Flea

00:00:00
Speaker 1: The Quest Left Show is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome to the Quest Left Show. I'm your host Quest Love. As of late on this platform we have shown love to the low end, of course, with so many awesome bass players, and today is no exception. However, you know that we here at this show cannot pass up a good pivot story and we are pleased to welcome a newcomer to the game, a trumpet player from Los Angeles by the way of Melbourne, Australia. His debut album, Hanora is a journey into the world of instrumental interpretations both the jazz, pop, rock, soul ilk covering all spectrums of music. Incidentally, our newcomer is also a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame member, shows you how far as journeys come. We like to welcome for the first time mister Michael Peter Balzari, also professionally known as Flea. That's me, that's your name. Okay, nice to meet you, Flee.

00:01:26
Speaker 2: Nice to meet you.

00:01:28
Speaker 1: All right, So what is your morning routine the first thirty minutes when you wake up? Do you have a morning routine?

00:01:35
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, very ritualized morning routine, night routine. I'm a man of many rituals.

00:01:42
Speaker 1: Actually, I'm glad you said that. Yeah, what's the last because I'm very strict on on night routines. What does the last hour of your day look like when you know you're going to go to.

00:01:55
Speaker 2: Bed I'm winding down. Yeah, I'm pretty strict about it. First as the the well, whatever music I'm gonna listen to you before bed, which is lately he loved Him Madly by Miles Davis every night, but always something like that. It was revel before that, you know, but I picked the music, brush, teeth, wash face, you know, a little cream or whatever as I get older and trying to like keep things supple. Yes, and then prayers. I'm a praying man, so I pray every morning and every night. And then I read. I always read before bed. I've been you know, since some little boy. I love to read, so I read every day. And that's pretty much it.

00:02:36
Speaker 1: What is your morning routine?

00:02:38
Speaker 2: Morning routine is? But once I like I wait, depending on if I have to get up or I have you know, flexible time. But no matter what the things are, I do exercises in bed before I get out of bed every morning, like stretched basically stretches and stuff because my back has gotten damaged before. So I have like things to do because it can settle in a weird way when you're sleeping and you get up all of a sudden, you're like, oh, you know, I'm old. So I have like a stretching routine and then you know, ablutions and then prayers and then exercise.

00:03:16
Speaker 1: Wait, I gotta, I gotta Yeah, I think I told you the story once before.

00:03:20
Speaker 2: But oh wait, wait there's one crucial other thing too, which is a big rule. Is no phone in the bedroom.

00:03:26
Speaker 1: No phone in the bedroom, No phone in the.

00:03:27
Speaker 2: Bedroom, Like what especially when I wake up in the morning, Like those are the magic times, Like you're in that twilight in between sleep and way, that's when good stuff comes.

00:03:38
Speaker 1: All right, Yeah, good to know where the same person. Yeah, I will probably say that you're the first person to seed plant in me the idea of giving gratitude. I'm gonna show you how you guys changed and subsequently save the roots without even knowing it. All right, I talked about this story in my first book. So this is two thousand and five. You guys are touring your and your arena status now soccer stadium status. You know, you're familiar with how stadium life is. That basically means you guys are playing anyway between. Some places are seventy thousand, some places are one hundred and twenty thousand, and we are opening for you guys. So even for us, we just arrived at our tipping point of not just being an underground band and you know, your band's favorite band or your singer's favorite singer, Like, we're actually reaching a new level as well. We're doing about a week with you guys. So Night one, I watch you guys, and you do something interesting. You do this magic circle thing where you guys sort of get in the football huddle, right, and then you go to play the music. Night two you do the same thing. Now the different and says I have a set list, and I'm like, and I'm trying to get out of my comfort zone. Like one of someone suggests, what.

00:05:07
Speaker 2: Do you mean you have a set list? Like you're making your set list.

00:05:08
Speaker 1: No, no, I'm looking at your set list. I'm standing by the mindset list, right. And so the thing is is that by this point, various people are trying to talk me out of the safety zone. I come from the school of Prince where George Clinton wants joke that Prince is a master at rehearsing his spontaneity. And so, you know, there's the point where people are like, you guys are musicians, Like, how come you don't jam more? How come you don't you know? I was like hyper sensitive about not becoming a jam band because I was like, oh, critics will use alive if we're you know. But I was learning to loosen up and hey, guys, do do another sixteen bars or whatever, like something off the grid of just not something that we do. Right, So you do this magic circle thing and I'm like, oh, they're going to call an audible another song. And then I'm like, oh, there's still on the set list. Okay, Night three, you do the same thing. I'm like, why do they keep having these huddles and circles?

00:06:07
Speaker 2: It was before the show though, right, No, during the show, you would do three songs, all right, see me, I have to I segue a song on like a jay.

00:06:16
Speaker 1: You would stop a song And then we're talking at twenty thousand people, right, I.

00:06:21
Speaker 2: Thought you were talking about before the show where we like hold hands in the circle. I got you.

00:06:25
Speaker 1: No, You're just you're talking about something and I'm like, oh, they're gonna switch songs or something. And then you go back and you still stick to the script. So I hit you up and I'm like, Yo, what are y'all talking about when y'all in that circle, you know, because you're still sticking to the script, so you're not saying like, let's switch orders or whatever. And you gave me my answer. So I go on the Roots tour bus. You know, we're young and dumb whatever, So I get on. I'm like, yo, man, because I was talking about it, and you know, my manager's on there and maybe like two other members of the band, and I said, yo, man. I asked a flea, like what are those guys doing? And he was like, you know, he gave me some like hippie dippy shit, like, oh man, we just you know, we I had a great once this morning, and you know, I went to the museum and da da da dah. And then I went to Anni. I'm like, what are y'all really talking about? He's like, oh man, it's like, you know, we're just just kids from La man. We're just like just taking in the moment.

00:07:27
Speaker 2: I was like, he's just.

00:07:27
Speaker 1: Talking about a hippie, dippy shit man, real dismissive of me, and I'm going back to play my my xbox and my manager says, yeah, it makes sense. You know, I can see it. They actually like each other. I was like, so I go back to the thing I'm playing and I'm like, forty seconds later, pause, I go back to the front of the bus. I'm like, what do you mean they actually like each other. He's like, and it's almost about to become the good Fellas. You think I'm a funny moment. He's like, uh, yeah, they actually fuck with each other. They like each other. And I'm like, as opposed to what? And he looks at me like, come on, dog, I'm like, what you're talking about? Because in my mind, I'm like, yo, like we were buskers on a street corner not even ten years ago, and literally day by day like we're here, Like what are you talking about? And he's like, well, if you want to call it that, yeah, I mean technically, he says, Look, my job here is to keep the train running no matter what. But what you guys think is your friends, like you used to be in high school, y'all don't even talk with each other. You're the one that has a griffin door bust and a slithering bust and y'all might show up the sound check, he said, I said, you say we're phoning it in. He's like, well, you guys are still good, but y'all ain't friends, like you're just going through the motions. Like He's like, dude, the Beatles broke up after seven years like this, this is year fourteen for y'all. So y'all lasted twice as long as the Beatles, And that really messed with me. Man. Once he made me aware of the fact that damn, like when is the last time me and Tarik just like went out to dinner or went to the movies like we were like brothers. Yeah, and then when it became a business, I think in my head, I said, okay, for the sake of the business, like let's separate and just keep the business running and you know, and not just figure like most people would have killed each other by now. I mean, yeah, because we were also like.

00:09:34
Speaker 2: Just in a I get it, man, I get it, But in a way, it's like, because there's times I've wanted to do that when it's become so difficult, you know, because you grow apart. You have different world views, you offend each other, you hurt each other's feelings. You're in this no matter what, even if someone's a leader and the marching orders. You're clear, you're always making yourself vulnerable in the creative communal, creative situation, and you hurt each other's feelings, it's easier to keep it organized clean. Look, this is what we're gonna do. Let's get it done. We're professionals. Just do the job. But when we're in those little circles, it's not always hippy dippy fun support. You know what I mean. I love you like sometimes I mean oftentimes it's like I can't hear shit, I don't know what to do. The monitors all fucked up. You know, there's that a lot too, Like I just can't fucking hear it. You're too loud, you know what I mean? Which loud. Sometimes it's complaining, it's all that you know, and trying to be respectful of one another. But sometimes it is just like like this is beautiful, Like we're doing this right here, right now, and you know, our band, we've been through all different you know, emotional states, but like you're talking about you and tyre. Like me and Anthony we met when we were fifteen. We're about like we're street kids. We're running around like we had nothing. We're like like, how we're gonna eat, How we gonna you know, get anything we you know, I came from a very difficult household. There was a lot of violence, There was a lot of chaos. There was a lot of like I'm not it was not like a sanctuary home to go into. So I kind of searched for my family with my friends. And when I met Anthony, I really found that, you know, and there's something no matter what, no matter what the professional obligations are, no matter when we piss each other off, there's always and no matter and we hurt each other too, but there's always like brothers, you know, but there's always this striving to try to make it right, to try to harmonize it, to try to get it into a good place.

