Huey.

He goes, that's our country club. Yep. He goes, she's on a tennis team with my wife. Yes. She's been to my house. I'm like, oh my God, you know Huey and you know Hayes and you're on a tennis team with Hayes, the Slice Girls. Slice Girls, I was going to say, what was the name? It had a great name. Great name. That was a weird ding, ding, ding. That was. She knows Huey and Hayes. The world is small. It's tiny. Please enjoy Maren Morris.

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There's more to imagine when you listen. Whether you're searching for the latest bestsellers and new releases, or you want to catch up on a classic title, you can find it all in the Audible app. And as an Audible member, you choose one title a month to keep from their entire catalog. What are you listening to now? Well, I'm just finishing The World's I See Now.

He's an uptake spender.

He's an ultra-next-class He's an ultra-next-class He's an ultra-next-class

It would be embarrassing if it just started playing right now. Or cool. What song were you listening to? I was listening to My Church. Yeah, My Church. Hard to get away from My Church. I love your Willie shirt. Oh, thank you. It's a nod to you. But more importantly, it's a nod to the high women. Oh, hell yeah. Have you had Brandy on the show ever?

I haven't. Okay. I'm trying to think of country guests we've had. We haven't had too many. Who? Yes. She's the queen. You know Martina? Yeah, she's a baddie. A baddie. I like that. She's kind of, if you're in Nashville, she's like a good surrogate mother to everyone, right? Yeah, she's really sweet. Very mayoral. She and her husband are the mayors. Oh, they are.

It feels like that at events. I'm glad you had that right. Because I was like, does she mean maternal? But no, mayoral. They're the mayors. I have never used that word before. I know. I need time to try it. You only say it when you're talking about a mayoral campaign, right? Yeah. I guess he's not really country, but you had Teddy Swims on recently. Yes. Do you watch Couples Therapy? Mm-hmm. Yeah, y'all had Orna on.

Oh my God, you know. Yeah, I'm obsessed with her and her therapist. Orna herself is very eccentric and gorgeous. But like sexy. So sexy. Something alluring. Her voice, her cadence as she speaks. She's so self-assured. She's just so quiet.

I want her to be my therapist. I know, same. Me too, but I would be too in love with her. I would be performing for her and trying to get her to like me. I'm glad you used sexy because we all too agree there's some sex appeal there. How many therapists do you think have had sex with their patients? The percentage. A lot. You think a lot? Well, not percentage, but...

It's such an intimate relationship. You get to know everyone's deepest, darkest. I don't think I could have a male therapist for that reason because I would fall in love with him. And I mean, I'm bisexual, so actually both are bad. But if it's someone that's like attractive and I'm just spilling all my childhood trauma, I'm like, we're in a relationship. And you are. So it's a little tricky. And in fact, we're in a better relationship than I've ever been in. It's so healthy. They have boundaries. Yeah.

They don't think of me when they go home. I was like, yeah, I love you. And they really have your best interest at heart because they only have to do that for an hour. Like everyone could be a perfect husband or wife or boyfriend or girlfriend for one hour a week. Oh, my God. You could nail that. You might have cracked the code. Yeah, just be together for one hour a week. But over time and living with people and I clear my throat so much.

However much you might like me, if you're on the outside, live with me for six mornings and hear what happens in the morning when I start up. The spell breaks. I'm like an old car, you know, wind me up and coughing and getting it going. And you'd be in the other room going like, it's not worth this. Yeah, the charm breaks after six mornings. And you're just left with the cough.

That's all you have. That's intimacy, though. It is. That's the sweet part. Toots, coughs. That's what they say on Google hunting. Everyone tries to be cool and like, oh, you know, I'll Frida Kahlo this thing and just live in a house next door to my partner. Connected by a bridge. But we're not sharing a bathroom. You go back to your place and...

After we're done, they might have been on to something there for sure. Also, Diane von Furstenberg, I think, had a similar setup with the husbands. Separate living situations. Yeah, which is cool. I would have balked at that a while ago because I was doing a movie with a guy and he was telling me, like, you don't live in the same room as your wife, do you? And I was like, of course I do. Why did I get married to you?

He was talking to me like I was insane. He's like, no, no, I sleep in another room from my wife. And I thought that was bonkers. I'm like, just don't be married. Does he snore? Was that the thing? It always starts with the snoring. Yeah. That's the white lie. Exactly. Exactly. But I was very judgmental of it. But I have to say, my wife has been sleeping with our two girls. At this point, it just took...

over in the last year. She's been sleeping with them probably 80% of the nights. And at first I was like, this is nuts. I mean, I just live by myself. But then I was like, this is awesome. I live by myself. So every night I get in bed and I'm like, watch whatever I want. I'm on my own little schedule. I gotta say, I still love the daylights out of her, but I'm not in a huge hurry. So now that I've had that experience, fuck, I don't know, maybe House Next Door is the way to go. But what have you done now in bed?

Like a bad habit, I think. You can keep it R but not X. Or go ahead. No, you would think I went with self-pleasuring and stuff. Yeah, but I'm even more kinky. Like, what are you doing in bed that you couldn't do when she was there? Well, even though I clearly fart in front of my wife, it would be insane that I didn't. I do try to keep a lid on it if they're problematic. Sure.

Sorry, this is bad everywhere. That was good. That was my goal. Sweet take. We want that. Always the fart culture that gets it. And let me be clear and very honest. If they're odorless, I don't care. Yeah, that's not a problem. But if they're rough, I'm not trying to put her through that. I'll get up and I'll walk to the balcony and I have a whole thing I do. I go out in a way.

Out and away, because I try to get it away from you. Social experience on the balcony. That's pretty entertaining for her, because she's just in bed watching me in the balcony, and I'm going, you push it out and away, because I don't want to bring any back in. So when I'm by myself, not only am I making no effort to curb that, I'm probably trying. Yeah.

Yeah. That's fair. There's like a Sex and the City episode about this where it's just like secret single behavior. And it's what do you do when you're alone? And for me, I don't know if it's just an overactive imagination from a child, but I'll have full scenes with just myself. I'm my own scene partner. I'll do accents. I have a full conversation with like an enemy in my head and I'll do it in bed by myself. Allowed? Yeah. Yeah. I can now. I'm divorced.

So all day. You're free to. All night. But does your son ever hear mommy like, who's mommy talking to in there? There sounds like a lot of people in there. What's that bad British accent up the stairs? Who's mommy fighting with upstairs? Yeah, just herself, her own demons. Is there a theme that you're normally having fights about? I mean, it's always about me being right, but I'm not very confrontational in relationships.

I am more so now, like I know how to set a boundary with loved ones. And I was talking to someone the other day about I don't have enough for everyone to give 100%. I only have that percentage for my son, myself, a few close people around me, but everyone else is going to get like 70% me. Yeah. That's fair.

That's a lot. Honestly, most days it probably should just be like 30% because I've just learned I'm exhausted easily and I can't do it that way anymore. I do a lot of, and this is so embarrassing. This is probably the most common for me.

I imagine wanting to make a statement in public about an opinion I have, be it societal, political, whatever. And then I anticipate what the backlash is. Are you like Town Crier in this scenario? Wonderful archetype. Tell people about Town Crier. I just imagine you walking through these cobblestone streets with the bell.

and hear ye, hear ye, and you have a statement to make to a mass audience. I can be even more specific. My main preoccupation is, and it's such arrogance, I think I can craft a sentence that can bridge the divide between people. That's generally what I'm ruminating on. It's like, I can point out to these people that their thing they feel passionate about is very identical to this other thing that these people feel passionate about.

If you take away the particulars, in fact, they're the identical arguments. And if I point that out to them. You can unify. They'll have some compassion. They're not going to agree, but they'll at least go like, I do know that feeling. That is the base of my position. And then I craft this perfect sentence that's going to heal the world. And then I wait for the backlash. So then I rewrite my initial sentence. Oh, that's right. They're going to outfox me on that. And that'll just go on and on and on. And then I remember no one's going to.

ever listen to anything I say or change their opinion. Yeah, well, what do you think's going to happen when, because I think it is possible to have compassion for something you don't agree with, but then what? So everyone has compassion, but they still have their beliefs. Yes, I'm trying to take it out of the realm of emotion and in-group, out-group and make it an intellectual disagreement. Like I said the other day,

No one that's arguing for Kantian philosophy against someone that's arguing for utilitarian philosophy. Neither side's going, that side's evil. They're going like, I don't agree with that, but I also don't think you're evil. That's like a pretty solid point of view. I just don't agree with it. My fantasy is that we could just move it out of this emotional identity-driven zone where you're fighting to protect your identity and just have it more like,

two intellectuals debating two ideas and maybe disagreeing at the end. Do you think some of that is because you are worried? Like you protect the idea that there's no such thing as bad people a lot, which I agree with. I don't know how you feel about that. It's so funny. I hate to always bring this back to like my new motherhood, because I think when you are taking it back to like the sandbox argument where I'm watching my son

on the playground and you are as a parent like a hawk watching them but also letting it play out because you can't control everything and that's a good exercise but you see children their same age from different backgrounds different homes different parental styles being little shits

To your kid. And you want to like step in. And I only do when clearly he's not sticking up for himself or what have you, or it's getting really bully mentality. But I think people are innately good, which is like a very hopeful thing to maybe realize about my belief system now. It starts so early. The small things. The cracks and the ridges of generational bias.

stuff. And so it's so apparent when you watch kids grow up and like start to have verbal skills and group mentality, bully mentality, peer pressure. It's very influential. And I've been influenced child to sometimes even now be like, I always have to check biases, always have to check my behaviors because

I think we all believe we're good people. Even people that have wild things to say. There's a person there. I agree. I think before I met Dax, I would have said things are a little more black and white and there's more good and bad. And I don't think that anymore after knowing you. I also don't think people are good. I want to say that.

I feel inclined to say. What's a better word? Well, just I don't think people are good or bad. I think they're innately generous to their family members that are carrying on their genes. I mean, I just think biologically they are that to those people. Protective. You see great sacrifice for their in-group. But I...

I just think they're capable of all. And I think anyone that thinks they're not a product of their household, that they would be the exact same way coming out of a different household is a little bonkers. And even your friendship group. I behave much differently, shocker, here in Los Angeles than I did in Detroit. And I could move somewhere else and I bet I have another whole transition left in me. Yeah, I think we adapt to our environment. We're survivalists at the end of the day. I don't want to be lonely. So we go to extreme lengths to not feel loneliness. Everyone is...

potentially swayable in that way. Great transition, great segue into Arlington, Texas. This is in the trifecta of cities, the Dallas, Fort Worth, Arlington. The Metroplex. That sounds like a cinema. Ooh, I love it. Phantom of the Metroplex. I'm from there.

I've lived in Nashville for 11 years, so it's home. But mom and dad did the cutest thing because they named their salon after their two daughters. I think this is so sweet. The name of mom and dad's salon.

Salon was Marin and Carson, Aveda Salon. Aveda? Aveda. My sister worked there, so I learned that. Yeah, I grew up in an environment of a lot of talking, a lot of heart to hearts, a lot of goss. Were you ear to the street? Were you trying to hear all the hot stuff? From like six years old to...

I think I worked there as a receptionist until I was 18 or 19. And when did you start as a receptionist? I worked there for two or three years. I had the idea of walking in and greeting a 12-year-old, which would have been so fun. Well, I mean, I was always there. Like, after school, I'd sweep the hair, restock the shelves. Did you have crushes on some of the beauticians or hairstylists? No. I mean, they were all batshit crazy. And I don't mean sexual. I mean...

It seems to me that there would be a lot of cool, younger, single women that seem to be stylish and fun. And if I were a young girl, I'd be like, oh, Susie's kind of awesome. Oh my gosh, yeah. I idolize them in a way, the ones that would just go outside the alley of the break room and smoke cigarettes between clients. I'd be like, that's...

me someday. And they all have tattoos and like crazy haircuts. They're awesome in that way, but something's off for sure. And I just say that as like the daughter of one. It attracts a certain type. I'll say it. I actually love the type of scene in show business, the hair and makeup teams that are in the trailers. There's a vibe. It's so many hours with someone for years. If you have this rapport and clientele. So my mom, some clients she's been doing for 35 years, she's done their hair at their own like wakes.

That's crazy. Oh, that's a call to get. Yeah. But seasonal changes, moves, babies, all the stuff. I remember just knowing everything about everyone. They're not like shy about it. They're in the chair. They feel like they know this woman, my mother, and they're just spilling all of the tea. It's the original podcast. It kind of is. Yeah. Oh, my God. You're right. We just talked about this on sync that apparently hairstylists, that's the happiest profession.

Oh, really? Because, you know, dentists are like... The least. They're not very happy. Highest suicide rate. It had to be said. Sometimes you have to say it. Although we looked it up and that wasn't true. They're always in there. Yeah. But anyway, apparently hairstylists are on the opposite end. And this sort of makes sense. Community, getting to know someone. Making...

Someone feel beautiful too. They walk out with a new lease on life if they walked in feeling like shit. That's really a powerful thing to be in control of for someone's day. You have purpose. Yeah. So I think there's a reason why we trust all of them so innately. You should listen to the Jeremy Renner episode. The way he spoke about this because he would do makeovers at the mall makeup. Oh.

No. Yes. He was like a highly skilled and coveted makeup artist. And the way he would describe helping these women that came in feel their best was so sweet. And I totally bought it. Do you think your mother had to ever fight the urge? Certainly she had a client for years that was like, Gail, your hair would look so much better if it were short, if you did bangs, blah, blah. And they never did. And then she gets the call for the wake.

She's like, now's my chance to give her the haircut. I know. At least she's got to go out. She cuts bangs on her finally. That's a bad example because it's a big swing. But you know, she might have always had a sense that she was framing her head wrong. And she's like, you deserve on your final resting to go out looking beautiful. Yeah, a 10. She's had to fire clients. Because it got too murky? Or they wouldn't accept her advice in the hairstyle department? No, I think...

