Latest / Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps / KEITH URBAN VISITS JOSH

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KEITH URBAN VISITS JOSH · Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps

• 0:00
  Get a humans, welcome to the safe space for dangerous ideas.
• 0:06
  If you're listening to the podcast for the first time, you should also check out the YouTube
• 0:09
  channel.
• 0:10
  It's always nice to watch the one and only Keith Urban actually sit there and listen
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  and see the twinkle in his eye and the smile on his face.
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  And if you're watching the YouTube channel, good for you.
• 0:20
  You made the right decision.
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  This is the show where some of the most fascinating people in the world wrestle with some of
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  the biggest issues in an environment that's free from censorship and political correctness
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  where they feel like they don't have to tread on egg shells and worry about the tripwires
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  that they might trigger by saying the wrong thing.
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  He really needs no introduction, one of the most successful and important musicians in
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  the world.
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  Keith Urban has won four Grammy Awards.
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  His new album is called High.
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  It's out now.
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  He's about to start a new residency in Las Vegas and to Australia.
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  Keith Urban.com or tickets, please enjoy it.
• 0:55
  It's not just I did the one, the only Keith Urban.
• 1:00
  So you win if you're more comfortable?
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  Definitely.
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  Absolutely.
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  I mean, I think it's more organic, isn't it?
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  You must find that when you're on stage and you know, you know, you know, what the set
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  list is.
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  Yeah.
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  We don't necessarily want it to be exactly the same show every single moment.
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  No, I like working with some kind of structure and then fish tailing in and around that structure.
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  Yeah.
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  And how do you determine where to go by feel?
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  Yeah.
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  What does that mean?
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  It means that I can read the room that I know if something feels like, okay, that's
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  enough of that or this is just good.
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  Let's stay in this moment for a little bit longer.
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  And is that a skill you learn or is that instinctive?
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  That's a good question.
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  I think like, I think for a scum, because I think it's a bit of both in with everything,
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  isn't it?
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  Yeah.
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  It's usually a bit of both.
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  I mean, it's probably the 10,000 hours doesn't hurt.
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  You need the 10,000 hours or I can, I think you're going to get them anyway.
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  It's like you can be an artist that, like for me, who played all the clubs, did my 10,000
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  hours in the clubs and then got to play larger places bit by bit by bit.
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  So when I got into those big places and stuff went wrong, I knew what to do.
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  Whether it's a cast or something, heckles you.
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  A light goes out the PA blows up.
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  Whatever it is, you go, oh, I know what to do here.
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  But I think artists that land in those big places and have to figure it out on the fly,
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  they don't know what to do, but they learn in the settings, so they're still getting
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  the 10,000 hours.
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  They don't know if that's just starting now.
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  But they fall flat on their face, but there are those big decisions, right?
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  Like when something screws up, then you have to know what to do.
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  But then what you're talking about in terms of the intuitive, like sort of sense of feel
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  that you've got for the audience is a more subtle thing where even if nothing's going
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  wrong, it could be a perfectly good show.
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  Yeah.
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  You have to be tuned into some kind of like spooky sort of sixth sense vibe that's going
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  on that you're getting from the audience and you have to know how to hear it or feel
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  it.
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  Yes.
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  It's just the movement of the crowd.
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  Yeah.
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  Sound of the crowd.
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  That's also the way I like playing.
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  And that's not every artist.
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  Some artists just, they play and they go, I do my thing.
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  Yeah.
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  You like it, don't like it.
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  I could care less.
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  But I'm more of an entertainer where I want, I want to bring the whole room together.
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  I want to connect with everybody.
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  Yeah.
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  That's interesting.
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  I mean, took you a while.
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  What's interesting, what fascinates me about your career is there was this whole period
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  where you were a huge deal in the States.
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  And I don't know if it's apocryphal or if it's true, but I heard a story that you went
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  to the US Embassy in Sydney for some reason when you were like huge in the States and one
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  of the American security guards asked for your autograph and was like, man, I'm so sorry
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  that you're not famous in Australia.
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  I don't remember that.
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  It might be true.
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  It might be true.
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  And like, well, you know, when you're in, when you were on the cover of every tabloid
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  magazine in America and being in rehab, you got on a conscious flight and a flight attendant
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  offered you a glass of wine.
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  Oh, yeah.
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  What's going on?
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  Like, you know, was that a weird straddling of two continents?
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  Um, I was just, I mean, that's the 10,000 hours, I mean, I'd put my time in here, but
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  it was in a, in a, in a tiny little environment where I hadn't sort of hit anything big.
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  And then I moved to America.
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  So I sort of built a career here, but it was still small, it was still under the radar.
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  Yeah.