00:11:32
Speaker 1: Have you guys ever had a like a I mean, right now, we're in the beginning stages of what I call the some kind of monster Metallica thing. There's a therapist, okay, and we're okay. So my feelings were hurt when you told me that the bridge wasn't good, And yeah, have you guys ever had to have like, no, who's the person that will? I think we have to have a band meeting?

00:11:55
Speaker 2: And yeah, I think we could use it sometimes, but I don't know if we could all get on this same page about it. But there's been many many heart to hearts, gotcha, like not that long ago, you know, just cut towards the end of our last tour, like there was a blow up that was really difficult for me. Difficult, like I was in a fury, you know what I mean, Like I left in a absolute fury, and it took like a week to like let me just settle down, try to have some perspective and then go, hey, you know, let's let's talk about this. Let's talk about what happened, because you know what I mean, like you feel that someone was dismissive of you, or you know, you feel must understood in a way that touches you to your core, you know, and you know, but we managed to have the talks and to get through it, you know, to varying degrees of success too. And professional help probably could help because being in a.

00:12:50
Speaker 1: Band is is a marriage.

00:12:52
Speaker 2: It's a marriage and it's an intense marriage, and you know, and all of us, you know, and everyone like Chad, he's pretty mellow, he's the easy one. But me, John and Anthony, like we're all, you know, intense people. We have our feelings. We're very passionate about what we think, you know, and it doesn't always align.

00:13:10
Speaker 1: All right. Even if my version was the idea, it was enough to scare me enough to literally, i'll say, four years later, once the Tonight show came. Yeah, we somehow morphed into the idea of what my manager was talking about on like suddenly I love playing with these guys, like we never laughed so many times, and even the fact like when you face each other in play, like that's such an intimate act that I think it's hard for people to like, I see that, and we use you guys almost as are the idea of what I think I see is our GPS.

00:13:54
Speaker 2: So yeah, no, that's I never told you that. I really appreciate that. And you know, I think as a musician and we all know this, it's like you're always striving to get to that place beyond thought, like beyond calculation and beyond you know what I mean, like getting to that place where you're just playing and channeling to gods, whatever they your gods may be. And like, as you know, when we're looking at each other and playing, it's like always that yearning to get to that place where we're just like one throbbing thing together, you know, beyond thought, like just surrendering to the moment. And sometimes we succeed and we're really connecting in a beautiful intimate way, and sometimes you know not, but it's always that trying, you know. Like I think, like if you idealize, like the things that you said that are very kind, thank you, Like I'm glad to be of service. But when if you idealize them at their best, we're always yearning for that. You don't always and I think like with any artists, like you know, you always try.

00:14:53
Speaker 1: And Ma, what is the first concert you ever went to?

00:15:10
Speaker 2: Well, definitely my stepdad, you know, playing, but I don't know if that counts like he's playing it. I don't count Hotel Wax Station, right, you know, he didn't even play like, you know whatever, like jazz gigs, you know, little jazz gigs in the middle of nowhere. Pizza place on Librea actually played a pizza place Lbrea with Philly Joe one time. So it's pretty awesome really. Yeah.

00:15:30
Speaker 1: One time I was randomly eating in a damn it's a it's a noodle spot in LA and I was like, oh my god, that guy looks like James Gatson. Suddenly, like all these LA cats were like it's like is this normal? And then the manager was watching me like yeah, I wanted to surprise you. Lets you know, I got James Gatson and like all these like yeah, my entire childhood record collections.

00:15:54
Speaker 2: Just like purposely like got in there because yeah, no, no.

00:15:57
Speaker 1: No, they were like this this spot was crustaceans from all places like Crustaceans just happened to have like one of the top session musicians as so yeah, on the weekends we have a band's player. And I was like, oh, that's really cool.

00:16:13
Speaker 2: Yeah Gotson you know Gotsam. Yeah yeah, maybe he's such an awesome dude. You know, I've never been a religious man, but I was talking to him and he invited me to come to his church play in the band. And I was like, he plays in the band. He plays in the band church, And I was like, man, this is gonna be banging, and I got there and it was like James Goatson kind of playing in this kind of square band, you know, And I was like, I was like, damn, but he got me to.

00:16:38
Speaker 1: Church, you know where during the pandemic.

00:16:41
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:16:42
Speaker 1: Once I figured out that he was much more than I knew him strictly as Bill Withers drummer, I didn't realize all of his motown work more importantly, like his high hat is like I will survive love hanging over such a very distinctive sound of his. And I think he was doing a session for Beck or something. Someone broke in his crib and stole those high hats. It's like the most legendary. Like whenever I hear those high hats, I instantly know that scats and playing drums, which is normally I can identify a drummer on their stare drum, you know. But for me to identify you on the quality of your high hat, it's such a travesty.

00:17:26
Speaker 2: I want you man, you know, dude.

00:17:30
Speaker 1: Well, is there a food you hate it as a kid that you love now?

00:17:36
Speaker 2: Damn? Not? Really? No, I know what is? I think everything? I mean that probably is No, I don't know. I was always a good eater. I always just put it down.

00:17:48
Speaker 1: You're forever a teenager to me, like, what is your lifestyle? Are you vegan? Are you no?

00:17:53
Speaker 2: I mean you know, I'm pretty strict about stuff. I don't eat sugar, I don't eat gluten, I don't eat dairy. Is that yeah? And I tried to eat organic, clean food.

00:18:03
Speaker 1: Okay, but yeah, I eat animals, gotcha.

00:18:05
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:18:06
Speaker 1: Did you ever have a recurring nightmare as a kid or do you dream about the same thing over and over? I used to.

00:18:13
Speaker 2: It was funny because I did that bed wedding joke yesterday I found but it's true, Okay. Yeah, And when I was a kid, I was thinking about it yesterday because I was like, you know, doing that joke, and I was like, when I was a kid, I would always dream that I was getting up and going to the bathroom and I just had something where I just didn't wake up, and in my dream, I'm getting up and I'm really proud of myself. It's like a great dream. I'm like, I finally beat this bed wedding thing. I'm going to the bathroom. I can do it. And then i'd wake up and no, you weren't going to that you weren't walking down into the bathroom.

00:18:45
Speaker 1: Used to do that a lot, like imagine I'm going to the bathroom, but never feel that relief of yeah and realize right right, yeah that had happened.

00:18:54
Speaker 2: But I know I had like nightmares. It was always kind of like like it's report card day at school, you too, Yeah, yeah, and it's coming and it's bad, and like I'm gonna have to pay the piper for all my misdeeds, which was what often happened. Like there was a couple of years where I like really tried and did good, but mostly I was a disaster.

00:19:14
Speaker 1: You know, Well this always occur even after you.

00:19:16
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, it would just come out with that feeling, you know what I mean, like oh, you get it, and you're just like you know what I mean, like hiding it from your parents and stuff that. And I haven't had it in a while that I can remember. But flying dreams that really beautiful, like really beautiful but also scary. Like I would have this dream where I would fly, but it wasn't like Superman like flying up high. I would just kind of like by power of myself kind of float above the ground, levitate up i'd be like ten feet up, fifteen feet up, and I still do have the dream now I'm thinking of it. I have it, and I'm just kind of like I kind of get this energy. It's like bigger than me, and I'm like floating. But in my dream, I'm always liked everybody like I'm up pero, like can you can you see? Can y'all see? And but in my dream no one ever notices. So it's like but it's like I'm like, I'm like, no, I'm finally like really tapping the source. I'm using this energy. I'm floating, but no one can see. I can never get my props, you know what I mean. And the dream, and that's it's kind of a weird a cross between a dream and like this feeling of not being seen.

00:20:21
Speaker 1: Entree three thousand gave the same answer. Really, the thing is I when I tell you, okay, so if you know about like how the brain works, your brain doesn't know the difference between reality and a fantasy. So if I were to tell you about like a horring car crash I had or whatever, like I'm taking you through the journey, like your brain wouldn't know. If you watch a movie your brain will process a bad guy chasing you the same way as if it happened in real life, so your body sort of goes through that. And I told him because he also said, like, I dream of flying. And when I finished that interview, I live pretty high up in my apartment in New York, and you know, people always ask like, aren't you free to heights or whatever? And I cannot dream of flying without the feeling of me crashing. Like even though if I were to close my eyes right now and say, okay, I'm here, I want you to imagine your own eighty stories up and jumping off a ledge, like fly to that building over there, I can't. It's such a fear of even dreaming of that. And I don't know if that's metaphorical.

00:21:37
Speaker 2: It's definitely metaphors.

00:21:40
Speaker 1: So you can fly, and I'm not like.

