Transcript for #887 - James Hetfield

I don't know much about moose.

I got you. No, and then other people start writing your songs. That's I think the ultimate kind of, uh, not giving up, but you've lost your way.

We're super competitive people. We're really perfectionists and we hate to let each other down. There's always a better riff coming. There's always a better album. Maybe there's the never satisfied part to us that will keep us going till we die. There's always the ultimate lyric that's going to connect to everyone in the world or something. There is always a better something that we haven't got yet.

Awesome to hear. Well, that's why we do it too. We write music. We write music. We record music that we want to hear because we're not hearing it out there sometimes. So, and that's how it's been since day one. And, you know, as you We're pretty honest in our music, too. So I love the fact that from album one to here, we're doing it our way, and we're writing songs for ourselves. And that there's an honesty that has to be in it, or people can see people can see that shit.

Yeah, the thing that bugs me a lot is when people say, okay, now that you're now that you're sober or now that you're matured, now all this and you've worked out all your demons and things like that, that your music's going to be all soft and flowery. and I tell you, if I could exercise all those demons, I would have, but it's just something you embrace. It's a part of me, and I get to celebrate it in my music. I get to communicate it, I get to use it as a therapy to help my own insanity and other people do too. So when you get those like-minded people together in a place and play live, music does something to people. Like you and the gym, I get to watch people at our shows transform from God. I just took my tie off or I still have my friggin' briefcase, you know, like handcuffed to me. I want out of this and I get to let loose. And I get to see these people transform and watch music do stuff to them.

You know, it's pretty misleading tickets. It's much more funny. Well, that's the best place, like, you know, for Lars and I to listen to the music when we're putting it together, You know, does it make the car test? You know, that, that, because you're yourself in your car, if no one else is in there, you're, you get to celebrate and listen and just go friggin' nuts in your car. And that's, that past the car test, you know.

Especially here in LA, especially here in LA.

Yeah, yeah. Well, you live in these places. Hopefully we save people from road rage. The kids just headbang and send us a lot of people.

Where do you live these days? I live in Vale, Colorado.

It's very cool. It's quiet. No friggin traffic. And especially now super quiet snow. snow does does something to calm me down a little bit.

Well, I like, you know, there's a, there's a, there's a lone wolf part of me that I, I, maybe you can relate to, but I like being by myself, but I also like, I need people to, to connect with as well. But when I get out, you know, living and veil, moving from California to Colorado was a, was a great thing for me. I feel really, Oh, I feel a part of nature there. Um, and you don't want to be inside there. There's something about it. You just want to be outside all the time. What's so beautiful.

Yeah, no doubt we get to look at the Gore range right out our mountain and I've drank plenty of cool lights in my life and that's the one on the can like wow I'm looking at it and lots of 14ers there lots of great you know lots of great snowmobile and wrapped in you know paddle board and you name it it's a 14er 14 thousand feet Peaks. Oh, 14,000.

Yeah. Or, you know, what made you move out there?

Yeah. There's probably a multitude of things that made it happen. My wife grew up there. She was born in Argentina. They moved to Veil. She went to elementary school there. You know, we were going to Tahoe a lot to do skiing and stuff like that. She said, you got to, we got to go to Vail. This is, this is not snow. We'll go to Vail and feel snow. And we went there a few times and I loved it. I'm not a huge skier, but I can ski and I have fun doing it. My kids love it. And so that, my wife turns into a kid when we go there, which I kind of like. It's a little more like me. You know. She can be a little, you know, a little too on point and a little, you know, she's she's she's she loosens up and she becomes young again there. So there's that. kind of got sick of the Bay Area, the attitudes of people there, a little bit. I was, you know, they talk about how diverse they are and things like that and, you know, it's fine if you're diverse like them, you know, but, you know, showing up with a deer on the bumper doesn't fly in Marin County. You know, my or my form of eating organic doesn't vibe with theirs.

Yeah, you know, it's something I felt. Uh, I probably made it up on my head a little bit. Yeah. Cause I'm pretty good at that. Pretty creative. And I can start fights with myself in my head all the time.

Oh, yeah. But, but there was there was just a, I don't know, I felt that there was an elitist attitude there that if you weren't their way politically, their way, you know, environmentally, all of that that, you know, you were looked down upon. I think in Colorado, everyone is very natural. People are not playing some game. They're not posturing. You know, they're very into, oh, you like doing that? Cool. How's that go? How are you doing with that? You know, and they're less, They're less obsessed with stopping what you're doing and more enjoying what they're doing.

Well, I just think I feel more at home in Midwest or the mountains or something. I mean, I love the ocean. And I love the Bay Area. I love what it's got to offer. But there's just an attitude that it was, it wasn't healthy for me starting to feel like I was just fighting all the time. And I just had to get out of my own head. So Colorado does it for me.

I kind of just took it as, okay, that's how it's been for me in the Bay Area. People don't understand it. And it's just like with anything. I don't think they understand that someone can be as passionate about something else, as passionate as they are about what they are, passionate about. So if you're as passionate about something, there's someone who's the opposite. And that's okay. You can get along. You can talk about it. No one's right. No one's wrong. This is my life. I like living it this way. You like living your life that way. I totally get it. But we can coexist in this and let's really be diverse. You know, for me, going out, whether it's planning my own vegetables, having, you know, my own beehives getting our own honey, harvesting my own meat on the ranch. That's what I love doing. I love sustaining my family with this organic as possible. And, you know, I respect people that don't want the blood. They don't want all that scene. They would rather see their meat or whatever it is show up in a nice cellophane package and it's handed to them. They don't want to know how it got there. I respect that. My kids are like that. They don't want to see it going on. But I want to be as close to the earth. I want to be as part of it as possible. I want to be part of every bit of it and respect it.

Well, I guess I'm more old school. I don't know whatever it is. You know, I think the Bay Area prides itself. And I'm glad there is a place that prides itself on being progressive, very moving forward. Hey, we're creating the future here. And I love the convenience and stuff of that. But then there's a part of me that just maybe is like frontier style. I just love that. I would rather be simple.

Very true. Very true. You know, what about me? I want me time. You know, chill time. Pulling me all these different ways and stuff. Certainly not complaining. That's what I choose to do. But I also choose this too.

Probably only maybe four years.

Start with one. I'll actually start with two. Really? No. They're not like rabbits, but they do produce quite quickly. You know, my dad raised bees. I just, we always saw boxes out in the corner of the house. You know, we grew up in L.A. here and, you know, the weather's so great. So there's, you know, lots of Pactivity. That's the bummer about being in Vale now. Not a lot of not a lot of B action going on. It's too high. It's too cold. Right. And, you know, certain vegetables grow there, but not a lot. But in California, the ranch love, I love it. I got a friend who in his backyard, he probably had six hives and he had this one really intense kind of rogue hive where Maybe the queen had some kind of strain of African eyes or something. And her wife could not, his wife could not go out in the backyard without being attacked. You know, whoa. So he says, hey, can I go put my bees on your property so they can cycle this queen out? You know, they got some breeding in it was just off. Jesus Christ. So. He brought it out to the ranch. He pinched the bee and then pinched the queen. Pinched it? What do you mean? Killed it.

