WEBVTT - The Decision That Changed Osher Günsberg’s Life 0:00:00.240 --> 0:00:03.360 We'd like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land 0:00:03.440 --> 0:00:06.800 on which this podcast was produced, the Galligall people of 0:00:06.840 --> 0:00:10.399 the orination. We pay our respects to Elder's past and present. 0:00:11.119 --> 0:00:14.120 Just a warning that Osher's story contains discussions of mental 0:00:14.160 --> 0:00:17.520 ill health and addiction. If this episode raises any issues 0:00:17.520 --> 0:00:20.160 for you, support is available through the links and phone 0:00:20.200 --> 0:00:21.440 numbers in our show notes. 0:00:22.840 --> 0:00:25.520 It's November two thousand and six and we're in the 0:00:25.520 --> 0:00:29.480 wings of the Sydney Opera House. Andrew ge is about 0:00:29.520 --> 0:00:33.320 to take the stage to host Australian Idols Ground Finadi. 0:00:34.040 --> 0:00:37.800 The lights are bright, the stakes are high, the pressure 0:00:37.880 --> 0:00:41.800 is on. One in four Australian households will tune in 0:00:41.880 --> 0:00:46.479 to watch him do his thing. This is his happy place, 0:00:47.120 --> 0:00:51.080 the place where he feels most in control. But when 0:00:51.080 --> 0:00:53.960 the lights go down and he gets off stage, he 0:00:54.040 --> 0:00:57.760 won't feel so in control. In fact, he's fighting for 0:00:57.840 --> 0:01:01.640 his life. His career has become his coping mechanism for 0:01:01.760 --> 0:01:03.520 his battle with OCD. 0:01:03.560 --> 0:01:04.839 Drugs and alcohol. 0:01:06.240 --> 0:01:09.440 Now as Osher Ginsburg, he sits in front of me 0:01:09.840 --> 0:01:13.840 a completely different person, a new name, a new approach 0:01:13.880 --> 0:01:14.440 to life. 0:01:19.120 --> 0:01:20.479 I'm Att Middleton. 0:01:20.280 --> 0:01:25.160 And this is head Game Today beloved TV host, podcaster, 0:01:25.360 --> 0:01:29.400 and mental health advocate Osher Ginsburg on making a life 0:01:29.440 --> 0:01:36.600 worth living. Asher Ginsburg, It's an absolute pleasure to have 0:01:36.680 --> 0:01:38.040 you on my podcast, head Game. 0:01:38.240 --> 0:01:39.520 I'm glad I can be here, mate. 0:01:39.600 --> 0:01:41.280 So just take me back to. 0:01:41.720 --> 0:01:45.880 Your childhood and who you were, who you thought you were. 0:01:46.000 --> 0:01:48.480 Did you have a good upbringing, what your parents were like, 0:01:48.480 --> 0:01:51.440 because it's podcast is about you and we want to 0:01:51.440 --> 0:01:53.240 get to know the nitty. 0:01:53.600 --> 0:01:55.520 I can answer that question in forty nine minutes and 0:01:55.520 --> 0:01:58.880 then you'll be done. But I'll tell you this short 0:01:58.960 --> 0:02:01.760 versions you're, you know, military man with a military background, 0:02:01.800 --> 0:02:03.600 so you know what I'm talking about when I tell 0:02:03.640 --> 0:02:06.640 you that I'm one of four boys. I'm number two 0:02:06.840 --> 0:02:11.280 of four boys, and I was raised by two people 0:02:11.320 --> 0:02:15.799 who know what it is to have authoritarian regimes kick 0:02:15.880 --> 0:02:19.400 your doorin and people with machine guns say this is 0:02:19.400 --> 0:02:22.320 ours now. And that happened to my mum when she 0:02:22.480 --> 0:02:24.920 was just a bit younger than my son. To be honest, 0:02:24.960 --> 0:02:30.200 it was about three they fled Lithuania with the retreating 0:02:30.320 --> 0:02:36.040 German army. Because we all know how terrible that was 0:02:36.080 --> 0:02:38.760 in parts of the Holocaust. The real groom kind of 0:02:38.760 --> 0:02:42.760 hand to hand brutal massacres happened before they mechanized it. 0:02:43.480 --> 0:02:47.240 That happened there, and they knew how bad those guys were. 0:02:47.360 --> 0:02:48.840 But when they found out the Russians were coming over, 0:02:48.840 --> 0:02:51.160 they're like, fuck, let's get