Latest / I Choose Me with Jennie Garth / Richard Marx, Forever the Romantic

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Richard Marx, Forever the Romantic · I Choose Me with Jennie Garth

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: You're listening to I Choose Me with Jenny Garland.
• 0:08
  Speaker 2: Welcome back to I Choose Me. If Richard Marks singing
• 0:12
  Speaker 2: to us isn't a moment, I don't know what is.
• 0:15
  Speaker 2: Be sure to listen to part one if you haven't
• 0:17
  Speaker 2: heard it yet. His wisdom, pure gold. Let's jump back
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: into our conversation.
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: You've written number one songs for so many different artists
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: across the decades, from NSYNC to Lionel Richie, Luther Vandross,
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: so many people. Does it hit differently when you hear
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: others sing your words? Like, what's that like for you?
• 0:42
  Speaker 3: It's a very different experience, but it's just as thrilling.
• 0:45
  Speaker 3: And I really love that I've had two careers, that
• 0:51
  Speaker 3: I have two careers, that I have this career as
• 0:53
  Speaker 3: an artist and entertainer and touring performer and songwriter from
• 1:00
  Speaker 3: my own things that I want to write about, but
• 1:04
  Speaker 3: also being a, um, a good facilitator and collaborator. Um,
• 1:11
  Speaker 3: and it also has opened up over the years. It's
• 1:14
  Speaker 3: opened up kind of like what I did with after hours,
• 1:18
  Speaker 3: but you know, I've written with artists like almost every genre.
• 1:24
  Speaker 3: So I've written R and B songs and country songs
• 1:26
  Speaker 3: and jazz songs and all I did Josh Robins' first hit,
• 1:32
  Speaker 3: To Where You Are, and produced that and wrote that
• 1:34
  Speaker 3: with my friend Linda Thompson. And hard rock songs. A
• 1:39
  Speaker 3: lot of stuff with hard rock bands. My songwriting and
• 1:44
  Speaker 3: producer resume is so schizophrenic. It's my favorite. It's the
• 1:50
  Speaker 3: thing I'm the most proud of, is that my music
• 1:54
  Speaker 3: covers every genre. I haven't done polka yet.
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: I'll be waiting. I'll be right here waiting for you.
• 2:03
  Speaker 3: Yeah. Um, but yeah, it's been, uh, it never, it's
• 2:08
  Speaker 3: never the same thing twice. It's never boring. It's never
• 2:11
  Speaker 3: sort of like, Oh, another one of these, it's always
• 2:14
  Speaker 3: something fresh and different. And to this day, you know,
• 2:17
  Speaker 3: and getting to write with, you know, artists and songwriters
• 2:22
  Speaker 3: who I've always admired too, has always been a really
• 2:25
  Speaker 3: amazing thing. Mm-hmm.
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: Writing songs for other people, it's just as fulfilling.
• 2:30
  Speaker 3: I love that. It's a different art form, almost. I mean,
• 2:34
  Speaker 3: every once in a while, I'll hear one of my
• 2:37
  Speaker 3: favorite things I've ever done with somebody else is a
• 2:41
  Speaker 3: Keith Urban song called Long Hot Summer.
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: Oh.
• 2:44
  Speaker 3: And whenever that's on the radio, because it still gets
• 2:48
  Speaker 3: played on the radio, like a lot of those songs
• 2:50
  Speaker 3: that I've been involved with, I just keep playing them.
• 2:53
  Speaker 3: And if I'm driving around and I hear Long Hot Summer...
• 2:57
  Speaker 3: I'm cranking it. Yeah. And I just, there are certain
• 3:01
  Speaker 3: records that just are personal favorites. And that one, I mean,
• 3:04
  Speaker 3: I love working with Keith, but that's my favorite thing
• 3:06
  Speaker 3: I've done with him for sure.
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: Yeah. You, you sound like you have a lot of
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: male friends because of your industry and what you do.
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: I'm sure that that's natural. It happens. And, you know,
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: data shows that it's very important for men to have
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: good friends. Just, you know, it's equally as important for women,
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: but especially men. How do you keep all of those
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: relationships going? It sounds like a lot.
• 3:33
  Speaker 3: It's not a lot. I have a lot of acquaintances
• 3:36
  Speaker 3: and very few friends. Okay.
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: That makes sense.
• 3:40
  Speaker 3: I think I'm pretty good about being diligent about keeping
• 3:44
  Speaker 3: in touch, especially with my friends who are much older.
• 3:49
  Speaker 3: You know, one of my friends, I've been friends for
• 3:52
  Speaker 3: 25 years. He's 94 years old. And he's had an
• 3:57
  Speaker 3: incredible life and had all kinds, been successful in all
• 4:01
  Speaker 3: different fields. And he's 94, so he's frail physically. He
• 4:06
  Speaker 3: doesn't really leave his house too much. But when I
• 4:10
  Speaker 3: go visit him and I sit down with him, his
• 4:12
  Speaker 3: mind and his humor is completely as I've always known it.
