John Mayer's First Podcast

my buddy John Mayer has a new world tour that's about to start I saw so many dates he goes all over the world on top of that he's never ever been on a podcast before and since I've barely ever even done a podcast I felt like it's a perfect marriage and music fans know him from his many Grammy winning songs and Smash Hits his world tours comedy fans Norman's as a frequent judge on roast battle and one half of the comedy duo control danger with Dave Chappelle I know him as the greatest blues guitarist ever to come out of Bridgeport Connecticut plainness in tonight hi buddy I'm so good that was really fun I'm not sure I'm one half of controlled danger with Dave Chappelle I don't know that I make up a complete 50% of that enterprise come on very helpful no it is I've seen it many times I've even opened for you guys on a couple special occasions New Year's things and it's fun man anytime I get to share a stage with Chappelle I'm like on cloud nine he'd say it's a drug that you can't really explain to people he's better than everybody else he's not a comic he's not a musician he's Dave Chappelle that's right he's a folk hero that's right and you know we all aspire to be great and then and then we you know for five minutes I might think I'm a hotshot and then Dave rolls into the comedy store and you know reminds me of the jay-z lyric I forget better [ __ ] than you ever thought of he literally forgets better [ __ ] than any of us have thought of it's I mean I I love to watch the the I think I said the other night to him on stage we're at the improv I go it's not the bricks it's how you lay him yeah you know I like watching the order in which he does masonry I'm not all that interested in the top you know I mean you can get caught up what it is he saying he's only setting up the most indefensible premise he can come up with because that's the way to lay the bricks in a way that's the most exciting you know and so I just like watching his brain light up you said that to me once too about music it's not it's not it's sometimes it's the notes you don't play and I don't know if that was your thing but I was watching you I said so yeah I was watching you record solos on born and raised and that's right you were at Electric Lady when we were doing that right and in my neighborhood in New York and I noticed like the more takes you did the less you played and I was like oh he's um what's the word I'm looking for you're sculpting yeah that's right subtractive synthesis yeah like blow into that because you know you always hear about guitar plays like well now I feel like everyone knows that I could do that so I don't need to do that so I think it's sort of like like doing a lap in an Olympic pool or something you play your ass off to get to one half of the pool and then you kick off the other side and it's like okay now you know the fastest I can play you know the most I can play I don't have to play anymore as a way to get you to understand how I play so now I can just play what's right for every moment you know wow that's interesting I noticed like and this doesn't have to be a complete music podcast because we having a very emotional roasting piece to do a little bit later but you have these new songs out sometimes I just feel like yeah I guess I just feel I guess I just feel like new light which is like and then current mood like there's something happening and that's going on with you they're all all of those things are like of the present in the mood yes go into a transitional thing which I couldn't help but notice when I came to your I G TV show current mood and then I hear the new song as you put out and I go this is about it's ironic it's an it's an Instagram show but we want it's about being in the moment yeah what is how how I'm interpreting these new that's right that's right I mean these ideas yeah it's hard to break down right like number one I've made so many records that I've lost a little bit of energy when it comes to walking into a studio for a year to make 12 more songs number two I don't want to be gone for a year to do that the world moves too fast to check out to be stuck in a studio and be putting up ten-second clips of a beat the next year and I also think that you can tour yourself into oblivion III don't even think it's a great idea for artists to go on the road 12 months a year anymore because you're only in the city you're playing you know so I wanted to be more places in more time in a shorter period yeah and I don't know that anybody is thinking about a record and it's weird like we want a binge watch an entire season of television right we only want one song a week from an artist it's the exact opposite of what it used to be you know well you can only tell what about comedy I mean I could tell once I tell the joke it's done ski they come to see you based on [ __ ] they've heard already but I don't play it right don't be it right the whole so I mean our job I feel like we do a pretty good job of it it's like read the biomechanics of what people are and what they want and how they want it you're never gonna hear me complain about well why don't you want it this way you still want it that way and now you don't like records I'll do whatever I'll go wherever the most energy is you know I mean every time a new social media platform comes out I go through I read through it like a new medical report if I was a doctor or something it's like what can I do with this yeah and then every time Instagram releases like a new tiny functionality I'm like okay there's something I can do other people can't do with this so when Instagram live put out the ability to place stuff from your gallery pictures and video I went I can now throw two clips this is gonna change my show forever I can throw two clips which is always funny Jeff you know it's always I love the lip clip man of Clips I'm such a clip fan I can't okay so now my show has clips so every time someone puts a new thing out I'm not looking at it like how can I be super popular I go how can make that work for my brain you know and what you mean I have a very particular shape of my brain I feel like you have a big head yes I don't mean like a ego you're physically big sizing aside which gave me a fedora that I may grow into when I had the furrow and fit no I have a very large head there's a lot going on and and so I just I'm into presenting myself and other people whatever creative format we are all into at the same time if you put a record out you were a well-known artist and you put a record out on Friday and I love you you know that look I'm not sure I would have heard the whole record by now I'm just not sure that I would have heard the whole rumors but if you put out a four-song EP I would have been listening to all four songs over and over again it's just we're all changing that way hmm where we consume things but this is a friends-and-family podcast and and I do feel like you know you're my more successful handsome younger brother my sister's been here my cousin does the show it makes sense that he would be here and I know that you came here right from visiting moose saw my dog I hope that's okay that I shout out moose oh you absolutely should shout out you know this podcast is about you know sometimes how sensitive our heart is and you know I'm finding late in life how dogs make me so happy last night I came home from Brody Stevens Memorial and I went to Rite Aid and all I bought was an ice cream cone for myself and for doggy toys for Luna stayed up till 4:30 in the morning just feeding her like squeaky toys you know it's funny even though even the worst people on the Internet the most hateful worst people on the internet if you trace back for their profiles they always write dog lover [Laughter] unbelievable bills right the meanest [ __ ] on your on your Twitter or on your Instagram and you'll be who could have ever written something this mean and it always just said devoted mom dog lover registered nurse and you're like oh I think if people put photos of their dogs with the dog's name and age in the signature line of every comment on the internet hate would disappear overnight online my first dog was a churro is a Siberian Husky named Lobo that my parents had really yeah he was a cool dog have you ever written a dog song I've written a dog song no no you ever play with Los Lobos and I and I have