#210 - Dan Johnson - Actor, Songwriter, Musician

Unknown Speaker (0:06): And we're live. Hello. Welcome, YouTube and Twitchers. Welcome. Especially the YouTubers.

Unknown Speaker (0:16): You all kick ass by that area.

Unknown Speaker (0:20): Listen to me. Gonna tell you what.

Unknown Speaker (0:30): Joe.

Chris (0:34): I'm gonna be Welcome to the Chris and Mike Show. He is Mike. I am Chris. This show is brought to by Riverside FM, the one and only choice for your podcasting platform. We are currently live on Twitch, YouTube, and chrisandmikeshow.com.

Chris (1:06): That's just chrisandmikeshow.com. There's no the in there. So if you want to jump on and watch our show with the one and only the amazing life resume, actor, writer, songwriter. Songwriter. That's what it is.

Chris (1:23): Musician. Great mustache grower. A fellow fellow bald man of the bald man united. Johnson. Welcome to the show.

Chris (1:35): We're broadcasting almost in the 100 countries now. Wow. We're approaching 700,000 views with I think over 6,000 subscribers. So you have picked a really good time to come on the growth of this wonderful little top three podcast show based out of, Arizona slash Pontiac, Illinois. What's up?

Unknown Speaker (1:54): Man.

Unknown Speaker (1:54): Thanks, I had a great day.

Unknown Speaker (1:55): It's been a long day. We just got back from, Bonnaroo last night about midnight.

Unknown Speaker (1:59): How was that?

Mike (2:00): Bonnaroo was worth it. That's what I'll say. -Right on. -It was not easy. At times, it was not fun, but it was worth it.

Mike (2:08): I got to see some amazing acts that that are like legacy people for me. They're just like lifetime. And honestly had even if I I could give you just a few of them that even if I had only seen them, it would have been worth the heat and the rain and the misery and the Okay. We we averaged we averaged 15 miles a day walking because like between the campsites and the stages and where the food's at and bathrooms and everything, 15 miles a day. Like they should've they should've warned you.

Mike (2:33): They should've said, hey, guess what? You know, do some workouts ahead of time because it is that much walking. But dude, like when you get to see some of the the incredible acts that they booked and how hard people play at Bonnery, I was just like, oh god, I'm so glad I'm here. So we've we camped for five days and watched four days of music and got back, we, got back at last night at midnight. So and then jumped right back into work today and had a bunch of content to create.

Unknown Speaker (2:55): So I'm good. I'm happy to be here.

Chris (2:58): Nice. Now to put your walking perspective, my son was a drill instructor in the Marines and he would average 31 miles a day.

Unknown Speaker (3:05): Oh, barf. See, that's

Unknown Speaker (3:07): why you don't join the Marines.

Unknown Speaker (3:08): There's a reason I didn't choose that path.

Unknown Speaker (3:11): I know what I'm doing.

Unknown Speaker (3:12): I'm a dummy. Look how much hair I've lost.

Unknown Speaker (3:15): Right. God bless them people.

Unknown Speaker (3:18): Yeah. God bless them all around. Because we're not doing it. So it it's been a good day. And, and then I I didn't realize that you guys were two hours behind me, and so, it it actually gave me a little bit of more time in the day to to So do what it was it was good.

Mike (3:32): Had another actor buddy of mine over here, and we were acting out a bunch of scenes for Cool. It's basically, that's how we that's how we a lot of us make money as actors, as, you know, companies hire us to, to be silly on their social media or make them look cool or whatever the deal is. Yeah. Right on. -That's kinda we do, we, we freelance a lot of that stuff out, and it pays a whole lot of bills in between TV and movies and, and concerts and whatnot.

Mike (3:55): That works

Unknown Speaker (3:56): alright. Where

Unknown Speaker (3:57): are you based out of, Dan?

Mike (3:59): The primary part of the year, I live in Fort Worth is where I'm at right now. Normally, would be gone by June because it gets hot as balls here. Oh. And so yeah. So normally, like, June 1, we've got a little bitty cabin up in, the middle of nowhere, Colorado, up in village with, 500 people in it.

Mike (4:18): And, so normally, it's, June through November in Colorado, right on the lake. I can walk down and go fishing every day. And then,

Unknown Speaker (4:24): Wow.

Unknown Speaker (4:25): The rest of the year here in Fort Worth. But, but I I have gotten I'll I'll be 50 this year. And so I've gotten to the point where I'm like, I don't I don't really enjoy sitting through the heat anymore. Believe I'll go elsewhere.

Unknown Speaker (4:34): I don't blame you.

Unknown Speaker (4:36): Yeah. No. Yeah. I mean, I can't say much. You guys are in Arizona for crying out loud.

Unknown Speaker (4:39): Well, I'm in Illinois now.

Unknown Speaker (4:41): Oh, okay. Gotcha. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker (4:42): Yeah. Yeah. He's in Illinois. He's in Illinois.

Unknown Speaker (4:44): I was in Arizona for twenty years and I had enough of the heat too, man. So yeah.

Unknown Speaker (4:48): Then you got smart and said that's enough of this.

Chris (4:50): It's well I'm the only one still here, man. I'm 56 and I live on an acre, so I really have to deal with the heat because my acre's all grass.

Unknown Speaker (5:02): Didn't she know they're not supposed to have grass in there, someone?

Chris (5:05): Dude, I love grass. Is. Right now it's not. It's too hot. All my grass is like, it looks like shit.

Chris (5:11): I'm I just irrigated today, so hopefully it gets all nice and plush again. Yeah. It takes

Unknown Speaker (5:16): some more.

Mike (5:16): Real comeback. My my my, my beautiful amazing lady partner and I have an ongoing internal debate about watering our yard. You know, we're like, you know, if we'd stop watering it, we'd quit having to mow it. Wouldn't that okay? But it looks so pretty out there.

Unknown Speaker (5:31): So Okay, Dan.

Unknown Speaker (5:32): Here's where I'm gonna be your subject matter expert. I worked four years straight all through high school at one of the nicest golf courses in the state. We hosted the state tournament every year.

Unknown Speaker (5:43): Right on.

Dan (5:44): You do not need to water your grass. We just went through a little drought period here. Every yard in my area was brown with little patches of green. It rained about seven or eight inches in twelve days. I had to mow twice.

Unknown Speaker (5:59): Well, that's because you have rain. See, if I have rain, my grass see, that's

Unknown Speaker (6:03): thing No, I yours is a different situation because obviously if Chris waits, he lives in the desert and it's like, duh, dude, you live in the desert, you gotta water your grass.

Unknown Speaker (6:12): Yeah. Yeah. But for where

Dan (6:15): you and I live, it's gonna come back every year.

Unknown Speaker (6:18): It'll it'll always come back. It always comes back. Yeah. Yeah. That's that's been that's been kinda what like when I was a little kid, I remember when I was, real young watching karate kid for the first time and looking at that garden in mister Miyagi's back backyard Oh, with the koi pond and, like, the wood, you know, walkways and everything.

Unknown Speaker (6:35): And I was like, when I grow up, I'm gonna build something like that. And then I did. And now it's just constant work, man.

Unknown Speaker (6:41): Yep. Yep. Constant.

Unknown Speaker (6:44): I dug I dug a pond in my backyard that's, like, four feet deep and put fish in there, you know, and lily pads and everything and the walkways and the Zen garden and the big Buddha and the whole thing. And and now it's just like every day you walk out and you're like, oh, wow. It grew more. Awesome. So Yeah.

Chris (7:00): That's great. See, mine mine just I need rain. If I have got a rain once a month, I'd be happy. Yeah. You know?

Mike (7:06): Yeah. I I don't I don't envy anybody that that lives in that lives in Arizona. I've I've visited there way too many times. I'm like, I I don't know how you folks do it. Y'all are tougher than I am.

Chris (7:14): Dude, it's it's it's it's really nice outside of of July, August, and half of September. Yeah. Like, had a really, really we had a really, really nice the first 100 the first over a 102 degree temperature was this weekend. Up until this weekend, it had past a 102. All year.

Chris (7:32): Gotcha. Yeah. So that's good. Now stop fucking stop talking about weather. Because we talk about weather, that means you have nothing to talk about.

Unknown Speaker (7:38): Like the conversation

Unknown Speaker (7:39): We is got oh, we got plenty to talk about. What you wanna say?

Unknown Speaker (7:41): We got plenty to talk about. So so before we came on the show, you were running the golden moments and I told you to stop.

Unknown Speaker (7:49): When you

Chris (7:49): were a wee little lad, when you're a wee little lad outside of, you know, Ireland, you know, harvesting potatoes, You know, what did you aspire to be?

Unknown Speaker (7:59): How'd you know? My great grandparents immigrated here from Ireland. That's a real thing.

Unknown Speaker (8:04): Right? It's a mother. It's a home

Unknown Speaker (8:06): in the motherland, man.

Unknown Speaker (8:07): It's a motherland. Come on.