At the end of the day, it's customer service. People are so particular about their hair. It's not like your food. It's the way you wake up in the morning. It could be determined by a bad hair day or good hair day. And she has had clients that are very high maintenance. There's two or three, I remember. And my dad works at the salon too. So he's the business portion and she does hair. I just remember he had to call someone one day and this lady was just hemming and hawing about how my mom's

Schedule was never open enough for her. And he finally was just like, Linda, whatever her name was, I cannot manufacture time for you. Okay. Which I thought was like a really good line. It is. That is a good line. I liked the boundary being set because yeah, customer is king, but also like respect people that are making you look good.

Okay, so maybe this is apocryphal, but you sang at one of the parties for the salon, karaoke. And in that moment, you're like, oh, this is pretty great. They love this. I think I want to do this. I think I always loved singing, but my parents would have these company Christmas parties with a karaoke machine. My mom loves karaoke. She's like won competitions for it. Oh, wow. Yeah.

I just loved, you know, I think I was going through my Wizard of Oz obsession at the time and singing Somewhere Over the Rainbow. I was supposed to be in bed because it's at the house. She's having all her employees over and I just snuck down the stairs and put that on the karaoke jukebox and started singing. My parents still tell the story where they thought that it was an adult singing in the other room. Oh.

And they're like, I think that's your kid. And it was me. And so I think that was when the light bulb went off for them of like, oh my God, we had no idea. Because I was 10 or 11. It wasn't like four. That's kind of where it kicked off. And your dad got kind of real supportive in a hurry? Yeah, my dad managed me kind of up until I moved to Nashville. So I would totally...

through Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, any honky tonk or barbecue festival or chili cook off or like whatever needed live music, I would be the singing sensation at 14. What was the worst? Because I was in on the honky tonks. But when you said barbecue cookout, I was picturing outside a stage. People are preoccupied with the barbecue. And I remember doing improv at a festival and there was a rock band on the next stage. You couldn't hear us. And there was five people. It's like probably my darkest moment as a performer. Did you have anything

that were just horrendous experiences where you're singing all by yourself and no one's watching because it was a barbecue festival? Most of them. Most of the shows. It was extremely character building. My mom has footage of me because they'd bring the camcorder and set it on the tripod at the honky tonk or the chili cook off or whatever. She was like, I'm going to film your performance so you can go back and watch the tape and

Criticize yourself? Sure. Break bad habits. Work on your banter between songs, maybe. I'm like 15. But it's funny and obviously really triggering to watch those back now because I'm like, how did I continue having a love for performing? And it kind of died. When I moved to Nashville, I was having a full like

I want to move here and just be a songwriter. I don't want to be this like little kiddie performer. I just wanted to start over, kind of rebel. No, I'm never getting on stage again. I'm just going to write songs for other artists.

on Music Row as like a working songwriter, have a publishing deal and be behind the scenes and not have to tour or travel. We had Shania Twain on and she talked a lot about being a kid and playing in bars. And what a wild... Now, mind you, she was in like Northern Canada or...

There was a fight every night when she performed virtually. But what was it like being young and being around drunk adults? It was strange. I think it was like that scene in Pinocchio where all the people get drunk and they turn into donkeys. That scene is terrifying. That's sort of like what I was seeing unfold. Because it's very interesting to know adults all day and then see them acting like children at night is very weird. Yeah, I think it gave me along with the stories I'd hear at the salon, like,

huge look into the lives of humans. The real life. And the drama and the relationships and the heartbreak and just the mania. So I think that's probably where my, again, overactive imagination kicked in for songwriting because I'm writing songs at like 16. I'm not dating boys because first off, they are idiots and I'm constantly around adults. Dating like a high school boy. Yeah. Pass. He hasn't even seen a stabbing. I know.

You've never seen anyone get hit in the head with a liquor bottle. So naive. You've never even smelled Jägermeister. So, like, what are you going to do? You don't come home drinking, like, cigarettes ever. You know what's funny? The other day, you can tell me if you don't want this in, but one of your kids came home from school and I was there and she said, oh, man.

So glad you're here. All these kids. She's back in school and she's like, I don't know how to talk to, like she has outgrown the kids her age because she's around adults a lot. She is surrounded by adults and she's like, this kid is doing this. And the thing is, I do that, but I know I do that.

And they don't. It was such an adult conversation she was having about understanding herself and the world. And she's just around adults. And being around these kids her age is hard. That's how I was. I mean, that's girls, too. We get it a little bit quicker. I think it is interesting when you're around a lot of adults. It definitely affects...

the way you see people your age? Well, not to have a pity party for myself, but yeah, I would go at this kid's house. You know, he and his grandpa had a coin collection. He had wallpaper of antique cars. His life was just so innocent. I could see. And like at my home, there's an alcoholic raging in the household. I just was like, I can't even relate to how simple and naive and innocent this bedroom is and the boy. And I guess there are pros and cons to both. It's not like a horrible thing to have to grow up fast, but it's also a sad thing to have to

grow up fast. Well, you have to be like cognizant too of grooming because I was 14 playing in bars and then this boy who was 18 started showing me attention and he had just graduated and I was like still a freshman and he was so into my music and showing me just a lot of inappropriate attention but I was like

I don't connect with boys my age, so I must just be interested in adults. Yes. And obviously at the time I thought that was really cool. And then we hooked up and I just realized how young I actually was. You felt immediately overwhelmed. Like this is too much. Yeah. And I realized I'm still a kid. Like this isn't cool. And it's totally fine, but yeah.

Now, we have a lot more resources and communication and tools to talk about this sort of thing. And it was no one's fault. It wasn't even at a show. It was outside of school summer after freshman year. Now that I have my son, who's four and a half, he's around adults a lot. And he's on tour with me on the weeks that I have him. And now he's back in school. But I just want to be extremely aware of his surroundings. And it's like not stranger danger, but it's

Strange Behavior. Oh, that's the new. I like that. But you did put out your first self-released album at 15 years old. And then you did another one at 17 years old. This is all before moving to Nashville. I was curious. It's been scrubbed from the internet. Oh, no. Well, I was wondering if you personally, when you go back and listen to those albums,

I would imagine it would be like reading your diary from that time. Yeah, which I'm sure for most teenage girls is very cringe. But there's moments, of course, that I loved of that era of my life. I think it gave me a lot of experience. So by the time I did move to Nashville, I wasn't catching up. I was like, I'm a...

I'm on my fourth. Yeah, badass. I don't blame my parents by any means because I think they were extremely supportive, but there were things I missed out on. What I thought immediately, because I'm egocentric, is, yeah, I could see this all happening with me and my daughter. If she loved something, I would be like, let's go and I'll help you do whatever. And then I imagine at some point you must have felt like,

OK, I need to do this without you. I need to be an adult and I don't really want to do it in front of you. Was there any growing pains with dad having been so close during the initial stage of it all? I think the cord cutting was me moving to Nashville. And it wasn't just my dad. It was my mom, too. They were like a management team almost. And so just the proximity separation was helpful. And then me really hitting the reset button. I remember I only knew like a couple of people in Nashville when I first moved there, but

Everything was truly ground up. I lived in like a shitty Craigslist house with two 20-somethings that I didn't know. Sight unseen. It's like condemned now. How old were you when you moved there? 23. I would kind of like go to writing rounds and shows by myself. And as like a sort of hermit, I really had to just get over it and just put myself out there and network.

And so I didn't have like cards or anything, but I was like, hey, if you're around next Tuesday, we should write like a complete stranger. And then eventually that became normal. And then I think it was eight months to the day of me moving to Nashville. I got an offer from a publishing company and they were like, we want to give you a publishing deal for four years. And the money was not enough, but I made it work to live on and just ate ramen every night, did the thing you're supposed to do.

And it took a few years to really find my songwriting voice, learning how to collaborate because Nashville is all about co-writing, not writing by yourself.

And I love it now. I can't write by myself. I love writing with my friends. I would write and try to like pitch songs to bigger artists. This is where I want your expertise. So I'm dying to know how that whole process works. It's so fascinating. So you get a four-year contract. It has what some built-in salary or yearly thing. And then you do. They call it a draw. So it's an advance against maybe what you'll make. Yeah, it's recoupable. So you do end up writing a song that Tim McGraw uses. And you write a song that Kelly Clarkson sings. Yeah.

So once that happens, how does the financials of that work? Do you get a fee for having written it and then you own some of the... Yeah, the publishing. Okay, how does that all work? Teach us about the music industry. Come on. I feel like a Belmont professor. Honestly, I've never been that articulate talking about the deal points of these publishing deals. And everything is so different now because it was 2013, 14 when I got my deal. iTunes was still...

King and radio. People bought a song for 99 cents. The label and the songwriters are making money and then streaming happened. And so if I were a songwriter in Nashville in the 90s and I had one song on that Shania Twain Come On Over album, which

went diamond. Even if you didn't have a single on that album, even if you just had a deep cut, you would have made hundreds of thousands of dollars, perhaps even millions. Really? Because radio and you're buying albums, CDs at Walmart. The songwriter gets paid every time it plays on the radio and every time, obviously, a CD is purchased. Yeah. And that's your ownership. You're splitting it with your co-writers, your publishers taking whatever percentage y'all have worked out on the front end. Nowadays,

With streaming, there's so many incredible organizations. NSAI in Nashville has been on Capitol Hill for a decade trying to work deals up with Spotify, Apple, all of the DSPs to provide more shares for writers. Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert, if you dare.

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Most of my songwriter friends, unless they are just having constant hits on the radio, they have second jobs. It is just not a sustainable living anymore. Do you get a fee, though, when they initially like Kelly Clarkson? Here's the song. You guys have recorded a demo, I'm guessing. Yeah. And she goes, yes, I want that. I want to do that. Is there an initial fee right then? No, it's all on the back end. Even if it went number one, you wouldn't see that money for over a year. What?

So everything has to go through the channels of the label. I'm with BMI, so they have a percentage and then you get your check in the mail. Everyone's like, oh my God, you sold a song? Buku's the money coming in. And you're like, no. And also if I do see anything, it's going to be over a year from now. Songwriters are the last people to get paid.

And it's so funny because they're the first one in. Yeah. It doesn't exist without them. Yeah, we're the creator. So I like talking about this. I make money from touring. I make money from merch. If you've restructured or renegotiated your deals with your label, which I have, and also I'm in a publishing deal now where I own the majority share. So my songs now I own.

Right. That's not the case for most people. It sucks because music is such a unifier. I have a provocative take on this. I would love to hear your pushback. I mean, because in TV and film, the same thing is sort of happening with the writer's rights. Well, people start buying DVDs. Half of your money was really linked to DVD sales for your residuals.

First statement, I think that musicians and the writers should get way more money, a thousand percent. But I also think it's a little simple to paint, say, Spotify and Apple Music as the bad guys because, A, Spotify is not even profitable.

Like they had their first profitable quarter last year or something, right? So it's not like they have this big bag of money that they're keeping. This is really a call to fans, which no one's going to want to hear. You would have to pay 30 bucks a month for these subscriptions so that the artists could get paid. That's the part no one really wants to talk about. And I feel always like we're kind of circling, but if we don't get real about what the solution is, it actually can't happen because people are not willing to pay for

Again, if you're going to watch my movie for free and you want my movie for free all the time, whose fault is that? So I do think if people really care about artists and they really care about the writers of the music, it's not just the Goliath streamers. It's ultimately the customer base that is willing or not willing to pay. I listen to a ton of music on the iTunes model era where I had to buy one for 99 cents.

I was spending 45 bucks a month buying music because I love it. And I was like, yeah, I'll do it because I want this fucking song so bad. And now all of a sudden I'm like, no, I don't want to pay more than $9.99. I want every song ever written all the time. In my pocket. Yes. We're really critical. We're not really taking a ton of responsibility on the fan side and on the consumer side. And a little bit of it is us. Everyone could be criticized, but I'm not really just pointing a laser at DSPs like Spotify or Apple.

They've been great partners to me and activations and playlisting and all this stuff, getting my music heard. They just help your tour business. That's all they can do, really. Yeah, but I think this is a much longer conversation and I'm probably not the most educated person to speak on it. But if we want to really have the conversation in the music side, labels are taking the lion's share. Okay, good. Of what's

profited from the stream. That's a bigger conversation when people are signing record deals is you guys are taking a huge chunk of this. By the time it gets to the artist, if they're a writer on the song or to the songwriters who wrote the song back in Nashville or LA, it's been whittled down to like 0.0000. So everyone's culpable.

Everyone needs to get together collectively and everyone's going to have to give some. The labels are very, very ignorant on this world. What do they do? Do they pay for the production of the music? They own the recording, correct? Generally. They own the masters. Why do they own the recording? That's my whole thing. They're paying for like the studio time, production fees, paying the musicians, paying for the photo shoot, getting it distributed. If they're signing someone off TikTok...

that maybe already either made this in their bedroom and it's ready to go. I would advise artists like that that have already done their production to be not signing away their masters. You should be just doing a distribution deal then. Exactly. Everyone has a different kind of deal now. And you're right in the old paradigm where it's like you needed a label to A, pay for a really great recording with they're going to bring in the producer that's a lot

of money they're going to bring in the song right right so they have a ton of upfront promo marketing that's what's really changed it used to be they really did have to spend millions to get you everywhere and all these backroom deals with the radio stations to play your song but their cost there has completely collapsed

They're not even signing anyone that doesn't already have kind of a following. Like even you had two and a half million streams in a month. Finally, when we get to the point where you put out five songs on Spotify, before you get signed as a performer, you've already shown that there's an audience for you. Yeah.

you. Yeah. We're skipping a step though. Let's get to the part. I'm sorry. I went too far ahead. You write my church during this period of writing for other people. And I love this, or at least I'm assuming this, you love it too much kind of to give it away. Yeah. It was the first time that had ever happened to me because I'd written songs before that I was like, I don't care about this one for me, but I just didn't have the confidence either to be the voice on the song. I would sing the demo and my publisher would be like, this is amazing, but no one's going to sound like this. And

And I was having like a real frustration of that because that was going to be my bread and butter. I wanted to be a hit songwriter. I wanted to have my number one party. I wanted to like get in rooms with big artists and be their buddy and just write their life. And maybe I had too much to say.

for my own identity to fill in someone else's identity. Too personal. Yeah. And that was like an age thing, a wisdom thing. I didn't have it yet. And so when I wrote my church, I was actually out here in LA with my co-writer and producer Busby, who's now passed away, sadly, but he was...