• 4:17
  Speaker 3: So he's not, he isn't failing in any other way
• 4:20
  Speaker 3: except that his body's failing him at 94. And so I.
• 4:25
  Speaker 3: Make a point to be in touch with him and
• 4:28
  Speaker 3: to visit him because I think a lot of people are,
• 4:31
  Speaker 3: have moved on. And I, I just, it's not even
• 4:35
  Speaker 3: out of sense of duty or anything like that. I
• 4:37
  Speaker 3: just really enjoy his company. And, and I'm, I have
• 4:41
  Speaker 3: several people in my life like that. And I, I
• 4:45
  Speaker 3: think it's important to just sort of maintain those relationships.
• 4:50
  Speaker 3: I've always had a sense of loyalty and, and nurturing
• 4:56
  Speaker 3: good relationships. I'm also good about letting them, the ones
• 4:59
  Speaker 3: that don't really show up for you, letting them go,
• 5:02
  Speaker 3: you know?
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I was just writing about that today, about the
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: courage it takes to really know when it's time to
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: let someone go, someone that's just not aligning with who
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: you are now.
• 5:15
  Speaker 3: Yeah, also- It's quite difficult. It's worth mentioning that over
• 5:21
  Speaker 3: my lifetime, Starting in high school, but over my adult lifetime,
• 5:27
  Speaker 3: I've also had some really, really deep, great friendships with
• 5:32
  Speaker 3: women that were not romantic. And what I've learned from
• 5:38
  Speaker 3: those friendships and those experiences, I think, have really made
• 5:43
  Speaker 3: a difference. I think everybody should be great friends with
• 5:46
  Speaker 3: someone of the opposite sex where there's no sexual tension
• 5:50
  Speaker 3: or there's no romantic. You know what I mean? It's hard.
• 5:53
  Speaker 3: it's difficult sometimes to find that, but when you do
• 5:56
  Speaker 3: find it, I think that those friendships are in a
• 6:00
  Speaker 3: certain way, uh, more educational than, than, you know what
• 6:07
  Speaker 3: I mean? Like with the other perspective. Yeah, totally. It's
• 6:11
  Speaker 3: always been important to me over my life to have
• 6:15
  Speaker 3: good female friends. Um, and now I have like, you know,
• 6:19
  Speaker 3: the fact that I am married to my best like
• 6:22
  Speaker 3: the best friend I've ever had is is really important
• 6:26
  Speaker 3: too how.
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: Do you let friendships go gently like ones that aren't
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: um working anymore for you.
• 6:36
  Speaker 3: There's a period where I start to go I'm doing
• 6:41
  Speaker 3: all the work here and so then I hang back
• 6:44
  Speaker 3: and then over a period of time if there is
• 6:47
  Speaker 3: not some reciprocal or like a hey what happened like
• 6:51
  Speaker 3: then I realize, oh, it's not, I don't take it
• 6:53
  Speaker 3: personally like, oh, well then they've just never cared about me.
• 6:55
  Speaker 3: They're just not, that's just not who they are. And
• 6:59
  Speaker 3: so I don't want to invest in those kind of
• 7:05
  Speaker 3: dynamics with another person. I can be like, I can
• 7:09
  Speaker 3: hang out with somebody or start to get to know
• 7:11
  Speaker 3: somebody and think I love hanging out with them. But
• 7:14
  Speaker 3: then over time, if it doesn't become reciprocal, I just
• 7:19
  Speaker 3: sort of, I don't, there's no like, you're fired. We're done. No,
• 7:25
  Speaker 3: there's none of that. It just, it just drifts away.
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: That, that is, that happens as we get older. I
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: think you feel bad, but I don't think people should
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: feel bad when they're pulled away from someone.
• 7:39
  Speaker 3: No. And there's only, you know, like, especially now I'm
• 7:42
  Speaker 3: very conscious of.
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 7:44
  Speaker 3: I have more summers behind me than in front of me.
• 7:48
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: You have to really prioritize. How do you want to
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: spend your precious moments here?
• 7:52
  Speaker 3: How do you want to spend that time? My two
• 7:56
  Speaker 3: favorite words that I've started using a lot, especially in
• 7:59
  Speaker 3: the last two or three years, my two favorite words
• 8:02
  Speaker 3: are no thanks. When it comes to whether it's a
• 8:06
  Speaker 3: gig or an invitation to something that I just, and
• 8:13
  Speaker 3: Daisy and I are like pretty diligent about this now.
