Speaker 1: The Season with Peter Schreeger is a production of the
Speaker 1: NFL in partnership with iHeartRadio. What's up, everybody, Welcome to
Speaker 1: another edition of the Season with Peter Schreger. I'm joined
Speaker 1: here by Aaron Wong Kaufman, a producer with Jason English
Speaker 1: from the iHeart team, and we're sitting this week in
Speaker 1: a dressing room on a high floor of a Manhattan
Speaker 1: sky rise. And our guest is one of the most
Speaker 1: successful musicians of all time. She also happens to be
Speaker 1: an enormous Kansas City Chiefs fan. Melissa Etherich, who just
Speaker 1: got done doing a six week Broadway show might have
Speaker 1: been longer, to be honest, I saw it on opening night.
Speaker 1: It was the Broadway show one woman show about her life,
Speaker 1: which included about with cancer, included multiple number one hits,
Speaker 1: included her coming out of the lesbian her getting married,
Speaker 1: her getting divorced, then her of course rise to fame,
Speaker 1: and there's a tragedy at the end where she loses
Speaker 1: her son and she bears her soul in this Broadway show.
Speaker 1: It just wrapped, and she's in New York still and
Speaker 1: I'm like, we got to have you on and she's
Speaker 1: going to join us in just a second. Very cool
Speaker 1: to have in studio guests. We had Hans Schroeder last
Speaker 1: week from the NFL in his office. Well, we're in
Speaker 1: my office now in one place I don't necessarily have
Speaker 1: any desire to be as in David Tepper's office right now.
Speaker 1: David Tepper is the owner of the Carolina Panthers. They
Speaker 1: made a surprise firing of Frank Reich public yesterday. As
Speaker 1: we're recording this, and Tepper just got done with a
Speaker 1: press conference addressing the local media. Let's go through some
Speaker 1: of the facts here. The Carolina Panthers are an unwatchable team.
Speaker 1: Their quarterback Bryce young Look was completely lost and they
Speaker 1: mortgaged a lot of the future to go get him.
Speaker 1: They hired Frank Reich, who was a veteran coach, to
Speaker 1: be the voice of stability and to be the one
Speaker 1: who's going to usher him into the league. As Frank
Speaker 1: Reik has coached several young quarterbacks in the past and
Speaker 1: has had great success with guys like Philip Rivers and
Speaker 1: like a young Carson Wentz and of course like Nick Foles.
Speaker 1: When Foles went on his rise in Philadelphia, it hasn't
Speaker 1: happened in Carolina. He gets fired eleven games into his
Speaker 1: first season with Carolina, Aaron It is the quickest firing
Speaker 1: of a first year NFL head coach in forty five years.
Speaker 1: Urban Meyer lasted longer, Nathaniel Hackett lasted longer. Frank Reike
Speaker 1: given the pink slip in Carolina, and this comes on
Speaker 1: the heels of him also firing Ron Rivera when he
Speaker 1: got there, also firing Matt Ruhle a couple of years
Speaker 1: into his contract, and not retaining Seve Wilkes, who had
Speaker 1: his team playing good football last year and is now
Speaker 1: the defensive coordinator of the forty nine ers. The initial
Speaker 1: reaction around the league and by fans is fair, it's
Speaker 1: how could you do that? That's ridiculous. You don't give
Speaker 1: Frank Reich a chance. I've had some time to talk
Speaker 1: to a lot of folks and you'd be surprised. A
Speaker 1: lot of people, and several who have similar positions in
Speaker 1: the league, meaning either owners or president, say like, rip
Speaker 1: the band aid off. It's going to be a wild January.
Speaker 1: What do I mean by that? Not about the playoffs?
Speaker 1: There is talk there's going to be eight to ten
Speaker 1: job openings in the NFL this year, and you can
Speaker 1: name the usual suspects. I take no joy in seeing
Speaker 1: some of those teams that might be replacing their coaches.
Speaker 1: And some of these guys will save their jobs. We've
Speaker 1: seen it before. I saw Chuck Pagano save his job
Speaker 1: in the final month of a seat. That's what Rex
Speaker 1: Ryan save his job in the final month of a season.
Speaker 1: We've seen it before where these guys can turn it around.
Speaker 1: But if you're talking just offhand, and I don't need
Speaker 1: to list them, I'd say there's eight to ten job opening.
Speaker 1: So why would Carolina do this now? Well, Vegas already
Speaker 1: fired their coach. That's a different situation. Antonio Pierce is
Speaker 1: the intern. It's gonna give them a real shot to
Speaker 1: be the head coach. But they're gonna most likely do
Speaker 1: a full coaching search and Antonio will be one of
Speaker 1: the candidates. Carolina now has a solid two months to
Speaker 1: do all of the work now ahead of interviews. Go
Speaker 1: to the farthest regions of the world and talk to
Speaker 1: the most in depth to you possibly can to get
Speaker 1: all of the candidates lined up that you want. Now,
Speaker 1: what makes it interesting is they went after that guy
Speaker 1: last year. I can say this now. I don't know
Speaker 1: if everyone was aware, but there was real interest in
Speaker 1: Ben Johnson, who is a thirty seven year old offensive
Speaker 1: coordinator of the Detroit Lions. Last year, and this is
Speaker 1: before the Lions even made the playoffs, they said that
Speaker 1: great finish. Ben Johnson is a North Carolina guy. He
Speaker 1: went to UNC, He's a local hero. In a lot
Speaker 1: of ways, he would have been the perfect fit. I said,
Speaker 1: He said, no, I'm good, I don't want an interview
Speaker 1: for the job. Said no, thank you. Went back to
Speaker 1: be the offensive coordinator the Detroit Lions. They're going to
Speaker 1: be eight to ten other job openings. What now would change?
Speaker 1: As they've traded away this year's first round pick, they
Speaker 1: have shown that they have a roster that is kind
Speaker 1: of barren on offensive line, skill position player, multiple things.
Speaker 1: And the owner just showed that he'll fire you if
Speaker 1: it doesn't work. In eleven eleven weeks. He hasn't like
Speaker 1: what he saw. What would it take for Ben Johnson
Speaker 1: to suddenly now say okay, now I'm gonna do it.
Speaker 1: I say this. It would take a boatload of money.
Speaker 1: How much money is Ben Johnson worth? Ben Johnson a
Speaker 1: guy who's never been a head coach Ben Johnson, who
Speaker 1: could walk through an airport and no one would know
Speaker 1: his face. Ben Johnson, whose name is still mistaken for
Speaker 1: the Canadian sprinter who went up against Carl Lewis. And
Speaker 1: I think that would be the first Google search that
Speaker 1: comes up. Is Ben Johnson gonna get money like McVeigh
Speaker 1: and Sean Payton and those guys have it might take
Speaker 1: that all right, So say David Tepper says, I don't
Speaker 1: want to have to beg Ben Johnson to be the
Speaker 1: head coach of my NFL team. What are the other
Speaker 1: routes they can do? Well, you can go that same
Speaker 1: kind of deal and look at the young offensive coordinators,
Speaker 1: the young bright offensive minds that people talk about, and
Speaker 1: that would be Bobby Slowick in Houston, who's thirty seven
Speaker 1: years old, and it's the Houston Texans offensive coordinator. And
Speaker 1: it is the guy who's been working with with c. J.
Speaker 1: Stroud and year number one and got tanked Dell to
Speaker 1: be an elite wide receiver in his first season in
Speaker 1: the league. That's a possibility. Let's circle that name could
Speaker 1: also go to the guy that we interviewed on our
Speaker 1: podcast couple of weeks ago, Drew petsing for a two
Speaker 1: win Arizona Cardinals team, but yet got Josh Dobbs to
Speaker 1: play competitive football, got a lot of young players on
Speaker 1: the field, and shown that he can run an offense
Speaker 1: even without the top elite talent in the league. A nameless,
Speaker 1: faceless offensive line in Arizona, a bunch of wide receivers
Speaker 1: who you might have on your fantasy team but aren't
Speaker 1: exactly winning any Pro Bowls or All Pro Awards. And
Speaker 1: then of course quarterbacks that you might not be familiar with.
Speaker 1: And Josh Dobbs and Clayton Tune before Kyler got there,
Speaker 1: So let's put Drew's name out there. Then you go
Speaker 1: through a list of guys that haven't had necessarily the
Speaker 1: breakout seasons, but we've been hearing about them for years.
Speaker 1: By that, I mean Brian Johnson, the offensive coordinator of
Speaker 1: the Philadelphia Eagles, whose home crowd was booing the play
Speaker 1: calling at certain points on Sunday, and yet is the
Speaker 1: offensive coordinator of a nine to one or ten in
Speaker 1: one team. And Jalen Hurts speaks to the world of
Speaker 1: him and would be a very interesting head coaching candidate
Speaker 1: right there. A couple other names of offensive guys that
Speaker 1: you've heard of and have been around and maybe it's
Speaker 1: their time. Well, you look at what's going on in
Speaker 1: New England and immediately you'd say, well, no, thank you,
Speaker 1: no one from that tree. But the name Bill O'Brien
Speaker 1: will pop up because of his success with young quarterbacks
Speaker 1: and the fact that he was Bryce Young's college quarterback
Speaker 1: coach and was this offensive coordinator. The two of them
Speaker 1: have a pre existing relationship. I'll throw out my name
Speaker 1: that I will always throw out because I still think
Speaker 1: he's a great young quarterback whisper, even if he's not
Speaker 1: in the NFL, but he just got done with the
Speaker 1: year with Kayleb Williams. I'll throw out Cliff Kingsbury's name.