Just so encouraging. And he was so genre bendy himself because he had written a ton with country artists, but also he had massive songs with Shakira and Pink out here. He was kind of the first in Nashville to really blend L.A. and Nashville as a producer. That was 2014, 15. I don't know Busby, but when I was learning about you, I then learned about Busby. And when I saw that he died at 43, what happened?

And brain cancer at 43 is so fucking heartbreaking. Respectfully to his widow, Jess, who I love and their girls, they all moved to Nashville when he passed away. So I'm glad they're with our community. But he was extremely influential on me. And a real champion, right? He's like, you should be performing. Yeah. He was like, dude, come on, quit wasting everyone's time pretending you're not an artist because we need this now. It was during a time in country music, there were just no women on the radio and there still kind of aren't. But I was like, all right, let's do it.

My church just was the smoking gun, I guess. I would be devastated if someone recorded this and fucked it up. Yeah. I truly felt motherly towards it because the demo was just so good. And we actually never even re-recorded the vocals from the day we wrote it because I can't recreate this song.

freshness and like rasp and not quite knowing it yet. There's just something special about Day of Demos. Why do you want to write that song? Does something precede that that also was quite real for you? That song was born out of a lot of soul searching. I was going through my first big break

breakup at the time and I was out here and I felt really far away from Nashville and all the drama of that and I was just able to be free and I still feel like that's the case even now when I come out here and write it's just so different from the stuff I get in Nashville oh really I don't know what it is it's like out of

sight out of your world you're not encumbered by your real life yeah maybe so I get to be like a different Marin here that song it was before Apple Music even existed so we put it on Spotify and then it sort of took off and then all of a sudden I was in a bidding war with the labels in town that previously were passing on me yeah there was one label president that made me

audition for him twice. He didn't even come to the first one. And the second one felt very like Tony Soprano. He's just sitting on a couch, just like watching me perform. Passed on me twice. And I was just like, all right, fuck off. These other two labels ended up putting their hats in the ring. And because of my church doing well on streaming, I was able to leverage a pretty good deal for a new artist. At Columbia. Yeah. Less albums. Some people are stuck in like five or six album deals. Do you know how long that would take to make six

albums. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Over a decade. Over a decade. So I was able to get a fair deal for the age I was and the young artistry I was. We skipped one thing that I think now is quite relevant because it is a pattern and it's a good one to observe for people trying something, which is you auditioned for American Idol.

for America's Got Talent, for The Voice, for Nashville Star. Every one of those rejected. Oh, I'm very well-versed in rejection. Does part of that inform I'm just going to be a writer? Yeah, that's a good point. Those were all when I was a teenager. Being told no that many times, I was like, maybe I just don't have it. Maybe I just need to be a writer. I'm going to put all of my energy on being the best songwriter. I'm going to figure it out like a science. I kind of did. And

Now, when those shows come around and people are auditioning with my songs on them, it is like sweet revenge, I must say. It has to feel so good. It does. Yeah, I would love that. And I've had friends that have gone pretty far on those shows. Yeah. All the respect in the world to them. I'm so glad I didn't go far. Not that it's cringe, but it's just too much too soon.

Yeah, it's a lot. It's like if you're a new drag queen and you immediately get on RuPaul's Drag Race. Thrown in the deep end. I need to go through the ugly drag phase. I feel like Alaska Thunderfuck has talked about this. I miss ugly drag when it's just bad before it gets good. Yeah. That's like same with artistry. Everything is so accessible now with TikTok. I love TikTok. I'm more of like a passive follower of that platform, but...

I am so glad people didn't have to see on a large worldly scale my shitty phases. I would have gone into American Idol going like, well, I've got this because most of the people I see on the show haven't been performing for four years. They haven't put out three albums. I

I would have gone in really quite bullish. And then when I got rejected, I would have been like, there's a lot of dissonance here between what I thought was going to happen and what happened. It's also television. So they're looking not just for talent. It's sort of like a scream-a-thon. And I'm not the belter. I think sometimes that's what gets their ear there. And then also they're looking for like a story. Yeah. Like who's more traumatic? Because we're going to like make a four minute package on this person and they're

You got to be rooting for them at the end of that. But that's easy to see in retrospect. But when you're in it and people are saying no to you over and over and over again, yeah, there's no way at that age, maybe any age, but at that age that you aren't affected by that. Yeah. I auditioned in the cattle call stadium audition for American Idol where you're not seeing the three judges because there's 20,000 entries. So they have to weed through us all. And you just get 10 seconds to sing for...

Some like 22 year old producer. I sang Sweet Thing by Chaka Khan. And that's still my karaoke song. Oh, sweet thing. Yeah, I love it. And I really did a great job. I can honestly say that. Go ahead. I'll let you sing it.

will love you anyway yeah anyways even if you cannot stay let's harmonize I'm the worst singer in the world and I live with three great singers it's extra cruel okay so when you're 26 you're now signed at Columbia and then my church comes out and you win a Grammy so again talks about the highs and lows like the light switch for that song to come out after just deciding I'm gonna give it a shot again as a performer and then you win a Grammy was that hard to accept and

and be present for and believe even? I don't think I processed any of it for like two years. That whole next year was just insane. It was turbo speed, Grammys. I'm performing, not just nominated. I won. And then I won best new artist at the CMA awards. And I performed with the McCrary sisters and,

the Prez Hall Jazz Band for my church. It was just so iconic to me. And then I wasn't expecting any awards, but then everything just happened. And then we're doing SNL and it just didn't stop for two years. And no one can process any of that. Even at the age I was, I was like 26. Imagine if I had been 19. I'm glad I was at least like a little bit older and knew who I was as an artist. The night before the Grammy Awards, they have the Clive Davis party. And

And all the new artist nominees play it. And so you're like meeting Clive Davis and you are performing with the Ricky Miner band. That's Whitney's band. And you're at the Beverly Hilton. It's just insane. But I remember I was going to sing my church and I had my guitar and the show happens at Clive's. And it's lovely, but right in the front tables because everyone's eating. It's like P. Diddy and John Legend and like all of these people. And this is early 2017. A lot's happened.

Meaning you weren't terrified out of your mind when you saw P. Diddy sitting that close to you? Well, I was for different reasons. I didn't know all the other stuff yet. But there's obviously insecurity because you're like, I'm this country bumpkin playing here tonight. And then right after me is Chance the Rapper.

Because like he was up for Best New Artist. Everyone seems so confident around you. Yeah, I'm holding it together and I look amazing. And I'm like my first Grammys. I'm excited and everyone's just being so supportive. But I remember I performed and the people gave me a standing ovation, which was really sweet. But like the only person that stood up at that front table was John Legend. Wow.

And I just felt like, I love you. Thank God. I love you for life. Yeah. Yeah. And do you feel like at this point, though, you believe that you deserve to be there? Or do you still sometimes struggle with fraudulence? Imposter syndrome. Yeah. I think I'll always have a healthy dose of that. Not enough to be crippling, but I still have stage fright in some ways, too. It's such an amplified version of myself on stage. And I do, after the first song, just truly...

ascend and meet some sort of spirituality within it. But there's always going to be a neurotic element to me. I don't know if it's like a female diminishing myself thing, like make myself smaller. I don't deserve to be here bullshit. But yeah, I do struggle with am I enough to be here? Was there a mistake? Yeah, exactly. I do wonder just personally because I struggle with that all the time where I think everyone's just wondering like why is she here or why is she sitting there? And no one's thinking that but you. But

When we were in India, it's fair to say people were thinking that. About me? Us in India when we were... Oh, but that's different. I mean, like, why are they here? It's an inappropriate question. Well, that is, why were we there? I still don't know. That's a different type of thing. But I mean, here, there's different phases of it. But I've thought recently in the past couple of weeks, because we're now doing video and it's a whole thing. And I'm like...

man, I wonder what I'll have to do in this life before I feel like there's an answer for why I'm here. Like you graduated finally. Yeah. And maybe the answer is I can do everything and I will still feel like that. What I would argue is because it's a fear and it's based in insecurity, it's actually not tethered to reality. It's like something you have to decide crazy enough. I mean, maybe some people like Gandhi level will be just like,

And now I've done it. Now I can chill. It's crazy the burden of work you feel like you have to do on yourself to just check these boxes. And then you're like, wait, did I have to take up all these hobbies and do this guided mushroom trip to feel like I finally did the work on myself? It's exhausting to be just okay. Yeah. To just not be bad.

Yeah. Wait, before I forget, I have to tell you, we have met before. Oh my God. Good. Just tell me. So it was the Super Bowl in Minneapolis. I was sitting next to you with my ex-husband and you're with Andy Lassner.

Oh, my God. Well, it would make sense I wouldn't remember because that was such a shot out of a cannon. Go to the Super Bowl. We were in Turks and Caicos. And I got a call from the Ellen team going, will you go to the Super Bowl and do a thing with Andy? Yeah. And I'm like, I'm in Turks and Caicos and I have shorts.

And t-shirts. And it's negative 30 degrees at that thing. I'm like, you guys are going to have to have bought me clothes. Do you remember all that? It was for chips though, wasn't it? No, it was just for Ellen. I was on Ellen so often. Because you also went though for chips. For chips, the next Super Bowl. Got it. Okay, okay. But do you remember that you guys all flew home and I then flew to Minneapolis. Yeah. And I showed up and I was wearing this virtually. So you were freezing so you couldn't remember Mary.

No, just it was like go to the mall, play this game with this person. And then we were filming stuff while we were there. We're also weirdly in the front row. Like it was so the seats were too good for us. That's so funny. Now continue. You were very nice. Okay, good. I'll set your mind at ease there. No, you and Andy were so sweet. And then I think you like bonded a little bit in conversation with my ex-husband who's from Michigan as well.

He's from Kalamazoo. I think y'all talked about Shinola. Oh, the watches. The watches. Yeah. Now I feel terrible. No. I'm relieved I was nice. It was a long time ago. Yeah. I had just been on the beach like hours before. You were lovely. Okay, good. You were...

such a gentleman. I just remember that night was so hilarious because we dipped out after halftime because I get anxiety about traffic and the hotel that they had put us in was 30 minutes away. And I just remember we watched the end of the game in the hotel bar and it was this atrium of this not very nice hotel, but I just remember they had stuffed all the like celebrities there. Yeah.

2017, 2018, it was like Pete Davidson was there. And we were sitting seats down at the bar from J.B. Smoove. Oh, yes. Fun guy. And Ryan, my ex, and I are like massive Curb fans. Yeah. And he's with all his friends. And we're like eavesdropping. They're waiting because he has a Super Bowl commercial that they're waiting to watch live. And I just remember he went to the bathroom.

while he was in the bathroom, it came on. On the hotel bar. Oh, no. Always. And his friends were hysterically laughing and he finally came back after like 15 minutes and he's like, yeah, he's like, they're all giving him shit. Was he sweaty? Yeah. He's like, I'm miffed.

It was just so memorable. That was a good Super Bowl. Well, then that's good then. Okay, okay, okay. Yeah, because when we first came in, I introduced myself. Nice to meet you. And I thought you were just big-timing me. You meet so many people. You just got to play it safe. Maybe we have met. But it turns out I was inadvertently big-timing you, but I wasn't meaning to. Okay, because we did have a guest on who claims that I shoved her and her husband when we met. You don't think it's true. I don't think it's true. But it's a he said, she said.

And we'll never know. I think for sure I put my hand up kind of a sitch. But throwing a woman into a wall seems a bit of a stretch. I don't think you threw her into the wall. But maybe you accidentally kind of because you were so frazzled in that moment. And I believe you were so frazzled in that moment hearing about the moment. Because you were in protection mode with Kristen. Yeah, I'm sure I was aggressively telling people they couldn't come into the room. Oh my God, my collar was up this whole time.

Rob, you're supposed to yell avocado. Oh, Rob. You're so busy. He's like, put a new lens on my camera. You see how busy he is on my camera? I didn't even clock it, though. Maybe it's the stripes. This is totally unrelated to anything other than hurting someone. Did I tell you about what I did to Delta the other day? No.

- Airlines? - Oh my God. - Daughter. - Oh, it was like Delta Airlines? - She loves when we fly Delta Airlines. - Yeah. - Yeah, she tells people, this is my name. We went to her older sister's barbecue at her new school. She had to go to the bathroom, so I took her to the bathroom and then we were walking by the gymnasium and there was basketballs in there. So she's like, "I wanna play." Great.

We've never done that. So she's shooting. We're shooting. At some point, she gets under my legs and I'm going to fall on her. And she's now on the ground. She moves. And then I'm trying to step out of the way. I roll my ankle just immediately like kink. And then I drop.