You didn't have to shoot it or nothing.

Well, I just pinched it because she was reproducing. I mean, they lay like a million eggs in their lives. It's insane that I I basically I could sit here and talk a whole hour about these because they're so interesting. Let's do it. All right. Well, I'm the listener.

So, yeah, put a new queen in there and they, you know, cycled through all of the other bees. I mean, they only live a month.

Yeah.

Oh, yeah. No, this wasn't me. This was my friend's wife. Oh, that's right. I'm sorry. Yeah, I mean, he, he's kind of used to it and she was not. She was out to go.

Yeah, pretty much. And there's certain things if you were in black, they'll attack you. You know, almost, they think you're a bear. You know, what? Yeah. Uh, if you like, just eaten bananas, there's some, there's some, I don't know a smell or something in it that is similar to their attack thermone that they set off. So there's a few things I've learned over the years.

Exactly. That's all you gotta do. But I learned this stuff being in the bee club. I was in the bee club. Yeah, in the Bay Area. Yeah, we'd meet down at the American Legion's Paul and have a monthly meeting. Wow. What are those dorks like? to be. Oh my god. We would just sit there and kind of laugh about them. But we're sitting there. I mean, we're here to learn some stuff, but there were people up there. Okay. We insminated the queen with this and, you know, there were counting bees. You know, we put little numbers on every bee and we've caught their flight pattern and how many were reproducing this? And I mean, it's all You know, it's all like they're they're doing research on how to make the B stronger because the B's are, you know, going away. Right. But, you know, it's this might this little of a row of might that's killing a lot of them too, along with the pesticides and herbicides. But, you know, people that are so into it and we're just going to sit there going home. Man, what have we got ourselves into, but it's kind of, you know, it's funny in a certain way, but I'm glad that it's happening. But, you know, I get, you know, at the end of the season, you've got like 500 pounds of honey and you're handing them out to your friends and everyone's loving it.

And we're bottling it up. My kids are filtering it. We're, you know, bottling it up. And it's due. It's just straight from the hive into a bottle. I mean, after you filtered it, and it really helps with allergies. It helps with, you know, the, whatever getting the pollen's and the, and the, and the nectar's from the area. So when you take that in and it helps build your immune system.

Absolutely. And I think being stung by bees helps you do. It helps with something getting your immune system built up to this.

Right. I think there's some people that do it for their lips here in LA.

But I tell you, those freak bees that Africanize or whatever, now there's a zombie bee and we can get into that too. But they are aggressive and an aggressive, you know, it's like any society, they do well. They get most, they produce a lot of honey and they, they're very, very prolific in what they do, you know?

Well, yeah, you know that and the, uh... Gosh, what's this stuff called? I mean, there's lots of really cool healing properties and like even the, the kind of glue that they use to plug up holes and you know, the royal jelly which is, you know, comes from there like the brain and that's how they produce a queen. I mean, there's a royal jelly is. Yeah. Yeah.

What do they have to scoop it out of their fucking heads? I haven't seen it that close, but, you know, they injected into the, they injected into the queen cell, or there's a cell that they make when a new queen is being made. So all the bees that are flying around that you see out here, you know, they're all females. It's a, it's all females society. So the drones that are in there, which are the males, they're just to reproduce and then they get kicked out in the wintertime. And then they all die. Yeah. Whoa. Yeah, man. It's hard outside. It's brutal brutal for us men in the B world.

Well, there's some, I guess, that couples stay okay. They, they, the queen makes more.

Yeah. Yeah. And they're just doing work. They're just they're just fertilizing. That's what they're doing.

Yeah. Well, they're, they're all females, they're all females, except for those drones. And then, you know, if there's, if they're making, you know, she knows she's going to die or they're, they're kind of pissed off or they're, she's not reproducing as much as she should. She will take off with half the hive and that's why you see a swarm. So she'll go inform a new hive and then these ones have a little queen cell that they've laid eggs and start to make a new queen. So that's how they reproduce. And if there's three or four queen cells in there, the first queen that's born, she comes out and she kills all the other queens.

I'm right now.

taste so good and we've got you know we we we have a place in Hawaii so we've got Hawaiian flavors Hawaiian flavors well there's stuff for you know that they they get the nectar and pollen from over there and the Hawaii is not stopped you know so you're getting honey around what island And Maui.

Yeah, well, and there are, there are states where there are more prevalent than others and they're just more aggressive and more aggressive and they're, they're, they're very protective. So you'll get stung if you're messing with them.

It's possible. Oh, yeah, for sure. There's some great movies about that too. You know, the killer bees.

I don't know. I don't think so. I'm somewhat into it, but I haven't. Haven't investigated that part yet.

Well, yeah, she, you know, she's laying the eggs. She's passing on the whatever DNA. But those, the, the, the, the forager bees, the ones that you see out and about, they only live a month. So they will die out. And how long did she live? She could live between one to five years.

It's a really, really cool. And without them, I mean, there's lots of orange, almonds, all kinds of stuff, especially here in California, in the center of California, all that farming. If there's no bees, there's no fruit.

Well, there are others that do it. What I don't like doing butterflies and really. I'll tell you, not just honey bees, but there's probably over 3,000 different kinds of bees. They don't have a high society like the honey bees do, but all these other bees are like loners. They live in the ground or something, and they just get enough pollen for themselves. So they're kind of lone wolves out there, but the honey bees are the ones that have more of a society.

Yeah. I mean, just like getting your first tattoo is like, yeah, wow. That's cool. I want more. Right. And yeah, you just start to appreciate it. I think when I come off tour, It's like my head is like ricocheting around and I go and I'll sit and watch the bees. Just watch them go in and out in and out. There's like this friggin landing strip that he come in and they look so busy. It relaxes me, you know. It's like, wow, okay. I'm not that busy. Just cool.

Yeah, I've got one of the, well, that's like a display one. We bring into schools and stuff. I think you can see, I don't have one of those, but I got a couple different kinds of hives and it's fun to see, you know, sometimes you have the frames that are already kind of pre-built and then they just deposit their stuff in it or you'll watch them grow their own comb from nothing and it's pretty amazing.

Well it's the queen. Wherever the queen is that's where they go.

You have a place for her to lay eggs. I mean, that's legit. Yeah, and she will stay and if she's there, you know, when they go off to to they swarm to go find a new hive. If you've ever seen a swarm up in a tree just like a giant like football size or even bigger a shape of just bees. That queen is right in the middle and they're all just around her and then they send off the scouts to find a new spot. They come back and say, hey, it's over here. You do their little wiggle dance and that shows them how to get there and they all go there.

Had a good negotiator.