Mike (8:08): Exactly. That's the thing. It's, my my great aunt, my my grandmother's sister, I guess, is, Jean Ritchie who is, like, really famous for being the first person to ever record, Appalachian folk music. She and a guy named Doc Watson, I don't know if you're familiar with him or not, but super famous folk

Unknown Speaker (8:27): heard singer. That name.

Mike (8:28): Yeah. Yeah. They were the first people ever to record, like, the old Appalachian folk music, and and it was the Smithsonian Institute. There's actually a movie based on it. The Smithsonian Institute started wanting to, like, record all of this old Appalachian folk music that came largely from Ireland.

Mike (8:44): And Cool. She recorded that. I've got the album sitting over here in my giant album collection, actually. And, so music was just a huge part of everything that I grew up with. When I was a little kid, my my dad's side of the family all lived way up in the mountains in Kentucky.

Mike (8:58): And so I spent most of my childhood up there. And for a lot of the time, we didn't have a TV at all. And, like, everybody in my family played music. And, you know, they all had that that that thing that the families do. They call it blood harmony where everybody can just sing together so beautifully.

Unknown Speaker (9:11): You know, whether it's whether it's gospel or or

Unknown Speaker (9:14): Nice. Folk

Mike (9:15): or country or southern rock or whatever it is. So my dad and all of his brothers and and everybody would get together and play guitars, and, my mom play piano and just everybody would, you know, sing together and then tell stories. And, it's a it's a very old kind of folk tradition in in the Appalachian Mountains. And so I grew up around a lot of that. And ever since I was a little kid, all I really wanted to do, you know, like, I was telling you guys earlier on, I I remember having friends in school that were like, you know, like, you remember when they put you up in the in the school, like the, the preschool or kindergarten, you know, assembly?

Unknown Speaker (9:47): And they're like, what do you wanna be when you grow up?

Unknown Speaker (9:48): And all the kids are

Unknown Speaker (9:49): like, I'm gonna be a firefighter. I'm gonna be

Unknown Speaker (9:51): a soldier.

Mike (9:51): I'm gonna be a policeman. Yeah. Mine was I'm gonna, I'm gonna be a rock star and an actor like that. And that was for since I was a little, little bitty, you can ask anybody that knows me in that. And so I did a lot of other things along the way, but nothing ever felt very true and genuine to what it was that I really wanted to do.

Mike (10:10): And that desire never, ever, ever went away. And so that's what I decided to do eventually in my, you know, middle age, it's, I would call it a middle age crisis, a midlife crisis, except it's going pretty well.

Unknown Speaker (10:25): So That's awesome. I get to make a

Unknown Speaker (10:28): lot of really cool music and play music for a lot of cool people. And I've been in I just finished a fantastic movie that I'm excited about, that I can't talk about too much yet, but,

Unknown Speaker (10:38): Okay.

Unknown Speaker (10:38): But, but it's just, it's been really cool getting a chance to like go back and go, man, that's what I

Unknown Speaker (10:43): wanted to do when I

Unknown Speaker (10:45): was a kid. I don't know that that works out for everybody, you know, like maybe- It

Unknown Speaker (10:48): does out.

Unknown Speaker (10:49): Very few. Life

Unknown Speaker (10:51): gets in the way, you know, and you gotta, gotta pay bills and you gotta do the things.

Dan (10:56): Well, know, that's where the old Walt Whitman, Most men live lives of quiet desperation.

Unknown Speaker (11:00): Quiet desperation.

Dan (11:00): That's why that's such a I love that quote. Because most people, they begrudgingly live their life every day, whether they know it or not, right? So that's really cool that you didn't start like Chris said. How did you start off? You didn't start off that way.

Dan (11:16): You found and that's what we're hoping to do here too. Him and I have always been creative spirits, right? We've had

Unknown Speaker (11:22): to

Dan (11:22): survive in life, but I think the thing that keeps drawing us back together is just this simple drive to wanna create something.

Unknown Speaker (11:30): Yeah. Mhmm. Yeah. Well, and and your music goes hard. That was awesome.

Unknown Speaker (11:34): -Thank you. -Thank you. -Yeah. And the

Unknown Speaker (11:36): fact that

Unknown Speaker (11:36): you guys get to hang out together and do, you know, the podcast, like, you know, the

Unknown Speaker (11:40): means more to me than anything.

Unknown Speaker (11:41): -Right on.

Unknown Speaker (11:42): -It really does.

Mike (11:43): Dude, that it just to to me I don't know. It's, it's, it's hard to balance it. I, I read a book a while back, many, many years ago now called The Four Hour Workweek, which is, it's a bit of a misnomer because it's not an actual four hour workweek.

Unknown Speaker (11:57): It's- Right.

Mike (11:57): That's to get your attention to make you read the fucking book. But once you read the book, what you realize is it's about lifestyle design and you're like, alright, man, you sit down and you make a list of the shit that's really important to you. And then you say, okay, what do I do that supports that? And what is the trade off that I'm willing to make? You know, how much do I need to work?

Mike (12:13): How much money do I need to make? Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, to where I can design this thing that I'm really excited about. And that book screwed me up. Like I my my pendulum swung so hard I fell over. You know what I mean?

Unknown Speaker (12:24): Like, so that was a big deal to me to say, Man, I'm living a life of quiet desperation. I'm really unhappy with what it is that I'm doing. And I had this At that point in time, had this big consulting company and, you know, I thought I was such a hotshot and I wore a suit and, you know, I had a big old house and I had a boat. I drove a Cadillac and and I was miserable. Dude, I was so miserable.

Unknown Speaker (12:44): I had a a therapist that was like, dude, you're you're you're only here because you hate your life. You know? Like, there's nothing actually that that's wrong, you know? And and, and I was spending more money than I was even making. And I finally just kind of gave it up.

Mike (13:00): And I, I think I just hit a breaking point and I went broke. Don't get me wrong. It's not like I left with a whole lot of money or anything. Mean, I, I walked away And and when I walked away, I had a ton of debt. I had a a property investment where I owned, like, five buildings that were in development.

Unknown Speaker (13:16): Ouch.

Mike (13:17): Yeah. And I literally just, like, handed it off to to my partner, you know, for for the small amount that she could at at that point in time, that she could afford to pay for it, she took it on and and rebuilt all the buildings, did everything. I sold the house that I owned. I moved to a tiny little one bedroom place, and I didn't even buy or rent that place. I found a buddy of mine who had a dilapidated, shitty little house in the old part

Unknown Speaker (13:41): of town. And I said,

Unknown Speaker (13:42): you know what I'll do? I'll, because I don't I I had a construction company. And I said, I'll personally remodel that and put that house back together for you if you let me live there for free.

Unknown Speaker (13:50): Nice.

Unknown Speaker (13:51): He's like, dude, I'll done.

Unknown Speaker (13:53): That's fair. So, yeah.

Unknown Speaker (13:55): So I, I moved in there and I just played music everywhere I could play music. And then while I wasn't playing music, I was working on the house. I had to jack up the floors and jack up the ceiling. I mean, it was a piece of crap. Yeah.

Mike (14:05): And, and I just like, I, I, I let my pendulum swing probably too far, but I just needed a hard reset, you know? So, and then it, and then I, I did that for long enough to go, okay, well, maybe you don't want to be a starving artist. Can be an artist without starving. Let's figure that path out. Know?

Mike (14:27): So, I, I played music on the road, I guess for seven years, maybe eight years. And, the last thing that I did was I I had I had been real upset about my dad's death for my whole life. Dad died by suicide when I was 10 years old.

Unknown Speaker (14:45): Oh. Oh.

Unknown Speaker (14:46): I'm so sorry, man.

Mike (14:47): Yeah. It it no. It's okay now, but I appreciate that. But he was a he was a vet who, he got injured when he was in the military, and they discharged him. And they said, basically, You're you're too injured to work for us.

Mike (15:01): You're too injured to stay here, but you're not injured enough for us to really give you any benefits or anything. That's an offense. Yeah. And so our family had a pretty hard time because he was always hurting, and he had a hard time keeping jobs and things like that. And so when I was 10, he, he went through a real bout with, mental health issues.

Mike (15:19): -And he died by suicide. And so, the rest of my childhood was essentially taken at that point in time. -Yeah. -Like, know, even like, my mom even had to put bills on my name and stuff, you know? And like, I went to work pretty soon after that.

Mike (15:31): So me and my mom and my two sisters. And, so when I got to be an adult, I got really good at being bad. You know, like, if if there was a drug, I'd do it. If there was a person, I'd have sex with them. If there was, you know, a drink, I'd drink it.

Mike (15:46): And I I realized at some point in time that a lot of that stuff was just anger about everything I'd lost. And so I had a spiritual experience down in Key West one time. And I was in Ernest Hemingway's house.

Unknown Speaker (15:59): Oh.