And you guys, I fell. I'm 200 pounds. She's nine. I felt full weight on her chest. Oh, no. And she let out a squawk. She was like, like, and I was like, oh my God, I've crushed my baby. It was so terrible. Almost worse than her getting crushed as she got up. And of course she wanted mama me. Like I was not going to be able to comfort her. I just almost killed her. So she runs out of

the gym and there's all these women just watching. That moment I was like, oh my God, they think I'm a terrible dad. That I got competitive or something playing basketball. Oh no. She was fine. She told me 12 minutes later she actually felt better having had it happened. That was her conclusion after 12 minutes and she got her cries out. She was like, I actually feel better than I did before that happened. I was like, okay, thank God. My ankle's swelling up. Oh no, that's scary. Okay, fast forwarding. You win all those things. You go on tour really quickly and

with Keith Ehrman. So these are big shows, right? We were a little spoiled at being our first tour because Keith is so amazing and his tour machine is so well-oiled. He is like the best catering. So we're just like, that's where you spend 80% of your day is just in catering. Yeah, milling about. It was an amazing masterclass every night, just watching him entertain and-

So kind. I also kind of learned how to be like a boss on the road from Keith and the way he would treat his employees and the way his sort of hierarchy was set up. I just remember he got like a snow cone truck for us one day because it was hot out. Giant blow up water slide. Just really nice. Keeping morale good. Yeah. Super generous. I'd imagine the first part of two is really, really fun. And then I would imagine you enter some doldrums where it's just like everyone's like, how many more shows do we have? How many have we played? Yeah. I think morale matters.

Well, sorry, I keep talking about the food. Catering keeps people healthy and the morale high if you look forward to something. Because the show is 90 minutes of your day. Well, not for me. I was like playing 20 minutes opening, but it's something I took with me in my own way. Opening for him. Yeah. When you get approached by Zed and Gray to...

To do the middle. Now, this is where I enter your life in a big, big way. Yeah, sure. And in fact. A lot of people did, but that song. My kids were old enough at that point that it was our first family favorite song. It was like everyone in the car wants to hear the same song. And then also one of my favorite memories, Monica, I remember being in Austin. Yeah, it was like the theme song to our Austin trip, which was one of our first live shows. And one of our favorite trips. And I remember being in the car just playing.

One of the few times you hear Monica singing at the top of her lungs in the backseat. It's a singable song. Yeah. So good. Something's in it. When they approached you, were you immediately game or were you hesitant because you wanted to be writing your own stuff? I was game because I'd already proven myself as a songwriter, winning awards for songwriting, having number ones as the writer. I had checked that off the list and I felt secure in myself in that way, but...

I was on vacation and it was his management, I think, that reached out to mine and sent this demo of the middle. So I'm listening to it like on the beach through my like phone speaker. And I hear this woman's voice singing it. And I was like, who the hell is this? Because they should be recording this, not me.

And it was Sarah Aarons, the writer of the song. And she's just a badass and has become like a friend and collaborator of mine over the years since the middle. But she's such an amazing singer. And we actually have very similar tones, lower alto, raspy. If you played it side by side, I still think hers is better. But yeah, I heard it and I was like, yeah, when I get home, I'm addicted to this demo. I would love to do like a scratch vocal for it. Then it was told to me, well, you're not the only one that they've approached.

and i'm like a little butthurt a little comp well yeah because at this point i hadn't really broken into any walls of pop music i was just having a moment in country music and yeah i had done all genre things like the grammys and snl but i'd never done anything in pop radio so my ego is like what i have to audition for this song yeah what the hell yeah i have a grammy like i was like immediately going there i already did i already

myself my manager janet she was like this is just such a different world marin this is not you being the best songwriter or like having this claim over it she's like do you love the song and i was like i do i had almost a similar feeling to my church where i'd be like devastated if someone else was singing this in their defense a little bit maybe they are realizing what they're sitting on right so we have this incredible song as proved to be

And so, yeah, we have these people that we think would be good, but I'm going to want to hear it because I'm not going to squander this. I know we have something. So I'm going to want to hear a few people do it. There's actually like a really amazing YouTube video. I don't know if they do this anymore, but the New York Times has a thing called Anatomy of a Song and Joe Coscarelli at the New York Times.

interviewed all of us. So like me, Zedd, Sarah, Aaron's, Monsters and Strangers, like all the collaborators and how they found me because I hadn't heard the other audition demos of other artists because there were way bigger artists that did a version of the middle. Ah.

Is it true Angelina Jolie put a scratch track together? Her leg dip. So that was sort of like all news to me after I sent my scratch vocal demo in. They were like, we went with someone else. And I was like, oh, shit, that sucks. Well, moving on, I guess. So that was like December. And then I think it was New Year's Eve. I got a call from my manager and they're like, they want to use you now. I was still a little, yeah.

You already passed on me. Yeah, you fell hard. What happened with the other artist? She back out? She's incarcerated. Maybe something happened. You're a little like, stop yanking my tree. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Again, I had to be humbled and my manager is like, listen...

Put your shit aside because this could be huge. Good advice. I know. Because I was like, get out of your own head about this. It works differently in pop than in country music. So we're like, sure, let's do it. Anton Zed's going to fly to Nashville. We're going to do like a proper vocal. We did that. We've met finally. He's so lovely and so professional and just savant. A whole court case you had in your head all went out the window once you met him.

Oh, neutralized. Yeah, yeah. He was like, oh my God. He thinks I'm not this. And I'm like, yeah, that was a nice guy. I never like met a DJ also. I have no idea what to expect, but he was so sweet. And we knocked the vocal out. He flew back. I think they sent us a mostly finalized version of the song two days later.

And they were like, oh, by the way, we have this giant brand deal with Target. They want to do this massive music video with Dave Myers and they want to premiere it at the Grammy Awards. I always say it's like Josie and the Pussycats where they're number one in two weeks and they're famous overnight. It'll never happen again.

Well, that's what I was going to ask is you'd already had a really good dose of attention and you won a Grammy and you're touring in front of a ton of people. I would almost imagine that you couldn't have even thought what this thing then becomes. Was it just like a whole other stratosphere of attention? Yeah, I was touring with Niall Horan that year. So we were doing...

international dates. We were in South America for the first time. We were in Australia, New Zealand, and the States. And so I'm on this like sort of pop tour, not a country artist I'm opening for. And I have this massive pop song going on simultaneously. And you just see the trajectory with each show, people freaking out when that song kicks in. Yeah.

Yes. And I was hearing it in taxi cabs in like Buenos Aires. Everywhere. Everywhere. And Taylor invites you to come sing it with her in Arlington, Texas. Did you know her before that? We had never met before that. So that song also gets you on stage with Taylor. Yeah. And she was so kind to let me come out at

my like hometown show because it was like Cowboy Stadium and my family and friends they all from like high school got to come out and watch this moment and the song for sure changed my life. Speaking of the Dallas Cowboys did you watch the cheerleader doc? Oh,

Wow. We loved it. We were obsessed. It is. It was really hard to watch, too. Psychologically, there's a lot going on. Yeah. It's rich. It's a dance. It is rich. Yeah, a lot of it. It's rich. I was left feeling really sad. Yeah. What did you feel? It's just crazy because I'm in awe of these women. They're so beautiful. They're so athletic. They're so hardworking and kind. And you just see when they don't get it how much it hurts.

Something so stupid and trivial, your kick isn't high enough. Also, I have no expertise in this realm. I can't dance for shit. But like the girl that was slightly too short, I was like, what the fuck? Ari. I know that would hurt. Yeah. That would really hurt. You can't outperform that. No.

There's not a height requirement. Well, that's the thing. And I kind of see the pickle here because I think they do need a height requirement. If they need it to look a certain way, then they need a height requirement. But I think in 2024, it's hard to do that. Maybe you can't. Couldn't they have put her at the end? Yeah, she was great too. I mean, I...

Put her in platform shoes. Yeah, put a little Luke Hazy platform in the boot. But you know, it's also life. Sometimes you're too short. Sometimes you're too short. I can relate. It was heartbreaking, but I did choose to believe the people. It would be easy for me on the outside. That's not my priority or my interest to go like, this is ridiculous that they care this much. But I listened to the testimonials and that's the best three years of my life.

I believe you. I'm not in a position to say what is a worthy or not worthy pursuit. But I had to keep reminding myself of that. Don't get kind of judgy of this. It was tempting for me to get judgy of the whole thing. But I kept going like, that's their podcast. That's their acting. And that's great. There's no hierarchy. I guess I didn't realize most of them have jobs. Yeah.

I know. I thought they had to just be cheerleaders for three years or however long until they retire, and then they have to go back and go to school or get a job. The one woman was an orthodontist. Yeah, that was the craziest. You were a literal doctor. Her only Indian offering.

I know. Of course she was an orthodontist. Oh my gosh. She was so beautiful and just such a badass. Phenomenal dancer. And then had to like stop middle of putting braces on to go practice her routine. She would have been my first pick if I was casting that team. Yeah, she was great. She was awesome. What's her name? Couldn't not watch her, which isn't that the point? Oh no. You remember the white girl's name? I knew it. I knew it.

Well, now we're understanding that you identify more as being short than Indian. That's probably. No, I mean, I obviously was majorly identifying and feeling a lot of feelings watching her. Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert, if you dare.

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Hold on. Back to the advice that your manager gave you. Do you ever struggle with this? That would be getting in your own way, right? If you were like, fuck them. They didn't respect me. When you start saying the word respect. Except that...

That's a reality too. And it's when do you know when you're getting in your own way versus when you are getting taken advantage of or when you should stand up for yourself or demand respect. This is such a hard line to walk. There's an answer in movies and it was given to me by a lawyer and I really am grateful that they told me this. You have to minimally be honest about does the movie need me or do I need the movie? And that can be answered if you're objective.

And to be honest, you're great. You did the perfect job. Also, the song didn't need you per se. The song could have probably worked with a few other people. Yeah. By the way, that's been the case in many of the movies I've done where it's like, the movie doesn't need Dax Shepard. Hopefully Dax Shepard can make the movie better, but the movie is going to be good without me or with me. And I think...

There are times when it's like, there's no song unless I join. And those are the times when you're allowed to feel that way. And there's other times where like, yeah, this movie doesn't work if it's not me. And I think that's what you're trying to figure out in life. Does this job need me or do I need this job? Well, I think that's the ego thing too, where it's like, I don't want to come across as desperate for anything because people can smell that.

It's stinky too. We don't like it. It's like, ugh, it's desperation. And my pride is too big to even do that. So it's like, get out of your own way. Thank God I have people around me to truly guide me and pull me back when I'm going too far. Do you know when I've suffered from that and I've struggled with it, which I have so many times, like I've had to go audition for things. I'm like, get the fuck, go watch the 30 movies. Do you know if I can do this or not? Go watch Punk'd.

Thank you. You probably need to watch a few more things before you cast me. But what's really going on for me is I hated having to prove myself. It was very hard for me to do. It took nine years. And so I told myself, finally, I'm over that thing and it'll be easy. So what really happened is I set an expectation that was probably unrealistic. Like, okay, I'm finally past that part that was so painful.

And then when I learned like, no, no, you're still going to have to do that. I'm like, I had this all mapped out and that wasn't part of it. And it's the discomfort for me of having an expectation that then the outcome is different. I know what I'm great at and what other people are probably better for. I'm OK with that because I've really had a huge 180 in my life in the last two years.

I switched labels. So I'm not on the Nashville Columbia. I'm on New York now. So retooling sort of this genre shift kind of away from country and more so like in every realm, genre-less space has been really tough, but necessary and scary. Yeah. Just to walk away from something that

I built for so long. I didn't fit it anymore. It didn't fit me. And then on the personal life level, getting divorced. Because you guys were together for what, eight years? Yeah. That's a long time. Yeah. That's a very destabilizing transition. Yeah. I mean, we're getting it together, but the co-parenting thing has been going well and we're trying our best in this way, but it's still pretty fresh. And then I have just been so deeply creative the last year because probably of all this transition. You got a lot of good fodder.

Yeah, I know. There's a lot to write about. But like a freedom too. I don't have to serve this machine of what I think country music was or what it expected me to be. Like I can just do my thing now. I am lucky I have the freedom and fan base to carry with me through that. But now it's like the sky's the limit. Where do we go from here? Yeah. But I also know when I have to say no sometimes to opportunities because...

I don't want to be gone all the time. I don't want to be touring 280 days a year. Like, I want to be home. I want to be a good mom and also have a social life because then I really don't have anything to write about. Right. If I'm not going through the shit show of dating, there is no album. Yeah. The well has to be filled in that way. Yeah.

This will be the first time I ever try to do this. Sometimes I try to do it with just Monica and I, where on the count of three, we say who the person most reminds you of. But I have a hunch that we'll be able to do it with all three of us and get the same answer. Oh, my gosh. So this is basically a question of who do people tell you that you remind them of the most? Oh.

Oh. Do you have a go-to? Well, don't say it, though. I'm just wondering if you get told somebody more often than another person. Are we talking, like, looks or vibes? Just the whole thing. Okay. Okay. I have a vibe one. Okay. It's not really a look one, but I'll still say it. Okay. Okay. One, two, three. Selena Gomez. What?

Who were you going to say? I was going to say Alison Roman. I love both of them, but I loved the Alison Roman conversation. Who did you say? I didn't say anyone. I was going to say Adele. I hope I'm not funny. Michael Jordan. Gomez, I can see that. I can see that. You would agree that the voice, you already described it, the Rav speak. Also, just we're both Texans.

Yeah, and she's cool. But Allison is such a cool, selfish girl. I think we could swap you out in a scene of murders in the building. And if it was wide, I think we could get away with it. Be her older sister. Are you older than her? I'm 34. I'm 34. I'm 34. I'm 34 years old. She's younger than that. Yeah, I feel like she is. Is she? Selena Gomez. 32. Oh, she's drastically younger. We're good. And when's her birthday?

July 22nd, 92. Because you're April? I'm April. And she's July. Okay. Allison became my COVID obsession. Obsessed. What's your favorite recipe? Have you made one that you go back to? The one I can do without looking at it anymore is the Big Ziti. Oh, yes.

Oh, yeah. That's a good one. That's a good one. Yeah. She has so many good ones. I want to go to her little store in, is it like upstate New York? Oh, me too. She posts about it all the time and I'm always jealous because I can't go. I'll never be in the area. Exactly. I'll never be there. It's like not in New York. It's not in LA. But anyway, I loved y'all's conversation with her. Me too. Mostly made me so happy for Monica. It was a very vulnerable conversation for her. So that was really sweet that she gave us that.