out of here. It was like, 0:02:51.480 --> 0:02:54.920 that's bad. Some twenty four years later, the same Russians 0:02:55.600 --> 0:02:59.080 stormed tanks through my dad's city of Prague, and he'd 0:02:59.120 --> 0:03:00.480 the one to look at that and when well, I 0:03:00.560 --> 0:03:03.400 better go, and so he was twenty it was twenty 0:03:03.440 --> 0:03:07.400 four when that happened, and so both my parents had that. 0:03:07.919 --> 0:03:11.560 They're both doctors, but they both had this idea of, 0:03:12.520 --> 0:03:15.480 you know, it can all get taken away, and you 0:03:15.480 --> 0:03:19.560 know a different relationship to authority than some people probably 0:03:19.600 --> 0:03:23.919 would have had, and most definitely an awareness of it's 0:03:24.000 --> 0:03:27.880 lovely here in Australia. Yeah, and there's parts of the 0:03:27.919 --> 0:03:30.200 world like in our lifetimes it's kind of not been 0:03:30.200 --> 0:03:33.440 that way now. So these people, that's that's what they 0:03:33.600 --> 0:03:35.280 you know, that's what they grew up with and that's 0:03:35.400 --> 0:03:37.920 you know, who they were, and they hoped he could. 0:03:37.720 --> 0:03:39.600 You sense that as a child growing up or did 0:03:39.640 --> 0:03:41.360 you learn that later or could you sense. 0:03:41.160 --> 0:03:43.760 That in the definitely knew that about my dad. Dad 0:03:43.800 --> 0:03:48.200 talked about it a lot. He lost family in the Holocaust, 0:03:48.240 --> 0:03:54.640 and you know, he was alrightly, you know, quite really 0:03:54.680 --> 0:03:56.720 making sure that us kids knew what it was about. 0:03:57.760 --> 0:04:01.280 Mum didn't talk about it so much until they'd split up, 0:04:01.400 --> 0:04:05.640 And it was once Dad had left that Mum started 0:04:05.640 --> 0:04:08.240 opening up about the things that happened to her and 0:04:08.520 --> 0:04:12.840 her journey, Like they walked from Colnus down to northern 0:04:12.880 --> 0:04:17.880 Germany in the middle of winter, they walked and wildly 0:04:17.920 --> 0:04:19.440 and well, I like to talk about this when when 0:04:19.480 --> 0:04:21.920 her and her family got to Australia. On the top 0:04:21.920 --> 0:04:23.599 of the form and I've seen the former says d 0:04:24.040 --> 0:04:27.960 P displaced persons. There were persons displaced by war. They 0:04:28.000 --> 0:04:32.719 weren't refugees, they weren't Q jumpers, they weren't asylum seekers. 0:04:32.920 --> 0:04:35.600 There were people. There were persons who had been displaced 0:04:35.640 --> 0:04:37.800 through no fault of their own. But look as far 0:04:37.839 --> 0:04:40.719 as how I was a jumpy kid. I was five, 0:04:40.760 --> 0:04:42.680 I think when my parents set me off to psychiatrist, 0:04:42.720 --> 0:04:44.640 and I think it was one in Brisbane at the time, 0:04:44.880 --> 0:04:48.480 in the late seventies, and I just remember like anxiety 0:04:48.560 --> 0:04:52.120 being this all encompassing thing that would just overtake me 0:04:52.240 --> 0:04:54.400 and I was unable to escape it and. 0:04:54.680 --> 0:04:58.120 Was quickly asked, you, so you were you were? You 0:04:58.160 --> 0:04:59.840 had a psychiatrist at the age. 0:04:59.640 --> 0:05:01.960 Of five, Like, what's going on with a kid that 0:05:01.960 --> 0:05:03.719 they gets into a psychiatrist at five? 0:05:03.960 --> 0:05:05.839 So I don't know, because nowadays that's sort of like, 0:05:05.960 --> 0:05:08.320 you know, we hear about it a lot more nowadays 0:05:08.360 --> 0:05:11.720 and it's more highly accepted now. How how was that 0:05:11.760 --> 0:05:15.400 perceived back into back back when you were five to 0:05:15.760 --> 0:05:16.680 how it's perceived now. 0:05:16.760 --> 0:05:18.080 I grew up in I don't know how much you 0:05:18.120 --> 0:05:20.600 know about Australian local politics. I grew up in Joe 0:05:20.600 --> 0:05:23.880 Bioki's