Mike (16:00): And, yeah, I love, love Ernest Hemingway. I love, I love the man that Ernest Hemingway was, you know, like the character in life he was, maybe even more than his writing. Because he was just larger than life, and he changed so much about literature, you know? So I, I was standing in his study in Key West, and I did this thing where, like, the tour group that we were with, I kinda hung back in the back where nobody'd see me, and I let them all go past and I just stood there, like, soaking in this place. I'm like, Oh my God, this is is where this man wrote all this stuff, right?

Unknown Speaker (16:30): -Mm

Unknown Speaker (16:30): -There's this typewriter and there's this bottle of whiskey and, like, the whole thing's there and his cat's still sitting on the couch and all this kind of stuff. And all of a sudden, this breeze blew through. And I felt like I had this massive download -MAN: of that he got to this point in his life where he felt like he had given everything he could give. There was nothing more he could give, and there was a month nothing more he could get from life. And he decided to end his life.

Mike (16:55): And all of a sudden, it let me know how my dad felt. -Oh. -So I, I had this this concept all of a sudden that was so strong that I had to go find a piece of paper and write it down. And I said, he took the Hemingway out. And so I I wrote that down, then I went off by myself and I wrote this song called Hemingway.

Unknown Speaker (17:17): Cool.

Mike (17:18): And what ultimately ended up happening is, is I turned that into an album. And then, I worked with a buddy of mine who's a novelist and we turned it into a book where basically, like, every song is a story song and when you read the book, every chapter tells the full story behind it. The whole point of that sorry, this is a long story.

Unknown Speaker (17:36): The whole

Unknown Speaker (17:37): point of

Unknown Speaker (17:37): that -You're good, man.

Mike (17:39): Was that I took that on a two year tour around The US and Europe where, you know, every VFW, every veterans hospital, every military base, anywhere they'd let me go talk, I'd go talk and sing them the songs and tell them all the stories and everything.

Unknown Speaker (17:53): Is really It

Mike (17:54): was it was so cathartic. It was so therapeutic. And I finally got rid of that anger. I finally was able to turn that into something that helped a lot of people. Cool.

Unknown Speaker (18:03): Not now

Unknown Speaker (18:04): That healed you, Dan, but you know how much that gave them to just to have that moment of not having to think about anything. It just that unification of I need you and you need me. They didn't even know you needed them. Dude,

Unknown Speaker (18:19): you're a 100%.

Unknown Speaker (18:20): Hope they listen to this because that was big bumps, man.

Mike (18:24): I like, you know, like all my, like I come from four generations of ministers, Baptist preachers. Oh, rude. Oh, lost you.

Unknown Speaker (18:31): That's a

Unknown Speaker (18:32): great Oh, picture, thanks, sir. He's sharing your stuff online. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker (18:39): That's my serious face.

Unknown Speaker (18:40): That's an awesome Yeah.

Unknown Speaker (18:42): Saw my mugshot. I can show you that too. Was in jail a while.

Chris (18:45): No. Don't I don't wanna see I don't wanna I don't I don't wanna see your mugshot.

Mike (18:49): But, I, I come from this long line of ministers, and so I would do this altar call, basically. And I'd say, man, if there's anybody out there that needs to talk, I'm gonna hang around here as long as you need me to talk. Okay. And and I would wait after every show. And, man, the people that I talked to, people that were either soldiers, you know, active military or vets or family of or friends of.

Mike (19:10): And I did that for two years, but that was a nonprofit tour. And so I didn't take any money out of that for two years straight. And I was already pretty broke. And so I at the end of that, it was my last show was 11/23/2019, which was the night before Thanksgiving, and I was in Trinidad, Colorado from the last show of the Hemingway, project. And I spent Thanksgiving.

Unknown Speaker (19:37): I might get emotional about this. That's okay. On Thanksgiving day, I left Trinidad and I was like, man, I'm finally done. I finally did all the work that I said I was gonna do for two years straight And I'm broke, and I don't know what I'm gonna do next, but it's gonna be alright. And this guy saw my truck and trailer in a truck stop.

Mike (19:58): And I've got a graphic on the side of it with dog tags that says Operation Hemingway, combating veteran suicide. And on Thanksgiving Day, this trucker comes up to me and he said, hey, man, can I talk to you? And he was like, right there. He was like, right there, about to go. And I was able to talk to him and tell him that story and just show him love and care, you know, and tell him like where to get resources, where he could go, who he could talk to, you know, get him hooked up with some people that would care and some people that would help.

Mike (20:31): And I realized that that that mission of mine will never ever go away because I just, I feel it so strong.

Unknown Speaker (20:37): That's awesome.

Mike (20:37): And I wish somebody would have been there like that for my dad. And so I've continued that this whole time. When COVID hit, like I, I thought I was going go back to regular work because I was going to put out a new album and everything was going be cool. And I was going go back to making money. Thank God finally.

Unknown Speaker (20:56): And then COVID hit and they canceled all my touring.

Unknown Speaker (20:59): Oh, shit.

Unknown Speaker (21:01): What do we do now? You know?

Unknown Speaker (21:02): What did you do through COVID, Dan?

Mike (21:05): Well, what I ended up doing because I had, the same buddy of mine, Travis Irwin is his name. You ever wanna read some great literature? He writes modern westerns. Oh, so modern western liter. His name's Travis Irwin.

Mike (21:16): Irwin with an e e r a w a I n. And he, fantastic writer. And he wrote the Hemingway book with me. Cool. And, he had narrated an audiobook, one of his one of his books, and he hated the experience.

Mike (21:30): So he had me start narrating his books for him.

Unknown Speaker (21:33): Oh, you

Unknown Speaker (21:33): have a great voice for narrating.

Unknown Speaker (21:35): I was just gonna say the same.

Mike (21:36): Yeah. I love, man, I love reading and I already had a microphone, so it turned out all right. So I started narrating audio books and that went pretty well. And a couple of different publishers had me start narrating their books for them. And then other people started finding me.

Mike (21:50): So I started narrating books and that's what got in, that ended up turning into voice acting. And then I was doing a bunch of voice acting when somebody finally said, Hey man, would you be comfortable being on camera? And I'd be like, I've been waiting for this my whole life.

Unknown Speaker (22:02): Right, right. -Yeah.

Mike (22:06): So that's when I got into, like, screen acting and, and that kind of thing. So, like, COVID, as much as it hurt a lot of people and we lost so many people that we loved, COVID actually ended up being a massive fucking blessing for me, man, because now I I get to I still get to play all the music that I want and put out the albums and go play the shows that I want, but I can cherry pick now because I've got this cool job that I enjoy through the day. So not I'm not a starving artist anymore. Still an artist.

Chris (22:31): Right. Right. And then and and and this shirt kinda says it all. You did it for the hose. I love that shirt.

Unknown Speaker (22:38): I love that you guys found all these pictures. That's really sweet of you. I'm gonna have a little little trip down to me and Kristofferson right there.

Chris (22:44): It it's your Facebook page, man.

Unknown Speaker (22:46): Yeah. Gotcha.

Unknown Speaker (22:48): Yeah. That's where I go. That's where I go down the rabbit hole.

Unknown Speaker (22:51): That's a that's a that's a clever idea. You get to you get all the the greatest hits there. That day, I mean, Kristofferson was that was life changing right there, man.

Unknown Speaker (23:00): That's awesome. I bet.

Unknown Speaker (23:02): One of the best, man.

Mike (23:04): Oh, man. Talk about an inspiration right there. Guy's a Rhodes scholar. He stole a helicopter to get, Johnny Cash's attention, to get Johnny Cash to record one of his songs.

Dan (23:15): Oh, I was just getting ready to say, Dan, it's a shame that the guy doesn't have, you know, more than one or two stories. Can you imagine that guy could tell stories the rest of his life and you'd never hear the same one twice?

Mike (23:27): Dude, that's a I love that so much. I could not wait to meet him when I found out I was gonna get to get to go meet him. And I brought that album with me and I hung around until he could sign it. And, I'm sitting there, and it's so funny because, I got to be kind of friends online with Ben Haggard, Merle Haggard's, son.

Unknown Speaker (23:46): Oh, yeah. Yeah. Nice.

Mike (23:47): Yeah. And Ben Ben took over the Strangers, and he sing or he he sings with the Strangers, plays guitar, and he sings a lot of Merle songs. And now he's finally. I've been trying I talked talked him into it forever, like, putting out his own music. And he's finally putting out some of his own music.

Mike (24:00): But, that show was, Kristofferson and the Strangers. And so I'm sitting there waiting in the backs in the staging area backstage, and this this limousine pulls up. Right? And I'm like, oh god. Oh, here it is.

Unknown Speaker (24:13): This is gonna be Kristofferson right here. I'm so excited. I got my album. I got my Sharpie. I'm pumped.

Unknown Speaker (24:18): And, the door opens, and Ben Haggard crawls out. I was like, Ben, what what's going on, man? He's like, oh, man. Just me and the guys decided to take this this limo in. It's like all the guys in the the strangers band come out.