• 8:17
  Speaker 3: We say to each other or to ourselves, do I
• 8:21
  Speaker 3: really want to go do that? And if the answer
• 8:23
  Speaker 3: is no, this sense of, well, I really should do that.
• 8:27
  Speaker 3: But they've gone out of it.
• 8:28
  Speaker 2: No.
• 8:30
  Speaker 3: No. It's okay to choose yourself. It's okay. Yes, it is.
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: But boy, is it hard to do, especially when you're younger.
• 8:39
  Speaker 3: Yeah, of course.
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: You reach an age where you.
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: Allow yourself. You give yourself permission, I think, to just
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: say no.
• 8:51
  Speaker 3: Yeah. But don't you think when we're younger, a lot
• 8:53
  Speaker 3: of that is just out of FOMO? It's like fear.
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: If I don't do it, someone else is going to
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: do it.
• 8:58
  Speaker 3: Right. All the wrong reasons.
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: Right, right.
• 9:01
  Speaker 3: Or what if I never have this opportunity again? Exactly.
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: No.
• 9:04
  Speaker 3: And you get to a certain age and a certain
• 9:06
  Speaker 3: life experience. My time is the most valuable thing I own.
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: Mm-hmm. It is true. So Richard, when you sing in
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: the shower these days, what are you singing?
• 9:26
  Speaker 3: Oh, good question. I'm either singing something I'm working on,
• 9:30
  Speaker 3: a song I'm working on, never a song I've already completed.
• 9:33
  Speaker 3: I don't sing my own songs.
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: You don't go back in the catalog?
• 9:36
  Speaker 3: No, I don't go back in the catalog.
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 9:38
  Speaker 3: But sometimes when I'm working on a song or I
• 9:40
  Speaker 3: have an idea for a song, I'll sing it to
• 9:42
  Speaker 3: kind of just keep Fleshing It Out. And if I'm
• 9:46
  Speaker 3: not singing one of those, I'm singing Selfish by Justin Timberlake.
• 9:54
  Speaker 3: I can't stop singing that song. That's one of my
• 9:56
  Speaker 3: favorite songs to sing in the car or in the shower.
• 9:59
  Speaker 3: Bruno Mars. You know, whatever songs of the day or some,
• 10:06
  Speaker 3: I don't tend to sing old songs. I'm always listening,
• 10:09
  Speaker 3: trying to listen to what's new. So I'm usually humming
• 10:14
  Speaker 3: something that I've heard on the radio that week.
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: I always wondered, like, a rock star from your era,
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: how music has changed so much. I mean, I remember
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: hanging out with my friend, Jacob Dillon.
• 10:32
  Speaker 3: He's my friend too.
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: There you go. He, he was doing the wallflowers. I
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: think it was their debut album. And he was the,
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: you know, the next greatest thing like bound for hugeness.
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: And then music took a turn. And jumped into, I
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: think it was boy bands, just sort of took over.
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: And the live music with the full band just wasn't
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: doing what it was doing.
• 10:58
  Speaker 3: Right. Well, and the majority of those boy bands, no disrespect,
• 11:05
  Speaker 3: but the majority of those boy bands, when that was
• 11:07
  Speaker 3: the craze, have disbanded and don't work anymore. And Jacob
• 11:11
  Speaker 3: and the Wallflowers are still out touring, still selling out
• 11:15
  Speaker 3: venues and still making, I mean, the last Wallflowers album,
• 11:19
  Speaker 3: I guess it was three years ago, maybe. Oh my God.
• 11:22
  Speaker 3: I just wore it out. I love it so much.
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 11:26
  Speaker 3: Jacob and I became friends about eight years ago and I,
• 11:30
  Speaker 3: I adore him. Like he's so fun and funny and
• 11:34
  Speaker 3: so talented. And, but I mean, to me, the answer
• 11:41
  Speaker 3: to how has music changed? How has the, how has
• 11:43
  Speaker 3: music changed is a different question that how has the
• 11:47
  Speaker 3: music business changed the music business has changed where it's
• 11:50
  Speaker 3: unrecognizable from what it was even 15 years ago let
• 11:54
  Speaker 3: alone 30 or 40 well i mean there is no
• 11:57
  Speaker 3: need for a record company there's no need for distribution
• 12:02
  Speaker 3: there's no how people consume music is just night and
• 12:06
  Speaker 3: day different no one i know including me even which
• 12:11
  Speaker 3: is i you know embarrassed to say sits down and
• 12:15
  Speaker 3: listens to a new album by someone without checking Instagram
• 12:20
  Speaker 3: or answering an email. We've all been conditioned over time
• 12:24
  Speaker 3: to become ADD. Nobody just sits and listens to an
• 12:28
  Speaker 3: album from beginning to end. I made myself do it
• 12:31
  Speaker 3: on the last Bruno Mars album. I was on the
• 12:33
  Speaker 3: road and it came out and I sat with headphones
• 12:37
  Speaker 3: and I listened from top to bottom because I was
• 12:40
  Speaker 3: really looking forward to it and I loved it. But
• 12:42
  Speaker 3: it's a really rare occurrence. And I think that because music,
• 12:48
  Speaker 3: not just music, all music, every song that's ever existed
• 12:52
  Speaker 3: is so easily tracked down and owned by the public.
