Melissa Etheridge

Propel Fitness Water. With Gatorade Electrolytes, zero sugar, and vitamins, Propel hydrates better than water to help you get the most out of your workout and get back to your best self. What propels you? Propel with Gatorade Electrolytes. This Labor Day at Lowe's. Get up to 45% off select major appliances. Plus, deals on select materials and tools to keep the job moving. Right now, get a free DeWalt 20-volt max battery two-pack when you buy a select DeWalt 20-volt max tool. At Lowe's, we have what you need to keep your job moving. Valid through 9-13. All supplies last. Selection varies by location. See Lowe's.com for more details. Well, life is a practice. Yeah. We're not supposed to get it all perfect, you know. There's things you learn and you'll keep learning and it's all we're doing is learning. I don't like to miss. When I get to meet someone for the first time. Oh. It's like a nice, it's a nice thing. It's a nice, it's a nice energy. Sometimes it's really nice, you know. Sometimes it can be like, whoa, but sometimes it's really nice. Good. And I have to say, it's like wonderful to meet you. Oh, well, thank you. Yeah. I have lots of people in my family who are very excited that I'm meeting you and I'm very excited. That's really nice to hear. It's so funny how like you're such a, you're such an iconic, you know, your music and you as that, the idea of you, right? So the idea of you, cause I've never met you before. So, so it's just my idea of you, right? It's so iconic and so badass. And so all these things, so rock and roll. And then to meet you is really lovely. Cool. It's really nice. A lot of people think I'm going to be really intense or something. Well, your music has an intensity to it. Yeah. It's bold. I'm very relaxed. I've been California for 40 years. Super cool. 40 years. You're in California? Yeah. That's cool. It's really great. I'm buzzing. Cool. Good. Good. And we look like we can like maybe be in a band together. We can be in a band together. We could. I really like it. How are you doing today? I am very good today. Yeah. Did some yoga this morning. You do yoga? Yeah. I do. I don't do it enough, but I do it a little bit. Keeps you being able to move and that's important to stay moving. I should do yoga. I know I really should. It's just, it calls me sometimes. Even just the stretching part of it. You know, yoga is one of those things that you never like go, Hey, I finished yoga. You know, there's no, it's a practice every day and you can get better and you can just, it meets you right where you're at. Yeah. It's kind of like a physical reminder that everything we do should kind of be a practice. Yeah. We're not supposed to get it all perfect. You know, there's things you learn and you'll keep learning and it's all we're doing is learning. Yeah. If you got up every day and it was more of a mindful practice and less of a result driven problem solving. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Mindfulness is a big, big part of surviving all this. Yeah. Surviving it. Yeah. You know, do you have any like philosophies that you've found that at some point started, you started kind of embracing and like it's really worked for you? Oh yeah. I had a big, my big moment was 2003. Mm. Some would say my, uh, I was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2004. But right before that, uh, in 2003 here, I, here I'd been a rock star in rock and roll, but I wasn't a drinker. I didn't do drugs. I fooled around a little bit more than I should have, but, um, you know, but just the, the, you know, the drugs and substances, I was never addicted to anything. And I was like, I was a good little rock star. But, um, in my early forties, I, I was, I, I'd smoke a little cannabis here and there and it was fun. And, um, I had a girlfriend at the time who had never done edibles. And I was like, oh, we got to do edibles. I, you know, and she cooks, bakes really well. So she made these great edible cookies and she's kind of from the Midwest and she's like, oh, it calls for a quarter cup cannabis. Well, a cup is going to be great. And so I eat one and then, oh, it's not working. And then you eat another one and then, oh, you get the munchies and you eat three. And it was just, I, I, I took what I call a heroic dose of cannabis, right? Yes. And, but I had this experience, this enlightening experience in 2003, like I came back a changed person the next morning. You got so high, so high that you, and it's a state you can get into with meditation, yoga. There's lots of ways. There's lots of ways to get there, but psychedelics are a shortcut. And, um, it really opened my mind to the spiritual nature of reality and really, uh, the, um, law of attraction and, and how things, you know, you, you manifest things, how important, how, how our minds are really running this whole thing. And it just started to, you know, crumble my Midwestern mindset that I'd been in my whole life and really changed my philosophy on life, really changed my, and then months later I was diagnosed with cancer and I went, oh, I had already died because there's a, there's a point in, in that sort of, um, enlightenment that you realize, oh, death, I've died. So I'm not afraid of death anymore. It's hard to explain. Yeah. Yeah. I understand. It's old. The, the, the peace with the idea of it. Yeah. You, yeah, exactly. So all of a sudden this cancer was like, wait a minute, this is just a, this is me shedding something. And I completely changed what I ate, changed stress. Stress is the biggest thing. And, you know, just how I looked at the world, how I held the world, you know, I, I started thinking about myself more, thinking about more taking care of myself before I made sure everybody else was all right. Little things like that, that really make a difference. 2003. So before that you had to likely be pondering those questions before. And then you had that psychedelic experience, which I believe that psychedelics are like healing meds. So I think most people do now agree that like weed isn't a drug. It can be misused for sure. Like anything. Yeah. But I do think it's a medication. Same with psilocybin. I think that mushrooms are like incredible if they're used the right way. Yeah. Um, but you had to ponder that stuff and whether you let yourself go deeper on it, or I, I think hearing that you had a Midwest Methodist upbringing, I had a very evangelical, uh, deep, I grew up in Southern Maryland, which is an interesting place because it's in Maryland, but it's down in the sticks. Yeah. And it's like very religious and I was not allowed to do anything. And I, like you, I didn't do drugs. I drank, I didn't have a great relationship with alcohol, but that's another story. Cause my, my dad was an alcoholic and I was conflicted about alcohol, but I did drink, but I didn't get in trouble. I didn't like party like that. I mean, we had something to do. We were going to do music. I was going to make it focused, but, um, I was very constricted. Yeah. And so I was always in conflict with myself when I wanted to like normal things, like if it were, you know, whether it was like girls or this or that, like I was always in conflict because I, I knew I was a bad, I was at my core, I was bad. Like I was kind of told that my whole life. So I think it was a very interesting job choice to go and start chasing rock and roll. And then I think like you, I had some moment as well of enlightenment where everything fell away. And I realized, but it's interesting that in 2003, it was after a ton of success, validation, all kinds of things that you could say, if you looked