Unknown Speaker (24:29): I was like, where's Kristofferson? I don't know, man. I haven't seen him in a while. So I'm sitting around waiting. I was like, holy shit, is he even gonna show up?

Unknown Speaker (24:35): Is he sick? Is he okay? Because he had been he'd been sick for a while before that he had Lyme disease and nobody knew it. He got real bad sick with Lyme disease. And they finally figured it out and he got better, which was awesome.

Mike (24:45): But, I'm sitting there hanging out and behind me pulls in this piece of shit beat up old, minivan. And I'm figuring this is a, you know, like stagehand, like not not even a roadie, some kinda like, you know, broke ass security guard or something. I don't know. This thing comes rolling up and crawling out of the passenger side in this beat up asshole minivan is Chris Kristofferson.

Unknown Speaker (25:11): That's styling, man. What the

Unknown Speaker (25:12): hell is going on? So he gets out and a couple of people get out his manager, a couple of entourage kind of people. And he gets out and I just can't believe it. I was like, Ben, oh my God, Ben, there's Chris. What's he doing?

Unknown Speaker (25:26): What's he doing in minivan? He goes, man, I don't know. That guy, you never know what he's gonna do. And I said, dude, can I can I go meet him? He goes, oh, you want a meeting?

Unknown Speaker (25:35): Come on. I'll come introduce you. So Ben and I walked up and Ben introduced me to Chris. And I just, like, fangirled. I just I just fan barfed all over him.

Unknown Speaker (25:44): I'm like, oh my god. You don't know what you do for, like oh, you know, just it's fucking embarrassing. So I was like, so that album right there is Borderlord. And, that's my favorite album of his just just fucking amazing work. I said, This album right here changed what I the way I thought about songwriting.

Unknown Speaker (26:05): And, I've I been carrying this here, and I I was just wondering if there was any chance you might sign this for me. And his manager stepped in and says, no, no, no, no, no. Chris doesn't sign anything. Chris Chris got to take care of his hands. He doesn't sign it.

Unknown Speaker (26:16): And he and Chris pushed his hand. I guess he goes, hey, hey, hey. I'll sign what I wanna sign. Give me that

Unknown Speaker (26:21): pen. Has

Unknown Speaker (26:22): his take

Unknown Speaker (26:23): care of his hands. What kind of bullshit common is that? Right? Like They're probably a man, man.

Unknown Speaker (26:30): Amount of autographs he has out

Unknown Speaker (26:32): there. Don't care. I don't care. That's a

Unknown Speaker (26:35): I know.

Chris (26:35): That's a stupid fucking manager, man. Give me a break.

Unknown Speaker (26:38): I'd fire his ass immediately.

Unknown Speaker (26:40): They gotta they feel like they gotta think they have they feel like they have to do something. Right? They gotta Well, just Oh, I better keep you away from Chris.

Unknown Speaker (26:47): Okay. But how many people were around you at the time?

Unknown Speaker (26:50): Oh my god. Easily, a hundred hundred and fifty, something like that, probably. We're it's it was a pretty big area back there where all the it was at this festival.

Unknown Speaker (26:59): Yeah.

Mike (26:59): It was at the the Outlaws and Legends Festival. So this was the staging area behind the festival. There's tons of people around there, so probably a hundred, hundred and fifty. And they might've been just trying to keep people from mobbing him, which which I can understand.

Unknown Speaker (27:11): Gotcha. Okay. For that makes sense. Because this picture looked like there was like five people, so I I did.

Unknown Speaker (27:15): Yeah. No. No. No. No.

Mike (27:16): You're you're looking at the buses on either side, and then we're standing, like, in between where the buses are. And if you look if you look over my shoulder, that blue hat right there with the curly hair, the guy looks like Merle Haggard? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker (27:26): Yeah. That's Ben Haggard.

Unknown Speaker (27:27): Okay. Cool. Nice.

Mike (27:29): He looks he looks just like his dad, and he sounds just like his dad. It's a trip, man.

Unknown Speaker (27:34): Then he should definitely be recording music.

Mike (27:36): Yeah. Yeah. So, so Chris ended up signing it, and, and I framed it on the wall, but that was that was a cool day. I spent the whole day back there just waiting to meet that man. Because you're right.

Unknown Speaker (27:49): He could tell stories. He could tell you stories probably for a year, you'd never hear the same one twice.

Dan (27:53): Well, all the and I don't wanna denigrate anybody's career, but all these wannabe, I'm living the life country stars of today are just acting out what he actually did. Him and Johnny and Merle and those guys, Waylon, they were the outlaws. They lived the life. They weren't staying in a Ritz Carlton. They weren't making $5,000,000 a gig.

Dan (28:18): Yeah. They just love playing music, and they love drinking whiskey. And they were living that life.

Chris (28:24): There's the there's the dog tags on the truck.

Mike (28:27): Yeah. That's the one. That that thing has 430,000 miles on it. It's sitting in my driveway right now. That's where I still go everywhere.

Unknown Speaker (28:33): And, that's my that's my that's my baby FJ. You can bury me on that motherfucker.

Unknown Speaker (28:38): It's it's it's it's a Toyota. Right?

Unknown Speaker (28:40): Yeah. Yep. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker (28:41): There you go. 450,000 miles. There you go. Fucking Toyotas.

Mike (28:45): That, that thing has been that thing has been to I believe it's I believe it's 45 US states plus Canada and Mexico. Been all over the world in, in that truck.

Unknown Speaker (28:54): It's

Mike (28:54): the only thing I've ever had to replace is this, this year specifically, I had to replace, the alternator. I was coming back from a show in Oklahoma City or something or something, and think and the, the, voltmeter started bouncing. Was like, well, finally at 430,000 miles, there goes the there goes an alternator, but never never a starter, never an air conditioner, nothing. It's crazy.

Unknown Speaker (29:16): That's crazy.

Unknown Speaker (29:17): I I keep telling her if she'll get me to half a million miles, I'll just replace the whole drivetrain just for just to be nice.

Unknown Speaker (29:24): Yeah.

Mike (29:26): Yeah. It's it's been kinda wild, but you're right about, like, the, you're right about the the way that the, oh god, there, there's a hell of a wreck. I went through 600 feet of guardrail.

Unknown Speaker (29:35): Oh. Oh. Why'd you do that? Ouch.

Mike (29:39): As a matter of fact, same trip. I was on my way back. No, was on my I had played a show in Wichita, Kansas. I was headed back when I was when I lived in Dallas. And it was about 03:00 in the morning, and I fell asleep on the road and went through, 600 feet of guardrail.

Mike (29:52): And they had one tow truck that pulled the front up and one tow truck that lifted the back up, and they pulled me back onto the highway. And I started it up, and the tow truck driver goes, there's no fucking way. And I just drove it home from there.

Unknown Speaker (30:05): Wow. Wow. Okay.

Unknown Speaker (30:07): They're pretty I've got a buddy of mine that's kind of a bigwig at Toyota. And he said that the rumor is that they quit making the FJ Cruiser because it was indestructible.

Chris (30:20): Oh, well, yeah, God forbid, you make something that people are gonna live. See, I had I've I've always been Chevys and Ford. My Chevy, I drove from 2,800 miles to two seventy four. And the only reason I got rid of it is because I hit a deer and it just was never the same after that. Otherwise, it was it was a great I mean, had changed the tires on it once.

Chris (30:37): I I don't remember anything big ever really going out on it because it just it was 2004 Chevy z 71, you know, Vortec V eight, the the kind of motor you step on the gas, you're just fucking gone. It was a great truck. It was just a great truck. It's it's, you know?

Unknown Speaker (30:52): Yep. Do those Chevy Vortecs?

Unknown Speaker (30:56): Right. Right.

Mike (30:59): I remember I had a buddy of mine let's see, I graduated high school in 1995, he bought his truck shortly thereafter. So it was probably like a 'ninety eight, something like that. And he drove that thing Oh, my God. He drove that thing until something something caught it on fire. Like his I think he I think he had a brake lock up on the highway or something and it got hot enough to set the tire on fire and the tire, you know?

Mike (31:20): But other than that, like, you did like, I can't I can't remember how many miles were on that thing. And he was beside himself. That something finally took it out, but it literally took being burned up on the side of the highway before the thing quit running, you know?

Chris (31:33): Well, it's that whole thing though. You take care of something, it's gonna last kinda like you take care of your body. It's gonna last. You take care of your your voice. You're gonna sing forever.

Chris (31:40): You take care of your your, you know, change your oil and all that kind of shit. People don't understand that concept with life, but

Unknown Speaker (31:45): if you

Unknown Speaker (31:46): do, right. Exactly.

Unknown Speaker (31:50): Now the trick would be if we all took care of our bodies as well as we know how to take care of our vehicles.

Unknown Speaker (31:55): Chris does a pretty good job of that. Actually stellar compared to the rest of us. I do not. I'm just blessed with a high metabolism.

