Speaker 1: Of Course.
Speaker 2: Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. This classic episode
Speaker 2: was produced by the team at Pandora Ladies and Gentlemen.
Speaker 2: This is QLs classic from January third, twenty eighteen.
Speaker 1: We talked to Jason Flom. Names like plant, familiar with what.
Speaker 2: His impact is felt, name of either Signed or Discovered
Speaker 2: or A and R, Katy Perry, Lord Sugar, Red Blue
Speaker 2: Man Group, Haley Williams in Paramol, Rolling Stones, Lenny Kravin's Coldplay,
Speaker 2: Jesse Jay, and list goes on.
Speaker 1: And this man has spent the first half.
Speaker 2: Of his life and making consisis dreams come true and
Speaker 2: the second half of his life in the end his
Speaker 2: career shining the light of those who have been wrongfully convicted.
Speaker 2: He's the host of Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flom. This
Speaker 2: podcast features apps with women who have spent time in
Speaker 2: the prison system or trying to fight the prison system
Speaker 2: as we now know it. Kardashians of Meat and Hill,
Speaker 2: Amanda Knox, Rodney Reed and he's trying to bring them
Speaker 2: their freedom.
Speaker 1: I hope you enjoyed this episode. You will listen last
Speaker 1: say with Jason for here we go. Just follow us.
Speaker 3: Supremo, sup sup Supremo roll call.
Speaker 4: Supremo Su Supremo roll call, Suprema South Supremo, roll call
Speaker 4: Suprema Sun Sun Supremo roll call.
Speaker 1: Swear to God. Yeah, from this day on. Yeah, on
Speaker 1: my speed down, We'll be Supremo suck you never know.
Speaker 4: Roll call Suprema Son Su Supremo role call.
Speaker 1: My name is Fante.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I'm much blacker yeah than the audience.
Speaker 1: Yeah for Uncle Cracker.
Speaker 4: Sun Supremo, roll call Supremo Sun Sun Supremo.
Speaker 3: Roll call.
Speaker 1: Name is Sugar. Yeah, y'all try to stay calm. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but on ancestry dot com.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I'm a flying Supremo.
Speaker 4: Roll call Supremo Supremo roll call.
Speaker 1: Bill woke up Yeah with the song on his mind.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Thanks, Jason Flahm. Yeah, for a week by White Lion Supremo.
Speaker 4: Roll was a Suprema So Supremo roll called.
Speaker 6: Yeah, everybody united.
Speaker 7: Yeah, Jason Fea, we gonna fight him, That's what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: Suprema Roll.
Speaker 3: Supremo, roll call me Dolly.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm the Obama. I don't know what to come up. Yeah,
Speaker 3: but I'll tell you this.
Speaker 4: Suprema Son Subprevo roll call suppreva su supremo, roll call, supremo, supremo.
Speaker 3: Roll.
Speaker 1: I love a good car crash every now and then
Speaker 1: about that. No, you know, use right up there. At
Speaker 1: least he didn't freeze up completely like some guests do. Exactly.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, you handle it fairly with white cleft.
Speaker 3: Tried to teach me how to freestyle. It just didn't
Speaker 3: work out.
Speaker 6: Freestyle.
Speaker 7: You don't you start with a freestyle. You gotta start
Speaker 7: with the freestyle as hard.
Speaker 3: I don't know that's.
Speaker 2: Going to college. Yeah, just start your basic rhyme. Make
Speaker 2: sure and I'm here to say, is your second one?
Speaker 2: That's your that's your start.
Speaker 3: He didn't tell me that. Yeah, it's gonna drop some
Speaker 3: roses and reddish violets are bluish. You know. I'm not
Speaker 3: very religious, but if I was, i'd be Jewish. But
Speaker 3: it just like it is.
Speaker 1: Steve is in love already, man.
Speaker 3: I mean, yeah, I got a nice little diverse crowd here,
Speaker 3: you know what I mean? Thank you very twenty eighteen,
Speaker 3: very much too much.
Speaker 1: Solf missing one of our white guys. Yeah we are,
Speaker 1: actually yes, he's actually he's at his job.
Speaker 2: We're hooking from our job to be here at this
Speaker 2: other job anyway, Ladies and gentlemen, our guest today. He
Speaker 2: has entered the professional music world or the industry, in
Speaker 2: his early twenties as an A and R REP, later
Speaker 2: as head in Our Atlantic Records. Might I also add
Speaker 2: under the Urdigon iron Fist, which basically means that he
Speaker 2: literally learned from the best h He's signed Twisted, Sister,
Speaker 2: White Lions, get Row, Tori Amos, Stone, Temple of Pilots
Speaker 2: name a few, and in nineteen ninety five he co
Speaker 2: found it or found it Lava Records, which was an
Speaker 2: Atlantic subsidiary signing the likes of all the nineties t
Speaker 2: R L staples like Kid Rock and Uncle.
Speaker 1: Cracker and oh Yeah, Massbox twenty Core in Sugar Bay,
Speaker 1: I believe yeah. And then since.
Speaker 3: Then, those days were fun.
Speaker 1: I can imagine. Yeah, I was in college with those
Speaker 1: Sugar Records.
Speaker 2: And since then and his world domination mission. Uh you,
Speaker 2: I'm sorry you. I'm telling you what you did. He
Speaker 2: led the Virgin in the Capitol Records merger, working with
Speaker 2: the Rolling Stones, Lenny Kravitz, even Coldplay, particular favorite of fantees.
Speaker 2: I'm sure that you have gazillion questions not to mention
Speaker 2: He's led many to the Promised Land. It's such unknown
Speaker 2: acts as Katie Perry thirty seconds to marsh multiple multiple
Speaker 2: plantum x, but way it gets worse.
Speaker 1: He's also the founding member of the Innocence.
Speaker 3: Project founding board member.
Speaker 1: The founding board.
Speaker 2: Member, I'm sorry of the Innocence Project not to mention
Speaker 2: the Bronx Freedom Fund FAM, which is a great acronym
Speaker 2: for Families against man intory minimums UH, basically trying to
Speaker 2: ensure that those that are caught up in the law
Speaker 2: with wrongful convictions get their proper due in court, get retrials,
Speaker 2: get get out, Yes, get freedom. Yeah, we can go
Speaker 2: on and on and yeah. She also signed Jesse, j
Speaker 2: and Lord. I'll add at the end, ladies and gentlemen,
Speaker 2: please welcome to our first show of the new year.
Speaker 1: Jason flomp to question.
Speaker 3: Thank you very much, dude, I'm happy to be here.
Speaker 3: Kind of an honor. Actually, we've gotta be honest.
Speaker 2: We're excited because you're a true record man, but you're
Speaker 2: also freedom fighter.
Speaker 1: Like one of the last record man like this.
Speaker 2: Dude, you knew I'm at Urnigan, which means something to
Speaker 2: someone that's watching from afar. I don't know how much
Speaker 2: that means to you, but that means, like it.
Speaker 3: Was incredible everything around that man. I mean he was
Speaker 3: he was every bit the legend that everybody thinks he was,
Speaker 3: and uh maybe the greatest of all time. You know.
Speaker 3: When he was on it was, you know, and I
Speaker 3: caught the tail end of that. But then I got
Speaker 3: to work under him. You know, he became more of
Speaker 3: like an honorary chairman. But I got to work under
Speaker 3: him for twenty five years. I mean it was an awesome,
Speaker 3: awesome experience. I mean, what else can you say? The
Speaker 3: guy died at Rolling Stones concert, you know what I mean?
Speaker 3: Like to the end, right, he was a legend to
Speaker 3: the fucking end, I mean the best.
Speaker 2: So would you consider yourself the last of his? Of
Speaker 2: his disciples? Like, I feel like those that have studied
Speaker 2: under him have went on to you know, reach further
Speaker 2: than other people in the music business, probably rivaling maybe
Speaker 2: Clive Davis as far as influences concern Like, would you
Speaker 2: consider yourself the last of his?
Speaker 3: Well, I don't know, you know, I guess Craig Kalman
Speaker 3: came up under him as well. And Craig's obviously done
Speaker 3: amazing stuff. Still does, and so you know, we worked
Speaker 3: together for a while and yeah, so it was it
Speaker 3: was just an amazing time to be growing up in
Speaker 3: the music industry. You know, I actually started Atlantic when
Speaker 3: I was eighteen, and you know, the first time I
Speaker 3: met omit, which is really kind of tell us. So
Speaker 3: I started off putting up posters in record stores, which
Speaker 3: I thought was the greatest job in the world. I
Speaker 3: had a staple gun, some double sided tape, some led
Speaker 3: Zeppelin posters, a CDC sister sled Chic. I mean, it
Speaker 3: was just it was incredible mid seventies. You were there
Speaker 3: was seventy nine. So I run around the record stores
Speaker 3: and climb up on ladders and put up posters and
Speaker 3: like it was just it was a great way to
Speaker 3: meet girls. I was incredible.
Speaker 1: So the PA job, I'm laughing.
Speaker 2: Wait, let me just pause this all right, for those
Speaker 2: that you that don't know, I meant the the mom
Speaker 2: and dad.
Speaker 1: The mom and pop.
Speaker 2: Record store was a staple of the seventies and the
Speaker 2: eighties more than what the chains were in the in
Speaker 2: the Tower records. But me as a kid growing up
Speaker 2: in the seventies, going to the mom and pop stores
Speaker 2: my favorite part of that whole experience was seeing the
Speaker 2: window display of how those posters would go up, of
Speaker 2: which when I would go home and everyone would play house.
Speaker 1: Or whatever, I played records.
Speaker 2: I used to do that too, and like because some
Speaker 2: of that I didn't know that some of those, like
Speaker 2: J cards and cards were not records, they were posters,
Speaker 2: so they'd be bent in a particular way. So I
Speaker 2: would take my father's records and try and then the record,
Speaker 2: Yeah I broke, like the Honey record, broke the Commodore's
Speaker 2: debut album, trying to staple them to the wall and
Speaker 2: bend them a certain way. So you are who I
Speaker 2: have to blame for many a punishment.
Speaker 3: Well knowing that, but probably half of my displays were
Speaker 3: either crooked or upside down because I was so stoned.
Speaker 3: So because I mean, weed was a big thing back then.
Speaker 1: Man, I I.
Speaker 3: Got news to tell you. Yeah game But anyway, Yeah,
Speaker 3: So I had this great job. I thought it was
Speaker 3: the greatest job in the world, and I got free records.
Speaker 3: I was like, this is it, Like I've peaked at
Speaker 3: eighteen years old. I can't do better, right, And then
Speaker 3: I discovered a band called Zebra right, and it's a
Speaker 3: crazy story how that even happened, But it doesn't matter.
Speaker 3: I determined that I wanted to get a job doing
Speaker 3: A and R because it looked like a great job
Speaker 3: to me, And so I found a band. Through a
Speaker 3: series of luck and synchronicity and serendipity and perseverance and
Speaker 3: a little bit of intelligence, I managed to find this
Speaker 3: band and became a hit. So they gave me a
Speaker 3: job doing A and R. I must have been twenty
Speaker 3: years old. I got a little office at Atlantic Records,
Speaker 3: and one day I'm sitting in there hi with the
Speaker 3: drummer from my high school band. We were actually in
Speaker 3: there hanging out like pondering, as we had just gone
Speaker 3: out and smoked a couple of joints. We came back
Speaker 3: and we were sitting there just in fucking amazement and
Speaker 3: shocked that I was getting paid to listen to music.
Speaker 3: I was like, how is this even possible? Right? I
Speaker 3: can't believe it. So, as we're sitting there in this haze,
Speaker 3: am It's secretary knocks on the door. Her name was
Speaker 3: Jenny Lynn. She knocks on the door and she pokes
Speaker 3: her head and she goes, AHMUT would like to see you,
Speaker 3: And I go you're fullest shit. And then he looks
Speaker 3: in and goes, no, she's not. And I was like, oh,
Speaker 3: give me, I gotta get cleaned up here. What am
Speaker 3: I going to do so with that fresh buzz on,
Speaker 3: you know? So I went in his office. Man, he
Speaker 3: had some kid in there that he had met in
Speaker 3: a club in the Bronx, you know, because he used
Speaker 3: to go clubbing and ship right, and this kid, I remember,
Speaker 3: this kid was taking a cigarettes cigarette butts out of
Speaker 3: the astray and relighting them right, and I was like,
Speaker 3: he was kind of a desperate looking kid, but he
Speaker 3: was on some like crazy type of music thing that
Speaker 3: I didn't even understand. I mean, I don't want to
Speaker 3: tell im. You know, I'm a rock guy. I don't
Speaker 3: know what the fuck you're talking about. I was just like, hm, yes,
Speaker 3: I was good. What was I gonna say. I'm sitting
Speaker 3: there in the presence of the greatest like a deity,
Speaker 3: and I'm high and I don't know what the hell's
Speaker 3: going on. I don't even know how I'm here. So
Speaker 3: it was it was an amazing It's an amazing way
Speaker 3: to start a relationship. Who was the kid? I don't remember.
Speaker 2: I can't remember but that was your first band. That
Speaker 2: was the first Byeah.
Speaker 3: They had a song called Who's Behind the Door that
Speaker 3: was a.
Speaker 1: Big he was signed to Atlantic.
Speaker 3: You signed them to Yeah, and they sounded exactly like
Speaker 3: led Zeppe, Which is funny because I have a band
Speaker 3: now called Greta van Fleet who also sound like led Zeppelin,
Speaker 3: and they're blowing up. They're actually they may actually save
Speaker 3: rock and roll. These kids, it's incredible. I think they're
Speaker 3: going to I mean, it's really fun. They're they're great musicians.
Speaker 3: He sings like fucking Robbert Plant and the kids are
Speaker 3: eating it up. So I think the I think the tide,
Speaker 3: the pendulum is swinging back to rock and roll.
Speaker 2: I gotta ask how how I mean you're you're lucky streak.
Speaker 2: I mean, you know, i'd be rereminious to say that.
Speaker 2: You know, the artists that you sign, you know, with
Speaker 2: the help of MTV, you know, you kind of route
Speaker 2: each other. A lot of the artists that you sign
Speaker 2: that blew up your first wave, your Twisted Sisters, your
Speaker 2: your first wave of metal bands that you signed to Atlantic.
Speaker 1: Uh, how do you feel about the.
Speaker 2: Theory of having good ears or that whole theory of
Speaker 2: did you were you like the new blood that beyond
Speaker 2: the ears and like they have a look, they have
Speaker 2: a charisma. I mean just the fact that seventies X
Speaker 2: were about Okay, they sound good.
Speaker 1: You know they could be ugly and still have a hit.
Speaker 2: Yes, the Christopher Cross exactly what was exactly what my
Speaker 2: head like, I am a twist assisterm fan. I knew
Speaker 2: all those That's how you know it's successful. When I
Speaker 2: knew I want to rock and all that ship like.
Speaker 3: Well, twisted Sister was a different story because what happened
Speaker 3: was I had found Zebra, and I was so excited
Speaker 3: because then I got this little office and a little
Speaker 3: job doing A and R because they were having a hit.
Speaker 3: And then and then the guy from Zebra his name
Speaker 3: was Randy Jackson, not the Randy Jackson that we're all
Speaker 3: friends with, but the different Randy Jackson.
Speaker 1: So there's a third one, not Michael's brother not.