Queensland. So the fact that my last name was 0:05:23.920 --> 0:05:27.760 Ginsburg was enough. It didn't need to didn't too much more. 0:05:27.800 --> 0:05:30.279 Topping on top of that cake. It was a pretty 0:05:30.320 --> 0:05:34.800 weird place, pretty pretty strange place. But yeah, you know, 0:05:34.800 --> 0:05:38.800 I remember it was it was. It was really weird, 0:05:38.960 --> 0:05:41.200 and I was always kind of afraid of people and 0:05:41.720 --> 0:05:46.279 afraid of strangers and two kind of I found it 0:05:47.400 --> 0:05:52.000 a bit of a salve for that a in you know, 0:05:52.000 --> 0:05:54.640 because what's anxiety for me at the time. Anxiety was 0:05:54.640 --> 0:05:58.960 a sense of lack of control and when am I 0:05:59.000 --> 0:06:01.720 more in control than and I'm on stage? I was eight. 0:06:01.800 --> 0:06:04.880 I think we were doing a sketch at school. We 0:06:04.960 --> 0:06:08.120 went to the kind of school where every Friday there'd 0:06:08.160 --> 0:06:09.640 be an assembly and you had to do a skit 0:06:09.800 --> 0:06:11.960 on like, I don't know, picking up rubbish or you know, 0:06:12.360 --> 0:06:15.080 whatever you're doing, don't masturbateer. Jesus is always watching you. 0:06:15.240 --> 0:06:17.240 It was that kind of school. And we did the 0:06:17.360 --> 0:06:20.839 sketch and I had to walk out there and do 0:06:20.960 --> 0:06:23.679 the line don't worry it was about picking up rubbish, 0:06:24.080 --> 0:06:26.640 and I think I said. I walked out and everyone 0:06:26.680 --> 0:06:28.719 was quiet, and they're all staring at me. It's like 0:06:28.760 --> 0:06:30.960 three hundred kids or looking at me with faces like 0:06:31.040 --> 0:06:33.960 cooy carp right, And I think the line was something 0:06:34.000 --> 0:06:36.440 along the lines of don't committe us in, put it 0:06:36.480 --> 0:06:39.359 in the bin. Indocrination was deep, but it was like that, 0:06:39.440 --> 0:06:41.719 and I got a laugh and the choy carp just 0:06:41.760 --> 0:06:44.960 started and they all just and that was really totally 0:06:45.120 --> 0:06:47.880 kind of the first high that I ever got, because 0:06:48.200 --> 0:06:51.800 here I am stay oh yeah, because like I'm now 0:06:51.839 --> 0:06:53.720 bear in mind. I was eight. I was also in 0:06:53.760 --> 0:06:56.680 weight watches at eight because my tummy felt it was 0:06:56.680 --> 0:06:59.640 the anxiety to make my feeling go away. This awful 0:06:59.640 --> 0:07:01.599 feeling is my body. I would put things in my 0:07:01.640 --> 0:07:04.400 tummy and I was just quite, what's going on with 0:07:04.440 --> 0:07:06.240 a kid? They get taken awight watches when they're eight, 0:07:06.480 --> 0:07:08.360 which later on I found out it's very much like 0:07:08.400 --> 0:07:12.720 a twelve step for fatty. I went through various stages 0:07:12.760 --> 0:07:18.240 of you know, not great, you know, mental health and 0:07:18.640 --> 0:07:22.240 you know, various that kind of coupled with not a 0:07:22.320 --> 0:07:24.560 lot of great fitness and stuff like that. But I 0:07:24.600 --> 0:07:30.440 always found a great amount of respite and relief in performing, 0:07:31.280 --> 0:07:34.280 and because there was this beautiful sense of I don't 0:07:34.400 --> 0:07:36.680 think I was necessarily I was just able to kind 0:07:36.680 --> 0:07:39.560 of communicate, I think in a different way, express yourself, right, yeah, 0:07:39.640 --> 0:07:41.560 And there was yeah, I'm not gonna lie. There was 0:07:41.560 --> 0:07:45.320 a sense of control. My coping mechanism eventually became my career, 0:07:45.440 --> 0:07:47.680 but I did come to a point where I had 0:07:47.680 --> 0:07:51.560 to reassess that and it's very different now. But like 0:07:51.640 --> 0:07:53.280 if I think back to some of the biggest things 0:07:53.280 --> 0:07:56.679 I've ever done, millions of people down the