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  When I moved to America, I was known in country circles, but not at all outside of that.
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  And did your Australian, this help or hinder you when you were in Nashville?
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  Definitely a massive hindrance at the beginning.
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  Because, you know, I just like, yeah, what are you doing here?
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  You know, I, you don't have a cowboy hat, you don't look like me, you don't sound like
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  me.
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  And there's nothing about you that fits into this town.
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  But I felt really sure about being there and why I was there.
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  So which was why?
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  Um, that was meant to be there and just put in the time and chip away at trying to build
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  a career in America.
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  Yeah.
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  Why?
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  Um, well, I mean, well, probably many reasons, but first of all was my dad was, um, he loved
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  American country music.
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  So I grew up with all these records.
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  And they're all recorded in Nashville, Tennessee, because it's country music.
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  But when you're seven years old and I'm reading credits on the back of a record and every
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  record says recorded in Nashville, Tennessee, recorded in Nashville, Tennessee, I just
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  went, oh, I'd like to make records.
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  Apparently, I have to go to this place called Nashville, Tennessee to make records.
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  So I think it got in at a very young age that I'm going to go to Nashville and make
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  records.
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  Right.
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  That was it.
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  So it wasn't necessarily, I'm going to be in order to be a global star.
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  I'm going to need to make it in the United States and therefore I strategically will navigate
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  my way to the place where that's going to happen.
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  No, but all my, most of my influences were there.
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  Yeah.
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  And, and, you know, the bar was set high there.
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  I mean, that's where the best writers are, especially for country music.
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  That's where the best musicians in the world are.
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  The best of everything.
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  I mean, that's it.
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  So if you're going to do this, go there.
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  Yeah.
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  And I saw early on too that it didn't matter what success you had in Australia, it meant
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  nothing there.
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  No.
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  The second you get to America, they're like, anyway, start at the bottom, work your way up
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  like everybody else.
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  And I'm like, no, no, no, I don't have to do that because I've been on carrying it.
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  Exactly.
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  I don't even know.
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  See, you get it.
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  Yeah.
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  Why couldn't you have been running thing?
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  That's right.
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  I'll tell you what, I'll get you some real success, Katie, none of this Mickey Mouse business.
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  And how, and did you know what you were creatively at the time, like, you know, I mean, it's
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  speaking of the 10,000 hours, it's quite sort of hard to build up a kind of sense of self-confidence
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  about exactly what you want your artistic style to be, what you want your persona to
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  be.
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  Right.
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  You know, how much did you know when you landed in Nashville?
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  Less than I turned out I did.
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  I, the hard part was, I had, because I've been doing it so long in Australia, I mean,
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  I do, I've been, I quit school at 15, so I was playing in the pubs at 15.
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  I'm in Nashville, I'm 23.
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  So for seven or eight years, I've been gigging in Australia, honing my craft and working
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  my way up and developing as an artist.
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  And then I get to Nashville and I have my version of country, which is a mix of things.
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  But it started very foundational, like, I know the foundations of country music.
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  I know the history of it, but I've evolved as an artist to this thing.
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  And you get to Nashville and they just look at it and go, I don't know what this is,
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  but this is not country.
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  Right.
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  Well, it's my, it, it's my version of it.
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  And it was like, well, you obviously don't know anything about country.
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  I'm like, well, no, I, I do, and I've, I've now done, I'm doing this version of it.
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  So it was like I had to start again.
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  It was like I had to reset the clock and go, okay, I've got to go back to ground, ground
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  zero and show that I know the foundations of everything.
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  Does going back to ground zero look like a going more country?
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  Uh, yeah, you're just proving my country is right, right?
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  You know, you've got to get a baseline traditional 101 cents, prove that first.
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  And then, you know, so I guess what I'm getting at is, I think if I was from Oklahoma,
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  I would have been seeing as original, but because I was from Australia, I was seen as ignorant.
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  Did it be right?
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  Yeah.
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  That was the difference.
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  Yeah.
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  I'm sorry about that.
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  I mean, I think you don't, you don't get how we do it.
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  And I'm like, no, no, I do, I, I'm doing my version.
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  Mm-hmm.
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  So who are you to do your version of it?
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  Yeah.
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  So what's standing do you have?
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  Yeah.
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  Yeah.
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  Yeah.
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  I'm going to show you how I got here and start again.
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  Yeah.
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  So I earned the stripes.
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  Yeah.
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  But I also needed to learn so much about writing because, you know, being a good writer
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  in Australia's one thing, when you get to Nashville, there's a whole different level
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  of songwriting.
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  Right.
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  Everything.
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  Studio playing.
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  Everything.
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  Yeah.