• 12:59
  Speaker 3: I believe that over time that has diminished people's sense
• 13:05
  Speaker 3: of what music is worth. There was a, you know,
• 13:09
  Speaker 3: when you would go and wait for, and even sometimes
• 13:12
  Speaker 3: in some cases stand in line at a record store
• 13:15
  Speaker 3: to buy that album and pay $ 12 or $ 10 or whatever,
• 13:20
  Speaker 3: knowing that maybe some of the songs are going to suck. Like,
• 13:24
  Speaker 3: you know, you hear the song on the radio, that's
• 13:25
  Speaker 3: the hit and you love it. So you're going to
• 13:27
  Speaker 3: go buy the album because you couldn't get the single
• 13:29
  Speaker 3: or you don't, whatever it is. Um, the whole, um,
• 13:36
  Speaker 3: experience of, of, um, letting music into your senses is
• 13:44
  Speaker 3: completely different. I feel like it's a shame on certain levels.
• 13:51
  Speaker 3: I can tell you for sure that the streaming platforms,
• 13:55
  Speaker 3: while it makes music so accessible and you can find
• 13:58
  Speaker 3: any song you can even imagine, it has really, really
• 14:03
  Speaker 3: done a horrible number on songwriters and artists and their compensation.
• 14:08
  Speaker 3: So a songwriter now, can't really make a living without,
• 14:14
  Speaker 3: you know, billions of streams of songs. And even that's
• 14:17
  Speaker 3: not the kind of money you think it is. There
• 14:20
  Speaker 3: was a time when musicians and songwriters and artists were
• 14:23
  Speaker 3: paid appropriately for their work. Those days are long gone.
• 14:27
  Speaker 3: And if you can't tour, if you can't go out
• 14:29
  Speaker 3: and do shows, which is the one thing that really
• 14:32
  Speaker 3: so far can't be stolen and put in somebody else's pocket, um,
• 14:38
  Speaker 3: it's really hard. It's really, really hard. I'm grateful every
• 14:41
  Speaker 3: day that I have a catalog of songs that I
• 14:43
  Speaker 3: can tour on for the rest of my life. But
• 14:47
  Speaker 3: so few people have that in the big scheme of things.
• 14:50
  Speaker 3: The music itself is different to me in that I
• 14:56
  Speaker 3: remember loving the creation of a song like as a journey.
• 15:04
  Speaker 3: So you'd have an intro and I would, work so
• 15:07
  Speaker 3: hard on this. I would have an introduction, a musical
• 15:09
  Speaker 3: introduction that would hopefully get people to go, wait, what
• 15:11
  Speaker 3: is this? What is that? That's cool. And then the
• 15:14
  Speaker 3: verse starts and I'm starting to tell you a story
• 15:16
  Speaker 3: or I'm starting to tell you about my heartbreaking or
• 15:18
  Speaker 3: whatever it is. Like I'm just leading you to something else.
• 15:23
  Speaker 3: And then the chorus would pay off and you would
• 15:26
  Speaker 3: hear it and you'd go, oh my God, it's a
• 15:28
  Speaker 3: release and it's catchy and it's an earworm. But then
• 15:31
  Speaker 3: I would take a whole left turn and write a
• 15:35
  Speaker 3: bridge that would tell you a different part of the
• 15:37
  Speaker 3: story and musically be different than the rest of the
• 15:41
  Speaker 3: song and then lead you back to one more chorus
• 15:44
  Speaker 3: that you're already familiar with. And there was something about
• 15:47
  Speaker 3: the craft of that that I loved so much like
• 15:50
  Speaker 3: so many other songwriters. And over time, the mission became
• 15:56
  Speaker 3: get it done and get it out there in 90 seconds,
• 16:00
  Speaker 3: two minutes tops. And do I hear stuff that I love?
• 16:05
  Speaker 3: Of course I do. But do I miss hearing the
• 16:10
  Speaker 3: kind of craft that I grew up on and that
• 16:13
  Speaker 3: I practiced? Yes. So the way.
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: All of us do that experienced it.