tried to keep yeah I wrote a song and one of the lines is dog in a ball at the end of my bed but that's the closest I've ever come to like featuring a dog in a song although it could be wrong and an album cover and a on the back on the back of my you know I have this new joke that's killing and I know like it's so relatable like I know everyone thinks their dogs the smartest this dog my dog really is the smartest dog because the other day I was um because this dog imitates me like she's a genius the other day I was taking a [ __ ] with a tennis ball in my mouth [Laughter] I always say that dogs and I mean this and I love my dog but I do feel like my dog is one feature short of being absolutely necessary like there's one more thing that all dogs should be able to do that would put them beyond the threshold of like gotta have a dog do you know what I mean like if a dog could let you know when you had a missed phone call what one more thing yeah one thing short you got I have to tell you you have to make a little bit of an effort to be like like my dog the dogs are odd and conditioning the greatest sometimes I look at my dog and I'm like this is it huh you fed you've slept you went outside and you're still staring at how do I please absent my brain goes we are one thing short both of us sides of this equation are missing one thing and I stare at him and I go I don't know what else to do for you and that's when I think if they could just bark like when carbon monoxide is in the house or something you know this is Luna talking do you get sad in advance for the death of your do I think sometimes they start thinking about what it would be like and I would be on the floor alright I once told Sarah Silverman and if her puppy passed away that she could call me and I would come help her organize it that's that's really nice to have someone set up well what I would need is someone to go through my house before I got there and remove every last like okay I want a few things in there that I can but like if I find a tennis ball somewhere if I find one chew toy in the corner I'm gonna lose it someone should be able to go into your house and do a full sweep on anything that might spark but that's a friend yeah absolutely and then you can open the box and look in it when you're ready on a random day when it's hot when it's less tough yeah you ever say something to your dog that you just have this just no way your dog can understand like ten more minutes you ever say to dog I talked to her all the time like she's like I just remind her I'm like no you don't go to human places you have to stay here I love looking at a dog and admonishing it as if it doesn't understand it it's stupid for not knowing that you're saying things like give me ten minutes dog doesn't know what ten minutes I know but what do you think it is that they read they read our they read our the way energy I feel energy I think we interpret it as very anthropomorphic and if they're just they're just making all sorts of crazy noises all day say things like he knows I'm leaving although I guess when you see the suitcase sometimes but I have a theory that here's something so this dog has been a vegetarian its entire life right now it meets me it's six years old and I hold roast beef over her head and and like she goes berserk and the first time I did it after she ate the slice of roast beef it was just me and her late at night her I started watering and she almost said words like she wanted to talk to me to say what what do you think she would have said it was just like did some crazy does she telling you she loved it you think she wasn't I loved I think she was just wanted to say they either I love it thank you what is this it reminded me of and I know this is probably a terrible comparison but maybe it works when you see that picture on youtuber Instagram of that little tiny like one-year-old who doesn't even talk yet but when they suddenly put glasses yeah yeah yeah I cry every time when it's it's the hearing aid they put the hearings they turn the hearing aid oh no it's the color glasses yeah different ones they're two different full-on choice makes me cry like if I ever like need to cry yeah you just put on the funny you see I cried I cried an hour ago when I saw my dog and then I felt so much better afterwards because it's what I call unconscious pain its pain you don't know you have till you till your dog goes like hey remember me I'm your dog I'm the life yeah I'm I'm you I'm the the harbinger of like who you are when you're most happy you're not very happy right new dog can look right at you and go like you're not happy right now are you and you just lose it and then I felt so much better afterwards it's so much better I really am resisting it because I know like like I've always like I'm always afraid if I love it it's eventually gonna die and it's like it's hard for me I always had an allergy to dogs and I was a little afraid of dogs as a dog that my sister but and I went to an allergist yesterday for the first time my life and I did confirm that I have mild dog and cat allergy but that didn't stop me from telling Luna to just jump in bed with I don't know there is physically bit emotional and how great is it when you finally give in to the licking in the hair and the spit in the dirt you just give in to it it's like it's like being in a like at a festival all the time but your dog your dog is around you just giving up I don't need to be clean when I leave the house I want to be half my dog's spit in hair yeah and it is kind of a communal thing once you stop going like hey it's on my pants there's like you just give all the way into it and you're just spit in my mouth my dog is addicted to piss his dog did a crazy thing the other day it might be the smartest dog in history it had to go the bathroom when I was asleep and instead of just peeing in the on my rug or whatever it pissed on my toilet accident that's the dog who knows yeah I was very impressed it's a dog who thinks it's a person yeah my dog goes to use the bathroom last thing every night before we go to bed he has a little doggie door and I have these little vertical blinds you know that I can like they're not horizontal blinds I can I can like put my faith like the way a cop looks at a window and I can like I sometimes he'll be out there for a while but what's he doing out there and I'll go up to the window and I'll I'll spy on my dog and now I'll just push the blinds down a little bit and look through the slit and he doesn't when I'm looking at him and he's just looking up at the stars and it's like he's taking a break from being my dog as if he's a performer who's just taken a minute backstage smoking a cigarette looking up at the stars because he knows for a minute like a casino dealer on a break and then he starts to walk back in and I go oh I gotta look busy I gotta look busy cuz I got to give him his time and he walks back and he's like and I'm like I watched you just looking up at the sky having time out thought what do you think they have nightmares you ever see like this dog will start barking and like running and stuff yeah yeah I would love to see a dog's nightmare oh definitely you know you'd get it on a VHS I feel like no matter what the technology to record a dog's dreams are you'd still ultimately output would be VHS I have to buy via just bear up at eBay now it's a hard one because I had a huge family my sister got a dog when her sons were you know just old enough to really run around they got a dog and I took it as a personal affront that she didn't ever want me to visit I go okay now I get it you'd rather have that dog than me around I just and so she's suddenly getting a dog like were you that allergic to dogs I guess as a kid yeah Oh hair and the dander in my eyes and now I have a very mild where it's fine I'm gonna get an air filter the allergist only get an air filter I think people who own dogs have a whole different lease on what it takes to keep their house clean and what they've also just given up on like yup there's like there is there really is as end of the dog owner where they just go oh though that's just always gonna be hair on that bed there's just we're never getting it off and people who don't have dogs start to turn a little OCD where they're like oh there can't be a single scratch on dogs kind of keep you from going crazy over the OCD