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  It's a whole different level.
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  In one way.
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  It's just great.
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  It's just proper great.
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  Right.
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  You know, coming from Kabulcha, hypothetically speaking.
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  And thinking you're awesome and you are and then you lob into Brisbane and you're not
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  so awesome anymore.
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  Right.
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  And then you get really good and then you go from Brisbane down to Sydney.
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  Mm-hmm.
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  And you're like, oh, it's apparently I'm not good by Sydney Stan, so each step is just,
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  there's just more and more.
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  So what you're saying is Australia is the Kabulcher of the Globe.
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  Yes.
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  Basically.
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  Not anymore.
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  See, I've alved quite a bit, but from a country music standpoint, it was a small town
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  that I've gone from.
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  In terms of the Americans requiring you to start at Ground Zero and not taking into
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  account any of the success that you've had in Australia, I've heard you say before
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  that if you'd known just how long it was going to take to work your way up there, it's
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  probably a good thing that you didn't know.
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  Oh, God yeah.
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  So like, do you think that's a good fiction for us to hide from young creative people?
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  I sometimes wrestle with this.
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  Like, you know, when you're giving advice to young creative people, do you tell them it's
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  going to be a long, grueling slog, but it's worth it, or do you go, follow your dream?
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  Because it may not be.
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  And you'll make it.
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  But is it ever not?
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  Oh, yeah.
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  When is it ever not?
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  And then it lasts.
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  That's a different conversation though.
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  You said the lasting bit at the end of it.
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  I assume that part of it.
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  I never want a creative person's desired life.
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  That's what I'm learning.
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  There's a whole new breed of artists coming through that have no plans for longevity.
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  It's of no interest to them.
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  And that's a whole different paradigm.
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  Are you sure?
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  Or are they just working with the cards they dealt?
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  I think there's some artists coming in that when you talk about building catalog because
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  they go, I just want to be a TikTok sensation.
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  I just want to have a hit.
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  I want to get a bunch of followers, get my numbers up, but the boom gets some endorsements.
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  I'm like, but you're not you're not building an audience, you know, slowly building building.
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  You just want this quick thing and they go, well, yeah, because I don't know how long
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  it'll last.
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  Not only be a few years.
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  And then I'll do something else.
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  I'm like, wow.
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  So if you're wired to think that it's important to be able to build something for a 30 year
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  career and you suddenly realize the person's going, I'm not interested in doing more than
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  five years, then it's a whole different conversation.
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  It's fascinating.
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  It is fascinating.
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  I mean, it's depressing as well.
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  It is.
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  And it makes me wonder whether they're actually speaking authentically or whether that's
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  a defense mechanism because they probably bit of us unstable and they're cynical and
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  they don't want to believe that a lot of things aren't built to last either.
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  So it's also a reality of like, well, I don't know, is this thing going to last?
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  But I don't know.
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  It's I think just the way in which I know what's happening right now.
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  There's a lot of, like right now, it's really hard to find opening acts for headline
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  country artists in America.
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  It's really hard.
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  Nobody wants to open for anybody.
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  They all want to immediately go out and headline.
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  Right.
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  That's what they want to do.
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  I should be the star.
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  I should be the star.
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  I've got a hit song.
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  Yeah.
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  One opening for you.
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  And you go, because you've got one.
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  Right.
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  One hit song.
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  Yeah.
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  It was got 10 million views on TikTok.
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  Exactly.
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  And so they're like, I'm going to go out and do my own show.
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  And I'm like, you're going to play to 30 people in a club and they went, yeah, great.
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  That's what I'll do.
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  But that'll be my audience.
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  Right.
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  And I'm going to do that.
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  And so that's happening too.
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  That's a new thing.
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  Yeah.
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  They're not interested in playing in front of 20,000 people that aren't their audience.
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  They go, I'd rather play in front of 20 that are my audience and do that.
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  And yet presumably there's an upside in the sense that all the gatekeepers who were standing
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  in your way when you were younger to whom you had to prove yourself, who may have been
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  executives who had no idea.
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  Yeah.
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  What Keith Irving's actual sound ought to be or actual look ought to be.
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  But they wanted to put you in whatever the marketing preconceptions that they were coming
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  to the table with.
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  Yeah.
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  Those people no longer holds away because you can just go straight to now.
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  Yeah.
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  Yeah.
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  You can find an audience.
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  I mean, would your accent have changed if you were coming up today?
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  Oh, yeah.
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  How?
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  It would have been much quicker, I think.
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  Much quicker.
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  You don't think you needed that battering and bruising and persuading of idiots that
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  you were worth it and proving your chops as a legit country position.
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  Well, the audience is so much bigger now that there's an audience for so many artistic
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  manifestations.