Speaker 3: Yeah, a lot of them jests, right, you know you
Speaker 3: can google that. You can actually google how many of
Speaker 3: me dot com and you can see how many people
Speaker 3: have your same name. And there's four Jason Floms in
Speaker 3: this country, you know. So but anyway, yeah, yeah, she's
Speaker 3: on it. So anyway, so the guy so Randy says
Speaker 3: to me one day Flom, he goes, Twisted Sisters the
Speaker 3: greatest live band in the world. He goes, we can't
Speaker 3: touch him, and neither can anyone else. And I was like,
Speaker 3: no shit, okay, well let me check this shit out,
Speaker 3: you know. So I went up to, uh, Poughkeepsie on
Speaker 3: a Wednesday night, and uh, for those of you who
Speaker 3: don't know, I Poughkeepsie's about one hundred miles north of
Speaker 3: New York City, and uh, it's funny name, Poughkeepsie. But anyway,
Speaker 3: Zebra was opening for Twisted Sister, which I thought was
Speaker 3: kind of weird because Zebra was signed to Twisted, was it.
Speaker 3: And anyway, there was three thousand kids that are on
Speaker 3: a Wednesday night at six Bucks ahead and we're talking whatever.
Speaker 3: This was nineteen eighty eighty one when six Bucks was
Speaker 3: six bucks, right, and uh, every one of these kids
Speaker 3: is wearing a Twisted Sister T shirt. And d Snyder
Speaker 3: comes out on stage and it's like thunder in there, right,
Speaker 3: the kids are about to riot. And he gets up
Speaker 3: and he goes, all right, New York. He goes, we
Speaker 3: just got back from fucking England. We're sick and fucking
Speaker 3: tired of here was lie me, motherfucker's telling us how
Speaker 3: bloody fucking good we are. What do you New York
Speaker 3: motherfuckers have to say? And all three thousand kids throw
Speaker 3: their fists in the ear and go twisted fucking sister.
Speaker 3: And I was like, get the fuck out of here.
Speaker 3: I don't even care if they can play their inscrments,
Speaker 3: it doesn't matter. Nothing matters from that point forward. I'm like,
Speaker 3: this one comes with instructions, you know what I mean.
Speaker 3: And then of course they put on that crazy live show,
Speaker 3: which was amazing. I mean, because they had done thousands
Speaker 3: and thousands of shows by that point, nobody would sign them.
Speaker 3: They were considered a joke. The funny thing was, I
Speaker 3: come back to the city. I drove back with the
Speaker 3: guitar player JJ and uh. I don't know if I
Speaker 3: got home at four or five or whatever the hell
Speaker 3: it was. And I walked into my boss's office the
Speaker 3: next morning on two hours of sleep, and god knows
Speaker 3: how many kinds of you know, Intuxicans exactly, thank you.
Speaker 3: And I walk in and I go, I found religion
Speaker 3: last night, and he goes, what the fuck are you
Speaker 3: talking about? And I go Twisted sister, and he goes,
Speaker 3: get the fuck out of my office. And I was like,
Speaker 3: I didn't know that they were considered it.
Speaker 2: So they were already known as a joke amongst the.
Speaker 3: They'd been passed on so many times by everybody's the
Speaker 3: music industry. Now they were you know, back then, they were,
Speaker 3: you know, known for wearing women's right Sometimes you'd come
Speaker 3: out on a dog collar with a chain or he
Speaker 3: did you know, makeup and finging out possible by the way,
Speaker 3: who cares, right, Rocky Horror was a hit anyway, so yeah, kiss, yeah,
Speaker 3: But anyway, nobody would sign him, and I went to
Speaker 3: see him again the next night in South Jersey. Had
Speaker 3: thirty seven hundred kids there, and I was like, this
Speaker 3: has got it. This is my mission and life. The
Speaker 3: funny thing was I finally got shut down permanently, and
Speaker 3: they would not sign. My boss would not sign him,
Speaker 3: no matter what. He threatened to fire me if I
Speaker 3: ever mentioned the name Twisted.
Speaker 1: Who is your boss at Atlantic?
Speaker 3: You're actually going to call him out for this? I
Speaker 3: don't know about that.
Speaker 2: Let me so many years years anyway, the president of
Speaker 2: Atlantic back then, so not on it.
Speaker 1: Okay, okay.
Speaker 3: So, so the funny thing was, I saw the head
Speaker 3: of the English company, guy named Phil Arson, in the
Speaker 3: hallway one day. I knew he was I didn't know him,
Speaker 3: but I knew he was like a serious guy, like
Speaker 3: he had signed a c DC and shit, he was
Speaker 3: like a real guy, you know. I was like, So
Speaker 3: I go up to him. I go, mister Carson, here's
Speaker 3: the I told him this whole story. I'm like stumbling
Speaker 3: over my words. I'm so excited to write a hand
Speaker 3: on the thing or everything. He told me. Later he
Speaker 3: threw the whole thing in the garbage. But then he
Speaker 3: happened to see them opening by accident for I think
Speaker 3: Foreigner or something in London. One day he calls you up.
Speaker 3: The next day he goes, this is the best thing
Speaker 3: I seen since I saw I see DC. I'm gonna
Speaker 3: sign him. So he signed them. We backdoored it into
Speaker 3: America and then ultimately, of course they became a monster
Speaker 3: hit and it was a lot of fun while it lasted.
Speaker 2: You know, well, yeah, I mean, I guess till what
Speaker 2: eighty Well, they at least had two.
Speaker 3: They had one. The first album was like a moderate success.
Speaker 3: It's called You Can't stop rock and roll. And the
Speaker 3: second one was stay Hungry, and of course that was
Speaker 3: We're not going to take it and I want to
Speaker 3: rock and you know all that's.
Speaker 6: What I'm not gonna take it. That changed my life.
Speaker 6: That even old enough to remember that I remember the
Speaker 6: video was really I thought you.
Speaker 1: Were born.
Speaker 2: Your older siblings told you about it, yeah.
Speaker 7: On the internet. But yes, yeah, we're not going to
Speaker 7: take it.
Speaker 1: Everything good, So I guess you would.
Speaker 2: I guess one could say that you were like the
Speaker 2: new blood at Atlantic, Whereas, because I've seen this happen
Speaker 2: where something doesn't translate to someone that's a baby boomer,
Speaker 2: like say one of your NR peers who was born
Speaker 2: maybe in like forty three, forty four, forty five that's
Speaker 2: slightly older that you know, thinks that this is just
Speaker 2: you know, trash and wouldn't translate is absolute garbage, whereas you,
Speaker 2: being slightly younger being I guess you could say a
Speaker 2: generation xer.
Speaker 1: Finds make sense of it all.
Speaker 3: And so yeah, I mean I loved you know I
Speaker 3: grew up on When I was a kid, my favorite
Speaker 3: artist were Zeppelin, Arrowsmith, the Beatles, Bob Dylan. You know
Speaker 3: those wuld probably be my top four, but there were
Speaker 3: so many. I mean, back then you had you know,
Speaker 3: Queen would definitely be my top five too. I mean
Speaker 3: that those are the greatest. It was like a renaissance
Speaker 3: to me, you know, musically in America and the world
Speaker 3: actually because a lot most of those actually came from England.
Speaker 3: But it was just an incredible period. But I grew
Speaker 3: up on guitar music, right, I like guitar music, and
Speaker 3: so to me the hard rock bands, and it peaked
Speaker 3: with Guns and Roses. Obviously I didn't sign Guns and Roses,
Speaker 3: but that that era was. It's actually I think a
Speaker 3: lot of those bands are underrated. I mean some of
Speaker 3: them weren't. Some of them were terrible, but you know,
Speaker 3: some of them were actually underrated. And I think skid
Speaker 3: Row was a great band, Like I mean, he was
Speaker 3: an incredible singer and those first two albums were magical.
Speaker 2: So did you sign all of the hair metal acts
Speaker 2: of Atlantic?
Speaker 1: Were you responsible for most of them?
Speaker 3: I didn't sign Rat I missed that one, but most
Speaker 3: of them I signed, And you know it was uh.
Speaker 2: Which one got away that you almost freaking had and love.
Speaker 3: I've been in therapy for years trying to forget them.
Speaker 2: You give me your top three, your top three could
Speaker 2: have had him in.
Speaker 3: Oh fuck, I mean I listened. I had a meeting
Speaker 3: with bon Jovi early on, you know what I mean. Now,
Speaker 3: now bear in mind, I think that bon Jovi signing
Speaker 3: to Mercury was the best thing that could happened to
Speaker 3: him because they made a decision that they were going
Speaker 3: to put the whole building behind him, because they were
Speaker 3: going to go broke if they didn't break somebody. And
Speaker 3: you know, remember that company was or it was a PolyGram.
Speaker 3: They were being sold for fifty million dollars, the whole company,
Speaker 3: and also some genius at that company had the idea
Speaker 3: to put them together with Desmond Child, which on paper
Speaker 3: wouldn't seem to make sense, right Desmond was like a
Speaker 3: gay guy disco songwriter, like bon Jovi was sort of
Speaker 3: this like macho kid from New Jersey doing rock and roll.
Speaker 3: But somebody had that vision to put them together. And
Speaker 3: that's where the greatest songs came from, was that collaboration. Okay,
Speaker 3: so you know, so who knows. You know, we can
Speaker 3: go back through history and you know and see what's what,
Speaker 3: But that would certainly be you know.
Speaker 1: You could have had him.
Speaker 3: I think we could have had him. I think, you know,
Speaker 3: we came close. What else did I come close on? Oh?
Speaker 3: I mean I tried. I tried like hell to sign Tool,
Speaker 3: but I didn't get them. I would have loved to
Speaker 3: get a Tool. Yeah, I mean, I don't know why.
Speaker 3: I still don't know why. I mean I schmoozed them
Speaker 3: and did whatever I could and didn't get it. And
Speaker 3: I can't think of the third one. It'll come back
Speaker 3: to me.
Speaker 2: So as a rock and guitar guy, I just have
Speaker 2: to know, from a professional standpoint, what was your feelings
Speaker 2: about the watershed moment in which Nirvana arrived and sort
Speaker 2: of rendered kind of the domino setup that you have
Speaker 2: for the eighties almost.
Speaker 1: Void. I mean, I've heard tales of artists speaking, So
Speaker 1: what was your when Nirvana came along and sort of
Speaker 1: marked the end of the hair metal guitar acts.
Speaker 2: Did you feel a particular way about their arrival or
Speaker 2: were you like, Okay, well this is this is on
Speaker 2: to the new and let me, you know, get ahead
Speaker 2: of the pack and see what else is out there?
Speaker 2: Or were you sort of a traditionalist hair metal and
Speaker 2: you know.
Speaker 3: You know, I felt like you could kind of see
Speaker 3: it coming because my feeling is that my theory is
Speaker 3: that the musical trends are dictated by whoever makes the
Speaker 3: best music. Right, That's how musical trends happen. Is that
Speaker 3: the most creativity.
Speaker 1: Are you sure about that though? I think so?
Speaker 3: Why what do you think you.
Speaker 1: As the most money?
Speaker 2: Because there's musical trends happening now that isn't necessarily the
Speaker 2: best music, but it's popular. Like can you separate the
Speaker 2: difference between popular and what you feel in your heart?
Speaker 3: Well, that's a very deep question, right, I mean, you know, Okay,
Speaker 3: let's not call it musical trends. Then let's talk about movements.
Speaker 3: Important movements happen, right, and then you can go back
Speaker 3: to like it's it's interesting when even going back to
Speaker 3: when disco happened, right, Why did disco happen because the
Speaker 3: creativity was incredible back then, right? Or why did rap
Speaker 3: come up? Right? And why is it still what it is?
Speaker 3: Because there's actual geniuses making music in that genre. Right.
Speaker 3: There haven't been any rock and roll geniuses probably since
Speaker 3: Jack White, So you know, it's hard for that to
Speaker 3: maintain when you don't have that influx of creativity that
Speaker 3: you that you need to sustain a movement. And then
Speaker 3: even going back to what you were asking about with Nirvada,
Speaker 3: the hair band thing, like I said, it peaked with
Speaker 3: guns and roses and then it went off a cliff. Right,
Speaker 3: you had bands coming up and actually getting over that
Speaker 3: were terrible. I mean, and we can name them if
Speaker 3: we want to, but it was okay, so.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I.
Speaker 3: Mean, you know, I don't want to mention names, but
Speaker 3: bullet Boys and Trickster and fire House and like.
Speaker 1: So eventually I grew up in Indiana.
Speaker 3: Man, Okay, there you go. So yeah, you can kind
Speaker 3: of see like this was not this was like imitation stuff.
Speaker 3: And if they're listening, you know, I'll probably get like
Speaker 3: nasty direct messages on my Instagram, but whatever. You know,
Speaker 3: the fact is, you know, it was ripe for change,
Speaker 3: and there has there's always a reaction. And then all
Speaker 3: of a sudden, the Seattle sound came up and you
Speaker 3: had geniuses again, right, you had Nirvana. I mean, I
Speaker 3: think Alison Chains was incredible. Obviously, Pearl Jam is music
Speaker 3: that people will be listening to one hundred years from now.
Speaker 3: So it's unfortunately, like I said, in guitar music, I
Speaker 3: think that was the last wave of music that will
Speaker 3: be time capsule music.
Speaker 2: I have a slight theory though, because okay, because hip
Speaker 2: hop was created out of sort of the impoverished conditions
Speaker 2: of the inner city, and thus this culture comes in
Speaker 2: seventy seven. I have a weird feeling that what's going
Speaker 2: on right now in society, ticularly with the slow rise
Speaker 2: or the you know us finally acknowledging the literal white
Speaker 2: elephant in the room of the the alts right kind
Speaker 2: of the the the anger, be it justified or unjustified, whatever,
Speaker 2: you know, whatever your feelings are about it. But I
Speaker 2: almost feel like it's it's that anger that might spark
Speaker 2: up rock and roll, like what we knew as rock
Speaker 2: and roll, which was non existence, because I mean, the
Speaker 2: reason why hip hop sort of replaced rock and roll because.
Speaker 1: It was angrier.
Speaker 2: Like it's it's like after fuk the police.
Speaker 1: Like where do you go for? You can't you can't
Speaker 1: get any deeper.
Speaker 2: And as far as like hip hop's concerned, always felt
Speaker 2: that fifty.
Speaker 1: Killed hip hop easily.
Speaker 2: After after well, no, no, I know where you're going
Speaker 2: with because after fifty was there was no more money
Speaker 2: after yeah, after after heat, after you get sad times
Speaker 2: and make it. It's like, okay, how do you become
Speaker 2: exactly like he said, I'll kill you? And then that's it.
Speaker 2: After that song and heat with you know, the song
Speaker 2: with Doctor Dre had the gun gun shot snare, like
Speaker 2: to really drive the point home because you missed it.
Speaker 1: That was the end. That was like you couldn't get
Speaker 1: no more extreme in that.
Speaker 2: And then hip hop is now you know, user friendly,
Speaker 2: it's heavy baton.
Speaker 6: You think rock and roll is ready to pick that up?
Speaker 1: Is trying I think like Scrillics is trying to.
Speaker 2: But I feel like this general, I feel like millennials
Speaker 2: are so all inclusive with mixing their cultures and everything
Speaker 2: that not even ed m was scary, even though that was.
Speaker 1: Supposed to be the supposed to be scary.
Speaker 2: The bus noise, I mean that was supposed to be
Speaker 2: like every generation has their rebel noise. We had eight
Speaker 2: to weight, the seventies had guitars like the the war war.
Speaker 1: Sorry you didn't think that weight was I figured it
Speaker 1: would have been the scratch to the record scratch the
Speaker 1: way it's pretty scary though.
Speaker 2: Well not scary, but just the presence that it is
Speaker 2: impact And I feel like some anger is going to
Speaker 2: come out in music again, directed or misdirected, poverty or not.
Speaker 1: And I feel like.
Speaker 6: I wish you to hurry up, you know, do you
Speaker 6: feel that because you're there.
Speaker 5: I'm still waiting for it to happen. When he said
Speaker 5: it was gonna happen during the Bush era, so yeah,
Speaker 5: I was wrong.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's actually weird that it hasn't happened, because if
Speaker 3: there was ever a time to get angry, it's now.