camera lens, 0:07:56.720 --> 0:08:01.960 literally coast to coast, live across America, just absolute ceremenity, 0:08:02.200 --> 0:08:05.360 complete calm when I think about those moments. You know, 0:08:05.560 --> 0:08:07.360 if I said to someone, I picked yourself speaking in 0:08:07.400 --> 0:08:09.640 front of hundred people, Now I speak yourself speaking eight 0:08:09.760 --> 0:08:11.600 hundred people. Now those eight hundred people are in a 0:08:11.640 --> 0:08:14.240 TV studio and there's twelve cameras in there, and at 0:08:14.240 --> 0:08:15.960 the end of every one of those cameras is a 0:08:15.960 --> 0:08:18.200 person except this ten million of them. How do you 0:08:18.280 --> 0:08:23.080 feel they probably shit themselves for me, It's like, I'm ready, 0:08:23.240 --> 0:08:23.680 let's go. 0:08:23.960 --> 0:08:25.800 Would you say from that moment onwards, from the age 0:08:25.840 --> 0:08:28.200 of eight, it did not to have knowing what you 0:08:28.280 --> 0:08:30.880 wanted to do, but you say you felt was hugely 0:08:30.920 --> 0:08:31.480 in control. 0:08:31.600 --> 0:08:34.160 It was I knew what I wanted to do. I 0:08:34.240 --> 0:08:35.760 knew that it was always going to be something to 0:08:35.800 --> 0:08:38.880 do with performing. I think my mum came in at 0:08:38.880 --> 0:08:42.760 the age of five. I grew up in Brisbane, which 0:08:42.800 --> 0:08:46.000 again it was a big cow town run by a 0:08:46.040 --> 0:08:48.160 premier who was essentially it was like a five tom 0:08:48.640 --> 0:08:51.760 and I'm standing on the coffee table and we only 0:08:51.800 --> 0:08:53.640 had three TV channels and most of them the whole 0:08:53.679 --> 0:08:55.720 day long was the test pattern, which is a great show, 0:08:57.120 --> 0:09:00.719 went all day, never canceled it, and they classical music 0:09:00.800 --> 0:09:03.520 underneath it, and Mum came in one day and she 0:09:03.559 --> 0:09:07.920 found me standing on the coffee table conducting the classical 0:09:08.000 --> 0:09:11.439 music on the table. There was just something about connecting 0:09:11.480 --> 0:09:15.320 with other people who are performing and you know, without words, 0:09:15.480 --> 0:09:18.200 doing this thing together to get an emotional response. I 0:09:18.240 --> 0:09:19.480 know that now as an adult, but there was just 0:09:19.480 --> 0:09:22.040 something about it that I just loved. Couple that with 0:09:22.120 --> 0:09:25.120 a sense of I know what's going to happen if 0:09:25.120 --> 0:09:26.880 I'm up here for at least for the next twelve minutes, 0:09:26.920 --> 0:09:29.040 I know what's going to happen, so I'm just calm. 0:09:29.400 --> 0:09:30.880 That's the sort of thing that kind of pushed me 0:09:30.920 --> 0:09:33.120 to want to get better at singing and playing guitar 0:09:33.160 --> 0:09:35.760 and playing piano and acting and whatever else I was 0:09:35.800 --> 0:09:38.600 doing to buy me that stage time, to get me 0:09:38.640 --> 0:09:40.320 that feeling, and. 0:09:40.200 --> 0:09:42.520 That feeling was pure I am in control Or was 0:09:42.520 --> 0:09:44.280 it just like this has giving me a buzz, this 0:09:44.360 --> 0:09:45.439 is making me feel alive? 0:09:45.440 --> 0:09:46.240 What was that feeling? 0:09:46.800 --> 0:09:49.280 And I still this part I still relate to, like 0:09:49.320 --> 0:09:54.360 I don't I don't do my job for this anymore, 0:09:54.400 --> 0:09:58.120 but it's nice when it happens when you you know. 0:09:58.160 --> 0:10:00.440 I don't know which high school musical is you were in. 0:10:03.000 --> 0:10:07.400 But when you're standing on stage and you're trying to 0:10:07.400 --> 0:10:10.439 remember your lines and you're trying to remember the song 0:10:10.520 --> 0:10:13.040 and the harmony, which isn't the melodies and fuck it up, 0:10:13.160 --> 0:10:14.840 and you're trying to remember where you have to stand 0:10:14.880 --> 0:10:16.559 and who have you've got to go, and there's a 0:10:16.600 --> 0:10:18.240 person there and you're trying to remember make sure you 0:10:18.320 --> 0:10:20.600 stand in the light and not in the shadow. There 0:10:20.840 --> 0:10:24.959 really isn't any room left in your brain for which 0:10:25.000 --> 0:10:27.240 is the barrage of noise that goes on in my 0:10:27.280 --> 0:10:30.679 head most of the time. So when I'm that focused, 0:10:30.760 --> 0:10:35.000 all that stuff goes away and it's just really lovely. 