00:21:42
Speaker 2: Hi, it's not like scary, it's not like I mean, there is the thing like, oh what I fall? But no, the feeling is that like did I have this power within me to do it? And that it is like we all have our own you know what I mean? We have our energy that we know is only ours and like it our job in life to nurture it and protect it and take care of it. But it's this thing that like, yes, it's there, but nobody cares. I think that's kind of the fear, Like that's the fear that I grew up with that like it's not no one cares.

00:22:13
Speaker 1: Do you feel like you're the brilliant tree that fell in the farest that no one knows?

00:22:18
Speaker 2: I don't feel like out of my day to day life. I mean feel really fortunate to be able to have, you know, expressed myself how I can with what I've got, and to be you know, being able to touch hearts with it. But yeah, I don't know if I I think it's childhood shit you know too?

00:22:36
Speaker 1: Yeah, name me five records in your childhood household collection?

00:22:42
Speaker 2: Mm hmm. Cannonball, utterly God, wish he were he just a preacher.

00:22:47
Speaker 1: It's live a country preacher. Yeah, why my treat is so bad?

00:22:50
Speaker 2: I think the country preacher is not the name of it. I can't remember, but country preacher. So as a kid and when I when I was really little, it was different. But my stepdad who came to my life when I was seven, okay, six or seven, he was a jazz guy and had a great record collection. But I remember hearing that and like thinking, whoa, you know what I mean? It really blew my Okay that the Beatles the White album.

00:23:13
Speaker 1: Okay, is that your favorite of the of the Beatles.

00:23:17
Speaker 2: It might be, but it's been it shifts, got it shifts, But yeah, it might be might be my favorite. It might be my favorite. But now that I have a little boy, like and I play stuff songs that he loves, like he loves the Abbey Road stuff, so kind of into that little Kid records. I had a Louis Armstrong record. Uh satch plays Fats All singing Fat Swaller songs. Okay, Yeah, and I really love that Clifford Brown Max Roach that Quintet I you know, that was a record as I was starting to play trumpet, and you know what I mean, It's.

00:23:50
Speaker 1: Just it's what you said to Clifford Brown.

00:23:53
Speaker 2: That wasn't good enough to shedd it. No. I just listened to it and knew it was possible. Okay, Yeah, still like that, you know, then your last album, what's that?

00:24:04
Speaker 1: Your last album?

00:24:06
Speaker 2: Yeah? Four? Just trying to think of little Kid records and I don't want to go too far like Sympathy for the Devil the Rolling Stones. Yeah that song?

00:24:17
Speaker 1: And when was that on The Woman with the Bathroom?

00:24:21
Speaker 2: Uh?

00:24:22
Speaker 1: Yes, oh, I beg his.

00:24:23
Speaker 2: I have a very distinct I have this distinct memory of my step dad. He frowned on rock music, but for some reason he had that eight track and we put it in and it would play and he would go, pleased to meet you, won't you guess my name? You know he's doing these verses. I've been around civilizations ancient and he was like, who's he talking about? Like who's he talking about? I was like, I don't know, Like I'm okay, like trying to think, like who's he singing about? Like who's pleased to meet?

00:24:46
Speaker 1: Who?

00:24:47
Speaker 2: Who's he taught me? And I remember him like, look at me going to the devil.

00:24:51
Speaker 1: That's how you met the devil?

00:24:53
Speaker 2: Yeah?

00:24:55
Speaker 1: Yeah, all right. What was your first job? Well?

00:25:00
Speaker 2: I had many jobs as a kid. I was always, you know, knocking on people's doors. I'll mow your lawn, I'll take your garbage out. I used to stand in the supermarket parking lot asking people to carry their groceries to their car, like hoping for a tip. But my first actual paying job was a liquor store delivery boy.

00:25:17
Speaker 1: Okay, you were allowed to delivered liquors.

00:25:20
Speaker 2: Sixteen in La Yeah yeah yeah, no I could drive, yeah, delivered liquor. So you were the original and drank plenty of it.

00:25:27
Speaker 1: Yeah, the original uber eats Okay yeah yeah, uh huh okay. So sort of expansion of the question before what album single handedly changed your life?

00:25:39
Speaker 2: It has to be one.

00:25:41
Speaker 1: This can also be your album whatever. But like, if there's an album that literally changed the trajectory of your life.

00:25:50
Speaker 2: I have to say, it's the record Gi by the Germs.

00:25:55
Speaker 1: What was it about it?

00:25:56
Speaker 2: It's a well, it's a very like wild punk rock album. Singing on it just goes wow, you know what I mean? Like he But what it was about it is so I grew up loving Miles Davis, loving my Vish New Orchestra. When I got into rock music, it was all about Jimmy Hendrix. It was all about the great, great players. You know, this is a music that was everything to me. And I looked at music as like your ability to play masterfully and and groove too, of course, you know what I mean, Like I understood the importance of you know, p funk and groove. But when I heard the germs, it was the first time what hit home to me, and it was huge. It was, here's this music, Like the musician ship is very few tools, you know what I mean. It's relative. You know, the songs are really good, and I think the playing is great harmonically melodically, it's relatively remedial and simple and destroyed it and a mess and all this stuff. But I remember, like laying back listening to headphones, just like being taken away by it, like into this real beautiful, cosmic place, and I just remember thinking, like, it doesn't matter how good you play. It was like everything is motivation and intent, and you come from all people come from all different cultures, they have all different you know what I mean. Abilities, But if you have the right of motivation, the intent, and the passion to express your story with what you've got and what you know, it is the most valuable thing in the world. And it just awakened in me a thing beyond music as a way to approach music, you know, like storytelling and just how important it is for us to tell our stories. And I think we're thinking of that about that a lot lately now, too, Like people are angry, you know, they're angry about oppression in the world and hypocrisy and cruelty and all this stuff. And I get it, you know, I'm angry too, Like there's all this shit going on, But how important it is to just let go of our anger and invest in beautiful things of Like like I was at the Vanguard the other night seeing Marquis Hill playing with Junius Paul Mchaya mccraven, like these guys throwing down in a way and playing the Vanguard. Little place, beautiful place, you know, historical place. But like, how more than ever, as you know, whatever protests or you know, big picture things that are really important to just invest our time and energy and people making beautiful things and put our energy into that, to support that, to be a part of it, to do what we can, to tell our stories in whichever way we have to tell them and anyway. So that record really awakened in me. That And at the same time, I was reading a biography of Bob Marley and I can't remember who wrote it was, you know, this is in the early eighties, and he talked about that about like motivation, what motivates you in the purity of your intent being everything. You know, He's like, I don't care about a reggae. It's my where I'm from, it's what I do, but everything is where my heart is at. And as well as like and this is something as you know, I'm always learning from like Coltrane. Recently I read a quote by him talking about like your music can only be as good as you are as a person, you know, and that really hit home to me, like yeah, yeah, like yeah, yeah, period, you know what I mean, And it maybe just want to be like all the like the ways that I can fuck up, you know what I mean, and be dishonest or manipulative or not a good husband or not a good father or not a you know what I mean. Like the more that you can walk with your truth and your honesty and your you know, your clarity and be at ease with yourself as being the best person that you can be, the better you can be as a player, you know what I mean. And now like take for me, like trying to take on these you know, fill a new place musically, really working on my horn playing and you know, doing your stuff and just more than ever, like man, there's no heiden, there's no you know what I mean, Like, all we got is what we got.

00:30:03
Speaker 1: So yeah, wow, damn I gotta question my entire life after that too.

00:30:11
Speaker 2: I'm with you, you know what I mean, Like that culturing thing was just like damn.

00:30:27
Speaker 1: You're of age and you are a result kind of a byproduct of the first wave of the punk movement. You were fifteen years old nineteen seventy seven, So I know the effect of the events that happened in New York in nineteen seventy seven, the punk movement, underground disco, even the sort of elitist studio fifty four atmosphere, the Blackout happening, thus giving birth to hip hop culture based on all the Turntaine acquired doing that those two nights. What was happening in LA in nineteen seventy seven. I know there's you know, and I often hear bands like X or whatever. But like, in nineteen seventy seven, was punk's movement immediate as it was in New York or was it sort of like hip hop where it took maybe like a year and a half to really like migrate to California for you guys to get enlightened.

00:31:26
Speaker 2: Yeah, LA had its own scene okay, And I confess that I'm l I was on a late fraight, like I didn't really get into punk, and like when I was got in my germs, I joined Fear, like the band like that was like eighty two eighty one, and before that, like I was, I was in the Hendrix, you know. But I got to know, you know, shortly after the birth of it, all the luminaries of the LA punk scene, and we had really great bands, like the Weirdos were incredible, the Weirdos, the screamers who are experimenting with like synse and electro sounds in punk. There was just ever and I would go out and see all kinds of weird bands like and I think probably like New York in a way where and it's something that I really miss and I'm so grateful to have had the opportunities that like from like when I met Anthony, we're like fifteen. It was like every single night we're trying to get into a club to see a band, and we didn't whatever it was, you know what I mean. And we see some weird heavy metal band, some like Sunset Strip hair metal band, some you know, dirty punk band, some arty band, some like African influence bands, some electro band. It was just relentless, Like every night there were clubs all over the city full of music. You could get down to the Parisian Room and see Freddie Hubbard, and then you could go to the Starwood and see you know, the suburban lawns, you know what I mean. Like there was just so much already weird underground music happening.