outside, someone got, that person has it figured out. Look at them there. They have it all. They have it all figured out that it happens almost like you had to go through everything to find out the answers were not there, even though you should do those things because you're capable of it. And you should always try to aim upwards and accomplish things. It's not the answer to the, the, the life question, which you found in like a simple moment. The biggest aha was that for years and years and decades, I had chased Okay. I need everyone else to tell me if I'm any good. I need to know, am I on the charts? Am I on the radio? What's my, you know, where's my album? Where's my song? What's what do they think of me? How many people are here? And it was always what someone else thought of me. And that will, that will ultimately kill you in the end, but it would definitely make you unhappy because I came to the point where I was like, Oh, this is my moment. And then my moment passed and I was like, wow, that was my moment. How come all my problems aren't solved? Like I thought they would be. And then you realize it, you have to feel that inside. You have to love you. I have to love my work. I have to love what I'm doing. And then everyone else can see that and they can go, Oh, that's great. And then you get the momentum behind your own momentum, but any other way is just, you're just gonna it's it's shallow. It's hollow. It's interesting though, because to hear you're saying exactly what I believe, I would say I started really working on myself in my like mid thirties was when I was like, Oh shit, Like I haven't figured out anything and I've done what I thought was everything. And then I'm telling people in their thirties, I'm like, Oh, I know, I know. Wait, he hit 50. Wait, he hit 60, 60 is when you go, Oh, I don't care anymore. It's so nice. You don't, you don't, you don't care what people think about you. And you know that it's all about what you feel about yourself. And there's really, there's really something in this wisdom. And I, this is my favorite time that I've ever been alive is right now. So, well, you, you have such good energy. You've really good energy. Thank you. You're, you're, you're thriving, like energetically sound. You know, I'm an energy person and I, and I not say I'm like all the all knowing energy person, but I just feel what I feel. So I'm a very, like, that feels like, yes, that feels like no, or, you know what I mean? Like, it's a very good way to go about life. That's our feelings are really how we should make our choices. And getting clear where nothing clouds, where. No amount of money or no amount of shine or no amount of whatever it is that you could say, like everyone has their vices or their fixations. So if someone could be obsessed with this or that, if you can get clear and just go, that feels like icky and that feels like, yes, that feels exciting. There's a real clear feeling of yes and no. And, and then it's the best way to be right. And then the confidence to go like, I don't actually have a clear feeling. I'm going to wait and let it emerge. Cause you will. Yeah. Which takes some patience and some trust and some ability to like, not get swept up in everyone else's like need for an answer or need to go forward or need when you're like, I don't really have a clear yes or no on this. I'm going to have to wait. And if that means no, because you need a yes, then it's a no, I guess. Yeah. Cause I can't, but there's a, something about that clarity that you have, because I can feel it that I wonder you're this very accomplished, you know, award winner. Grammy and Oscar millions of albums, all the things that anyone could put on a board and go like, look, look, look at this. I've been out here for 20 years and I grew up in like really down far away place. So I had a very clear experience because of where I was from. It was so small. I wasn't confused about some stuff, you know, and what I've always kind of noticed is out here after hanging around long enough. And then you start to meet all the different types of, of successes, right? There's the guy who's famous. There's the actor, there's the musician, there's the billionaire guy who sold the, this, there's the, this guy all great. I'm not, I'm not saying it like they're bad. I'm friends with a lot of them really accomplished. People are really interesting people most of the time. But what I started to notice is there's a large group of people who are not happy. There's a certain group of people I've noticed like are kind of, you can't sit with them. It's like a weird, it's can't explain it, but it's like, they're not there, you know? And there's no room in the room for anyone. I go, why, why, why does it feel like they haven't figured out how to be in this body they're in, in this life they're in and maybe shut off that when they need to and be here with everybody or, you know, but it seems like there's people who have figured it out. Which is like a Zen feeling. And it does not relate to money or anything. There's, there's very happy, very poor people that I know. And there's very, you know, unhappy, rich people. And there's, I know some really happy, rich people too. Lots of them. Yeah. Yeah. And it's, and, and it's all like what you said, it's just energy. We, if we really gave into a bit more of how we understand energy and how feel it. And really, like I said, just. Operate from that, we would all be a lot, it would, life would make a lot more sense. It's the journey of self. Absolutely. And I think when I listened to your music, I hear you, there's some journey going on. You were in, you were in, you're in some journey always doing it. Yeah. You've got some, you're figuring something out. You're saying something, it feels very self and maybe the enlightenment you had in 2003 was the connection with yourself. And that was like the moment where you, like, you came together. Cause almost like sometimes I feel, do feel like we, we left our life. We thought was little. We thought it wasn't important. We thought we were less, we thought we were, we thought we needed to be rock stars. We thought we needed to write a hit song. It's great. We did, but it actually wasn't what we needed to do to be special, to be invaluable, to be. Well, the journey was later. They, the journey wasn't the getting famous. The journey was. my own inner beliefs about it and and about myself and how i felt about myself and and you know just looking back on it it's it's very different i mean very glad i have loved my career oh yeah of course you know and but i think you can actually um appreciate it on a deeper level than just a hit even though that's amazing to have a hit there's something deeper there i tell people It is about, it's about reaching people. I love performing. I love, I've just, Chris Staple called me a road dog. I'm a road dog. I own it because that's where all the work pays off is when I walk out on stage and there they are and they love the songs and they love listening to it. And, and, and it's a, it's an energy exchange for two hours. We're going to do this. And, and there's nothing like that. And so everything else I do is so that then I can go on the road like I'm about to do in two weeks and do it again. You're going on the road in two weeks. What's the, the, the next like three months look like? It's, well, the album comes out also in two weeks. Oh, say album and tour together. Album tour together. That's nice. So it's a new, so I get to do a few new songs. I will always do my hits because I love them and my audience loves them and we do them. And, and