Chris (32:04): Yeah. When I stopped drinking, Dan, my addiction went to fitness. So there's that. So that's been twenty one years of just, you know, aside from a couple

Unknown Speaker (32:12): of Congrats, man. That's amazing. What made you decide to what made you stop?

Unknown Speaker (32:16): My wife and I had

Chris (32:17): a big blow at argument and we never really argued and woke up the next day and was like, ah, something's gotta change. You know, this I changed. Never looked Wow. Wow. I'm weird.

Chris (32:29): I'm weird like that, though. I stopped chewing Copenhagen on fourth of July weekend, like, back in I don't know, February '9 because I my my can was empty. I didn't wanna go to the store and I'd been chewing since I was 17 because I was, know, started playing baseball as a catcher. So, you know, baseball chewing.

Unknown Speaker (32:46): It's you know?

Chris (32:47): I'm just weird like that. I just legit. I looked up, grabbed the can. I'm like, fuck, it's empty. I'm like, looked at my wallet, go to the store.

Chris (32:55): Didn't want to go to the store.

Unknown Speaker (32:57): Quit chewing because he didn't want to leave.

Chris (32:59): I didn't want to go to the store. It was only fourth week and Nikki and my son were visiting some visiting some friends in another state and I was just kind of chilling at home alone. I'm like, that fucking sucks. And so I just I just that's it. That's my coping story just stopped at a time.

Unknown Speaker (33:15): People like, what the fuck? That one blows

Unknown Speaker (33:17): me away every time I

Unknown Speaker (33:19): hear it. You just stopped? I'm like, yeah, I was just

Unknown Speaker (33:22): going

Unknown Speaker (33:22): You

Unknown Speaker (33:22): know what sucks? Going to the store right now? Don't want to

Unknown Speaker (33:24): do it. Not doing it.

Unknown Speaker (33:26): That's right up there with another friend of mine who only smokes when they want to. That guy pisses me off too. He's like, yeah, I'll have a cigarette. Like four times a year.

Mike (33:36): Man, I remember being I remember getting in little league because baseball's always been my thing. It's about the baseball's the only sport that I give a damn about and I love baseball. Was gonna league when I guess I was 11 years old and it was either that year or the next year when the coach had a can of skull. You know, like real level took a

Unknown Speaker (33:55): long cut. Yep. That started with skull. Yep.

Mike (33:57): Yeah. And, like, literally, like, he's like, anybody anybody wanna dip? You know, at that age. And so there a bunch of us did, and then we all got sick and puked. So maybe it it might've been a good strategy.

Unknown Speaker (34:07): Who

Dan (34:07): knows? That's what happened to me. Was just getting ready to tell you. Luckily, I wish that would've happened with smoking, but the guy's dad lives right across the street from me now, ironically enough. We were jumping bikes.

Dan (34:18): You know, we were making our own bike ramps or whatever. And Greg chewed. He's like, you want a dip just like your buddy did? I said, sure, I'll try it. Well, I wrecked my bike right after I put that dip in and I swallowed the whole thing.

Dan (34:31): I'm about 11.

Chris (34:36): Everybody who's chewed for a long amount of time has a story where they have to swallow. I had to make sure I phrased that properly. I didn't want to say my swallowing story.

Unknown Speaker (34:45): Right. Yeah.

Chris (34:50): It was it was in I was in Dillard's in Mesa in line for rush tickets. Now this is when you got the tickets and they were, you know, the concert tickets were just like what Mike and I sold when we sold when we were in our band because back in the day, we would sell our own tickets to our show. So it's like that. Well, the ticket was so badass. It was the the their name Rush was glitter.

Chris (35:08): Like, that's you know, right? The badass time. So I'm standing in line at Dillard's and I forgot to take the chew out when I walked into the store and I was fuck. And there was a line. So I'm sitting there, I'm sitting there, I'm sitting there and it's just, you know, the salivating whatever the saliva is growing.

Chris (35:23): It's growing. It's growing. It's growing. It's growing. Right?

Unknown Speaker (35:26): You see where this is going? Yeah. So I get I I wait. I wait. So by the time I get to the, to the ticket counter probably like this, you know, and then, you know, I put my money out and the lady's like, what can I do for you?

Chris (35:40): Oh, four tickets to rush, please. You know, and I'm like, fuckin hurry up. So I give her the money you know but here's your tickets thank you as soon as I walked out the door of Dillard's to the left was the dark garbage can it's just woah but I got the rush tickets Hey. And then and then felt like shit the rest of the day. Whatever, dude.

Unknown Speaker (36:02): You had tickets for Rush. It's a win, dude. I quit I quit dipping because I quit dipping because I don't remember anything that ever made me feel so addicted. Like, I couldn't tell you what it did for me, but I wanted it again. You know what I mean?

Mike (36:16): Like, that's because I smoked, you know, and I like and and and honestly, I still really enjoy cigars, and, and I I even keep a vape around. But but giving up smoking, I gave up smoking because of my stepson because he asked me to quit smoking. Nice. And, Good job. And yep.

Unknown Speaker (36:33): So I I quit smoking cigarettes. And but when I was a little bit younger, I dipped for quite a long time. And man, I finally got to the point where I was like, God dang, man, I can't stop thinking about it. Like, I just always gotta have another one. Always gotta have another one.

Unknown Speaker (36:46): And I

Mike (36:47): was like, man, something I just didn't like the feeling of anything having a hold of me that hard. It pissed me off, honestly, to feel like I had, you know, such, so little willpower that, that I couldn't just put something down. And so, that's kind of been a thing, like even with the, you know, with cigars, it's a pretty rare thing. And, and, even like with the vape thing, which is enjoyable because it tastes good. Like they figured out how to make it taste like bubble gum, which is a really tricky move.

Unknown Speaker (37:09): Like I'll leave it behind a lot of times just to make sure I can still, just to make sure I can still leave it behind. You know, I'll leave it behind for the day and just so, okay, I'm, I'm, I'm good. But yeah, that dipping was, dipping was freaking super addictive, but the,

Unknown Speaker (37:20): uh- It was. It's because it goes right to your blood. And I chewed for probably over twenty years. Yeah. You did it with

Unknown Speaker (37:26): a nail on the head. It's right there.

Unknown Speaker (37:27): Yeah. And then when I went to your

Unknown Speaker (37:28): dentist bloodstream.

Chris (37:29): Yeah. I'd go to the dentist and, you know, I'd tell him I flat out, I I chew. I get lectured. He's like, there's nothing wrong with your mouth. I don't I don't I don't know.

Chris (37:37): I don't know how to tell you that, but there's nothing wrong with you to stop. I'm like, but there's nothing wrong with my mouth. There's nothing wrong with my teeth because I grew Tempe up tap water that had a florid in it and then I brushed my teeth all the time. Just you know, I think

Unknown Speaker (37:50): we found out along the way that for Christ's sake genetics have so much to do with everything. Sure. There's people that smoke till they're a 103 George Burns. Yeah. Cigars didn't kill him.

Unknown Speaker (38:03): The stuff he he he

Chris (38:04): he yeah. Yeah. He died with a cigar in his mouth, though. Who's that? But that he was asleep.

Unknown Speaker (38:09): Was so he Oh, yeah. It was just a joke, man. He was asleep with a cigar in his mouth.

Unknown Speaker (38:13): Yeah. It's no doubt.

Chris (38:15): I had friend. I had friends that would shoot twenty four seven, man. They would take they would fucking sleep with that shit. Oh. Oh.

Chris (38:20): I was insane, man. It's just that vitamin D, think, was more addictive than cigarettes, just the sheer fact that's constantly in your as soon as you put in your mouth, it gets into your bloodstream. Yep. It hits you right away.

Unknown Speaker (38:45): And then you see Keith Richards and just none of it makes sense in Mortal. Right?

Unknown Speaker (38:48): None of it makes sense. None of it makes sense with Keith Richards.

Unknown Speaker (38:51): Which is my canary in the coal mine for genetics.

Chris (38:56): It's just yes. Yes. It's it's it's it's though.

Unknown Speaker (39:00): No better picture than him and Mick Jagger standing next to each other and the caption underneath says, Mick, I don't know how to tell you, but you gotta take better care of yourself, mate. Right? Right?

Mike (39:17): Dude. Yeah. There's there's there's there's no other explanation than there's there are genetic factors at work here that that we don't have any idea about, man. So Okay.

Chris (39:26): So I wanna I wanna I wanna I wanna talk a little bit about because we got about fifteen minutes left. I wanna talk a little bit about what you've done from an acting standpoint. Because obviously you did some voice acting and stuff like that. Yeah.

Mike (39:40): The acting thing got interesting because, it's odd because because when I was a kid, I was I was in kind of that the traditional term would be loser, but I don't use that anymore. Okay. I was I was in kind of an outcast crowd. Alright? Okay.

