SPEAKER_01 0:34

Welcome to the Better Two Podcast. I'm your host, Donna. Today's guest is Keith Carne. Keith Carne has a brand new record out called Magenta Light. He is also the drummer of We Are Scientist. And on the podcast, we talk about that, his 13 years with the band. We talk about him being a drum teacher. We talk about movies, his cat, and so much more. So tune in. Hi Keith, how are you doing today?

SPEAKER_00 0:59

I'm doing great. Thank you. How are you?

SPEAKER_01 1:01

I'm doing well. So you are in Sweden, is that correct?

SPEAKER_00 1:05

I'm in Stockholm right now. I've been here since yesterday. I'm on tour right now with We Are Scientists. Uh and we have about five days left of this European run.

SPEAKER_01 1:16

So is I'm sure this is not your first time being in Europe because you've been with the band for 13 years. So is it different now with the climate of the world? Is it different now being on tour?

SPEAKER_00 1:30

Do you mean the fit like the literal climate of the world because everything's getting warmer? Or do you mean the uh sort of uh that could go that could go either way? So you can't do it. I'll tell you, um, personally, things are a little bit different for me right now because uh in a sort of big brotherly way, we are scientists has shown me so much of Europe and I've seen so much of the UK and Europe through playing with them for so many years that I feel very comfortable to explore on my own. So in that way, in that climate, it's it's a little different, different. In the physical climate of the world, I guess uh I haven't you know felt an appreciable climate difference in the last 13 years, but I'm sure if we get into decimal points, we could probably see it going that way. And with Trump, um it's interesting because uh I think that there's this like implicit idea that as a like a rock band, you know, kind of traveling in Europe, that people tend to give us the benefit of the doubt that we are on the left, like on the progressive side. And especially for a band like us, that is a very safe assumption to make. Um and um we uh we we we chat about people with it. People are curious, they ask us what things are like in um you know in America. But also, uh, you know, being a band from New York, it's hard for us to say sometimes because New York is a little bit of a bubble, though we certainly get to see a little bit more of the country than most of our New Yorker compatriots because we travel in a van so much around the country. Um, so it was really interesting. In 2023, we went on tour, it was a year before the election, and I came home and I said to my wife, honey, get ready. He is going to win. It was very obvious with the groundswell. Uh, and so here we're like a little bit defenders of it. But, you know, I also try to stick up for people. I think that a lot of people have been hoodwinked into voting for him. Uh, and um, I think a lot of people are just trying to put food on the table and they're trying to look for shelter for their families, and they've just been misguided by a Republican Party that that is taking the mantle and making them feel that they're gonna do that for them. So I try to also defend Americans in that way too.

SPEAKER_01 3:50

I I often thought when the first time he ran, I'm like, when I would hear people saying that they were gonna vote for him, I'm like, you think a man with a golden toilet understands you? How is that possible? And and it and it's very interesting because I I moved the day I was m in the process of moving the day of the election. And we delayed it a day because after the election, I was just kind of devastated. It was like a nightmare. I woke up in the middle of the night just like the first time, and it was just like, oh no, here we are. And I remember asking one of the movers that day, I'm like, so did you vote? No, why bother? Why bother voting? It's not gonna make any difference in my life. And I'm just like, oh, so you're part of the problem. And and I mean, I know we've all we've all had those moments where it's like my vote doesn't matter, but it does. And and that's kind of that's kind of how we need to look at things. And and to your point about New York being a bubble, I grew up in New Orleans until I was 16, and then we moved to Shreveport. And New Orleans is a bubble all to itself in Louisiana. I mean, things have gotten a little bit further out now, but back then Mardi Gras was only celebrated in New Orleans. Mardi Gras was not anywhere else. And it was very conservative up in Shreveport. So everybody looked at me and said, Oh, you must be a party girl. You came from New Orleans. It's like, no, but okay. So there's that assumption, just like New York, that New York, and and even I would say this in a world representation, and that we do this a lot because I'm I'm outside of Chicago, way outside of Chicago now. Chicago is the bubble. Everybody looks at Illinois, we think of Chicago. Everybody looks at New York, we think of New York City. We don't think of everything else.

SPEAKER_00 5:32

Right, right.

SPEAKER_01 5:33

And it kind of goes with when you look at politics, we have the fearless leader. And everybody else, I I wrote a piece recently about this because the fact of we have leaders in power that really don't represent the people. They have their own agendas. And really, I think if you ask most of the world if they really wanted to be in this war, I would say most people would say, oh, excuse me, training exercises or excursion because we can't say the word war. Um I think most people would say they didn't want this.

SPEAKER_00 6:06

Yeah. And even the right is coming around on that, not even coming around. They they feel um misrepresented, you know, and uh, you know, this is not an America sort of first policy, you know.

SPEAKER_01 6:20

No, no, and we didn't hear to talk about this. I didn't mean to go make this so political, but I appreciate your input and I appreciate your your voice on this because it's something sometimes that I feel that as a podcaster, I can get in trouble. And and there was never a time in my life that I would think, oh, well, what I say is gonna get me in trouble. But now it's like, well, it can get you flagged.

SPEAKER_00 6:41

Yeah, it can. It's relevant as well. You know, it's it's I think it's important to always try to be looking outside of your island or your bubble. I mean, that's a little bit what got us into this mess to begin with. So I I I see it as a as a place of responsibility for us to be sort of stewards of goodwill and um uh sort of like rational like rationality when we come over here and we speak to Europeans. And, you know, I I hope that we impart a sense of uh sanity, you know, because if if you're going based on headlines, it doesn't feel like America is a very sane place right now.

SPEAKER_01 7:21

No, no, and it kind of I want to go back to something that I read in your press bio because you talked, you know, we talk about how crazy the world is now and how it feels so, especially in the States, it feels very uncertain. There's a lot of uncertainty here and a lot of things that we saw progress in. Because you talk about being a kid in the 90s and how as a boy you were scared to reach for the color pink. And and I and I bring this up because you think about before all this started and how uh uh the LBGTQ community had so many rights expanded upon, they were being accepted, and now they're trying to pass a bill to criminalize being LGBTQ. I mean, how do we get here and how did these things become so unacceptable? And why are they so unacceptable? Because even as you as a kid, you were scared to pick out a freaking crayon.