00:32:52
Speaker 1: You know. Was it typical to have that expanse of a vocabulary as you did, Like, Hey, I'm just as excited to see p Funk and those guys as I am to see you know whatever other things happening. Like you, you seem to have a wide open palate, which to me is very hip hop.

00:33:13
Speaker 2: Yeah. No, for me, take everything, It's always been like that for me, Like anything I'd love was never to the exclusion of anything else. Right, And no, it was not common at all, Like people I knew from each thing always did mostly didn't like the other thing. But for me, and it's kind of like what I spoke to earlier when I was a kid, Like when I saw my stepdad playing jazz and I got into his jazz records and I was mind blown by this level of musicianship. I still love the Beatles, and it was the same to me, like when if I listened to Charlie Parker and I listened to the Beatles, it was just music. Like I didn't. I never separated it out, and I feel so lucky for that and was always grateful for all of it. But I confess that it wasn't That's why I mentioned that Germs record. It wasn't really until right around then when I opened my mind enough to really see the beauty in that, you know what I mean. I knew there was something about it, like I'd go out to punk shows, but it was scary. It was violent, man. It was like ambulances out front, people getting beat up, the cops waiting with night sticks out in front of the show, come out bam, slamming on people. I remember being a forty five Grave show to Anti Club on Melrose. Literally walked out boom, cops on here with night sticks like run it, you know what I mean. Like it was just happened, like it became a threat. It was like there's gonna be riots, there's gonna be a problem. The cops were just outside the show waiting and uh. And also I'm within it too, like you had the wrong haircut, you ten guys stumping the shit out of somebody, like terrifying.

00:34:38
Speaker 1: See you only thought, okay, so for New York, that club would have been the Latin Quarter.

00:34:42
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:34:43
Speaker 1: And during this period, like, yeah, that is such a renaissance happening with one night you're hearing Boogie Down Productions, next night's Ault Magnetic next night. It's it's like literally your life is being changed week after week with a classic records, like you're hearing Rebel without a pause for the first time.

00:34:59
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:35:00
Speaker 1: But it's also like you might die tonight. Yeah, And I keep asking people to come on and still like so you knowing that you're risking your life just to get your mind blown by a four minute song and you might not sit. And they were like it was so worth it that dying wasn't even an option, Like you just felt so for you, it was.

00:35:19
Speaker 2: Just like had to go. I wanted to be where it was. You know, one of my favorite writers, Yukio Mishima, great great writer, and he you know, at this crazy ending in his life where he he was like revered as like the Shakespeare of Japan, like this great writer then it became like the severe hardcore right wing nationalist dude who like kind of gathered his own army together and they would march around, you know what I mean, like doing this thing. There's a great Schrader movie about him. I don't know if you ever saw it, called Michie mats Great. But at the end of his life he went and like took the head of the Japanese military hostage. It made him assemble the troops where he gave this big speech like Japan has to come back to you know, it's nationalist values. And then boom, Harry carried himself. It was on the news like it happened, and I think he killed the general guy, like they took the sword to him as followers like this crazy guy. I mean he really you know. But something he said, and it kind of speaks to the way he went out, is that there are very rare times in life when art and action come together, and when those things come together, it's everything. And I didn't know that at the time, but it was that feeling you're talking about, like you're going out to the music. There's physical danger, you know what I mean, for whatever the reason is, and you're alive man in that moment, you know, and it's when art and action it's like these two things for you.

00:36:45
Speaker 1: Is danger a necessary element?

00:36:50
Speaker 2: I don't know, Like in most situations, I think like that kind of danger where it's like people having fun. I was at a punk rock show a couple of weeks ago, like a kid I knew since he was born as a punk band. The mainliners went to see him play. You know, they're slamming, moshing like crazy troubadoor all a fight breaks out, like you got really at the Troubador at the troubadoor a punk show. Yeah, punk show, full on punk show.

00:37:15
Speaker 1: Goddamn, Okay, yeah they do it.

00:37:16
Speaker 2: They do it and fight breaks out and like it. And I'm like in the balcony above, like right right, they're like punching the fuck out of each other and like you feel like you see a few different groups kind of square off and like, oh, it could become way bigger and it didn't, but you know, security ran in. But but that feeling, I don't know. I mean usually for me, like when I was at the punk shows, like and I would to see Black Flag or Circle Jerks or different hardcore shows, and it would be really violent. Like there was this club in the star Wood in Hollywood. I live right down the corner from it, and I'd always try to get in. It was the whole thing. You either just like go to hang out in the parking lot or get in if you can, you know, and it would be so fun. But to me, honestly, like it felt ugly, like it didn't really feel like I was like because there was a lot of times there's like these jock kids, you know what I mean, Like they don't even you don't love this music. You don't like you're wearing your anarchy button? What is anarchy? What does that mean? You know what I mean? Like it's just another pissed off kid, Like you're a bully in school and now you're trying to do this bullshit here right, like you know what I mean. Like to me, like the music was all it's like, it's beautiful, Like I get the cop thing when that happened, that was really scary because I was like, you know that was riot police on horse with sticks.

00:38:36
Speaker 1: You know, what do you consider the bracket like if it started in seventy seven?

00:38:42
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, how was it.

00:38:43
Speaker 1: Safe to see?

00:38:44
Speaker 2: I feel like then in seventy seven it was it was way more safe like that was there was super arty and underground before. Yeah, this is after, like I'm saying because I'm late, right, I'm going like in nineteen eighty, nineteen eighty one, you know what I mean, And seventy seven it was like all these bands like I mentioned, like Weirdo, screamers, germs. There was like underground and it was people in the know, and it was really about like they're making their own clothes and they love Captain Beefheart and they love you know what I mean, Phyroh Sanders, they love all kinds of weird shit and they're just being weird, you know what I mean. Making like it was to them was like Artie and and yeah it was angry and I had that rhythm and the dancing was crazy and all that shit, But it wasn't like there wasn't that meanness to it. It was like later on, like around Black Flag time, it was like this the South Bay La this very it just got ugly and territorial. They were like there was gangs involved, you know, and like suicidal guys and stuff like suicidal tendencies. There was like you know, it was violent brass knuckles, and you know, I just like, like, not for.

00:39:50
Speaker 1: Me going there with the intent of stopping someone.

00:39:52
Speaker 2: Yeah, and that just I didn't like it. I think the element of what you're talking about, like that's fun and passion getting out of hand, gotcha, you know what I mean? Like, and I'm that I love but when it got like it just fell small and diminishing of the beauty of it.

00:40:07
Speaker 1: For artistic value, which band of that entire period would you just say the ultimate like there will never be.

00:40:19
Speaker 2: Like a punk rock the whole time from because it shifts?

00:40:22
Speaker 1: All right? Give me three just bands that like just you when they're in amazement you learned something or you so many? Were you going there for artistic value?

00:40:34
Speaker 2: Yes, far i'saw all I cared about. I wanted to hear like weird rhythms and different ideas and be excited.

00:40:40
Speaker 1: You know, who's the most intricate band?

00:40:43
Speaker 2: Fugazi? Okay, kind of later, but Fugazi?

00:40:46
Speaker 1: Who was the best like leader, like the front man.

00:40:53
Speaker 2: It's like I'm trying to really know what's really good questions like like like Black Flag was so great. I think of Greg ginn as being the leader, you know, what I mean. I think it was always he was the hub of this thing that everyone went around, you know, the guitar player, right man, I you know I loved the weirdos, love the weirdos, excitement, so many great songs. Yeah, the answer is it's very difficult for me to answer. I feel like I'm not doing well.

00:41:18
Speaker 1: All right, one more? Okay, what band should have made it? And I trust me as an artist, I know self sabotage and all that stuff. It's not just like oh we had a hit or or the right manager or whatever.

00:41:31
Speaker 2: But what band out of the puncture?

00:41:34
Speaker 1: Yeah, if there were justice in this world, like who would have been like primed for you bragged about him and they just couldn't.

00:41:42
Speaker 2: Yeah, just stay with the weirdos. So many I just don't think they got it right on tape, you know what I mean. They didn't get it right on tape. They had like everything like they were like you know, Blondie opened up for them, like it was like they were just they were so good and so entertaining and so original and so many good songs.

00:42:06
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, the trumpet, yes, sir? What was the straw that broke the Camel's back? That stopped you from stalling. Because the thing was when I was watching you play last night, yeah, I was like, wait, you know, I've read the book and I was like, well he has chops, Like this could have been a thing.