of keeping your house clean just like this is the way it's gonna be there's gonna be a layer of hair everywhere I go and I think I actually not trying to put the loose ends together but I think that actually makes you kind of a little more Zen and easygoing when you're like or the house is never gonna be a hundred percent clean ever right I bought a house that I'm sure a dog [ __ ] in at least eight years ago and I can still smell it every other day every once in a while you catch the owner dogs mow absolutely on a hot day it starts to come up somewhere around the laundry room lucky enough to live in a new construction oh good for you there's only ghosts so your home is not a rescue your body you got your home from a breeder it makes me happy environment is a big part of being happy when you when you this podcast is about thick having thick skin in life and you know life being a challenge sometimes and and and I go and people always ask me so I wanted to see what you think like when you're a comedian and you're in a bad mood how do you can you just go perform and I'm like a professional you know but I also kind of love it now here's a guy you're a guy who plays the blues but you're not necessarily sad I play bluesy stuff John Mayer Trio trio you play you know the BB King shows these Clapton shows and you play the blues but I'm just saying I know you're yeah but it's like to me you know like what do you when you're actually feeling down you can't use music okay that's your business no no no no you can okay so there's a couple a little Rodney Dangerfield hey I'll tell you baby you don't feel better I don't have bad moods most of the time like I am very physical okay so I could be tired and that's a very empirical physical thing I could be rundown tired stressed out because of this and that but a mood to me is a feeling you can't explain a mood is a is a zone and you're thinking that you can't explain because if you could you'd probably get along better with it so a mood is just a rock in your shoe you know and I know myself pretty well so I don't necessarily have moods right and then the other thing is my whole life playing a guitar and listening to myself play the guitar I've never said this out loud so I'm gonna chance it has always been a way for me to get my confidence back no matter what happened to me in my life right so I would go home after high school after day of school and I would play like hammering out the dent in me anybody made me feel bad anybody who punched me in the arm for flinching or a girl who I don't think knew I existed I could go home and I kind of felt like it was 21 Jumpstreet in some weird way because I always had this 21 Jumpstreet fantasy when I was a kid like I was all I ever wanted to be was like an undercover cop in high school it was a fantasy and I was yeah this 21 Jump Street I wanted to be like Johnny Depp like an undercover cop you know thank you and Soho Johnny Depp they call me now so so I would look at it like I was going to school secretly as a student but really a guitar player and then I would come home and play and I guess it's yeah I have to tell the whole story I would hear myself play and then I'd be like yeah no one's gonna [ __ ] with me right you know and I would I would witness my own playing and go I'm a black belt yeah I got no I got no issues like I don't what am i doing worried about these people and so I can still do that and that's what's kept me sane because if anything that came my way and I won't complain about any of it but if there was an offshoot of me being successful that also made my life really tough in one way or another I would just pick up a guitar and play and within like three minutes be like oh yeah shut up you know so that was my anchor so that's your that's your shut it all down that's my air compressor so and you don't have to play but here's an interesting distinction I need to get a laugh can you just play by yourself in your room when you're a teenager and that was enough oh yeah comedian it's you need an audience hi fantasized about the audience I put everyone in the audience that bothered me that day I put them all in there in my head and I'd play along to CDs and this was well before Garage Band well before anything you could jam along two in my day and I know I speak for a lot of guitar players around my age and older we played along to records and ignored the guitar playing on the records and pretended it wasn't there and played over it so imagine the built-in cocky of playing over BB cane and pretending BB Kings not there I speak bird a large number of guitar players who played over BB King like like it didn't matter that BB King was playing you know and now I see people who can like they play alone on Instagram or they play a looper we we never had a looper pedal right and everyone has the ability now to go do but and then that keeps going and they do another thing and you can get good but you get good in your own the problem is you have to learn how to play with other people and if you were doing a looper pedal you're only learning how to play in your own sense of time right and I worry I'm not upset about it but I worry that these Instagram musicians who play in their own meter who they're looping and they're playing 8 tracks of themselves yeah are gonna have a tough time finding the universal beat with another drummer or a bass player or another guitar player but they'll let them worry about that do you ever I mean I've heard I've heard rock musicians like make fun of bands that use a click track because then they go that's not a real band yeah holding it together oh we're many many phases beyond the click track being I mean the cool if a band just used a click track right now it would be the purest thing you've ever heard in your life yeah yeah I mean I would I would always record with a click track now very rarely what I know I mean that's one piece of technology that you should take advantage of you know I mean the stones never use a click track but they also do like a hundred takes of every song and if you tap the tempo at the beginning of a stone song and tap the tempo at the end of a stone song though they wildly fluctuate but that's one band that always plays together you know let's think of their vans they're playing like yeah they're allowed to to waver I saw you're John invited me to a dress rehearsal to his tour oh cool and it's like it's something between like it's like a a revival kind of feeling the bands Mac up singers I think horns showed up at one point in that show I don't know there's a couple of it's like it's like people I've seen you with before and new people you know but yet new people - yeah and um it was cool yeah it's really great it's a great band I've always tried to be thought of as the solo artist who puts together great bands like sting inspired me that way sting was always about putting just the greatest band of yeah yeah a Peter Gabriel yeah you know God I like solo acts where you want to really want to understand the guys they're playing with and you want to learn their names and you want to hear them play in their own bands and it's kind of an all-star lineup of musicians right now and the other thing was I wanted I don't want to carry Aaron Starling who was on born and raised in Paradise Valley and Pino of course who's killing and David Ryan Harris who's played with me for almost 20 years now and I wanted to do a little less heavy lifting and there's a beautiful thing that happens when the band is playing all of this music and it takes a little bit of onus off the guitar you know when I was starting out it was mean a guitar so I had to be bass drums and and guitar at the same time you're early South by Southwest yeah that's playing you know college bars and frat houses and stuff and it's very herculean overly adrenaline thing and as I get older I don't need to push them need to push I love a band doing all of it and I just get to I mean that's really what Grateful Dead is is the B is the most beautiful everybody lifting a thing with their pinkie and it all just goes like levitate does that's the word it levitates I've seen that show a few times yeah took over you you you replaced Jerry Garcia and I replaced Jerry Garcia the paint every week you know what I always think to myself and I've never said it but it really is from the heart and what what would a podcast