SPEAKER_00 8:19

Yeah, it's true. I mean, I think a lot of that also comes from the fact that I was uh an only child. I mean, I had plenty of friends, and I did not live any sort of like abused childhood but or like bullied child. I mean, every kid is bullied, uh, but I grew up in a wonderfully supportive and nurturing environment through my parents, but I had long hair. I'm an only child. Uh I was really, really, really intensely into music and like art and um and you know, kids would call me gay all the time. So I think I was just particularly sensitive about it. And, you know, there was a thing about, you know, in in in 90s kid culture, you know, whether it was uh beats and liver or gross um or like boys wear blue and girls wear pink, you know, there were these um sort of echo chambers uh reinforcing this age-old thought that ironically was kind of dying out with with my generation. Um and yeah, I said that in the press bio, and I almost like regret it uh in saying that like thank gosh, things are different now, because I don't want to suggest that we've moved beyond prejudices that keep people oppressed. We have so much work to do in that regard. But at least superficially, I don't think it's ridiculous for um people to be thought of as like emasculine if they're wearing pink. And as a sort of subset of that, I don't think that if you're a man and if you're thought of being as a little bit feminine, that that's a bad thing anymore, you know?

SPEAKER_01 9:59

No, it's not. And I and you know, the one thing that that is really being perpetrated a lot nowadays is division. And it's not now, I mean, I I've seen this just keep mushrooming and mushrooming. It was the races, it was age, it what and now it's I mean, we've had gender inequality for a long time. But now with the manosphere, and we are really dividing people between women and men in a different totally different level.

SPEAKER_00 10:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:32

And I think when you really think about that, if if you look at the bigger picture, you have to ask who is behind all of the division. I mean, division started way back in the potato famine, back in the I the days of Ireland when we wanted to divide people. So if you separate people, they're not as strong. So now we're but yet in the same token, we're sitting there rallying, and this is a lot of BS that they normally do. We're rallying that we need the family, we need the strong family, we need kids, and okay, and we're pro-life. Okay, but we don't want to support you, we don't want to help you, we don't want to give you anything. And so all these things are very contradictory. And you even have politicians who will vote against LBGTQ when you know that most likely they are closeted, and that's unfortunate that they've lived their life that way.

SPEAKER_00 11:27

Yeah, log cabin Republicans, right? Um yeah, it's interesting. Uh I when I was in high school, I was a senior in high school, gay marriage was coming up, and marriage equality was sort of coming up, and it's something that I had the luxury to never really think about or worry about as a straight white male. Um not that race has anything to do right now with uh, you know, marriage equality. Uh right now, I say after like loving, you know, loving this decision. Um, but it it sort of blew my mind. And it was something that I had never thought about that gay marries like were were not uh gay couples were not allowed to marry. And it's almost like I remember being at dinner and asking my parents about it, and they're big supporters of LGBTQ rights, they're advocates. Um and uh I was outraged about it and almost like outraged that they were not outraged about it. They said, yeah, it's unfair, it's just kind of the way that the system works, and you know, there are other sort of like legal definitions like civil unions. I was like, yeah, but this just seems crazy. And I think that sort of generationally that was happening. People used to say that too, that like millennials, the big contributions to politics that we made were uh marriage equality, that that was not really a thing that was considered taboo unless you were a part of like evangelical, right? Um, and legalization of marijuana, and that these were things that were going to become passe in uh in the Republican Party, and insanely they haven't. Um, but I think everybody smokes weed and sexuality is a spectrum. So, you know, hopefully we can move past it soon, you know.

SPEAKER_01 13:12

True. And well, there and here's the problem we have somebody on the Supreme Court who benefited from loving, but who would like to wipe out loving.

SPEAKER_00 13:20

With Clarence Thomas, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:21

Yeah, it's and it's it's like, how? And when you think about, you know, you're you're talking about how these things come about. Jerry Fowell put all the stuff the Heritage Foundation started all these wheels back in the 70s, all because he wanted to be able to control more. They wanted more power, and that's why we have the right evangelicals that we do now. Because my generation, which is the Gen X, never would have thought that Roe v. Wade would have been turned over.

SPEAKER_00 13:53

Yeah, it's wild.

SPEAKER_01 13:55

So but speaking of legalizing pot, um, so your wife had a psychedelic vision that inspired your record, um a gentle light. Was was this a bad was this a trip from that? I mean, I not maybe that's too much of a question, but I I can tell you a whole story about my husband trying new marijuana that was pretty wild and sent him an opet way. But so was it inspired by uh a ride like that?

SPEAKER_00 14:23

It was, it was a psychedelic vision. We try to take um we try to take psychedelics responsibly, like you know, we're we're we're very careful about how we use them and what we're taking, um, and realize that that's not for everyone and you know advocate for it responsibly. Um but you know, we try to do it as a sort of bonding exercise uh a few times a year. And um, yeah, she had uh this this intense vision of magenta light pouring out of my face. And it's very funny because I'd never really communicated to her how much that color had meant to me. Um and it felt like uh it was this uh something that was sort of like dying to to express itself from within me. And um she shared this vision with me, and it really moved me and it really struck me, and I really started recording ideas for what became this album the very next day.

SPEAKER_01 15:20

Cool, very cool. Uh my my late husband, he uh he was used to smoking as he would call it Indiana Ditchweed. So he he had smoked most of his life, even in the early 2000s, and he quit cold turkey and marijuana became legal and he needed it for medical use. So he took a couple of hits and I'm like, I'm gonna go upstairs and write. He's like, No, you can't. I'm like, why? He goes, You have to sit here and hold me down. I'm like, excuse me? He's like, everything is like pixelating and moving, and I don't know how to stop it. I'm like, okay.

SPEAKER_00 15:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:57

So I sat there and just held his knees down because he felt like he was moving.

SPEAKER_00 16:02

Yeah, it's it's it's it's very real. Uh, I think marijuana has become a little too intense for me, and I I'm starting to sound like a boomer or a Gen Xer right now. But uh I go into dispensaries now asking them for lower strength marijuana. I just I feel like it's too debilitating. Uh, and I'm sort of showing my age here with that. But uh, you know, my friends and I often want that sort of like you know, 70s kind of midweed a lot, you know, um, where you smoke it as an enhancement, um, and then you know, it allows you to still keep your facilities. Um yeah, it's it's you have to be really this is why I sort of say uh my wife Haley and I are advocates for responsible use of of psychedelics. Uh it was mushrooms, by the way, that we had been taking um that that that day in particular. Um and uh I'm also I'm sorry to hear about your husband, uh, but it's it's it's amazing that you have these colorful uh memories and stories to reflect on.

SPEAKER_01 17:08

Oh, I you know, the the best is when I wake up from a dead sleep and I hear him saying set phasers to purr. Because he's dreaming. So yeah, I mean, he's been gone six years, but it's one of those things where it's like you have those memories, and I'm sure you have those with your wife, and vice versa. And that's the thing about coupled in that we don't really talk about is there are those little pieces that are unique to our relationships that can still make us laugh.