Smells, smells and dances. Tell me, do it. Yeah, some bee will find it like a good hey man. I found like a garden somewhere and they'll come back and they'll see him do the little wiggle thing. It's like how many wiggles this way and then they turn left and then turn that. Okay, that's that's like a half a mile this way and then that that way and then they all learn it and then they go for hey. I found some water. Here's a place to go.

Yeah, it's pretty bizarre. There's a lot to learn about those things. That's really bizarre.

Yeah, and there's I'm sure there's probably a feel of like Wow, I'm there's a whole society right here in my yard and I'm I'm overseeing it you know, there's probably a sense of importance But you know, I lay off them. I mean there are people that are you know checking them all the time and this and that and oh you got to put the the certain pads in there to kill the mites and you got to do this and that's like they're natural man they've been around longer than we have so let them go they know what they're doing I don't you know who who's to say I know what I'm doing with them do they need specific types of plants around them in order to survive yeah well something they can pollinate and you know it's from It's good to plant, you know, what I've planted stuff that, you know, okay, it blooms in the spring and then there's other stuff that blooms in the summer and then there's other stuff that blooms, you know, like in the late summer. So they've always got something going on, but they hibernate. They hibernate the winter. No kidding.

Well, I don't have bees in value yet, and I'm going to try and figure out how to do that. But they, I mean, just like cattle, you know, you winter them down in the lowlands. So I haven't found a place to have bees go where they're, you know, there's less snow. But I'll figure something out because it's something I love doing.

It is awesome. I tell you. And that's a place I could just go up and disappear. I love it, man. And just get lost. Just get lost in the anything. Get lost in detail. I got lots of fun stuff up there. You know, quads and, you know, I got my welder and whatever. I just get lost in things and I love it. You know, yeah, you know, hunting deer, turkey stuff that we eat.

Yeah, he loves it. He loves music. He loves the, you know, nature as well. And I've been up to his ranch. It's really cool. We've played the Neil Young Bridge School Benefit like three times. And he invites people out there to the ranch. It's beautiful. It has buffalo out there. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. See Buckling. Acres does he have out there? A lot. A lot. A lot. 10,000. Something like that. Yeah. Wow. But yeah, beautiful. You know.

Ouch. Fucker.

Yeah, yeah. Slowly, I'm not there yet, but you know. that more will be revealed, you know, it's a, you know, it's a, you know, it's a journey. And I, once I realized that it's just a journey, I'm okay with it, you know, someone on another interview was just asking me, hey, you know, back in the early days, you guys released, you know, almost every year, you know, you've got like five, you know, five albums and six years or something. And what happened, you know, it was eight years since the last one, it's like dude. There's a lot more life to do. You know, there's a lot, you know, vacations with families watching my kids grow up, you know, touring a lot longer than it used to be, you know, shit back in those days. We had this many songs and this is how many gigs we can do and then we're back in the studio. So a lot is happening in life and everyone in the band is on the same page, which is really a great thing. We've all got kids, and we've all got other lives, but we can't live without metallic abandon. It's just something that joins us. You know, we're these friggin' four married guys that know more about each other than anyone knows about us. Maybe our wives. You know, the fact, you know, Lars and I have known each other for 35 years. Wow, even maybe 36, but I tell you that I don't, there's nobody else I've known longer except for maybe family and Lars. So it's a brother, you know, he's a brother. I hate him. I love him. I want to kill him. I want to hug him all that, all that stuff, man.

I wake up every day and think, I'm freaking blessed. I mean, this is unbelievable. What if I complain once today punch me in the face? You know, this is stupid. You know, this is stupid that I would complain about something. But I tell you, it is hard at times. being on the road, doing stuff. And when you don't want to do stuff, you do it. But then you find something. You find someone. You find a thing. And it's usually someone in the crowd. That's just, you know, I see myself right there. It's like, I'm that kid right there at the motorhead concert. Looking up, but let me go on. This is fucking awesome. And so I just sucked that energy and go, all right. This is, this is all I need. This is all I need right now.

Oh my God. Yeah, and he didn't want anyone to know that it was really that sick and he just kept going and God, that's what he knew and it's what he loved and it's what he was. And, you know, for me, I thought the man was immortal. You know, he was just this icon of a figure. You know, he was the Godfather of heavy music for us without him. There certainly wouldn't be a Metallica. Certainly wouldn't. He was the catalyst for Lars and I, you know, getting together, you know, that add in the paper, you know, we like bands like Motorhead was like, hey, somebody else likes Motorhead? All right.

Yeah. It goes straight to the edge. Straight to the edge section. You know, all the, you know, the, the, the, the, the classifieds, you know, pass up all the stuff. Just go right to each were said heavy metal. Like, Well, there's my ad and there's his. We should meet. There's only two of us.

Absolutely. And that poor guy still, you know, he's taking bullets, he's taking hits for it still. Still really where. Oh, everyone who's got a beef with any other thing, then, you know, Napster, they just gravitate stores at all the time. that poor guy yeah he got beat up by that and we all stood behind him obviously he was the spokesman for it he he he chose he chose to do that management said hey this is coming this is coming let's be the ones that stand up for artists and he took that he grabbed the flag said I'm going and there were lots of other musicians and people that were on board as well But they weren't as vocal or taking the hits like he did. There was something about, you know, even like a doctor, Dre, he was on board with it. But for some reason in the rap world, it's like, well, it's all about money anyway. So so what for heavy metal, there was some kind of stigma around You know, you're, you're an asshole if you're rich or if you've been successful or something. It's like, we got to pull you down into hell with us. You know, don't, don't be getting good now. You know, yeah. So that was that stigma. But there were other artists that would show up at show saying, hey, man, I'm really glad you're doing what you're doing. It's like, come on. You know, join us. Oh, no. Again. Oh, no. Like a rear would be over. It's like you fuck, you know, it's so frustrating. It's like, dude, do you believe in it? Yeah, then stand up. I can't, but no, it will fall apart. Something will happen to my fans, blah, blah, blah. So they, they were concerned about their own careers and not the big picture of artists and obviously these days you can see. There's no copyright loss. There's no nothing, man. You can rip this and that and whatever and do whatever you want with it. There's a beauty to that and a lot of creativity comes out of it. But it gets watered down. It gets, you know, I don't know. We acknowledge that. Yeah, there's an inspiration somewhere for everything. blatantly taking that and using it is pretty frustrating to me and we were at that point where we were we had a such a following we had such a strength in Metallica that we survived all of that stuff but there was a lot of bands that didn't you know they couldn't sustain themselves couldn't feed their families because of what happened and I think the frustrating part was no one really understood that music is our life. If you take that, if you take the way we want to present our music is part of the art.

Well, like releasing an album, here's how we'd like to release it. We don't want it leaked over here. We don't want this happening. We don't, you know, a presentation is part of the art. Like when you walk into an art studio, the artist has been in there putting it together. Like, okay, I want you to see this first and then that. And then you go here and you get bam, you know. that there's a passion behind that and when someone just throws it out there. And it just it kind of loses loses an impact. So if I'm complaining, punch me in the face. But we have survived and we feel good about it and we've adapted, but the record company certainly did not.