Speaker 1: Is that a possibility. Does Cliff get another shot?
Speaker 2: Probably not.
Speaker 1: I don't think David Tepper is looking to hire another
Speaker 1: fired coach from another team that missed the playoffs. That's
Speaker 1: what he did with Frank Reich. But I think if
Speaker 1: you're looking about a young quarterback and someone who can
Speaker 1: speak to him and get the best out of him,
Speaker 1: Cliff's done it time and time again, whether it be Mahomes,
Speaker 1: whether it be Kyler Murray. In those first few years,
Speaker 1: and then of course what he's doing with Caleb Williams
Speaker 1: in USC now working with Lincoln Riley. I think that's
Speaker 1: really interesting. Brian Flores possibility. Brian Flor is a defensive coach.
Speaker 1: Brian Flores has been a head coach, Brian Flores is
Speaker 1: now in Minnesota. Or that defense is carrying that offense
Speaker 1: and getting them to the finish line. Is he a possibility?
Speaker 1: You go down these lists and then you want the
Speaker 1: wildcard ones. Who are the wildcards? Is Jim Harbaugh wild card?
Speaker 1: Would that personality mesh with David Tepper? Tepper is a
Speaker 1: is a bull bulldozer in a lot of ways, and
Speaker 1: it's a big personality. But I could assure you knowing
Speaker 1: David Tepper and watching the way he has owned this team,
Speaker 1: he just wants to win Harbaugh everywhere he's gone, whether
Speaker 1: it be the University of San Diego, whether it be Stanford,
Speaker 1: whether it be the forty nine ers, and whether it
Speaker 1: be Michigan he wins. Is Tepper looking to bring in Harbaugh?
Speaker 1: That would be a very interesting dallions in a very
Speaker 1: interesting pursuit. And I would find this to be fascinating
Speaker 1: for the NFL for years to come. You look at
Speaker 1: Mike McDonald, defensive coordinator down in Baltimore, first real year
Speaker 1: as the as the main man last year. Now it's
Speaker 1: his second year, and that defense is as good as
Speaker 1: any does. Mike McDonald, the young defensive coordinator at the
Speaker 1: Ravens who also worked for Harborough in Michigan, is here guy.
Speaker 1: And then there's our guy who had on the podcast,
Speaker 1: Jed Fish, who has NFL ties and is now coaching
Speaker 1: at Arizona and got Arizona to do some amazing things
Speaker 1: this year, but has worked with Belichick, has worked with McVeigh,
Speaker 1: and has worked with countless others. The list can go on,
Speaker 1: and can go on and can go on, and you
Speaker 1: can do the coordinator from this team. That's why they
Speaker 1: have the time to do this. Narrow it down, figure
Speaker 1: out what you're looking for, and try to put the
Speaker 1: best path forward. I think what Tepper said in his
Speaker 1: press conference today, and I'll summarize two points I think
Speaker 1: really the only two that matters. One he wasn't like
Speaker 1: this in his finance career. David Tepper is worth billions
Speaker 1: and billions and billions of dollars from making money on
Speaker 1: Wall Street, which is as cut third as the NFL,
Speaker 1: if not more. And his point was people worked for
Speaker 1: him for twenty to thirty years, like he had his team,
Speaker 1: and he was not a guy who was quick to
Speaker 1: pull the trigger and fire people. In fact, he would
Speaker 1: nurture and grow. And these people, he's got his own
Speaker 1: David Tepper tree on Wall Street, all different hedge funds
Speaker 1: and all different finance firms where they swear by Tepper
Speaker 1: and they say that he's the guy who got them
Speaker 1: to start. He's the Belichick of Wall Street in a
Speaker 1: lot of ways. And if that's the case, he says,
Speaker 1: you know, that's not my mo just so you know,
Speaker 1: and I'm very successful in that road. But until you
Speaker 1: get success, I will be quick to make decisions because
Speaker 1: I know what success looks like, and what we have
Speaker 1: on the field every Sunday is not success. The other
Speaker 1: point which was interesting was that he said he was
Speaker 1: set to take c. J. Stroud at number two. They
Speaker 1: thought they had a trade set up. They were gonna trade,
Speaker 1: they were gonna get up to number two with the Texans,
Speaker 1: and that whoever had that number one pick, whether it
Speaker 1: be the Bears or somebody else, they were gonna take
Speaker 1: Bryce Young and they were set with c J. Stroud.
Speaker 1: They were fine with it. What happened was that trade
Speaker 1: fell through. They end up making the trade with the Bears.
Speaker 1: They got number one, and he said, I didn't make
Speaker 1: the pick. He said, the football people make the pick,
Speaker 1: and I'm the final decision maker. And I was more
Speaker 1: than comfortable taking Bryce Young over c J. Stroud. And
Speaker 1: as this thing moves forward, I will be okay with
Speaker 1: it because I believe in the Bryce Young pick, and
Speaker 1: we'll go from there. They might blow the whole building
Speaker 1: up right now, we've had already. The head coach Josh
Speaker 1: McCown unceremoniously fired after a great fanfare about his hiring
Speaker 1: as a quarterbacks coach for Bryce Young. He's gone, Josh,
Speaker 1: As we say, as a friend, I think he was
Speaker 1: a little bit surprised that once they named the interim coach.
Speaker 1: The interim coach, Chris Tabor said, all right, out with
Speaker 1: you and out with Duce Staley. I think both those
Speaker 1: guys have really good resumes. Josh is a player. Due
Speaker 1: to the player and as a coach, they'll be okay.
Speaker 1: I assume they're both going to be all right. But
Speaker 1: part of that is, you know, we need to just
Speaker 1: extinguish everybody from the building, put in our guys who
Speaker 1: we want. Josh was in Bryce's ear the most, so
Speaker 1: if the new coach is Jim Caldwell, Thomas Brown, whoever.
Speaker 1: The fact that we're naming a half dozen different offensive
Speaker 1: minds probably was part of the problem here. That's a
Speaker 1: lot of people in a young quarterbacks ear. They'll figure
Speaker 1: this thing out then. The general manager situation is fascinating.
Speaker 1: Scott Fitter was chosen after he lent the general manager
Speaker 1: search in Carolina a few years ago. I'm talking three
Speaker 1: rounds and everyone from Ryan Poles to Adam Peters to
Speaker 1: all these different guys who met and then did not
Speaker 1: get the job. They chose Scott Fitter, who had been
Speaker 1: an interview candidate for several different jobs over the years.
Speaker 1: Fitter is there, Dan Morgan, the former Carolina Panther legend
Speaker 1: is there in the front office. Do they blow that
Speaker 1: whole front office out and do we start from scratch
Speaker 1: on that side of it as well? We will see.
Speaker 1: Whatever the reason that they did it this week or not,
Speaker 1: the bottom line is this Tepper couldn't watch his team anymore.
Speaker 1: He found it disgusting. He couldn't see it. He couldn't
Speaker 1: see it and he couldn't see success coming. So they
Speaker 1: make the change and everyone goes up in arms, says,
Speaker 1: he's a horrible owner, and we'll see, let's see he's
Speaker 1: gonna get a Let's see, he's had Ron, he's had
Speaker 1: whoever the interim for Ron was. So that's two, he's
Speaker 1: had Rule, he's had Wilkes. That's four, he's now had five.
Speaker 1: And Frank Reich he's now got six, and Chris Table
Speaker 1: he'll go to his seventh. Different look at what a
Speaker 1: head coach could be for the Carolina Panthers. And that's
Speaker 1: just since twenty eighteen, so interesting times in Carolina. But
Speaker 1: this is kickstarting what I think is going to be
Speaker 1: a wild, wild January of the hiring cycle. And we
Speaker 1: went away from calling it black Black Monday on the
Speaker 1: NFL Network because it's like two ominous, I don't know
Speaker 1: what you want to call it. We're here, it's not
Speaker 1: even December. I'm gonna tell you it's gonna be a
Speaker 1: blood bath. That's what everyone says. That's coaches from the
Speaker 1: head coaching position to offensive coordinators, defensive coordinators, just get ready,
Speaker 1: buckle up. No one covers these coaches better. No one
Speaker 1: interviews these gms. Better, No one talks to these young
Speaker 1: coaches more than this podcast here, So don't be shocked
Speaker 1: with a lot of the voices that you've heard on
Speaker 1: the season with Peter Schreger end up being mentioned and
Speaker 1: interviewed by a lot of these teams in the next
Speaker 1: couple of weeks. Real quick, Aaron, we got through Thanksgiving weekend.
Speaker 1: Everyone has their pictures of their turkey and all this stuff.
Speaker 1: I have to tell you. I went to the Jets
Speaker 1: Black Friday game against the Dolphins. I took my son Mel.
Speaker 1: It was his first NFL game with me. Can I
Speaker 1: tell you the experience? Zero to ten, ten out of ten.
Speaker 1: It was unbelievable. I was so scared about the traffic.
Speaker 1: All I heard about was the traffic. Even leading up
Speaker 1: to the day of Everyone's like, you're gonna probably want
Speaker 1: to sit and watch that game on your couch because
Speaker 1: there is a mall there called and chime in here
Speaker 1: at the American Dream Mall. I had never heard of
Speaker 1: the American Dream Mall.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 1: I remember there was the Xanadu project years ago that
Speaker 1: Chris Christy tried doing, and it was just like a
Speaker 1: ski lift to nowhere, and I think that's what this is.