SPEAKER_00 17:34

So it's true. And I do have her to thank for the she is the the the prime engine behind the inspiration for this album, both her art and like her paintings and her uh her support for uh for for my working on it.

SPEAKER_01 17:50

And I wanted to ask, you made a statement called termite art practices. What exactly is that?

SPEAKER_00 17:56

Termite art practices. That's a uh um that's a phrase coined by, I believe, Manny Farber, the film critic um and at film cinema academic. And it was basically a way to combat against sort of important um like costume y cinema that tends to win academy awards. I think the line has really been kind of blurred between the that kind of art, um, you know, like sort of uh the the the contrary type of art is white elephant art. And it's basically like what causes more damage, a stampeding white elephant or termites. And you know, termites get in the foundation, they gnaw away at the at the wood, at the very support structure, and then before you know it, the house collapses versus this stampeding elephant, it makes a lot of noise, and sure it's it's of course a danger, but um it's really the sort of like invasive thing that takes longer for its impact to be felt. Um and I try to remember this. I mean, and to some degree too, this is this is more a part of the sort of critical discourse than it is for like uh an art practitioner. Um, but I think it's important to remember these things. And it's a thing that sort of gives me hope as a cinephile and as a lover of certain kinds of music that aren't necessarily written about in laudatory ways. Um, but you know, it's like how Jim Carrey can have uh, you know, or Adam Sandler can have a huge impact on cinema and filmmakers um over the course of the 90s, where his movies are sort of written off compared to something like Shakespeare in Love or The King's Speech. Those are fine movies, don't get me wrong. And I don't want to sound judgmental about other people's enjoyment of them. But I think that you can see great legs in you know movements that are uh discounted by critical establishment um in art. Um, I mean, most of the great stuff people don't appreciate when it's released anyway. Let's make it clear. I'm not trying to say that about my stuff. I just I really appreciate uh DIY art practices and come from sort of like punk basement scene music. And um I think that that place has as much critical and cultural value as you know, things that are nominated for Grammys.

SPEAKER_01 20:33

One thing that you also made me think about when you were talking about the termite situation is that's kind of the situation with AI now, with generative AI. Let me clarify, not all AI, but generative AI, because you know, now there's stories coming up where people, artists, have had their voice stolen, have had their lyrics stolen and re-recorded and put out, and somebody's turned around and tried to copyright this. Even uh Ariana Grande apparently has been subject to this. I saw an article today. So it's like as a musician, there's this parasitic thing that's now there that slowly is creeping into the creative world, and maybe not so slow, but it kind of started out slow, and now we're to a point where it's trying to devour creativity. And how do you combat that and how do you feel about that? I mean, I know environmentally AI sent AI data centers are bad, but data centers in general are bad. So and there is a pushback also because eventually, once all this AI stuff comes out, social media is gonna be a graveyard. We're not gonna need it because how am I gonna know that this conversation that we're having is very real? But somebody could take my image and your image and create a whole different conversation.

SPEAKER_00 21:48

Yeah. And that is interesting.

SPEAKER_01 21:52

So how do you as an artist feel that this could be a detriment for or do you think it is a it would be a great tool? To have something collaborate with you.

SPEAKER_00 22:03

I'm not a Luddite, but I am pretty scared of AI and the way that it's invaded creative working spaces. And I feel very torn about it because I should probably utilize it more than I do. I am worried about its um, you know, the outsized environmental impact that it makes. For example, you know, uh a search on Claude or uh whatever your Chat GPT takes what five to ten times the amount of energy that a Google search does. Um I think that that's important. But at the same time, I don't want to cripple myself uh, you know, and be unfamiliar with tools that you have to use to be a sort of competent uh producer or songwriter or engineer or whatever. Um I don't want to sound like a person who is unfamiliar with using the internet, like the way that those people sound now. So I'm I I struggle with it. As a just like a session drummer, it's already starting to impact my work because if you're a songwriter that wants to put demos out or just put some songs out and you sort of slap some AI-generated drums on it and you think they sound pretty good, that puts me out of a job. That's of course not the songwriter's concern, but it is my concern. And uh, you know, I'm not really sure. Um that said, if you sort of like back up a little bit, I uh AI technology seems to have a sort of different flavor because it's invalidating a lot of human creativity and human labor. But I also wonder if um digit digital music and digitization of the music recording process wasn't thought of in a in in in I wonder if it was thought of in a similar way. Uh I was only able to make this record, for example, because I didn't have to have a gigantic real-to-reel tape machine to do it. Uh, I'm able to make half of my living as a studio recording drummer because I, you know, microphones are inexpensive enough and preamps are inexpensive enough. Uh, and uh my laptop here is basically all I need to um to sort of drive those tools. Uh and I'm able to compete with uh maybe not like top studios because those are insane rooms with insane mic lockers, but I'm able to give people a sort of like uh mid-point, mid-budget equivalent. And I don't think very many people will hear much of a difference, you know, in the way that they're consuming music. So I'm conflicted about the whole thing, is uh it's a long way of saying that. Um, but I tend to not use AI very much. Um, and I tend to, you know, worry about it a bit.

SPEAKER_01 25:05

Well, I mean, the thing is, uh you make a fair point. It's like when music went to digital, it opened doors for people that they had the ability to record. I mean, we all know Wild Thing was recorded in Tone Lok's closet, uh, you know, so that was a very small little piece. That wasn't really AI, it wasn't computer at that time. But as we've evolved, it's opened the door for more artists to be able to record. The problem becomes when people are going, hey, I I want a song about this. Can you give me a song about that? That's the problem. It's the same thing with authors. I mean, I wrote a piece because I was working with an author who wanted me to edit her book, and there were red flags. And she's like, the biggest red flag was, here's my book, do what you want with it. Because just like your song, just or your album, just like a book to me, that's my baby. I'm not gonna hand that over and let you just do whatever. And she had left prompts in there. And so you're asking somebody to go in and fix this for your benefit, but you're not doing the work, and then you're gonna turn around and say, I'm an author, I'm a musician, but are you really?

SPEAKER_00 26:20

Right.

SPEAKER_01 26:21

And and if you're doing it for a cash grab, it doesn't work that way.

SPEAKER_00 26:25

Yeah, it's very true. I'm I'm writing a drum book right now. I was gonna ask you about that. Oh, really? Yes, that was on my list. So cool. Um I'm writing a drum book right now, and I am not a visually inclined person. I'm not a designer, and I probably would have had a much easier time using Canvas AI uh sort of like editors, uh editing like visual systems. And I who knows, maybe I will wind up um using it and dabbling a little bit because it will be a time saver. But I think again, thinking about it as a tool as opposed to thinking about it as the the practice is is the big difference, you know.