Yeah, even, well, a couple of years ago, we got the rights to our catalog, our music from Killing Mall up till now. We own it finally, which is weird. I tell my kids, hey, you know, let's go celebrate. We've got, and we've got the master recordings. We own it finally. And they were just looking at me like, what the hell are you talking about? You wrote it. Why isn't it yours? Right. Okay. Well, I had a little talk about how it was back then. You know, you would somewhat sell a little bit of your soul to get a bigger something. You know, it was basically the record company was a bank and a marketing tool to get you where you wanted to be. So, you know, it was a necessary thing at that time, but it's great to have our stuff back and be able to You know, we own our own record press. How cool is that? Wow. In Germany, one of our management people found a place that had some machines that were for sale and we bought on and so we press our own vinyl, man. Wow. And we could kind of do whatever we want. What color vinyl today, you know, or what crazy things you can do, you know?

Well, it depends. We have a record company. We own our own in America or North America. The rest of the world's little tougher. You know, there's a lot of countries out there, especially in Europe. And there's no way we can deal with the distribution in each different country. We've cut really good deals with with other record companies that have a vision and a have a love for Metallica and understand that This is powerful stuff and people love it and we want to be part of the family. But having your own record press is a pretty darn cool thing. There was really inspired by Jack White who, you know, white stripes fame, you know, wreck on tears. He's done a lot of stuff, but he He loves that stuff. He's pressing his own stuff. He's coming up with different ways of doing vinyls and colors and hidden tracks and cool stuff like that. And it's just another way to get creative in your career.

I don't know the numbers and they're probably very all over the place, but vinyl has never gone away. And it's I don't know if it's coming back, but it's more popular than it was. I think there's just something tactile about it. There's something great that people are finally understanding that you can look at artwork, you can feel it, and then the ritualization of opening up the player, taking it out and blowing on it, cleaning and putting it down, setting the needle down. It's something really cool. I just I came down to L.A. a few months ago and hung out with some high school buddies. It's like, hey, what do you want to do? Let's listen to some songs. And he takes out the Kansas, you know, album, puts it on and carry on away with some exact There's a dude, this sounds so great. Wow. And we were actually listening to music, sitting down, listening to it. My kids got into vinyl, they got a... you know like it urban outfitter you buy the little the setup now and that's where they that's where you can get vinyl it's so it's there there are some record stores out there but that's where they gravitate towards got them this little player and they just picked out some album covers they even know who they were it's like this cap this cover looks cool this speaks to me I'm buying this I remember doing that kind of thing oh yeah cool cover Yep, that's how I discovered tons of bands. So, they go into the room and, you know, I leave Malone for a while and they come back and I haven't come out. It's like, what's going on? I look in there. They're, you know, the record players on the floor covers and stuff strewn out all over the place and they're laying on the floor, listening to it's like, that is what, that was me, you know, and my daughter comes out. She said, Dad, you'll never guess what? Like, what? They're songs on the other side. Oh my God. Yeah, it's not a CD. You know? I was like, she discovered some huge thing, you know.

I tell you, that's just cool, uh, uh, in general. Uh, yeah. The more ways you can get music to people, uh, the better.

Well, you would get downloadable artwork, but you're not really looking at the artwork while you're listening to it on your mobile device. So, you know, the event of sitting down and disappearing into the music, you know, being a real music listener. Not, I mean, while you're driving, I get it. It's keeping you from killing people on the road, but when you go home and you just get lost in stuff, Even like those the cheap friggin' headphones, man, the little earbuds, my kids were listening to stuff on that. It's like, you guys haven't experienced music, like good sound here, try these headphones on, they're like, whoa, I hear stuff I didn't hear before. But just seeing my kids get excited about going to a live concert, you know? They go there and they absorb it in like every sense. you're not just having your ears hear something and that will never be I don't know, maybe the friggin' goggles or some kind of audio visual stuff will reproduce live shows, but there's something about being next to a sweaty fucker at a gig and pushing you or seeing someone headbang wildly or getting thrown over the top of you and there's just so much smells, things like that that just can't be recreated. So live music, my daughter just like, I can't believe that guy just pressed a button on his computer and he's singing over his own music. That's not performing. You know, she discovered that on her own. Hey, these guys are actually playing their instruments and they fucked up. They fucked up a song. It was so cool. You know, I saw something that I wouldn't have, you know, really cool like that.

Right. Are you pretending you're you?

I've gone to see plenty of shows with my kids and You can tell. It's like, all right, the mic's way over here, and they're still singing. And it's like, well, they have to have the backing tracks cut their dancing and they're out of breath. It's like, well, fucking stop dancing and do the song. I mean, are you a dancer or are you a musician or singer?

It can be daigo and the veil and then run up the 14er.

But I've seen shows where there's that going on and then they'll get real like sit down on a couch, plug it in acoustic and sing at a key and like really try and struggle with the song or sing it, you know. It's like that's natural. That feels good. Who would not gravitate towards that? Yeah. Then listening to the album, I can listen to the album at home. Yeah.

Yeah, that is pretty intimidating. I tell you, when we do like that Neil Young benefit words, you know, acoustic only. And you're, you're, you're friggin' naked up there dude. And every note is like, you know, and every fuck up on the vocal, it's, it's great. I mean, it's like when, you know, you go, you're gonna be on a TV thing and they put makeup on you. It's like, why are you doing that? Right. Exactly. So when people see me in person, I think damn you're one ugly fuck. It's like, no, I want to be as ugly as possible to everyone. So when they see me, they go, hey, it's you. Exactly.

Sometimes sometimes you get to do it or like, you know, if you're in a band like I am and the three guys get the stuff put on and then I show up. Dude. Oh my god. You're shiny.

No, no. I, you know, I'm all for convenience in the technology moving forward, getting music out to people is the important part, but just make sure the artist gets what they deserve from it. Because without that, it's going to become a hobby. No one wants, you know, I don't want to see the paramedic show up at my house, and it's like a hobby for him. Hey, you know, I'm not really getting paid for what I think I should get paid for my creation, but I guess I'll save your life, you know, maybe people didn't relate that to their their career or something equivalent.

touring and merchandise, and that's now how record companies are structuring their deals. You know, hey, we get a piece of your merch and touring.

Well, it's the only way they can survive now.