0:10:36.600 --> 0:10:37.720 Yeah, no, can, I can. 0:10:37.800 --> 0:10:40.040 I can relate to that because it's those focused on 0:10:40.120 --> 0:10:42.560 what you need to do that all the noise distractions. 0:10:42.720 --> 0:10:46.440 But ultimately that's that's quite rare because normally it's the 0:10:46.440 --> 0:10:49.320 flip side, Right, Normally people get up and it's the noise. 0:10:49.360 --> 0:10:52.000 It's the distractions that really, you know, that really break 0:10:52.040 --> 0:10:55.000 them down and stop them from performing. But you you 0:10:55.040 --> 0:10:57.720 were just so hyper focused and what you need to was, Yeah, 0:10:58.040 --> 0:10:59.360 it silenced all the exterior. 0:10:59.480 --> 0:11:01.880 Was very lucky. I was very lucky to have that. 0:11:01.920 --> 0:11:03.520 But there's the same thing goes. You know, if I'm 0:11:03.520 --> 0:11:05.120 doing a show like I mean, it's not on air 0:11:05.160 --> 0:11:07.280 at the moment, probably won't ever be again. But a 0:11:07.320 --> 0:11:10.400 show called the Masts thing. It's very silly show. But 0:11:11.280 --> 0:11:15.280 I walk out and there's twenty dances. I'm wearing this 0:11:15.360 --> 0:11:17.840 helmet that looks like I'm in daft punk. It's all LEDs. 0:11:17.920 --> 0:11:19.920 I can't actually see out of it, so I just 0:11:19.960 --> 0:11:22.080 have to count my steps and remember I'm walking in 0:11:22.080 --> 0:11:25.960 a straight line. Walk six steps forward, don't walk seven 0:11:26.320 --> 0:11:28.560 because right there on that beat there's going to be 0:11:28.880 --> 0:11:31.440 propane cannons going across in front of me, So don't 0:11:31.480 --> 0:11:34.199 stand there. But then when the music continues, take four 0:11:34.240 --> 0:11:36.320 steps forward because now you need to be that point. 0:11:36.320 --> 0:11:38.559 You can still smell the fumes in the air. Flip 0:11:38.600 --> 0:11:40.520 the mic without looking, take the helmet off. Remember all 0:11:40.559 --> 0:11:43.040 the dance moves. There's fourteen cameras in the room. Da 0:11:43.120 --> 0:11:45.200 da da da Da da da. Now I've got a 0:11:45.200 --> 0:11:49.600 brain that goes no problem. I'm fine, And it's just 0:11:50.160 --> 0:11:52.040 it's just like the ding of a bell at the 0:11:52.120 --> 0:11:54.360 end of sevasna and the yoga class. That's what it 0:11:54.360 --> 0:11:59.000 feels like. But when I don't have that amount going on. 0:11:59.440 --> 0:12:02.439 It can be challenge still, but so I actually work 0:12:02.520 --> 0:12:04.440 these days. I work quite hard to make sure those 0:12:04.480 --> 0:12:07.719 noisy bits have something to do. Which is that when 0:12:07.800 --> 0:12:09.560 is that when the self doubt kicks in? Is that 0:12:09.600 --> 0:12:13.559 when the habits, that the temptation kicks in, is when 0:12:13.559 --> 0:12:16.920 you're not in those moments, Because it sounds like pretty 0:12:16.960 --> 0:12:19.600 much like me, when I'm sat twiddling my thumbs, that's when. 0:12:19.480 --> 0:12:23.760 I get myself in a bit of idle hands. 0:12:26.160 --> 0:12:31.320 No self doubt. Self doubt's a bit more. I don't 0:12:31.320 --> 0:12:34.839 know about that. I think no, it was never really that. 0:12:34.960 --> 0:12:38.600 I think there's an element. I don't know if it's humorous. 