Speaker 3: I mean, it's never been more obvious, because I mean,
Speaker 3: ship George Bush looks like George Washington all of a sudden,
Speaker 3: the worst president ever, all of a sudden, everybody's wishing
Speaker 3: he was back. I mean, if we could have a
Speaker 3: national referendum and bring him back, I'd lead it, you
Speaker 3: know what I mean?
Speaker 7: Yeah, at their current conditions.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah, any one of them. Absolutely, Barbara Bush.
Speaker 7: Yeah, But you know what, maybe because music has become
Speaker 7: so corporately involved and I don't know, with the whole
Speaker 7: scaring of the NFL and things, do you think maybe
Speaker 7: artists are taking note of that.
Speaker 6: And I'm speak a little and I'm a Graham, but.
Speaker 3: Like, how crazy that the civil rights leader of our
Speaker 3: era is a quarterback, right, I mean, how crazy it's
Speaker 3: supposed to be music. I don't know what's going on.
Speaker 3: I mean, Dixie Chicks.
Speaker 1: I don't think.
Speaker 2: People don't want to mess up their money. Like that's
Speaker 2: what I'm asking Like a musician now.
Speaker 1: Like you want to be.
Speaker 2: They want to be in bed with all the corporate
Speaker 2: sponsors and all of that ship. So they don't want
Speaker 2: to say anything that will remotely even fuck up the
Speaker 2: chances of them getting some outside bread.
Speaker 1: They want that Kitcat commercial.
Speaker 2: They want a kit Cat commercial, they want to Sprite commercial,
Speaker 2: they want all that, but.
Speaker 3: There's gotta be some I mean, that's a really, that's
Speaker 3: that's it. It really hurts me to hear you say that,
Speaker 3: and it's kind of it feels that way if it's
Speaker 3: very cynical and it's like it sucks, you know. I mean,
Speaker 3: somebody's got to come out and be the new dealan.
Speaker 1: You would have to be the have not.
Speaker 2: Like whoever's going to be the new dealan is has
Speaker 2: to be a half not and be cool with being
Speaker 2: a half not. I mean, you know, hip hop has
Speaker 2: already tainted. You know, did he came along too much money?
Speaker 2: Did he came along and showed us all these yachts
Speaker 2: and ship and you know, I mean, I'm.
Speaker 6: Trying can trick it somewhere, you know, you.
Speaker 3: Know, you know what's the best protest song I've heard
Speaker 3: in a while? Did you you know this song by
Speaker 3: Brett dennan Ain't No Reason? Oh that's a good one.
Speaker 3: You may have to play it on the show. Yeah,
Speaker 3: it's it's about four years ago and he hasn't, you know,
Speaker 3: become a commercial. You know, I was hoping he was
Speaker 3: going to become bigger because that song's power did sign
Speaker 3: I wanted to, But I think he may have stayed independent.
Speaker 3: I'm not sure what became with you Brett denn and
Speaker 3: d E N and the N and the song is
Speaker 3: Ain't No Reason strong ship. But so yeah, somebody's going
Speaker 3: to come along, and you know what, whoever it does
Speaker 3: and does it right is going to own it because
Speaker 3: nobody else is doing it. So there's that giant hole.
Speaker 3: David Foster likes to talk about that hole in the marketplace.
Speaker 3: Sometimes I don't think this is what he meant. But
Speaker 3: in this in this case, there is a void, and
Speaker 3: somebody's going to come along and fill that void. And
Speaker 3: you know, some of the rappers are talking some straight stuff, right,
Speaker 3: but yeah, I mean.
Speaker 6: Chance logic, yeah, logic definitely, so.
Speaker 3: You know, but it doesn't it's not anywhere near what
Speaker 3: it could be and should be. Where's the Colin Kaepernick
Speaker 3: of music? Come on, let's go.
Speaker 2: Celebrity has ruined the industry. And that's the thing. Even
Speaker 2: if we find that person.
Speaker 1: They're gonna go off for the reality show and.
Speaker 2: They'll be lifted to celebrity heights so big that they
Speaker 2: can't you know, they they would have to. Unfortunately, I
Speaker 2: mean Kurt Kobaine's solution to that. You know what his
Speaker 2: solution to avoiding becoming a cliche was, And that's, you know,
Speaker 2: sadly what the reality is.
Speaker 1: It's like, we find something and then we in trying
Speaker 1: to avoid a cliche, he became one.
Speaker 3: So I'll tell you this. I think somebody's out there
Speaker 3: probably listening to this show who's got that gene that
Speaker 3: won't let them be anything other than what they're meant
Speaker 3: to be, which is exactly what we're hoping for. You know,
Speaker 3: there's one motherfucker out there who's going to come out
Speaker 3: and be like because they need to, because they have to,
Speaker 3: and and they don't care about you know, sponsorships, and
Speaker 3: they don't care about you know, I mean, it exists.
Speaker 3: And if, like I said, the time is so ripe now,
Speaker 3: oh my god.
Speaker 5: Then how do you keep that kind of person motivated
Speaker 5: to stay in the business Because you get these acts
Speaker 5: that are they get hyped up to become the next
Speaker 5: h next big thing and then they turn to Ja
Speaker 5: Electronica and disappeared in front of an xbox for six years.
Speaker 3: I think I think that that person does exist, And
Speaker 3: like I said, it's it's almost like they're gonna have
Speaker 3: to plug Maclamore made some really important records, right, I feel.
Speaker 7: Like every time he does it kind of almost yes.
Speaker 7: But yeah, that White Privilege, that song was amazing, but
Speaker 7: I feel like nobody ever.
Speaker 3: Heard Yeah so was the one the one about the
Speaker 3: same Love. What a beautiful, beautiful record, I mean amazing.
Speaker 3: And some of the statements he made her so powerful,
Speaker 3: you know, I wish there was more of that, you know,
Speaker 3: And but I but I'm an optimist and I believe
Speaker 3: there will be because it has to be a reaction,
Speaker 3: always has to be in a yang.
Speaker 2: Speaking of which, Okay, I gotta say I was joking
Speaker 2: by saying, speaking of which, let's talk about.
Speaker 1: Kid Rock man.
Speaker 2: No, I gotta say, even though his politics anger the
Speaker 2: ship out of me.
Speaker 3: Speaking of Kid Rock, I loved Hamilton, No, but I was.
Speaker 2: I will say that of any story of an artist
Speaker 2: getting signed to a label, uh, his story is the greatest,
Speaker 2: funniest story of all time, almost to the point where
Speaker 2: I think I would almost invite him on the show
Speaker 2: to do a one on one without you guys just.
Speaker 1: Scared scared? Oh no you should be.
Speaker 3: No, I mean we were.
Speaker 1: We were thrilling. I mean, he ain't gonna, we ain't gonna.
Speaker 2: God damn Kate walk right, But but do I keep
Speaker 2: it respectful?
Speaker 1: Yeah? But a Republican he wasn't running. He was he was.
Speaker 1: He was trying to sell us out.
Speaker 6: He's not, okay because I appreciate it. Rock he said
Speaker 6: some things that have been listened lately that I don't
Speaker 6: know him no anymore?
Speaker 2: No, no, yeah, no more?
Speaker 3: How about those next seven and man things? You know
Speaker 3: looking up.
Speaker 1: Who won last?
Speaker 2: So okay, I'm trying to move you down the timeline.
Speaker 2: Why did you leave Atlantic Records? Did you have when?
Speaker 1: When?
Speaker 3: Uh?
Speaker 2: I'm at Urican? First of all, just Okay, you already
Speaker 2: explained that he was a guy like were you. Was
Speaker 2: he approachable at all? Or was like when he was
Speaker 2: in the building, everyone like straightened up and cleaned off
Speaker 2: their desk and pulled out the yo yo.
Speaker 3: And that's how I thought it, I was supposed to
Speaker 3: be until I met him, and then I realized that
Speaker 3: he was cooler than any of us, you know. And
Speaker 3: he could he was known him. He could drink any
Speaker 3: of the rock stars under the table. He could party
Speaker 3: with the best of him.
Speaker 1: What was his best story to you?
Speaker 3: Oh?
Speaker 2: His best story so many.
Speaker 3: So he told me a story about when he was
Speaker 3: at mixed wedding to Bianca, which one he was the best,
Speaker 3: He was the best man. And it was in the
Speaker 3: south of France, beautiful day, and he tells me they're
Speaker 3: having a reception outdoors and everybody's there, all the local
Speaker 3: officials are there, the mayor, chief of police, everybody else.
Speaker 3: And he says, Keith's walking around with a bag of blow.
Speaker 2: Of course he's this chessut.
Speaker 3: Using one hand to shovel it into his face, right,
Speaker 3: and I hang, you know, and the and he literally
Speaker 3: bumps into the chief of police of whatever it is
Speaker 3: niece or whatever town they're in. I remember it. And
Speaker 3: so the chief of police says to I'm in French
Speaker 3: because I'm spoke French. He spoke a lot of languages,
Speaker 3: I think, and he says to him something I'm going
Speaker 3: to mess up to French. But he says kiss pudre, right,
Speaker 3: which I think means what is this powder? Right? And
Speaker 3: am it goes, oh, you know what, of course in French.
Speaker 3: But he says, uh, this is they're not only musicians also,
Speaker 3: they're clowns. And he starts pulling this stuff out and
Speaker 3: popping it on his face.
Speaker 8: Right, Yeah, only if I could do that, right.
Speaker 3: But he had stories of Jim Moore, I mean all
Speaker 3: the you know, like everybody. I mean, it's it's so
Speaker 3: great being around him, you know. I do want to
Speaker 3: get back to how I left Atlantic, by the way,
Speaker 3: because that's a great story.
Speaker 1: All right, How did you leave?
Speaker 3: I got fired over a poem that I wrote.
Speaker 6: Yeah, wow, it's the word get you have a time.
Speaker 3: The story goes expecting this. So I was working there.
Speaker 3: I had been named almost twenty five years to the
Speaker 3: day that I walked in there on July thirty first,
Speaker 3: nineteen seventy nine. It was my first day work in
Speaker 3: the Atlantic, and you know, eighteen years old. About twenty
Speaker 3: five years later, I get named chairman and CEO of
Speaker 3: the company. I sold my company, Lava, to them, and
Speaker 3: they offered me the job, and I was It's funny
Speaker 3: because my first reaction when they said, you know, you
Speaker 3: can actually run the place, I was like, you mean
Speaker 3: I get to decide whether it's a snow day, Like
Speaker 3: are you kidding me? Because I still felt like that
Speaker 3: eighteen year old kid. You know, this is under Doug
Speaker 3: Marsh Now, yeah, he's under dunk ye. No, no, no,
Speaker 3: this was under Leor. Now Leor was now running it
Speaker 3: and Edgar. Yeah, Edgar had bought the company and Leor
Speaker 3: was running it right or years Yeah, So there you go.
Speaker 3: So strangely enough, I didn't get along with lee Or.
Speaker 2: I know, thinks what all the guests have been on
Speaker 2: the show have their best lee Or imitations. Ever, so
Speaker 2: even when you talk, Leor say it in the lee
Speaker 2: Or accent, because we'll have a.
Speaker 1: Compilation of everyone imitating le Or on the show.
Speaker 3: So this is Leor on the golf course. You're ready,
Speaker 3: Oh my god, did you see how I hit that?
Speaker 3: You cannot get the gop ball any better than that
Speaker 3: shot was incredible. That shot was amazing.
Speaker 2: Nos, Like I'm talking about or Trump. We don't want
Speaker 2: you to do the President of the United States or
Speaker 2: New York going.
Speaker 3: Let me see, let me do it different. Okay. But
Speaker 3: by the way, I had the misfortune of playing nine
Speaker 3: holes with Trump about six or seven years ago. It's
Speaker 3: a horrible experience. But anyway, Okay, we come back. We're
Speaker 3: gonna come back. Okay.
Speaker 1: So wait, can I ask you? In order to make
Speaker 1: it to.
Speaker 2: That big money level, am I going to have to
Speaker 2: learn how to play golf?
Speaker 4: Oh?
Speaker 3: I think you're doing okay. I mean, I don't know
Speaker 3: who your accounting is, but if you're not, you should
Speaker 3: probably get a new one.
Speaker 2: Powers talking about I'm talking about adding extra zeros to
Speaker 2: my bank account because that's the one common denominator that
Speaker 2: all my peers now that are jumping to that film,
Speaker 2: that are making successful film and Louise Cliff jumped to
Speaker 2: the other side of the mountain. They're all suddenly like playing.
Speaker 3: And I'm not Puff doesn't play golf, does he?
Speaker 6: He does music video?
Speaker 3: So you never mentioned it to me?
Speaker 2: Do you like golf? Wer do you know that's the
Speaker 2: language of the well.
Speaker 3: No, no, I like golf. It's a really fun sport.
Speaker 3: And you know, I actually broke kid Rock as a
Speaker 3: result of a golf game. So it's been it's it's
Speaker 3: very good for business. You know, it's because think about it,
Speaker 3: you're out there for four hours, you're walking around, you're socializing.
Speaker 3: You know, it's it's beautiful. You're walking around on grass
Speaker 3: and there's like trees and water and birds and ship
Speaker 3: it's nice. And that's something. When you hit a golf
Speaker 3: ball correctly, which doesn't happen that often for even the
Speaker 3: best pros, they'll say, like you know, they don't actually like.
Speaker 3: But when you actually pure the golf ball, you can
Speaker 3: feel the ball compressed because you know that's physics, right,
Speaker 3: The ball compresses and then explodes out. The energy explodes
Speaker 3: out the other side, and you can actually feel the
Speaker 3: ball compress against the club through your hands and into
Speaker 3: your soul. I mean, it is like being connected to
Speaker 3: the center of the fucking universe. And and then you
Speaker 3: get unlike other sports, nobody hits you, nobody tackles. You
Speaker 3: don't have to run, you don't have to catch anything.
Speaker 3: You just stand there and admire your work as the
Speaker 3: sails out over the horizon and lands gently on the green.
Speaker 3: I mean it's a feeling, that is, it's our gasmic.
Speaker 6: I'm telling you do need a couple of coins though.
Speaker 7: That is the sport that you need coins for, because
Speaker 7: you got to get into the golf course.
Speaker 6: But you're fine, okay, Well you can play public and
Speaker 6: warm up.
Speaker 3: I used to play public golf courses all the time
Speaker 3: before free or just well yeah, I mean you gotta
Speaker 3: pay something.
Speaker 7: I like playing golf. I'm not gonna say I'm good
Speaker 7: at it, but I do like playing.
Speaker 6: Black defying me. I like to play golf. I've had
Speaker 6: a couple of Well, I haven't a man.
Speaker 1: You gotta wait for a man.
Speaker 6: I don't wait. But I'm just saying it's nice to
Speaker 6: deal with a partner.
Speaker 3: Okay, so let's go play some golf. I will post
Speaker 3: it on our Instagram. We're gonna go do it. I'll
Speaker 3: take you on playing the snow because it's getting Coldut
Speaker 3: I don't care.
Speaker 2: He judged potential business partners or people that you're gonna
Speaker 2: work with based on their golf game.
Speaker 3: No, I mean, I don't care how somebody plays as
Speaker 3: long as they don't play slow. That's if you're starting out,
Speaker 3: just don't play slow.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 3: I mean, nobody cares if you're good or bad or whatever.
Speaker 3: Everybody's pretty wpped up in their own ship. But you know,
Speaker 3: you just like keep it moving, and you know, it's
Speaker 3: just it's a fun it's a fun game. It's extremely
Speaker 3: frustrating game too, by the way. It's it's the craziest
Speaker 3: thing because some days you can or you go from.
Speaker 1: Hole to hole.