I'll tell you the whole, you know, would you, would you go up to the artist and take that out of his pocket? You know, would you go into a record store and just lift that steel it right out the door with it? You know, would you do that with, you know, okay, there's, you know, there's big corporations at a rich and would you go walk in and just steal their stuff? I mean, there's software companies that are massive. Would you go in there and just rip their stuff? I don't get that mentality. I don't call me old school, but you need to earn what you get. And if you get stolen from you, it doesn't make any sense. It's hard to fathom. And what it seems like to me, and I could be talking out my ass, but the record companies dropped the ball and the new record companies became iTunes and control it all. here's how much we're charging for your music and here's how much you're gonna get everyone's even it's like some communist approach you know and I don't understand I don't understand that if we're an artist and we make a lot of money that's up to us If we give all our money away to charity, or we throw it back into a movie that bombs, which happen, that's our choice. We're the fucking artist. We get to do what we want. It's our party. You're invited. And we can destroy this thing if we want. I don't want you to destroy it.

No one knows what they're doing. And, you know, there was a system that worked. And I'm up for bucking the system and making it better, but it didn't, it didn't get better. It's like, like you said, the cat got out of the bag and you can't put it back in, man. You just can't. So what do you do? Oh, you got Spotify or you got something else where streaming's gonna help get the artist their money. And it's, it's, you know, companies like that are losing money a lot. Spotify? I don't, I don't know the exact workings, and I'm not going to speak for them at all, but it hasn't been figured out yet. It's what I'm saying. It hasn't been figured out how to make a music model work, and there's no one way, maybe there'll never be one way again, and that's fine. But it's still unbalanced.

We're talking a lot about money here. There it is.

It's another thing, but that's nothing.

Yeah, 43 million. I mean, it's nuts. We talk a lot about money, but it's not I mean, it's not about the money and it doesn't it shouldn't be anybody's freaking business. How much you make how much he makes. I mean, if you want to reveal it fine, but Why is there such a stigma around being successful? I don't understand that. People just want to rip you for it.

It's been done before.

Right. Well, that's not hard-wired. That's for sure. No. No. We're still we're still we're still we're still searching for it. We're still doing it. Still searching for the right the best the ultimate riff. Yeah.

Not only him, but one person, we get compared to the stones. Like, how long are you going to do this? Is the question? Right. Right. Right. I don't know. I don't, when it's, if it's still fun, we're going to do it. Where it's not fun, then we'll let you know.

But yeah, Mick Jagger, the myth stones, Mick Jagger for sure. He's out there. He's doing his thing. He's all over the place. You know, the stones, music wise, and the rest of the band, you know, they're doing what they've always done, but it's not the physicality like, say, Metallica has. So, you know, you know, Charlie Watts is not Lars Ulrich. You know, like, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck. You know, right. at some point your body's saying oh boy we can't do this and for this long anymore let's take a break uh so keeping yourself healthy and physical mental and spiritual sense you gotta do all that for sanity sake and Other bands that are out there that are doing it that Angus young is probably the guy or I definitely take my hat off for that dude is insane and So I don't know you must sweat gallons every show and he's you know, he's like the size, you know, he's like a little dude. He is an elf and he's now where's the water coming from? How can you sweat this way? The body weight, you know, and he's out there head banging and rocking. I mean, and he's up there in age two. So that's the person we're kind of I guess seeing how long can this guy go?

He is, man.

Well, I'll tell you, out of the big four, if you know the big four, Metallica, Slayer, Megadeth, and Threx. These four bands that are still going and unbelievably after 35 years. myself Dave Mustang and Tom Orion have all had neck surgery from all of this had neck surgery. Yeah, what kind of neck surgery? It was a partial diskectomy in like C 16.

Yeah. Well, I couldn't pick my arm up.

Like a spinal decompression, compression chamber?

I don't have to wear that shirt, right?

We were looking at that.

making it straight, making your back straight is harder now than it was. Leaning against the wall and thinking, wow, I don't want to be that old dude, you know, right, hunched over the middle of his back is like a frigging, you know, like the, you know, hunchback, Notre Dame or something.

I got a physical trainer in Vale. Basically keeping range of motion going core, you know, lots of hiking treadmill stuff like that. Not so much, you know, power, you know, bulking up or anything, but just trying to stay mobile. I've got, you know, And I'm sure everyone at my age has some of it. It's a, you know, a spinal stenosis where there's, you know, calcium and, you know, kind of arthritic build up around the neuro around your spinal cord. So keeping that mobile, keeping things moving, I go to a like holistic healer too, who's breaking up calcium on fingers and toes and stuff. And I'm doing all I can doing all I can to get up there and be angus young still.

Well, he's pointing at that lady like something's happening.

Oh, that's what they know. And that's what they're schooled on. And I love the fact that you're giving them the fingers. They say, hey, no, I don't have to go down that path. I'm going to try it this way. And there are lots of different ways to do that. And unfortunately mine was it was touching the nerve. And I couldn't lift my arm. And there was atrophy happening. So some had to happen. But my back, yeah, I've gone on to, I've had like, you know, rupture discs. broken ribs going on tour you know singing with two broken ribs not fun uh but yeah the back Man, when it, when it hurts, you turn into a fucking baby, man.

You're like, I can't do anything. My life's over. Yeah. But all right, we'll go see your torture chamber or your.

No.

Dude, I don't care about any of that crap. If it's going to help me, it will. I'm into it.

Especially, yeah, cool. Well, I mean, I've done things where, you know, okay, we're gonna ask your body some questions and here put this statement against your chest or here what are these colored glasses and, you know, here's tuning forks on your body, you know, things like that. You know, I'm totally, I'm an explorer. I'd like to, and if it works, cool, if it doesn't work, hey, I tried it.

Yeah, what was the question? Am I retarded? Never go full retard. Look at Champagne, full retard. No, it did look. Right, I don't know what the question was. Why am I doing this?

Yeah, putting on my chest. Something like, you know, am I willing to get healthy? Something like that, you know? I'd like to be friends with my body instead of abusing it, you know? Stuff like that.

We have PT on the road, a therapist who will stretch us out, do in a world different, you know, my back, my neck, Robert's calves, you know, he's this calf. Yeah, it's like, uh, It's like he's he's freaking Tarzan that guy. He gets way down, you know, he's a surfer calves and finger or his forearms from playing, you know, with his fingers, they cramp up so and then Lars is shoulder or this one, you know, I had. So we've all got our thing, Kirk's wrists and this guy's out there helping us and, you know, he'll he'll give us things to try and work on and You know, we all, we all have to have our regiments out here. It's like you take a part of home on the road. You know, it's not like I need my, uh, I need my hotel room decorated like my house, you know, bring my bed on tour and not that, but it's people that can help me out on the road.

They do. Some rotters. Yeah. I want you to recreate that and I've heard stories and it's kind of funny. Maybe it's true. Maybe it's not. I don't want to continue a rumor, but just hearing that yeah, some of the guys in the stones will have their decorator come in and and they've decorated their hotel room like their home or something. Put their favorite things in there and all that and then they're there for a night and then they go off to the next place, you know, and the decorator meets them in advance and sets it up at the next spot too.