SPEAKER_01 27:09

Well, and you can also with Canva, you can always buy stock photos to represent your stuff. I mean, that's the thing. You and even with stock photos, um, like deposit photo, you have an option to turn off AI. And that's where you can look at true pictures, but that also is you're trusting the people that are uploading those photos that they're not that they're being honest.

SPEAKER_00 27:31

That they're right, right.

unknown 27:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 27:33

So what made you decide to write a drum book? I know you're a teacher on the side. You're a drum teacher on the side.

SPEAKER_00 27:38

Yeah, just years and years and years of teaching, and I used to uh write, you know, hand write uh very similar uh music notation for different students. And so rather than taking uh valuable one-on-one lesson time, whether it's through virtual sessions or whether it's in person, I just said, you know, a lot of this stuff tends to be very similar. I'm prescribing very similar grooves or lesson plans to uh elicit, you know, certain facilities and to sort of like work on different things for students. Uh I said, you know, I'm gonna, I'm gonna sort of codify this information. And the other reason is because I have a lot of the I call these things trail markers. I'm really, really big into hiking and outdoors. I love that stuff. And I have these things that I call trail markers to steer students onto the course like a trailblaze on a tree. Uh, and they're little helpful things that I want people to keep in the back of their minds when they're working on any task. For example, um, the key to speed is accuracy, the key to accuracy is relaxation. I want students to remember this as they're practicing. Uh, something like playing it slow will let you know, you know, and it's just like a matter of not just knowing that you have to play something slow, but taking the time to kind of remember that maxim to ask yourself, is this slow enough? And those are just a few examples. And I wanted to have the sort of like technical uh exercises and that sort of like supportive pat on the back that I like to provide for my students. I wanted that sort of codified in the same way so that I could give it to people when I'm not physically in their presence.

SPEAKER_01 29:27

And you also wrote articles for drummer magazine, correct?

SPEAKER_00 29:31

I wrote about 20 articles for Modern Drummer from 2016 to 2020. Um I had the pleasure of working with that magazine. I had the pleasure of growing up reading that magazine. Um, so yeah, that was that was a very cool experience.

SPEAKER_01 29:46

Which kind of leads me into so what made you decide to be a drummer? I mean, I always wanted to be a drummer, but my mom's, you know, that never happened. I I got a bass guitar. I snuck a bass guitar. She didn't know I bought one, but I said it was my friend's. But anyway.

SPEAKER_00 30:01

That's okay. That's very Lane Kim of you from Gilmore Girls. I like that. Uh, you should try drums. Drums are great. Um I never decided to play drums. Uh, it's almost kind of like having uh an adopted, you know, animal or a rescue animal. It's like they choose you. Uh, my dad is a musician and my mom has great musical taste. And so they were always playing music around the house when I was a kid. It's the same age-old sort of like musician story. Um, and I had a musical epiphany one day leaving the cinema with my dad. They'd gotten me a drum kit when I was three years old because I was totally obsessed with it. Um, and I butt banged around on it and whatever, like didn't try to organize my thinking at all. Uh, but then when I was about six or seven, I was leaving the cinema and I just had this realization that I could play like within structure, and asked my dad if we could pull that old, like, you know, mini drum kit out when I got home. And he said, Yeah, of course. Yeah, sure. Like, let's check it out. And I learned my first grooves that day, and um, I haven't turned back ever since. I've been totally obsessed with it ever since.

SPEAKER_01 31:16

Cool. The closest I got to playing drums, I think, was my I dug all the pots out of the cabinet when my mom was making peanut butter fudge and just left town, and she was not happy.

SPEAKER_00 31:26

But oh yeah. Well, hopefully you didn't damage them, but I hey, look, I I'm a full advocate of that. There was a really famous jazz club uh in New York City called Bradley's that for some reason did not allow uh drum set, I think because of a noise ordinance issue. And every once in a while, you know, there'd be drummers who'd come come down to that gig. This is before my time, but they would like take pots and pans out of the kitchen and uh and drummers would like play a little time on it. It was very hush-hush.

SPEAKER_01 31:57

Why didn't they just use you know brushes? That wouldn't be. Yeah, they could do that.

SPEAKER_00 32:01

I don't, you know, I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 32:04

I don't know. So you you have been with We Are Scientists for 13 years, you've been on Seven of the Records, but you also have recorded numerous other stuff as a session player. So would you say that drumming has been your life? I mean, you went to um Rutgers for music, correct?

SPEAKER_00 32:26

That's correct. Yeah, music and journalism, the two highest paying professions uh in the world right now.

SPEAKER_01 32:31

So your writing kind of fits that too. Um so what made you decide that I'm going to because you the way you talked about it is you had your strict jazz proficiency during the week, and then on the weekends you went out exploring in a van and and exploring the music scene and playing. So what ultimately called to you? I mean, you could have stayed the true path of being a jazz musician, but you kind of what led you on your new path?

SPEAKER_00 33:01

You know, I always identify it as a sort of rock musician. Uh going to school for jazz music. I mean, I'm intensely interested in jazz music. I go hear jazz music all the time. I live in New York City, and we have such an amazing uh history of it and an amazing relationship with it in its current form. Um, there's just more work to be had in the rock milieu, and it's just sort of where I found work. And uh it was a language that I understood that that that I seemed to you know speak pretty well. Um and I think that my specialty is as a jazz, as a rock drummer, influenced heavily by jazz, uh, as opposed to the other way around, really just because I don't get enough opportunities to play it. Um I put a lot of improvisational elements into my playing with We Are Scientists, and I play with a lot of ensembles um in New York that heavily rely on improvisation. Um I'm playing a show in support of my album uh on May 2nd at a great club called Union Pool. And at that show, we will play a number of the pieces from my album from Magenta Light and we'll expand them with a lot of improvisation. Um, and so that sort of like spirit of jazz music and improvisation pervades all of the music that I currently work on. I don't see it as like choosing necessarily. I just see everything as some degree of influence. You know, I had one of I had an absolutely um, you know, like soul-jarring experience right before I left for this tour where my wife and I went to go see Tristan and Isolde by Richard by Wagner. Um, you know, this amazing five-hour yearning opera. And that was incredibly impactful on me as a musician. And I think about that a lot. Don't necessarily know how opera will, you know, play into the future of my like uh recordings, but uh it's in there somewhere.

SPEAKER_01 35:09

Well, and if it inspired you, I mean that that's an important thing, which I'm gonna this is gonna seem off maybe, but you're Cinephile, and we were talking about jazz and we're talking about music. The movie Sinners.