Speaker 4: Now.
Speaker 1: They took the Xanadu project and they turned it so,
Speaker 1: you know, New Jersey. I grew up in Jersey. Tax
Speaker 1: dollars the whole thing. They dumped, you know, not millions
Speaker 1: and millions of dollars into this thing. It never opens
Speaker 1: for years. It's an eyesore. It's pink, it's on the
Speaker 1: side of the parkway and the turnpike. You're just it's
Speaker 1: just an eyesore. And they eventually turned into a mall.
Speaker 1: How many years ago? Four years ago? All right? So
Speaker 1: then they turned into a mall. It's called the American
Speaker 1: Dream Mall. My last version or the last thing I
Speaker 1: would ever want to be in a dream is in
Speaker 1: a mall. They open it up. I guess it survives COVID.
Speaker 1: All right, great, the American Dream Mall. We pull up
Speaker 1: to this thing, you would think it's Shangri La. My
Speaker 1: son in the back seat sees a giant SpongeBob, then
Speaker 1: he sees Legos, then he sees a water park. This
Speaker 1: thing looks like it's the most amazing place in the
Speaker 1: history of the world. It seemed like it was Disney
Speaker 1: and Universal combined and I'm telling my son, no, no,
Speaker 1: that's not where we're going. We're not going to see
Speaker 1: your friend's SpongeBob. We're not going to the water park. No, no,
Speaker 1: We're gonna go sit in the cold and watch a
Speaker 1: football game. No traffic. So everyone who bugged me out
Speaker 1: about the traffic, no traffic, We get there.
Speaker 5: What time did you get there?
Speaker 1: All right? So that's it, okay, all right. We left
Speaker 1: Brooklyn around noon, three o'clock kickoff. We probably were walking
Speaker 1: in the stadium around one point fifteen. So I would
Speaker 1: sign up for that right Lincoln Tunnel, a little bit
Speaker 1: of traffic, and we get there, pull up the Jets,
Speaker 1: hooked up field passes. I have no shame in telling
Speaker 1: you that I very rarely will call in favors. I
Speaker 1: didn't call in a favor. I'm like, is there any
Speaker 1: way my son can just see the field. I've been
Speaker 1: to a million games, he's never been one with me.
Speaker 1: There were enough guests on the field that I guess
Speaker 1: they could spare a couple more. My wife came with me.
Speaker 1: It was so amazing to be there and see the
Speaker 1: wonder in my kid's eyes as what he wanted to do.
Speaker 1: And you'll love this. He wanted to sit underneath the
Speaker 1: goalposts when they were practicing the field goals. So here
Speaker 1: come these missiles from Jason Sanders and from Greg Zerline,
Speaker 1: and the punts are coming there, and my son is
Speaker 1: like enamored with the fact that he's watching from that angle.
Speaker 1: The ball go through the goalposts, the game starts, It
Speaker 1: goes horribly for the Jets, but mel my Son had
Speaker 1: a blast. The fans were cool. I don't get stopped
Speaker 1: everywhere but an NFL game. If you're a fan of football,
Speaker 1: you might have seen our show Good Morning Football. You
Speaker 1: listen to this podcast. So people are cool. They're not
Speaker 1: everyone you know, wants a selfie. It's it's fine, I'll
Speaker 1: do a selfie. It wasn't too many and everyone was like, hey,
Speaker 1: you brought your son, How cool, and like it was awesome.
Speaker 1: So we stay pretty much throughout it. I was hanging out.
Speaker 1: Got to meet Eric Decker, Remember Eric Decker. Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: got to meet Eric Decker, who, by the way, is
Speaker 1: the coolest dude in the world. And he's got four kids,
Speaker 1: and our kids are hanging pregame and Decker was awesome.
Speaker 1: You know who else was there who was super kind?
Speaker 1: And cool, the actress from White Lotus and from True
Speaker 1: Detective and like alexand so her step kids are huge
Speaker 1: football fans and they were there and it was so funny.
Speaker 1: So her kid, her step kid, and her husband, uh
Speaker 1: Andrew really nice guy. We're talking to them pregame. We're
Speaker 1: all in the same little waiting area that they like,
Speaker 1: you know, if you want to go on the field
Speaker 1: for five minutes for the game. Commutum and their kid
Speaker 1: had on an authentic Jets helmet and I'm like, oh,
Speaker 1: that's badass, Like did a player give him that? And
Speaker 1: the his dad's like, no, that's four hundred and fifty
Speaker 1: dollars in the team store if you want to die.
Speaker 1: I'm like, you bought that. He's like, I don't know,
Speaker 1: I have no idea. Yes, we bought it. He wanted it.
Speaker 1: That's his Christmas gift. I'm like, I love that, the
Speaker 1: Black Friday thing. I don't know if the game stunk.
Speaker 1: I don't know if everyone at home was like turning
Speaker 1: it off the third quarter. It felt like an event.
Speaker 1: It felt cool. I had the alternative is not having
Speaker 1: football on Fridays? Like I loved it. I asked Hans
Speaker 1: Schroeder last week. Like the impetus of it, I would say, PostScript,
Speaker 1: I'll put it out there. I would love it if
Speaker 1: it was in New York every year. I think it
Speaker 1: was a cool feeling of like the Roquettes and the
Speaker 1: Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade and New York and Thanksgiving and like, oh,
Speaker 1: there's a game on Friday that you've got the stars
Speaker 1: already there and this kind of thing can kind of
Speaker 1: bleed into it. I get the feeling the NFL is
Speaker 1: not looking at you that. I think the NFL is
Speaker 1: going to rotate at city to city. I don't think
Speaker 1: they love the fact that they're tied to the Thanksgiving
Speaker 1: cities necessarily, and this one, I think it would be
Speaker 1: a lot like how the primetime game on Thanksgiving that
Speaker 1: kind of moves place to place. But ten out of
Speaker 1: ten experience, I can't say enough about the Jets game
Speaker 1: day experience. Really cool, lively. They of course have what
Speaker 1: every kid needs, and that's great concession stands and most
Speaker 1: importantly a T shirt gun and a T shirt cannon,
Speaker 1: so that gets them going. And the music was great.
Speaker 1: The football just stunk. Other than that, it was cool.
Speaker 1: And when you're a seven year old kid at your
Speaker 1: first NFL game. I don't think you're so worried about,
Speaker 1: you know, what the quarterback decisions are and how they're
Speaker 1: going to run the two minute drill at the end
Speaker 1: of the half, and whether or not you throw a
Speaker 1: hell Mary with two seconds left to the third string quarterback.
Speaker 1: You're more concerned with just the experience. And I think
Speaker 1: my son had a great one. So everyone wondering, as
Speaker 1: we lingered on it last week, ten out of ten amazing.
Speaker 1: Take your kids to football games and if you can
Speaker 1: ask for as many favorites as you can so they
Speaker 1: can touch the grass too. That was pretty cool. I
Speaker 1: know that was a rare experience. I'm so excited for this.
Speaker 1: Our guest is a longtime friend of mine, a Emmy winner,
Speaker 1: a Oscar winner, and she just wrapped doing a one
Speaker 1: woman show on Broadway that I happened to see and
Speaker 1: was blown away by. No further Ado Chiefs diehard fan
Speaker 1: Melissa Etheridge, Welcome to the season with Peter Schrieger.
Speaker 2: Oh, thank you. I know you're fried. But I didn't
Speaker 2: win an Emmy.
Speaker 1: I want a Grammy, okay, so let's get you an Emmy.
Speaker 1: How do we get you an Emmy.
Speaker 2: Well, I'm working on Believe me, I've got lots of plans.
Speaker 1: Is it so like when you hear that the accolades
Speaker 1: listed and you're sitting and then you add in Broadway show,
Speaker 1: Where does that stand? I'm like, the accomplishments and accolade
Speaker 1: from a career.
Speaker 2: Well, you know, I stopped thinking about the once I
Speaker 2: won an award. I was like, Oh, it's not really
Speaker 2: about the award. It's about getting there. It's about the experience.
Speaker 2: And I really nowadays it's more about I want that experience.
Speaker 2: Whether whatever awards are great, they're fun. I'm not putting
Speaker 2: them down, but it's the experience. In man, this experience
Speaker 2: of being here in New York City, being part of Broadway,
Speaker 2: going and doing the show, same show over and over,
Speaker 2: five nights a week. That was an experience and it's
Speaker 2: something that I'm proud I did. Probably won't do it
Speaker 2: again soon.
Speaker 1: But I have to mention it's just I mean, because
Speaker 1: I've got friends who are on Broadway, we've seen it, like, yeah,
Speaker 1: that grind of obviously six days a week, but then
Speaker 1: you have the matinee shows and then you have the
Speaker 1: two shows on certain day. By the end of it.
Speaker 1: Are you just so mentally and physically exhausted doing a
Speaker 1: Broadway show every day? I can only imagine. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and you know, bless my family. My daughter was
Speaker 2: staying here and she just totally understood. And my wife,
Speaker 2: who was there with me constantly like okay, you know,
Speaker 2: sleep in, make sure I had enough sleep and and
Speaker 2: fed me and just you know, I had a great
Speaker 2: support and but boy, it was very exhausting.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And for the listeners, the show is amazing. It
Speaker 1: is your story, so it's not just doing a show,
Speaker 1: it is bearing your soul to strangers. Your story is incredible.