Who am I to say it's wrong, man? You know, yeah, you do what you want and feel good about it. When you go to bed and wake up and go, okay, am I right? You know, that's the main thing. You know, if I've gone to bed and say, man, that was stupid or Actually, yeah, the other day, it's pretty stupid. I got to call this guy, tell him. But we were doing this. Oh, what was it? The guy Billy on the street, you know that? Billy on the street with some Billy I call I think his name is and He just you know, he's on the street just running up to people Okay, yeah, like quiz shows. Yeah, what's the name of Adele's album now you suck and then run off to the next person you know really manic kind of crazy stuff We did that in a store with him the other day. We went shopping at a supermarket and in a shopping cart Metallics pushing shopping cart around. He's running up to people going, hey, what do you buy in today? What, uh, oh, you're making a salad? Hey, do you want to get pumped up while you're shopping? We got Metallica here to pump you up. So we, uh, We pressed the play button and same man's playing. We're like, yeah, come on. We're uh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And we're filling up their cart with stuff they don't need. Oh, fuck. And uh, this one guy was at the salad bar. And he looked like he just took a break from work. You know, it was on a lunch break. And I started filling up his salad with peas and all kinds of stuff. And we're throwing salad all the place. And uh, I turned around to to grab some more stuff. Lars had put dressing on a salad. I didn't know that. So at the end when we took off, I just... I wanted to just throw it in his face. Like, it was a dry salad. And I'm like, oh, God. And the dressing went all over me. He's like, you fuckers. Like, oops, that backfired. Okay, we've gone a little too far. Yeah. I'm 18 again in trashing the hotel room. Okay. We're at the supermarket. Chill out, James. All right.

Oh. It was just part of our promo tour thing, you know. And We're trying to do funny, do cool, different stuff. Some of these shows, they get wacky. I don't know if you saw the Metallica playing with the roots on Jimmy Fallon, playing Samman on the little... No, I didn't see that. You know, we got little like recorders and, you know, little, you know, like, little drum sets, you know, little kids instruments. That was a lot of fun. So we're getting to, you know, getting to have some fun and kind of not be too serious about all of this, you know?

I'll put it in. It's a normal one. They don't want to get my son. The roots are good, man. They are great band.

We were having some fun. Definitely having some fun there.

You're serious about your art when we write a song. It's, we're serious about this. But when we go out, when we play live, I mean, we're, You know, we're not, we're not the best musicians separately. I would say. And someone might disagree, but when you put us together, something happens and we create something really cool. There's an energy. And I think back from the very beginning, like when someone fucked up the song, we just stopped. It's like, oh man, let's try it again. We can do this better. and people sit with the you're not supposed to do that do they're not very professional like yeah but that's what happened I mean we're honest we want to do it better and we know we can so we're gonna stop it and do it again you know or I mean just like the other day I was like this friggin brain fart on stage where were up there and they play the one the intro to one which is like this army had you know all the board going on and then I start this thing and I started the wrong song I started to fade to black instead of a different song I'm standing there going What do I do now? And like this wave of shame comes over you like you're a bad man, you know? And I'm looking over my roadie and they're going, not that song. And I look at, it's like, okay, I'll stop it. And then I went to the other song. And then I'm able later to go up and say, hey, wanna hear Faye to plaque again, you know? you got a joke about it or else you you it's like you become it's like you got to expose your vulnerable parts people People make fun of that and they'll take advantage of it sometimes. But most of the times people will relate to it like, ah, he's human. He fucked up. Okay, you know. So trusting that there's more, there's more life guards than sharks out there. Most of the time.

Very true. Very true.

So you're tough on yourself.

You say things to yourself that you wouldn't even say to your worst enemy.

Absolutely. And that's it. There's a healthy part to that. And then like moving on from it is, it's easier now than it used to be. It would just like, it would live in me for a while. Like, oh, dude, you forgot the words to that song. And then it becomes a mental block. Yeah. You get up there and you go, oh, shit, like a, you know, like a kicker or something. You know, like I go in a kick and feel goals like, oh, I missed that one. I can't believe I did. Then the next one. Oh my God. Now it's a thing. Yeah. Oh. So getting over those matters.

And it's so crazy. The power of thought, the power of my mind is, it's pretty dangerous at times. And being creative, I make up all kinds of crap. You know, like, uh, Lars is doing that. Just to fuck with me. I know it. And then he'd talk with them later. He's like, what are you talking about? What? What? Yeah, that's pretty, it's, it's a curse and a gift that creativity, you know?

uh... fear was a big motivator in that for me you know losing my family was that was that was the thing that scared me so much that was the bottom i hit that my family's gonna go away because of my behaviors that i brought home from the road i got kicked out of the house by my wife i was living on my own somewhere and i you know i did not want that And maybe as part of my upbringing, my family kind of disintegrated when I was a kid, father left, mother passed away, had lived with my brother, and then kind of just all, like the family, where'd my stuff go? Where'd it just kind of flowed it away? And I do not want that happening. No matter what's going on, we're gonna talk this stuff out, make it work. And my wife's of the same idea, the same thought that You know, she hurt her family. She was the invisible kid, too. You know, so we relate a lot. So there's no way we're going to let, you know, any argument getting the way or just, you know, we're survivors. We're survivors and we're going to, we're going to talk through it no matter how much. And, you know, she, she did the right thing. She kicked my ass right the hell out of the house, you know, and that scared the shit out of me. So, and she said, hey, you're not just going to the therapist now, and it's not talking about this. You got to go somewhere and sort this shit out. So, that's what I did. So, rehab did. We rehab really worked for me.

Well, what worked for me was seven weeks someplace, like basically tearing you down to bones. ripping your life apart. Anything you thought about yourself or what it was, anything you thought you had, your family, your career, your anything gone. Strip you down to just, okay, you're born. Here's how you were when you're born. You were okay. You're a good good person. Let's get back to that again. And then they slowly rebuild you. And then I went to another, they call them aftercare places. I went there to a couple of different ones. And they find tomb stuff and get you integrated back into life. Because when you're in this cocoon and you're, you're frigging raw. I mean, I was raw meat when I came out. And you can see it in that some kind of monster movie. I was pretty raw still. I didn't know what I could or what I should or shouldn't do, you know. So the last place we went to was a place that helps relationships. So they got me and my wife together and we'd see people separately and then come together and talk about what we did in communication, freaking saved my life, saved our family, and working through that stuff. very grateful for my wife. She's the one that didn't ask for the shit. She walked through fire with me and we walked out together, stronger, way stronger than we ever would have been before. In, you know, my kids know my story, my kids know my struggles and they respect that. They respect me in a different way. I don't have to tell them what to do all the time or just be like, I'm this, I can say sorry. I can tell them, hey, here's what happened when I did that and, you know, I don't need to preach to them. They got their own stuff, but now they, now they goof with me. I ruined my trust with my family and now by some miracle, they are goofing with me. It's like, Dad's shut up. What do you get in my command? You're overblowing this. You're way ahead of dad. You're taking it way too much space here. Okay. So they help me and I realize that there is help in a loving way.