be if I didn't beat myself up on the way home for saying something the thought that comes to mind is I'm just holding his space till he comes back that's what it feels like to me man and I'm sorry that's how my heart feels the heart feels like I'm just I'm just holding it down till he comes back I mean he's one of the greatest ever not the great and I can I can like because I'm a guitar player I can explain to any guitar player who isn't all that well versed in the music of the Grateful Dead why there's three there's three Titans of musicianship in my world and it's Miles Davis yeah Bill Evans and Jerry Garcia and you could put Jimi Hendrix in there too those are the four great top four these are the people who are playing with a level of intention so beautiful that I mean are there comics like that where okay they know all the jokes yeah he plays with a certain attention doesn't he he's like I was compared him to Allen Ginsberg you know yes because he's not he's gone past comedy you know laureate but if you if you could play guitar with Miles Davis do you think you would have been able to make that work absolutely you do the Dead oh yeah absolutely in about five year but maybe like four or five years from now I wouldn't have to but but but you could play that kind of music if you had yeah if you were asked to yes even if he had like a gun sitting on his lap you know every time someone asked me to play along with them like I did a Herbie Hancock record one time and I got real nervous right before and I was like I really don't know jazz like and I went he doesn't think I know jazz I'm not here cuz he wants me to play jazz like and then from that point on I realized if if you want me to be a part of what you're doing you already know what I do right and you've already signed off on that right otherwise where they need it well that's the thing sometimes a man needs a look at it called a billion other jazz guitar players but you wanted me here for one reason or another so I'm gonna do my thing right yeah but yeah we're also a bit of a sure your thing but you're a chameleon too because I've seen you like I don't know I've seen you with comics with the guitar without the guitar I've seen you play with your own solo shows I've seen you do an entire pre-new year show like sitting down with like pedals yeah I've seen you jump into blue jams that had nothing to do with us we're just you know walking through a bar or whatever and the mood hits you like you got it like you know what is the word they're like a troubadour like everybody who who can sort of bang in anywhere and you know maybe one or two songs you can take over but for the most part you got to be able to like fit in it's almost like an improv I love warmer I I think the the closest thing I can think it's like is like a blackjack a professional gambler who just wants table action yeah I just want do you have that you know there's this question and cut you going up tonight yeah you know they ask that when I walk into the partly my fault they ask this but I'll walk into the you know the the cellar especially and they'll go you going up tonight and even if I don't which most the time I don't I just loved the question that someone thinks I might you know I think that creativity is like this jump rope that's going around all the [ __ ] time and I just want to jump in it and for better and for worse with stand-up which I think I learned isn't gonna be my wheelhouse but anytime there's a guitar that's on a stage that's an opportunity and I swear to god it's not an opportunity to be like look it's me Johnny Mayer playing that's a that's an opportunity to like get inside the jump rope or get on the like when that dealer starts going flip flip flop fluke fluke you go I might win a million dollars and it's the same thing when I go in the studio right I might write thriller right or when I you know go up with Dave I go we might come up with the world's luckiest best hour that someone joke because yeah you know the jokes are what people remember we killed each other the other night I mean I heard you guys from last night I was only one time my life the other night that I laughed so hard on stage that I couldn't breathe I mean I was truly gone what was he saying even if the road is Joe no no I won't it was a very unconventional thing we had going on with nothing harder the coatings about no it wasn't a joke per se but it was about uh it was like the way you and your brother will build a scenario and you'll just keep stacking on to the scenario over a course of two or three hours to the point where you're just like writing a movie you know when you're building more than a joke you're building like this shared vision of what of what a movie might be about these two things and this and that and we just got into some of the funniest stuff and it's just crushing and and it's funny because at the end of it you're like thank God nobody taped that because my career would be over but I really wish somebody taped it so I can get back and it's catch and release man right it's yeah have you ever had a shot did you ever have a magic show that wasn't recorded and you yes what's that laughs yes yes do you still tease our one night I not one necessarily one night that jumps off at me but there were times where you have the right jokes for the right crowd your whole thing your metabolism is lining up with the the tutoring committee and you just feel really good and the only times I really think about it is it wasn't taped a part of the sense of had great shows that is when you're gonna be taping something soon like oh I wish it was tonight next month you know and one of the reasons that Mina tells our thing was hard to figure out because you know like you and Chappelle we don't I don't want to say you guys don't prepare I've seen you guys have your meetings but you know like four five minutes before a show like tell won't even give me that right so I gotta go what's the best way to set him up and do all this without annoying like we've lived enough life together on stage that we're building kind of like a carbon copy of the hard drive so we're both on a local area network of the same joke list we've been around the same set but then it gets hard to make new ones that's why the other day you're right so that sort of tells right I'll set him up for something my nose gonna stop showstopper and he'll ignore me completely because he did it last week doesn't want to repeat himself I had this problem my whole career where I would do press and my I went through publicists because they were I was difficult for them you know because they would say John just answer the question the same way and my brain even to this day as a musician works like if it's already happened it can't be done again and so I would keep answering the question in an increasingly more but not the esoteric way until you get to your fiftieth person and now you're beginning so far beyond the buoys that you just get in trouble because you don't want to say the same thing and then you see someone like Lady gaga who does what publicists have been asking for years to do and they make a supercut of her saying the same thing all around the world they make fun of her for it so just that alone right look at that it's the microcosm of like okay what's the right way to do it be safe and boring or interesting and possibly lose everything so what what other game in the world if you win they chuckle and if you lose you will die it's the weirdest set of consequences crazy it's so cutthroat right now I don't tweet jokes anymore it's not it's just this is the longest form communication I've ever had with people in the last few years I don't do interviews right Instagram captions are a couple sentences I don't do Twitter anymore so it's kind of interested to do this cuz at a certain point you can play it so safe that your own fans don't know how you feel about this yeah you know well that is you know people take neutral stance especially in the red-blue war you know wants to be out there talking about politics and now even that's a problem if you're oh wise to why is soin so so quiet you know like yeah they'll give it's just like there's no winning anymore so you just gotta try to take take the battles you can take and the ones you can back up and you know you never want to it's hard to stick you got you really got to be