I, I have changed up a bit of my show that I've done for the last few years. And, and so I've got new songs and getting out on the road with my band, which I love. So the next. Badass band. Badass band. Yeah. Oh my God. I have worked with some of the greatest musicians and. Yeah, I know you have. You, you know, good musicians too. When you lock into them, there's just, there's something so like getting in a really good car. There's nothing more badass than like a band. On stage in those moments, click. Yeah. There's, and I'm very, I'm not, we have to do this, this, this, and this, and that's what we're doing. I, I leave the borders open, a lot of room to when it's a hot night, we're jamming. And I said, right, we're going to jam. Yeah. So I'm, I'm really looking forward to that. So the first part of the tour is just an evening with me. So it's an evening. So I have all two hours we're going to play. And then the summer I actually go out with Winona Judd. Amazing. Yeah. And we're, we're, and so we get to play, you know, the big old amphitheaters and stuff. And that's awesome. Yeah. Have you guys known each other a long time? I have not. Oh, really? I have met her a couple of times. That's cool as shit. Yeah. Yeah. I'm really, yeah. I'm like, yeah. So you have a full year. Yes, sir. When do you wrap up the touring? Well, I try to work, uh, April through up to November. That's my, that's my, I'm going to work once football really starts. We start, then settled in November, December, January, February. I really try to be home. You want to be home for the post season. Watch. Yes, yes, yes. And you know, and that's, and, and just to be with my family and really just enjoy myself. Yeah. So that about now I'm like, oh, I'm ready to go back on the road again. Yeah. You're ready to go. That's amazing. You love football. I do very much. I know your team is the chiefs. Yes, sir. There's yes. I mean, I, I grew up in Kansas right next to it, right. Really close to Kansas city, about 45 minutes from Kansas city. And, um, I remember, uh, 1970, I was. Nine years old. And, uh, my, my dad was a big football fan. He was an athletic guy and, and he, um, he was watching the chiefs and I would, he would explain everything to me, which I really enjoyed. He just told me all about football. And so when they won the super bowl in 1970, the whole neighborhood went crazy. And it's really something that, that burns into a kid, you know, you're like, oh, this is great. And 50 years later, we finally won another one, you know, finally got, we hadn't even been in the super bowl in 50 years, but I was, I was a big fan. I was a big fan for my whole life and I've really enjoyed the last 10 years has been I'll bet any amount of money that that moment where you're there and everyone's happy is what seared it into your car, into your brain and your consciousness of like a joyful thing to experience. And I bet every time you watch a chiefs game, oh, you're, you're getting close to touching that joy every time. Oh, that's it. When I lost my father 30 years ago, when he was, when I was 30. And that's the, I mean, just, it takes your whole body. When we won that, uh, the AFC championship to get back in the super bowl for that first year with my homes. Yeah. What a game it was. I mean, my father was there weeping. You're just, you know, it's such an, uh, a crazy, crazy experience. I don't know. This is a game, but I, it means a lot. It means so. And so I know whenever I see, I love anybody. I love anybody who loves a sports team. Yeah. I think it's a, I think it's a good thing to do. It's wholesome. It's healthy. Unless you're a jets fan, it's not. It's yeah. Yeah. There's a couple of teams because I don't like the Cowboys. Plenty of people like the Cowboys, but I'm a Commanders fan. We grew up with the Redskins and it's been a long, tough road. I do root for the Ravens. It is a nice little bonus to have a Maryland team, even though we grew up DC side, the Ravens came and we root for the Ravens, but we kind of bleed for Washington and it's been a long road for us. You've got your NFC, AFC thing, but it's fun. I'm excited again. We're all undefeated. Here we go. That's really, really, really nice. Do you have any favorite players? Well, I love me some Travis Kelsey. I mean, he's just super cool. Is he coming back? Yeah, yesterday he said, I'm coming back. I'll do one more. One more. I'll do one more. Come on, we need to all say goodbye to him. We need to go well done. No, I knew it. He's not done. That was a horrible season we had. He doesn't want to end on that season. Yeah, you got to redo it. Yeah. And then my new favorite is Kenneth Walker that we beat the Super Bowl. We just got him. Yeah, that's right. I just saw that yesterday. My son showed me. He keeps up on all of it. Oh, yeah. He tells me all the trades. Yeah, we're back. We got Max Crosby at the Ravens. Oh, at least we don't see him twice a year now. Yeah. Raiders used to, oh, horrible. Do you ever go to the games? I didn't for a long time. I just didn't have the opportunity. It didn't come up because Kansas City is pretty far away. I'm here now. But I sang the anthem at a couple songs at one of the AFC championships. Did you enjoy that? I did. It's kind of crazy, right? That big football crowd. Oh, because you know what the Chiefs do, you know, and the home of the Chiefs. And they all say Chiefs. And so I was like, they warned me. They say, look, they're going to do this. I'm like, okay. Yeah. Yeah. That's really, really fun. And it's really nerve wracking. People are like, you're ever nervous? I'm like, no, no, no. I'm never nervous except when you sing the national anthem because you, you can tank your whole career if you mess up the national anthem. Propel Fitness Water with Gatorade Electrolytes, zero sugar and vitamins. Propel hydrates better than water to help you get the most out of your workout and get back to your best self. What propels you? Right? Yeah. I have a rule with that. I don't, I've never done the anthem because it terrifies me. You really have to be a next level. You could do it. Obviously. Chris Stapleton could do it. There's a list of artists who could do it. I'm not doing it, but you know, I don't have that range. It's like start low, start low, start low. Yeah. It was a start low, start low. You don't start high, you'll be in big trouble. Well, I made you a little thank you card. What'd you do? Check it out. I made that for you. It's a, so I have a little thing when I do thank you cards or birthday cards. I do them on trading cards. Oh, look at that. Oh, look. There's a little Mahomes. I was going to say Mahomes. A little Mahomes peeking through. Mahomes. And that's my favorite Johnny Cash song. Oh. One piece at a time. One piece at a time. And there's a trading card game that I collect called One Piece and it all kind of ties together. Oh yeah? And I just like always connect things. I might've heard. Oh. Someone might've told me. And let's see, does this, uh, does that mean anything to you? Oh, that does. Oh, that does. This is One Piece. This is what I collect. Yeah. What are we watching tonight? We're watching the leader. Come on. Oh my God. That's come on. Yeah. Oh my God. That's a leader. I went all the way. That's a leader card. Come on. Look at that. I know. Come on. These are, these are, it just goes on and on. Yeah, buddy. Here we go. We love you very much. There you go. And one more. Thank you. Come on. Yamato all Yamato's your favorite Yamato. deck, right? I love Yamato. Well, I love my home. You can see why she's, she's, I didn't personalize any of them. No, no, no. I, I got