Speaker 3: You could play like Tiger Woods. One hole in the
Speaker 3: next hole, you're playing like super Sales, you know. So, yeah,
Speaker 3: it's really weird. What a reference. I know, I gotta
Speaker 3: tell you the poem story before. Yes, so I wasn't
Speaker 3: getting along with Lee or right, I don't know. I
Speaker 3: found it ironic that his name was liar, you know
Speaker 3: what I mean. And one irony was killing me day
Speaker 3: to day. So we didn't get a lot, and uh,
Speaker 3: it was a very frustrating experience, you know. It was
Speaker 3: it was a fun time and I signed Hailey Williams
Speaker 3: back that it was called Paramore right and it was
Speaker 3: you know, I was only chairman of Atlantic for about
Speaker 3: a year, but it was good. It was you know.
Speaker 3: I loved the was it? What was it that was?
Speaker 3: I'm gonna say two thousand and.
Speaker 1: Three or four so, ok okay before you guys.
Speaker 3: No no, no, no, no, no, no, two thousand and
Speaker 3: five probably whatever right around there.
Speaker 2: That was when we signed. I was in my group,
Speaker 2: little brother. We signed like oh four five.
Speaker 3: I think I didn't fuck that up for you anyway.
Speaker 1: It was or it was kind of already fun up
Speaker 1: before we got to use it.
Speaker 3: Got it, okay, dodge that bullet, okay, so.
Speaker 1: Wouldn't be funny. This was like not even a real podcast.
Speaker 1: There was revenge for that anyway. Go ahead, a big
Speaker 1: Sun present you for the revenge forgetting Yeah.
Speaker 3: My god, everyone's always out to get the Jews.
Speaker 6: Anyway, so it's going to replace us, That's what I hear.
Speaker 3: I had to go there.
Speaker 1: So yeah, quiet, you've ever been to you? So I'm
Speaker 1: not feeling well.
Speaker 6: So I'm just laying back and Jason's got just doing
Speaker 6: it for me.
Speaker 3: Yeah, solidarity, So.
Speaker 6: Ask you an old question. We just go back real quick.
Speaker 7: Not an old question, a question from your coming up
Speaker 7: because I thought I read something the poems the poem
Speaker 7: the poem, sorry.
Speaker 3: But don't forget you.
Speaker 6: I won't forget it.
Speaker 1: Write it down.
Speaker 3: So anyway, So here it is about a year and
Speaker 3: a quarter into my you know, tenure as chairman and CEO.
Speaker 3: It is my favorite record company in the world, Atlantic Records.
Speaker 3: And Edgar was going to be honored by the u
Speaker 3: j A at a music industry lunch and that's a
Speaker 3: Humanitarian of the Year award or whatever I think it was.
Speaker 3: And so is the United Jewish Appeal, major Jewish charity. Wonderful,
Speaker 3: wonderful charity. Anyway, So there was a kickoff breakfast and
Speaker 3: the chairman of all the different companies came and so
Speaker 3: I pledged a bunch of money to the uj and
Speaker 3: Edgar's honor, which was appropriate thing to do, and also
Speaker 3: I think it's a great charity. So a couple of
Speaker 3: weeks go by and I get a call from I
Speaker 3: don't know, somebody from the UJA, Steve Stu whatever his
Speaker 3: name was, right, and I'm like, hey, what's up? And
Speaker 3: he goes, you know, you gave us a bunch of money.
Speaker 3: You know, you get a full page ad in the booklet,
Speaker 3: you know, but it's it's due tomorrow. You know, what
Speaker 3: do you wanted to say? So off the top of
Speaker 3: my head. Now, bear in mind, our stock had just
Speaker 3: gone public and wasn't doing so well. You probably remember
Speaker 3: that one of music group Stock, the IPO had just happened.
Speaker 3: So off the top of my head, I said, how
Speaker 3: about this. Roses are reddish, violets are bluish. Our stocks
Speaker 3: in the toilet. But at least we're both Jewish. So
Speaker 3: I was Steve, he goes, are you sure about that?
Speaker 3: I was like, oh, you said, I have twenty four hours.
Speaker 3: Let me let me run it by few people, right,
Speaker 3: So I read it by a few people. Everybody's reaction
Speaker 3: was the same as yours. And I even called up
Speaker 3: Edgar's brother in law, who was working at the company
Speaker 3: at that time, and I said to him, as it
Speaker 3: was Alex, I said, Alex, what do you think?
Speaker 1: Like?
Speaker 3: I mean, you know, I tried to rewrite it, but
Speaker 3: you can't. It's perfect, right, You couldn't change one word
Speaker 3: in that. It's poetic perfection. So I call Alex like
Speaker 3: he says, listen, Edgar has a wonderful sense of humor.
Speaker 3: I know he's going to love this. In fact, I'm
Speaker 3: so sure that if he doesn't, I'll take the heat.
Speaker 3: I was like, okay, So I had the art department
Speaker 3: mock up the ad with some roses on the page
Speaker 3: and stuff, you know. And what I didn't anticipate was
Speaker 3: that people at the lunch. You know, it's not the
Speaker 3: most exciting lunch in the world, right, I mean, you
Speaker 3: got some speeches there, they're a little bit ponderous. And
Speaker 3: so what you do in these in these lunches, you
Speaker 3: go through the booklet, right, and every ads the same Edgar, congratulations,
Speaker 3: you're wonderful. What are You're a fantastic honor umanitarian? This
Speaker 3: that yours schmoozer, You're fantastic. And then you come to
Speaker 3: my ad and people were like spitting out their food.
Speaker 3: You try to to try and not to laugh because
Speaker 3: everything's quiet because the guy's up there making a speech
Speaker 3: about a serious issue, right about their helping people, and
Speaker 3: you know that wherever they are, the things they're doing,
Speaker 3: and you know, and you can't be just breaking out
Speaker 3: and then make matters worse. The Daily News ran my
Speaker 3: poem under the headline Edgar can't even get respect from
Speaker 3: his own CEO. Yeah, so I guess that didn't Unfortunately,
Speaker 3: I didn't have a poetry clause in my contract, so
Speaker 3: I was, I was paid. You know, I got fired
Speaker 3: and I got paid out and then I went to
Speaker 3: run Virgin, and you know that was a fun time too,
Speaker 3: so you know, and actually when I took over Virgin,
Speaker 3: I'll show you this I took over. You can't see
Speaker 3: it on the radio, but I'm gonna show it to
Speaker 3: you anyway. When I took over Virgin, which was shortly thereafter,
Speaker 3: the hottest movie in the country was the fourty year
Speaker 3: old Virgin. Everybody remembers that iconic poster with his face
Speaker 3: on it, right, So I decided, rather than run a
Speaker 3: normal announcement Jason Flaming, chairman and CEO Virgin Records, I
Speaker 3: decided to take a picture as him. Right, So I
Speaker 3: bought a wig and uh, and I bought a shirt
Speaker 3: and this is what it. I can pull this out
Speaker 3: of my walle to show it to you. I ran
Speaker 3: this ad full page in Billboard and hits.
Speaker 9: He pulled, except I mean, come on, can we use
Speaker 9: that photo advertised.
Speaker 3: To use it for whatever you want? That was my thing. Yeah,
Speaker 3: I think I bet the card in the process. I
Speaker 3: can get you a clean one, though, But yeah, so
Speaker 3: it was. It was really a fun time. Virgin was great.
Speaker 3: You know, we turned that place around. That was you know,
Speaker 3: red jumpsuit apparatus was the first thing I signed, actually
Speaker 3: the day after I got there. And then Katy Perry
Speaker 3: and you know, the thirty second of Mars was amazing.
Speaker 3: You know. Jared Leto is a force of nature. That guy.
Speaker 3: He's one of those rare people that everything he does,
Speaker 3: like Jamie Fox, right, everything he does is perfect. It's
Speaker 3: like annoying almost.
Speaker 6: Right, well, not every single but yeah, yeah, I got.
Speaker 3: That same watching Hamilton. You know what the worst thing
Speaker 3: about going to see Hamilton is, I'll tell you right now.
Speaker 3: You sit there and you just feel I feel so inadequate,
Speaker 3: you know, I mean not only because of the the
Speaker 3: unreal accomplishment of Lynn Manuel Moritta writing and producing and
Speaker 3: everything and doing everything around that show, but also Hamilton himself.
Speaker 3: You're saying the way I haven't done ship in my life.
Speaker 3: Oh my god. People were like, hey, you don't pretty good.
Speaker 3: I'm like, nah, I haven't done anything. It sucks.
Speaker 2: So, yeah, what a thing is listening to j Z
Speaker 2: likes about how well?
Speaker 3: Yeahology, you know, but and yeah, and Hamilton, I mean,
Speaker 3: good for you, by the way, I mean it really is.
Speaker 3: And and by the way, there's the there's a rebelliousness ironically,
Speaker 3: right that we had to go back to the founding
Speaker 3: fathers to get some rebelliousness back in our culture. And
Speaker 3: it is. But it's it's so nice to see how
Speaker 3: that thing has become, you know what it is, because
Speaker 3: it's so important and it's so profoundly it's just I mean,
Speaker 3: it's perfect. It's one of the only when I went
Speaker 3: to see that and people are like, well, is the
Speaker 3: first time, and people are like, is it as good
Speaker 3: as the hype? I'm like, you know, it's probably the
Speaker 3: best thing since either Prints at the bottom line or
Speaker 3: Zeppelin at the garden?
Speaker 2: Did you see Hamilton pre hype or like two thousand
Speaker 2: dollars a ticket hype?
Speaker 3: So here's what happened is amazing. I went my son
Speaker 3: is in the business, Mike Flom, and he's really excited.
Speaker 3: I'm on your show, by the way. But anyway, because
Speaker 3: he's a student of and he was working when he
Speaker 3: was sixteen years old, he started working with Roys to
Speaker 3: five nine, and so we were down in the studio
Speaker 3: with Royce in Atlanta, and I was I started talking
Speaker 3: to him about Hamilton and he goes, this is when
Speaker 3: Hamilton had first come out, and he was like, oh,
Speaker 3: that guy called me the other day, Lynn Manuel Miranda guy.
Speaker 3: I was like, what'd you say? He goes, I didn't
Speaker 3: know who he was. I didn't take his call. I
Speaker 3: was like, holy shit, dude, Like are you like, let's
Speaker 3: get on the phone and get us in, you know,
Speaker 3: like and so he called and Lynn got us tickets
Speaker 3: and I went with with with his manager as well
Speaker 3: as my son Mike, to like flying to Ce Hamilton.
Speaker 3: So it was pretty early on and then Lynn took
Speaker 3: us back stage afterwards because you know Lynn, well, you
Speaker 3: know better than anybody who loves he loves the great one.
Speaker 3: Then Royce's is one of the real greats and hip
Speaker 3: hop in my opinions. So so we got to see
Speaker 3: it as his guests, and it was just a magical,
Speaker 3: magical experience, you know.
Speaker 2: So I need to know with you being in the
Speaker 2: position that you're in as far as being in the
Speaker 2: business by that point, like thirty plus years, running three
Speaker 2: labels and pretty much signing like you know, people's highlights, Yeah,
Speaker 2: how the hell did you sort of take a detour
Speaker 2: into social justice? Because I because I feel like if
Speaker 2: you if you're going to do something, you got to
Speaker 2: do it well and really put your heart into it,
Speaker 2: not just like jack of all trades, master of none.
Speaker 3: So.
Speaker 2: But the thing is is that your you know, your
Speaker 2: your history shows that you're you know, you're deeper than
Speaker 2: one footage plant planet, deeply into the music business and
Speaker 2: and well but you know, your work with social justice
Speaker 2: shouldn't be scoffed at.
Speaker 1: Either because.
Speaker 2: Like why I'm not saying why because like people behind
Speaker 2: in the boardroom shouldn't care about the you know, the
Speaker 2: have nots, but what like what happened? Like what what
Speaker 2: compels you to even care?
Speaker 7: Can you just add a little layer of who your
Speaker 7: parents were to even have your up that situation because
Speaker 7: the fact that you so didn't have to go this way,
Speaker 7: it's kind of ill to me because I know we
Speaker 7: haven't discussed where you came from and which I heard
Speaker 7: your father did some amazing things in a business world,
Speaker 7: so it's really like you really did not have to
Speaker 7: do this, right.
Speaker 3: Yeah, My dad was My dad was my hero. You know.
Speaker 3: He he was the son of immigrants, grew up as
Speaker 3: poor as you could be. He was so poor that
Speaker 3: back then in Brooklyn when he was growing up, they'd
Speaker 3: give your first months free if you moved, and they
Speaker 3: would move every month. That's how poor he was. And he,
Speaker 3: you know, he went to City College at night. And
Speaker 3: it's a great story. Actually, when he got out of
Speaker 3: the army, he wrote a letter to Harvard Law School
Speaker 3: and he said, I don't have any money, and I
Speaker 3: don't have a college degree, but I'm the best thing
Speaker 3: since sliced bread, and I'm a soldier and if you
Speaker 3: let me in, you won't regret it. And they gave
Speaker 3: him a full scholarship to Harvard Law School, and he
Speaker 3: became that's all. That's not anymore.
Speaker 1: And I also thought you were going to do some
Speaker 1: roses a red couple.
Speaker 3: That was all me. But he no, he you know,
Speaker 3: that was when we actually used to treat our gis
Speaker 3: as with respect, rights, as as they should be you
Speaker 3: know treated. But but don't get me started on that.
Speaker 3: But yeah, so he became one of the greatest lawyers
Speaker 3: of the twentieth century. And you know, there's a chapter
Speaker 3: in Outliers about him, the three less as a Joe Flom.
Speaker 3: But moreover, he told me and my brother, do whatever
Speaker 3: you want to do. Try to be the best at it,
Speaker 3: but just make the world a better place. He says,
Speaker 3: if you do that, that's that's success. That's what I
Speaker 3: call success. And I wanted to be a success in
Speaker 3: his eyes. So so yeah, so he you know, he
Speaker 3: was very driven to make the world a better place himself.
Speaker 3: He was very strong on civil rights and.
Speaker 7: On quality acquisition to like he created a concept or
Speaker 7: something like that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, he he, well, he basically pioneered hostile takeovers and
Speaker 3: proxy contests and all that stuff. And it was at
Speaker 3: a time when you know, Jewish lawyers couldn't get jobs
Speaker 3: at Wall Street firms. So he went to a firm
Speaker 3: that had four he was the fifth lawyer, and they
Speaker 3: had no clients, you know, but they were you know,
Speaker 3: they're trying to figure it out. And then he found
Speaker 3: this niche and and by the time the Wall Street
Speaker 3: firm started getting into it was too late. He was dominant,
Speaker 3: you know. So and then he built his law firm
Speaker 3: up into one of the most powerful in the world.
Speaker 3: And you know, but he did it. He always did
Speaker 3: it the right way. He never cut corners. He you know,
Speaker 3: he treated people with respect, and you know, I remember
Speaker 3: him defending you know, cases, and he did. They did
Speaker 3: a lot. They still do a ton of pro bowl work,
Speaker 3: including for the Innocence Project. By the way, Scadden is
Speaker 3: the firm. It was Scatten Off, Slate, mar and flom
Speaker 3: And because he was the young guy when they started.
Speaker 3: But yeah, so he I remember him when he defended
Speaker 3: the They were trying to get rid of evolution, the
Speaker 3: teaching of evolution in in one of those states, Kansas
Speaker 3: or something, and he sent his Scatten like team of
Speaker 3: lawyers out there and he was so excited when he
Speaker 3: then he came back and they won. You know, that
Speaker 3: was his ship, you know. So anyway, so yeah, so
Speaker 3: I grew up. I grew up with him and my mom.
Speaker 3: You know, my mom graduated Cornell when she was eighteen.
Speaker 3: When she used to remind me all the time, especially
Speaker 3: when I was dropping out of college. But anyway, so yeah,
Speaker 3: that was my mother. Was she was. She was doing embarrassing.
Speaker 3: She was actually a decorated when she met my dad.