And she thanked Monica for being one of the only people in public that was still claiming her love for her during her canceled phase. And I was like, that's right, girl. You stick up for people. Yeah, I'm loyal. Yeah. For better or worse. People make mistakes. The only other song I want to ask you about before we talk about the new stuff is The Bones because it's so interesting to go to your Spotify thing and look at the downloads and which ones are big.

And your version of The Bones is the biggest, but also the other version is also quite big and in the top five. How does one get the idea to like release one version and then at some point go like, you know what? Let's also do this again right now as a duet.

How did that happen? So with Hosier, who I've obviously been a fan of for a decade now, he's also on Columbia. My friend Rachel, who's actually in my band, used to tour with him. He kind of goes away when he's making records for years. And then he'll come back and tour for like three years. And then he'll leave for five to make a record. Kind of like Adele. But I think they were on tour and I was touring my second record. The Bones was now a single. Rachel, my friend, was like on the bus with the whole band of his and him and was just like...

Andrew is humming this song of yours. I just had to let you know he's a fan of it. How flattering, huh? I know. That was years ago now, but we just reached out and was like, hey, this song's already on the radio, but the label would love to have a different version of it. We're trying to push it to number one. And at the last second, labels will be like, let's do like a feature or something. Just get some excitement at the homestretch, if you will. So he kindly obliged and put a vocal on the second verse and just did some amazing like

harmonies and ad-libs the rest of the song and just truly elevated it in a way that I hadn't imagined it could be. Both are really great. Yeah, I really love the original one too. Yeah, I don't think one's superior. It's kind of cool that they can both exist at the same time and be really great and be different. I think it was after COVID when we were finally able to tour again because I hadn't even gotten to really understand or receive the love of that song live because it went number one in April of 2020. Oh my gosh.

So it was like, well, so you've never performed it with him. I have now several times, but we did the Hollywood Bowl and he came out and we sang it. I say this all the time. The Hollywood Bowl is the most magic offering we have in Los Angeles. Do you love the bowl? I do. Or is it not good to perform at? No, it's beautiful. Sound is great, especially for an outdoor. But I love the Greek. I was about to say there's something very special about the Greek. Greek rules.

He's just such a sweetheart. And we just did this thing last year on CMT. It's a show they've done for years called Crossroads, where like two artists from different genres will do a concert together. Oh, cool. So we like, of course, did The Bones, but then we got to use each other's bands and collaborate on other work.

But it's rare when you just like have an organic pairing. Usually I feel like it's concocted in like a label test tube where they're like, let's get this feature on. But no, that was genuinely out of love for each other's work. Sorry, I have one more question about the actual business. No more questions. Okay, bye. But since this is an expert episode, when you said scratch work,

lyric, what'd you say? Vocal. Scratch vocal. What is that? It's just a vocal that you try to sound good, but you're not going in and comping it perfectly, editing it to put all the best, you know, because for a vocal, you do like 15 takes and then you copy and paste together the best

Whatever. It's like super nuanced. But a scratch is usually a one take. And it's a temp. It's put on there generally by the writers. So, you know. Here's the vibe. Yeah. It'll obviously sound better if we go for it. But I'm not going to spend three hours on a vocal that is temporary. Even like for Frozen, Kristen will receive the music. But it'll also have Bobby and Kristen singing her song. Mm-hmm.

As a temp, just so that you know what it's supposed to be. Like a guide vocal, basically. So for Intermission, which is out now, you worked with Antonoff? Not on Intermission. Fuck, sorry. No, no, I love Jack. I worked with Jack last year. On The Bridge. On The Bridge, yeah. And then I have a few songs that I haven't released yet that I did with him in New York at Electric Lady that I want to put out. But yeah, this EP, Intermission, was...

The last like six months of life for me. So it was really condensed song versions of just everything that imploded in my life and changed. That's why it's an EP is because it just happened very quickly. And I just wanted it out.

We talk about this a lot with people in memoirs, and I don't know why I've never really thought to ask musicians about it, which is you're in your bedroom, you're writing your memoir, you feel safe, no one's there to talk about it. And then you get to the stage where you're like, I guess I'm going to release this. But then it weirdly invites like a face-to-face conversation about this thing that you felt fine talking about in your bedroom, but maybe not out in the world. Are songs like that at all? Like, of course, you're going to have to write what's going on in your last six months in your songs.

But then do you feel like you're opening the door to then have to discuss all the drama that created those? Oh my God, it's like Taylor Swift's life. Yeah. Well,

Well, you know, she don't see her talking too much about anything. But she's being asked nonstop about everything. Well, right. I think people are sounding off in the media or whatever. But like she doesn't have to ever sit down. I see. I see. And actually have to talk about it, which is her freedom. Yeah. She and Beyonce have just reached a level of like, we don't do interviews anymore. You just receive my work. Have your own cultural conversations about it. Posting ghosts. Yeah. Yeah.

Post and go. Post and go. And obviously those are mammoths of the industry. At this point, I love chatting. I kind of like this version of the industry now. Well, I've always loved chatting with people and doing podcasts because I just talk about the songs all day, every day. And that's usually what the press is or has been. But now,

Now, of course, I love talking about, like, my journey and how we got here. But I just love, like, shooting the shit with people. Yeah. And I like seeing that side of my favorite people because...

I've already liked their work. And obviously, you know, people are discovering it too through this, but I want to hear weird stories. Yeah. Yep. I want to feel like we could have a drink together. That's where I'm at now because I can listen to your music all day. That's great. I'll support. I'll come to the show. I'll buy the shirt, but I just want to hear your weirdo stuff. Yeah. Like what happens in the bedroom when your partner's not there. Now we know. Or learning about the two toilets.

Meghan Trainor. Meghan Trainor has two toilets. Her and her husband have dueling toilets next to each other. And that's like an invention of hers. So that if he's peeing, she's got to pee. That would be cool. No, I think they're just side by side. Side by side. But again, what a lovely thing to learn. That's so much more interesting than probably anything else. I thought the toilets would be like infinity symbol. You're looking right here at the person. Right. With the infinity symbol, you'd be back to

back. I guess. So the tanks would be touching. That might be cool too. Oh, that's kind of cute. How's it going? Cheek to cheek. There might be some splashing. I don't want to hear any noises. There better be a door, floor to ceiling. Yeah, me too. Oh God, no, I could never have dueling toilets. That's so funny. So you don't mind

You can handle it. But is there any song on intermission you're like, I'm going to put this out and they're going to figure out what I'm saying here. And that's going to be a whole thing. I had to make a decision on, there's a song at the end called This Is How A Woman Leaves. And I was a little bit nervous just to put that out. Not because

It's untrue to me, but because I'm not in the business of malintent. I never write a song to like fuck someone over or hurt anyone. Get even. Yeah. Well, that's not true. Maybe I've written a couple of songs about not my ex or anything, but just like people that have scorned me. But at the end of the day, I can't control people's perceptions of the song that they're hearing of mine. With this one, I could just picture a healing that would happen live. So if I'm writing the song and I can already envision it live and just...

with strangers. When I go to shows and I'm just a patron in the crowd, the most special thing is just bonding with a bunch of strangers. Yeah. Over a collective adoration or appreciation. You're an instant in-group. Yeah. Or even when you go to like the movies. I went and saw Alien Romulus yesterday. It's not a great example. I keep hearing that's really good. It was so good. Yeah, I keep hearing that. If you like the Alien franchise, I was in deep lore TikTok Alien franchise last night. I was like, I need all the conspiracy theories.

I know it's cliche, but we're going through life just like bags of water. And we just want to feel things. I go to the movies to feel things. I like going alone. I go to shows alone or with friends to feel things next to strangers. It's nice when it's collective. Probably why people go to church. Yes. For me, that's mad church. Yeah. There you go. Call back.

So this is a woman leaving is again from the outside. I could go like, oh, this is you departing the country genre. This is you departing a marriage. But does it even matter? Are they all the same? It's a break in the act. That's why I named it intermission because there's more to come. It's not the full book, but it's a chapter. And I like EPs now because it's so much work to make an album. And by the time it's out, you have already processed all of those feelings in the songs for the most part.

Maybe they can come back around and have new meaning, but I liked this EP coming out as I was still in the thick of it. Yeah. Because now when I perform it, I'm truly, well, I don't know how much pain I'm causing myself in the moment, but I'm feeling it as it's been written. You're still there. Yeah. I'm still there. I'm also just like not in a rush. I'm dating again or dating for the first time, truly. It's interesting. Are you on Raya or one of these cool dating apps for fancy people? No.

You are. You're afraid to answer. Yeah, I am. Can I look at your thing? Oh, the profile? Should we go through it? I'll get kicked off. I want to see who's on there. Have you seen any friends? I'm not asking you to name names, but have you seen someone you're like, wow, that's a big star that's on here? Yeah. Wow.

A few times it's kind of shocked me. Wow. And it makes me feel better too. Yeah. Because there's such a vulnerability of being like, here's the buffet of options today that I'm a part of. It made me feel better knowing this person was on there too. But I would compare it to one of the things I've been most self-conscious about since I've been recognizable is when I'm eating in a restaurant by myself and I notice many people are staring at me.

God, they think I'm such a loser. I start getting really self-conscious that they think like I'm supposed to have a better thing going on than being by myself at Fuddruckers. Oh, they're going to say like Chipotle. I was like, is it a chain? Similar, yeah. There's something vulnerable about eating at a chain. Yeah, there is. Yeah, I love it though. Yes.

But like you picture, like if you saw Hillary Clinton at Taco Bell at a booth by herself, you just fill in all this crazy stuff, even though all the other booths are full of one person eating. But yeah, if you saw Hillary Clinton at Taco Bell, you'd be like, what happened?

that's how I want to get to know a person is I want to know Alison Roman's Taco Bell order. Like, tell me all about your time, you know, working for the New York Times, but I want to know you. Yeah. I need to know what you're ordering at Taco Bell. So then again, on a dating website where people already are feeling a little embarrassed or vulnerable. Yeah. Well,

Well, don't you think embarrassed is a fine word? A real word? I felt embarrassed until I saw that person on there. And I was like, wait, what? I also didn't know she was into women. I'll tell you after. But I didn't feel embarrassed after that. I was like, oh, we're just people that are busy. And it's hard to meet people in this

industry and line of work, if you're always traveling, touring and add in the element of kids and it's tough to meet people. You have to. This is how it's done. It's not embarrassing. Objectively, it's not. It's just how people date. I just think if you were on like Bumble and you're Jennifer Aniston, you're probably like, man, people are going to think, you know, I think it's harder. It's about other people's perceptions. It's not about you because obviously if you want to be on there, you want to be on there to meet people. But at

It's like, oh, it's a Taco Bell thing. What are they going to think about me? Which is already a problem, right? Because you know why you're there. You're there because you're in between things and you're at Taco Bell for 20 minutes. Get in my Baja Blast. Yeah, exactly. I like it here. But as soon as you start. I love that we're like sponsored by them on this show. We should. We should reach out. But yeah, immediately you get into the brain of what everyone else is thinking. And that's.

part of being a public person. You're always aware of what other people are thinking. In an AA, we say that's none of your business what someone thinks about you. It's none of your business. Exactly. Okay, and then the last thing I just want to bring up is The Wild Robot because you did a song for The Wild Robot, Kiss,

the sky kiss the sky kiss this guy and we love the wild robot in this house you do we love that book series so much and then we interviewed Lupita oh amazing and so we watched it and the girls watched it with me and we were all crying and it was wonderful it's so sweet I love Roz so much I love that you got like an advanced screening this job has perks you know people I've

never really done anything for a film before. I've brought this up to other people. It feels like so much pressure. When I think about A Star Is Born, I'm like, OK, so Gaga's got to write a song and it's got to be a fucking hit. Like the whole engine of the movie is that they strike

gold yeah right it has to be one of those you know 12 songs that transcends the movie in a way that's impossible and i'm like how does one sit down knowing the weight of that's on their shoulders it seems much harder than writing a song for your album oh for sure because it's like living in a universe that's not your own it's a character it's not you which i guess is sort of like a nice exercise too because a lot of my friends were the writers of those stars born songs and i'm like

Oh, well, I mean, you just get to like be a different person for the day. Yeah. And you're not writing really for Gaga. You're writing for her character. So it's almost maybe like acting. Yeah. You're playing in a new creative space. Yeah. This is obviously a little bit different because it's an animated film and it's not a musical. It's just a song that's narrating a scene. DreamWorks were great because they were like, just write a song that you would love. This is the scene that it's happening in. And that's all you need to know. Ooh.

We were just like, let's write something that we enjoy. And being a mom, it informed that scene more so. But we got to see an early screening. They were still animating a lot of it. But they were like, we really need an end title sequence. And I was like, okay. And I'm glad that they showed us the film because there was just silence when it cut to black. And I was like, okay.

What am I feeling right now? What would I want to hear as someone that loves going to the movies? And so we wrote this other song for the film that they ended up using as the credits. That's kind of an honor. It's a big moment and super emotional. We're going to Toronto TIFF. Oh, fun. That's my first time. That's cool. Your first premiere. Yeah. And, you know, with animated movies, everything's so disconnected until it's out. Yes. All the voice parts are done years before the editing and animating. No one's met each other.

Yeah. So it's kind of interesting. It'll be fun. I got to hear Pharrell get interviewed by Adam Grant of all people at this kind of live thing. And he was asking him about Happy for Despicable Me. That underrated bop. That was like, I forget what number, but I want to say that was the ninth thing he turned into them.

And that's Pharrell. Yeah. Oh, that's crazy. And then back to the conversation of respect. He said, cool. He wrote Happy and he got a mix and he put it in his car and he drove around and he said, I just couldn't stop listening to it. And they rejected Happy.

And then he went to the president of the studio and he said, look, I haven't really fought back on any of these. I'm asking you to listen to this in a very specific way. I want you to listen to it in your car and I want you to drive around. And he did that for like an hour and then it's happy. Wow.