00:42:26
Speaker 2: Yeah, kind of wanted it to be a thing when I was a kid.

00:42:30
Speaker 1: As long as it's hiatus, isn't the time in between records? I know it's touring for two three years or whatever. But what were the steps that finally made you complete that circle? Yeah?

00:42:42
Speaker 2: Well I'm still working on a circle. But a big thing was I mean, it was just the dream had always been alive in me since I was a little boy, and I fell in love and to a point of not just in music, but like romanticizing my heroes. You know, Miles and Clifford Brown and Morgan's common law wife shot him on stage, like all these stories. Clifford Brown like getting in a car accident and dying when he's twenty three. I think, you know, these guys that were such heroes to me. And then you know, I start playing bass Chili Peppers ended up doing what they did and all this stuff, and occasionally I'd pick it up and play it a little bit, but I think it was just always something like once in a while, I'd kind of start with the intent of doing what I'm working on doing now, and I'd either get busy or I'd get I'd just stop whatever. I'd get frustrated, I didn't know how to go about it right. I would mess up my lip. And I think it's about a thing that really awakened it in me again was when Camasi put out his record to Epic, And for a long time I had been feeling jazz music. And I know that I'm wrong. I know I just didn't hear the right shit, but I had the stuff I had been hearing. It would be impressive, but it was kind of leaving me cold. You know. I wasn't filling the spirit of the records that I love from the fifties, sixties, even the early seventies, you know. And when I heard Kamasi's record, I was like, that's that feeling of the street, that revolutionary spirit, that spirituality, that togetherness that I want, you know, and it was really inspiring to me. And you know, Thundercat too, and I just I was like, man, I really you know, when I was a kid and my stepdad would have these guys over and they'd play standards and play bebop and throw down. It was always like, in my head, that's like the high point, and like my dream is to be able to sit in with any jazz dudes and just throw down on the horn, you know. And and when I started seeing these guys play and also in a way that wasn't elitist, like I think one of the things that I really relate to them about is they're embracing all of music. Like the jazz guys that I grew up with, they really look down on rock, they look down on pop music. You know. They were just like this, like they can't play this is about like haircuts and fashion, like they don't know the shit, they can't blow changes, you know. And then seeing this new generation that you can tell they embrace hip hop, they embrace youth culture. They it's all RELI it's all beautiful to them, yes, you know, And and there just really inspired me and it made me I was like, if I'm ever gonna do live that dream that I wanted to live, I gotta do it now. Like you know what I mean, I'm getting older and so I just you know, I'm pretty good at making commitments to myself and sticking at them. And I made a commitment like I'm going to play trumpet every day no matter what for two years. At the end of two years, I'm gonna to make a record plan trumpet.

00:45:34
Speaker 1: How many hours do you practice as much.

00:45:37
Speaker 2: As I can till my lift gives out? Like two?

00:45:39
Speaker 1: Okay, yeah you mentioned it. So like, what is the typical atmosphere at a Walter Urban junior living room? Jam sessions?

00:45:49
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's you know, so this is New York and like nineteen seventy okay, sixty nine seventy.

00:45:58
Speaker 1: In an apartment.

00:46:00
Speaker 2: No, no, house in Larchmont.

00:46:02
Speaker 1: Okay, I was going to say, like my first question was like, what are your neighbors saying? It was a nightmare on my neighbors.

00:46:08
Speaker 2: Okay, So house in Larchmont, New York, and people come over, my mom's made food, barbecue, going, food happening, were over, They're drinking, smoking weed, setting up, and then they just you know, Cherokee, let's go. You know that's fast. You know. I was going to says, yeah, no, they're serious. I mean, you know, as a little kid, you know what I mean, Like, I don't like if I saw them. Now, I don't really know, but as a little kid, they were the greatest musicians I ever saw in my life, and I I couldn't believe it, you know what I mean. It was just like the house filled up with music, and you know, you have those moments when you're a kid and it's like people can do that. And I, you know, I'd yet to play anything yet, and I was seeing them play this music and it was so wild, and it just seemed magical to me, like literally like magic, like Harry Potter's style, you know what I mean, I'm gonna make an owl appear, and you know what I mean, It was like that feeling. And I just remember everyone and it was open for me in a lot of ways too, like racially, you know what I mean. Like I hadn't really hung out with black people before, right and all. Now I'm a little kid and my stepdad's friends are mostly black, and all these guys are coming over and they're playing and I didn't like, adults were just weird to me, flat out, you know what I mean. And all of a sudden, there's these people and they're hanging with me, they're joking with me, they're talking to me. They're asked me, like, do you play an instrument? Do you want to play an instrument? Like they're like I existed, I was being seen and it was you know, all of it, Like it was just it was good, man. They were so healthy, so grateful for that.

00:48:04
Speaker 1: What non musical talent do you also possess?

00:48:08
Speaker 2: I had a pretty good jump shot. I have a pretty good jump. I'll a basketball, man, Yeah, I love it. I've always played, but I was never very good. I never really learned properly. Like I was like, you know, street ball growing up every day. But during the pandemic, I got a shooting coach, the lethal shooter. Yeah, yeah, man, yeah, and he came over and he was like, we're gonna get you right, and every day, every day shooting shooting, shooting. I learned proper form for the first time, and I'm always nurturing it, working on it and other skills. I don't know, I'm I mean, like you, I like writing a lot, you know what I mean, and sitting down and taking pen to paper and just the whole literature world for me is a huge part of my life. Like I said, I read every day, always studying writers and being transported by that, and so I don't I can't really speak of it as I guess it's a skill. But I just think of the things that I'm always working on, that I always care about, you know.

00:49:14
Speaker 1: I was going to say, especially with musicians and basketball and having toured with the Beastie Boys for good two years and whatnot, I see like games or whatever like then versus other at your most extreme physical state, would you often do pick up games with other artists. I'm only asking this because I finally after hearing all the folklore of Prince as a basketball player, like I've seen actual footage he can really playing. He was amazing. Wow, Like it has one of is the just the determination to he knows you're underestimating him. But literally just on some iverson like it will just come to a crowd of whatever, it'll go in.

00:50:01
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, yeah, wow.

00:50:02
Speaker 1: How serious were you?

00:50:03
Speaker 2: Like, I mean, I don't know, you have like a much No oh no, never, I mean on tour it's for me, it's like just touring itself take so much energy. But now I do you know, Like now I bring a ball everywhere I go and any day off, for any time, I just go to a park and shoot around. I just kind of get my head right, got yeah. But my highlight of my basketball career is they used to have that MTV Rocking Jock Rocket. I was on Rock and Jacket and I hit the shot to win the game with an assist from Mitch Richmond, and then I won the three point shoot off. I hit like eleven in a row or some ship, and that was my moment of glory. I've watched those yeh yeah, that was my moment of glory. But I'm better now since the lethal Shooter.

00:50:48
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, all right, yeah, got you tell me the process of bringing your band together for this specific project.

00:50:55
Speaker 2: Well, initially, when I was getting ready to make the record, I.

00:50:58
Speaker 1: And Ricky Washington Is Yeah, Ricky, yeah, Ricky.

00:51:02
Speaker 2: I was studying with Ricky. Ricky is Camassi's father who taught Kamasi and Thundercat Taris Martin. You know, yeah, yeah, that whole crew. Yeah yeah, yeah, that crew. Well, he and this guy Reggie Andrews.

00:51:13
Speaker 1: Too, Ressie Andrews from the Dazz band.

00:51:15
Speaker 2: Yeah, yes, yeah yeah, and he was at the music teacher at Locke High School. Okay, and you know it's a renowned you know teacher But anyways, I was making demos at home and I have an eight to oh eight some sinse you know, baking beats playing bass keyboys played trumpet melody over it, and it was sounding kind of cool and you know, real raw, but it had had a thing to it, and I was kind of thinking, I'll just do that. And I was kind of on the fence, like do I get musicians or not? And I was listening a lot to I met Jeff Parker because our kids were going to school together, the guitarist Jeff Parker, and uh, he put out a record called The Way Out of Easy with with that with this band with Anna Butter's and Jay Bellerose and Josh Johnson, and I really loved, like I'd love that record. And at the same time, kind of coincidentally, I was listening to Michelle and Digiocello the Omnichord Real Book. It's a great fucking album. Yeah, it's a great album.

00:52:15
Speaker 1: Man.