Speaker 3: That's how she met my dad. When he first got
Speaker 3: any money was because he was in an accident. He
Speaker 3: got hit by a taxi and was in the hospital
Speaker 3: for a long time and got some money, so he
Speaker 3: hired a decorator, and that's how he met my mom.
Speaker 3: So yeah, you know, wherever your mind goes there, I
Speaker 3: guess I can go. But anyway, anyway, So yeah, that's
Speaker 3: how I grew up. And then But what happened was
Speaker 3: that in ninety two or three I read a story
Speaker 3: in the newspaper about a kid who was serving fifteen
Speaker 3: years to life for a non violent first defense cocaine
Speaker 3: possession charge in New York State, and he was in
Speaker 3: maximum security prison. And the reason it was in the
Speaker 3: newspaper was because his mother had been trying to get
Speaker 3: clemency from Governor Cuomo. This was the first Governor Cuomo,
Speaker 3: Mario Cuomo, and she had had She was just a
Speaker 3: homemaker from upstate New York, from Rome, New York, and
Speaker 3: she had gotten letters from the judge. The warden, Geraldine
Speaker 3: Ferraro had written a letter on her behalf right. So
Speaker 3: that's why it was in the newspaper because Cuomo turned
Speaker 3: down Ferraro, who was asking for clemency for this kid
Speaker 3: who had been in for eight and something years already
Speaker 3: for non Like I said, let's just reflect non violent defense, right,
Speaker 3: cocaine possession?
Speaker 2: Can you for our listeners that don't know. Could you
Speaker 2: explain the history of the Rockefeller law so that they
Speaker 2: know why New York's laws have been tougher the early nineties.
Speaker 3: It's odd, you know when you think about it, but
Speaker 3: New York has some of the worst laws in the country.
Speaker 3: I mean, you would think that the Rockefeller laws would
Speaker 3: be more, you know, something that you would see in
Speaker 3: Mississippi or Alabama or something like that. But the fact
Speaker 3: is the Rockefeller drug laws came up under Governor Nelson
Speaker 3: Rockefeller at the time when everybody was getting tough on
Speaker 3: drugs and war on drugs and all this stuff. And
Speaker 3: you know, they made it extremely.
Speaker 6: They put it in the community.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, yeah, there's that too. But yeah, So
Speaker 3: they made these crazy mandatory sentencing laws, and basically they
Speaker 3: took all the power away from the judges and gave
Speaker 3: it to the prosecutors. So the only way out of
Speaker 3: a mandatory sentence is to rat on somebody else. And
Speaker 3: because and so the prosecutors literally have all the powers.
Speaker 3: So they could sit there and say, you, look, what
Speaker 3: do you want to do? Or you can plead guilty, right,
Speaker 3: but even if it's something you didn't do otherwise you're
Speaker 3: looking at this mandatory sentence of you know, could be
Speaker 3: decades in prison, and you know, you never want to
Speaker 3: find yourself in that position. But and judges in so
Speaker 3: many of these cases, judges as they're sentencing somebody will say,
Speaker 3: I wish I didn't have to do this, you know.
Speaker 3: And I had one guy that I was talking to
Speaker 3: who had been sentenced to I don't know, twenty or
Speaker 3: more years in prison than he was out now, and
Speaker 3: he said to me, you know, that was the thing
Speaker 3: to kill me was when the judge said I wish
Speaker 3: I could give you probation. And I'm sitting there going, wait,
Speaker 3: I can accept the sentence, but not when I mean, like,
Speaker 3: how's that working? You know what I mean, like, yeah,
Speaker 3: it's just it's really sickening. So anyway, in this particular case,
Speaker 3: I just read this story and I was I was flabbergasted,
Speaker 3: you know, like I was like, I didn't know about
Speaker 3: these mandatory sentencing laws, as most people don't until they
Speaker 3: get caught up in it. So I contacted a music
Speaker 3: business lawyer, a defense lawyer I knew. The only defense
Speaker 3: lay I knew was a guy Naed Bob Coleena. He
Speaker 3: represented Stone Double Pilots and skid. Oh, and they used
Speaker 3: to get in trouble a lot, as you remember. Yeah,
Speaker 3: So I called Bob. I was like, Bob, can you
Speaker 3: do anybody this? He says, nothing you can do about it.
Speaker 3: It's Rockefeller drug laws is just the way it is.
Speaker 3: I was like, well, can you talk to this woman
Speaker 3: on the phone, because I'd called missus Lennon. That was
Speaker 3: her name, was in the newspaper, Shirley Lennon. I just
Speaker 3: called her and I said, look, you probably think I'm
Speaker 3: some freak from New York, but I got to do something.
Speaker 3: I don't have a lot of money because I didn't
Speaker 3: back then, but I'll send you what I can, maybe
Speaker 3: get a new appeal or something. And she said on Jason,
Speaker 3: He goes, we've exhausted. We've spent all of our savings
Speaker 3: on lawyers, and we've exhausted all of our appeals and
Speaker 3: this was our last hope. And she says, you know,
Speaker 3: crazy thing is there was a murderer who went to
Speaker 3: the prison same prison as my son, after my son,
Speaker 3: and he's out and my son's not eligible parole for
Speaker 3: another seven years.
Speaker 2: And I was like, and this just for cocaine powdered possessions.
Speaker 3: Yeah, cocaine powder possession. It was four point two ounces, right,
Speaker 3: so it wasn't a little bit. But the fact is
Speaker 3: even still you know the cliff, there's a cliff right
Speaker 3: over four ounces and York State possession is an A
Speaker 3: one felony. So it's like, you know, it's like murder
Speaker 3: one two to four ounces is an A two. But
Speaker 3: he had four point two ounces.
Speaker 2: Now, was there a difference if it's powder cocaine or
Speaker 2: if it's crack. I mean, back in ninety one, we're.
Speaker 3: Well, we're talking. I don't know exactly what the difference
Speaker 3: was back then. That was when crack was first coming up, right,
Speaker 3: But in the federal system there's a huge difference. And
Speaker 3: I actually worked on the legislation that rolled back the
Speaker 3: mandatory sentencing of laws with crack because crack used to
Speaker 3: be treated one hundred times more severely than coke. And
Speaker 3: there's a very simple reason why, and I don't have
Speaker 3: to tell you what it is, because it's lost smart
Speaker 3: people in the road. So yeah, So I worked with
Speaker 3: Senator Durbin and others on that bill, which was the
Speaker 3: first mandatory sentencing rollback in America in forty years, and
Speaker 3: the best deal we could make with the Republicans was
Speaker 3: to change it from one hundred and one to eighteen
Speaker 3: to one. And the worst part of it is that
Speaker 3: it wasn't done retroactively, which always blows my mind. Like,
Speaker 3: if we're acknowledging that a law is wrong, how is
Speaker 3: it wrong now? But it wasn't wrong before? It doesn't
Speaker 3: make any sense. And I worked very actively on the
Speaker 3: clemencies that President Obama granted to so many of those
Speaker 3: people that are serving what are illegal sentences.
Speaker 2: So you're saying that once it was turned around, they
Speaker 2: decided to not even go back to reverse all those
Speaker 2: wrongful convictions.
Speaker 3: No, it was, like I said, it wasn't retroactively. So
Speaker 3: if you were, if you were so misfortunate as to
Speaker 3: be busted before the law was changed, you're gonna you're
Speaker 3: still sitting there in prison to eat that. And I was,
Speaker 3: you know, I was really trying hard to get the
Speaker 3: Obama administration to grant clemency to all of those people
Speaker 3: unless they had committed some terrible crime while they're in prison,
Speaker 3: because again, it doesn't make any sense. How can you
Speaker 3: shade it? How can you look that guy in the
Speaker 3: eye and go dude, you should have been busted a
Speaker 3: few weeks later. You know, you'd be out, you'd be
Speaker 3: home with your family, you'd have four years instead of
Speaker 3: twenty five whatever it would be. It's you know, it's
Speaker 3: literally was reduced by eighty something percent the sentences, but
Speaker 3: those people are still in something. Now. President Obama did
Speaker 3: grant clemens to a lot of them, and you know,
Speaker 3: I worked with the NACDL and other organizations on those clemencies,
Speaker 3: and you know, he granted over seventeen hundred clemencies. Not
Speaker 3: all of them were crack sentences, but a lot of
Speaker 3: them were. But there's still thousands of other people who
Speaker 3: were still stuck in there, and obviously they're going to
Speaker 3: be for the foreseeable future if they're in the federal system.
Speaker 3: But back to the original story. So, so Bob as
Speaker 3: a favorite of me, calls missus Lennon and he says
Speaker 3: to me, look, I don't have any hope for this,
Speaker 3: but I'm gonna read the transcripts as a favor to
Speaker 3: you because I was a good client. I guess right,
Speaker 3: and he takes the case pro bono, and five months
Speaker 3: later we ended up in a court house, a courtroom
Speaker 3: in Malone, New York by the Canadian border, and I
Speaker 3: was sitting there. They brought Stephen in in shackles. I
Speaker 3: was like, who is he? Charles Manson? This isiculous. Legs
Speaker 3: were chained together, his hands were changed to his waist,
Speaker 3: and I sat there holding Missus Lennon's hand, and the judge,
Speaker 3: who I thought was never going to give us a
Speaker 3: break because he looked like a conservative guy, he said something,
Speaker 3: I haven't heard anything in this courtroom today understatute this
Speaker 3: section app But he was all this legal mumba joh.
Speaker 3: I don't know what he's talking about. And then he
Speaker 3: goes but under the power vested in me that is
Speaker 3: stated in New York, the motion is granted. Whoa thing down?
Speaker 3: And I was like, what the fuck? And then Bob
Speaker 3: comes over. I was like, Bob, what happened? Because we won?
Speaker 3: I was like, get the fuck out of me. Way
Speaker 3: so he so. So Bob found this angle right, which
Speaker 3: is that he and I don't even know how this worked.
Speaker 3: But there were two kids in the car when Steven
Speaker 3: got arrested. He was driving and his friend was in
Speaker 3: the pastor's seat. They got pulled. One of them got
Speaker 3: out to take a leak apparently, and the cops saw
Speaker 3: him and came over and searched the car, found the
Speaker 3: found the coke under the seat. Whose is it? Most
Speaker 3: kids say, it's not mine. Well, everybody should know out there,
Speaker 3: if you're in a car and the drugs are in
Speaker 3: the car, it's yours, right if everybody everybody in the
Speaker 3: it could be twenty of you in the car and
Speaker 3: be a clown car. Okay, it belongs to everybody, and
Speaker 3: all of it belongs to.
Speaker 1: This possession, not ownership. That's that's what. So how much
Speaker 1: coke was it though?
Speaker 3: Like four point two ounces, so just over the cliff right,
Speaker 3: just over the limit. It's really the terrible, terrible coincidence there. So,
Speaker 3: so both kids said it wasn't mine. Both kids pleaded
Speaker 3: it and sin Steven's lawyer told him, will I will
Speaker 3: win this case where I'll hang up my shingle? Right,
Speaker 3: he should have pleaded guilty because he was guilty, but
Speaker 3: the other kid was not guilty. The other kid was
Speaker 3: a passenger, and both of them ended up getting fifteen
Speaker 3: years to life. Now after he went to prison. Yeah,
Speaker 3: so after he went to prison, Stephen wrote letters saying listen,
Speaker 3: this was me it wasn't him, but their response was
Speaker 3: too late. You know, you should have said so before.
Speaker 3: So they eventually allowed the other kid, whose name I
Speaker 3: don't remember, to plead down to an A two fel
Speaker 3: and I think he was released after eight years for
Speaker 3: something he didn't do, by the way, God dude. And
Speaker 3: then my guy Bob went in and said, you can't
Speaker 3: treat the same crime. It's the same crime. You can't
Speaker 3: treat the two guys differently for the same crime. They
Speaker 3: both picted the same crime. Basically, you know, I'm garbing
Speaker 3: it was twenty five years ago, but that was the
Speaker 3: basic argument, and it worked, you know, and Stephen got out, you.
Speaker 2: Can't send us one guy to eight years and another
Speaker 2: guy to twenty for the same thing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, fifteen the life but yeah, so you know. So anyway,
Speaker 3: it was a cathartic experience, as you can imagine. And
Speaker 3: I said, holy shit, that was the best feeling I know.
Speaker 3: I mean, losing my virginity was good, but even this
Speaker 3: was even better, you know what I mean, By the way,
Speaker 3: I lost our virginity at a yes cozer the matters
Speaker 3: of course, seventy six bases, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes,
Speaker 3: that would have been funk here audience.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yes, I was like, yo, do it.
Speaker 3: Was actually in the skybox in the bathroom. Yeah, it
Speaker 3: was a romathic but anyway, but the that's how I
Speaker 3: knew I was ended up working at Atlantic because yes, it
Speaker 3: was a land So anyway, So what I did then
Speaker 3: was I, I, you know, I experience, you know, hit
Speaker 3: me so hard that I did some research. I found
Speaker 3: out about Families Against Mandatory Minimums, which you talked about before,
Speaker 3: a fam which had just started. I called them up.
Speaker 3: I joined their board. That led me to the Drug
Speaker 3: Policy Alliance, the Legal Action Center, and then I saw
Speaker 3: some on TV about the Innocence Project and that's when
Speaker 3: I really like went into overdrive because that hit me.
Speaker 3: This was again, almost twenty five years ago. The Insty
Speaker 3: Project had just started and one of their cases was
Speaker 3: on TV and I was like, holy shit, that's even worse, right,
Speaker 3: this is a motherfucker who was innocent and got sentenced
Speaker 3: to death or life in prison or whatever it was.
Speaker 3: And I called them up. And you know, at the time,
Speaker 3: there's only only the two founders working there and maybe
Speaker 3: maybe a I don't know, maybe they had a receptionist
Speaker 3: or something. And so you could just call and get
Speaker 3: them on the phone. I went in and met with
Speaker 3: them and I set them all in and I was
Speaker 3: and I became the founding board member. And it's really
Speaker 3: become my life's work. I mean, I you know, I
Speaker 3: still love music and I love my job, but I
Speaker 3: love this more.
Speaker 1: More than Twisted sistern. This is more important than twist.
Speaker 3: Woke up.
Speaker 2: When we were in the elevator before I was to table,
Speaker 2: you were talking that you were in Virginia.
Speaker 1: You were doing some work in Virginia.
Speaker 2: You are a prison in Virginia before you came here yesterday?
Speaker 1: Yesterday? Yeah, what was that about?
Speaker 8: So?
Speaker 3: I do you know I have a podcast now called
Speaker 3: Wrongful Conviction. Yes you do, And on it I interview
Speaker 3: I interview people who have been wrongfully convicted of crimes
Speaker 3: they didn't commit.
Speaker 2: It's a very heartbreaking podcast. I mean redemption at the end,
Speaker 2: but it's hard to hear people lose those decades.
Speaker 3: Man, Just one story is crazier than the other. And
Speaker 3: sometimes I go inside prison and interview people who I
Speaker 3: believe to be innocent who need to get out, but
Speaker 3: also on occasion I will. And now my inbox is
Speaker 3: going to be flooded. But you know, I only have
Speaker 3: twenty four hours in a day like anybody else. But
Speaker 3: sometimes if I think I can make a difference, I'll
Speaker 3: take on an individual case that's not an INNOCENTCE project case,
Speaker 3: or I'll just join a team that's already working to
Speaker 3: try to get somebody exonerated and try to connect the dots,
Speaker 3: either with the legal team or with you know, clemency,
Speaker 3: which I've been successful at enough times. You know, I
Speaker 3: was saying, I've seen too many miracles to stop believing
Speaker 3: in miracles, and it is a miracle when it works.