• 16:21
  Speaker 3: I mean, I, you know, every once in a while
• 16:23
  Speaker 3: I hear a new kid in town by the Eagles
• 16:25
  Speaker 3: on the radio. And I just think about the way
• 16:27
  Speaker 3: that song was constructed and the story it tells and
• 16:30
  Speaker 3: the musical journey it takes and the Vocals and the
• 16:34
  Speaker 3: harmonies and what the Eagles were doing song after song
• 16:37
  Speaker 3: after song. But that one, that one just absolutely to
• 16:40
  Speaker 3: this day just blows my mind in terms of craft. Yeah,
• 16:44
  Speaker 3: the Eagles, man.
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: I mean, do you feel like there's a, maybe prior
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: to this point in your career, but recently, do you
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: feel like there was like a pressure within you to
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: keep innovating or trying to keep up with the new ways?
• 17:00
  Speaker 3: I mean, that. Sure.
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: That sounds exhausting.
• 17:06
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: And so fun.
• 17:07
  Speaker 3: It's a lot of times it's just sort of out
• 17:10
  Speaker 3: of your control. And when music, when the taste in
• 17:14
  Speaker 3: music changes, sometimes that can throw you or make you go, Oh,
• 17:20
  Speaker 3: what do I do now? But what I never did
• 17:25
  Speaker 3: over my career to this day is resent those changes
• 17:28
  Speaker 3: because I think it's imperative. Music has to change. the
• 17:32
  Speaker 3: popular tastes need to change or else we wouldn't have
• 17:36
  Speaker 3: all kinds of new artists. We wouldn't have, you know,
• 17:39
  Speaker 3: Youngblood and we wouldn't have Billie Eilish and we wouldn't
• 17:43
  Speaker 3: have all these, you know, really innovative, talented people breaking
• 17:47
  Speaker 3: through unless the public taste evolved and changed. And sometimes
• 17:53
  Speaker 3: it's like, yeah, there's a part of you as an
• 17:57
  Speaker 3: artist or a creator that you think, well, do I
• 17:59
  Speaker 3: need to chase that? Do I need to do a
• 18:01
  Speaker 3: version of that to stay relevant? My attitude is generally
• 18:08
  Speaker 3: do what you do and just do it really well.
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: Yes. Don't try to be something you're not.
• 18:14
  Speaker 3: It's okay to experiment. For sure.
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: And to try to grow or learn.
• 18:20
  Speaker 3: A new thing. And if you're influenced by something and
• 18:23
  Speaker 3: then you just organically create something on the heels of that.
• 18:29
  Speaker 3: There's no piece. There's no song ever written that wasn't
• 18:31
  Speaker 3: influenced by somebody else. There's no, there's nothing truly original.
• 18:34
  Speaker 3: Prince would have been the first to tell you that
• 18:36
  Speaker 3: everybody who says the Prince was so innovative. Prince would
• 18:38
  Speaker 3: be like, I wasn't innovative. I was imitating James Brown.
• 18:41
  Speaker 3: I was imitating, you know, Otis Redding. And so there's no,
• 18:46
  Speaker 3: there's nothing brand new, fresh and new that hasn't borrowed
• 18:50
  Speaker 3: from somebody else. So it's like borrow, Yeah. And see
• 18:58
  Speaker 3: what you can do with that.
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: Make it your own. Yeah. That's the way to do it.
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: You're all so kind. I get asked all the time
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: where I find easy, wearable pieces that look polished but
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: still feel relaxed. And honestly, a lot of them are
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: from my own collection. Me by Jenny Garth, which is
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: exclusive at QVC, is filled with versatile staples that you
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: can dress up or down and wear again and again.
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: I design every piece with comfort and confidence in mind.
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: You can shop the collection anytime at qvc.com. Search me
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: by Jenny Garth. I want to talk about marriage after
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: a decade because I had so much fun talking with
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: Daisy when she was here and she made your relationship
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: feel so easy. So like you guys, like you said,
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: you love hanging out, listening to music, doing your thing,
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: having a drink. And it just seems so effortless for
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: you guys.
• 20:04
  Speaker 3: That's a good word.
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: Is it?
• 20:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 20:08
  Speaker 3: But part of the reason that it's, effortless, or at
• 20:12
  Speaker 3: least pretty effortless, I mean, I don't know that any
• 20:15
  Speaker 3: relationship is completely effortless, but for us, it's pretty damn effortless,
• 20:20
  Speaker 3: is really more about the luck of how much we
• 20:27
  Speaker 3: have in common to begin with. So when we started
• 20:32
  Speaker 3: to get to know each other, there was this list
• 20:38
  Speaker 3: of things that I'd did differently than she did. And
• 20:41
  Speaker 3: she did differently than I did leading up to our
• 20:44
  Speaker 3: meeting each other and knowing each other. And some of
• 20:47
  Speaker 3: it was like, Oh, I don't, I don't do that
• 20:49
  Speaker 3: that way. I do it this way, but I'll try
• 20:52
  Speaker 3: that just in terms of life and how you do life.