brave to be a relevant performer that's right now that's why when I noticed you're going all over the world I go you're going to Japan and Europe and all over America is what I spotted and I know you were just in South America notice when I travel overseas the audiences are super curious what Americans think about what's going on in America so you're gonna get hit with all those questions and but I don't I don't even do press there yeah I mean that this is the joy of my life yeah you're gonna get hit by it by the doorman by the driver everyone's gonna want to know what's coming on in America it's like I don't think they I mean I know you're right I know I get your point I think it does happen to an extent but I feel like these what's happening in politics is like everyone's parents are fighting right now yeah and when parents fight the kids are warm you know I would I would fight with my brothers but when my parents fought my brothers and I would be there for each other yeah and I really feel like politics right now is almost like our parents are yelling at each other in the other room and we are trying to make each other laugh because we ultimately do care about each other yeah and that's what I'm feeling in in my life and and the other thing it's so crazy like if you work backwards from the way people really are right now nobody wants to offend everyone severy ones trying not to hmm everyone doesn't want it everyone wants no offense no one wants to everybody wants to be like everybody wants to be an ally everybody wants to participate very few people have said something that offended someone and said I'm sticking to it what does everybody say I'm sorry I'm sorry I didn't mean to so I don't think Humanity is in the garbage when you have so many people just trying to be interesting right I grew up wanting to be I grew up loving Letterman and Howard Stern right and we would laugh at Morton Downey jr. I mean you and I are from the same we watched the same affiliate yeah we watch W wor yeah channel 9 that's lame delay what's up turn night writer for the men that's rain delay Niners corner will be preempted so so I grew up miners quarter was the best postgame show or the rainout show Ralph Ralph Kiner who knows this if we grow up we grew up wanting to be interesting and we laughed at Letterman who was absurd and interesting and there was a generation that came up in fact a lot of generations that have now come up don't acknowledge being absurd or irreverent as a way of life right and it's very difficult because you're now speaking to everybody all the time because the thing will jump the rails if something does seem to have some merit as being able to dig into it and pull some some stuff out of it so it's like but people don't but we're not I have met many people in my life I've met very few sort of self-appointed [ __ ] starters I just met people who really wanted to get a laugh or be interesting or or say think you know this will get you in trouble now um you're not allowed to say to acknowledge the existence of two opposing but coexisting thoughts I find that very difficult because that's what most things law no one's talked listening and talking back and that way yeah you wouldn't be allowed to say right now that there's something about rock with you by Michael Jackson there's something in the right that you want a copy for your next record right yeah you know you you wouldn't be able to say if somebody would say hey all of that's foreboding and you know well I don't want you to think that I'm but so I'm just gonna say any of it right so there's all these things that start getting grayed out you're not allowed to go into them it's a very strange time but but I always look at like okay you don't mean to everybody doesn't everybody you you you you name check thriller before and I was glad you did because this is part of us you know we can't pretend the past doesn't exist and and and we need to be nicer to each other and a little more tolerant of slips of the tongue you know there are young people hearing you talk about this who will say well I hardly think and they would make a slip of the tongue joke this is in your this is right up your alley but they would say well now you're reducing what Michael Jackson did to us above the tongue and so here's the other problem right it's like we don't put a period and a line break at the end of everything we say and we move quickly from idea to idea idea and I'll tell you the biggest difference that's causing all of this ire and upset is that we don't know each other and when you know somebody and you're talking with them the assumption is they mean well you think of how many hundreds of things your friends say to you all the time that you just pour right oh you just drive right over the pothole but don't because you know it's just so intense he does that so or or I know what you mean we fill in the blanks for each other right when you don't know somebody you don't give them the assumption that they mean well right and so then everything becomes these little tiny shards of glass that can cut then what I think is even worse than people getting offended is constant disclaimers constant not to blank but not to blank but not to blink but so so the social media thing is like everyone's your friend we're all gonna be sitting at a table except it's the first day of school every day you know people acted unlike the first day of the real world it's the first day of the real world every day for the last 10 years hi I'm John I don't you know so I can set myself up in five sentences yeah and and it's all gonna come crashing down when I don't agree with the country singer over there that's right but it's yeah and well before you've gotten drunk together America needs to get drunk together and show off their dogs now they're just getting drunk with their dogs getting drunk when I used to drink I would get drunk with my dog my dog didn't drink but I always related to my dog so well when I was drunk really something happens because you get more dog like when you're drunk if you look at my dog I'm gonna be like you need to like heavy breathe heavy drunk breathing what's up buddy gonna go take a piss in your own bedroom your dog's sitting there looking at you like John you're so funny and it's I'm so honored that your baby's first well you I would do stand-up at the the seller in New York you would watch me do stand-up and then we would both walk up the stairs and we would sit and you would give me notes yeah on stand-up so this is you know now I feel like I've a little bit kind of stated my case for having a little to do with comedy which is like not supposed to be on a stand-up stage by myself but is sort of interacting with comedy in a certain way and I feel like okay you know maybe there's maybe it's I've had a little Bar Mitzvah in a way where a current mood is like yeah that's what I should be doing you know not not pacing a stage with the empty microphone stand in my half closed fist rocking it back and forth that's not for me I was trying to I feel like what you were really doing was you're expressing yourself you know you could call it stand-up I don't call it and that what you were doing I was saying he's he's being comedic he's doing comedy in a stand-up Club but I feel like you're still in a weird way it's just all writing it weren't alright it you weren't thanks forming it's all writing you were writing alright then when I see you at your rehearsal the other day you know you made a few poignant comments that were in a weird way about your writing you were specifically talking about your music you said well I've been doing this long enough now something I'm paraphrasing to know that this is what I do yeah and and you know you're securing your place yeah and I sing these songs back from now sometimes so 15 maybe maybe comedy and being on stage and developing a thicker skin that's a gets you to the place where you can stand there and say that to an audience well it was writing right you said it it was all about oh my god all these thoughts that they go rushing through my head all the time if I grab the right ones and I interpret them metaphorically in the right way and I organize them the right way I could possibly I didn't really ever do this but I could get an entire roomful of people to be howling with laughter it never really happened but the possibility