Speaker 1: But I mean there's the first of all to rock concerts.
Speaker 1: He play all the hits, which is awesome, but it's
Speaker 1: also this emotional journey through your life and what you've
Speaker 1: learned and all the tragedies, but also the amazing highs
Speaker 1: that have come with it. Of all the people who
Speaker 1: you got to meet through this experience, either attending the
Speaker 1: show or people who perform with Was there someone new
Speaker 1: in your life that you met that you were like, Wow,
Speaker 1: that was pretty cool. I'm so glad I got to
Speaker 1: come away with that experience as well.
Speaker 2: You know, yes, there was. I did get to meet
Speaker 2: a lot of people, a lot of great people. Came
Speaker 2: back and met a lot of people you know, on
Speaker 2: Broadway doing the stuff. But it surprisingly enough, it was Wolverine. Yeah,
Speaker 2: it was huge.
Speaker 1: Jackman.
Speaker 2: Yeah, like I asked a friendship like butt from this
Speaker 2: one hundred percent. I had met him before. You know,
Speaker 2: we you know Hollywood, and you go, you know, I
Speaker 2: know this person, but you know, are they? And the
Speaker 2: show touched him and he if someone had told him
Speaker 2: you should come see the show that maybe it would
Speaker 2: help because he was going through some stuff and it
Speaker 2: really touched him. And I gave him my number. I said,
Speaker 2: you know, call me, and you know he didn't.
Speaker 6: He didn't.
Speaker 2: And the friend that the mutual friend, I was like,
Speaker 2: you know what, tell him, he's not bothering me if
Speaker 2: he calls me. And and he called, and we just
Speaker 2: started talking about life. We started talking a lot about
Speaker 2: what the show is about, which is, you know, how
Speaker 2: to be successful and you know, famous in this world
Speaker 2: and not lose your mind, you know, and be a person,
Speaker 2: and and how not to just please everybody because we
Speaker 2: have so much success, we've got to make sure everybody
Speaker 2: else is happy around us. That's a that's a hard
Speaker 2: hole to fall into. And and we've just been talking
Speaker 2: and I can now say, you know, I have a
Speaker 2: new friend because.
Speaker 1: It's so beautiful. The show itself tells the story, but
Speaker 1: I think one of the takeaways something you just hit
Speaker 1: on that you were, in a lot of ways chasing
Speaker 1: not fame, but you were chasing it. Yeah, and then
Speaker 1: you got it. And it was in the early nineties
Speaker 1: and you're sitting on the perch and you're on the
Speaker 1: cover of Rolling Stone and in the show you explained
Speaker 1: there was this emptiness of wait, I got it in
Speaker 1: it hasn't filled that hole.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that that I think it's hard to explain to
Speaker 2: people who don't have this sort of experience. But but you,
Speaker 2: I'm sure have, you know, growing up loving sports the
Speaker 2: way you do, and now you are on you know,
Speaker 2: one of the greatest, you know, football shows ever in
Speaker 2: my opinion, and you know, you're like, yeah, but that's
Speaker 2: not it that I don't wake up and go, well,
Speaker 2: I did it, you know, you you It is about
Speaker 2: the dreams, it's about the the adventures on the way
Speaker 2: to it, and and so putting that in front of
Speaker 2: me all the time, no matter what. Oh, this is
Speaker 2: the this is the next adventure. That's what I'm looking
Speaker 2: forward to.
Speaker 1: Yeah, the story is amazing and your life story is amazing,
Speaker 1: but your love for football is cool too because it
Speaker 1: starts with your father, who was also your biggest supporter
Speaker 1: in your quest to become a rock and roll star.
Speaker 1: Why don't you tell the listeners your connection to football
Speaker 1: growing up in Kansas?
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, Well, my father was. He he grew
Speaker 2: up in Saint Louis, Missouri, and he he was very athletic.
Speaker 2: He was actually a really good swimmer too. And his
Speaker 2: high school that he went to, the coach. My father
Speaker 2: came from a really trouble family, you know, seven kids,
Speaker 2: The father was a horrible alcoholic from World War two,
Speaker 2: you know, just really they migrant farmers. It was bad.
Speaker 2: And this guy really helped him and said, look, you
Speaker 2: can get a sports scholarship to college. And none of
Speaker 2: his family had ever gone to college. And so he
Speaker 2: went to college in Arkansas and got a teaching degree
Speaker 2: to where he could be a coach. And he went
Speaker 2: to and moved to Levenworth, Kansas because they needed a teacher.
Speaker 2: We didn't know, he didn't know anybody there. And so
Speaker 2: I was born there. And while he was there, the
Speaker 2: Chiefs come to, you know, Kansas City in sixty four
Speaker 2: and I'm three years old probably, and I have pictures
Speaker 2: of my father and I watching the Chiefs on television.
Speaker 2: Can't tell, it's just pictures. I was watching TV. But
Speaker 2: I've got a red shirt on. I know what we're doing.
Speaker 2: And he was so patient with me teaching me, and
Speaker 2: I think that's something that that I really loved. He
Speaker 2: taught me slowly about football and it's all about, you know.
Speaker 2: And I remember as a kid watching and going, what
Speaker 2: are they doing? Okay, why are they doing?
Speaker 5: What?
Speaker 6: Why?
Speaker 2: What's that mean? And he would explain every single thing
Speaker 2: to me. And once you get the formula in your head,
Speaker 2: once you get the strategy and you know what they're
Speaker 2: doing and watching it, it's so much fun to watch
Speaker 2: and we would share it. I remember the nineteen seventies
Speaker 2: Super Bowl, Lady Dawson, and you remember watching it, Oh,
Speaker 2: one hundred percent watched it. Bobby Bell and Buck Buchannan
Speaker 2: and Willie Lanier and just all these great and when
Speaker 2: they won. I mean, Levinworth is forty five minutes from
Speaker 2: Kansas City, and everybody just all the horns were honking everybody,
Speaker 2: and I was like, what's happening in the world. And
Speaker 2: once you have that experience as a child, forget it.
Speaker 2: You're hooked.
Speaker 1: And then you wait fifty years fifty years, but you do,
Speaker 1: and there's so many heart breaks. I don't think people
Speaker 1: everyone talks about the Vikings fans and the Jets fans
Speaker 1: about the Chiefs would go to the playoffs every year
Speaker 1: as a one seed and have this amazing home atmosphere
Speaker 1: and road and they would lose the game they know
Speaker 1: they would always lose. And then to finally win, what
Speaker 1: was that like?
Speaker 2: H it's it. It is hard to explain, you know,
Speaker 2: having gone through it. When when Andy Reid finally came,
Speaker 2: that was you could feel kind of, oh wow, we've
Speaker 2: just entered a level that we really haven't been on.
Speaker 2: Joe Montana, sure we were there out there, you know, yeah,
Speaker 2: three was there, but when Andy Reid came, it was like,
Speaker 2: oh wow, and you could feel, you know, we still
Speaker 2: lost that first year, but and then you know Alex Smith, Oh,
Speaker 2: and all of a sudden there were games where finally
Speaker 2: you'd see, you know, Alex Smith is quarterback, really try
Speaker 2: that extra bit and go in there. And that's why
Speaker 2: I wrote my first chief song, Alex Smith I Love You.
Speaker 1: You came on the show Good Morning Football and two
Speaker 1: twenty sixteen before Mahomes leaving on the Chiefs, and you
Speaker 1: were like, I like the show, I'm gonna come on
Speaker 1: and you wrote a song called Alex Smith, I Love You,
Speaker 1: which to me is still my favorite moments on the show.
Speaker 2: And so then when we get there and I actually
Speaker 2: sang the anthem when we uh were playing, when Jason
Speaker 2: was on that, Yeah, the Patriots.
Speaker 1: The AFC Championship for D four, Yeah.
Speaker 2: D Ford, and just the feeling and the whole feeling
Speaker 2: in that stadium you've been there. Oh, and then to
Speaker 2: have at tension just yes, and everybody doing that walk
Speaker 2: to the parking lot afterwards.
Speaker 1: I was in the building when they lost to Pittsburgh
Speaker 1: in the playoffs that a couple of years earlier, after
Speaker 1: like four different times of the goal line that game.
Speaker 1: And then god, I was in there when they lost
Speaker 1: to the Bengals in the AH champion a couple of
Speaker 1: years ago. But I wasn't there when you guys beat
Speaker 1: the Titans in the AFC Championship. Came and anyone who
Speaker 1: was in that building was like you felt fifty years
Speaker 1: forget the super Bowl just to get there again, and
Speaker 1: the stress of it is just gone.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I remember, I think it was a Sammy Watkins deep
Speaker 1: touchdown put the game away. It was and like generations,
Speaker 1: the chief sentences.
Speaker 2: C crying, crying because it brings back your father, it
Speaker 2: brings back why we loved it. I mean, I still
Speaker 2: get joked up because that that was really special, and
Speaker 2: that first one where we went and I remember we won,
Speaker 2: and after we won, I went, huh, this is what
Speaker 2: it feels like, you know, and I just stood and
Speaker 2: it was kind of oh. And the day went on.
Speaker 2: I went, well, now that's over. Whow what a journey.