But it's like, that's the magic. Somehow they were correct eight times. He was correct the one time. How on earth do you advise somebody to know that is tricky. Like the person that rejected happy. Do you think they're just like shaking their boots? They don't have a job. Again, I don't think anyone's good or bad, right? It's just once it hasn't happened eight times, you yourself are in a

panic state. Like, we can't crack this. By nine, I can't even imagine how you're listening. The president was probably saved having to even go down that path where he could be very objective. But yeah, once you've gone through eight, I think everyone's probably just fucking pained now. You can't hear straight. You can't hear happy and realize it's happening.

Yeah. Oh my God. After like three submissions, I'd be like, I'm not the one for the job. Like clearly you need something else. I can't figure out. So good for him. Totally. It's like a really good story to know. Even if you're Pharrell, which I can't think of anyone that has a higher genius IQ for music currently alive. Or just like ubiquitous.

presence in the music scene. Yeah. But do it nine times. Everything deserves nine attempts. That's right. That's the take. If you can't get it on the ninth, put your foot down. Yeah. The only other thing I wanted to say, because I just think it's really, really funny. Tucker Carlson. Yeah.

Called you a lunatic country music person. And then you made shirts that said that and sold shirts. I want that. I think that's so funny. Tell me your size. That's incredible. It's kind of beautiful, though, because, you know, I'm from the South. I've got a lot of conservative family members. When he called me that, it's sort of like you can talk shit about your own family, but no one else can. A lot of them stopped watching his show. Yeah. It like broke the Fox News spell.

That's a blessing in disguise. They had to come at one of their own personally. Yeah. And that's how nice people are. You don't understand it until it's you or someone you love. Well, everything's so worldly and distant until you're like, oh, my gosh, this is a real person talking about my family member, my daughter. It changes things for sure, which sucks. But also, hey, glad you arrived at the party. That's right. But it's, I guess, an honor.

Yeah. It's a bad honor. Well, Maren, I've enjoyed the hell out of this. I've obviously gleaned throughout this interview that you listen, which is so flattering. Yeah. Oh, my gosh. I have been so looking forward to this. I feel like I know you. Oh.

And now I kind of do. Now we do. We're all buddies. We're going to get some scoop after this. Can't wait. Oh, I know. Yeah. We're going to go to Taco Bell. Can't wait. But we'll sit at three different booths. That's right. Eating insecurely alone while we think people are watching us. It's a sight to see me at Taco Bell. When I do go, which is very rare, it's fucking on for the year. I go, I'll eat 12 hard shell tacos. Oh, yum. I am hot.

I am too. We keep bringing, I keep bringing this up. I need to go eat. This was so nice. And I'm so glad that you guys are on video now. It's so amazing to be able to just see you guys like come across my feed too. Along with being a listener. Well, we adore you. This was really fun. And then I certainly won't make the mistake I made ever again.

Well, just remember you met me today. We'll definitely remember that. We sat for two hours and chatted. All right. Good luck with everything. Everybody listen to Intermission and see The Wild Robot. All are great. Thank you. Stay tuned for more Armchair Expert, if you dare.

This episode is brought to you by Huggies Little Movers. Huggies knows that babies come in all shapes and sizes, and their tushies do too. Huggies has more curves and outstanding active fit. Parents know that there's nothing worse than an ill-fitting diaper, especially for active wiggly babies. Huggies Little Movers are curved to fit all curves, so babies feel comfy no matter how much they're moving around. And we all know, they're moving around a lot.

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How do you say it? I don't. You refuse to say it? There's so many letters in that olive oil brand. I know. Do you have it at home? I do. And so if anyone likes it and asks you about it, what do you say? Okay, let me see how to spell it. Okay. Not a sponsor. Yes.

Okay. Yeah. I mean, I guess I would say. Loud meal. I would say. Oh, it's loud. I would say, oh, it's a lot of meal. A lot of meal. Yeah. A lot of meal. Yeah.

Yeah. It's probably Laudamio. Yeah. Yeah. I'm going with loud like it's a loud olive oil. Yeah. And you're going with it's a lot of olive oil. Sure. Laudamio. Both are correct. Yes. A little goes a long way with Laudamio. That should be their catchphrase. I think they need a catchphrase that is more telling of what it does. It's

You shouldn't cook with it. I mean, you can, but that's a waste. It's a waste. I'm glad you're saying that because I don't cook with it because I think it's a waste. It's more of a topper, a drizzle, a dipper. A garnish. A dipping sauce. Yeah, exactly. A creamer. Okay, before we...

Keep going. Launch in. Yeah. The breaking news. Do you feel the earthquake this morning? I did. Yeah. I did. It was a long one. It was a long, gentle guy. Where we live, it wasn't too bad. Where was it from? Malibu. Oh. Because it was a five. No way. Yeah.

I got a few texts checking in. Okay, family members. Yeah, and Robbie. Yeah, okay. Oh, good. I liked it because it was long and subtle. And I feel, I really probably am not in a position to say this authoritatively. I've been in whatever now, 20 of them since I've lived here. Yeah, they happen a lot. 30 years.

probably more. It does seem that you get a little warning, like you get a little, and then it builds. Right. And then it seems to peak out really soon into it. And then the rest is just kind of, you know? Yeah. So it was like after the first, it's a bell curve. Yes. Even more, uh, a ski slope. Sure. I, I agree. And actually I got kind of cocky. I was like, I can like, I can like hear earthquakes before they happen. But,

But really, I think everyone maybe can. No, you know what's interesting? Wow. I'm so glad you just said that. I would have forgot to bring that point up. I heard it before I felt it. Yeah. But maybe everyone can. But no, I bet the sound waves are moving at 760 miles an hour. Yeah. And I doubt the quake moved from Malibu out at 760 miles an hour.

It would happen instantaneously. Yeah. So I bet we did hear it. But what I was going to say is once that little peak happens 10 seconds in, you're like, okay, well, the rest isn't going to get worse. Yeah, but you don't know.

You were hoping. I feel confident that that's it. Well, I got word that that was like a preemie. Uh-huh. And that there was going to be like a big one soon. A big boy. Yeah. Big baby. Yeah, but never came. It never came. Anyways, I kind of enjoyed it. And it was long. I want to say it was like a 30-second experience. That's an exaggeration. It was like 10. That's it. Yeah. Think of it.

10 is actually long. I'll count to 10. Okay. But do with Mississippis. I was going to do 1000s, but I'll do Mississippis. Okay. What about Nebraska? No one does Nebraska. No, because that's not. One Nebraska. Two Nebraska. It sounds like Nabisco. Makes me want cookies. Cookie boy. Ding, ding, ding.

One Mississippi, two Mississippi, three Mississippi, four Mississippi, five Mississippi, six. Yeah, you're right. Yeah, it's long. Yeah, you're right. I think it was six seconds. I think it was longer. It was one second. Okay. So anyways, I interrupted you. I assume that might be what it was about. Was there any destruction in Malibu? Oh, I didn't look. Okay. Yeah.

No, I just was wondering if you noticed. Wait, have you done more work? This is every man's favorite question. Well, here's the things I noticed. Your hair's up. You have a pretty bow in. Thank you. It's a clip. A clip. Got that wrong. But what's on top? What are the ruffles? Yeah, there's a rose. See how it's a rose? Oh, I see. It's a fabric made to look like a rose. Yeah, Susan Alexandra. Okay, so hair's up, main back, face is on full display. Mm-hmm.

And I don't see it. Did anything change? I will tell you this before you tell me. Yeah. You don't read comments. Yes, I don't.

Or no, I don't. The most consistent comment. And I got to say that I now relate to you a lot on this. There's another thing we have in common. Okay. People are like, wow, seeing Monica's face move instead of just in photographs. Yeah. She's so beautiful. Oh, that's nice. I think what's happening for people who are watching the videos is they see the full, the thing I always talk about.

They see my personality a little more. Well, just, I don't, like any individual freeze frame of my face, eh, questionable. But when it's blurry, you know, when I'm moving it fast, it works better. It works better. Right.

I'm best to keep it moving. Okay. Anyways, just across the board, everyone's pretty thunderstruck with how beautiful you are now that we're on video. That's fair. I'm not shocked. Your hair is back. You got a bow. What else is new? Monica? I'm very buff. Oh, you had your first training session. Yeah. Can you tell that would have been two days ago? And then this morning? Oh, um, Oh no. Oh no. Okay. Um,

Second appointment was already canceled. Because my- Because you got too buff on the first one. Okay. No, because my car is in trouble. Your Benz? Yeah. What's the matter? It's a brake. It says I need it like brake pad situation. Oh, okay. Also, the air is low and I know I can fix that. I went to the gas station. It was out of order. Sure. Bring it back.

Bring your car in here. I have a compressor. Well, now it's at Mercedes. Oh, okay. It's a big problem. Well, I also thought the brake... I want... If it says that they need to look at the brakes. Also, it's time for a checkup. Sure. Time for your checkup. Time for your checkup. How did you know there was a brake issue? It told me. It said? It said brake. And I was like, oh, I guess that means my parking brake is on. Sure. Great first thought. So then I was...

Not texting and driving. I stopped. You pulled over. I pulled over. Yeah. And then I looked up. I actually looked up how to release the parking brake because I was like, oh, I must have done that accidentally. I don't know how to do it. Right. I still don't really know how to use the car very well. Yeah, it's okay. And then it showed me where the parking brake was. So I...

You know, tried to do it. You probably turned it on at that point. Yeah, I didn't do it because actually that says park. It doesn't say break. So then I looked up what it meant and it said parking brake stuff. And then when I got back in my car, it said it. It said like check parking brake or something like that.

In yellow. Check parking brake? I mean, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Check brake pads. Brake pads specifically. Nope. I don't remember what it said. Because what would be news to me is that it has a brake wear indicator on it. What would seem more likely is there was like an ABS issue, which you know what ABS is? Let me guess. Anti-braking system. Oh, okay. It's

Anti-lock brakes, ALB. Yeah, but for whatever reason, it's ABS. Because Mercedes. Well, no, everyone is ABS. They love to make it fancy. Let's not single them out. They are a sponsor. I hope. Well, they should be. We love them. Yeah, we've given them a lot of money. They can give some back. Anyways, you know, this was an invention in the 80s. It's life-saving. Normally, you'd slam on your brakes. They'd lock. Once the brakes are locked and the tires are sliding, you can't steer.

Right. And it stops stopping itself. Right. Sliding tires goes a lot farther than if they regain traction. So it's this ingenious solution, which is once it detects that it's locked, the front wheels are moving at a different speed than the rear wheels. It releases the brake, lets it get traction again, then reapplies the brake. And then if it breaks, it releases it. And it does it like a million cycles in a minute. You know, it's so fast. Right.

But it's electronic and that could easily go wrong. Okay. You don't have enough miles on your car to have gone through a set of brake pads. Do you know how many miles you're at? You're in the teens still, right? I don't know much. I bet you're barely in the teens. I go to Santa Monica sometimes. Oh, which is like maybe 19 miles is the crow flies. So.

Yeah, even when you're in there, even if you drove your car for hours a week in LA, you've really probably only gone 90 miles because the traffic's so shitty. Yeah, it's true. Anywho. My goodness, you love. Talking about car stuff. Yeah, it's really nice. Well, I always lose you. I mean, yeah, I stopped listening, but I think it's nice that you like something so much and you know so much about it.

That's great. What do you think's under it? I think I know the appeal of it. Okay. It's like maybe because cars don't have emotions. Yeah. When there's a problem, there's always a solution. Yeah. Like if you understand how it works, you can understand why it's not working and it can be fixed. Right. I kind of feel like that's the appeal of it. Yeah. I mean, you like...

Knowing how things work. I do that. In general. Sure, sure. And so that's probably connected. You like knowing. This is a first too. I'm definitely cutting that. You sure? Yeah. Some people say I look hot when I blow my nose. Who says that? No one's ever said that. Do you think it is?

The reason I said that is because I've never left it in ever, so there's no way anyone could have possibly seen it. Well, I blow my nose in public a lot. Oh, and people are like, oh my God, sir. Oh my God, will you blow your nose again? You are so attractive when you do that. Oh.

Would you mind blowing your nose again? You were so attractive. I was sitting next to you for the last six miles on this bus, and it was not until you blew your nose where I thought, you are so attractive. Ooh, I wonder if there is anything like that. A nose-blowing fetish? For certain. Oh, well, for sure that. But I mean like something, a little tick or something that somebody does. Oh.

Like, I wonder if there's anything I do that you could be sitting by me for a long time and not notice. And then I do like one thing and then I'm noticeable. You do a lot of weird mouth and tongue stuff. I've been noticing that. I shouldn't have even said weird. You do a lot of interesting. And this is what we learned to switch in India for me to say that's interesting.

Instead of weird. Again, then this goes back to the fact that I was aspiring to be weird. So weird to me is very positive. So, okay. So you do a lot of interesting mouth, lips, and tongue thinking.

Right. You know, like some people, they clue that they're thinking in certain ways. They'll raise an eyebrow. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. They'll blow their nose. Well, as we established, I do a lot of face acting. Yeah, you're a great face actor. So, yeah, that could happen. Someone could be like, oh, I love this playful thing you do with your mouth while you're thinking. Or they might be like. Are you available for dinner? My name is Kenneth. That'd be great. Oh, my God.

Oh my God. Hi. I didn't recognize you because you keep changing your face. Like you keep getting face transplant. Every six months. Wow. Wow. Yeah. Wow. Good for you. A lot of people just, their face rejects, their head rejects faces. Like some kidney transplant people. Oh. That's me. So I get about six months out of a transplant and then it gets gangrenous. Oh, okay. Yeah. Well, I'm busy. Because of the gangrenous face transplant? No.