of it always drew me to try I remember people would go you going up and I go I am not going up tonight and I just remember the next thing I knew that my legs were moving and I was going down the stairs and I was hearing my intro nice nice guys we got a really cool surprise for you it had begun I guess I am going up right you know and I don't know people knew that but that's I guess the sign of partly the sign of being a comic but the but the part of me that wasn't a comic and I want to say this to anybody who was like why should merry do comedy or whatever like I understand now that whenever whenever I would get my tape I wouldn't watch it and it cuz I don't know why I wouldn't watch it I think was something about it I didn't want to control how do you watch is it too hard to confront it's boring no I think it's too hard to confront and when I realized I didn't want to watch my tapes I went okay if I was ever really gonna do stand-up I better take a year off and do it every night like Judd did when he came back you know I said otherwise I'm not doing I'm not being fair so I kind of don't do stand-up anymore because it's not fair to pop in and do things off my iphone notes go home never watch the tape get my own feelings hurt by my own lack of clarity or quality and then and and everyone else gets a little bit like well are you gonna do that again no maybe not I just I feel like when I first screwed up on the guitar like first time I ever played live on the guitar my hands just locked up with nerves and it was this preteen talent show and and I my mom had just bought me a new guitar it's a preteen talent show remember what it was called what what the song was oh the show it was the preteen talent show with the Levitt pavilion in Westport Connecticut it was Anika's ebo and I was so bad and I thought I was gonna win you know cuz I thought I was cool and my hands just went when they just wouldn't open my hands wouldn't work and I went cold no I was just nervous and I went straight home and dug in and played and played and played and played and when I went up and did stand-up and you gave me a whole bunch of notes and was like you're right you're right you're right I didn't go watch the tape and I was like looking back on it it's like if you ever see me on a stand-up stage again by myself it's because I took a year or two off to really do it right but I just have too much respect for the people who are there tonight not to go up by myself every once in a while and skim off some of the glory and then head home and it's precious for a lot of people and I appreciate your respect for the stage and for stand up but I also think stand up for me started as a hobby and I might have done it for a hobby if I had another career I loved it as a hobby and when people say they're de trying it I admire that like some comics are not like that and I appreciate that they're almost always insecure comics there was an issue last week with stormy Daniels doing a stand-up gig and comedians were and we're shouting her down it was all social media but and I immediately said on this show yeah she's a porn star the someone said stay in our lane I was like that Lane's drying up she wants to express herself creative she's a director she's she's a she's a letter let her try it like I'm always up for anybody especially somebody who like me who could be who could be a stereo to a pigeon-holed as the roast guy like I admire when people try new things a guy at the cellar once I once to try to three-minute bit that went nowhere this is a long time ago and a comic said to me Oh a long way to go for that laughs and it hurt me so bad it kept me from really being adventurous for a long time until I just started to get better and better and better I'm just like [ __ ] that guy yeah if I want to wear clogs and a nose ring and act crazy and do whatever I don't know like it doesn't like I can be out there you know and and you have to sort of let go of some of your inhibitions and some of the haters I'm not just talking to you I mean it go sermonize like like like the haters will keep you I know it sounds so corny but we did a screening here for a Disney cartoon that I'm on tangled it's a cartoon now Mandy Moore and and Zachary Levi and I play one of the pub thugs her bodyguard and in the episode I look for a foot I'm a hook foot that's my character it's a on the TV show a big bodyguards thug with a hook for a foot I never complain about my disability I've been on for two seasons I'm always a great guy fell in love with a mermaid I sing Howard Harrell mink Howard Menken song sometimes it's the best cake I ever had then there it's my last episode so the animators came over to show it to me with my friends the other night and in it my long-lost brother from the movie hook hand shows up right and it's Brad Garrett and and he the whole storyline is how he mocked me for wanting to be a dancer when I was when we were boys when we were young brothers you know you have brothers you could relate and mocked me and mocked me and I left my dream and I became this pub thug bodyguard for Rapunzel but he's a big star now but he used to being a jerk about it and he's like rubbing it in and he's making fun of me still from wanting to be a dancer with my hook foot and every time he has a hook hand and he's like a musician so and Rapunzel gives it to him good lecturers say how dare you stop somebody else from living their dream don't be like that don't be negative you know bring be positive and then he apologizes to me and we kind of leave and go off into a vaudeville act and we're kind of I'm out of the series that's how they killed me off right long way to go for that story beautiful but what I'm saying is the haters like my mom I love my mom loved me but she always said to me like you have it I had a terrible voice you have a terrible voice don't sing and then and then and then so I let that keep me from trying haters [ __ ] on Twitter or so obnoxious comedian says don't try something uh it's just the negative I'd rather see somebody waste stage time or you know I don't ever see that as waste I see any time a human being wants to express himself in a new way I think the community the comedy community should be inviting you could say and that is true plenty of stage time to go around you could say that haters are like unemployed gatekeepers nothing you're like okay so you're working for free right no one's paying you to defend something and the thing you're defending is nothing so if you really break down like what a hater is they're sort of saying not that that you're not that that's that well that whatever they're not even pointing to what that is and whatever that is doesn't need them to continue on to carry on and hold hold hold strong in front of the gate and go you're not funny like you're no one's paying you to do this and the thing you're defending might not be true and the person that you're comparing this thing to doesn't want you to work for them and you're not getting paid so you're holding up this idea that only exists in your head I have not been hurt by a hater in years and years you know I don't think they're actually haters but let me ask you this question do you think as usual buddy who blocks people and I always tell them like don't block somebody if you don't like what they wrote ignore them let them drift it see yeah why are you engaging this nudnik yeah part of the thing that makes haters easy to ignore is that they give themselves away with their syntax there's like four ways to write a hateful comment there's a billion ways to write something nice right and there's like four ways like like I don't know but by the third word I go okay I don't even read it I got it I got haters are always corny yeah like and if because if they weren't corny you would love them right so you are a hater but you're a clever hater and you're not corny and you're interesting to listen to you hate on stuff so you're ultimately you're not a hater thank you but my question is do you think there's a rage there's like this correlation between open-minded Zen performers and really successful like satisfied fulfilled performers is there anybody who has your point of view about hey the stage is for everybody who's also losing out jobs to other people right now and are just closing the store at the very last can you think can you simultaneously keep an open