Speaker 3: But I've got you know, I've been successful more than
Speaker 3: a few times on taking on the case that I
Speaker 3: see an injustice and actually getting that person freed.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 7: Can I ask you do you guys work with prisoners
Speaker 7: inside of the prison like as it's personal to me
Speaker 7: because I have a friend who's been inside the New
Speaker 7: Jersey prison system for a while now, highly educated activists
Speaker 7: in a way. And it's funny because does he actually
Speaker 7: sent me a whole essay about what's going on with
Speaker 7: the water system that actually had a whole bunch of
Speaker 7: water coming to the prison when the water was dirty
Speaker 7: and they never used it. It was bags and bags and
Speaker 7: bags and bags of water. So he wrote this essay
Speaker 7: about how they actually had a balloon party and the guards,
Speaker 7: you know, kind of just poured it out at a
Speaker 7: time when we're going through what we're going through with
Speaker 7: Puerto Rico, you know, and so you know, he kind
Speaker 7: of felt some type of way about that and wrote
Speaker 7: the essay. But I'm curious, is there an opportunity for
Speaker 7: prisoners in that way organizational wise to speak and it's
Speaker 7: hard for them to speak out, So I don't know
Speaker 7: if you have any direction with that it turns to
Speaker 7: speak out about the issues that are going to the
Speaker 7: wrongful inside of the prison as well.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean that's a whole other area that I'm
Speaker 3: not an expert on. There are definitely organizations that are
Speaker 3: devoted to that. I know the Correctional Association in New
Speaker 3: York is one of.
Speaker 7: Them, and I know the New Jersey prison system is
Speaker 7: a mother Anyway, the reputation weren't all really.
Speaker 6: Really is there.
Speaker 7: It's funny because I was like, in my mind, is
Speaker 7: there a top three like states where it's.
Speaker 1: Like were you to go?
Speaker 6: You don't want to go to jail, You just don't
Speaker 6: want to be there.
Speaker 3: Well, I mean the laced, I mean it's it's you know, look,
Speaker 3: we are in a situation now where we have four
Speaker 3: zero point four percent of the world's population, right, almost
Speaker 3: four and a half percent of the world's population. We
Speaker 3: have twenty five percent of the world's prison population. So
Speaker 3: we lock people up at more than five times the
Speaker 3: rate of the rest of the civilized world. Now, chew
Speaker 3: on this one. We lock up black men in America
Speaker 3: per capita at a rate that is six times higher
Speaker 3: than South Africa at the height of apartheid. Okay, just
Speaker 3: fucking chew on that for a second. And then there's women, right,
Speaker 3: which is the fastest growing part of the prison population.
Speaker 3: We have thirty three percent of the world's female prison population.
Speaker 3: So what do you can what kind of conclusions can
Speaker 3: you draw?
Speaker 6: Oh my god, it's look what is it done?
Speaker 3: Yeah, or in a lot of cases, a single parent,
Speaker 3: you know, whatever it is, it's it's still devastating to
Speaker 3: the communities, and it doesn't make any sense. It doesn't work,
Speaker 3: it doesn't promote public safety, it doesn't help anything or
Speaker 3: anybody except the private prison industry, which is only six
Speaker 3: percent of the prisons but still that's too much. It
Speaker 3: should be no private prisons, and you know, prisons should
Speaker 3: be focused on rehabilitation. I mean, first of all, we
Speaker 3: had three hundred thousand people in prison the thirty years ago,
Speaker 3: you know what I mean. Like now we're at two
Speaker 3: point two million right including a half a million who
Speaker 3: right now while we're sitting here eating donuts and playing
Speaker 3: ping pong and talking about fucking whatever. So there's a
Speaker 3: half a million people in jail in America right now
Speaker 3: just because they can't post bail. And that's another thing
Speaker 3: I've been extremely active in is bail reform, and that's
Speaker 3: starting to really feel like a movement now because you
Speaker 3: can't have a system in which we have two we
Speaker 3: have two separate systems of justice. That's what it comes
Speaker 3: down to. What if you have money, what if you
Speaker 3: don't have money? And that is a violation of the
Speaker 3: sixth Amendment and the fourteenth Amendment, equal protection and due
Speaker 3: process and the Brown Laws.
Speaker 7: Because I feel like this opioid epidemic is not going
Speaker 7: to provide as many prisoners in prison as the crackademic epidemic.
Speaker 3: I don't know that's the reason. First of all, they're
Speaker 3: all dying you know what I mean, So you can't
Speaker 3: put them in prison after their death.
Speaker 6: Somebody's selling it to women, is not just in the pharmacy.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so yeah, No, it's it's bad. I mean, sixty
Speaker 3: four thousand opioid deaths in America last year passed. It
Speaker 3: became the number one cause of death.
Speaker 7: I believe it, but I do not think that it
Speaker 7: will have the impact of crack.
Speaker 1: No, they're not gonna lock them up with no.
Speaker 2: No.
Speaker 3: Of course. Now that goes back to like, oh, do
Speaker 3: we really even have to say it?
Speaker 6: I mean, sometimes you do.
Speaker 7: Sometimes you in today in twenty seventeen, unfortunately you do.
Speaker 6: Well.
Speaker 2: I would like to ask eighteen because I feel like
Speaker 2: the Mount Saint Helen's of Innocent Project poster representative, Uh,
Speaker 2: I would like to know what your feelings are or
Speaker 2: if you even tried to come close to anything remotely
Speaker 2: touching the case of Philadelphia's own Momia abul Jamar. And
Speaker 2: do you think that there's any chance in hell that
Speaker 2: even if his case could be reopened and reintroduced with
Speaker 2: whatever new You know, because I've been hearing like since
Speaker 2: the nineties that there's evidence that they wouldn't let us
Speaker 2: enter and d but I also know, you know, I'm
Speaker 2: a Philadelphian, especially growing up doing the Frank Rizzo era.
Speaker 1: You're here, I'm telling you, no real talk.
Speaker 2: And so it's not just for everyone like him, but
Speaker 2: him specifically. Do you think there's any chance whatsoever? Or
Speaker 2: is it just a loss cause? And as far as people, yeah,
Speaker 2: rallying for him and.
Speaker 6: The Innocent Project even touch is he something that they touch.
Speaker 3: The Innocence Project? Now, there are fifty something instance projects
Speaker 3: around the country. The main one is the Hub is
Speaker 3: in New York. That's the one where I'm on the board,
Speaker 3: and we only work on DNA cases. And I don't
Speaker 3: believe his is a DNA case. I think it's a
Speaker 3: shooting case. But so I haven't been directly involved in
Speaker 3: his case, but I will say, and I think it's
Speaker 3: it's worth mentioning, and then we'll get back to this
Speaker 3: that there was a wonderful article in Rolling Stone magazine
Speaker 3: about a guy named Tony Wright who was on my
Speaker 3: podcast as well, and I'm gonna plug it again wroeful conviction.
Speaker 3: But Tony was wrongfully convicted and served twenty five years
Speaker 3: in prison in Pennsylvania, and in the article, one of
Speaker 3: the bylines it says in nineteen ninety, whatever year it
Speaker 3: was that he was arrested, a black man had a
Speaker 3: better chance of getting justice in Philadelphia, Mississippi than he
Speaker 3: did in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. And that was really the case
Speaker 3: for a long time time. Now what's interesting is and
Speaker 3: where it may pertain. And Tony's out now, and he's
Speaker 3: an amazing, amazing guy, and I encourage you to read
Speaker 3: that article. So the good news is there's a new
Speaker 3: DA in Philadelphia who is elected in November, who is
Speaker 3: a former I think he's a former civil rights lawyer.
Speaker 3: Actually he's he's a fantastic, fantastic guy, and he is
Speaker 3: going to make a systemic change in the way justice
Speaker 3: is is served in Philly. And and who knows, I
Speaker 3: don't know whether that will provide, uh, you know, an
Speaker 3: opportunity for Mama to to get out. I mean not
Speaker 3: even you know others. I have a layman's understanding of
Speaker 3: the Mamia Jabar Bul Jamar case. But uh, you know,
Speaker 3: there's it, certainly there's light, you know, and and it's
Speaker 3: and it's important to know there's a there's a wonderful organization.
Speaker 3: Shouldn't call the Justice and Safety pack who are backing
Speaker 3: progressive das in races like that one where because it
Speaker 3: makes such a huge difference. You now have a Houston and.
Speaker 6: Chicago I think because people need to know.
Speaker 3: It's called the Justice and Safety Pack. Uh and uh
Speaker 3: look it up, give money, get involved. It's an incredible group.
Speaker 3: They're electing amazing people. We have a black woman uh
Speaker 3: DA in Chicago now also in Houston, and when they
Speaker 3: come in the difference that it makes in so many
Speaker 3: cases is amazing because, like we said, the prosecutors have
Speaker 3: all the power and.
Speaker 6: The Philly one kind of fucked up. But hopefully I
Speaker 6: don't know.
Speaker 8: If you oh yeah, he's got he's got serious issues,
Speaker 8: got big problems.
Speaker 3: And yeah, I mean and I don't want to you know,
Speaker 3: we're not but yeah, they're.
Speaker 2: Not going to open that door democratic do. So what
Speaker 2: would you recommend to uh, especially in the the age
Speaker 2: of of of social media and how the way that
Speaker 2: news is spread now and awareness is spread and an
Speaker 2: alarming rate that it hasn't been done before, what would
Speaker 2: you recommend for those that simply don't know just small,
Speaker 2: minuscule entry ways that they can get involved politically with
Speaker 2: helping out you know, the innoces projects and these various
Speaker 2: uh organizations that help people in their situation, Like I mean,
Speaker 2: just beyond retweeting something and you know.
Speaker 1: Like what's what's what's step two to get to there?
Speaker 2: Because I think a lot of people just even before
Speaker 2: meeting you, I would just think like, wow, okay, well
Speaker 2: social justice. I'm I'm kind of interested. Yeah, But then
Speaker 2: it's like, oh god, I don't know if I could
Speaker 2: do that and my day job at the same time.
Speaker 1: But are there ways to.
Speaker 2: Involve yourself that you know, it doesn't necessarily take up
Speaker 2: all the time of your day and or it is
Speaker 2: just like you just got to jump in the river
Speaker 2: and swim at piranha and snakes and no.
Speaker 3: I mean, look, you know, I'm I'm very lucky. I've
Speaker 3: been you know, fortunate to be successful in business and
Speaker 3: now I can do things at my pace. I also
Speaker 3: have a small company now used don't run big companies,
Speaker 3: so I have more time and you know, and you know,
Speaker 3: and ultimately it's it makes me, It makes me feel good.
Speaker 3: I call it selfish altruism. You know. I mean I
Speaker 3: like helping people, and I like helping the helpless, and
Speaker 3: I can't imagine anyone more helpless than someone who's stuck
Speaker 3: in our gulag system for a crime they didn't commit.
Speaker 3: And so if I can, if I can make a
Speaker 3: difference in that way, then that you know that I
Speaker 3: don't know, like I actually you know, I had this
Speaker 3: thought yesterday. I spent the day in a maximum security
Speaker 3: prison in Virginia yesterday and I was leaving, I was like,
Speaker 3: you know what, there's nowhere else I would have rather been.
Speaker 3: You know, I could be playing golf and pebble b
Speaker 3: each are doing this, I could be doing whatever the
Speaker 3: fuck I want. But it was it was an amazing,
Speaker 3: amazing experience. I met with two guys who I'm helping.
Speaker 3: One of them has been in for thirty one and
Speaker 3: a half years for a crime that he had nothing
Speaker 3: to do with and DNA proves it, and you know,
Speaker 3: and the other guy's been in for ten and it's
Speaker 3: a very interesting and complicated case. But you know, I'm
Speaker 3: I'm going to make a difference in these two people's lives.
Speaker 1: And DNA proves that he had nothing to do with it,
Speaker 1: and he still loves.
Speaker 3: It nothing to do with it. I mean, it's amazing,
Speaker 3: but but there's there's light at the end of the
Speaker 3: tunnel there too. And he's an amazing guy. He's a
Speaker 3: he teaches tai chi and Meditation's written seven books. He's like,
Speaker 3: he's a brilliant guy on top of everything else. His
Speaker 3: name is Jens Surring j E N S S O
Speaker 3: E R I n G. There's a movie about him
Speaker 3: called The Promise, and there's gonna be a big twenty
Speaker 3: twenty piece in December about his case. But so, how
Speaker 3: you can get involved is I mean the first thing
Speaker 3: to do is go to go to website. I mean,
Speaker 3: go to Innocentsproject dot org, you know, or visit your
Speaker 3: local Innocence project website. There's going to be a section
Speaker 3: that says how to get involved. You can write letters.
Speaker 3: You know, people the politicians actually pay attention when you
Speaker 3: write letters. You know, letters are better than emails. But
Speaker 3: you can write emails. You could get on these mailing lists,
Speaker 3: you can, you can create a page, you can you
Speaker 3: can write the inmates too. I mean, that's it. That's
Speaker 3: a great thing. Whenever I speak to these guys, it
Speaker 3: means so much to them that anybody gives a fuck
Speaker 3: enough to write a letter. You'd be to be surprised and.
Speaker 6: Once you start, you can email, so it's not that deep,
Speaker 6: you know what I mean. People are scared of letters.
Speaker 3: Yes, that's true. It's a it's a lost art. My
Speaker 3: mom used to write letters like crazy. But anyway, she
Speaker 3: write a letter.
Speaker 1: The last time.
Speaker 6: But down they have the email system, so I'm winning
Speaker 6: they do.
Speaker 3: They go, oh, they can links, you can ye je
Speaker 3: different places, but uh and then you know, uh, and
Speaker 3: then the other thing is you can organize an event.
Speaker 3: I mean you can contact a local organization and you know, organize, uh,
Speaker 3: invite your friends over and do a you know, maybe
Speaker 3: even get an gennery or or just you know, get
Speaker 3: somebody to come in and speak, or you know, contact
Speaker 3: the local You know, there's organizations all over the country
Speaker 3: doing this kind of work. And now that there's Google,
Speaker 3: it's really there's really no excuse not to find out
Speaker 3: about it and get involved.
Speaker 6: Cititism uh work too.
Speaker 7: That's I was going to say, under this umbrella of
Speaker 7: mass incarceration and all the issues that exist underneath it,
Speaker 7: because in my mind, wrongful uh, wrongful imprisonment is one
Speaker 7: of them. But what do you think are like to
Speaker 7: come some of the other issues underneath that umbrella that
Speaker 7: people may need to be concerned about outside of that.
Speaker 3: Like, well, there's so many. I mean, for me, I've
Speaker 3: been deeply involved in bail reform. I think that's so
Speaker 3: important because you know, locking people up when we don't
Speaker 3: know if they're guilty, just because they can't pay it
Speaker 3: should be an affront to everybody's humanity. And what people
Speaker 3: don't understand is that jails in this country, most of
Speaker 3: them are worse than the worst maximum security prisons. And
Speaker 3: the reason and people think jail so jails. And when
Speaker 3: you talk to the people that I talked to on
Speaker 3: my show, most of them will say that they like
Speaker 3: even one guy had on recently, Ryan Ferguson, he was
Speaker 3: saying that if he had to go back to maxim
Speaker 3: security prison or jail, he said, I'd take two years
Speaker 3: at maxim security prison over one year in jail.
Speaker 6: Tell them the difference, because everybody don't.
Speaker 1: It's difference.
Speaker 3: So jail, you go to jail when you're awaiting trial.
Speaker 3: And for instance in New York City, Rikers Island has
Speaker 3: become infamous. Right, that's jail. It's a jail, it's not
Speaker 3: a prison. Right, So in jail, No, there's no recreation
Speaker 3: in most jails. They're basically buildings where you can be
Speaker 3: in your cell twenty four hours a day with seven
Speaker 3: eight other people twenty four hours a day. The lights
Speaker 3: don't go off in a lot of jails, right, And
Speaker 3: it's just a pressure cooker of insanity. And you have
Speaker 3: innocent people, guilty people, violent people, we don't know who who.