I just have a lot going on in my life. I didn't think you were that shallow. I have a lot going on in my life. Okay. You got a lot of car issues you're dealing with. Call me when that's all sorted out. Anyways, back to your car. There's no way. You don't need new brake pads. Okay. Well, that's fine. It's at the shop. Okay. I'd like to interface with them when they call. I'm nervous about what- But I also need like an oil change and a regular. It's time. Yeah. And what are we doing about that door? I've hired Ana's brother to help me out. Okay.

Gloves just went for the last two days. Yeah, I know. Cause I asked him to do some stuff and he was, he couldn't. Okay. It's just like a couple of things here and there. I'm so sorry. I must interrupt. Would you, this is fun. Okay. He's so cute. And he's your friend's little brother. Yeah. Are you about to ask if I'm attracted? Yeah. Yeah.

I am. I was kind of with him for two days and I'm like, he is so cute. He's very cute and he's charming, but he's a little brother. I can't be attracted to someone's little brother who's my friend. And that's great. I think some people have a pattern of being attracted to their friend's little brothers. I think that's a thing. Really? Well, I know a lot of little brothers that had a lot of good offerings from having an older sister.

Because I think this is how it happens. Whoa. Your guard is down. Sure. This is the same reason why I have this theory about a couple different guys. They've been on the show and I've suggested this to them. They seem so safe.

Yeah. That they're very disarming and people will just kind of wake up in their bed and they're like, what happened? I wasn't you. I didn't have my guard up. So I think you enter into you are in a position of feeling powerful and kind of above hierarchical. Right. You're confident.

And they're cute and they're safe because they're younger than you and they feel more innocent. Yeah. And if you're someone that's spooked easily, I could see where that's a thing. Okay. I could see that too. But we've already talked about, I'm not crazy about little brothers. Right. Well, this is new. We have talked about it, but just as of like four weeks ago.

It's not even, that's not right. You introduced me to little brother energy, which is, and you said I had it. I didn't say you had it. You said you were a little brother. And I said, it's not just being, you can have little brother energy and not be a little brother. It's a, it's a, it's a trying very hard. Okay. You can sometimes dip in. Yes. Because you had a specific example. I did. Yeah. I can't remember exactly what it was, but I was doing something.

And you said this is very Little Brother energy. But my main example is Rhode Island. Rhode Island is Little Brother energy. The state. Yes. It's always wanting to be... I almost said the country. I know. No one knows what it is, really. And it... No one knows. It is the... Yeah. It wants...

badly to get the approval of New York. Well, no, I don't think that's right. Other places nearby. Boston is its sister city. Other places, all the places nearby. Now, I have a different read on Rhode Island. Okay. The country and the state. Is he your little brother? Maybe. Yeah, maybe. Oh, God. Okay. Because Providence. Sure. Boston's its little, its big brother. Okay.

And Boston had all this infamous mafia. Yeah. Whitey Bulger. Yes. That whole scene. Yeah. And Providence, they had their own criminal scene and it got really out of control and they kind of overperformed. No, that's the problem. Over-indexed. They wanted...

That's the thing though, little brothers sometimes can become bigger than the big brother. That's what happened to me. I grew bigger than my big brother. But it's trying too hard. It's trying too hard. Okay. Okay. Anyway. Live show in Providence.

To mend this fence. I love our Rhode Island listeners. Yes. You just don't like the energy of their state or country. That's right. Yeah, yeah. We put so many, we left a lot of trails. Breadcrumbs. The door. The door. Yeah. Juancho, while I was gone, he took it there. He took it to Mercedes-Benz.

To have a look at it. They said it's going to be $10,000. No. So I said no. Yeah, yeah, good. Yeah, I was like, that's not true. And so we'll find another place. I have a body shop guy. Okay. Who will do it on the cheap. Okay, thank you. It won't be great.

Okay. I've had, but I've had mine done twice there. At some point, if you know, you're going to be scratching into shit and you're not going to have a fucking perfect car, a car show level car. Like who cares? Yeah. Like Kenny came out and looked at my Benz and he went to school for auto body.

Ken Kennedy. He did? Yes. He went to Ferris State for auto body. He and six classmates were driving home in a van or a station wagon on icy roads. The driver lost control of the car. They rolled the car out into the median. It landed on its wheels. They all had their tools with them. And they all got out and started pulling dents out and fixing the window. Oh, my God. And there were six guys.

They were majoring in auto body on the side of the road, and they just kind of repaired the car. And they got back on the road and drove home. How funny is that? That's great. Yeah, I don't even know an analogy that would be more perfect than that. But Kenny. But Kenny, he looked at the car. One second. I would have never picked this up. The indicators on back that tell you if you're getting too close to something, the little radar devices, they're black. They stay black.

Well, when this person painted my bumper, they just blasted over those. It still works. The radar goes through the paint. Right. But he's like, oh, you had this repainted. They didn't mask off that. He was like, ew. Yeah, he turned his nose up at it. Oh, he did. Which he always does with all my stuff. Kenny.

He's very meticulous. He's very meticulous and you can't make him happy. And I love him. Well, that's why he's so big brother. That's why he's Ken Kennedy. He's so big brother. Well, he's first born. Exactly. Yeah. I would love for him to come over and fix my car. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You don't. He's so nice. If it was 10 grand at the Mercedes dealer, it would be 25 if Kenny did it. Oh, my God. Now, this is where he's hoisted by his own petard. He and I, we grew up working on cars together. Yeah, let's give some context to Ken. He's your friend. Ken is one of my very best friends from Michigan. And we had this really fun relationship because we went to different high schools. And we met at another kid's birthday party, but we really liked each other. And then we really started hanging out.

when i was 15 and he was 16 because he had a mustang gt and i lived to go drag racing and we would go drag racing in his mustang gt and often he would let me drive it even when i was 15 and race guys and then i got a mustang gt and we both had mustang gt so our friendship was like he was my outlet for cars because i hung out with all the artistic kids and the snowboarders but on the weekends i would go with ken kennedy and we would go to grass shit and we would go to mylon dragway

And we were constantly working on cars together. And he hates how I work on cars. Because I'm like, let's get this fucker running in the next two hours. I don't really care if I had the right gasket. I can make this gasket work. Let's just put a little RTB here. But he has to do everything by...

the numbers. Yes. Well, he went to school. And it's just his nature. He's very anal for lack of a- He is so kind and sweet and like the loveliest, loveliest person. I adore him. And he's so protective and he takes care of people. And if you go somewhere with it, he's like thought of the things you'll need. He's incredibly thoughtful. He brings flowers when he comes to stay with you. He texted me on my birthday.

No, he's the one person who texted me on September 1st and said, 20 years, buddy. Like, yeah, he's so sweet. Yeah. Back to my grievances with him. First of all, he borrowed my Hellcat the last trip and he took it out of the mode it was in.

and put it in eco mode to save four cents on the highway. This is so Ken Kennedy, mind you. This might be my biggest grievance of 2023. Oh my God. He doesn't even know how angry I am about this. It's okay, he needs to hear. He's here right now? No, he just needs to hear. Oh, okay. So he borrowed the car. He wants to save five cents on the highway. So he switches it to eco mode, which is a joke. That takes it from 707 horsepower to 500. It's already preposterous. Anyways, ever since he did that,

It now defaults in eco mode and I've got to go into the fucking menu and put it in my mode. And then I've looked up online and they're supposed to come in eco mode and you always have to do that. Mine wasn't like that. I don't know why, but because Ken Kennedy put it in fucking eco mode. Now, every time I get in it, I got to reprogram the thing to get it to perform. That's kind of a great prank. If it were an intentional prank, it'd be perfect. How do you know he wasn't messing with you? Yeah.

I don't know, but I know, but I know Ken Kennedy. He is a bit of a prank. He can be a rascal. You know, here's a prank he pulled on me. What? And it's mixed with his, of course, his sweetness. Yeah. So my Mustang sat in Michigan. I moved to California. I never brought it out. It stayed at home. It loitered up my mom's shop. Everyone hated that it was there. I had at one point blown the mechanical fuel pump.

And Kenny knew I was coming back into town. And so he was nice enough. Now, this is where he's so sweet. He put in a new fuel pump for me on the weekend and he put an electrical fuel pump in. And then he,

Where my company or my family's business, we did a lot of business at the airport. Journalists would fly in and we would have a new GM car sitting at this quick park, this parking area. Yeah. And we had a lot of spots there. And we'd leave cars for journalists. They'd pick them up. They'd return them there when they flew in and out. So he's like, your car will be at quick park. I'm like, kind of awesome. My own car will be at quick park. This is fun.

I go to quick park and I look at the like tag, you pick up the tag and I look at the key chain. Also, there's a Corvette zero one key fob on it for some reason. Well, that's new. And then it says like between G and a 34. I'm like, what, what the fuck is this? I go out to the lot and there's a cement median separating two areas of the parking spots and

And it's probably like an eight inch lip on this concrete embankment. He brought ramps with him to quick park, parked my Mustang up on the cement block. What? And the Mustang is sitting on this cement block. Oh my God. And I've got to get home. Get it off. And if I go slow off of it, it'll drop the front wheels and then drag the whole thing, maybe even get caught on there. So basically what I had to do. Oh my God. Is I had to fucking rough it up.

And dump the clutch and just go as fast as I could and jump the Mustang off the thing. But he took the time to bring ramps to Quick Park and put it up on this fucking cement island. How did he get it up there? With ramps. He brought with him ramps and drove it up in reverse. And he wasn't worried you were going to ruin the car? Worth it. See, there's where a prank, he will go for a prank. Wow. I think the eco thing was a prank. Well, yeah.

It's a great one because it's going to last forever. It makes me almost want to sell the car. Wow, that's great. Anyway. Okay, now back to your Mercedes. I got a spot. Thank you. It won't be perfect. Kenny will know it, but no one else will know it but Kenny. I want Kenny to like it. He's not going to. Okay, fine. Don't ever let him see the passenger side of your car. I won't. Okay, so all to say. Back to your face. No, I had to. I skipped today's training session.

Because the car. Because you needed to get it to the. Yeah, I don't have it. So I walked here today. Anyway, I had to skip my second sesh. Okay, how was your first session? But I rescheduled it for Saturday. So it's not like, I'm not skipping it completely. First session was great. I am so sore. You are. Yes, and I was not expecting it. And. Of course you are. You're like doing things you've never done. I know, but also it wasn't too hard. Oh.

Uh-huh. He asked me like, on a scale of one to 10, how hard was that? And I was like, a four. Oh. And he was like, oh, wow. Okay, great. And then I was like, I mean, am I just doing like an ego thing? But I wasn't. It felt all very doable. Yeah. And he did say, he said, well, since we don't work out with weights much. What did you do? Can I ask what movements you did? Did you squat? Yeah, we did squats. With just the bar? Yeah.

No, we, I used a kettlebell. Kettlebell. Okay. Both like holding it on my chest and also like holding it down. Okay. You know what I mean? Sure. Between your legs? Yeah. Yeah.

I don't know the names of anything. Okay. Okay. But I did an hour's worth of stuff. And did you hate it or enjoy it? No, I enjoyed it. You did? Yes. Oh, good. I did enjoy it. I could see you getting into it. It's a to-do list. Well, exactly. I mean, it's like writing. I like after. Have you done it? Yeah, I like after. But he was great. He...

Pulled on my pants. Oh, my God. He pulled on your pants. What did you evaluate? What are you starting with? What if he's like, we need to start with some pictures before and after pictures. Some baseline. Some baseline. Let's get some baseline pics. What did you wear? Did you get like a brand new outfit for this? No, I didn't even think about that. Oh, that's shocking. Wow. You got to eventize it. That's what Panay taught me. And that's right. Another friend, Andrew Panay. God.

20 minutes on banana. No, you don't have to do that. But he did teach me that. Yeah. You get a very special outfit. Yeah. And when you put it on, you're eventizing the whole thing. And now you're like, it's time to go. Yeah, that's my life. I get it. Yeah, okay. But for this, I didn't, I wasn't ready to do that. What did you wear? Like an old pair of stained sweats and a ripped up painter's t-shirt? No. Do you look like a fucking hobo? Okay, look, I...

It's not like I've never like stepped into a workout situation. He did ask. He said, he said, you've never worked out with a trainer before. He was shocked. Oh, okay. But now comes why he was shot. What's your story in your head? Cause you're in such great shape. Well, he did later say, cause I told him about my cholesterol. Okay. And he was like,

What? He needs to know about that. It feels like you told your waiter about your cholesterol. Like you tell everyone. A trainer needs to know what's going on with my heart. I don't think so. What? Yes. I don't think your trainer needs to know about your cholesterol, but continue. Definitely he does. He was surprised because I was so good at everything. Oh, okay. And also, yeah, when I told him about my cholesterol, he said...

that's really surprising because you're so fit. And I was like, I know it's genetic. And he was like, yeah, my mom was really small, but also, oh, I shouldn't say that. I shouldn't. Well, I'm not saying his name. Okay, great. Did he ask you what your workout goals were? Yes, he did. And what did you say? I said, I really just want to build strength and build muscle, but I don't want to look jacked. Yeah.

Yeah. I said, I don't want to look too... Did you say, I want to be stronger than my coworker? No. I said, I don't want to be bulky. Right. But yeah, and then... But you would be bulky in the back, right? What's that mean? In my butt? Yeah, you'd grow a big old muscular ass, right? No. No. I mean, I want it to be toned and like...

Yeah. And nice. But no, my boob. Okay. This is just the way I look at the mirror and look at my body. What other people's bodies are. Great. Everyone's great. Yeah. Everyone's perfect. But I don't think because my boobs are so big and because I'm so short, there's so much going on that I think a big butt.

It's just not what I'm looking for. It's too much. There's too much stuff going on. It's not what I'm looking for. Okay, great. Great. I want a humongous butt. Right. That's why I asked. But you don't have big boobs. Well, I do have a pretty nice chest. No, you don't have big boobs. I have pretty big boobs. I can do this with them. I know. You can't. Yes, I can. If your boobs were... If you really have big boobs, you'd be able to do this. Okay, so...