Oh absolutely that was it that was That is, you know, the power of the mind and how, you know, here's how my life works and to actually just completely throw that away and start over. It's like, well, wait a minute, who am I without this? I'm a, I can't talk to people. I'm anxious. I'm shy. I'm all of the stuff that I thought booze was helping me with, or, you know, booze, drugs, women, shopping, eating, gambling. You know, there's so many things that can manifest out there that It all goes back to one core thing. It's like, I don't really know who I am. So it took years and years to figure out. Okay, I like that. That's part of me. And this is part of me, the anger, the, the, the, you know, the corkiness, the dark part of me, all these little things that make me I got to hug him. I got to accept him, you know, and put running from him and pretending like I am some immovable object on stage that's tough and, you know, nothing can do, you know, nothing can hurt me. But inside, yeah, it's kind of a cliche saying, you know, the harder that external shield, the softer the inside and the more vulnerable and and balancing that, you know, almost like you're concentrating so much on the hard outside that you ignore the inside totally totally and then forget what I really want and then you lose yourself in that other that other person and yeah being in a band certainly accelerated that you know there's there was drink a drug and all kinds of stuff just thrown at you all the time and it starts off as a fun little thing and then it turns into a escape and then all of a sudden you don't really you don't remember why you're out there doing stuff. I went on tour just so I could go to the strip club you know hey we're going to this place you know and we're going to drink here and you know new all that stuff but the actual playing on stage it kind of got forgotten about a little bit. You know, it was, we get caught up in the rock star stuff. And there's a, there's a song on this album called Mothin to Flame that directly talks about how fame can be this crazy drug. And it can completely take you over if you let it. You know, you're searching for that thing that's going to save you and it's, it's you. It's in you. It's already there. You just got to, you just got to find it and accept it.

Right. Well, Joe, do you hit it? I mean, it's the transitions from road to home are always somewhat difficult. It's like there's a PTSD that goes along with it, you know, you are, like you said, worshiped, you know, there's a lot of, you know, where do I get my validation? Really, that's where I have to step back and say, okay, am I who these people say I am or think I am they have their own vision or version of me just like I had my own version of lemme you know this is this thing that it was strong and you know these people expect me to be a certain way and when you when they meet you in normal life you're sitting with your family eaten or you're frigging in the supermarket you know throwing salad on some guy you're uh people want you to do the thing you do you know hey headbang jump up on the salad bar and rock out or something is dude music does that to me music playing music with these guys does that to me but when I'm not doing that I'm just a dude you know and they don't want that that it hurts them it scares them like wait a minute I need you to be this certain way. It makes me feel secure. So when you're not that, I, you know, I don't want to sign stuff. I don't want to take pictures selfies with people. I want to shake your hand. I don't want to talk with you. I want to say, Hey, who are you? What do you do? Here's what I do. You know, people think they know me because of the music and all the interviews and all the stuff. I get that. I don't know you, so when you come up and say, you know, I want to know you, because we're in a disadvantage here.

Oh, I, I got to leave. I mean, there's an anger part of me that I still wrestle with and things get stupid and It's like, it's a fighter flight thing, man. It's like, I'm being attacked. Wait a minute.

Yeah. Yeah. It's just so weird. It's so weird. We played in front of half a million people. And half a million people. And where was that? This was in Russia. This was an airfield. Oh my god. So we've done that. What the fuck was that like? Um, it was a sea of Russian people. I mean, that's what it was. This was in 1991. 1991 when the, you know, the curtain came down and all of that in time, Warner. had a, uh, uh, they wanted to basically get their foot in the door. And so they were created a free concert. Uh, it was, uh, AC DC us, Pantera, and I think maybe a local band or some other bands. I'm sorry if I can't remember, but they flew us in there. We landed in this airfield. Oh, my, the crew was on it. uh... landed in this airfield and as far as you could see it was a free concert and it was just people and we get on stage and do what we do but there were it was military military in the front this crisis that photo holy shit holy shit jamey go full screen with that does just go with that one what in the fuck

Is that it? Is that the one? Whoo!

Yeah, pretty remarkable. And there were dude, imagine the sea of people like that, and see, there's a helicopter. Helicopter flying over people. Oh my god. What if that thing goes down, man? Oh, they could be chopping the ballcow.

And that helicopter would come down close and then we're yelling at people like stop, you know, people were moshing or going crazy. They didn't know what that was. Oh, wow. You know, it was like a fight. African communist country man and there's like, wait, people are getting out of order.

No way. They didn't know what to expect of that. So there are people throwing, you know, hitting people from the helicopter and down on the front there, there were guys in uniforms, you know, there was, you know, police military, same thing, you know, so they're standing there in their uniforms and after like three or four songs, they're like, Fuck this and they took off their stuff and they're at their head banging and having a good time. So we saw the transformation of you know a closed-down society to freedom right before us individually and in people it was awesome. Wow

What does the sound of their roars like? Pretty massive. I'm obviously, you know, I lost count. I don't know 300 and something thousand, but I tell you, and they don't speak your language. That's just such a That's the power music man. That's a language in its own. It's connects people. It is so cool. So yeah, we went to a place that no one spoke English or people were telling us, you know, I learned English from your lyrics. Oh shit. I failed English just so you know, I didn't do so well in school. Wow. It's pretty bizarre.

Yeah. Yeah. It's like you go out into the mountains. Nature doesn't give a shit who you are. Mother nature will kick your ass, you know, and leave you frozen and, you know, lost.

Well, I think I started out my dad was a hunter. I remember him, you know, skin and dears and the, and the garage and Southern California here. Skeet shooting probably started with that. Skeet and trap. And then, uh, uh, went duck hunting with my buddy up in Kalusa and San Francisco area and, and then, hey, we're going on a pig hunt. Let's go. And then, so it's slowly the animal got bigger and bigger. and really enjoyed it and enjoyed the guy hang, just get away and just get scared together.

It's awesome. It is for a crew. Yeah, making fun of each other and all the stuff that you don't get to do, you just go and hang. I like getting scared out there. It's like, wait a minute. I got this 60-pound backpack on and I just came from sea level and I'm up here at 11,000 feet and I don't feel very good guys. How the fuck am I going to get off this mountain? I can't do it. I'm like, yeah, you can't come on. And we'll carry you off if that's what it takes. Okay. Yeah, but the truck is, you know, it's like a three hour hike to the, to the, a three hour hike to the spike camp. And then another two hours to the base camp, you know, you can do it. And stuff like that, you know, pushing you to limits what you didn't know you could go to.

Yeah, this dude's deep. It's awesome. You're deep dude. I love the cool you stuff. Yeah, yeah, I got turned on to it by those guys and Yeah, you know, I can get pretty cold and scary up there and it's it's fun.

Yeah, we contacted him. Can we borrow your pattern? That's pretty fucking cool. Oh, yeah, I love it.

Well, yeah, you know, at least probably, you know, a couple of weeks every year is what I get to do. And obviously if it's, you know, elk season in Colorado. And then there's deer season in California and Turkey season.

Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Onel, up there. Oh, my God.

It is amazing. And, you know, from the house, or if you're dropping the kids off at school, just drive up the road a little bit and be spotting, you know, hey, there's some elk up there. And, you know, where the kids go to school, there's a, there's a sheep herd, you know, just up in the mountains. Oh, my God. It'll take me about 45 years to draw that tag, but yeah, as we'll start.

Absolutely.

Yeah. The elk, I mean, you know, I like, I like the Venice Inn, but elk, that's probably the thing I would eat. Yeah. Nonstop.

We'll pull in at out of your freezer and making it there for your kids. I mean, there's nothing, there's no nothing more organic than that.

Yeah, this is not mixed up with some other crap from some other farm or something. This is it. This has been cut and prepared for you. So I see that massive thick bastard out. Yeah, that's my latest one. Yeah, that's a son boy. Where is that? That's what I want to guess.

No, it's just going to guess in New Mexico.

Yeah.

Dude. It's a massive, massively thick.

I go back and forth to the boat.

I like I'm a meat hunter, and that's the way to do it, you know, and I was a new bow hunt. Uh, I do it on my ranch at home in California. Uh, it's just tough. It's tough with the black tail. You know, you got a, uh, it feels fairly small deer, too. Yeah. It's pretty tough. I just like pulling it. I like, you know, target practicing and stuff. You know, I have gone bow hunting and taken a pretty nice elk with it when it's the rut. I mean, that it's so amazing. And it scares the shit out of you and that they're screaming. Friggin Frost beast coming running down at you with a hard kick your ass or fuck you. Yeah. Okay.

Right. But I've missed some stuff so much, and I just, you know, I'd rather use, I want to get the animal down and done. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. So, what bow you get? I saw you got it.

I agree. Yeah. Yeah, I had a, yeah, I had a Matthews from, you know, three years ago and I went in to get it tuned up. And the guy says, oh my god, it's like, you know, a computer. That's a few years old. Wow, it's dude.

It's like I got a Matthews that I really love and you know, who knows next year like you said the technology just the way they pull the way they balance and all that stuff that like you said with a gun, you know, guns has come a lot of waste the long ways too. I got to saw some fierce gun that, you know, carbon fiber barrel and it's super lightweight for packing in, you know, it's down to like six pounds, you know, with the scope on it. So, yeah, lightweight, good.

That's why I'm in successful life.

Yeah. All right.

Yeah. Old guy.

So you spray up. You do all that stuff and get good.

blow off all those red flags where he just wants a you know he smells a predator and he wants a bolt right yeah well I guess that be you could see the results of it if you're in the same spot year after year or something but I never know if that stuff works you know because we're traveling doing different stuff different places all the time yeah well most of the hunt I go on our spot and stalk so that's not really it doesn't really apply but

Yeah, and that doesn't send off a signal.

So you think the baby wipes do good or bad?

That would be bizarre. The red flag and the cape on the bulls. It's not really red. It's just something's moving. What do they see? What do they hear? What do they smell? Yeah, I guess once we figure that out, then it's really on.

You know, it's like, I wanted to get into voiceovers. So that I took the gig.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And, well, you know, I took the gig. you know I wanted to get into voiceover stuff so that was offered to me and yeah I probably had it could add a choice whether I did it or not but that's what that was and I think the main the main head budding happened when I did that show and then we went to go do glassed in berry which is like the ultimate like a celebration of English hippy dumb. And they somehow caught wind it. I've been always a hunter and he did this show and it was like boy caught Metallica. You know, don't play the show. We don't want that and wow, you know. So what we did was we made this silly video. There's always some thing going on in England where, you know, there's something. There's a controversy. That's going to happen with this, you know. So when the artist shows up, they do something. They want something special. So what they want. So the fact that I was, you know, I did this bare-hunting show and so we made this movie about I was a guy in England, put this movie together that depicted old school English Huntsman, you know, they're on horseback fox hunters, you know, Dr. Dr. in off release release the fox and all the hounds go and they go galloping through the the the the English countryside. and they come to a spot and they start getting shot at and it's these bears come out of the woods and they've shot the hunters and they become the hunter and the crowd loved it you know they oh yeah right you know arm the bears, you know. So it kind of just instantly diffused all that bullshit. And, you know, when you're able to like, we said earlier, make fun of yourself and make fun of controversy, then it just, it kind of goes away. And then you just get on, you know, get back to business, you know?

Well, that to me just told them told me about them that they're ignorant and that's not even me. So, you know, there are people out there that want to just, they just want to throw the fuel on the fire and make it crazier and get upset about stuff. And, you know, I got no control over that, man. You know, once it's out there, you know, I don't want to spend all my time justifying what I do or don't do, and it's not even something I did, you know? So, yeah, it's always the time. Do you bear hunt at all? I did, I did, but now I wear clothes. Do you hunt bear? I was really stupid, man, sorry.

The hunt bear. I did. I went to Russia, went to Comchaka and hunt bear. Yeah, it was a crazy, crazy adventure.

Yeah, it was brown bear. Did you eat any of it? No. No, I did not. And that's one regret I have. And I mean, getting the meat, I mean, for some reason, they didn't allow you to bring meat from Russia and to America. But we did have meat there. They had meat from other bears. And so that's how we sustained ourselves out in the middle of the Communist Brown Bear tastes like. You know, a bear doesn't taste great to me. It's super fatty for sure. This, this was less fatty because it was, you know, spring bear and then, you know, they were out, you know, they hadn't, they just come out of hibernation. So it, I wouldn't, it's not my favorite thing. So I'll probably wouldn't hunt it again because I do like to eat what I, what I, what I harvest. So, It wasn't, wasn't great, but we had links. We had all kinds of different stuff there that they, you know, they were in the middle of nowhere.

Taste like chicken. You know, everything tastes like chicken. Uh, you know, it depends on how you cook it. I mean, it's meat. And it tastes like meat. And we were in this little, little hot that was super short. because, you know, it's really, really cold out there and there's like about eight feet of snow. And yeah, you're in this little hut that's really short to keep warm, you know. And the hunter, the guides out there, they had AK-47s, you know. We were, it was pretty scary. You know, we took a military helicopter, we probably flew two hours in this thing that looked like it survived World, you know, one and two. Well, it wasn't around. World War One, but survived World War Two and it was, you know, exhaust down the side and no seats and we're sitting on the metal floor and we get dropped off in the middle of this nowhere place and these guys have snowmobiles and there's, you can't get around because the snow is so thick. You need a snowmobile. and the guide show up in there. You know, they're here's Russians with AK-47s. We're America's high, you know.

It was set up, you know, it was like, you know, through the Safari Club, you know, and it was just one of those crazy things like, hey, I'm gonna try this and get scared. And I was.

Well, thanks. Thanks, brother. I appreciate you and keep doing what you're doing, man. I will.