Speaker 2: And then you just want to get back there every
Speaker 2: time now and they and I it's such a pretty cool,
Speaker 2: such a gift, and you know it happens every now
Speaker 2: and then to a team, a different team, and and
Speaker 2: some day it could be your team. I just you know,
Speaker 2: it might be just great when it does.
Speaker 1: What what's your viewing situations? You go to some games
Speaker 1: to perform, but I feel like knowing you you're a
Speaker 1: couch and right you watch the game.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, oh, no, no, I watch it. No, I'm
Speaker 2: I watched every game. I'm a red Zone junkie. You
Speaker 2: know how six hours can go by and you know
Speaker 2: the whole and and uh no, I I like to
Speaker 2: go to the games, but when it comes to like
Speaker 2: the really important games of playoffs and like the Super Bowl,
Speaker 2: it's like, no, no, I have to watch it at
Speaker 2: my house.
Speaker 6: I have that right.
Speaker 1: You haven't been in the building for either one of
Speaker 1: the Super Bowl wins?
Speaker 2: No, no, no, no, I haven't. I've been at home.
Speaker 1: Interesting, I know. It's it's I've been on the field
Speaker 1: for both the Super womins because they're both on Fox,
Speaker 1: and I was doing postgame and it's that same feeling
Speaker 1: of the Chiefs fan I was just talking about of
Speaker 1: this generation of Generation Van. It's like, yeah, that is
Speaker 1: a real fan base.
Speaker 2: Oh no, it's for real. It's so. I mean I
Speaker 2: can walk around and I do often in my Chiefs regalia,
Speaker 2: and I you know, I walk through airports, I'm in
Speaker 2: every city. I'm in countries where people walk up and go, oh,
Speaker 2: the Chiefs, you know. And before I mean now it's
Speaker 2: like we're like I said, yeah, but back then, before
Speaker 2: people really knew it's it's a it's a language. You're
Speaker 2: instantly you know, friends is there.
Speaker 1: You're an individual act when you go out there on
Speaker 1: the stage and then you see this team sport. Is
Speaker 1: there some sort of parallel to you know, the art
Speaker 1: of football and the art.
Speaker 2: Of Oh yeah, no, no, it's And I can do
Speaker 2: my show solo, yeah I can, but I prefer to
Speaker 2: do it with a group. And then not only do
Speaker 2: I have those musicians on stage, but all the technicians behind.
Speaker 2: And it takes that We're about a twelve person you
Speaker 2: know unit as we travel around the world. But man,
Speaker 2: those twelve people, they know exactly what to do. And
Speaker 2: sometimes it's funny. I've had a conversation with my wife
Speaker 2: where I say, god, I feel like Patrick Mahomes, I
Speaker 2: feel like, yeah, like there was there's there's a time
Speaker 2: when like something can be going so well. The audience
Speaker 2: is crazy. Let's say it's like forty thousand people that
Speaker 2: you know, some outdoor, big, crazy thing, and I just
Speaker 2: I can look, I actually I have my Kelsey, I look,
Speaker 2: I've looked at my drummer like this and he knows, okay,
Speaker 2: we're not going It's like they know you don't even
Speaker 2: have to say what it is. It's just a look
Speaker 2: and everyone goes, Okay, I know what we're going to do,
Speaker 2: and boom, it's really fun and I felt I felt
Speaker 2: like that.
Speaker 1: So I loved the show. But I was a part
Speaker 1: of the show getting to know your story even more.
Speaker 1: And there's been about with cancer, there's been tragedy in
Speaker 1: your life, but I want to talk about like the Rise,
Speaker 1: because I think that's such a cool story for somebody.
Speaker 1: People were like, you moved to LA. You have a
Speaker 1: family member from my mistaken and who's out there?
Speaker 2: Yeah, she was my aunt, your aunt.
Speaker 1: You moved to LA not knowing anybody, and you didn't
Speaker 1: just this wasn't I take the greyhound to LA and
Speaker 1: I hit it. You struggled for a while yet in La.
Speaker 1: And one of the stories is you end up at
Speaker 1: a lesbian bar as the in house entertainment and it
Speaker 1: becomes a sensation and like the underground of La and
Speaker 1: that kick starts your career. And that's when the A
Speaker 1: and R Record first seats it. But this is in
Speaker 1: the eighties. This isn't in twenty twenty oh.
Speaker 2: This is the eighties. This is and it did. It
Speaker 2: took five years and my manager at the time. He
Speaker 2: and I made a choice because I was making a living.
Speaker 2: I was actually getting paid to play five nights a
Speaker 2: week and musicians don't have that in La and I
Speaker 2: had made this, you know spot for me to play
Speaker 2: and make money. What was the bar called, well, there
Speaker 2: were One was called actually played in two separate well
Speaker 2: three but two really. One was called Vermes, which is weird,
Speaker 2: but and the other one was called Kraa And that's
Speaker 2: actually it started as a it's in Long Beach and
Speaker 2: it started as a you know, ladies women's club, lesbian bar.
Speaker 2: They I said, look, let me set up in the corner.
Speaker 2: They didn't have a light. After like the first year,
Speaker 2: they said, we'll get you a spotlight. I'm like, hey, great,
Speaker 2: you know, but I sat up in the corner and
Speaker 2: I would play. And now that bar is not a
Speaker 2: lesbian bar anymore. It's a live music and my my
Speaker 2: gold records in the corner. And yeah, it's really I'm
Speaker 2: really proud of that.
Speaker 1: That's so cool. And then the record guys, and you
Speaker 1: had a couple of records before you hit though.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean my first record, you know, if you
Speaker 2: bring me some water, like the way I do. Those
Speaker 2: songs are are classics in the kind of the rock world.
Speaker 2: But it wasn't until it wasn't until my fourth album
Speaker 2: that I got like a big mainstream hit. Yeah. The
Speaker 2: first big hit was what Was Coming to My What
Speaker 2: Was Coming to My Window? Okay, and then I'm the
Speaker 2: Only One?
Speaker 1: And so yeah, both those hits back to back and
Speaker 1: you end up on the cover of the Rolling Stone. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you're doing everything on MTV, your fame rises. Are you
Speaker 1: comfortable with that level of fame?
Speaker 4: You know?
Speaker 2: What's interesting and I know you have I have. Some
Speaker 2: of this is is it is hard to tell how
Speaker 2: famous you are in the world because your own skin,
Speaker 2: you're in your own skin, and you don't you can't
Speaker 2: you separate yourself from it. And at the time there
Speaker 2: was no social media, so you couldn't. You had to
Speaker 2: kind of judge it by.
Speaker 1: As a kid in that era and not dating youore me,
Speaker 1: but I was that was like peak MTV, peak v
Speaker 1: H one, and you're video was on.
Speaker 2: You couldn't get away from every hour.
Speaker 1: And so like What's efford was part of it was
Speaker 1: Arrested Development, it was Ethridge, it was Twooty in the
Speaker 1: Blowfish like it was.
Speaker 2: The late nineties music back then.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, And for someone who had been hacking away
Speaker 1: at this for a while, I can imagine like I
Speaker 1: did it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you there's a sense of, oh, well, there it is.
Speaker 2: There's my top ten album, there's now I'm a hit
Speaker 2: now and there's more people coming and I am I'm
Speaker 2: playing arenas and you know, and personally I wasn't happy,
Speaker 2: So that sort of I mean, you do know it.
Speaker 2: But again it's it's not even there's no you can't
Speaker 2: stop and go hey, you know, I did it. There
Speaker 2: I am. There's no stopping. You want more of it,
Speaker 2: you want to stay there, you want to you know,
Speaker 2: keep going. So it's a weird, funny trap the fame
Speaker 2: thing is, And it wasn't until I just let it
Speaker 2: all go and go Now I'm just going to do
Speaker 2: what I love and whoever wants to you know, enjoy it,
Speaker 2: you know, enjoy it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And I'm imagining that the international stuff that you
Speaker 1: talk about in the show, a bunch of all of
Speaker 1: a sudden you're in these countries and they know your
Speaker 1: songs by heart. Yeah, it's a lot of travel, it's
Speaker 1: a lot away from home. Yeah, and of course you
Speaker 1: put it all together and you have this amazing career
Speaker 1: and then you're honored in all these different ways than
Speaker 1: the two thousands. How do you take it from that? Oh?
Speaker 1: My god.
Speaker 2: Well, the shock in the music industry from the nineties
Speaker 2: to the two thousands was unbelievable, and it grew once
Speaker 2: CDs came in and record companies started making ridiculous money
Speaker 2: for listener.
Speaker 1: It was twenty dollars for a CD. Back then.
Speaker 2: They didn't think anyone would buy them because they sounded
Speaker 2: so horrible. They were like, oh, and they just said, well,
Speaker 2: we'll just you know, twenty bucks a CD, okay, And
Speaker 2: all of a sudden everyone was buying them and they
Speaker 2: were making money hand over fist. My record the guy's
Speaker 2: My record company, Island Records, was founded by Chris Blackwell.
Speaker 2: He was just a genius. He brought Bob Marley to
Speaker 2: the world and you two, and he was just kind
Speaker 2: of this genius music guy. And so in the nineties
Speaker 2: then he sells his company for hundreds and millions of dollars, right,
Speaker 2: and so now at the end of the nineties, I'm
Speaker 2: part of a big conglomeration. The record the building is
Speaker 2: as big as this that I go into instead of
Speaker 2: this little thing I used to well in ninety five,
Speaker 2: you know the height of that, Yeah, that was it.