Speaker 3: They're all just thrown in there together just because you
Speaker 3: can't post the fucking bail. By the way, do you
Speaker 3: know that if you get caught in New York City
Speaker 3: and you get taken to rikers and they go your
Speaker 3: bail's five hundred dollars and you're like, okay, but I
Speaker 3: got five hundred with me and they're like, well, where
Speaker 3: is it that you guys took my It's in the locker.
Speaker 3: They're like, we're gonna just get it out of the locker.
Speaker 3: They're like, no, you can't get it out of locker,
Speaker 3: not until you're out, not until you're freed. So wait,
Speaker 3: so I got the money, but I can't post. No,
Speaker 3: you can't post it. Right. And by the way, one
Speaker 3: thing I'll say to anybody if you get arrested, remember
Speaker 3: phone numbers. When you think about that, you go in
Speaker 3: there and get a phone call. You don't have your
Speaker 3: fucking phone. They took it. You got to remember to
Speaker 3: call your mom or whoever it is that's gonna answer
Speaker 3: the damn phone. Remember fucking phone numbers, because if you don't,
Speaker 3: you're gonna be stuck. And who remembers phone numbers? Think
Speaker 3: about it, right, I mean, nobody needs to remember phone
Speaker 3: numbers anymore, So that's an important.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna say some real one percent shit right now,
Speaker 2: go for it. I don't know my number, the phone number.
Speaker 6: I don't know your old number. You know, you.
Speaker 2: Don't know your own phone number. You don't know I
Speaker 2: have four phones, but my home number. I don't know
Speaker 2: that ship. Oh you know your phone?
Speaker 1: You are right? Like if I didn't have my cell phone,
Speaker 1: I wouldn't know.
Speaker 6: Nobody's paragraph you just gave us.
Speaker 2: It's almost everybody, Like nah, I got like a few
Speaker 2: you know your mom's number number I got after like
Speaker 2: two thousand and two, I don't I don't know it. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: any all my new contexts, but yeah, my mom, my wife,
Speaker 2: like my my homie, like Nicola, Yeah, you know what
Speaker 2: number I got? Nick's numbers would reach numbers, Shorge numbers
Speaker 2: I want to.
Speaker 1: I want to memorize your number. Person I'm calling anyway,
Speaker 1: who said.
Speaker 6: You're gonna be wrongfully convicted though you're arrested.
Speaker 2: Do you think do you think there's any chance in
Speaker 2: hell of us ever repealing the deathly.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think there's a chance of us repealing the
Speaker 3: death penalty. And I think it's one of the reasons
Speaker 3: I actually I'm really it's very gratifying to me because
Speaker 3: I'll get sometimes a direct message or something from somebody,
Speaker 3: or message on Facebook whatever, But I don't really use
Speaker 3: Facebook that much. I'm on Instagram. Instagram is my ship.
Speaker 3: By the way, ad is Jason Plump. I gotta plug that.
Speaker 3: I'm gonna tell you laugh. I'll make you cry. I
Speaker 3: guarantee it. That is Jason Flumm follow me. So. But yeah,
Speaker 3: I'll get messages from people saying, you know, I used
Speaker 3: to believe in the death penalty, but now that I
Speaker 3: hear on your podcast about all these wrongful convictions, I
Speaker 3: realize it happens. You know, We've had twenty one DNA
Speaker 3: exonerations from death row, you know. And I say, to
Speaker 3: anybody who believes in the death penalty, which I don't,
Speaker 3: if you believe in the death penalty. Then you're saying
Speaker 3: that you're okay with sometimes executing anything wrong.
Speaker 1: Right, then you're.
Speaker 3: Okay with that. I just want to make sure you're
Speaker 3: okay with that. Right. We executed an innocent guy in America, oh,
Speaker 3: two months ago in Arkansas, the deel Lee innocent as
Speaker 3: the day is long. The DNA proved it, and they
Speaker 3: executed him anyway, and you know he was a client
Speaker 3: of ours.
Speaker 2: Can I ask, uh, what is your annual Well, I
Speaker 2: know it moves in the snail space depending on what
Speaker 2: state you're dealing with it and trying to get them exonerated,
Speaker 2: But what is your annual average of turning these cases around?
Speaker 3: Well, that's a hard question to answer because there's innocence
Speaker 3: projects all over the country, like I said, affiliated with
Speaker 3: different law schools. There's innocance projects in the forty three states,
Speaker 3: I think, and there are there's more exonerations every year,
Speaker 3: I think. I don't know the exact number last year,
Speaker 3: but I think it was it might have been a
Speaker 3: couple hundred Nationally. It is not enough because if you
Speaker 3: think about it, the best estimates are that somewhere between
Speaker 3: four and seven percent of the people in prison in America,
Speaker 3: not including jail, right, are innocent, right, So that sounds
Speaker 3: a lot like about one hundred thousand people that are
Speaker 3: innocent in prison right now while we're sitting there. And
Speaker 3: like I said, I'm not talking about jail jail, A
Speaker 3: huge percentage of people in jail are in the same
Speaker 3: because I haven't even tried yet, and so you know,
Speaker 3: And that's the thing, like I said, that whole the
Speaker 3: death penalty has to go away, like fucking civilized countries
Speaker 3: don't excellent execute people. And we're in the top five
Speaker 3: behind like China, Iran, North Korea and I don't know, Pakistandards.
Speaker 3: It's not a good group to be in, you know
Speaker 3: what I'm saying. Of course, now we're the only country
Speaker 3: in the world that's not in the Paris Agreement, right,
Speaker 3: Syria actually signed on yesterday. Syria.
Speaker 7: I was about to ask you, what's the what do
Speaker 7: you think of the top issues with us and having
Speaker 7: Trump in here in reference to the work that you
Speaker 7: do things.
Speaker 3: All of them.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that was what I'm saying.
Speaker 3: Yeah, all, yeah, it's all.
Speaker 2: Yeah, how does the Innocence Project raise money? Like I'm
Speaker 2: figuring that you guys would in order to keep up
Speaker 2: with the thousands and thousands and thousands of cases that
Speaker 2: you have to deal with. You know that there's less
Speaker 2: people on the Innocence Project side.
Speaker 1: Of the fence to help.
Speaker 2: The amount of prisoners that you know are coming to
Speaker 2: you guys for these for your help.
Speaker 3: So yeah, I mean we raised money from individuals and foundations.
Speaker 3: That's what we do, and you know, every little bit helps.
Speaker 3: The more money that comes in. It is a not
Speaker 3: for profit, donations are tax deductible, and you know, the
Speaker 3: more money that comes in, the more more difference we
Speaker 3: can make, not only in individual cases, but also in
Speaker 3: creating systemic changes and how everything from lineups are conducted
Speaker 3: to forensics to you know, to there's so many changes
Speaker 3: that have to be made in the way the way
Speaker 3: interrogations are done, right, I mean everything videotaping, mandatory videotaping
Speaker 3: of introgations in New York State just passed that finally, Right,
Speaker 3: we didn't have that New York City. Yeah, just passed it. Yeah,
Speaker 3: shout out to del Ricomo for that one. But yeah,
Speaker 3: I mean that's that's it's so crazy, right, it's.
Speaker 6: Just him on a first forty eight yet, Yeah.
Speaker 3: It's it's I mean, look, we were also the second
Speaker 3: to last state to UH to stop treating juveniles putting
Speaker 3: juveniles in adult prisons, you know, like it was only
Speaker 3: us and I think South Carolina were the last two. Yeah,
Speaker 3: gouvenills in adult prisons. And yeah, and back to the
Speaker 3: jail thing, the jail, the jail thing. They're so dangerous.
Speaker 3: I mean, Clif Brouder, anybody, you know what I mean. Yeah,
Speaker 3: rest in peace, I mean. And then there are others,
Speaker 3: I mean, and my my thing is to try to
Speaker 3: prevent that from happening. I started the thing in the
Speaker 3: Bronx called the Freedom Fund, which was the first bail
Speaker 3: fund in the country, which basically how that works is
Speaker 3: I raised the money. My dad actually put up half
Speaker 3: the money to start it when I when I went
Speaker 3: to him with the idea, and I put the money
Speaker 3: in the hands of the lawyers at the Bronx Defenders,
Speaker 3: which is a great organization, and they post bail for
Speaker 3: their own clients in misdemeanor cases. So it was it
Speaker 3: was an innovative idea, it seemed common sensical.
Speaker 6: Made it to the bill later.
Speaker 3: No, No, the good money comes back when you when
Speaker 3: they show up for court. And by the way, ninety
Speaker 3: seven percent of our clients show up for every court date.
Speaker 3: We have a higher percentage of people showing up than
Speaker 3: people who actually have to pay money if they don't. Right,
Speaker 3: So that whole argument's out the window that we need
Speaker 3: money bail to make sure people show up. People, you
Speaker 3: know what they do. They show up. We send them
Speaker 3: a text message and say don't forget you know what
Speaker 3: I mean. And that's how they show up. And they
Speaker 3: show up, and then usually their cases are dismissed because
Speaker 3: if they have you in jail, you got to plead
Speaker 3: guilty or you ain't going home. So but if you're out,
Speaker 3: they just they're a good process for jumping jail.
Speaker 6: You have to plead guilty or else you ain't going home.
Speaker 3: Think about that, right, you're gonna you're gonna be in
Speaker 3: jail for you want to stay in rikers for a
Speaker 3: week two weeks waiting for your court date. And and
Speaker 3: by the way, sometimes you'll go to court and they'll
Speaker 3: the prosecutor will say, well, you know, we're really not
Speaker 3: ready for this case, your honor, And the judge says, okay,
Speaker 3: come back in three weeks. What else can he say?
Speaker 2: So if you're saying that I'm not guilty, then I'm
Speaker 2: doing that time in Rikers until.
Speaker 3: And a lot of people will end up serving more
Speaker 3: time in Rikers than they would have served if they
Speaker 3: were guilty.
Speaker 1: Wait, okay, I got wait ask a fourth time.
Speaker 2: So you're saying, okay, let's say I did jump a
Speaker 2: turnstot and I get arrested and taken too. Well, you
Speaker 2: go downtown first before you go to Rikers. I assume
Speaker 2: it depends. Where is there such a thing as downtown?
Speaker 1: Is that just television New York? You're going downtown.
Speaker 3: There's the tombs, but almost everybody goes to Rikers.
Speaker 6: Okay the way it don't sound fun?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I learned.
Speaker 2: Also, don't do anything on Thursday or Friday or.
Speaker 6: Yes, you'll be a weekdays.
Speaker 1: So you're saying that once they're in process.
Speaker 2: If I say that I'm innocent and you got the
Speaker 2: wrong person, I'm staying in Rikers.
Speaker 3: That's what happened to Khalif Browner. He was there for
Speaker 3: three years awaiting trial. Three years I mean, and then
Speaker 3: they dropped the charges. You know that, right, They dropped
Speaker 3: the chargers after three years.
Speaker 6: I don't even like to think about him because.
Speaker 3: No, yeah, it's I mean, and he ain't the last one.
Speaker 3: There was this case with Pedro Hernandez. I was in
Speaker 3: court when his when the charge some of the charges
Speaker 3: were dropped. He was he was in for a year
Speaker 3: awaiting trial, and he was a valedictorian in his class
Speaker 3: in Rikers Island and was offered a college scholarship, and
Speaker 3: they were trying to keep him in there, you know,
Speaker 3: so that he would miss his college. But he just
Speaker 3: got out. But yeah, his case is horrible too.
Speaker 2: So for those that are wrongfully convicted, do you guys
Speaker 2: also work on making sure that the state makes up
Speaker 2: for any wrong convictions or wrongdoing as far as like.
Speaker 1: Emotions and those.
Speaker 2: Things, and what's the like, what's the likelihood of because
Speaker 2: I'm thinking about the Central.
Speaker 6: Park fact, you know, what they say is not even
Speaker 6: but even.
Speaker 1: Then it's like.
Speaker 2: So mentally fucked up from there from there. So I'm asking,
Speaker 2: I'm asking about, like, you know, mental health and all
Speaker 2: those things. Is that even thought about now or is
Speaker 2: that just like a you know, the lost cost to
Speaker 2: even think that.
Speaker 3: Your mental health of exonerreies. Yeah, yeah, I mean it's
Speaker 3: something that I've been very focused on. I you know,
Speaker 3: I started a thing called the Life After Exoneration Program
Speaker 3: at the Innocence Project and also the thing that's become
Speaker 3: the Innocence Network Conference, which is as a group every
Speaker 3: year we bring together a lot of exgneries. Last year
Speaker 3: I had two hundred in the same room who collectively
Speaker 3: had served over thirty six hundred years in prison. And
Speaker 3: it's all for healing and you know, adapting and reintegrating
Speaker 3: into society, because I feel the same way you do, Like,
Speaker 3: what do we do for these people when they we've
Speaker 3: you know, we've wronged them so much, and you know,
Speaker 3: when they get out, they get a bus ticket basically
Speaker 3: and forty dollars in a lot of cases, and you know,
Speaker 3: sometimes not even an apology. And then if they sue.
Speaker 3: You know, thirty states have compensation statutes and twenty don't,
Speaker 3: and you know it is New York one of them.
Speaker 3: New York does. And then you know, even the even
Speaker 3: the states that do have very very different, you know,
Speaker 3: levels that you can you can get. You know, some
Speaker 3: of them are so shockingly low that you would be embarrassed.
Speaker 3: But that's something we've been working on changing and getting.
Speaker 3: You know, we actually managed to get a very good
Speaker 3: bill passed in Texas, of all places, so in Texas
Speaker 3: you get now I can't remember. I think it's fifty
Speaker 3: or eighty thousand a year for every year you were
Speaker 3: locked up, plus an annuity of an equal amount. So
Speaker 3: it's not a fortune, but at least it's something to
Speaker 3: start your life again, because a lot of these people
Speaker 3: come out after ten, fifteen, twenty thirty years in prison
Speaker 3: and good luck getting a job. Right, what are you
Speaker 3: going to do? You don't know how to do phone?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I've never seen a phone.
Speaker 3: I mean, like, and so you know, we are, you know,
Speaker 3: we are working on that. Amazing, you know, the spirit
Speaker 3: of these people is so strong. I guess the ones
Speaker 3: that collapse never get out, you know. And and I'll
Speaker 3: talk to the ex houneries and I'm like, I'm always
Speaker 3: amazed at how they don't show any signs of bitterness,
Speaker 3: you know. And it's but it's it's it's true, and
Speaker 3: it's incredible. You know, not every single one, but almost
Speaker 3: every single one has this like state of grace that
Speaker 3: they're in where they've just let go and they're you know,
Speaker 3: they'll say things like I don't want to live in
Speaker 3: the past. I can't change the past. I want to
Speaker 3: move forward. I want to live every day in my
Speaker 3: life is you know, like I can't you know what
Speaker 3: am I gonna do? Walk around being bitter and angry.
Speaker 3: It's not going to help me, you know. It's like
Speaker 3: that's where they say bitterness is a pill you take
Speaker 3: hoping to make somebody else sick. Right, But the fact is,
Speaker 3: there are a lot of things that we're putting in
Speaker 3: place all over you know, I mean that that are
Speaker 3: designed to help hoies. You know what's crazy, love is
Speaker 3: that if you are guilty of a crime and you
Speaker 3: serve your time and you proll out, you get a
Speaker 3: prole officer, and you get certain services that are designed
Speaker 3: to help you get back into society. They don't always work.
Speaker 3: You don't get it if if you're innothing to getting nothing,
Speaker 3: what mn and even if you sue, and even if
Speaker 3: you're able to sue, and if look how long it
Speaker 3: took the Central Part five to get paid, right, I
Speaker 3: mean Central Park five. You were a kid growing up
Speaker 3: when that shit happened. Right now, they just got paid
Speaker 3: what was it like a year ago? And it's worth
Speaker 3: mentioning that Trump took out ads at the time of
Speaker 3: their arrest, calling for all of them to be executed.