a, I, I, it's just something I do and it's a fun little way to do personal notes, you know, less of those these days. So I made you a little Patrick Mahomes. Thank you. Card. I appreciate that. That's going next to my Patrick Mahomes. I think I have his rookie card. Would you get me this year? Yeah. You got me the rookie card. Yeah. You got the little shrine going. Thank you. This is very thoughtful. You are welcome. It's a trade. Yeah, that's what we do. We trade cards, right? Was that kind of the nature of your relationship with your dad? Was it, was it like fun like that? Oh yeah. My dad was, it was all about my dad. My dad was high school teacher, a basketball coach. He grew up super poor, like migrant farmer, no shoes sort of thing. And, and got a scholarship because he could swim. He was on the swim team. And, and so he goes to Kansas and when I first started playing, get a guitar, he brought a guitar home for my sister who was older than me and she didn't want to play. And I grabbed it and they were like, you're too young, you're too young. And, but he was like, okay, well, if you want to try. So I started playing about eight at eight years old, nine, 10. And did you have a natural like knack for it? Well, I had a desire for it. So there you go. That's what you need. Yeah. And I want to do it every day. So you got to sit there for hours. So eventually my fingers bled and, and you, you, and you get past those hard parts and I could play. And I started playing in bands. Like grown guys and me, 12, 13 year old, but because my father drove me everywhere, every rehearsal, every gig I played, I got to play in bars, clubs all over the Midwest for like five years. So the performer you see is because he drove me around. He was really supportive. He wasn't, he didn't push me or anything. He just allowed it to just love you. Yeah. He just loved me. And you wanted to do it and he was like, all right, let's get in the car. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. That's super cool. Imagine had he not, imagine had he not said, yeah, let's go, you know, like whatever that feeding that dog, I would say that to my, my wife, like, let's just feed it, whatever it is, like, like, let's just like, they're into that. Like, just don't dump everything, whatever it is, like, what do they need to go get supplies or whatever project they're doing or whatever passion they have, you kind of just go and you're like, okay, well, that's how we got into cards. My son's into it. But now it's 10 years later, turned into this like whole world. That's like actually quite big. We have kind of an insane collection, but it was him. It was his interest. He was just my kids too. So, you know, and so, or baseball or with my daughter dance or whatever, but like, I think that parent that'll drive, just be there. Sure. Yes. Show up. Very important. Amazing. Where did the songs come from? Oh, like when did those. Emerge? Well, I grew up in the sixties and seventies, so I grew up in this delicious time of music and singer songwriters and my parents, my dad would had was cool. And he listened to really, you know, great. I mean, we had everyone from Johnny Mathis and Aretha Franklin to Simon Garfunkel and moms and papas, and he was a big Neil diamond fan. So there's a lot of songwritery things around me. The first album he got for me as a gift when I was 10 or something. Was, uh, Carol King's, you know, tapestry. Cool. Yeah. So to me, it was the songwriting was a part of this song, the singer songwriter was a thing I could be. It always like stood out to you. Yeah. The two were like, yeah, that's interesting. That makes total sense. I felt the same way when I was growing up. It wasn't about being someone who's going to sing some other stuff. It's I'm going to play the guitar, I'm going to live my life, and then I'm going to take that life and, and. Yeah. And create art from it. Right. And that's the only way that I thought, I mean, I, that's what Joni Mitchell did as far as I knew. That's what Bruce Springsteen was doing. Yeah. This is it. So I just worked on that and I, the songs, I was to people this, that all of my songs, you know, are mostly a truthful and then sometimes there's more truth to me that are in my songs. You know, it's, you, you can't, you have to, there's a place to make it palatable for. Everyone. And, and also truthful to me, especially before I came out, it, I was very non-gender in my music, so it made it very, you know, I'm the only one I'm the, although I wrote that afterwards, but. Right. So when did you come out? Came out in 93, I was 32 years old. That's like, it's a long time. Yeah. My first year, it was my fourth album that came out after. So my first three albums, I wasn't, but nobody came out in the eighties. Right. That's so interesting. Cause we live in a time. Now where God, I can only imagine, you know, we're always standing on the shoulders of the people who did something before us that, that laid the road for us to travel down. And I always wonder like how we don't think about it now, how difficult it was in the eighties and the nineties and the two thousands. And, you know, it's interesting to me to think about, like, do you feel like the younger generation sees that work? Do you feel like they see it? And they appreciate it. I'm not, I'm not saying they don't. Some do. Yeah. Some, yeah. I don't think they need to. Right. I, I think, believe me, not a week goes by that someone doesn't, you know, thank me, you know, just say something to me. So it's not like I feel underappreciated. I don't at all. And I'm glad that people don't know what it was like, that, that, that, that is gone. That is such a, such a nice. Yeah. I, I, people would ask me. When did you say it? In 93. In 93. They would say, well, what do you think about the future? And I would say, well, I think it's a good thing. I think it's a good thing. future and i'm like i do believe someday a young pop artist is going to come on people are going to go crazy and they're going to be gay from the get-go chapel roan sam smith yeah no they're all here and it it makes me very very happy that's such a nice way to put it but i guess i say it to say and you answered it but i guess i say it to say to give you your flowers i have lots of flowers i know i'm really okay but i think it's more of like um the empathy that you have when you look back and think like the idea that someone couldn't be themself or that they had to think twice about yeah them being themselves is a is something that frustrates me and um i'm i'm happy we're here but we are here collectively through a bunch of people's effort and their lived experiences and they're you know being fearless you know and being able to step out and say like this is me because we're never alone no i consider billie jean king was that for me because she was the first word i'd ever saw lesbian next to anybody and it was she was she lost everything you know back in the late 70s so when it was time for me and i was ready to come out i reached out to her and and martina and abertolo and they were very supportive and and there was a real it was a very small community but there was those of us who were like that's cool you can do this yeah yeah that's cool you ever think that maybe also there was like it also maybe drove you to like there was an edge you know that i think like sometimes the chip on your shoulder is like is a good thing sometimes sometimes it can get in our way but yeah a lot of times it can be really powerful not to say it's a a good thing but there is like an edge to it yeah when my first album came out it was it was