Speaker 2: By two thousand and five, empty empty, nobody's a sharing music.
Speaker 7: It's over.
Speaker 1: And the.
Speaker 2: Sales and everything just plummeted, and I realized, wow, I'm
Speaker 2: on my own. There's no yeah, no, no infrastructure anymore
Speaker 2: to really you know, the radio stations had narrowed themselves
Speaker 2: down to jack FM. Yeah yeah, exactly fifteen year olds
Speaker 2: and you were here or not. And you know, I
Speaker 2: get my songs played on you know, nineties radio and
Speaker 2: stuff like that now. But man, it was there was
Speaker 2: just no room for art.
Speaker 1: And yet there's this touring culture and you have your
Speaker 1: fan base, and I have to imagine that stuff never.
Speaker 2: No, that doesn't go away. And I learned very fast.
Speaker 2: I could see that if you were an artist and
Speaker 2: you didn't write your stuff, and you were not a
Speaker 2: live performer, you were, you know, just a kind of
Speaker 2: a tract sort of person. You were not going to
Speaker 2: make any money. You are, You're going to have money
Speaker 2: for a year or two, and then you're not. And
Speaker 2: you see all these people going bankrupt because of that. Fortunately,
Speaker 2: I write my own stuff, so I could that's part
Speaker 2: of an income. And then I was dedicated because I
Speaker 2: love it to performing, to going out there. Every year
Speaker 2: you go, I go over to Europe, I go to Australia,
Speaker 2: you keep going back that people keep coming. You do
Speaker 2: a show that they like, so they come and you
Speaker 2: can do all the hits so that you know, you
Speaker 2: play the songs that they love, and you just it's
Speaker 2: that's my bread and butter. That's that goes to me,
Speaker 2: all of that stuff, you know, and and it's that's
Speaker 2: that's what I do now.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Who are the who are the acts that you
Speaker 1: looked at as peers in the nineties when you were performing,
Speaker 1: and I know there was obviously this amazing movement of
Speaker 1: women musicians and of course this different voice, and so
Speaker 1: lillath Fair there was all Who were your crew? Who
Speaker 1: are the people that you rolled with? And who is
Speaker 1: kind of people that you looked at and said, hey,
Speaker 1: I see I I with this person, whether it be man, woman, whoever.
Speaker 4: Oh wow.
Speaker 2: Well Springsteen was a real help and a real please.
Speaker 1: That's amazing. It's a freehome New Jersey. I'm from, so
Speaker 1: he is.
Speaker 2: And he he kind of for for a couple of
Speaker 2: years that kind of took me under his wing, and
Speaker 2: that was ninety Yeah, I was right on Tunnel ninety
Speaker 2: two to about ninety nine.
Speaker 1: So he wasn't with the East Street Man at the time.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he was. Yeah, and so we and and so
Speaker 2: you know, we he helped a lot. We did a
Speaker 2: certainly certainly you've seen the Unplugged I did with him. Okay, good,
Speaker 2: I was like please, yes, and you know, and so
Speaker 2: that he really, he really was helpful in letting me know, look,
Speaker 2: you you know, you want to hit every now and then,
Speaker 2: but you don't want to have too many. You want
Speaker 2: to be known as a two artists. And he's the
Speaker 2: one who told me go back to Europe over and over.
Speaker 2: They'll keep coming out for you. And he knows that,
Speaker 2: and so I've just sort of followed that. But there,
Speaker 2: you know, there was a ton of artists in the
Speaker 2: nineties that you know, Cheryl Crow and you know, we
Speaker 2: all kind of were in the same boat together and
Speaker 2: Lannis Morris.
Speaker 1: You know, Cheryl Crow was inducted into the Rock and
Speaker 1: Roll Hall of Fame. We saw Dolly Parton at halftime.
Speaker 1: There is that something you would care about the rock
Speaker 1: and Roll Hall of Fame. I know, we laughed as
Speaker 1: we were talking off camera.
Speaker 2: Right now, do I care about it even a thing?
Speaker 1: Or is it?
Speaker 2: You know, I can't help, but it kind of is.
Speaker 2: It's not asking a football player. Is that a thing?
Speaker 2: It was the Hall of Fame. Yeah, it's a thing.
Speaker 2: You would love to be part of that, and you
Speaker 2: would hope that your music would would stand a testa
Speaker 2: time and be thought of as as you know, contributing
Speaker 2: something to the whole world of rock and roll. And
Speaker 2: and I hope to someday be able to celebrate with
Speaker 2: my family and do that. But I'm not going to
Speaker 2: get all twisted up about it.
Speaker 1: You also have a second memoir that is out and
Speaker 1: I think I haven't read it yet. I will, and
Speaker 1: it's a little deeper than just music in the past
Speaker 1: of fame. Why don't you share with the listeners what
Speaker 1: your heart and passionates really circled around?
Speaker 2: Now, well, yeah, it's my life has Oh, I've just
Speaker 2: had the most interesting life, I really have, and I'm
Speaker 2: so grateful for my life. But one of the journeys
Speaker 2: I've had is actually with plant medicine, you know, psychedelics
Speaker 2: as medicine. When I went through cancer twenty years ago.
Speaker 2: It played a big part in healing and kind of
Speaker 2: setting me to understand how important my own feeling is
Speaker 2: about myself, you know, my health, my you know choices
Speaker 2: I make. And the psychedelics part was was was a
Speaker 2: big part. And and in the book I talk about that,
Speaker 2: I talk about I mean, the first time wasn't actually
Speaker 2: an accidental overdose of cannabis. I call it my heroic
Speaker 2: dose of cannabis that I went way far out on.
Speaker 2: But it really opened my mind to a lot of stuff.
Speaker 2: And I'm a big supporter. And unfortunately, about three years
Speaker 2: ago I lost my son, my oldest son. He was
Speaker 2: twenty one, to an opioid addiction and he had he
Speaker 2: had gotten addicted through pain killers. He was a snowboarder
Speaker 2: and had a really bad accident and in his foot
Speaker 2: and so he went down that road and it was
Speaker 2: very hard to see him. And I had wished that
Speaker 2: there was some alternative, you know, to help him, and
Speaker 2: so we have formed after he passed, reformed the Ethridge Foundation,
Speaker 2: which is a leader in raising money to study to
Speaker 2: get the data because you know, the government says, well,
Speaker 2: you know, we can't deschedule these things because there's no data.
Speaker 2: Well you can't get data because their schedule. Yeah, So
Speaker 2: so we we go to foreign countries and we go
Speaker 2: all over and in America when we can to do
Speaker 2: to fund studies for specifically for these psychedelics, these plant
Speaker 2: medicines and how they can help with opioid EUSt disorder
Speaker 2: and you know, pain and all kinds of things.
Speaker 1: It's a beautiful show and that portional show. It's difficult.
Speaker 1: It is for the listener and for the viewer to
Speaker 1: watch it. You bearing your soul. It has to be
Speaker 1: therapeutic to be able to m kind of perform and yeah,
Speaker 1: share it with people and get it off your chest.
Speaker 2: Yeah, every night, over and over. I mean you you
Speaker 2: came the first night, the opening night, and it was
Speaker 2: really intense to speak about it. But then I got
Speaker 2: back the next night and did it, and the next night,
Speaker 2: and by my last couple of weeks, I was like, oh,
Speaker 2: I have found a way to organize this in my mind,
Speaker 2: which that that that feels good, that feels like okay, yeah,
Speaker 2: I'm going to be okay. I do believe this. I
Speaker 2: do believe that my son would want me to be
Speaker 2: happy and not struggle with any kind of guilt about
Speaker 2: this is something I didn't do or or did too
Speaker 2: much or whatever with him that he would want me
Speaker 2: to happy. He's out of pain. Now he's gone, you know, physically,
Speaker 2: but he's there and not you know. And and the
Speaker 2: spirituality that I have it really supports me in choosing
Speaker 2: not to you know, close off and make myself sick
Speaker 2: because I lost my son. And I tell you, by
Speaker 2: the last night, I was like, yeah, I got this.
Speaker 2: It really it was very healing.
Speaker 1: What an amazing opportunity you can even do that. What's next?
Speaker 1: What do you want to do?
Speaker 2: I just want to go on the road and just
Speaker 2: play my I was.
Speaker 1: You could do one or the other. You could say,
Speaker 1: I want to go on the road and playing songs,
Speaker 1: or I want to go hibernate for the next six
Speaker 1: months and not be seen.
Speaker 2: And just be going to watch football for the next
Speaker 2: three months.
Speaker 1: Figure Chiefs needed you to be watching football aast few months.
Speaker 1: Maybe that was the only thing missing.
Speaker 2: I'm so glad I missed the Broncos.
Speaker 1: I'm going to say the Broncos game wasn't the only one.
Speaker 1: I was at the Jets game, and I'm wondering if
Speaker 1: it's the same one.
Speaker 2: But I'm like, going, But doesn't it seem like that
Speaker 2: they were trying to just see what key fit and
Speaker 2: they would not give anybody. I don't know enough time, yes,
Speaker 2: until I had to do this.
Speaker 1: We're recording this. The Raiders game just happened. They were
Speaker 1: down fourteen nothing and they went there and we just
Speaker 1: talked about on the show. I don't get the feeling
Speaker 1: that they're suddenly fixed.
Speaker 2: No, no, no, no, no, nothing.