0:12:39.880 --> 0:12:43.880 I just I just believed, and I think there's got 0:12:43.960 --> 0:12:46.160 to be an element of it. To anybody that says 0:12:46.480 --> 0:12:49.160 I am a songwriter or I am an author, or 0:12:49.240 --> 0:12:52.840 I am the one soldier who's going to go and 0:12:52.880 --> 0:12:55.480 make a massive TV show about soldiering and overgive a 0:12:55.520 --> 0:12:57.079 fuck what any of those hard heads are going to 0:12:57.120 --> 0:12:58.960 say to me yours or grunts, Here I am winning 0:12:58.960 --> 0:13:03.720 the leggy fuck yah, Like there's something about you that goes, yes, 0:13:04.120 --> 0:13:06.520 I am going to do this, And here I go 0:13:06.600 --> 0:13:09.800 and that's you. I don't think you can achieve those 0:13:09.840 --> 0:13:14.239 things in life. If you allow that self doubt to 0:13:14.280 --> 0:13:17.280 make your decisions, you know, you kind of make those 0:13:17.320 --> 0:13:21.880 bold moves because you are willing to be with the 0:13:22.000 --> 0:13:26.559 criticism and will with the critique because otherwise you'd never 0:13:26.640 --> 0:13:28.640 leave the house. You wouldn't go No, no, no desk 0:13:28.679 --> 0:13:32.319 job for me, thank you? No, Like that's never been 0:13:32.640 --> 0:13:35.760 I don't work with anybody like that. Camera guys, sound guys, anybody. 0:13:35.920 --> 0:13:38.680 Everyone's like, yep, I'm going to not pursue a career 0:13:38.960 --> 0:13:41.079 that's solid and you know, has a regular income to 0:13:41.080 --> 0:13:45.280 support my family. I'm going to swing a boom. You know, 0:13:46.120 --> 0:13:48.280 these guys work. You know, there's got to be something 0:13:48.320 --> 0:13:52.760 about you know, certainly in a seasonal industry like mine, 0:13:52.920 --> 0:13:56.960 you've got to have some amount of confidence or belief. 0:13:56.720 --> 0:14:07.520 In when was your big break? 0:14:07.559 --> 0:14:09.760 Because you go through you know, you realize that you 0:14:09.760 --> 0:14:11.640 want to be on stage. This is where you come alive, 0:14:11.800 --> 0:14:14.920 This is where you're incomplete control. Where did it all 0:14:14.920 --> 0:14:16.560 start and how did you get your big break? 0:14:16.559 --> 0:14:18.280 I always knew I was going to do it. I 0:14:18.280 --> 0:14:20.120 always had this idea that this is where I was 0:14:20.160 --> 0:14:22.200 going to go. I played in a lot of bands. 0:14:22.200 --> 0:14:27.320 I always played music. I still do, and I just 0:14:28.120 --> 0:14:32.160 knew that there was something. I had something more to 0:14:32.240 --> 0:14:37.240 give than what was there. And I was a roadie 0:14:37.280 --> 0:14:41.440 for a long time and I was lugging road cases 0:14:41.520 --> 0:14:44.440 up and down flights of stairs at three in the morning, 0:14:44.440 --> 0:14:46.200 and the blistering. 0:14:46.840 --> 0:14:47.720 It was awful. 0:14:48.000 --> 0:14:49.680 I did that for like it was fun, you know, 0:14:49.720 --> 0:14:51.760 but I learned a lot. I learned a lot doing that. 0:14:51.800 --> 0:14:54.440 I think it's really important to do a hard physical 0:14:54.520 --> 0:14:56.760 job when you're like seventeen eighteen nineteen, so you spend 0:14:56.760 --> 0:14:58.960 the rest of your life going I'm going to do everything. 0:14:59.000 --> 0:15:01.240 I can never do that again because it's I've got 0:15:01.280 --> 0:15:03.480 two hernias and hearing damage out of it. We're hearing 0:15:03.520 --> 0:15:07.560 age now because my ears are fucked. But when I 0:15:07.600 --> 0:15:10.600 was doing that, and I started playing in bands quite regularly, 0:15:10.720 --> 0:15:15.600 and then I was like, there's gotta be something, there's more. 0:15:15.760 --> 0:15:18.960 I've got more to give than what's here. And so 0:15:19.040 --> 0:15:22.040 I just literally I just sat down. I wrote handwritten 0:15:22.120 --> 0:15:25.160 letters to all the radio