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  You know what I mean?
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  Like this, whatever your version of country music is, there'll be an audience for it.
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  I don't think there's any audience for my version of country music.
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  There would be.
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  This is what I'm trying to say.
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  It would be a hillbilly dance and I would be like swinging from a jug of moonshine.
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  Perfect.
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  That would be it.
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  Yeah.
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  Three people.
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  One TikTok.
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  Nothing about that suits you, by the way.
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  It's all I got.
• 13:54
  Can't infuse you all I got.
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  It's all I got.
• 13:56
  Okay.
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  So like Spotify, for example, as a place to, you know, because when you were starting out,
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  you had to convince radio stations to play you.
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  Yes.
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  My radio was where it was.
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  Yeah.
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  Now, all the power.
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  Yeah.
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  You've got a hundred million, you know, your tracks have a hundred million streams on Spotify.
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  Right.
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  And you don't need to go through radio stations.
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  I mean, you're still big on radio, but you wouldn't need to be.
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  Is that change things?
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  Yeah.
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  Yeah.
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  I mean, at the end of the day, you kind of want it all.
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  If you, if you can, you want to be humming on all cylinders.
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  If you can.
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  Radio is still very important in America.
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  Country radio is still a very strong, important part of the puzzle, because there's still a huge
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  audience out there that don't stream.
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  I know it seems insane.
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  It's amazing.
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  It's amazing.
• 14:43
  It's amazing.
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  It's amazing.
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  Who are these people?
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  They exist.
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  They buy CDs.
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  Wow.
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  You know, so you don't explain to my six-year-old daughter what a CD was the other day.
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  Yeah.
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  You know.
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  I don't know what pads are.
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  I don't have.
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  If someone gave me a CD, which someone did recently, somebody goes, oh, these are my,
• 15:00
  these are my songs.
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  I don't know how to play it.
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  I don't know.
• 15:03
  I literally have nothing to play that on.
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  Yeah.
• 15:05
  Let me get up my beta max.
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  I'll see if I can play it on that.
• 15:08
  Yeah.
• 15:09
  It's good, isn't it?
• 15:10
  Yeah.
• 15:11
  It's wild.
• 15:12
  You were just saying that you wrote an entire album and then you threw it away.
• 15:15
  I kept four songs and then scrapped everything else.
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  What's that all about?
• 15:20
  Yeah.
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  I made a record.
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  Yeah.
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  I just didn't, I didn't, I wasn't feeling it when I...
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  So you tour every couple of years.
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  You toured in 2022.
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  Yeah.
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  You were going to tour this year.
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  Yeah.
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  So during 22, I was making my albums.
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  Were you telling me this in confidence, by the way, was I supposed to not raise this
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  or anything?
• 15:41
  No.
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  Okay.
• 15:43
  Good.
• 15:44
  No.
• 15:45
  So I was sort of doing a song when I was ever off the road, do a song, a few weeks later
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  do another song.
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  So piece by piece by piece.
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  And each one individually felt and sounded really good.
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  And when I've strung them all together to sort of put a form and album, I was like, ah,
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  it's all a bit, it's all a bit one note.
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  Interesting.
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  Everything was a bit too, yeah, because I just hadn't, it was just a bit linear.
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  So yeah, I scrapped it.
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  How does the record label feel about that?
• 16:16
  How does that feel about that?
• 16:17
  It was okay with it, yeah.
• 16:20
  You know, when I moved to Nashville, someone said to me, you know, what's the most important
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  thing for you right now?
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  And I said, I have to get a record deal.
• 16:27
  And you guys, nah, it's not the most important thing.
• 16:29
  I said, what's the most important thing he goes to get the right record deal?
• 16:33
  Hmm.
• 16:34
  I said, well, what do you mean like to not get ripped off on the contract?
• 16:38
  I think it's, well, yeah, of course, but you've got to have final say of everything.
• 16:43
  You have to.
• 16:44
  You have to, you have to be able to choose your songs, choose the album cover.
• 16:48
  You have to be able to choose everything.
• 16:49
  You can't have someone doing all that for you.
• 16:52
  Yeah.
• 16:53
  Because it's your sword.
• 16:54
  You're good to live and die by it.
• 16:55
  And if it's successful, you should claim that.
• 16:57
  If it fails, you should claim that too.
• 17:01
  So wait, hold out for the right record deal that'll give you that creative freedom.
• 17:05
  And I did.
• 17:06
  And it's, it's proved to be the best advice.
• 17:10
  How do you know when to trust your gut and when to take another person's advice though?
• 17:14
  Oh, I don't know that anyone ever works that out.
• 17:18
  But that's not true because it's a good question.