Speaker 1: This isn't the team that was beating the Titans and
Speaker 1: the Texans in the playoffs.
Speaker 2: That was with that Tyreek killing and he was he
Speaker 2: was obviously a big part of Patrick Mahomes's you know,
Speaker 2: and and they when you had Tyreek and Travis, well
Speaker 2: you can't double team both of them, so you know,
Speaker 2: you always had that kind of thing going on. So Okay,
Speaker 2: he doesn't have that, but we still have Travis and
Speaker 2: Rushie Rice. I think he's up there in the top.
Speaker 1: All the numbers and he leaves the wide receivers for them.
Speaker 2: And then it's just that that was just it's just
Speaker 2: throwing it to him over and over and over, getting
Speaker 2: him confident, getting I love talking.
Speaker 1: Defense has actually been carrying the offense the defense.
Speaker 2: See that's the difference. I mean, we'd play games like
Speaker 2: I went to the game in Oh my God, do
Speaker 2: you remember Jesus on the Wall five years ago? The
Speaker 2: Rams back in the college.
Speaker 1: Monday night game? Yes, and had to change it because
Speaker 1: of the fires, so they put it Monday night and
Speaker 1: it was fifty five to fifty one.
Speaker 2: I was at that game. It was the most electrifying,
Speaker 2: awesome game. Frustrating because my defense couldn't stop them, and
Speaker 2: now my defense can when it comes down to that
Speaker 2: part of the game and you're like, oh my god,
Speaker 2: if we just hold him for this, I believe that
Speaker 2: they can. And that's that's different to a Chiefs fan
Speaker 2: because we used to always go, all right, can they
Speaker 2: do it?
Speaker 1: I don't know. You know, you have such a unique
Speaker 1: perspective being a Chiefs fan and an international rock star.
Speaker 1: And we've talked about it before, you and I, But
Speaker 1: like this, Taylor Swift, Travis Kelcey, you can bringing over
Speaker 1: a whole other audience, and a lot of football fans
Speaker 1: are pushing it away it saying we don't need to
Speaker 1: see her after every touchdown please, And I don't need
Speaker 1: Travis Kelce's mom in a shot every two seconds with Taylor,
Speaker 1: I get it. Yeah, you have a different perspective. You
Speaker 1: think it's kind of cool.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think it. I mean I never like to
Speaker 2: get political or kind of you know, or or highlight
Speaker 2: divides in our in our nation. But there is, uh,
Speaker 2: there's obviously a rise in in the female power in
Speaker 2: our society. You know, there's there's an equalization happening when
Speaker 2: you look around and see that. Who was the best
Speaker 2: thing for the economy in America? Oh it was Taylor Swift,
Speaker 2: you know, just in the Barbie movie and the Barbie movie. Yeah,
Speaker 2: so this is happening, and you know, good straight white
Speaker 2: guys are cool with it, and and there's others that
Speaker 2: are a little weird about it. So to see the
Speaker 2: most he man, you know, cool, the dude of all exactly,
Speaker 2: big straight white guy loving this powerful woman. That's that's
Speaker 2: that can only be good. That can only be good.
Speaker 2: It's like, look at that. See that's how you love
Speaker 2: a powerful woman. You you embrace her, you support her
Speaker 2: and show up and go yeah I'm here.
Speaker 1: There's that moment where he's down there in Argentina and
Speaker 1: she comes running off the station I don't care how
Speaker 1: cynical you are. I don't care how much you have
Speaker 1: to appreciate it.
Speaker 2: Yes, we went. Nut's my fan. I can't even I've
Speaker 2: got two. I've got a twenty seven and a seventeen
Speaker 2: year old daughter, and they just you know, where did
Speaker 2: you see? Did you see her? And it's so it's
Speaker 2: such an American story and it's beautiful and and it
Speaker 2: gives us something all to kind of look at and
Speaker 2: go look, no, no, no, we're not divided. This is
Speaker 2: how you can do it. We can we can grow
Speaker 2: and change and get out of the weird patriarchy stuff
Speaker 2: and be more balanced.
Speaker 1: Have you met Travis before? I have not that happen.
Speaker 1: He's really great, I bet.
Speaker 2: I mean I've just seen him.
Speaker 1: You know, He's funny, so fun and it's you know,
Speaker 1: it's not the corny like football player, it's he's clever.
Speaker 1: Like I had that experience with him where I'm like, oh,
Speaker 1: that was actually a good line. And he hosted Saturday
Speaker 1: Live and was excellent.
Speaker 2: He was awesome. Yeah. I I hope he doesn't retire soon,
Speaker 2: but you know, it is around the corner, and I'm
Speaker 2: prepared for that.
Speaker 1: He mentioned it in the Wall Street Journal. They had
Speaker 1: an article a big for him, and he said, you know,
Speaker 1: eventually that day's coming, and everyone freaked out. But you know,
Speaker 1: he's the Saint Magor's Gronkowski. Gronkowski's been out of the
Speaker 1: game for several years. No, so he's thirty four.
Speaker 2: It's not it's going to have You met Taylor Swift, Yes,
Speaker 2: well I met her once. Gosh, fifteen years ago when
Speaker 2: when she was like a second or third album was
Speaker 2: out and hers and regan where was it? I was
Speaker 2: it was an Awards thing cool and I was backstage
Speaker 2: and she was so this is when she was, you know,
Speaker 2: nineteen maybe or something, really young, and she came up
Speaker 2: to me and she was a fan, and it was
Speaker 2: very sweet, and she goes, I just got to tell
Speaker 2: you you You've meant so much to me. You I
Speaker 2: saw you when I was eleven years old in Reading, Pennsylvania,
Speaker 2: and she said, and my parents took me to see you,
Speaker 2: and I picked up the guitar because of you.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, I know.
Speaker 2: And I tell that to my kids all the time,
Speaker 2: just to try to get cool perspective, cool points. Yeah,
Speaker 2: but ye, that for you? Is that?
Speaker 1: Janice Joplin was that Joan Bias, who was wow.
Speaker 2: You know, No, Janes Joplins scared me when I was
Speaker 2: a kid. I thought it was too yeah, because I
Speaker 2: got it when I was like eighteen or nineteen, But
Speaker 2: when I was eleven or twelve, it was she had
Speaker 2: weird hair and I screamed. I didn't get it. It
Speaker 2: was there's more of the Beatles. It was more your
Speaker 2: singer songwriters, and there wasn't a lot of women that
Speaker 2: I looked.
Speaker 1: Up to at that time. Joan Mitchell, like I'm trying
Speaker 1: to wrap, Yeah, Joan.
Speaker 2: Mitchell was as a as a songwriter. I really appreciated her.
Speaker 2: There was an artist named Joan Armor Trading that was
Speaker 2: that was kind of underground and big in the late
Speaker 2: seventies early eighties that I loved. It was the songwriters.
Speaker 2: It was Bruce Springsteen, you know, it was it was
Speaker 2: it was Barbara Streisan, you know, I thought she was
Speaker 2: an incredible performer. It was the you know, the people
Speaker 2: that got up and were able to hold an audience
Speaker 2: and say. I always felt like if I could sing,
Speaker 2: if I could write, then I could, you know, stay
Speaker 2: in that arena of singer songwriters that I that I loved.
Speaker 1: The Chiefs are now driving towards the playoffing, would you
Speaker 1: go to a game in the next few weeks or
Speaker 1: are you like, I'm good?
Speaker 2: Oh, it's funny if if they asked me to come
Speaker 2: do something. Okay, anthem, I've done the anthem three times
Speaker 2: and they've lost every time. Okay, so I know, I know,
Speaker 2: I know, So I would have been the drum too.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: No, I have not been that they have asked me,
Speaker 2: but I wasn't able to get there, so I might.
Speaker 2: I don't know. I get really comfortable at home, and
Speaker 2: now that I have not that, I've had to watch
Speaker 2: the games recorded.
Speaker 1: Do you really like There's an old Seinfeld episode where
Speaker 1: he's like, I watch every we Met game on vc R,
Speaker 1: don't tell me, and then right when he's about to
Speaker 1: get to like the biggest point, someone said, no, the
Speaker 1: Mets lost. Right, you're that person. You watch it. So
Speaker 1: how do you stay off social media? Is you don't
Speaker 1: see to do it? There's no bottom line ticker. You're
Speaker 1: able to DVR a game, yeah, and you'll watch it
Speaker 1: start to finish and somehow not get a score, not
Speaker 1: a text, nothing. That's amazing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it is amazing and nowadays, the things you can
Speaker 2: you can watch him really fast, you know you can.
Speaker 2: And and sometimes like the Broncos game, and I took
Speaker 2: there's a thing it's like, you know, uh, important plays
Speaker 2: or something up to you know, when they're playing. And
Speaker 2: I was like, okay, just give me the And then
Speaker 2: I watched the last quarter and I was like, oh,
Speaker 2: this is horrible. All that hurt, especially in the Broncos.
Speaker 2: But they were playing with such passion because they were
Speaker 2: we had beat them, you know, bazillion times.
Speaker 1: And I'm friendly with Sean Payton, and this whole thing
Speaker 1: was like, if I'm taking this job, I've got to
Speaker 1: deal with Justin Herbert twice a year. And Patrick Collins
Speaker 1: is like, I can't so him to beat Mams. Yeah, banishment,
Speaker 1: Would you perform a song? I know we're here as weird.