stations in Brisbone and said, 0:15:25.160 --> 0:15:27.280 I don't care what it is, I just want to 0:15:27.280 --> 0:15:29.480 be around it. I just I'll come do anything. I'll 0:15:29.480 --> 0:15:31.000 turn a light bulb and I don't give a shit. 0:15:31.920 --> 0:15:34.120 And one of the people that worked at the radio 0:15:34.160 --> 0:15:37.720 station B one O five, he used to be the 0:15:37.720 --> 0:15:39.320 bar manager at one of the places that I would 0:15:39.400 --> 0:15:40.920 lug in and lug out of on a Tuesday, and 0:15:40.960 --> 0:15:42.320 I used to go get the keys off of him 0:15:42.320 --> 0:15:44.360 to open the loading dock and he's like, I know 0:15:44.440 --> 0:15:48.120 that guy, get him in here, and and that was it. 0:15:48.400 --> 0:15:50.360 I got my first overnight shift like six weeks eight 0:15:50.360 --> 0:15:53.520 weeks later, so I was just giving out the ICICL 0:15:53.600 --> 0:15:56.800 cans for a while, and pretty soon I was doing 0:15:57.080 --> 0:15:59.920 the overnights. And so these jobs don't exist anymore, which 0:15:59.920 --> 0:16:03.080 is a real drag because I think the great fallacy 0:16:03.120 --> 0:16:06.200 that people think is that you can go from I'm 0:16:06.240 --> 0:16:09.680 interested in doing this to a million downloads, Like, no, 0:16:10.240 --> 0:16:12.560 you're gonna have to be prepared to be shit for 0:16:12.640 --> 0:16:15.480 quite a while and understand that you're not going to 0:16:15.520 --> 0:16:19.080 get it straight away. And flight miles really truly is 0:16:19.120 --> 0:16:22.200 the only way that you can get something into until 0:16:22.200 --> 0:16:24.960 it's automatic. Absolutely, Like I don't know how many times 0:16:24.960 --> 0:16:27.920 you've disassembled and reassembled a rifle, mate, but if you 0:16:27.960 --> 0:16:29.280 have to think about it, you're gonna have to do 0:16:29.320 --> 0:16:30.600 it again. You have to be able to do it 0:16:30.640 --> 0:16:33.360 while counting a deck of cards right, and then do 0:16:33.400 --> 0:16:35.360 it perfectly because your hands just have to know what 0:16:35.440 --> 0:16:38.280 to do instinctively. And then there's a skill to broadcasting. 0:16:38.280 --> 0:16:40.800 There's a way to you know, truncate the things you 0:16:40.800 --> 0:16:43.160 want to say, cadence of your voice, operating all the buttons, 0:16:43.200 --> 0:16:45.520 all that kind of shit. And so I did five 0:16:45.640 --> 0:16:49.160 years of like between midnight and six Amazon Air playing 0:16:49.440 --> 0:16:52.560 fucking Sleandyon and Brian Adams and Third Eye Blind and 0:16:52.560 --> 0:16:57.760 all kinds of other nineties stuff. And then I was like, 0:16:57.800 --> 0:16:59.320 I'm never going to get a job in the daytime. 0:16:59.360 --> 0:17:02.920 And one of the daytime jobs dies, so so I 0:17:02.960 --> 0:17:05.520 sent started sending tapes around the different stations around this country, 0:17:05.560 --> 0:17:10.000 and the guys in Adelaide were like, oh yeah, let's 0:17:10.600 --> 0:17:12.120 want to come down. And so I got a job 0:17:12.160 --> 0:17:15.800 in the daytime and I my girlfriend and it was 0:17:15.840 --> 0:17:17.920 at the time we're not together anymore. It was years ago. 0:17:18.840 --> 0:17:21.720 I left her, left my family of my friends, left everything, 0:17:22.080 --> 0:17:23.439 and I just got on a plane and went to 0:17:23.440 --> 0:17:26.680 Adelaide and I said, I've just got to go. I've 0:17:26.720 --> 0:17:29.560 just got to go. And as I left. 0:17:29.320 --> 0:17:31.159 One of the were you following you were you just 0:17:31.200 --> 0:17:33.560 following that career or were you following your gut where 0:17:33.560 --> 0:17:35.400 you're you just gut? 0:17:35.720 --> 0:17:37.760 It was just I just knew I had to do 0:17:37.800 --> 0:17:40.600 this thing. I just I couldn't put words into it, 0:17:40.680 --> 0:17:42.560 