00:52:15
Speaker 2: You know you said that's a great album, right, And so I'm listening to that album and I really like Deantony's playing on that de Antony parks yes. And then and I'd met Josh Johnson before because I'm a last Chili Pepper record. We wanted to put some horns on a tune and my friend Nate Walcott knew him Josh trump bumperal named Victim. Nate played trumpet and we all came and I played. I was just starting to kind of it was one of those times I got the trumpe together for like a few weeks before I put it down again, and we all played together on the record, and I was really blown away by Josh, like his he blew a couple of solos for us that were so musical, like you know, someone just starts playing and you just like pay attention, Like it's that he was so good the way he worked with time and melody. And and then I was listening to Omnichord Real Book for like the tenth time, and I finally I saw produced by Josh Johnson, and I was like, oh damn, and that record is like well made. It's really holistically a good record. And so then I just like got to inklaying, Oh, I'm gonna play with other musicians. I'm gonna ask Josh to produce it. He knows these other musicians. I'm going to ask Like I had the people of mine. I'm like, I want de'antony, I want Jeff, I want Anna, and he came over and heard my stuff. I said, you think you know they would do it? And he asked them all they all said yes, and that was kind of it, you know, and I couldn't be more grateful, you know, Like when we showed up in the studio, I was definitely, you know, some hesitance on my part, just like, wow, they're such good jazz musicians and I don't know shit. You know, I'm working on it, but you know, they know how to try to touch hearts. And I had my structures and the shit that I had written, and we got together on the first day. I'd never played with anyone before, and from from the first downbeat, it just felt beautiful, like they're just all so sensitiven't connected, and we just you know, just improvising, playing, you know, playing like I had, like I'd played the demo and I was like, this is the vibe. If there's you know, certain chord changes or a melody, but mostly improvisation.

00:54:11
Speaker 1: How many takes of each song would you go through before you decided.

00:54:16
Speaker 2: Depended somewhere first take, somewhere like.

00:54:20
Speaker 1: Two or three, gotcha.

00:54:22
Speaker 2: Yeah, there might have been the I think where I struggled the most. Sometimes there are a couple of tunes and I don't think any of them actually on this record I made. I recorded a lot where I struggled with the trumpet a little bit, like I blow a solo and I'd be like, no, do it again. But you know what I mean, Like I kept, you know, being insecure about my trumpet playing and maybe overthinking it.

00:54:37
Speaker 1: Were you allowed to punch in or.

00:54:39
Speaker 2: Well, you know, I played bass show, I'd overdubbed my trumpet.

00:54:43
Speaker 1: Okay. Yeah.

00:54:43
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:54:44
Speaker 1: Another collaborative of yours that's on this album is Tom Yorke. Yeah, I've seen you guys do shows together. Now, talk about how that relationship started, like how did you.

00:54:55
Speaker 2: We just became friends, going to each other's show and meeting, and he.

00:55:02
Speaker 1: Would come to Chili Beverer.

00:55:03
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I know, believe it or not, New York.

00:55:06
Speaker 1: He's just like us.

00:55:08
Speaker 2: Yeah. No, he was into it. You know, he was into it, and he would come and hang out and talk, and you know, I think there was something about it that, as he going into all different kinds of music, he saw that he thought was beautiful and then he made that record, The Eraser, and I love that album. It's a great album, and I told him so. And then he was getting ready to do a tour for it, and he called me and asked me to.

00:55:33
Speaker 1: Play, you know, and so that's how it came to be.

00:55:37
Speaker 2: Yeah, so that's how it came to be. And then we ended up making you know that album after and touring, doing like two different tours through the States and Europe, and yeah, just built a friends, two of those.

00:55:48
Speaker 1: I want to see more of that.

00:55:49
Speaker 2: Yeah, super fun.

00:55:51
Speaker 1: Which person in your life keeps you in check?

00:55:56
Speaker 2: My wife of course? Time?

00:55:59
Speaker 1: Wait exactly, I mean I totally forgot that I know her.

00:56:02
Speaker 2: I'm like, I mean, you know Mel before I know Mal. I know a part of Mel that I don't even know because I just know with me Mal, dude, like you know Mal from before.

00:56:10
Speaker 1: I couldnot be happier that more that two people have found each other, and especially with her, like you know, because a lot of us tend to reach the end of our rope and give up on you know, like she was almost at that place. And when she she kept you secret for like a year.

00:56:31
Speaker 2: You know, It's funny. Well I met her and I was at the end of my rope. Like I was like, I'm gonna suffer and have pain. That's it, ruin it and I'm not worthy and I'm you know what I mean and anything. And I was just like and I make this woman and she's just, you know, this glowing thing. But when I first met her, you know, we got together and romance ensued and I was just head over heels and above and you know, and early on, like right after met her, I got her. There's a Melina Matsukus director and Lena Wait, the writer and actor. Milina's making this movie and Lena making this movie called Queen Slim. I got the script in the mail, and you know, my agent, these people are interested in you acting in this film. I readscript. I'm like, wow, this is an important movie. I would love to be a part of this. And you know, just right when I first started seeing mail, and she comes over and I'm like, talking to you, I got the script in the mail. Looks really cool and she's like, oh, oh shit, when are you meeting with them? And I was like tomorrow and she's like, do not, Like that's my best friend, Like it's her people, you know, what I mean, her best friends, and she's like, do not mention Malina. Can't you know what I mean, She's gonna tell everybody. I don't want anyone to know. Don't tell anyone, Like, we gotta keep this, We got to protect this and keep it quiet, you know. So I went like, you know, I sitting there with Molina and like you know when you go to a movie audition all if you've ever done it, it's like it's nerve wracking. It's like the only time, like music, you don't only do that, Like you walk into the room, You're like, am I good enough? Like do I look right? Am? I am? I? Do I have a witty repartee? You know what I mean? Like I got tons up every time? Right? And this is how I'm thinking. I'm like, you know, I'm sleeping with your best friend. Like in my head, it was so so funny. Yeah, So, just in terms of her not telling anybody, if.

00:58:16
Speaker 1: Mel possesses this gift, when she laughs, Mel has for and I think it's for me only. Yeah, Mel has a laugh similar to Nelson on The Simpsons.

00:58:32
Speaker 2: And I never together.

00:58:34
Speaker 1: It triggers me. Now you're doing it. Wait? Wait, so when I.

00:58:38
Speaker 2: Hear you picturing her.

00:58:39
Speaker 1: It's so true.

00:58:40
Speaker 2: I never clocked it.

00:58:41
Speaker 1: When I hear that laugh, it instantly takes me to second grade, when, like I think in second grade was the one year in which I was the only boy in a school with seventeen girls. Yeah, so if anything I would trip or something whenever like that, like it would just trigger me. And I asked the asked her once. I was like, is that your natural laugh? Or like do you have another laugh you could do? And you could do for me because and then once I let the cat out of the bag that you laughed just like the girls in second grade? Yeah, And I was like, I know that's and then she really let her on. So when she comes to game nights or whatever, it's like I was like, stop that, okay, fine. I also want to talk about plea because here's the thing. We live in a time in which I know it's expected for artists to art, you know, and whatnot, and oftentimes, like I could tell who's like, all right, I'm gonna come up with the anthem, Like everyone dreams of that whole Like I want to teach, and then an anthem gets chosen that you don't like, no one saw Kendrick Lamar's alright, as like, okay, this is our official anthem because everyone else had the stand up at fight or like they had their anthems slogan right, and the thing A plea kind of snuck on me and I love the energy that it gives. So, like cand you talk about just the process and the decision to really kind of capture the angst that some of us feel.

01:00:17
Speaker 2: Yeah, I can't really say that I had a decision in that way. I was just saying how I felt, right.

01:00:25
Speaker 1: No, No, it felt very organic.

01:00:26
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's just organic. I thought it was just and I think you know, it started off like kind of every song it has vocal on my record. I had never intended for there to be a vocal, okay, And it started off there's this and you know the Fool Sanders record Black Unity. Yes, so I wanted to do something like that, Okay, Like I was very inspired by that sign of Cecil McBee and Stanley Clark double bass like throwing down. And but then when we got in started playing, it just felt more kind of more organized than the Faro Sanders tune and we're playing I did it, and then I just like had this. I just had this idea of having different sections that shifted from like an anger and a resolution, you know what I mean, or you know, the tension and release that we always want on the arc of a story. And I started thinking about, like, you know, the worst case in the scenario and everything that's happening is like civil war, right, Like that's like the worst case scenario of the divisiveness that's happening. And I started and I started thinking about, like what is this and what's the best outcome? You know what I mean? Is the thing like we're all all striving for is peace and harmony and togetherness, you know. So I and at the same time feeling you know, you go on online on Instagram or whatever, and it's just constant, like someone makes a political stand about something, you know, and it might be a right, something I agree with someone's I don't view whatever it is, but it's always you're preaching to the converted or you're saying fuck the converted, you know what I mean, And it's just back and forth. It goes nowhere. And even though the people I agree with, you know, on occasion, can be heartwarming, you know, But when I say, like on the songs like I don't care about your politics. I don't want to hear about your fucking politics. It's not like like I care deeply about the issues, you know what I mean, It's issues that mean everything to me. But I just like the way that the forum has evolved is just into this bickering thing that feels like to me only enhances divisiveness. And I just I don't know. It was just everything about it was so you know, wanting to do it in like, you know, kind of different sections, but just like just sprawled it out and did it, you know, just wanting to be organic to how I feel to express myself. I didn't there was nothing beyond that.