• 17:21
  I think about that a lot.
• 17:22
  Yeah.
• 17:23
  It's a really good question.
• 17:24
  Knowing what to listen to and what to discard, because literally everybody around you
• 17:28
  can have this one opinion and you go, well, they, they might, I must be the wrong one.
• 17:33
  Right.
• 17:35
  Is saying the opposite.
• 17:36
  And you can defy them and have a massive success.
• 17:40
  You can defy them and have a complete flop.
• 17:44
  So I think at the end of the day, you just got, I got to listen to my gut.
• 17:49
  And if I'm 100% confident with it, then that's what I was meant to do.
• 17:53
  And if it fails, then I was meant to learn from that, experience that, because that was
• 17:59
  going to help me with the next thing, you know.
• 18:01
  So it's failure, even the definition of failure is continuing to change for me.
• 18:06
  What is it now?
• 18:08
  A learning experience, you know.
• 18:16
  But even, I guess a better example would be put out a song and it doesn't seem to do
• 18:24
  anything.
• 18:25
  Doesn't got the charts.
• 18:27
  Streams a little bit and you're like, ah, bugger.
• 18:30
  I felt really good about that.
• 18:32
  And then like two years later, people start requesting it in concert and you see the
• 18:36
  streaming numbers going up and it's sort of found its way.
• 18:40
  Somehow it found its way.
• 18:41
  Well, you meet somebody that says, that's song that you put out, man, change my life.
• 18:46
  And you're like, oh, okay, well, that would make it a success.
• 18:51
  Not the tangible success I was thinking, it had some other purpose, which was equally
• 18:55
  successful.
• 18:56
  That's what I mean by that.
• 18:57
  Right.
• 18:58
  Yeah.
• 18:59
  Yeah.
• 19:00
  Yeah.
• 19:01
  You do quite a lot of press.
• 19:03
  You do a lot of the stuff.
• 19:05
  Yeah.
• 19:06
  I'm just interested, like, you've got to a position and you can, because when you're starting
• 19:11
  out, you know, you want to go and you want to sit on as many couches as possible.
• 19:15
  You want to talk to as many people as you can.
• 19:18
  Not as close as this one.
• 19:19
  Not as nice as this couch.
• 19:20
  Obviously.
• 19:21
  But if people are listening to the podcast, they should check out the YouTube channel and
• 19:24
  they should look at the beautiful podcast that we're sitting on.
• 19:28
  But you know, once you get to a certain level, people, Clooney's not doing podcasts.
• 19:33
  You know, De Niro doesn't have to go on the tonight show.
• 19:36
  I think he's promoting a movie, he will.
• 19:39
  He'll sit there and say nothing.
• 19:40
  If he's a hero.
• 19:41
  Look, the raft doesn't have to.
• 19:43
  He doesn't have to.
• 19:44
  He's the new.
• 19:45
  Be an item, man.
• 19:46
  Do you enjoy doing press or is it?
• 19:49
  I enjoy talking to people.
• 19:50
  Right.
• 19:51
  Yeah.
• 19:52
  I enjoy having conversations.
• 19:53
  I enjoy being asked questions because I learn a lot from the question and from the way
• 19:59
  I answer it.
• 20:00
  Oh, that's interesting.
• 20:01
  Yeah.
• 20:02
  Sometimes you say things that you wouldn't have expected that you would say.
• 20:04
  Yes.
• 20:05
  Or I go home and I think, is that really what I thought about?
• 20:07
  That was a good question.
• 20:09
  Is that really what I thought?
• 20:11
  I may be surprised.
• 20:12
  It's like therapy.
• 20:13
  It's like it's cheap therapy.
• 20:14
  Yeah, that's right.
• 20:15
  Yeah, that's interesting.
• 20:16
  It's a little bit.
• 20:17
  And talking about yourself.
• 20:18
  When there are worse things in the world, talk about yourself.
• 20:21
  Changes day to day, doesn't it?
• 20:23
  Most people quite like it.
• 20:25
  They ask me out themselves.
• 20:26
  I've been told that they're great.
• 20:27
  Sometimes.
• 20:28
  I just, yeah, I don't know.
• 20:29
  I think there comes a point at which you can also just go because when you were, wasn't
• 20:32
  there an album that was released when you were in rehab and they were, and the label
• 20:36
  was like, well, I don't know if we should release it because we want them to do press.
• 20:39
  They will not do very well.
• 20:40
  Yeah.
• 20:41
  And they released it and you were in the Betty Ford clinic or something.
• 20:43
  It was like a massive smash hit.
• 20:45
  Yeah.
• 20:46
  So what's the point in doing all the press?