that unspoken thing right and i would go do a show and my first you know two rows would be women losing their minds right and i'm like i don't know you know what's this and you know and so you you but it was that sort of oh we're all getting like oh i know this and you know and and there's there is that thing but there came a point i put two albums out and then my third album it was a great album and i was okay and this is like 90 91 91 and grunge is starting and i'm like hey i can wear flannel i've been wearing flannel for a long time you know and yeah you know and so uh so and i hear alternative and i'm like this is the time and i i did an uh interview with someone for it was music express magazine and oh yeah i remember that that's crazy and i was on the cover express and he changed every pronoun that i used he changed it to my boyfriend and i was no way and it horrified me because there was an underground you know the the gay community was really strong but it was underground right and i'm like oh my god they're gonna think that i did this and so my plan was i was going to come out on arsenio hall oh wow you know but before that's crazy that um i worked on the clinton gore campaign and at the inauguration there was a i was around a lot of really important strong powerful gay leaders right and they were the ones they're the ones who were because this is during aids and they're the ones who are standing up and saying you know act up and and these guys they would put in their jobs and everything on the line these women and and they would here come to this they would kind of drag me along and i was like yeah i gotta do this this is my brothers and sisters right and so i finally came out at the at the inauguration actually what a time man what a wild time i can almost feel you in the room with those people and at those times because i can see the clips on tv and i can so interesting to have to hear you talk about it it's really cool to to to hear that i'm grateful that that i had the opportunity to be truthful to myself and then speak about it and like i said it comes back to me constantly i'm very happy sitting with you and getting an getting a sense of you it makes me feel good about the person that you know i feel like you help more people than you could even imagine could relate to you and you'll never meet them and but to know that you've that that's a really cool thing to think about this is the butterfly effect of it because i really believe in that too it's like how many people did that song get to we don't we'll never be able to quantify the vibrations of one action or one song or one and so when you start to kind of try to round all that up you couldn't quantify how you've impacted the the globe now what is there eight billion people it's interesting to think about but the other thing i'll say is alternative because this is what i was talking to my brother i was talking my twin brother's my best friend we talk about every every time i'm coming in here to talk to someone i'm always like a little buzzed like i'm like and so i'm like thinking whoa what am i going to talk about you know i never know right he said it he's like oh she's the original alternative like she's that's that's alt rock that's the beginning of alternative rock and when you think about it's it's cool and that's what we came up in as an alternative rock radio in the 90s that's when our like musical uh kind of we started our band in 96 we were listening to alternative radio of course i i grew up listening and hearing your music and so but when you think about it it really is like the beginning it all starts from somewhere and it starts to emerge and you were like the beginning of an alternative that's been now going for you know i mean the 90s it's exploded but it never stopped i mean there's every band's alternative now yeah it's a kind of it it's almost genre-less now right if i find that i mean this new album i have it's like where is it going i mean to me it's just the same it's rock and roll right but that rock and roll isn't really a place anymore i mean the country music sounds like 90s rock and roll it's kind of there and you've always had a little country yeah i grew up right in country bands right i can sing stand by your man with yeah tammy winette i can kill it you know and yeah and johnny cash big influence on me and the radio station in the 60s that i grew up as a child it was one am radio station that's all we had it was out of kansas city it's called whb and it played everything it would play tammy winette then we played led zeppelin they didn't play marvin gay then you could hear you know johnny mathis and it was just it there was not these this is your music this is your music it was all the just good music and i i always felt that so i i always was always don't put me in a box just if you like it listen to it yeah i think that's great music too it's kind of genre-less i think that about classic music it's genre-less it's rock and roll but it's a little country sometimes or it's a little whatever you can hear your roots in the music you know you can hear you're from where you're from yeah and it plays well if a country artist wanted to sing it easy you could go the only ones that ever covered my music have been country artists it's interesting little nicorette how long you've been on the nicorette my friend seven years yeah see so my wife before she was my wife she's my best friend and one year for um new year's eve i said my new year's resolution is that you will stop nicorette she's like i don't think that's how it works it's not good for you but she did it's better for you than cigarettes okay but but but make a case for me i want to i want to because you could speed up my my uh my dependency getting off of that um nicotine's probably the hardest thing to get off of oh it's like absolutely it gets its claws in you i remember i was uh for a minute i was one of the long line of women who was up to play janice joplin and so i was like okay janice she smoked a lot so i was like you know what i gotta get or i'm gonna look like someone who you know you see him in the movies and they don't know how to smoke right and i'm like i need to i need to do this so um i would i would smoke a cigarette once a day like at the end of the night at the end of the day i'm like okay i'm gonna one one a day and i remember the morning i woke up and i said oh i don't feel very good but and the first thought in my head was bing but i bet if i smoked a cigarette i'd feel better and i was like there it is that's what it is boom and it's a it's a it's a really the only way out of it now i think i do think so i got off everything else yeah yeah although i wasn't really on anything else i stopped drinking years ago just because i didn't like the way it made me feel have you tried like something like psilocybin or something even harder to because i have a foundation i lost my son to an opioid overdose about five years ago i'm sorry and i tell people he was my greatest teacher he's grateful for the time i knew him and he it was a hard life for him and he and what we did was start a foundation called the etheridge foundation that we provide funds for research into psychedelics and how they can help with opioid use disorder or just addiction in general but what we're finding now in these studies is that it can interrupt your neural your neural pathways those grooves those nicotine grooves that you've put in there and they're going to go away and they're going to go away and they're going to go away and they're going to go away and they're going to go away it gives you a