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 20:58
  Speaker 3: And so I learned a lot from her and how she,
• 21:01
  Speaker 3: cause when I met her, she was, she'd been single.
• 21:04
  Speaker 3: I mean, she'd had long relationships, but she was, um,
• 21:08
  Speaker 3: completely her own person doing things her way um very
• 21:13
  Speaker 3: independent and had um a quality of life that she
• 21:21
  Speaker 3: was enjoying that i was like oh i like that
• 21:24
  Speaker 3: i don't want to do that that way wow and
• 21:27
  Speaker 3: vice versa and so over time we started to just
• 21:30
  Speaker 3: sort of borrow from each other and that that was
• 21:33
  Speaker 3: pretty effortless because it was never too much of a
• 21:36
  Speaker 3: 180 from what we were doing you know Um, but
• 21:41
  Speaker 3: there was just so much that we just instinctively had
• 21:44
  Speaker 3: in common. It was so much part of it was
• 21:47
  Speaker 3: being three and a half, four years apart in age.
• 21:50
  Speaker 3: So there's very little culturally in terms of pop culture
• 21:55
  Speaker 3: or history that I'm aware of that she's not aware of. Um,
• 22:00
  Speaker 3: she's so smart. She's always been from the time she
• 22:03
  Speaker 3: was a kid. She just, she just, um, absorbs knowledge.
• 22:08
  Speaker 3: And she's the most curious person I've ever met. And, um,
• 22:13
  Speaker 3: it's at the end of the day, it's effortless, but
• 22:15
  Speaker 3: it's just fun. We, we really do have a lot
• 22:18
  Speaker 3: of fun together. But again, Jenny, like part of that
• 22:23
  Speaker 3: is that we met later in life. So some of
• 22:26
  Speaker 3: the stuff that traditionally can complicate a relationship, kids, um, finances, um,
• 22:37
  Speaker 3: career butting heads or this one's none of that was
• 22:43
  Speaker 3: there was none of that on the table for us
• 22:45
  Speaker 3: it was just um i just and the only reason
• 22:50
  Speaker 3: we got married to be honest with you was i
• 22:51
  Speaker 3: just wanted her to be my family you know we
• 22:55
  Speaker 3: didn't have to get married there was no agenda neither
• 22:58
  Speaker 3: one one of us needed to have a marital partner
• 23:01
  Speaker 3: there was days he used to say the last thing
• 23:04
  Speaker 3: i need to do is sign another fucking contract But
• 23:11
  Speaker 3: after a couple of years together, it became clear to
• 23:15
  Speaker 3: me that I just really wanted her to be my family.
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: That's so beautiful.
• 23:22
  Speaker 3: There's really no other reason.
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: I mean, I see you guys doing your thing and
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: it just always makes me happy. You're a couple that
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: makes me feel happy about love.
• 23:36
  Speaker 3: That's a great compliment. That makes me happy. Yeah.
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: You hate social media.
• 23:42
  Speaker 3: No, I don't. You don't? No.
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: You think it's toxic?
• 23:47
  Speaker 3: Yeah. It's awful, but I don't hate it.
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: It's awful, but you don't hate it. Okay.
• 23:52
  Speaker 3: There are things about it I hate. I can't ever
• 23:55
  Speaker 3: hate it because without social media, I wouldn't have met Daisy.
• 23:58
  Speaker 2: Really?
• 23:59
  Speaker 3: I met her through Twitter. I did not know this. Yeah,
• 24:03
  Speaker 3: we were both... Do you remember Martha Quinn from MTV? Uh-huh, uh-huh,
• 24:07
  Speaker 3: for sure. We've always been friendly and Daisy's friendly with her.
• 24:11
  Speaker 3: And so Martha and I followed each other back when
• 24:14
  Speaker 3: Twitter was still kind of fun and it was a
• 24:17
  Speaker 3: different sort of creative outlet for me. I could just
• 24:19
  Speaker 3: be kind of sarcastic and funny and tweet things and
• 24:23
  Speaker 3: not the toxic waste dump it became. But so like
• 24:28
  Speaker 3: 14 years ago, I was having a funny back and
• 24:32
  Speaker 3: forth with Martha. And it showed up on Daisy's Twitter
• 24:36
  Speaker 3: feed because she followed Martha. So she sees this and
• 24:39
  Speaker 3: she chimes in and she's like, oh my God, you
• 24:42
  Speaker 3: guys are giving me the sweetest 90s flashback right now
• 24:44
  Speaker 3: or something like that. And then I was like, I
• 24:48
  Speaker 3: saw it. And I was like, Daisy Fuentes. Oh my God.