Speaker 3: He spent a bunch of money on all the newspapers
Speaker 3: in New York say these guys should be executed, and
Speaker 3: of course he still says they're guilty because he knows
Speaker 3: these things. And the first, you know, the first episode
Speaker 3: of my podcast, I actually interviewed Raymond Santana. It's a
Speaker 3: really powerful episode. And I've done, I've done, you know,
Speaker 3: I do a lot of speaking, and I did a
Speaker 3: speech with him at the Nantucket Project, which you can
Speaker 3: actually look up online if you just google my name
Speaker 3: and Nantucket Project where I interviewed him on stage, and
Speaker 3: he's extraordinary, I mean, in that story is extraordinary.
Speaker 2: I have a one more question, and I know it's
Speaker 2: weird to ask, but because a lot of these a
Speaker 2: lot of the people that you're releasing, some of them
Speaker 2: have certain decades in you know, three, two, three, four decades,
Speaker 2: I assume.
Speaker 3: Yeah, guy got out in New Orleans this week after
Speaker 3: forty six years.
Speaker 1: I was going this week, I was going to say.
Speaker 3: Wilbert Jones, how old is he now? I don't even
Speaker 3: know how old he is? Forty five or six forty five?
Speaker 3: He went in in seventy one my.
Speaker 2: Life, Well, yeah, that's forty six years.
Speaker 3: Yeah, right, you're born seventy one, right.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So I was going to say that I have a
Speaker 2: couple of friends in Philadelphia that were caught up in
Speaker 2: the system.
Speaker 4: And.
Speaker 2: Coming out of jail was so frightening for them that
Speaker 2: it was almost like the feeling of you going to jail,
Speaker 2: and to the point that two of those three basically
Speaker 2: told their families like, look, I'm gonna I'm not going
Speaker 2: to go see my uh my, my Bill, my parole officer,
Speaker 2: because I don't know anything in this world, like I
Speaker 2: gotta go back.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's kind of some weird stock.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So like, what's what are the cases of those
Speaker 2: that you get out and they come out and they're
Speaker 2: just like, I have nothing to live for, Like I
Speaker 2: my whole world is inside of that prison. And one,
Speaker 2: you know, willingly want to go back because I know
Speaker 2: that that happens a lot.
Speaker 3: You know, I've heard that happens. It happened in Shawshak Redemption, right,
Speaker 3: but movies. But I haven't seen not even one of these.
Speaker 7: I don't want to do that, probably guilty.
Speaker 3: That might be the distinction. It's a psychological you know phenomenon.
Speaker 3: But yeah, it's it's getting out is another punishment, you know,
Speaker 3: when they come out and we make it so difficult
Speaker 3: for them to get compensated. It takes years, even in
Speaker 3: the cases where it's successful. And you know, I've taken
Speaker 3: it as my you know, one of my missions to
Speaker 3: try to help bridge that gap when I can, because
Speaker 3: you know, these people deserve I mean, they got everything
Speaker 3: coming to them and they get nothing, you know, like
Speaker 3: we owe them as a society and everything. It's it's like,
Speaker 3: there should be free education for these people. There should
Speaker 3: be housing, there should be you know, it's nuts, Like
Speaker 3: it's just I don't know.
Speaker 7: Have you been able to garner any of your roster,
Speaker 7: any of your kind of celebrity friends to not just
Speaker 7: be a voice, we kind of get involved as well.
Speaker 3: None of the none of the ones that I work
Speaker 3: directly with, have gotten involved in any deep level.
Speaker 2: I mean, like do they know of your work, of
Speaker 2: your kind of Clark Kent Superman life for it?
Speaker 3: Do I look like someone who knows how to shut up?
Speaker 3: Because he might have be mixed up with some other guy?
Speaker 3: But no, I yeah, I mean I'm proselytizing this stuff
Speaker 3: all the time. Like I said, I promoted on my
Speaker 3: Instagram and anybody who follows me knows that. And then
Speaker 3: I you know, and I also talk about it to
Speaker 3: anybody that will listen, and you know, and it is amazing.
Speaker 3: I mean the you know, social media has been really
Speaker 3: helpful for me in getting that word out, but it
Speaker 3: hasn't yet. I mean, look a lot of people some
Speaker 3: people are just not you know, the people. I think
Speaker 3: in their thirties is usually when people start to become
Speaker 3: interested in really making a different something else. I mean,
Speaker 3: you know, I mean, you know, look Scooter Braun. Interesting, right,
Speaker 3: here's a guy who's on top of the world and
Speaker 3: he's now look what he's doing right with these kind
Speaker 3: inserts Manchester thing and the hurricane relief. I mean, he's
Speaker 3: become that guy in his mid thirties.
Speaker 1: Where he's like, I'm Bob Gildo.
Speaker 3: It hit it hits you at some point that you
Speaker 3: have a higher purpose. And I don't mean that in
Speaker 3: a religious way. It's just like you have, you know,
Speaker 3: you have a calling. I mean, we're here, We're here
Speaker 3: to be our brother's keepers. And that's the way it is,
Speaker 3: you know, like and and it doesn't make any sense
Speaker 3: to fight that feeling, like, just go with it. I mean, look,
Speaker 3: some people have working three jobs just to put food
Speaker 3: on the table. They don't have time. But you know,
Speaker 3: it's that old thing. If you're up to your ass
Speaker 3: at alligators, it's hard to remember to dream the swamp.
Speaker 3: But you know, if you got, if you got yours,
Speaker 3: then get off your ass and go find your shit
Speaker 3: like it's it's give. It makes me so fucking happy
Speaker 3: to be able to make this difference. It's it's nuts.
Speaker 3: I mean, like I feel, I feel lucky, you know,
Speaker 3: to be in a position to be able to do
Speaker 3: this and to have found something that really touches me
Speaker 3: and makes me want to do more every day.
Speaker 2: Well, man, we thank you for fighting a good fight,
Speaker 2: and hopefully that will inspire listeners to uh you know,
Speaker 2: get involved as well.
Speaker 6: And we are lucky to have you.
Speaker 1: Have you, thank the show.
Speaker 3: Thanks for that. Thank you. Since project dot org everybody.
Speaker 2: Yes, it's Jason Flummer Instagram. I just followed him.
Speaker 1: It's Jason.
Speaker 3: I'm a follow backer. Let me now watching a thousand
Speaker 3: people to follow me back? What is this guy? Full ship?
Speaker 3: We have?
Speaker 1: Let's talk ask right now?
Speaker 2: Yeah, twenty questions, are you serious second coming to Okay?
Speaker 1: No, they weren't a second company to you.
Speaker 6: I'm just saying no.
Speaker 1: Matchbox twenty was like twenty years before, ten years before.
Speaker 2: Listen, just let him have this, give me, give me
Speaker 2: a three match box. Any questions then?
Speaker 3: Words?
Speaker 2: Now, let me see Okay, massbuster? Okay, Rob Thomas, I don't.
Speaker 1: Know what do I stought?
Speaker 2: Okay, just yourself? Just like yourself? Is someone like you?
Speaker 2: That was the album with three am on it?
Speaker 1: Right? Okay?
Speaker 3: So much because this is like me trying to freestyle.
Speaker 2: Man, I don't know what, Rob Thomas, So it was
Speaker 2: that one he had three amals on that record, and
Speaker 2: then what was the big big record, Push Push Push?
Speaker 1: How do you know that? It was everywhere everywhere? How
Speaker 1: do you not know it? Yeah?
Speaker 2: That record was everywhere? Okay, So then the thing happened.
Speaker 2: How did did that affect the group at all? Like
Speaker 2: once he had that huge record, once smooth came out smoothly,
Speaker 2: that messed up group dynamics with Rob and the rest
Speaker 2: of the guys.
Speaker 3: Oh that's a good question. I never really thought of
Speaker 3: it that way, And I don't know. I think it's hard,
Speaker 3: you know, it's hard to figure out the cause of
Speaker 3: the effect, but you know, it seems like something like
Speaker 3: that will affect the dynamic one way or another. Right.
Speaker 1: It was always kind of just robbing the other guys,
Speaker 1: wasn't it. Yeah I didn't know.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, yeah, Rob's that guy I mean.
Speaker 2: And then Sugar Ray, whose idea was it to put
Speaker 2: super Cat on something?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 3: I think that was the producer David Khan who had
Speaker 3: that idea.
Speaker 1: David con produced him.
Speaker 3: David Khan, Damn.
Speaker 1: That's he produced.
Speaker 3: Yeah. It was strange, you wouldn't think, right, but yeah,
Speaker 3: he produced fly.
Speaker 1: I did not know that.
Speaker 3: Wow, that was fun.
Speaker 1: That's the joint. Okay, that's cool.
Speaker 2: Any cold Play questions, man, because okay cold Play, I
Speaker 2: don't Actually.
Speaker 3: I only work with them for a minute, so I
Speaker 3: don't know, like.
Speaker 1: I literally okay, well, Craig on the show.
Speaker 3: I didn't even work with them. I met them. They
Speaker 3: were just happened to be signed to the label I
Speaker 3: was running. But you know, I was only I was
Speaker 3: only there for a whatever, a couple of years. And yeah,
Speaker 3: they were they were doing they were the stratus for already.
Speaker 3: I get zero credit for that.
Speaker 2: Okay, we're all when I said and done for your
Speaker 2: your music, your music career, what's the one achievement where
Speaker 2: you're just like.
Speaker 3: Me?
Speaker 2: I did that like to yourself, you know, your humble
Speaker 2: brag moment to yourself inside.
Speaker 5: That you're gonna guess on Pandora In the music business. Yeah,
Speaker 5: in the music business.
Speaker 3: I mean it's funny because the one thing we didn't
Speaker 3: even talk about is one of my proudest accomplishments, which
Speaker 3: is Translateburian Orchestra. You know, because of it, Yeah, I
Speaker 3: mean Translbian Orchestra. Was was it crazy? Crazy ass story?
Speaker 3: You know, I'd signed this metal group called Sabotage, not
Speaker 3: because I want to do it, because a guy I
Speaker 3: was hanging out with back in those days wouldn't leave
Speaker 3: me alone. And so, you know, I don't even really
Speaker 3: like metal music, but I like hard rock. But anyway,
Speaker 3: they'd she had fallen out of favor, and you know,
Speaker 3: we're really I was. I actually dropped them in ninety
Speaker 3: six because they weren't doing anything. And then one day
Speaker 3: their lawyer, Nick Ferrara, calls me on the phone and says,
Speaker 3: did you know the w PLJ is going to add
Speaker 3: Sabotage tomorrow? And I said, do you know you must
Speaker 3: be the single dumbest lawyer in America? You think w
Speaker 3: And we can't even get that shit played on metal
Speaker 3: stations anymore. College stations won't even playing what are you
Speaker 3: talking about? PLJ was the biggest station the country back then,
Speaker 3: you remember. And so next day Scott Shannon, this was
Speaker 3: December eleventh of ninety six, Scott Shannon plays the last
Speaker 3: song on the Sabotage album, and not only does he
Speaker 3: play it, he reads the liner notes and he goes
Speaker 3: into a whole thing about how there is the most
Speaker 3: powerful piece of music. And every store in New York
Speaker 3: blows out right like people are calling the stores are
Speaker 3: calling us, going where's this record? We need more of
Speaker 3: these records. We're like, we don't even know, Like we
Speaker 3: don't have any. We dropped the band. And then Scott
Speaker 3: starts calling other radio stations saying, this is the biggest
Speaker 3: thing I've ever seen at it right, And all these
Speaker 3: other stations called Colonis saying, so it turns out they
Speaker 3: had put a Christmas song on a metal album, right,
Speaker 3: who does that?
Speaker 1: It was?
Speaker 3: The last song was Carol of the Bells, done with
Speaker 3: metal guitars and an orchestra.
Speaker 1: So like members were they.
Speaker 3: There was four members in Sabotage, but the smiff's guy
Speaker 3: was really the producer, who was a guy nam Paul
Speaker 3: O'Neil who sadly died this year, and so he he
Speaker 3: had made this record d D then the with the
Speaker 3: good metal guitars, and no no, no, no, no no, it
Speaker 3: was the strings right, and then then the guitar. No no,
Speaker 3: no no no, and for whatever reason, it was pure magic. Right.
Speaker 3: So we start shipping and pressing these records and setting
Speaker 3: them out as fast as we can, making copies for
Speaker 3: the radio stations, and because we still own the mastery
Speaker 3: though we had dropped the band. And then in January
Speaker 3: I called Paul on you and I go, Paul, people
Speaker 3: love this record, but they hate Sabotage. So I said,
Speaker 3: here's what I want you to do. Take that song,
Speaker 3: don't mix it, don't fix it, don't edit it, don't
Speaker 3: do a fucking thing to it, because it's perfect, and
Speaker 3: make a whole album of songs just like that. Give
Speaker 3: it a nice Christmas Eve name, and I'll sell millions
Speaker 3: for you. So he calls me up. A couple of
Speaker 3: weeks later, he goes, what do you think about Trans
Speaker 3: Siberian Orchestra on what the fuck do I know? I'm Jewish?
Speaker 3: I don't know about if you making help of calling
Speaker 3: so he so we called the Trans Siberian Orchestra and
Speaker 3: it became the biggest Christmas artist in the history of
Speaker 3: the world.
Speaker 6: Publishing must be crazy.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah, unfortunately that's not me, but whatever, But so, yeah,
Speaker 3: so that was really fun because it was so difficult
Speaker 3: to break that act. That one in kid Rock really
Speaker 3: were the hardest, and in spite of the current things
Speaker 3: that are going on, it was so much fun breaking
Speaker 3: Kid Rock. Looking back, it was just nobody was on
Speaker 3: that guy. I mean, it was like everybody was against him.
Speaker 2: He told me the story, did you you said you
Speaker 2: want to sign too?
Speaker 3: He's the one that broke on the golf course.
Speaker 2: You didn't get to sign to. Were you at Virgin
Speaker 2: with the Perfect Circle his side group?
Speaker 3: No, I didn't. I don't think they made any records
Speaker 3: while I was there, so they may have been signed there,
Speaker 3: but I never got to deal with that. I did
Speaker 3: try to sign him as a solo artist as well,
Speaker 3: and that didn't work out either. So yeah, that was
Speaker 3: Perfect Circle, right, I tried to sign perfect Circle, so
Speaker 3: he he he left me at the altar twice. You know,
Speaker 3: I'm still a fan.
Speaker 1: He's really I love his voice.
Speaker 3: So yeah, I think those those were the most fun.
Speaker 3: I mean, I'm super proud of Tory Amos because I
Speaker 3: think she's had a real impact on music and culture.
Speaker 1: There's a lot we didn't mention.
Speaker 2: We didn't get to talk about Lord or Jesse, Jay
Speaker 2: or I didn't even ask for di'angelo nightmare story.
Speaker 1: Oh we already have plenty of those, right.
Speaker 2: I think we got off our questions out. We thank
Speaker 2: you very much for coming on the show.
Speaker 3: Well, we finished credit and we started considering. I garbled
Speaker 3: my wrap.
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, on behalf of Boss Bill Unpaid, Bill Sugar,
Speaker 2: Steve Fan, Tickelo and it's like Elite, It's Lee or Cohen. No,
Speaker 2: it's like this is Quest Love signing off. Thank you
Speaker 2: very much Jason for joining us, and so let's key too.
Speaker 1: Right, make sure you make sure he signs rease form too.
Speaker 2: We will see you next week on the next go
Speaker 2: round of Quest Love Supreme, only on Pandora.
Speaker 1: West.
Speaker 2: Love Supreme is a production of iHeart Radio. This class
Speaker 2: said of U Soap was produced by the.
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