01:02:53
Speaker 1: I would be remiss if I don't ask this question for bass heads out there. Yeah, what are your three most treasured bases? How many bases do you own? You know, I'm trying to get rid of them because they're too many stories Union time.

01:03:17
Speaker 2: Yeah, they're in the house, but it's like it's dumb, you know what I mean, Like twenty basses or something. It's still it's a lot. And yeah, but it's I need one, you know what I mean. I don't play a five string. I play a regular four string bass. I mean my main, my real baby, my main one is a sixty one Fender Jazz based beautiful place like Butter played it yesterday, And then I have another.

01:03:43
Speaker 1: Is that what you've always used on?

01:03:45
Speaker 2: I get I'm using it since like twenty years ago. Someone gave it to me in a Tower Records parking lot, just gave it to me. Yeah, And it's a beautiful fucking base. And what's a butler the money to really? Yeah? Yeah, No, it's like early days of Twitter, and I got on there and I'll like high question love you know.

01:04:01
Speaker 1: Yeah.

01:04:01
Speaker 2: But I had kind of finally figured out that I liked old Fender bases, like I always just kind of played whatever like new bases, and always had this attitude about instruments that the instrument means nothing. It's all in the fingers in your mind, like that you know your motivation, your intent, that thing I was talking about. And then but it kind of dawned on me like the longer a thing hasn't been a tree and it's been a base, it really takes on a feeling of its own. And I started playing some old Fender bases that were beautiful, and I just wanted to get one, didn't have one, and I wrote on Twitter, I want to get one. Some guy wrote me, you know, meet me at the Tower Records parking lot on Wednesday at two o'clock.

01:04:39
Speaker 1: I could have sworn you were a Fender guy.

01:04:41
Speaker 2: No, it was because you're twenty years ago.

01:04:44
Speaker 1: Okay, so yeah, I know you know if you're a slab method but also like you you you're Jamison game.

01:04:49
Speaker 2: Is one point one into it.

01:04:51
Speaker 1: Man, I always thought you were a Fender guy on.

01:04:53
Speaker 2: An occasion, but I was kind of like whatever, whatever I had, you know, got but that one. And then one time Damien Hurst said to me, what's the best bass ever made? You know whatever? Just in conversation. I was like, sixty one jazz like this, that's not a question. It's the greatest electric bass ever made. And he was like, oh wow, that's cost interesting. And like a year later I'm playing in London, He's like, flee, I got something for you. Come over. I don't know if that and you know he makes those butterfly paintings. Yeah, he made me a butterfly bass, a Fender sixty one covered in the most beautiful butterflies, Like it's this gorgeous thing man a mirror. It's so beautiful and he gave that to me, a gifted debt to me, and yeah, super nice. So both of my.

01:05:33
Speaker 1: Are there artifacts based that you collected like blah blah blah played this bass on?

01:05:40
Speaker 2: No, No, I don't really have like historically important basis, but those two which are both the same kind of bass. And then you know my son in law, Wileie Gelber, he makes instruments and has gifted me two basses that he made by hand, and it's just I have a lot of love in him and I really love those basis too.

01:06:00
Speaker 1: You sid sun in law, And instantly I was like going into my head and I was like, in my mind, your daughter is still the three year old that you think the MTV Awards.

01:06:11
Speaker 2: She's thirty seven.

01:06:12
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was also like it was like thirty years ago.

01:06:14
Speaker 2: Yeah, and she if she saw the video for a place she directed that did that whole thing.

01:06:18
Speaker 1: Nice.

01:06:18
Speaker 2: Yeah, she's a great kick. Thirty seven.

01:06:22
Speaker 1: What regular chores household domestic chores? What one chore do you loathe doing?

01:06:31
Speaker 2: Cleaning up dog shit? You have dogs when they.

01:06:38
Speaker 1: Just recently became a dog dead and uh yeah, it's territorial, literally territorial.

01:06:46
Speaker 2: Finding really good. Actually switched to food and it stopped happening. But it's just like when you wake up in the morning and like you somewhere and it's like pissing ship on the floor and a nice rug and you're just like, dude, the fucking you down on hands and knees. I've been trying to get.

01:07:00
Speaker 1: The smell ouloon.

01:07:02
Speaker 2: The rug is fucked, you know. And also it's like with mel like she was never a dog person before me, you know, she never ever and I'm like, before she got the ee of dogs in the bed, you know, dogs in the room, and she is just like uh.

01:07:15
Speaker 1: Uh, like no way, I'm meiling this situation.

01:07:17
Speaker 2: Yeah, so she's like, yeah, I wake up, I get up in the morn and she just be sitting there like the dog's pooked enough rug and like and just looking at me like deal with it.

01:07:26
Speaker 1: I mean like I'm meiling this situation. Yeah yeah, okay, okay, maybe I'm asking for my own benefit. How did you guys And it's not like I will say that he had the keys of the kingdom because you guys were headed there even during the mother's milk period. How did you guys manage to let Rick Rubin get you out of your own way to get to the place where you needed to get Because again, there's so many powerful bands that when that moment happens, they'll sabotage it and won't go there.

01:08:04
Speaker 2: How did you and I know musicians I don't want to say names, but we'll sabotage that every time out of some kind of insecurity.

01:08:11
Speaker 1: This is probably the first record, our seventeenth record I will consider our first real album because I'm the amount of times where I've X needed something because it might work, or they'll think we're sellout or are you thinking about someone judging you or something like, you'll sabotage it. How did you guys manage.

01:08:30
Speaker 2: To You know, we had been humbled many times by things not coming out the way we wanted them, and we had actually met with Rick before we made not Freaky Styd. But I think our third record, Uplift Mophole Party Plan right, we met with Rick and we were in a rehearsal studio. He showed up with the Beastie Boys came in and they were all like picking up our shit and playing it and We're like and everyone just thought, oh no, these guys like they're arrogant, they think they know everything, you know, Rick, and no one wanted to work with them. But he also like there was a lot of heroin going on in our band at the time, in fighting all this shit. We were not in a good energetic place. It wasn't long you know before HELLEL died got but anyway, so he came in and it didn't work out, like he was just like he said it was like later on he told me, man, the vibe was so bad, Like I didn't even realize how bad it was, but he was like, it felt like death.

01:09:22
Speaker 1: In that room.

01:09:23
Speaker 2: And I was like, okay, you know, damn you know what I mean, Like didn't even really clock it myself. I was just trying to make it through and do something. But by the time he came around again, you know, we had done our first tour with John. We made Mother's Milk and things were very optimistic. We were playing our asses off like things had gotten difficult before that. You know. Helll was kind of in and out of drug problems, and he left, came back. We hired Blackbird McKnight for a while. Didn't work out Hellell came back, he died, and then we get John. We get this kid, this hot shot kid, and who's just like, we'll do anything to be a good musician, like a most driven musician I've ever met in my little life.

01:10:09
Speaker 1: And how is word getting out that you like? Was this the days of you read I met backstage or you put an add out or something.

01:10:15
Speaker 2: No. I met John through Dh Poligro, who was the drummer in the Dead Kennedy's, who was a very close friend of mine. We passed away Rip a couple of years ago, and Dh said, I know this kid, he's just awesomelest jam got together and jammed, and I remember in that jam, it was the first time I ever went. I started going doing good, God doing Good, the higher ground thing I just as part of a jam, and oh wow, that'd be a good cover. But met John and then I can't but I think, you know, we hired BlackBerry and it just wasn't the chemistry wasn't working out. And then I had this thing I'd recorded at home on my FoST text four track. I was like, let me just see what this kid would do. And he came over and you know, sat with me started and it was like damn, you know what I mean, like right in the pocket, like good everything I could have wanted. I remember calling Anthony, who was in Michigan drying out, you know he was before he got sober. He was like on a dry out, you know, to get it together. I was like, I just played with this kid. The kid is you know, it's serious. I think he's our guy. And he came back some John was playing in his Bancelonia spons to our friends. Anyways, we get John, We're doing really good. We did Made Mother's Milk. We go on tour and we really reached a peak like playing we did, Like right at the end of the tour, we played in La the Greek Theater. Rick came saw the show and it was just chemistry was just right, like we were at our peak. He was blown away. Our energy was real good and he was like, let's make a record together, and we got together. There was never anything that he said it was like changing us in a way that felt uncomfortable. He was like, every time you guys make a record, you get in a studio and you change what you do. It's not like what I hear in this room, you know, what I mean. It always becomes like this sounds triggering others sounds and too much compression, overthinking, like over and he was like, I just want to like the way you guys sound when you jam free in the room, the warmth of it, and the invention and all the stuff, like the funkiness. He's like, all we got to do is like get in a room, get sounds, put up mics, and do it. And then he started having really good ideas about arrangements and stuff, like we'd play songs and he would be like, you know, cut the outro. Can you do it in a key lower? You know, it'd be better for Anthony's voice or whatever it was. And he was like, all I ask of you is that you at least try every idea I have. We don't have to do it, but try it with an open mind. And we just took to it and did it and it was working, you know what I mean. It just felt like magic. Every day we rehearsed for that record. We played for like a year before we went in the studio, right, played like five days a week. Every day. I remember going home thinking like, got something good new happened today. It was like be like a bridge, like the bridge for the song Blood Sugar or something like always someone was coming with some little idea. And also we spent more than half the time just jamming. Like there's one point like we were just we'd come in, just set up and just jam free for at least an hour before we even worked on a song. And it was just like and great all the time, ideas off the time just disappearing into me that well we did that, we did that, And so we were so in a place of playing together. And also I think like when John first joined us on Mother's Milk, he was trying to fit in, you know what I mean. And he was clearly like a you know, stunning talent, but he hadn't really, i think, trusted himself yet to just go be himself and be free, you know what I mean. He was still wanting to fit into what we had gone and then when he started, like by Blood Sugar, trying to be himself, he was bringing us shit that we never had before.