• 20:47
  Two million copies.
• 20:48
  That's right.
• 20:49
  And I didn't know press for it.
• 20:50
  That's right.
• 20:51
  Actually, I'm done.
• 20:52
  You're done.
• 20:53
  Exactly.
• 20:54
  I'm putting myself out of my jobs here.
• 20:55
  I'm out of here.
• 20:56
  I'm out of here.
• 20:57
  Anyway, it always interests me, people's attitude towards doing press, especially when
• 21:03
  you're performing.
• 21:04
  You're performing at the moment.
• 21:05
  So you're blabbing all day and then you're having to crew it at night.
• 21:11
  I get to shred as well.
• 21:12
  You get to shred a little bit.
• 21:13
  You get the vocal arrest.
• 21:14
  Yeah.
• 21:15
  You get to play.
• 21:16
  Okay.
• 21:17
  Do you play anything?
• 21:18
  Piano.
• 21:19
  Piano.
• 21:20
  Because that's what my parents got me to go to lessons of.
• 21:23
  Right.
• 21:24
  Yeah.
• 21:25
  And then once you get good at something, you like it.
• 21:28
  Yes.
• 21:29
  Yes.
• 21:30
  Attitude is fun, Keith.
• 21:31
  Can you, how do you teach somebody tenacity and motivation?
• 21:38
  Can you teach somebody motivation?
• 21:42
  Probably not.
• 21:46
  What are you reckon?
• 21:47
  Probably not.
• 21:48
  We're listening right now, screaming answers at us and we can't hear them.
• 21:52
  But I've always wondered about that.
• 21:54
  It's a blessing.
• 21:55
  Because motivation comes from all kinds of places, doesn't it?
• 21:59
  You know, sometimes healthy, sometimes not healthy.
• 22:02
  Yeah.
• 22:03
  That fire.
• 22:04
  Yeah.
• 22:05
  That hole that you're trying to feel.
• 22:06
  Yeah.
• 22:07
  If it's a hole that you're trying to feel versus some aspiration that you're reaching for.
• 22:11
  Yeah.
• 22:12
  I mean, I think ego and motivation are closely related.
• 22:16
  Right.
• 22:17
  And both be positive and negative.
• 22:20
  Yes.
• 22:21
  Right.
• 22:22
  Yes.
• 22:23
  Well, because you're going to think quite a healthy amount of it you need.
• 22:24
  Yeah.
• 22:25
  Exactly.
• 22:26
  And they can be the, you know, they can be generative and they can also be destructive.
• 22:28
  Yes.
• 22:29
  I mean, you know, as the father of six-year-old twins, I think a lot about what is my
• 22:33
  capacity to instill in them motivation, interest, desire, perseverance, tenacity, all that
• 22:40
  stuff.
• 22:41
  And to what extent is that they just come baked in, you know, nature versus nature?
• 22:45
  How do you feel with your girls?
• 22:48
  Well, we'll see.
• 22:49
  Yeah.
• 22:50
  Jury's out.
• 22:51
  So far so good.
• 22:52
  So far so good.
• 22:53
  So far so good.
• 22:54
  Yeah.
• 22:55
  What did I read the other day?
• 22:56
  You know, where there is, where there's danger, there's opportunity.
• 22:59
  And where there's opportunity is danger.
• 23:01
  That's good.
• 23:02
  Aren't they the same character in, like, Mandarin or something?
• 23:05
  Is there something I might be thinking about?
• 23:06
  That's interesting.
• 23:07
  But I think there's some Asian script where, like, opportunity and danger or something.
• 23:10
  There's, you know, flip sides of the same character.
• 23:13
  Yes.
• 23:15
  What about spirituality?
• 23:16
  I'm interested in how creatives kind of think about where creativity comes from and like
• 23:21
  their muse and like sometimes you just hit that flow stage or you hit that, you know, creative
• 23:26
  burst of energy.
• 23:27
  And there's something sort of sublime about it.
• 23:30
  Yeah.
• 23:31
  Do you, what do you think that is?
• 23:34
  Mysterious.
• 23:36
  Mysterious.
• 23:37
  But the flow state is it.
• 23:39
  That's where you want to get to.
• 23:40
  I want to get in the flow.
• 23:43
  The album I scrapped didn't have the flow.
• 23:47
  That's what I, that's what I could not feel when I was listening to it.
• 23:51
  I'm like, it's not flowing.
• 23:53
  And I'm, where's the spirit?
• 23:55
  Where's the happy tire swing ever, you know, like it just didn't have the, it didn't
• 24:00
  have the flow.
• 24:01
  That's interesting.
• 24:02
  And I, I wanted to flow in the studio and have the album feel like it's flowing top
• 24:08
  to bottom.