SPEAKER_00 35:22

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_01 35:23

What did you think about that?

SPEAKER_00 35:25

I really, really, really loved Sinners. Um there were things about it that uh, you know, uh I haven't seen it, I should say, I haven't seen it since um I saw it in June. Um and I I've only seen it the one time, and I was really moved by it. I thought it the way that the film tackles a shared cultural history in both black Americans' sort of like shared cultural history in segregation and their sort of shared cultural experience with you know slavery and the shared cultural history that they have uh through music and field song was amazingly rendered. And the way that they sort of put it on a parallel track with Irish folk song, the Irish, you know, also a very um uh like uh segregated group who was sort of like racially uh cast aside. Um and you know, the way that sort of like art finds a way in these in these communities, I thought was really brilliant. And then the way that they tied that together with like vampire lore and they made it all this one like kind of cosmic cocktail was very was was very moving and very cool. I will say I did find that one segment where you know they had the uh Parliament Funkadelic guitarist and the DJ with turntables. I found it a little cheesy, I'll be honest with you. Yeah, I found it a little bit I mean, I I could see what they were doing. I mean to cut you off, I just don't want to lose this train of thought. I could see where they were going and what they were doing, and I also think that Ryan Kugler, the strongest part of a lot of his films are the astral travel sequences. Um, in Black Panther, uh Tichalla goes through this amazing sort of like ancestor ritual where he finds the power to become Black Panther, right? And um and and and Ryan Kougler uh is an amazing director at that, and I could totally see that, but it felt a little bit to me uh like Hollywood's version of uh of a music lesson. But I mean, whatever. It was a big Hollywood movie, so that's okay.

SPEAKER_01 37:48

I I did like the ending too. I like I like and I don't want to give too much away, but I liked the ending that you saw the longevity there. And in in that he he was true to the I don't want to say the devil because that's what his father said that that guitar was. But he was true to his passion.

SPEAKER_00 38:08

Yeah. And we got more from the great buddy guy, you know, it was so cool.

SPEAKER_01 38:14

So I mean I think it was it was a powerful movie, and I just saw it, I guess about two months ago. But when you look at the bigger picture, you know, you were talking about the Irish. There we go again with the potato family, because that's what was the dividing line. And yeah, I don't understand I'll say this real quick. I don't understand how we can't just all get along. We are all the same, we are all human. And you're you know, we are scientists, but we are all human, and we you know, we all love, and somebody's benefiting from our hate, and that's what's scary.

SPEAKER_00 38:50

That's true.

SPEAKER_01 38:52

So when you look at your because you do have a video for for Look for the Moon, that's your single. What made that stand out of all the songs that are on the record? What was that? Why did you choose that one to make it your single?

SPEAKER_00 39:05

Well, I um so I actually just had a music video come out yesterday um that is for a song called Totally Liminal. And I don't mean to undercut your question, but that is actually the song that I put a sort of like big production uh and I'm also not correcting you. Uh it it sort of goes into the um the answer of uh of look for the moon. Um I made this really, really cool music video with one of my best friends in the world for this song, Totally Liminal. It's now streaming uh through uh the website, music website under the radar. Um, and then I'm gonna make it public on YouTube on uh Monday or Tuesday. But um that was the song that sort of most embodied the aesthetic of the record, brought together the sort of like dance and sort of like um transcendent um indie rock sort of like practices. Um and um that was the one that felt the most sort of like danceable and catchy and and the most uh sort of palpable distillation of the record. But the entire record, I will all that stuff to say, like go listen to Totally Liminal, go check out the website, or pardon me, the um go check out the music video directed by Al Markman. It looks amazing. I play a Theosophical Preacher, um, with and there's like a little bit of a twist ending, uh, very heavily inspired by Robert Altman films, um, and kind of like conspiracy-minded, like unsolved mysteries and stuff like that. Um all that stuff aside, Look for the Moon is the song that kicked off my record. Uh it's the first song I wrote. It was the sort of first song wherein I proved to myself that I was able to um distill these sort of like disparate visions in my head, uh, with like inspiration coming from lots of different places into a thing that actually felt coherent and catchy. Um it was essentially the song that allowed me to articulate the full aesthetic. Um and uh there were very easy visual, there was a very easy visual language to tap into. Most of the footage uh is stuff that I've filmed either on tour or on vacations with my wife, and I think a lot about my wife while I'm on tour. We have a very, very, very deep uh connection and uh sort of shared support system for one another. I encourage her art making practices and she reciprocates many times over for me as well. Um, and so it was really easy for me to sort of tap into a visual language for it and sort of create almost like a memory diary uh for um these times that I think about her while I'm on tour or traveling. And uh yeah, and I thought that would be a moving way to sort of kick off the album.

SPEAKER_01 42:17

It is, it is, it's a nice song, and and having having your partner be supportive of your creative vision is very much a gift. And I I had I had one that way. And he was he he was somebody that because my first book is about a drugged out rock star, a bass player who uh it's been out since 2019. He actually ODs and he lives his whole life in a coma. Oh wow, and then he wakes up and realizes none of that was real. So I used to my husband was on dialysis and I would go write and I'd pick him up. He's like, So what happened with Nigel today? And I would tell him, he's like, I'm living vicariously through this man. So but I mean it was he wasn't always the nicest guy, meaning Nigel, but it was something that my husband was supportive of. Because he also was legally blind, so I'd have to read it to him. Okay. And so he was there. And and that's the thing, if you have that support system, whether it be your parents or your spouse, it helps a lot as a creative because it makes you feel like I can, I don't want to say I can do anything, but I can do this, I can make it happen.

SPEAKER_00 43:25

Yeah, especially as a novelist or as a writer, is alone with your thoughts, and there's no uh, you know, there's no committee to sort of check in with. I mean, that's the thing about a band is that you have somebody who's standing by saying to you, like, oh come on, that's corny or whatever, right? And I can identify with that. If it's like the buck stops here, the buck stops with you. You're in charge of making these decisions. So, you know, you have to have somebody to bounce that off of. That's really beautiful that you had that with your husband. And uh it sounds like you found a channel for the uh trauma. traumatic experience of seeing him go through something that was physically difficult, but maybe he was mentally unbound by, you know.