Unknown Speaker (39:56): I like outcasts better. Didn't Yeah. We were we were we were outcasts. We didn't have, like, a cool kid table. You know, there was a bunch of us that only hung out together because we were all outcasts.

Unknown Speaker (40:06): You know, we kind of found each other that way. You know, and we probably played, you know, Dungeons and Dragons all weekend long. And, I wrote this

Chris (40:16): amazing song called Silhouette of an Outcast, not to interrupt you. So I get that totally.

Unknown Speaker (40:20): Yeah. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker (40:21): Go on. So, yeah, go on.

Mike (40:22): It was, you know, and and and that was a thing. And then, you know, and then being being a band nerd and being in drama, you know, and and essentially getting getting made fun of quite a bit. Had a pretty negative experience in school. And it was interesting to get to adult life and figure out that all of those things that made me feel like a loser, you know, but now I just realized I was just different and I was kind of an outcast because I didn't fit a popular clique. They all turned into something that I really enjoy doing You know, like they, they, they, people give me their books and pay me really well to just stand there and read their book for crying out loud.

Mike (40:58): Yeah. And enjoy the shit out of my life, you know? And then that turned into voice acting and cartoons and and documentary amazing documentaries. I I did this whole series called The Red Zones about the most dangerous places in the world. You know, I get to learn all these things.

Mike (41:12): And so that that happened. And then that turned into video games and I got to be the the main character in a whole bunch of cool ass video games. So, like, all this stuff that I was into when I was a kid ended up being -Yeah. -becoming a career.

Unknown Speaker (41:24): -That sounds

Mike (41:25): -And, yeah. And then, and then, like I said, one day somebody said, Hey, would you be comfortable on camera? And so then I started, doing social media primarily, like, you know, like we were talking about before this started. Like, companies will hire me and say, Hey, man, can you can we send you our stuff and you just talk about it online and tell people what you think? And then that turned into acting roles, that turned into TV, and that turned into movies.

Mike (41:49): And and so that part's been going really good. So I I essentially, I get to use the money that I make doing that to pay for, like, you know, the new album. I saw a picture just a minute ago with the new album Yes. That came out at the end of April. Because when you're when you're playing music full time, you kinda you have to take pretty much any gig they'll give you just to make sure that you pay the that you pay the bills.

Unknown Speaker (42:10): Right? Oh, yeah.

Mike (42:11): And you never wanna bitch about doing it because you're still getting to do what you said you wanted to do for a living. But it's also kinda hard to, like, take you know, like, it's kinda soul crushing when you when you're playing for a whole bunch of people that couldn't care or you're playing for nobody sometimes. And, but you gotta do it because, you know, it's a $100 here and $200 there. Yep. And so one of the things about finding, sort of my muse, you know, my muse is the ability to act and make fun content or interesting content or audiobooks or documentaries and to get paid to do that and then roll what -Yeah.

Mike (42:47): You know, the money that I make from that into making music where I don't have to take every shit gig that somebody will give me. -I can cherry pick the the things that I think are cool, you know? -So I I play I only play about once a month now and it's always someplace that I think that's gonna be pretty cool. I'll go, I'll go play that. Shockingly, the last several shows in a row have all been a sellout.

Mike (43:09): In my entire career of playing music, my whole career of playing music, I only had one sold out show and it was in Moscow, Russia. Because how often does a guy from Texas go play Moscow? Right?

Unknown Speaker (43:20): Right. This is true.

Unknown Speaker (43:22): So they're like, holy shit. This this this Texas cowboys coming over, and the place is sold out. But that was the only sold out show I ever played. And since doing it this way, the last three shows in a row that I've played have all been a total sellout.

Unknown Speaker (43:34): Why

Mike (43:34): not? Because I think it's about picking and choosing, but that freedom only came from saying, all right, I'm gonna have to balance both sides of this where I've got one thing that I love that makes good money and one thing that never really made money. Right. Low and behold, now that, now that I'm picking and choosing these things, it's actually doing that well too. So, you know, it's, it's weird to me.

Mike (43:55): I always, I always thought that I always knew that I would, I would do these things, whether they made money or not. But then there's that shift that happens in your head where it's like, man, I'm just going to do this thing that I love and only pick the things that I love about it. And then it sort of worked out. And I don't know if it works that way for everybody, but I've heard people say that before, you know, that when you really buy in and you really say, man, I'm just going to give it my whole heart.

Dan (44:18): I think that's the only way it works, Dan. I really do. I think if you're talented enough and you have the right connections, you can force anything out there. If you're gonna start something like him and I did from scratch, you did from you better believe in it because my favorite gig I can remember, we played a pizza joint that shared the PA with us. So, you know, in the in the middle of the gig, it was Johnson party of five year tables ready.

Unknown Speaker (44:49): You know, that's that's dedication. That's dedication, man. On a Tuesday night, you know?

Unknown Speaker (44:55): Yeah. I mean, dude, that's like that's like the Beatles playing a strip club or a bowling alley, man. Are you gonna do? Do you do you want it or do you want it? You know?

Unknown Speaker (45:01): Like

Unknown Speaker (45:02): Yeah. Chris says it best. We wanted to jam, man. That's all we wanted to do. The money we cared about.

Dan (45:07): The agents, everything that came along with that later that was like, hey, we believe in you guys were like, cool. We believe in us too. Right?

Unknown Speaker (45:14): Come

Dan (45:14): on. Just come along for the ride. There was no ex I mean, we were excited. That's the wrong word to use, but there was no shock that anybody liked what we did because we loved what we did. Yeah.

Dan (45:26): Were our biggest fans. That's the whole point.

Unknown Speaker (45:28): Right. That's

Unknown Speaker (45:30): awesome. I'm I'm just gonna let you know, Mike, I'm totally stealing that line.

Unknown Speaker (45:35): Yeah. But it's yours. Though. It's It's true, though. That's why we had so much fun.

Chris (45:39): That's why there was there was no, oh, shucks moment. There was no there was no arrogance and egos and narcissism with us because we just, we just loved what we created and we wanted to share it and we wanted to entertain and just go jam. And I know

Dan (45:54): that's so cliche to hear everybody's like, yeah, right. There was never there was one moment where Scott and Rick, for whatever reason, got into it. And I put the kibosh on that right away because Scott and I had been together for a long time. It's like, hey, man, you gotta talk things out. You know?

Dan (46:10): You can't just the guy's sensitive. You can't just attack somebody. Yeah. And then the end of that, he's like, I didn't really think I was attacking him. It wasn't intended.

Dan (46:19): You know? So what Chris is saying is true. It was always what is right for the song and what's gonna make this band stand out from everybody else. Yeah. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker (46:27): Because individually, we weren't that great a musicians. But collectively, there was magic that happened. There just was That's

Unknown Speaker (46:34): so cool. So how do you guys coordinate now that you live in separate, like halfway across the country from each other?

Unknown Speaker (46:39): We just do this.

Unknown Speaker (46:41): Right now, we've just been doing this. I have been writing music, he's been writing lyrics. We're gonna make that happen eventually. Cool. Just, I think this was a way to force us to do something on a week plee basis.

Dan (46:53): We talk all the time. Yeah. Now if the music happens, it'll be like, yeah, that's the next natural progression.

Chris (46:59): He was in a funk, Dan. And I started sending him lyrics that I was coming up with, because I'm not that person who writes I don't sit down and write. It has to, it has to hit me. Right. I wait till somebody was whispering in my ear and then I pin it.

Chris (47:13): You know, you're So writing it's the same concept when I write my books. It's like, I got to have the idea. And then when I got the idea, I just, it starts flowing. So I never forced myself to write anything. So I came up with something one day and I sent it to him and he's like, well, I can't play because this, I said, I don't fucking care.

Chris (47:30): So I just kept sending them. I just kept sending them stuff. And I, because I was in a weird little mode where I stopped playing music in 2008 because I was done with the last the final band I was in because it just put such a bad taste in my mouth because that was narcissism at its best. And we wrote a Sturgis tour in 2008 and our drummer quit day we got back. The bass player was gonna quit while we're there and I'm trying to keep all this shit together.

Chris (47:54): Motherfucker had the balls to call me like two weeks ago. The narcissist once said, Hey, need to buy a house. Fuck. Never fucking calling you back. Like, what the fuck?

Chris (48:02): Then I find out later that one of our mutual friends, they he got separated. And then two weeks after after he this person found out they got separate, he asked out that dude's wife, like, the fuck are you, man? What kind of human are you not? So, but that's just kind of like I was done. Like I've been there, done that, you know, everything we did with Nemesis is still the best time in my mind musically that I've ever done in my lifetime.

Chris (48:28): So it just it sucks. We couldn't get to where the last band did because we ended up going national recording run iTunes all that kind of shit, which is cool, but I'd rather nemesis be all over the place. But that's the thing. I started writing again, shit started just popping up in my head. So I'd write it.