moment and that's why we've heard of ayahuasca now but beyond that there's a thing called ibogaine in iboga it's a root from africa ancient ancient and it it is we're finding that one treatment of that puts totally opens up your neural pathways and you put in all the good habits then and you won't have the you can actually get off of it like this so i'm into it okay um ayahuasca scares me because i don't like to throw up when i hear you throw up on it yeah you don't want to know the mysteries of the world because you're afraid to throw up okay all right fear is a real stopper you know what but when you really keep on a journey when you throw up you're going to be happy that you're throwing up okay well i do it with you okay i'll call you next time next time all right hopefully somewhere not in all the way down no no no i know many people gone to peru and i'm like okay i don't need to do but okay i recently heard um someone did a mushroom journey with a person who does it and then i also which i'm interested in doing because i i i microdosed and i found that too i only did like one cycle for like a couple months and i found it had a huge impact on me and i haven't done it since and i kind of always think about it i'm like maybe i should do another cycle because that really had a huge impact on my yeah if we got out of the thought of oh this is so woo woo and i'm going to be wearing white robes or something you know no this is it can absolutely be done in a way that it's so helpful just rewiring those things that we're talking about those those habits those thoughts that we don't even know that we're putting in our lives and we're putting in our lives that we don't even know that we're putting in our lives that we don't even know that we're putting in our lives that we don't even know that we're putting in our lives that we're putting in there when we were 10 years old yeah we it's old yes so that's where we're focusing on actually the care and the facilitation after the journey because you you can have this moment but you can go back home and just it it can all go right back in and it's not just the thing is is like the addict who's suffering is like the most apparent right the most honest person they're in there an addiction in their suffering the most honest person they're in there an addiction in their suffering the most honest person they're in there an addiction in their suffering the most honest person they're in there an addiction in their suffering the most honest person they're in there an but the rest of us are in some but the rest of us are in some but the rest of us are in some addiction suffering in in smaller ways addiction suffering in in smaller ways addiction suffering in in smaller ways where we're kind of we can hide it a where we're kind of we can hide it a where we're kind of we can hide it a little bit we can we're functioning and little bit we can we're functioning and little bit we can we're functioning and we're functioning but we're still we're functioning but we're still we're functioning but we're still dealing with old yeah and we need dealing with old yeah and we need dealing with old yeah and we need to go into the basement and clean it to go into the basement and clean it to go into the basement and clean it out we're in a problem solving out we're in a problem solving out we're in a problem solving consciousness that's what we wake up in consciousness that's what we wake up in consciousness that's what we wake up in every day we we it's like what do we every day we we it's like what do we every day we we it's like what do we solve today what are we going to get solve today what are we going to get solve today what are we going to get done let's get our coffee so we can do done let's get our coffee so we can do done let's get our coffee so we can do all the things that are legal are to all the things that are legal are to all the things that are legal are to help our problem solving consciousness help our problem solving consciousness help our problem solving consciousness cigarettes uh you know cigarettes uh you know cigarettes uh you know coffee these things are stimulus so we coffee these things are stimulus so we coffee these things are stimulus so we can get everything done we need to get can get everything done we need to get can get everything done we need to get done yeah that's that's where we're at done yeah that's that's where we're at done yeah that's that's where we're at yeah well that's going to this is my yeah well that's going to this is my yeah well that's going to this is my third coffee today oh okay so you've got third coffee today oh okay so you've got third coffee today oh okay so you've got is so nicotine is not the only thing yeah but you get it you get it done yeah yeah but you get it you get it done yeah yeah but you get it you get it done yeah and the thought that oh i can't get it and the thought that oh i can't get it and the thought that oh i can't get it done without these things or that i need done without these things or that i need done without these things or that i need to get it done that's to get it done that's to get it done that's the part that needs to change not just oh the part that needs to change not just oh the part that needs to change not just oh i need to stop doing this but it's i need to stop doing this but it's i need to stop doing this but it's it's that belief and it's that belief and it's that belief and beyond that i believe that exploring beyond that i believe that exploring beyond that i believe that exploring your consciousness is a civil right your consciousness is a civil right your consciousness is a civil right right and it would be great if it was right and it would be great if it was right and it would be great if it was something that we could something that we could something that we could lead ourselves to and you'll find as lead ourselves to and you'll find as lead ourselves to and you'll find as you get older it'll be more important to you get older it'll be more important to you get older it'll be more important to you the the problem you know the kids you the the problem you know the kids you the the problem you know the kids will get older the will get older the that you'll see that they'll they'll that you'll see that they'll they'll that you'll see that they'll they'll they'll get into their things that they'll get into their things that they'll get into their things that they're into and you'll realize that they're into and you'll realize that they're into and you'll realize that you're just here to feed and water them them and love them and and then they then they go make all their choices and they're going to have problems and go up and down that's that's what we all do so we can learn to make better choices and improve and then everybody improves that's that's that's the organism that we are so it's the evolution yeah the interesting thing too that i just thought about is exploring your like consciousness and your subconscious and the deeper you the did i just think that did i just notice that that subconscious part of you is actually like true spirituality yeah and the idea of that by people it's interesting because i grew up listen i'm not saying there's not a lot of value to some to religious teachings there's not there's a lot of value to them but that i find because i come from that deep in me like i'm like i i can't do that i can't when i first did mushrooms right i took microdose and i tried to explain that to my mom i was like no no mom it's i wasn't tripping i wasn't tripping it was a little microdose and it made