SPEAKER_01 44:07

It it was I mean, hit for him to live vicariously, it was like Nigel was was messing around with a bunch of broads and hate to say broads because it's really tacky, but the book was set in the 80s so or 90s. So it was kind of one of those not so nice things. I should just say groupies because Nigel was with a bunch of groupies. But anyway, um it was one of those things that my husband would never have lived that life. My husband always longed to be able to kind of look do what you doing. He as far as traveling because he always like once my parents die we're going to move out of Illinois. Okay. He never left Illinois. And I had had this life before him that was I moved from New Orleans to Shreveport to Dallas to India. I mean I moved around I followed bands I hung out with bands. So I had this life I produced a television show I was a disc jockey and and he had his normal job and he was the good boy. So yeah but I needed the stability. So it worked out you know I mean that's the thing sometimes when we have people that are opposite of us even though they're very much like us they give us that support.

SPEAKER_00 45:21

It's important I mean you know it uh prevents redundancy for sure.

SPEAKER_01 45:26

Yes yes so what do you hope to accomplish with this record? I mean you're on tour with we are scientists so what's what's coming up in the future? Yes you have that one date what do you see long term are you going to do more dates to support this or are you going back in the studio with we are scientists are you going back out on the road with them what's going on I'm always going back in the on the studio and on the road with scientists.

SPEAKER_00 45:49

I'll continue teaching I'll continue you know working as a session musician if people are good enough to have me on uh on their uh on their albums uh I I still value and and love that work. This is you know I I I don't really know and and it's funny because I'm understandably asked this question a lot people are asking about what the sort of vision is and really it it this record is just an articulation of of a kind of like inner voice and and and a mood and a feeling and I had had so I've had so many ideas and thoughts um and I've been there to support so many other artists' vision and I'm grateful for that opportunity. But I really just kind of wanted to have my own contribution sort of like out in the world. You can think of it a cynic would call it like a contextual business card where you're like this is how I musically see the world right but I I just like to think of it as a sort of personal aesthetic ethos. And um it sounds high-minded I don't mean to make it sound that way it's it um but you know I just it it was something that was inside of me and I always knew that it was there this sort of like gushing bittersweet uh music that that is both very melancholic but also like right and melodic um like I love music that that that you know makes you want to cry but makes you want to smile at the same time you know just love beautiful um music and I really just wanted to make it make something like that that articulated that and that's really just all it came down to I'm incredibly grateful to have uh uh this show coming up where I'm uh putting together a like dream band of some of my closest friends uh and a band that I would never be able to uh put on a tour because I couldn't afford them and I couldn't uh get everybody's schedule aligned. Um so I'm really just kind of focusing on the immediate there and you know this the the the the show is on my 40th birthday actually as well. So I this is almost kind of like a 40th birthday gift to myself is um I beat myself up a lot about about not being productive enough and about not not doing enough work. And this is like literally the the the other than working toward a charitable aim uh you know like giving money or or my time to a charitable cause um this is truly the best way I could imagine spending time is is is is by doing this. And so I decided to do it for my 40th birthday.

SPEAKER_01 48:42

It's a nice gift for yourself. It really is. When you were talking about you know creating something there's one band and I'm sure other bands have done it um back in the 80s NXS I'm sure you've heard I was just talking about NXS the other day. Yeah um they used to put out B sides you know they would have their eight their the singles or whatever and on the B side a band member would always do their own personal track that sounded nothing like what normally would be on the record. But it gave each band member something tangible to put out to create their own music to create their own vibe. And I think at that time that made the band stronger and it made the fans more curious.

SPEAKER_00 49:27

It's really cool that they're willing that they have a sort of liquid enough idea had a liquid enough idea of what in excess could be that they that they could um support so many like different aesthetic opinions I'm a little bit uh hesitant with that kind of stuff with we are scientists for example I think my music is quite different from we are scientists um and that's okay uh I I Keith Murray our singer is uh and one of the most amazing songwriters I've ever worked with and he is just like so hardworking and he has just such a gift for the song craft um and he sees music in a slightly different way than I do we come together and and and it's amazing I love his music and I love working on it and working with him and playing music with him is one of the most fun things in the world. But you know I kind of wanted to to to not have to worry about the baggage of creating music for we are scientists. That's why I don't bring them songs and I contribute to his songs in in other ways um when we're sort of like creating the record. And so it gives me a lot of appreciation for what NXS does or for a band like the Eagles that brings together like all these different songwriters and they're putting them together. But you know part of this was also designed to be a slightly a selfish thing. And it's it it it it feels good to be the person in charge of it.

SPEAKER_01 51:04

Not like I'm ego tripping I understand and here's the thing what NXS did then you can't do now because we don't release singles. We well we release singles but we don't have B sides. Right. So you couldn't do it now. But back then it was like you had a little bit more fluidity and yeah when when you can bring like you said the Eagles all these songwriters together but each band has their own I don't want to say hierarchy but their own ability to be that family because it's like a family and a marriage all combined in one you you have the stresses you have the personalities you have your roles to play and and the bands that succeed know how to do those roles you know exactly and especially with being in a band for 13 years yeah that says you've had the longevity you've worked through things you know the routine and that's an important thing because a lot of bands just like podcasters will get somewhere and they'll say you know what I'm tired of this I I I should be here and no dude your ego role just because we sign doesn't mean and of course signing now means something totally different than it did in the 80s and 90s so you know we we have to look at the world in a different view but some things being in a band still has that family dynamic still has those interactions personal interactions so for you how different is it when you're in we are scientists and you have this groove to suddenly go into a different project and just be that player um it's funny it it it feels very different um but it also it it it's partially because it sounds so different.