Chris (48:45): I'd send it to him. I do it on my Apple notes, you know, section of my iPhone note and send it to him and send it to him send it him. And and we've told this story many times. You probably haven't seen the part one of these clips in the show, but the the cool thing about Mike and I is I could write lyrics. I could give it to him, and he would read those lyrics.

Chris (49:01): And the next day at practice, he would come back with the music that emotionally fit what I was writing about.

Mike (49:08): Like Bernie Taupin and Elton John?

Unknown Speaker (49:10): -Yes. -Yes.

Unknown Speaker (49:12): Same with John John Storzian.

Chris (49:13): Just Yeah, just fit it. Just like he knew whatever I wrote, I didn't have to say into him. Would just give him the lyric, Hey, I wrote the song. And then the next day, he'd come back with just this riff that fit. We'd have to maybe restructure it.

Chris (49:26): Okay, I need more verse here and chorus there, whatever. But when he came up musically just fit. It was just, it just fit. It's, you know, two piece And to me, pop, dude,

Dan (49:35): that was the highest compliment because I just talked about this with another musician we had on on Friday. Mhmm. I'm not a cover band guy. I don't know a 100 cover songs. You want me to sit down and play the solo to Stairway to Heaven, I don't know it.

Dan (49:50): Yeah. But the guy I was talking to could. He actually played it while we were on the show. I'm but he gave me a huge compliment too. He said, Mike, I'm gonna throw myself under the bus.

Dan (50:00): If you notice the way I play that, there's no bends in there. I play it straight because that's the only way I can play it.

Unknown Speaker (50:07): Yeah.

Dan (50:07): He said all that shit that you're doing that you think you don't know what you're doing

Unknown Speaker (50:12): Yeah.

Dan (50:12): He's like, all that your dynamics are outstanding. Your phrasing is outstanding. You know? He knows the right musical vernacular to say, I guess, you know, all that stuff I just do naturally. Right?

Dan (50:25): It sounds good to me. I know how to make a guitar sound like I wanna make it sound. Right. So when I would read his lyrics, it was almost like it was a sixth sense, you know? Yeah.

Unknown Speaker (50:39): In in the end, he doesn't know this, but ultimately, it was just my goal to never let him down. You know? I knew those lyrics meant

Unknown Speaker (50:46): something to him. Oh, dude.

Unknown Speaker (50:47): That was the moment right there. That's amazing. I love that.

Dan (50:51): I was like shaking in my boots to go, Here's what I think that you'll like. Right? Because I knew what his lyrics meant to him. This guy's a serious writer. He's not, I went out on a Saturday night, and I met this hot blonde, and we got in a Ferrari, and we went to the lake, and I banged her.

Unknown Speaker (51:09): None of that shit. None of that shit.

Dan (51:11): These lyrics were, like, either something he had experienced or something that he wanted somebody else to experience, which I thought was badass. Now he's writing in the third person as somebody else, right?

Mike (51:22): Oh, dude. And Chris, that's been an interesting one that I've been digging into lately. I've had this meditation that I've been doing before my shows, where there I watched this interview with John Mayer quite a while back now, I guess. And he said that a big change happened for him when he stopped saying, Hey, look at me. Look at what I can do.

Mike (51:46): And started saying, How much can I connect with you?

Unknown Speaker (51:49): Right. Yes.

Mike (51:50): You know? And so that

Unknown Speaker (51:51): My whole objective, Dan, -was not to stand out.

Unknown Speaker (51:55): Right. -PETER:

Dan (51:56): Right? Like, during the song, I would take my moments in between his moments to make sure that nobody got bored. Right?

Unknown Speaker (52:03): Because Sure.

Dan (52:03): Especially me. I like to do things that keep myself interested too.

Unknown Speaker (52:07): Of course.

Dan (52:08): But I was so green as a lead guitar player that I was scared the whole time I was doing it. That's the one regret that I have was I would play these leads, and everybody would be like, wow, man. That was cool as hell. And I'm like, phew. Thank you.

Unknown Speaker (52:21): Yeah. I just winged it. Now I kind of think I know what I'm doing. Know? I come up with ideas and I got phrasing and I that concept I understand.

Dan (52:30): Back then I did not. Just wanted to get from him singing to him singing again.

Mike (52:35): Yeah. I think music can be tricky because like, you know, by its nature you know, unless you're unless you're just sitting at home, which we all do, just sitting there playing by yourself. But as as soon as you make public music, you know, whether it's whether it's online, whether it's, you know, on stage, whatever the case is, there's there there are people watching and listening, you know? And then it becomes and then, like, you you know, you get the self doubt creeps in, and then you and then when you do well, you're like, oh, man, look how I do what I did. And and that's I think that that's one of those things is, like, getting rid of an ego is one of the toughest things in saying that I I really don't want this to be about me anymore.

Mike (53:11): I would really just like to connect emotionally with what you know, with who you are and what you're going through. And that's

Dan (53:16): been Well, I was in the self doubt mode when he contacted me again, but Yeah. I was too embarrassed. As much as I love this guy and I know he loves me, Yeah. There's still that I shared a stage with this guy in front of hundreds and thousands of people. Right?

Unknown Speaker (53:30): Yeah.

Dan (53:30): It's like we're equals on that level. And how do I tell him that I'm not mentally prepared to do whatever? Right? So here's the way I did it. You wanna do a podcast, dude?

Unknown Speaker (53:41): Right? And now here you sit in front of hundreds of thousands of people. You screwed up.

Unknown Speaker (53:45): No. No. No.

Dan (53:46): No. And here's why. Because I knew just like and I said it the last time he he had one show off, but the last time he was here, every night I went on stage, Dan, and I'm gonna say this for the rest of the time we're on this show. I knew I was going on stage with a murderer. Wow.

Dan (54:02): No matter how I felt going on there, this guy had everything under control because that's what he lived for. And that's what I wanted in a front man. Right? Somebody that had no ego off the stage, but when he took the stage, it was like, I'm here. This is my show.

Dan (54:19): You guys are just along for the ride.

Unknown Speaker (54:21): Yeah. Yeah. Gotcha. Killer.

Unknown Speaker (54:26): That's how he looked back then. 1994? Yeah. Think about that. He was that guy in 1994.

Unknown Speaker (54:33): Wow. Wild. So you guys haven't put out any music for a little while, but you know it's coming back around.

Unknown Speaker (54:39): -Oh, yeah. -Some point in -Oh, yeah.

Unknown Speaker (54:42): -It's gonna -Yeah. Meeting too many musicians like yourself and producers and people who inspire me to wanna do better again. This is so much fun on that level for me.

Unknown Speaker (54:54): How many episodes have you guys done now?

Unknown Speaker (54:56): This is two ten, I believe.

Chris (54:58): This is a small sample of my lyrics, Dan.

Unknown Speaker (55:03): Hang on. Gotta get the screens off. Oh my God, dude.

Unknown Speaker (55:10): That's just a small

Unknown Speaker (55:12): Well, it's a shame you don't have any material to work with.

Unknown Speaker (55:14): I know. That's what my drummer and I said when he showed up, we're like, You got any lyrics, dude? He's like, Yeah, that's what the We thought it was like his lunch or his books or, you know, he's like, no, that's what this is. Oh yeah, we're going to be okay.

Unknown Speaker (55:26): Guys can do the Right. Thing where

Chris (55:29): And then they still wrote on top of that. So like half that stuff wasn't used. It was just stuff. I, I, I, I started writing as a senior in high school. My English teacher challenged me to write a ballad for a class because she saw something in me and I wrote it and got an A.

Chris (55:41): I'm like, holy shit. And that was it from that moment on. It's just that changed the trajectory of what I wanted to be a writer when I grew up and then, you know, and then I went through acting, through music, and then realized, okay, I can be a singer in a band that encompasses everything. It's acting, it's writing, it's music. You know, which is why why I just wanted the jam because that's what I needed to make my day.

Chris (56:04): I don't know. To finish my day out, I needed to be in front of people and just see their faces. And here's

Dan (56:11): how crazy that is, Dan. I just recently learned on two episodes ago that he was done with music before he met me that night.

Unknown Speaker (56:17): -Oh, no shit.

Unknown Speaker (56:18): He was like, yeah, was going on to acting and

Unknown Speaker (56:21): I'll be damned.

Chris (56:23): Yeah, I was kind of like you. Yeah, was kind like you. I wanted, you know, I knew I wanted to be a writer long story short, then I won a bunch of awards and got an internship at a local paper in Arizona and I realized, okay, I worked my ass off for $25 like that. That's not paying the bills. So brilliant.

Chris (56:37): I'm gonna go into acting because, know, it's a sure fit there. And then so I had, you know, local success with that plays and musicals. I had a couple independent films where, you know, directors came into the to the classroom looking for actors and I just had to look so, you know, had some really fun roles I played and and and then it just, you know, I kind of realized, okay, well, isn't really going to go anywhere because I didn't have the balls to do to go to LA. Right. I didn't have the balls like Mike did.