• 24:09
  So this record finally did that.
• 24:11
  Great.
• 24:12
  It's a great record.
• 24:13
  I like it.
• 24:14
  I like the first track, which is 12 seconds long and it's just you.
• 24:16
  No, I hate it.
• 24:19
  I was so bummed out on the label went, we have to number the first track.
• 24:24
  It's not a track.
• 24:25
  No, it's just added to the second track.
• 24:28
  Just make it the beginning of the second track.
• 24:30
  I will.
• 24:31
  I would have, I would have just tacked it on to the beginning of the song except
• 24:36
  you couldn't skip past it to get to the song.
• 24:38
  Oh, yeah.
• 24:39
  And after a while you're like, I can't, I get it.
• 24:40
  I don't want to hear that every time. I want to hear the song. So that was why I got stuck having a number.
• 24:45
  I like it. Yeah. Are you a God guy? What do you reckon happens after we die?
• 24:50
  How great is that as a question? Well, here's the great thing. Number one, nobody knows,
• 24:54
  which is one of the most beautiful parts that is on. A lot of people seem to think they know.
• 24:59
  Well, that's different. A lot of people think a lot of things, but factual actuality.
• 25:05
  The mystery is great because it allows us to choose a belief that works for us and to change
• 25:14
  that belief as well and keep changing it constantly. I'm always amazed at people who have
• 25:27
  you're free to think whatever happens after you die happens. You become worm food or you are
• 25:34
  sand or you get into some astral body or who knows what you come back as a dog or something,
• 25:38
  whatever. You're free to choose anything. It's like it's up to you. I'm always amazed that people
• 25:43
  don't choose something that gives them a sense of peace. Why would you choose something terrifying,
• 25:49
  absolutely terrifying when you're choosing it. It's just a belief and you're choosing something
• 25:57
  that's terrifying. Well, isn't the terrifying belief always sold, like opportunity and danger,
• 26:06
  I flip sides of the same thing, always sold with its opposite, which is paradise.
• 26:12
  But I mean, isn't the terror, if you're talking about hell, I mean, yeah, like I don't
• 26:15
  want to be scared to die is what I'm saying. Well, then you just have to believe on Jesus,
• 26:21
  is the clueless, you know what I mean, like, or any, or something like peace or Yahweh,
• 26:27
  I don't know. Or something like to ascend to some other to some other sort of energy type of
• 26:35
  existence or emanation or something. I mean, I don't know what happens after you die, but I will
• 26:40
  tell you that I had a better relationship with my father now since he died than I did when he
• 26:46
  was alive. I feel closer to him and just feel like I got a better relationship with him.
• 26:52
  But is that because he was a prick or because he died? He was alcoholic. So you can only get so close
• 26:59
  to an alcoholic. And now that he's not alive, he's not an alcoholic anymore. And I get to have
• 27:12
  this conversation with him that gives me peace. And I'm quite aware that I could just be talking
• 27:19
  to myself. Right. It doesn't matter. It does the conversation, give me a sense of peace and
• 27:24
  connectedness and it does. So works for me. Do you suspect that he's present? I do.
• 27:32
  That I do. And again, if that's only the belief, then the belief gives me a sense of comfort.
• 27:40
  So whether it's just the belief or the real thing, what's the difference?
• 27:45
  Remember that movie Leap of Faith? Yeah. Steve Martin was in. There's a great moment in that
• 27:50
  movie when I was basically saying, you're a complete Charlotte and you're making these people believe
• 27:54
  in something and it's just all rubbish. It's just all false. And he said, but they believe in it
• 28:00
  and they seem happy. So what's the difference? It's really quite beautiful.
• 28:07
  I like it. Yeah. What's your belief? What do you think happens after you die? No idea. I suspect
• 28:14
  probably nothing. Okay. Probably the same as what it was before I was born. Oh, that's interesting.
• 28:19
  Yeah. That's a good conversation. We all know what nothingness is like. We've spent billions of
• 28:23
  years being nothing. But here's the other thing. Why do we think we're capable of comprehending
• 28:28
  everything? Like don't you think these things will be on your comprehension? Completely. I mean,
• 28:33
  I'm totally agnostic. I mean, as you were talking about that flow state, like there's clearly
• 28:38
  something weird about the ability of matter to get ejected from stars and assemble itself
• 28:48
  into the form of a human brain that is capable of generating a consciousness that can then look
• 28:53
  back upon the universe. Put the ball away. Hey, urban. That was awesome.