SPEAKER_00 52:47

The music that I'm making is much more heavily influenced by avant-garde and experimental and instrumental music. So it does feel very different you know the sort of like the points of reference are coming from much different places. But you know we are scientists has to worry about entertaining more people because people are you know buying tickets for their to their shows around the world and I don't necessarily mean to make it a market driven thing but the part of the aesthetic of we are scientists is giving people the space to dance in a room and you know to this sort of like angular rock music and and and that informs a lot of the ways uh a lot of the I should say that informs a lot of the choices that they make in terms of selecting certain songs. Keith is a prolific songwriter and um he I think for our last record he wrote he and Chris well he Keith wrote something like a hundred and twelve songs and then we took you know 10 or 12 of them or however many are on the the record or whatever. Right. And so the part of that selection process is okay how do what 10 songs best fit the space that we are scientists are in for this you know for 2025 or 2026. I didn't have that baggage uh to worry about that this was just could be a complete and full-on expression. Um and I had the uh the ability to to to make it a little bit physical one of the things I love reading about and listening to is is when people talk about their creative processes and especially in New York City, artists will have to use their studio apartment as their practice space. And so people have really novel ideas about what they do. Some people leave their physical apartment and take one a walk around the block. You know I've heard some people take the subway somewhere because it's about moving through physical space from one place to the next I was recording a lot of this in the same studio where I was teaching and doing drum tracks for other people. So anytime that I was recording a note of music for this record, I turned on a magenta light that my wife gave me she gave me an LED lamp that I could change the colors for and anytime I was recording any note I made sure that that magenta light was on and that was my um you know my positive dog whistle to myself that okay this is your space to create this world you're inside that Crayola color right now you know and so make the choices that feel appropriate for that you know and then when a student would come in the light would go to green or a light would go to whatever you know and which makes sense um who worked some of your drumming idols who inspired you oh wow that's a great question I love love I live and breathe uh Elvin Jones is playing John Coltrane's drummer he is probably my all-time favorite drummer but I'm obsessed with Dave King the drummer from the bad plus uh Brian Blade the drummer from Brian Blade fellowship and who's worked with um Joni Mitchell and Bob Dylan um I love I grew up listening to uh Carter Beauford the drummer from the Dave Matthews band Eric Kretz from Stone Temple Pilots Dave Grohl um Danielle Haim the drummer from Haim uh you know she doesn't play with them live but I just absolutely love her playing on on recordings um Sarah Jones who plays with um uh my god uh Harry Styles I love her playing um god uh I could go on all day Jeff Widner who's one of my best friends in the world um he just inspires me every day he's like a local New York drummer uh Chae Chen or there's a guitarist I for the guitar the drummer from uh $75 Bill in New York band um you know uh I I could go on and on and on Mark Giuliana amazing drummer uh the it it's boundless I try to find value in all drumming whether it's disciplined academic drumming or whether it's intuitive drumming you know um you know like like sort of like punk oh god how could I not mention William Goldsmith who's become a close personal friend of mine the drummer from sunny day real estate uh he is one of my idols and I have the pleasure of being able to text and call him to seek his ideas for things and um you know um just just there's a really important band for me named Penfold um and their drummer uh was was was big uh the singer of Penfold is actually gonna be playing at my show uh on May 2nd as well so it's feels full circle um I just always try to remain wide-eyed and inspired by drummers who are my peers or my superiors who are younger than me doesn't matter it's all good so I'm gonna ask something that's off topic because but you're a movie buff so and it it's not the it's not the uh directors that I know you favor but the Matrix the first time you watched the Matrix the original Matrix not the other ones the first one did it kind of mess with your head uh it totally messed with my head I saw the Matrix with one of my best friends uh in the world Scott Woznak at the Amboy Multiplex Cinemas um in 1999 when it came out and by the way Scott Woznak huge inspiration he's a great drummer one of my best friends we grew up together he's one of my favorite drummers um he uh yeah of course it messed with my head it was uh it was uh it was uh yeah it was confusing in the most uh inspiring way you know it had it had me after I watched I watched it at a friend's house I was like so is everything real it gives you that that questionable thing of I want it I want it to taste steak again you know that's still one of the most prolific lines in that movie because are we experiencing reality or is it all a simulation? Simulation simulacrum yeah yeah so you have a cat named Mona did you uh did you adopt Mona I did I found Mona on tour while I was on tour uh I was in Detroit well Ferndale Michigan just outside of Detroit with We Are Scientists and we uh pulled up into our venue uh into our hotel early which was really strange we never get to the hotel before soundcheck never we go we check in after the show and this was this like you know we've checked into a hotel before show like maybe 20 times uh in the 13 years that I've been with them and this happened to be one of them and the band went into the reception office I was changing out of my Birkenstocks and I heard meowing coming from the bushes where we had parked next to and I stuck my head in the bushes and I saw this adorable little thing flopping around and she came right out and greeted me and we couldn't find a shelter for her. So we brought her to the show thought she would get adopted by somebody from the venue she didn't and the crazy thing is I left her behind because again we thought she was going to get adopted and so I left her at the venue in in in somebody's care um and we had and we went on to Chicago and we had had plans to go back to literally that same hotel that same city and so when I found out the next day she hadn't been adopted I said well that's it I'm adopting her. And so we went back and we scooped her up and she came on tour with us she came into Canada with us. Um it was the most uh stressful three days of tour I've ever been on because we had to have this cat in our lap and I had to make sure that she didn't get herself into trouble at these venues uh but she was such a good girl and um God I miss her right now.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:32