Chris (57:03): Let's just jump on a Greyhound bus. I stopped in Phoenix, you know, so it's just, it's one of those things that just when, when we met, he was like, you know, he had a band and I was like, okay, why not? You know, it's just, it was one of those things that just were supposed to be there. And you know, here we are thirty some odd years later, friends. It's still really good friends.

Unknown Speaker (57:23): A long time to be friends with anybody, you know, plus staying in a band, you know, making music together.

Unknown Speaker (57:28): Mhmm.

Mike (57:28): There's yeah. We we did this dedication on the new album because, like, the the original album was called Salt Cedar Rebels, and it's it's more of like a it's more like a concept. It's more of like a collective, like all these different people who have checked in, you know, there's been, like, 25 Salt Cedar Rebels over the years. Right?

Unknown Speaker (57:43): Okay. Okay.

Mike (57:44): And, depending on where we're at, what kind of music we're playing, you know, the it people people people have always come in and out and added things or subtracted things from the band. And, and it was interesting that that when we did the ten year the the new one is Salt Cedar Rebels two, and it's a ten year anniversary. So we rereleased the first album, on vinyl and then did the the release of the new album. So 12 new songs on vinyl and streaming. And the dedication to it was like, all of this has been formed by the people who checked in and checked out over the past ten years, you know, and and brought some level of, like, something that I heard from them or some level of creativity or inspiration that I got from them or some really painful, like, one of the the guy that was the lead guitar player for a long time ended up having an affair with the the woman I was married to at the time.

Mike (58:33): And then, and then he and I got in a fight and I ended up in jail over it, know? Like, like, there's been like a lot of those stories that happened. And so to to maintain that kind of a friendship for the for thirty something years, you know, through making music and and hanging out and being buddies and now the podcast. That's amazing.

Dan (58:48): It was like the three Musketeers, only there was four of us. We knew we needed each other, man. And that's the moral of the story in nutshell is we knew we needed each other and there's no reason to fight with your brothers. And if you do get it over quick, you know? Hey, I don't like what you said there.

Unknown Speaker (59:04): Move on. Whatever.

Unknown Speaker (59:05): Yeah. And I and I've never I've never been a fighter, man. I just I just want

Dan (59:07): to I've never had it. I just told the story to another buddy of mine at work, and this is a true story. Chris and I have never raised our voices to each other ever in the whole time we've known each other. Woah. We agree to disagree on the most respectful.

Dan (59:20): That's why I chose to do this podcast with him. I knew if I said something that he doesn't believe in, he's not gonna lose his mind over it. He's just gonna say, hey, man. I don't You can believe what you want to believe, but this is how I feel about it. And I respect that.

Unknown Speaker (59:34): Yeah, we have. That's about the most unheard of thing I think that's ever actually happened in this whole conversation. Can't imagine. I've I've yelled. I've yelled.

Unknown Speaker (59:42): I can't think of anybody I've never yelled at. That's wild.

Unknown Speaker (59:45): Yeah, I can't either other than him because I don't want to.

Unknown Speaker (59:48): I have no reason to.

Chris (59:50): Yeah. I've never yelled at my wife, dude. My even when my wife and I were our darkest part when I was drinking, I just I I don't remember really ever really yelling at her. We just and we don't argue and fight. And when we do fight or have disagreements, we call them.

Chris (1:00:04): It's on this level. It's not it's not it's not screaming and yelling and calling each other's names. It's like, I don't like that or I don't like this or I don't like that. And it's just it's this really weird dynamic. People don't often believe me when I say that we just don't fight.

Chris (1:00:18): We've been together thirty one years and then twenty one years ago, twenty two years ago, I had a really bad year. My last year drinking, you know? And, you know, we just got separated and and we worked through it and, you know, here we are. And

Unknown Speaker (1:00:32): But I'll tell you

Unknown Speaker (1:00:32): one thing.

Unknown Speaker (1:00:33): If if you saw him on stage, you would think he was the most ego ego Maniacal. Maniacal.

Unknown Speaker (1:00:39): Maniacal. Mean Yeah.

Dan (1:00:40): Yeah. It's like, wow. That guy, don't know how they put up. Really, that was the persona. He delivered just such a I'm here to kick your ass persona.

Unknown Speaker (1:00:48): Yeah.

Unknown Speaker (1:00:48): Yeah. When he get

Unknown Speaker (1:00:49): off stage, he'd be like, hey.

Unknown Speaker (1:00:51): Yeah. He would tell me people would people would say, well, he left. He's just a dick. He's like, no, he's married. He's got a kid.

Unknown Speaker (1:00:56): That's why he left. Yeah. That's what I would hear. He's not a dick. Wow.

Unknown Speaker (1:00:59): How do you put up

Dan (1:00:59): with your singer? I'm like I'm thinking, rest in peace to Scott, but he was the person that you were gonna have to work the drummer, right? He's fucking Drummers are crazy by nature, most of them. Yeah. They would say something bad about Chris and I'd just start laughing.

Unknown Speaker (1:01:15): I'm like, he just had a baby. He's got a wife at home. He just left, man. That's the nicest guy you're ever gonna wanna meet. I know what he looks like up there.

Unknown Speaker (1:01:23): Right.

Dan (1:01:23): Wait till you talk to him in person.

Unknown Speaker (1:01:25): Yeah. I get

Unknown Speaker (1:01:26): like a very Henry- like a very Henry Rollins kind of a thing, know, like screaming at like everybody's like, Oh my God, this like this huge personality. Then he's like, hey, can we, can we talk about, you know, can we talk about, Tao Buddhism? Cause that'd be great.

Dan (1:01:39): On stage, he's swinging from the light rafters.

Chris (1:01:42): Right. I, you know, I was, I was, you know, I was a performer, man. I was, I was an entertainer. That's what I saw. You know?

Chris (1:01:48): It's I'm gonna be here one day. I'm gonna be I mean, I'll be here tomorrow, so might as well just fucking go for the go for the fences. You know?

Unknown Speaker (1:01:54): That's We

Unknown Speaker (1:01:55): need to have you back on the show because Yes.

Unknown Speaker (1:01:57): Dude, I'd be here in a heartbeat.

Chris (1:01:58): You are an amazing human. You have a great, very old soul. So when we get done, we're gonna get you in July or August because that's where we're booking out.

Unknown Speaker (1:02:06): But we're still got I think we got about a million other things we can talk about. I don't think we even But scratch the

Chris (1:02:10): we want you on a Friday because a Friday, we have unlimited time.

Unknown Speaker (1:02:14): Okay. Right on.

Chris (1:02:15): Okay. So we'll do that.

Unknown Speaker (1:02:17): Cool. Count me in.

Chris (1:02:18): We always, yeah, we always, and thank you for your time. We wrap the show up like this all the time, which you're going to really dig because of what we So talked about if you're feeling sad, suicidal, depressed, don't do it. Go scream in a pillow, go outside or run, go work out, go find somebody to talk to. If you can't find somebody to talk to, we had a, we have a friend that came on not too long ago. He's behind an app called Zobe.

Chris (1:02:38): Z O, right? Zobe, is that

Unknown Speaker (1:02:40): it Mike? Yep. Z O B I space A I.

Chris (1:02:43): Yeah. So go Google Play Store or Apple. It's, basically it's an AI chat generated therapist $6 a month. Will help change your mindset. If, if you want something more immediate, sunflowerssober.com has all the resources you need regardless of what state you live in.

Chris (1:02:59): You can still text 988, but there's some stuff going on with that. So just remember not to leave a hole in somebody else's heart because you chose not wake up tomorrow. It does affect the people that you leave behind and you don't want to have that trauma carried on to them. So don't do it. Tomorrow is always a better day with you in it.

Chris (1:03:14): That being said, I'm Chris Heesmike. This is Dan Jansen Dan Johnson. Dan Johnson Music dot US?

Unknown Speaker (1:03:20): That's correct.

Chris (1:03:21): Yeah. That's one of the great I mean, I just Googled him. I just Googled Dan Johnson, singer songwriter, actor, and all the stuff came up. So you definitely wanna pay attention to him. You wanna find him if he's playing his unique shows because they're gonna sell out, so you wanna get tickets.

Chris (1:03:34): If you ever come to Arizona, let me know. If you ever go to Illinois, let

Unknown Speaker (1:03:37): him know. Just made a new connection just made a new connection in Arizona that wants to plan a tour out there, so I'll be hitting you up pretty soon, brother.

Chris (1:03:43): Awesome. So we will we will be there. It'll be fantastic. For the Chris and Mike show, I'm Chris Heesmichael. Again, this is Dan Johnson.

Chris (1:03:49): Nothing but love. Thank you for your time.

Unknown Speaker (1:03:51): I truly

Unknown Speaker (1:03:51): appreciate you. Thank you. We will have you back on.

Unknown Speaker (1:03:54): Alright. We'll see you all soon. Have a good one.

Unknown Speaker (1:03:55): Love you, brother.

Unknown Speaker (1:03:56): Love you, brother.