me feel a little it was subtle it made me feel like a little happier it made me feel a little bit in a better mood it wasn't a trip i wasn't seeing things i was like and i did that for four days then i did three days off yeah then i did it i did that for four weeks and like she couldn't all she heard was i was doing mushrooms yeah oh and i was like no mom i'm in touch i'm getting more in touch god forbid we did use something that came from the earth to make us feel better right yeah it's it's i did it eventually gummies weed gummies though okay yeah yeah she's come over a little bit too all right we'll do mushrooms she's scared of those but i was like okay just the weed is enough but yeah for now yeah it no but it's the when i had my experience my heroic dose i afterwards i for 20 years i studied books and i and i studied the world's religions and there's actually good evidence that religion was actually born out of mushrooms right and things right that the understanding that we're all one no we started talking actually after mushrooms yeah we actually like you know language and stuff like that yeah it would be nice if it got a little better you know rap in the world so we could incredible yeah stuff though could yeah incredible very much so it's it's finding its way these days also incredible what you're doing with it with the addiction i think is incredible because i think that i actually have seen it work with people personally yeah good and that hit me to you know that that that hits home my my uh my dad was a alcoholic and he died from it and then that's a tricky one because it's not yeah alcohol socially it's acceptable and everyone accepts it and they all kind of like drinks a little too much drinks a little too much you know like and you see it coming like a slow slow motion train it's a it's a slow suicide yeah yeah and i and i used to i me and my dad were estranged for many years and then we reconnected it was uh talked about it a million times but it was really nice we became good friends he was a very old school tough guy but in his last 10 years there was a a side of him that came out that i never knew when i was a kid he was around and we were estranged for a long time but it was really like nice but the drinking was always there it always been and i said to him i was like dad this is not good dude you're gonna like let me try to get you into this treatment place a million times he said no this is just how it is and and then he died one day and it was you know from drinking and i knew it was coming but i thought maybe in like 20 years it would be like he'd break down and go into the hospital and to be one of those which is also kind of awful yeah but he's had a really big night and boom and it's sad it's i don't it's of course it's sad and it was shocking and i and i and it was painful because it was i didn't get to say goodbye or anything like that but also it's weird to say it's hard to say like like yeah it was my dad he had a big night and and he yeah it was it but also kind of the only way he would have gone out which is and crazy probably didn't want to have a long sickness and whatever and that was not his style for sure i think i mean i don't know but i think sometimes death can be a choice death is not that they're killing themselves but in the moment you're like okay i'm i'm letting go also within the same amount of time you're like okay i'm i'm letting go of time my one of my old oldest bestest friends also died from opioids so it was a small window where it really hit me in the face but i knew it was coming because both of them wouldn't they wouldn't listen we'd all accepted that that's just how it was there comes a point where you realize you can't save people yeah you just you can't and that's not our job that each person kind of has to save themselves you can inspire you can be a light you can inspire but anything else you know i had to i had to come to that place with my son you know for years and years just trying this and that this and that and you know too much money not enough money but you know and and and finally i said you know what he's i have to be prepared that i might lose him this is his choice ultimately in the end only he can do it and it's the the pain and suffering of life is is um is real is real and and none of us escape it yeah no the loss is a part of life how we deal with it is our job i mean i could have easily and i meet parents all the time who have lost their children to opioid addiction and they just crumble the guilt and the shame and i'm that that's no no no it's that they would not want us to take on the guilt and shame for what they couldn't do the choices that they made and it's a big lesson that's deep to not stop my life because my son made a choice that he wouldn't want that nobody wanted he's out of pain he's happy there's no reason for me to suffer now yeah but people need to hear that because it's hard it's just one it's it's it's hard to reconcile it's just it's hard to reconcile um and every parent that would would relate to that it's very it's there's not a word in the english language for a parent losing a child yeah you can be an orphan you can be a widow right but there's no oh my god i call myself as a mother who's lost a child there's no word for it not supposed to happen well i'm sorry for your loss you know like i said i had 21 wonderful years with him you know yeah i learned a lot he was my biggest teacher with breast cancer so i i won't say who but we just had a family member beat breast cancer and now it feels like they've gotten so far with treating it so it feels like it's um we felt optimistic good we did we felt really optimistic but it wasn't a sure thing it wasn't early but it wasn't late yeah you know there was a moment there where we were all really really worried and not just one moment it was a long it was and but we just got the all clear uh a a year ago and then it was the anniversary a year and we got the all clear and so like we all just celebrated it was a big deal this is where the i mean go ahead and ask the question but the real work starts after because it's yeah so that's what is how after and and when did you um when did you uh beat it it's i've been 22 years cancer free now it's incredible yeah and it's it's yeah what's the key the key is understanding that cancer just doesn't happen to you it just doesn't oh i got cancer well my family had cancer so i'm going to get cancer each of us in our ancestral lines have a way that dis-ease is going to present itself okay some families it's heart disease some families it's diabetes some some families it's it's neural yeah wherever that my father died of cancer my grandmother died of cancer my aunt died of cancer so it my stress and my life choices were so that my body had to cancer is this is what really freaked me what really like opened my eyes is that in the medical community they will tell you cancer starts when cells go bad and they start there and then they blah blah blah blah and it's all numbers there's just tons of numbers and letters your hp2 negative seven something i don't know all those things and they start from there but i was like well what makes cells go bad well cells go bad when there's too much acid in the environment a lot of us think that a cell that the most important thing is the nucleus it's actually the covering of the cell because a cell will become anything that it is emerged in that's why it's called a gallbladder cell it's called a stem cell it's called a gallbladder cell it's called a stem cell it's called a gallbladder cell it's called a gallbladder cell it's