• 24:51
  Speaker 3: I always had the biggest crush on her. And I
• 24:52
  Speaker 3: was like, she was so cool. And so then we
• 24:55
  Speaker 3: started following each other. And then I was coming out
• 25:00
  Speaker 3: of a relationship maybe a year later. So we didn't
• 25:04
  Speaker 3: really communicate or like we would retweet each other or whatever,
• 25:08
  Speaker 3: but we didn't talk. And then when I was becoming
• 25:13
  Speaker 3: single for the first time in my adult life, really,
• 25:16
  Speaker 3: I came out to L.A. to do a show. This
• 25:20
  Speaker 3: is like a year and a half later, something like that.
• 25:24
  Speaker 3: And I slipped into her DMs.
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: You did what?
• 25:27
  Speaker 3: I slid right into her DMs. That's what I did.
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: Oh, my God. I never thought.
• 25:32
  Speaker 3: And invited her to my show. And she came to
• 25:34
  Speaker 3: the show.
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: I mean, that's like the best move.
• 25:38
  Speaker 3: Yeah, she said it was a baller move. Yeah. And
• 25:41
  Speaker 3: it was at the Grammy Museum. We were filming a
• 25:43
  Speaker 3: show for PBS at the Grammy Museum. So I put
• 25:47
  Speaker 3: her in the front row. And I can tell you this.
• 25:53
  Speaker 3: I'll happily tell you this part of it. So I knew, obviously,
• 25:56
  Speaker 3: she was coming. Put her in the front row. She
• 25:59
  Speaker 3: was with a couple of girlfriends. and after the show
• 26:04
  Speaker 3: in the green room in the dressing room people were
• 26:06
  Speaker 3: coming back and daisy generally doesn't really like to do
• 26:09
  Speaker 3: the backstage hang she's actually known more for not doing
• 26:13
  Speaker 3: that for whatever reason she came back to say hello
• 26:17
  Speaker 3: so this is the first time we're actually meeting and
• 26:20
  Speaker 3: then by the way there was no flirtation in the
• 26:22
  Speaker 3: dms at this point just an invitation to the grammy
• 26:25
  Speaker 3: show and you know i think once before that like
• 26:27
  Speaker 3: a hey may i hope you have a great christmas
• 26:29
  Speaker 3: or something like that um And so I was greeting
• 26:33
  Speaker 3: people and then I looked over at the door and
• 26:36
  Speaker 3: I saw her coming in the door of this green
• 26:37
  Speaker 3: room to say hello to me. And it was truly,
• 26:42
  Speaker 3: I'd never experienced this in my life where I felt
• 26:44
  Speaker 3: this lightning bolt of like literally like it took my
• 26:51
  Speaker 3: breath for a second. But then I remember, I still
• 26:54
  Speaker 3: remember this, that the way I can explain it is
• 26:56
  Speaker 3: that my brain went, everything is different now. And I
• 27:02
  Speaker 3: didn't know what that meant. I had no idea if
• 27:04
  Speaker 3: we would date or become friends or ever see each
• 27:07
  Speaker 3: other again. But I just remember this feeling of everything
• 27:12
  Speaker 3: that I've known up to the second is shifted. And
• 27:18
  Speaker 3: I couldn't explain it. She came over, gave me a hug.
• 27:23
  Speaker 3: There's a Getty photographer there takes a picture of the
• 27:25
  Speaker 3: minute we met. We just recreated it a couple last week.
• 27:30
  Speaker 3: I did a show at the Grammy museum again. And, uh,
• 27:32
  Speaker 3: we'd recreated that same spot. And I, you know, and
• 27:36
  Speaker 3: then the next day she DM me her number and
• 27:39
  Speaker 3: then I started to reach out to her and, you know,
• 27:41
  Speaker 3: it was a real slow get to know you kind
• 27:45
  Speaker 3: of courtship. And, but I, I owe it all to Twitter.
• 27:50
  Speaker 3: So no, I don't hate.
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you can't.
• 27:53
  Speaker 3: And I have a, you know, I have a handful
• 27:55
  Speaker 3: of friends in my life who I met through same thing,
• 27:58
  Speaker 3: you know? Yeah.
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: Well, it can be, you know, the greatest thing ever.
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: And it can be.
• 28:05
  Speaker 3: You hate it? Would you say that overall you hate it?
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: No, I don't hate it. I think it's a big
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: time suck.
• 28:11
  Speaker 3: Totally.
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: I try not to get in too deep.
• 28:15
  Speaker 3: I totally agree.
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: Because I don't want to use my time like that.
• 28:18
  Speaker 3: Right.