Speaker 2: I don't know my guitar and did you play one
Speaker 2: of your heads?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Why not?
Speaker 1: All right? Uh, Melissa Etheridge take it away.
Speaker 2: Here we go.
Speaker 6: I would dial the numbers.
Speaker 2: Just listen to your birth.
Speaker 6: I would stand inside my head and hold the hand
Speaker 6: of death. You don't know how far I'd go to
Speaker 6: ease this precious ache. You don't know how much.
Speaker 7: I'd give how much I can take just to reach you,
Speaker 7: Just to reach you, to reach you.
Speaker 3: Come to my window, all in shine, wait by the
Speaker 3: light of the moon, Come to my window.
Speaker 8: I'll be on the shore. I don't care what they think.
Speaker 8: I don't care what they say.
Speaker 7: What are they all about?
Speaker 4: This law? Where came to my window, crawling shine, wait
Speaker 4: by the light of the moon, on to my window.
Speaker 1: I that was unbelievable. Thank you. One of my favorite
Speaker 1: performances of all time was right there, right now. That
Speaker 1: was so good. Howard Stern once had the Foo Fighters
Speaker 1: on him. They played ever long acoustic on their show,
Speaker 1: and He's just like, oh my god, that's how I
Speaker 1: feel right so good, and I appreciate you doing that.
Speaker 2: What a pleasure, What a pleasure.
Speaker 1: We've been friends for a bit on social media through
Speaker 1: the show, but I feel like we've really connected over
Speaker 1: the last couple of years, and I just you're a
Speaker 1: special person. Thank you so much for joining us today.
Speaker 2: Thank you. In best of luck to you, and come
Speaker 2: see me sometime when you're now.
Speaker 1: I'm definitely gonna be out there and we will definitely
Speaker 1: see it, and I would.
Speaker 2: Love to see the perform Come have a dinner.
Speaker 1: All right, beautiful guys. Melssa Etherage on the season with
Speaker 1: Peter Schrager. Uh, go about those je Aaron, that was amazing.
Speaker 5: I was not expecting to be recording an acoustic performance
Speaker 5: today this morning, and that was huge highlight. That was incredible.
Speaker 5: One of the it was great.
Speaker 1: That was yeah, a speech the listeners. It's four of
Speaker 1: us in an office space and it's four of them,
Speaker 1: and like that was amazing. Melissa Etharge so cool and gosh, uh,
Speaker 1: that was neat. It was neat. I'm kind of spelled bout.
Speaker 1: I'm a little awestruck right now.
Speaker 7: Yeah, it was nice.
Speaker 5: Before you came in, you know, she was sitting in
Speaker 5: here and so we were chatting a little and I
Speaker 5: was talking to her about different guitars and everything, and
Speaker 5: you know, getting the story behind this guitar that she's
Speaker 5: got with her, and she just had it and I
Speaker 5: was like, oh, she's you know, she just has the
Speaker 5: guitar with her. And then she didn't put it away
Speaker 5: and then it was sitting there and then I went
Speaker 5: for it.
Speaker 1: I was like, we play us one of your hits,
Speaker 1: because I could also say, like, we play us a song,
Speaker 1: and she does like a silly like Chief song, or
Speaker 1: she does something where she plays like a new song.
Speaker 1: She played the biggest song of the nineties, just like
Speaker 1: an acoustic person.
Speaker 5: Yeah, you know, I think from now on, every guest,
Speaker 5: including ocs, including you know, gms, they've got to come on,
Speaker 5: they got to do an acoustic performance of as they
Speaker 5: got to have.
Speaker 1: A talent crche Like we bring on John Schneider from
Speaker 1: the Seahawks, and he takes us through the drafting of
Speaker 1: a player, and like we get to watch it like
Speaker 1: in real time, we watch his craft. In all seriousness.
Speaker 1: I grew up listening uh to most Ethridge's music, of course,
Speaker 1: as one of many artists from the nineties, and then
Speaker 1: I have such an appreciation for acoustic, whether it be
Speaker 1: VH one, UH, Storytellers, MTV Unplugged, and I mentioned to
Speaker 1: her the Howard Stern performance that Dave Grohl and Foo
Speaker 1: Fighters had have ever long, which is like consider one
Speaker 1: of the greatest like live impromptu on a show performances.
Speaker 1: That was that moment for us right here. That was
Speaker 1: kind of cool. It's very different than our usual guests,
Speaker 1: all due respect to Nick Cassario GM of the Texans.
Speaker 1: Different element here when you got live live music was
Speaker 1: really cool. Let's wrap it with a quick mention of
Speaker 1: the game of the year, which is gonna be on Sunday,
Speaker 1: Eagles versus forty nine Ers. I think it's the best
Speaker 1: game on the schedule I set up before the season started.
Speaker 1: Here's why. A. It might help decide who's home, although
Speaker 1: I think it's gonna probably go through Philly the way
Speaker 1: the schedules lie out. B. These teams hate each other.
Speaker 1: It's real. They don't like each other. Deebo Samuel I
Speaker 1: think called James Bradbury trash last year, and then they
Speaker 1: asked him this week about it and he's like, no,
Speaker 1: I double down, like I don't regret anything I say.
Speaker 1: If you remember, Fred Warner's wife, Sidney, was in the
Speaker 1: crowd and she came out on her podcast afterwards saying
Speaker 1: that the Eagles fans were absolutely horrendous to her and
Speaker 1: to the other Niners' wives. It wasn't even funny, it
Speaker 1: was like dangerous. And then on the field, there's a
Speaker 1: feeling from the Niners side that they were screwed last
Speaker 1: year by the brock Purty injury, and that was a
Speaker 1: freak thing that happened, and there's an asterisk, and I'm
Speaker 1: putting this words in their mouth. It's not them saying,
Speaker 1: but there's kind of an asterisk to the whole thing
Speaker 1: that they didn't get a chance to play the Eagles
Speaker 1: with their full strength, with Perdy being on the field.
Speaker 1: So Perty's on the field, Devo's on the field, Trent
Speaker 1: Williams on the field, Kittles on the field. Four o'clock
Speaker 1: on Fox. Greg Olsen, who I didn't mention as a
Speaker 1: potential Carolina Panthers head coach. I saw he put his
Speaker 1: name in the mix or someone through it in their form.
Speaker 1: He'll be calling the game with Kevin Burkhart, Erny Andrews
Speaker 1: on the sideline. I'll be on Fox pregame doing it
Speaker 1: from LA. But I really do feel like this is
Speaker 1: like forget NFC Championship preview. I feel like the winner
Speaker 1: of this game is the top team in the NFL
Speaker 1: right now in the AFC is wide open. On that note,
Speaker 1: the season with Peter Schrager delivering results is presented by
Speaker 1: Uber Eats. It's time for delivering results presented by our
Speaker 1: friends at all Uber eats. Where I discussed a team
Speaker 1: or a player that deserves the award this week for
Speaker 1: their performance last week. I'm going with the La Rams.
Speaker 1: Running Back Kyn Williams got off the ir and went
Speaker 1: for two hundred and four yards of scrimmage only a
Speaker 1: few weeks after going for one hundred and fifty eight
Speaker 1: yards from scrimmage against the same Cardinals team. Before he
Speaker 1: got hurt. They were one in three when he was out,
Speaker 1: they win the game. Suddenly, with all of these teams
Speaker 1: losing in the NFL and especially in the NFC, the
Speaker 1: Rams have two straight wins. They're five and six, they're
Speaker 1: a half a game out of the playoffs, and they've
Speaker 1: got a pretty manageable schedule up ahead. Yes, they've got
Speaker 1: the Ravens, but after that, I think the Rams they
Speaker 1: might do a little thing or two in the NFC
Speaker 1: and they might find themselves as a seventh seed. Stafford
Speaker 1: was amazing, but Kyrone william second year running back in
Speaker 1: a Notre Dame, a Day three guy. He is our
Speaker 1: winner of the Delivering Results presented by Uber Eats Award
Speaker 1: for this week. On that note, I want to thank
Speaker 1: both of you guys, Aaron Wan Kaufman, Jason English. I
Speaker 1: want to thank everyone out in LA. I want to
Speaker 1: thank Melissa Etheridge for wowing us today with her musical brilliance,
Speaker 1: and I want to thank you the listeners. We've got
Speaker 1: a lot of great feedback over the last couple of
Speaker 1: weeks from whether it be Drew Petsing or Cassario or
Speaker 1: last week Han Schroeder, the NFL Media EVP. It's a
Speaker 1: wide range of guests. We're doing good things. I think
Speaker 1: I've mentioned it before. We're in talks to see if
Speaker 1: we can get to the super Bowl and do a
Speaker 1: show from there. If not, that's a budgetary thing and
Speaker 1: we'll have to just lick our wounds and keep on rolling.
Speaker 1: In the meantime, let's continue to keep on rolling. We
Speaker 1: can only do what we can do. We can only
Speaker 1: control what we can control, and we're gonna continue to
Speaker 1: get the best guests we possibly can and maybe a
Speaker 1: live performance of a number one hit from the nineteen
Speaker 1: nineties in studio. Enjoy the week, guys, an amazing slight ahead.
Speaker 1: Enjoy that Eagles forty nine Ers game until next week.
Speaker 1: This is the Season with Peter Schregan. The Season with
Speaker 1: Peter Schrager is a production of the NFL in partnership
Speaker 1: with iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, wherever you get your podcasts.