I just adopted a cat this week that's why I was curious congratulations what's the story uh well actually I had lost I had another cat I had a cat and a dog and I lost both of them in between 21 days in January like it was not good. I still have one one of my dogs. So I decided I need to finally get another cat. So I went to the shelter and I was looking for a black cat because I wanted one and I ended up with Chester. Chester turns out um and he had surgery so he's kind of sequestered still he had gotten neutered this week at the same time when I picked him up so he went from being in a cage being neutered to coming to a new house where he can't really explore because he's not allowed to jump so but it turns out his name was Redwood and the other day they had a cat another cat up for adoption it turns out he was one of 10 cats that was abandoned in a house oh my God. And so they found him when I when I went to the shelter and I I went into the room and he was just like he couldn't get enough love. So I was like okay you're coming home with me. Yeah yeah so and and then I this week like I said I found out his story about one of 10 cats and I'm like I don't know why somebody would leave 10 cats behind but unfortunately with the way the world is and the economy I can see it but it still breaks my heart that he was abandoned. But just like your Mona she was abandoned and she found love and that's that's what we want to do. So is I can't imagine where uh how she was abandoned she's so amazing so sorry no I mean that I've had I I had my neighbor's cat showed up at my other house that's the one that passed in January we had when we lived at another house there was this little black cat with a little white spot on his chest and I had a black cat already and my neighbors were like did you lose your cat I'm like no my cat's inside so one day I was outside and this little guy comes sauntering up to me and I'm like okay and he had a swagger he had fallen out of a tree I found out but he had a swagger kind of like Jack Sparrow because he kind of just so my husband's like well we we can't keep him like okay and then the next thing I know he's going to go get food and he's going he comes out with a cardboard box I'm like what's that for well we we need shelter in case it rains or something we already had cats this is why we didn't bring it in right away so he's like well let's call her in some shelters nobody would take and this is during the housing crisis so we ended up bringing him in and I tried calling him midnight trying calling him all these other things finally I called him ta and he responded and everybody's like why tack because he just showed up I love that like magic. I love that so is there anything that we haven't discussed that you would like to add no I just I just want to thank you um for asking insightful questions and for the the fantastic conversation and uh and just for your interest in in in the album and in in in the work I've done it just it just means the world for me to be able to share that and uh I just want to um voice humble uh appreciation um for anybody that listens and it just it kind of blows my mind that people are interested uh and just again express gratitude but well thank you for coming on the show talking to Keith was great I know we got a little political at first and sometimes people get a little upset that you know I don't want to hear about politics and I apologize if that's not your thing but if you've listened to me for any length of time you know that occasionally I will wade into that pool. And I think it's important especially during this time you know I'm recording this it won't air for a while I'm recording this on April 18th and the fact of the matter is we are still in this I don't want to call it a war because technically it's not because legally that's why they haven't said it is you know Operation Whatever Fury whatever the hell it is um we have people making these decisions that most of us don't support most people in the world I'm sure if you sat down and you asked them what they want they would say they want to roof over their head They want food on their table. They would like health care to stay healthy. They would like to have their family. They would like to have love. They would like to have compassion. And they would like to not be so stressed out. And this is something I wrote about not too long ago. I mentioned it in the profile or on the podcast. And it's one of those things where it's like we want our basic needs met. And we don't want to be surveilled and we don't want to have to not have an opinion. But we have a society that is constantly stressing us out. We have people, you know, the younger generation, some of them can't afford rent. You know, my first apartment, I paid $275 for. It was a one-bedroom apartment. And at the time, yeah, that was a little high, but it wasn't, it wasn't really. Um, and now, you know, when I before I moved here in my last hometown, which was a small town, a studio apartment was $900. Who's got that? And why do we keep raising the rents? Why do we keep doing this? Nothing's really changed. You have not approved that apartment. That apartment has not been redone since I since the whole time I lived there in uh the town in Harvard, but and it was Illinois, not Massachusetts. But the fact of the matter is, everybody else wants to raise the rent, so we've got to raise the rent. And when the rent goes up, well, the property value went up. So the property value and the property taxes go up, so then we got to raise the rent. And it's just this vicious cycle. And it's like what you're doing is you have people living out of a car now. A person, and and then they they have to wonder if they're gonna have a job because now we have AI. So we have to step back and really look at, I dare I say, where the money's going. You know, who is profiting off of this? You know, when we have companies basically being bought by investment firms because they want to load it with debt and then break it up. Watch the movie Wall Street. You know, greed is good, Gordon Gecko said it. And I've talked about this before prior. But the fact of the matter is that movie, as Oliver Stone has said a couple of times, I did not make that movie as a playbook, but that's exactly what it turned into for several organizations that I will not name here. So we have to find a way to try to make it where a small group of people don't own everything. We have rights, a right to life, a right to be able to be happy. You know, and and Elon Musk came out recently and said, hey, you know what? By 2030, AI will have all the jobs and humans won't have to work anymore, and we'll have to give you a government check. But then we can control everything. That's the subtext there. We don't talk about that. That's the subtext that we will control everything. And if we if you say something we don't like, well, we can disappear you, we can turn off your power, you'll not get another check because you're dissident. So, how do we change the world? And I know what does this have to do with Keith? And it just his interview got me thinking about that because it's like imagine a world where they where technology has become the end-all be-all, and you can't be a creative anymore. You can't write, you can't make music. Well, you can, but nobody's gonna hear it. You're not gonna be able to share it with anybody because nobody's gonna care because it's not the world, it's not AI. And the bigger thing is when you really want to think about it, and I know it sounds silly, but if you look at the movie Wally, and yes, it's a cartoon. But if you look at Wally, what were humans doing? They were in a recliner or a chair watching TV all the time. They weren't doing anything with their life. And at that point, going back to the Matrix, at that point, when does our human energy, our life force, because something sustainable for somebody else to use? To use it as feed, to use it as power, to use it as energy. And what are we left with? Where is our humanity going? Because both Musk and Bill Gates have said we're not gonna need humans. But a robot in artificial intelligence is never going to have compassion, they're never going to think as a human. And here's something scary that I didn't say on the podcast. A person said they were talking, they had a friend, a lifelong friend for 30 years, and they knew that this person was using uh an AI program. I'm not gonna name names, but they were feeding in any text messages, any things that she sent to the friend was feeding it into this to get an opinion. So she said she sat down and she wrote out this long piece and she put it into the program. And the program came back and said, Oh, this person loves you and they're very compassionate and they care so much about you and everything else. And then she said, I changed the prompt. I said, I suspect this person's bad mouthing me. And that little sentence changed everything because the program came back and said, Oh, yeah, this friend, this friend's gonna betray you. This friend, we don't look at those programs as something that is rot, you know, brain rot. There's studies now that are showing it's brain rot. Same thing with social media, but it's brain rot. We're not thinking, we're not using our thought, we're not really knowing what we are doing because we're feeding it to this program. And this program's gonna give us this information, this program's gonna tell us how to think. But what happened to your critical thinking? What happened to your ability to think? And with AI usage up on social media, you know, social media is created to be addictive. But what happens when it's all AI? And you're hearing it. You're hearing it with the fact that people don't want to pay for subscriptions anymore. They want the they want the vinyl record, they want cassettes, they want to drop the subscriptions, they want to drop the social media, they want to go out and explore the world again and not have some influencer tell them, this is what you need to do, this is how you need to look, this is what you because we are trying to get back to who we are, which we are human. We're not scientists. That's Keith's, that is Keith's thing. But we need to get back to a human place, we need to get back to knowing music, understanding creativity, understanding art, and embracing that in ourselves and not saying, Oh, I'm gonna make a quick buck becoming the next big podcaster or the next big novelist or the next big musician. I'm doing this because I love what I do. And yes, you're always competing against an algorithm, but you have to keep going forward and you have to understand that life is the most valuable thing. Your mind is a valuable tool, and to allow it to rot and not grow, well, you're wasting your energy, you're wasting your ability, your power, and your gift because there's nobody else like you. And even though we may have similar thoughts, there's always something slightly different, and slightly different in who we are. So, on that note, I'd like to thank Keith for coming on the show. I'd like to thank Fast Susie for the intro and outro music. And as always, I'd like to thank you, the listener, because without you, I wouldn't have a podcast. Well, I'd have a podcast and I'd be shouting into the void, but it's a little bit fun knowing that somebody's listening because I want you guys to listen. I want you guys to interact, I want you guys to experience something different, and I want you to know that just because I'm in the good old USA doesn't mean I believe what's going on in the world here. It's just this is where I am, and that's my circumstances. And you know, if I could go anywhere in the world to travel right now, I would go to the UK, but I can't. My circumstances are what makes me here. And that's okay. It's alright because I'm where I am supposed to be right now in my life, and I think we all are. So just hang in there, guys. Things will get better eventually. But you know, as I say, sometimes it's dark as before the dawn. So something new is coming. We just have to be patient with it and hang in there. So, like I said, I thank you guys for tuning in, and I'll catch you next time. Bye.