• 29:02
  You know what I mean? I mean, you can't even talk about this shit without
• 29:05
  seeming like you're a stoner or like you're on an Iowaska ceremony. You know, I mean, it's like
• 29:10
  that is not the best. It is a fun. It is a weird thing that we're alive and aware of. Oh,
• 29:15
  it's free people the whole thing to each other. Yeah. No, it's what the fuck's going on, Kate? No
• 29:19
  idea. No idea. What's the whole cosmos here for? Merrily, merrily, merrily life is but a dream.
• 29:24
  It's just a big dream. It's great. It's one of the best lyrics ever written. It's great, isn't it?
• 29:29
  Right. Isn't that right? You vote gently down the stream. When you think about the philosophy of
• 29:32
  that lyric, actually think of it as a life philosophy. Okay. Like ro, ro, ro, you vote gently
• 29:37
  down the stream. Like just go through life a little bit more chill if you can. Merrily, merrily,
• 29:43
  because life is but a dream. It's just a dream. So just go gently, go easy. It's actually
• 29:49
  amazing. It's like sort of guide for life in this crazy little song. Never thought about it that
• 29:55
  way. No. And it seems like everything that we're coming up with in culture and society at the
• 30:00
  moment conspires against that philosophy in the sense of the like what you're talking about.
• 30:05
  Well, that's the ego pace and the, you know, like everything. We've got we've got we're being
• 30:09
  fed a firehose of content. Yes. There's the ego, as you say. Yeah. It's like the instantaneous
• 30:15
  success. Yeah. Short term thinking. They're like freaking out about every little thing. Yeah.
• 30:20
  There's the kind of, you know, the finger wagging, sensorious scolds who are going to try to clip up
• 30:26
  this interview and find some way of taking something that you set out of context to make it sound
• 30:31
  like you were anti-Christian or pro this or whatever. I saw that Nicole your wife said something
• 30:36
  onto an interview or about how we need to support the president or something of the United States.
• 30:40
  Everyone went batchit crazy saying that that meant that she was a Trump supporter when she was
• 30:45
  just saying we have to support the office of the president. Like what do you make of this moment?
• 30:49
  Do you feel like you have to try it on egg shells and anyway, do you feel like we're fracturing?
• 30:58
  Well, we live in a clickbait society. So we're just looking for that little bit of clickbait to
• 31:05
  sell this interview, to sell another interview, another podcast and other this and other that.
• 31:11
  But I remember when I got out of rehab and I was talking to a journalist and he was saying to me,
• 31:18
  said he feel different, you know, did you learn a lot? You know, I'm like, oh yes,
• 31:23
  of course I learned a lot. I said I sort of have this now when I'm trying to make a decision on
• 31:30
  something, instead of getting stressed out about it, I imagine that I'm a 90-year-old guy
• 31:36
  and thinking back to this moment, did this moment really matter that much? So I sort of,
• 31:42
  I think like a 90-year-old guy and it helps me calm the moment down and keep it real,
• 31:48
  the interview came out, Keith Urban feels like an old man. It's literally what the headline read.
• 31:55
  What a dick, you know, what's that 1975 song where he says found a gray hairs in one of my suits,
• 32:06
  which is a joint, like context in a modern debate, I just took it out. That's such a good lyric.
• 32:13
  That's great. All right, I'll let you get out of here. Quick questions, a few rapid fires,
• 32:18
  you ready? Yes. What is the best American holiday? All of them. I like Fourth of July. Great. Yeah,
• 32:27
  yeah, it's a great one. It's the independence, it's the fireworks, it's hot, barbecues,
• 32:31
  everything good. I like it. I like it. What's the most underrated part of Los Angeles?
• 32:36
  Underrated? Yeah. Jeez, I don't know. I don't feel like I know L.A. that well to say with the
• 32:43
  underrated part of Nashville. I don't know if it's got an underrated part. Love it all. Yeah,
• 32:54
  yeah. They should do something more with the river in Nashville. Yeah. What should they do?
• 33:00
  Just make it a thing, like, like, put outdoor cafes and make it a thing because Brizzy does it,
• 33:06
  you know, it's terrible in Brisbane. It's a brown snake. It's horrible, but you've got to
• 33:12
  surf, but we don't worry about it. We don't care. We scout water. Let's make some, and I remember
• 33:16
  being in Nashville going, how can you guys then have cafes over the water? Yeah. Have you seen
• 33:20
  our river? Have you seen the Brisbane river? Doesn't matter. Doesn't matter. It doesn't matter.
• 33:25
  No, so that's that's going to come you watch. All right, I'm going to leave it there because I know
• 33:29
  that's it. Oh, that's it. Oh, that's it. Oh, that's it. I've got a million other things. That's
• 33:31
  awesome. Good on you. Thank you, Kate. That's really good. Thanks, mate.