called a gallbladder cell you can take a cell and you can put it in with other gallbladder cells and it will become a gallbladder so it's the environment so if our environment is too acidic a normal cell will get so in acid that it will go bang and it will become a cancer cell then your body goes okay white blood cells everybody and it puts a tumor over the cancer cell it's called a gallbladder cell it's called a cancer cell it's called a gallbladder cell it's called a cancer cell it's called a cancer cell and it lets you know hey hey you got cancer that's and and then you were supposed to go oh i need to change whatever it was is making my body acidic mine was number one stress those thoughts you think they're all sending chemicals chemicals stress is chemical stress is a real thing it's a chemical reaction and is it propel fitness water with gatorade electrolytes zero sugar and vitamins propel hydrates better than water to help you get the most out of your workout and get back to your best self what propels you propel with gatorade electrolytes just stress from this you don't even know right just thinking how you think about your stress that oh my god my pants don't fit me right that's it so self-esteem is a part of that self-esteem is a huge part of it how you think about yourself those and your relationships if you're in a stressful relationship i'm not getting enough but i'm not oh i'm afraid that they're gonna any fear anything toxicity toxicity is very very and then you're gonna be drinking and that's acid then you're gonna be that's acid that's you know and then and then you're looking he's good and you know and sugar that's gonna make me feel better and you're just we're just petri dishes of acid right inflammation inflammation a hundred percent and you know it you know it too water we're supposed to drink so much of this we're supposed to drink a gallon of this a day i know and none of us do this change i try you do i do i can tell you very nice skin ask you to go to the bathroom right yeah you can go if you need to yeah i will but yeah but yeah but but these are the things but so so cancer once you then go okay i've got cancer and then then they cut it out like they did they cut mine out well i need my responsibility my ability to respond to my cancer was that oh let me look at the thing that put me in that state and change it i've all the doctors i had were like well we find that the ones that survive are the ones that make a change right in their work in their food in their exercise and whatever they're like i'm changing in their mindset that's what it is and it can change it changes your life for good you're going to be an insufferable guy in 10 years telling people you shouldn't drink that much coffee you should you know you're going to be like me because you will see the light in my eyes yes because i've seen the light because you see because it will because it works you'll feel better you'll love better you'll love people better you'll love yourself better the that's the way that's the only way you can love better is to love yourself better the best thing you can do for your partner is to love yourself and take care of yourself i agree with that and and a wise man once told me that better is better yeah we get used to better really fast you We don't get used to worse yes we will never go back to worse once we've had better there you go and so when you hear uh advice of something that could be done better you should you know we're so closed off because we think we're well i'm doing it this way and then someone says there's a better way to do that you know if you do that and then when you listen and you do discover better never go back it's very easy to adjust to better we will hit our heads against the wall for a long time and go yeah yeah yeah i know i shouldn't be doing this i know i know and then something will happen a health thing will happen yeah your body is like okay i tried to give you this signal that one okay it's finally going to have to be you know that that high blood pressure that whatever it is that's your body's going to warn you it's going to say hey we need to kind of make another decision and the good thing is once you start making the other decision your body your body can get rid of cancer it can if you put yourself but it's really up to you i don't recommend it for everybody you know but it's what you believe if you're doing what you believe like i believe i will never ever have cancer because i will never get my i know you won't yeah to that point yeah i mean 22 years is incredible that's a real that's incredible that is that's without medic all the medications they wanted me to take i was like no i i got this that's it congratulations that's incredible and i knew that what i believed and felt i knew that every year that i was a survivor and that pretty soon after 20 years i could go look this worked for me this worked this is i'm proof yeah be happy yeah yeah yeah and then you go back to your work with a whole different yeah there's a there's a different vibe it's like you're bringing it's a practice it's the yoga yes it is life is a practice you i don't ever get to a place where i'm like i'm not gonna do this i'm not gonna do this i don't ever get to a place where i'm like i did it i yeah i've got this life diploma no it's just every day it's like right if i start my day out great chances are my day is gonna be great yeah and most of them probably really are i have i love my life that's one of my songs on the album is called being alive it's like and the chorus is god i love being alive do you love this record i love this record i cannot wait for everyone to hear it isn't that a good feeling and for me to sing it it's such a good feeling it's so amazing when you feel that way about a record yeah you don't always get that there's been moments where you know every moment matters and you were there for whatever reason to get here but you get to that where you love the album and then you want to go play on you want to go on stage it's incredible just play just play and play and if anybody wants to hear and join me great not i'm just loving playing it new record the tour is there anything else you're excited about i'm excited every day yeah i'm excited i'm excited about um i'm at the point now where i used to like live you know years ahead of myself and and and never really spend time enjoying this so i'm at the point now it's like yeah i got lots of things coming i've got and i know they're out there and they'll be they'll come here when it's time yeah you know it and and i don't have i don't have to go make it happen i know that those things are out there my desires are out there and they're coming to me all i got to do is be in the place where i'm ready for them and that's that's a place of of joy of appreciation appreciation is huge you can change any situation any day anything about yourself just by appreciation just by man i really appreciate this talk with you this has been an incredible this lifts me up this fills me up my whole day me too i haven't had this you know nice of a deep conversation in a long time well i really stoked i got to talk to you thanks for coming i hope i see you many many times you will i i look forward to that i'm gonna come to the show come on come on right on thank you all right thank you for watching artist friendly if you like this episode please make sure you hit the like button you follow the channel and please share it with your friends we appreciate the support that is why this show exists because you listen to it thank you guys and we'll see you next time