mind for all performers and be someone hungry to win at the same time or do you have to kind of be like you and I work we're established do you have can you be unestablished and still keep that open mind or does this come from success as success the ultimate xanax for this stuff I feel like at least my generation of comedians was communal a brotherhood or sisterhood maybe part of that was the cellar the Friars Club the alt scene the USO tours I'm not really sure no one got upset when someone from your singing got jealous and and and there was always I feel like I spent some of my forties apologizing for [ __ ] I said and did in my 30s to my peers and vice versa like we made up we were the alpha male alpha female stuff comes out in your 30s really a lot it's right 20s it's like everybody's it's a free-for-all that's right but then the 30s you start to go oh maybe this one will be bigger than this one and maybe it made me I really probably won't make it until I always knew I wouldn't make it in show business so a tell made it and I was right you know I could tell how to make it insomniac is they're all like okay the funniest guy made it now we can all make it this is it like you're in the desert and you have enough water in your canteen for you and other people that you can let other people drink from your canteen but other people who don't have enough water in their canteen just can't afford to share and that guys like you and I have like gallon drums of water because we're fulfilled that we have that to share with other people the people I don't understand not to name names are people who have an entire tanker truck full of water and won't give someone a sip yeah that up my brain does not understand yeah I don't understand I mean there was like billionaires you know you know that's your you know not I mean yeah like you said not to name names but it's like the president you know as you know it's just this is how they are you know it's greed and you want to be the best ever you want to be yeah that's a path aw that's so pathological it's such an outlying pathology that like what would you I mean it's such a blacks he's such a Black Swan there's nothing to take from it it's just it's I just look at it like a like a petri dish and it's just got this organization of cells in it I don't even really humanize it like I don't get upset I don't get newly upset every time the president does something upsetting it's an extension of passing yeah it's a pathological thing it's like watching two two cells just bounce off each other something and other people go you see what they just did no that's what those do in that slide at the right in the petri dish or something you know but um I I agree and yeah it's just as upsetting but I don't open a new file for each thing that's why the left is getting so beat up because they get so flared up over every little thing the guy mispronounces Tim Apple Tim Cook is Tim Apple and it's a big news story well at least it's all over social and go how about not caring about that stuffing just caring about the important stuff that's life-threatening yeah being selective is a very very smart shrewd way to do it but the the the the problem is that there's some of the lesser infractions are some of the more fluffy ones and more people want to see those things and so everything gets conflated with like do you know what he did No yeah and if you're trying to win the ground war of no no we're not concerned with him calling him someone Tim Apple we're concerned would be much more fundamental hey keep your kid keep your eyes on this ball you know it's very it's people who aren't select yeah people who aren't selective have a hard time stating a case I don't want to get political but I don't think we should be separating families at the border but I do think it's okay to keep kids in cages just at the movie theater and in airplanes I don't know so much so much so one more top so before we get to our you write it down like time cuts you have the good stuff yeah I don't think we will talk for a minute and then I'll do roast in peace and we can rapid fire a couple touchy subjects just to get some laughs yeah yeah into a wrapper funny right yeah I don't hate myself yet so let's keep going I think you're doing great no it's great yeah this is the most effortless conversation i'm saucin in here this is like my wrong no it's yeah just you're the guy to talk thank you you really are because I know you a long time and I feel like you did for your first podcast appearance I think we talked about everything except two things that I wanted to quickly mention which is you designed a guitar yeah this is wild because you always had this one kind of guitar as long as I could remember and then one day I saw it pp TRS PRS could you say I redesigned a guitar right so I've been offender guy my whole life and this is your idea yeah yeah yeah for years I mean I'd like a Fender Signature Series Stratocaster me too Mike Eldred thing which I we love Mike al burdy you know I think for me when mike Eldred left fender that was the beginning of the end of that era where where artists really had people to talk to at that company and we could call we going oh I found the part you're gonna be mad about on your right oh this part right here and I would talk to Fender gonna go like hey I have this idea for more than a signature model and they never really bit and and by the way I never was like well how dare you not take my idea I never had an issue so ever but I wanted to go somewhere they would take my ideas and was like hey let's freshen up the electric guitar right because the electric guitar still always this vestige of 19 fifties and sixties car a surf horse it's still ridiculously tied to vintage car and surf culture and there's absolutely a place for it but sixty years later you're still putting out these tributes to the station wagon you know when it comes to the design language of the guitar and so basically like I took those ideas to PRS because Paul Reed Smith is the guy who started the company and he's still there and I talked to him daily and it's like the relationship I used to have with Mike over at fender which is like you call someone up and you have ideas and you share them and they're not afraid to turn them CNC machine on and build you the thing you're talking about you know and and this is always a difference between someone working at a company who loves what they do and and then like a venture capital company coming in and buying a thing because one day you'll call up and you'll go like hey can I get one that's got a rosewood hole rosewood neck and they'll go yeah it says here you you already got two this year yeah and our contract was for two so I'm gonna have to charge you is like no don't mind item.this Mike would send me a thing and then we would do something together off of that that would make you guys yeah really happy at the end of them you know so now I do it over at Paul Reed Smith and it's not really like thumbing my nose at fender I mean how are you gonna get mad at the company I mean you'd be like no more Jimi Hendrix I can't I'm boycotting right mute Jimi Hendrix played a Stratocaster it's gonna be fun to play something you thought well so now I'm playing this thing that's a hundred percent mine right and you know the fact that you're playing or your mood it's affected my overthinking because right because it's like you you'll cook for yourself all day at night it doesn't matter how it tastes but as soon as that you're cooking for other people you start getting paranoid about every variable of the meal you know yeah but I've gotten to a point where it feels so good now that I'll never again have a number-one guitar it's like a basketball player just changing it out of shoes like I could play a show I could hand someone my guitar and I played that night at the end of the show and then just get another one and play just the same way on that guitar cuz it's bespoke for me so for the first time I could go to a guitar Center and pull a guitar off the wall and be like it would feel just like the one I had for twenty years which is super cool it's called the silver sky it comes in many colors PRS guitars of Mama yellow chicken parmesan chicken parmesan metallic there's one has the ceiling from Canter's and your TV show that's crazy I yeah oh yeah yeah yeah they're making a they're