It went great. And you liked it. And I liked it. But you were very sore. Oh, he said, because you haven't worked out with weights that much, you'll probably be sore. Yeah. And I was like, yeah. But you were like, no, I won't. I was like, I don't know, maybe a little bit. And I'm so sore. Right. Where the most? Mainly my legs and my butt. But mainly my legs. Your butt, that's gotten bigger. I mean, everything's gotten huge. I can't believe you didn't notice. Did you look in your mirror? Yeah.

To see if you could see changes after the first workout? Like you're eight years old. No, I didn't. I would have. I didn't. Are you going to take before and after pictures? You kind of should. Oh, no. Okay. I'm out. Yeah. I'm going to let you do all this on your own. I'll stay right out of it. I will. Now, I brought something in today, which I don't normally do. Oh, my God. I want to set this up by saying my mom, sweet Laura, she doesn't listen to this show.

In a healthy way. But she knew about Luthi. So maybe she listens to Synced. I think she watches, I think she follows us on Instagram. So if there's a clip, she'll see it. But again, she doesn't listen. And again, in a healthy way. Yeah. So I don't think this will get back to her. Okay. Uh-oh. And if it gets back to her, maybe she needs to hear it. Oh, like Kenny? Yeah.

This is like, this is your episode where you're telling everyone things. Not to their face. It's called the clean in the closet episode.

Fact check. Well, I was going to start with a question of, and my mom's a little older than your parents. Okay, I'm just going to get right to it then. So my mom for a while now, and I got to say, and I'll try to describe it visually. You know, there's an ASL sign for I love you. And it's very big in our family. We do this a lot. If we see each other from the audience, we give it. And it's a thumb out, your first finger out, your pinky out. It's very cute. So my mother signs off.

With that emoji, but it's the black emoji. What's really funny is it's on a lot of the group text to my brother and my sister. And I'm kind of like waiting. No one said anything. I was going to go like.

mom you probably i mean you probably i i don't think you know what you're doing and i also i don't you're like wayne telling her because who cares it's on this chain but then you're wondering is she gonna send it to someone else is she sending this to everybody well which is she even know like i'm gonna show you because i i can't imagine you even believe me what's funny though is you have to

Oh, sure. Like, it's not that it's like a default. I'm doing a screenshot to you right now.

And I'm going to shoot it over. It comes in yellow. Exactly. And so you have to hold. Oh, my God. And there's no way she figured out how to hold. What she may have figured out how to do is she accidentally held one time. And now the white one's gone. Okay. But I don't even know if she notices it's black. That's what I'm wrestling with. I think the first time you use it, it makes you pick a color.

Okay, but I do feel like in the past, she's been doing this for a while, but it has. And then you got to wonder, is it intentional? I got to guess. I got to ask her. Maybe should we call her? Oh, no. Is it going to make her? I don't want to make. She's got a good sense of humor. Okay. Okay. Oh, my God. Oh, thank God you answered.

I'm recording right now. Oh, okay. I'll try to be polite. Oh, okay. Well, and I'm airing, I'm going to be honest with you. I'm airing a little, I'm talking with Monica and I'm asking her if she's noticed anything that her parents are doing as they get older or they've, they've actually signaled like, okay, they're out of, they're out of step on this one thing. Oh, Jesus. Okay.

So you have one. You have one. And I haven't been telling you. And I've decided to do it on air. Okay. When you send me a text and you send me that wonderful I love you sign. Yeah. Do you realize you're sending the black person's one? Oh, yeah. I like it better. Oh. The excerpt.

I like it better. What a great answer. It's hard to argue with that, mom. You just visually, you like it better. I deliberately choose that one because I like it better. Oh, okay. Great. Now you know. Okay, now let's back up. You know that you can't go in blackface. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, but if you got to pick the prettiest skin you could have, that's the skin I'd pick. Wow.

Okay, that's a great rebuttal. That's going to be hard to cancel. Carly pulls the car over all the time and says, you can't say that. Okay, so you are saying some things that maybe are out of date. Yeah, I mean, yeah, I saw it. It's going to happen to everyone. It is. Yeah, it's cultural. It's what you were brought up with. You are such a good sport. I love you so much. Come on.

Well, I'm glad you love me because I love the dick inside of you. Okay. All right. Well, I love you. Thank you for picking up. Can I just say one more thing real quick? Yes, of course.

It's funny that you would call on this because Daniel and I, I don't know if you can see, we painted this room. The ceilings, the trim, the walls. We've been working a whole week on it. This would have taken me one day while I got home from work. Yeah. I just was out in the garage with him. And I said to him, if you're doing that door, it's got to be turned over because you're painting it the color. I'm not talking about food.

The doors are being painted. Can you see them? Yes, I can. And I said to him, you've got to flip the wrong... Oh, shit. Oh. What happened now? You just spilled a whole can of paint? Oh, boy. Oh, boy.

I can't even tell you what a zoo it is with two septuagenarians doing home improvement. It is nothing like when I did home improvement five years ago. Yeah. We are both stupid and tired. I told him three times. Stupid and tired is a bad combo. Stupid and tired is a bad combo.

Every day from the moment you wake up. And so here we are, and we're in this world, and I come out here, and he's got the door flipped over. And I said, didn't you remember I told you to flip that door over? And he goes, what? What? No, it's right. I said, no, we just went through this whole thing. I picked up the door, and I moved it next to the other door and showed you I was the wrong side. And he goes, oh, yeah, I think you're right. And it's like...

We do this all day long. One room. You want to know the decline? The decline is we are on a bobsled in Norway. Okay. I love you. I love you too. Bye. Okay. So she knows. She knows. That was a reveal. I like it more. What are you going to say to that? Yeah.

Right. I guess we said everything that should be said. Yeah, there's really no more to say about it. Yeah. Okay. Maybe she doesn't really know that, or maybe she does, but that like it is supposed to be you. Right. Now that-

I don't know that she understands that part. Right. Right. Clearly not. She just was like, oh, I like this. Yeah, this is preferable to the lighter colored. Right, but not, it's not me. It's not my hands. Okay, anywho. I mean, ultimately what happens is your parents will be 90 and they're at the table.

My grandmother used to say this. My grandmother was not a bigot by any stretch. And as she got way older, she reverted back to when she was a kid. Well, we're just going to let it slide at this dinner table because she's 90 years old. Yeah. Yeah.

I don't know what to say. It is how you grow up. And it's so that's that is why. Like less assured what we're saying right now will change by the time we're 90. It will change. We're never going to land on the thing. It just that's not how language works. No, no, for sure. And there's a million things that, yeah, we do now. We don't have any idea that are going to be wrong. And at some point, your memory will just stop.

Helping you, like, it'll only be that core memory you have. You won't even have access to the thing that it evolved into. I guess. I mean, I do think... Like, you're going to stay unhoused at some point when you're 96 and someone's going to lose their mind. Sure. Yeah, yeah. Sure. But when it comes to race... Yeah. You know, it is dependent on your upbringing and your surroundings and all of those things because...

Ding, ding, ding, because you had mentioned India and weird and interesting and all of that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Which was a tussle between us. And actually, you know, I thought so much about it when I got home from that trip. Oh, okay. You know, I was like, I'm really glad, I'm really proud. Yeah. That I'm from here and I'm glad that I'm from here. Yeah. And that's true. I am. That was shown to me in like such a wonderful way. But...

I think part of it is also I'm grateful. I'm grateful to, this is going to sound so weird, but not be part of the hegemonic group. Oh, uh-huh. No, that doesn't sound terribly weird to me. I can see, like from the inside. The outsider. The outsider's perspective. Uh-huh. And so I have a quicker access to empathy there. Uh-huh.

because it's just built in. Like, I don't have to work hard to understand when someone says they've... I mean, everyone can relate to being other in some ways, but if it's like a racist thing, I'm there. And I am glad I have that. Like, that's a perspective that I like...

through the world with and not having to work very hard to do so. Yeah, well, I would say it's very similar to being really grateful you're an addict. Like, it's a thing that you were dealt and you can come to love it. Yeah, and have so much understanding for others in a way that a lot of other people can't do. Right. Or have to work.

Very hard to do. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Okay. So I think we did leave a lot of open ends. Great. We'll revisit them. Yeah. We'll come back to that at some point. Last week. Yeah.

In 2022. Okay. A couple, some facts. This is for Maren. Maren Morris. Lovely. Okay. The Sex and the City episode that was about single person behavior is called The Good Fight. It's in season four. It's episode 13. Great. Revisit that. Should be streaming on your Max app. Carrie finds living with Aiden is tough. Okay.

She misses her single lifestyle. In her secret single behavior. Okay, secret single behavior. So I looked up percentage of people who don't fart around their spouse. Probably hard to find. It's not that easy to find. According to one study reported by the Plymouth Herald, around 45% of couples in the southwest of England claim they don't fart in front of their spouse.

It's a very limited... I also, speaking in broad generalities here, I do imagine Americans fart in front of their spouse more than English people do. Oh, because they're so proper? I have a stereotype that they're a little more proper than us. Except not the countryside ones. Right, they have white trash like me there. Well, and just, I think they have... They got some bumpkins. Well, they... Some country bumpkins. Okay. Some hicks. No, not hicks, like...

Just it's more cozy, like in the holiday where she lives in that little like cute, cozy kind of cabin. Wool sweaters. Yeah. In a hearth. Yeah. I don't think those aren't proper. No. Do you think they fart? I still don't think they're farting as much as Americans. In the movie, they fart. Oh, okay. Then I, yeah, then I guess that seems high to me, by the way. 45, I agree. I mean, you're talking about decades together. Yeah, I agree. I think it's, I think it's weird.

Okay, now you said that Spotify reported its first profitable quarter just last year. Spotify reported its first profitable quarter in the first quarter of 2024. There you go. Even more recent. Yeah. I mean, that's crazy. It is. Okay.

There's a New York Times article on the middle. It's called Diary of a Song. So maybe this is a separate thing. Back up. Yeah. First of all, I heard diarrhea and I'm dead serious. I'm not trying to do a bit. Okay. So back up really far. What was the setup for that? She talked about a series called Anatomy of a Song. Okay.

And they did one on the middle. Okay. And there is a New York Times piece called Diary of a Song, not diarrhea. Okay. I wonder if there's ever been the word diarrhea in a headline of the New York Times. Probably not. I'm sure. You think? Of course. Yeah. Like deaths. Soldiers struck with diarrhea or something. Yeah. Or diarrhea outbreak. People still die of it. Well, Bill Gates. I found one. Oh, yeah. See? He was remarkably healthy until...

I need to pay. Until chronic diarrhea nearly killed him. Oh.

Okay, chronic. They added chronic to make it more medical. No, diarrhea is the medical term. What if it's a chronic Hershey squirts? Otherwise healthy man dies of chronic Hershey squirts. Oh, God. Diarrhea is the medical term, right? Yeah, but if you study it,

It's technically Hanus Rius or Hanus Ria. That's right. Yeah. If you're an expert in the field. Okay. Pharrell for happy. Yeah. 10 attempts. What did I say? Nine. Even more. I was nervous. I exaggerated. That's generally what I tend to do. No. No. Wow. And just confirming, I'm not going to go down the list because we have talked about it before. Okay. I will. Jobs with high suicide rates. Okay. Okay. Medical doctors, dentists, plasticians.

police officers, veterinarians, financial services, real estate agents, electricians, lawyers, farmers, pharmacists. Isn't that all the job sectors at that point? No, our job isn't on here. Podcasters?

Okay, well, I should have started. That's a huge group for a data group. It is. Eight million. The last I heard, eight million active podcasts. That's a huge. There's probably more podcasters than Dennis. Okay, but that's a good question. How many people do you think? Oh, my God. There's more podcasters than Dennis. Well, how many people do you think qualify themselves? Like,

Like if somebody asks us our job, somebody asked me my job. Yeah. I say, well, I don't say I'm a podcaster. It's very embarrassing. No, it's not. You'd have to say I host a podcast. I do. I say I produce and host a podcast. Well, it is embarrassing. That's why you don't say podcaster. Be honest. It's not that it's embarrassing. It just doesn't seem accurate. It's incredibly accurate. You're a podcaster, but it sounds really embarrassing.

Why though? Because there's 8 million and it's a punchline in every show you watch. Right. But what's the difference between- Who's your new boyfriend? Oh, he's a podcaster. It's like a, it's like a, it's a go-to joke and everything. Yeah. You know what I do say? God, I do. I say I host and produce a podcast network. And you had pro- You had network and- That's true. I know. I know. But you had a lot of things. You had produce. Well, I want them to know the reality of my life. Yeah.

I'm not just a podcast. I don't just step into the booth and step out. You don't. But the thing that you're making all the money on is actually your podcasting. Just I hate to break that. What do you mean? You're a very good editor. You're very good at a lot of things. The reason you're making a ton of money is because of your personality. It's actually your podcasting. Well, podcasting incorporates all the pieces. The editing is a huge piece of my day. So it has to be. I could find another editor.

That would do a good enough job. I could not find another Monica Padman. Okay. I hate this is like a compliment and you're hurt. Well, yeah, because I'd like to, I kind of would like to see you try. I'm serious.

And in fact, great. That would free up a lot of time for me. It would. So you circle back. It would. You circle back on that. Anyway. All right. Well, I hate to end on suicide, but that is where we are. Well, it's off in the end. Wow. Yeah. Should we call my mom back to put it back on a high note? See what else she's doing. All right. All right. Love you. I love you.

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What's up, guys? It's your girl Kiki, and my podcast is back with a new season. And let me tell you, it's so good. And I'm diving into the brains of entertainment's best and brightest, okay? Every episode, I bring on a friend and have a real conversation. And I don't mean just friends. I mean the likes of Amy Poehler, Kel Mitchell, Vivica Fox. The list goes on. And now I have my own YouTube channel.

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