• 28:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 28:19
  Speaker 3: You can lose hours. Like you, all of a sudden
• 28:21
  Speaker 3: you look up and you're like, what the fuck? It's
• 28:24
  Speaker 3: eight o'clock. Nobody ate dinner. Oops. Yeah.
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: But it's like, it's such an incredible tool as well
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: to like get to know Especially people in our situation
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: where you get to know your fan base and you
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: get to really hear from them.
• 28:40
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: There's such a genuine interaction that happens that I'm so
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: grateful for.
• 28:45
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, it is something that's not going anywhere, so
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: we better embrace it.
• 28:51
  Speaker 3: I think that, you know, I have three sons who
• 28:54
  Speaker 3: are grown and they have basically a hate-hate relationship with it.
• 28:58
  Speaker 2: Mm-hmm.
• 28:59
  Speaker 3: And like I know some people who have to like
• 29:01
  Speaker 3: delete the app off their phones because they become addicted
• 29:04
  Speaker 3: to it. Right. I get all that. I don't have
• 29:07
  Speaker 3: that problem. But I also think that there's a way
• 29:10
  Speaker 3: to embrace any of that kind of technology or I
• 29:16
  Speaker 3: look at those kind of things as opportunities if you
• 29:18
  Speaker 3: look at it the right way.
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: Right? For sure. Well, there's so much you can learn.
• 29:22
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: Yeah. So many different cultures you can learn about and
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: people's just people.
• 29:29
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: It's pretty cool.
• 29:30
  Speaker 3: For sure.
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: Oh, my gosh. I've had such a great time sitting
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: here across from you and talking. Thank you for taking
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: this time.
• 29:39
  Speaker 3: My pleasure.
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: It.
• 29:40
  Speaker 1: I know you're a busy man. But before I let
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: you go, Richard Marks, what was your last I choose
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: me moment?
• 29:51
  Speaker 3: About a year and a half ago, I fired everybody.
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 30:00
  Speaker 3: It sounds so callous when I say it that way.
• 30:04
  Speaker 3: I am a very loyal guy. And it's really hard
• 30:10
  Speaker 3: for me to cut ties. And I had people in
• 30:15
  Speaker 3: my life, my business life, who I also had friendships with,
• 30:19
  Speaker 3: which is always a little tricky. But I finally realized
• 30:24
  Speaker 3: I was keeping people employed in my business life. out
• 30:30
  Speaker 3: of loyalty and not based upon their job performance. That's
• 30:35
  Speaker 3: so hard. And it all sort of, like it literally
• 30:41
  Speaker 3: hit me like in an instant. And it wasn't just one.
• 30:44
  Speaker 3: It was like I fired my manager, my agent, and
• 30:47
  Speaker 3: my business manager in one day. The trifecta.
• 30:50
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: Wow.
• 30:51
  Speaker 3: And I've never been happier because if you don't allow
• 30:58
  Speaker 3: room for something new. You never know. And I was
• 31:03
  Speaker 3: really ready. I just knew that I was not happy
• 31:06
  Speaker 3: with what was happening. And the only reason that it
• 31:10
  Speaker 3: dragged on for years was because I wouldn't choose me.
• 31:13
  Speaker 3: I kept choosing them. I kept choosing loyalty to them.
• 31:16
  Speaker 3: And finally, it just hit me that they were not
• 31:19
  Speaker 3: my responsibility. I'm my responsibility. And I.
• 31:27
  Speaker 3: I'll never have another manager, a personal manager. I managed myself.
• 31:30
  Speaker 3: It's the greatest thing I ever did. I don't have
• 31:34
  Speaker 3: now a buffer between... Sometimes, as you know, you probably
• 31:38
  Speaker 3: had this experience where you pay somebody a commission to
• 31:43
  Speaker 3: represent you. And not only are they not really representing
• 31:46
  Speaker 3: you well, they're getting in your way or they're blowing
• 31:50
  Speaker 3: situations for you, unbeknownst to you. So I changed my
• 31:56
  Speaker 3: entire business life in an afternoon. And it's the best
• 32:01
  Speaker 3: thing I could have done.
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: I know that was hard.
• 32:05
  Speaker 3: Really hard.
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I've been there. I too am a very loyal person,
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: so I fully understand that. And I can imagine how
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: freeing it must have felt to just sort of start
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: from scratch.
• 32:17
  Speaker 3: Yeah. Sometimes you just have to throw yourself into the
• 32:20
  Speaker 3: deep end of the pool now and then.
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 32:22
  Speaker 3: And remember how to swim. Yeah.
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: Hopefully you'll remember. Well, thank you so much for being
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: on the pod.
• 32:31
  Speaker 3: I really appreciate it.
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: Please give Daisy a hug from me.
• 32:34
  Speaker 3: I will for sure.
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 32:36
  Speaker 3: I'll see you out there. All right. See you.