making a TV show yeah ABC's producing a pilot based loosely off of a song that I wrote that a writer got really inspired by ever happened in history maybe someone said it had at some point I mean there was a Margaret Childress yeah married with children but we'll see I mean it's really it's really fun I didn't get into this part of life part of life yeah I didn't get into this stuff to be like oh I want to produce stuff but I take these fun little opportunities as they come and and it's just a fun little playground out my career now as strange and this joint it is it is actually as a perfect kind of impression of the way my giant head looks little weird River that breaks off here and does that and here and does that and I know you want to get out of here we can both go to the Rose battle one time one time we were talking and talking and talking and we wanted to go to the San Gennaro feast and we just kept talking through the feast and took turns saying hi to people another time yeah yeah another time another time you couldn't talk you were on voice rest and I came over and you would just write me notes for a really long time when I had my vocal issue and I figured out the the smartest way to communicate was with an iPad with a Bluetooth keyboard and the iPad facing away from me so I would type and then just Apple a delete and just just like to all delete and just type and just understand that was pretty close and where we would we would go around they say what a weird times we got we've been one time jeff borrowed a shirt from me in my house before we went to this to the cellar together so hey can I borrow a shirt yes sure we both go to the cellar and he calls me up on stage and he makes fun of my shirt and I go Jeff you're wearing one of my [Laughter] forgotten that I you you put that on your credit says that you fit into John Mayer we had a night one time that was to me the moment where I went okay I don't suck at this anymore you came up to join a towel at the at the cellar and then you guys both brought me up I'll never forget I think about it all the time and I sat at the piano with you I think here I was just sitting there and you would at my laughter whatever but I didn't say a word because I started getting really good at like the inner water slide you know like where it's like go hold up hold up hold up hold up go and I just held up the whole time because there was never anything good yeah and so I sat there the whole time and I finally learned how to not take every bingo ball that comes up out of the cage and I just sat and sat in a towel was talking about going down on a girl and some strategy he had for going down on a girl and he turned to me he said John what's your strategy for going down on a girl and I said I spell out I'm John Mayer and it was the only thing I said that night I bat 1000 because I took one hit one swing and it was a home run and even a tell was like yeah yeah okay you got it you got it and I'm giving you a bump mic on it and and and that's when I was like okay now I feel like I've entered a new realm where I'm not hyper actively trying to throw things out that come to mind yeah part of part of holding a joke when you have a joke it's the hardest thing to do because you know you might miss the shot it's like seeing the opening but you know you got to run the clock out or whatever and it's really it's really the the Zen master timing thing of knowing that you might not get to do it but if you do it you have that's right you know when I do my speed rose not with Dave because we're like basically doing a duet but like if I bring up another comedian to do with me in a rare occasion so I'll bring out Mike Sarah Silverman's done it with me a couple people I have a signal so I'm making I'm doing all the jokes running down the run of people I mean I had a woman with one leg in the other night at my show like it was crazy that you never know what you're gonna get and I'm just boom boom boom wedding to these people and I told the other I told the other comedians like when they do with me have their hand up by their chest when they have something oh that's great I'll be able to go you know that's great John would you ever hang out with a guy like this it comes down to having a great joke in mind and if the moments gone throw it away yeah brilliant this was a blast we do a segment called roast in peace I'm gonna do that did you want music I remember you asking me early on I was gonna say this one's very emotional I'm hoping maybe you would play some blues or whatever you feel would be would be would be appropriate for [Music] it's time for roasts in peace [Music] this is tough billionaire he hood air Lani Otto it's a diamond trader 65 years old he died while having his having his penis enlarged he traded blood diamonds as his job yep he owned the largest penthouse in Monaco really he had another place mansion in Bel Air lived in Israel in Africa he sold the most expensive diamond ever sold to a Chinese criminal well II hood air Lonnie Otto penis enlargement surgery he had a heart attack when they injected his penis with his last words were a large or larger he who'd started his career off this is a fact we looked this up he was a masseuse but his life did not have a happy ending hey what's the point of being worth millions owning thousands of diamonds having a mansion in Bel Air the most expensive penthouse of Monaco if you can't have a little dick guys with big dicks don't accomplish what a who'd accomplished is they're too busy [ __ ] his dick was so small Michael Jackson one of the second instead of penile enlargement he should have just gotten hand reduction surgery he who'd Errol and I know roastin penis plugs plugs oh man John Mayer calm for concert tickets how many people are in this band I saw you introduce them all without like like you just rattled it off I could never do that perfect I happen to know them personally but it is a deep-seated fear of mine that I'll get it wrong my favorite really I mean it's bound to happen a lot of guys had a lead singer guys know what the order of well so I go around I go around the stage because Springsteen would have to do clearance laughs cuz everybody we create like go around the stage it's the only way to be fair you could do like Van Morrison does and he's forget their name you just throw a bottle at him just a big red LED clock facing towards them and I you know that's what I heard and I mean then as in like that's what he does that's the strange relationship a shot clock song I saw him he left the stage and the band didn't even know he didn't say goodbye to the audience if you're doing it for that long you got to figure out a way to make it work for you 67 dates across the world between March and October I'm gonna miss you both good luck man be safe you thank you I'm gonna try you once told me that the beginning of the tour in the end of the tour is the easy part it's the middle part the tour it's the middle of the book where the staples are it's the middle of that itinerary all right safe travels one well you're playing in Japan I'll be at the Brea improv March 29th 11th at the La Jolla Comedy Store it's my South cow so kaltura Brody great and then go see me natal to Borgata and in the sands Bethlehem labored Memorial Day weekend roast battle will be a cluster fest in San Francisco it's gonna be [ __ ] crazy Jeselnik told me he wants a judge yesterday that's gonna be amazing anything else pal rate and review us on iTunes check us on Spotify you can email us to say hello at thick-skinned with Jeff Ross at Gmail Instagram thick-skinned with Jeff Ross Twitter thick-skinned cast and we love you John Mayer safe travels give my best to moose I will and the band bring them by the Comedy Store before you guys take off well lots of love everybody life is hard but we're getting through it together bye

Channel: Thick Skin with Jeff Ross

Views: 173,139

Rating: 4.945919 out of 5

Keywords: john mayer, jeff ross, thick skin with jeff ross, comedy store, comedy, funny

Id: huHs1Oauh2M

Length: 73min 27sec (4407 seconds)

Published: Wed Mar 20 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/[deleted]]

defiantly a good listen cool hearing what he could say about him and chappel

[u/[deleted]]

As a heads up to everyone here, it's an interesting interview, but the Dead aren't talked about very much here. Only briefly