like what is follow your gut? Follw your gut is? 0:17:42.600 --> 0:17:45.880 And what is intuition? It is simply a subconscious reflection 0:17:46.119 --> 0:17:50.359 of something that you've already seen or experienced or you understand, 0:17:50.400 --> 0:17:52.960 but you may not you may not be able to 0:17:53.000 --> 0:17:55.600 put into words. That is all intuition is. You don't 0:17:55.600 --> 0:17:58.399 have some sort of divinity put through you. It's just 0:17:58.440 --> 0:18:01.119 your subconscious is able to make decisions quicker than you 0:18:01.160 --> 0:18:04.679 can think about it cognitively. Right, This stuff happens automatically. 0:18:05.000 --> 0:18:06.560 And I was just like, Oh, I have to do 0:18:06.600 --> 0:18:08.320 I have to go, I have to go. And so 0:18:08.400 --> 0:18:11.439 I got there and within about a month I was like, 0:18:11.560 --> 0:18:14.800 oh fucking hell, I'm in Adelaide. This is weird town 0:18:14.840 --> 0:18:16.760 on the edge of a desert. Like the whole snowtown 0:18:16.800 --> 0:18:18.119 thing was going on at that time. I was like, 0:18:18.119 --> 0:18:22.320 this is fucking strange here. And when I was leaving Brisbane, 0:18:22.680 --> 0:18:26.280 Darryl is an amazing audio operator. As I left, he said, 0:18:26.480 --> 0:18:28.199 you'll be in Sydney within six months. I was like, 0:18:28.240 --> 0:18:29.800 what the fuck are you talking about. I don't even 0:18:29.800 --> 0:18:31.679 know when I'm going to be in six weeks. I 0:18:31.720 --> 0:18:33.160 just know I have to go now. I just got 0:18:33.160 --> 0:18:38.680 to go and look mate. Sure enough, about a month later, 0:18:38.680 --> 0:18:39.840 I was like, I've got to get out of here. 0:18:40.400 --> 0:18:41.879 This is That's not big enough. I've got to go. 0:18:41.880 --> 0:18:44.160 I've got to get bigger than this. And so, because 0:18:44.160 --> 0:18:45.760 I've just been in Europe right and for the first 0:18:45.800 --> 0:18:49.280 time as an adult, and you know, it was I 0:18:49.320 --> 0:18:51.359 was like, oh my god, the word's bigger than Brisbane. Wow. 0:18:52.200 --> 0:18:55.359 And so as January, there was an old TV show 0:18:55.560 --> 0:18:57.880 here called Recovery. It was on Saturday mornings. I don't 0:18:57.880 --> 0:19:01.119 do that anymore. And I got an email from the 0:19:01.119 --> 0:19:03.399 same guy who now moved to Sydney and he was 0:19:03.440 --> 0:19:06.359 working at a cable network down there, and he said, 0:19:06.359 --> 0:19:08.520 one of the hosts of the afternoon Request show has 0:19:08.600 --> 0:19:11.520 just left. You should send him a tape. And I 0:19:11.560 --> 0:19:12.760 was like, well, if we're going to make a tape 0:19:12.760 --> 0:19:14.840 for that show who was asking about presenters, I'll send 0:19:14.880 --> 0:19:18.040 Daryl one as well. And so I roll I rode 0:19:18.080 --> 0:19:20.080 my escape. I found the tape the other day and 0:19:20.359 --> 0:19:22.960 I rode my skateboard around the beach in Adelaide and 0:19:23.600 --> 0:19:26.080 walked through the park and I did this whole pitch 0:19:26.119 --> 0:19:30.200 and I posted it. That was it. Two weeks later, 0:19:30.200 --> 0:19:33.000 I was on a plane to Sydney for an interview. 0:19:33.520 --> 0:19:35.240 And here's the thing, because I worked at the radio 0:19:35.240 --> 0:19:37.600 station and I wouldn't want to tell him I would 0:19:37.600 --> 0:19:40.600 have breached a contract. Right, So good night, everybody, see 0:19:40.600 --> 0:19:43.240 a lot of guys gonna get him my Kingswood. Fang 0:19:43.280 --> 0:19:46.119 to the Adelaide airport, get on the plane, fly to Sydney. 0:19:46.119 --> 0:19:48.040 It was like two and a half hours. Land, get 0:19:48.080 --> 0:19:50.280 a cab to the restaurant, meet the boss, have a 0:19:50.359 --> 0:19:52.320 chat for a couple of hours, get back to the 0:19:52.800 --> 0:19:54.159