01:13:44
Speaker 1: Okay, So, as the director of the S and L Music Dot, yeah, I couldn't get you for the interview, and you know that I wanted to talk to you about fear and all that other stuff, but the one thing that people like wanted meet it. I was just asking the most simple way possible. Yeah. Yeah, ten minutes after one minute after your performance of under the Bridge, which is legendarily talked about, so fucked up? What happened backstage?

01:14:16
Speaker 2: I can't remember what happened backstage. I remember the state of the band. I'm sure it wasn't pleasant. The state of the band going into it was not good. It was right, you know, before John quit, right he you know, we had had this huge success, like our first really huge, like.

01:14:34
Speaker 1: Yeah, this is this is the moment up on the top pop charts. Yes, you've blown thegyes is this is the time.

01:14:41
Speaker 2: And I think we were just a mess. You know, we were all going in different directions. John was like anti rock star. He's like, I do not like being famous. I do not like being in a famous rock band, and I do not like you, you know what I mean. He was not happy with me, He was not happy with Anthony. And the song itself was a song, you know, it was very new for Anthony to be singing a ballad like that, and he was like, I think he asked John before we did the song to you know, give me the tone, you know what I mean before so I could just have it in my head and I think John didn't do it. And then when it came time to sing the background vocals, he just you know, yeah.

01:15:23
Speaker 1: He went rogue. Yeah, he went for people that don't basically you know, the the end of the song where you're supposed to sing the background, he just rages and screams.

01:15:35
Speaker 2: Yeah. He wasn't gonna. He just was like anti.

01:15:39
Speaker 1: I didn't know the history behind it. Yeah, so watch him for the first time. I was like, oh, he's this intense version of it.

01:15:44
Speaker 2: Yeah. So no, Well he quit right after that, and he was just we had made this record, and when we got on a tour he for a variety of reasons, which I don't you know what I mean. I can't speak for him, but he was, without doubt, very disillusioned with everything about it and had really kind of separated himself. And I was also like, I was going through a period I don't know what of extreme anxiety and unhappiness and sleeplessness, gotten divorced. I just wasn't doing good, man. I remember like I felt so bad in sleep. I was like, I look like shit. I remember, like I had like this, like you know, you put a face mask on and I was like hiding. I covered my face in a face mask, I think, and like you know what I mean, Like it was just this we were just a mess everyone. I think Anthony was like, you know, so excited that we were doing so well. We got Sad Night Live, we having a record, and he was like, what the fuck is the matter with you guys? Like we got everything we ever wanted, and he sees me like crawling into my shell. He sees John being completely anti and he was just you know what I mean. And I can't remember afterwards, but there was probably some screaming and yelling and unhappiness and yeah, it was like, you know, man as our band, like as times if we've had like complete light and riding this wave of like love and togetherness, we've gone the other way too, you know what I mean. And it's like you were talking earlier about us huddling together, like it's not always you know, it's always close, but it's not always like we're not always expressing or your human fondness. Yeah, but I'm not. I think, like the one when you asked me whatever I said, I probably in that moment we were actually being like, whoa, this is beautiful, Like.

01:17:25
Speaker 1: Oh, you have enough to convince me, and.

01:17:27
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, I wouldn't lie. I wouldn't lie about it, you know what I mean. But there's many times where it's just like someone expressing, you know, displeasure.

01:17:35
Speaker 1: All right, my last three questions. Jeez, if you could go back to the age of ten in nineteen seventy two for one hour with a brain and monology you have, now, what would you do?

01:17:47
Speaker 2: Go back and I can speak to myself or go back and.

01:17:49
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'll allow you to speak to yourself.

01:17:51
Speaker 2: Yes, yeah, I just like one, believe in yourself, trust your instinct, trust your love, focus on that music, do the work, don't you know? Stay off the pipe?

01:18:05
Speaker 1: Okay, yes, okay.

01:18:07
Speaker 2: I was with Chris Rock. We were at a Laker game and Chris go is like, your kids run up to him photographs and stuff. It's like in the nineties, and he was like, give a kid. It's like sweet, look, give audio. Stay off the pipe. That's very very funny.

01:18:24
Speaker 1: All right, what song do you absolutely love that everyone is indifferent about our hates or what's the embarrassing I.

01:18:37
Speaker 2: Mean, I'm not embarrassed about.

01:18:39
Speaker 1: Any of it still away or like.

01:18:45
Speaker 2: I can't only think of anything because there's always someone that loves it. But there's one thing that, like, my friends used to really give me ship for loving hit me, which was and I wish I remember the name of a song. It was Hoody and the Blowfish and it might have been their first big hit. And I can't even.

01:18:58
Speaker 1: Think I want to be with you or hold my hand.

01:19:00
Speaker 2: I think it was I only want to be with you, okay, Yeah, And I loved it. I was just like it made me feel good, and everyone was just like, what the fuck does the matter with you?

01:19:09
Speaker 1: You know?

01:19:10
Speaker 2: And Culture Club? I used to like Culture Club, but I remember people are making fun of me for that too. Oh yeah yeah in my world, man, it wasn't cool. I was like, it's good.

01:19:18
Speaker 1: Yeah, those are great songs. We gotta get boy Georgia on the show.

01:19:21
Speaker 2: Yeah, boy George get him.

01:19:23
Speaker 1: Yeah, all right. My last question, what is the most difficult part of your job that no one ever gets to see?

01:19:32
Speaker 2: Managing time and work, being relentlessly diligent about doing the work to the sacrifice of other parts of my life. Being on tour, like people have this ridiculous fantasy that it's just like this glamour, it's like rockstar glamour, and it's like, you know, sitting alone in a hotel room, my ears ringing, thinking, Okay, nurture myself, be ready for the next show. Like that's the hard part, you know, Yeah, all.

01:20:04
Speaker 1: Right, it's actually one point five because the thing is you're also an athlete on stage, and there's this expectation. Oh yeah, you're going to be flexible. That's all part of.

01:20:13
Speaker 2: It, you know what I mean, Like nearly, like do.

01:20:15
Speaker 1: You rue the day? Like right now, Bootsy Collins is not picking up a base because it's beck just can't take it anymore.

01:20:22
Speaker 2: Well, I do everything I can to take care of myself physically, and I you know, pretty much every Chili Pepper show, I push myself to abject exhaustion to like I'm just done. I got nothing left at the end. But you know, I want to give it to the people, Like I just feel like this is my job, Like if I'm going to do it, it's always been all or nothing for me. It's like give it everything you got, or you know, be in miss the middle of the road player fucked.

01:20:49
Speaker 1: Up as a new artist. Yeah, I think you're going to make it.

01:20:54
Speaker 2: I got a piece so bad and I appreciate it.

01:20:56
Speaker 1: This is it, I get it.

01:20:59
Speaker 2: Thank you. I'll you read that all right.

01:21:01
Speaker 1: It's Quest Love Show evers Flee Thank You. Quest Love Show is hosted by me a Mere Quest Love Thompson. Executive producers are Sean g Brian Calhoun and Me. Produced by Britney Benjamin and Jake Paine. Produced for iHeart by Noel Brown, Edited by Alex Convoy. iHeart Video support by Mark Canton, Logos Graphics and animation by Nick Lowe. Additional support by Lance Colpan. Special thanks to Kathy Brown. Special thanks to Sugar Steve Mandel. Please subscribe, break review, and share The Quest Love Show wherever you stream your podcast, make sure you follow us on socials. That's at q LS. Check out hundreds and hundreds of QLs episodes, including the Quest Love Supreme Shows and our podcast archives. Quest Love Show is a production of iHeartRadio