Latest / The Chris and Mike Show / #180 - Mark Winters - Musician/Songwriter

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#180 - Mark Winters - Musician/Songwriter · The Chris and Mike Show

• 0:07
  Welcome YouTube and Twitchers. Welcome.
• 0:12
  Zip fizz. Zip fizz.
• 0:15
  Whoa, Hey, everybody. That's the groove.
• 0:30
  That is the groove, man. This Is Us.
• 0:38
  This is Mike and I's band. That's awesome man, I'm waiting
• 0:44
  for the big high pitched rock screen baby, come on, lay it
• 0:47
  out. That was awesome, guys.
• 1:02
  Man, I'm sorry I didn't see you live, man.
• 1:03
  Dang it. It's I know, I know it's, it's,
• 1:05
  it's one, it's one for the ages, right?
• 1:07
  Hey, welcome to the Chris and Mike show.
• 1:09
  He's Mike. I'm Chris.
• 1:11
  This is Mark Winters. He's a bad ass.
• 1:13
  We are brought to you by Riverside FM, the one and only
• 1:15
  choice for podcast platforms. Remember, we're live on Twitch,
• 1:18
  YouTube and now streaming on our website, chrisandmikeshow.com.
• 1:21
  So for those of you that are out there in the 32 countries now,
• 1:26
  3434 countries, now 34, now 34. We just picked up the
• 1:32
  Netherlands and Costa Rica. Yes, Bienvenidos, I don't know
• 1:36
  how to say hey, yeah. So maybe Mark, maybe Mark can
• 1:39
  talk backwards in Netherland language and that would.
• 1:43
  For us, that would be awesome. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:45
  I'm not sure how to do straw cab and another I'm not sure how to
• 1:48
  do Netherland language. What?
• 1:49
  What's the native tongue there? I have no idea.
• 1:52
  I have no idea. Dutch.
• 1:54
  OK, Dutch. There you go, Dutch.
• 1:56
  OK, yeah, Dutch is, is one of you guys.
• 1:58
  One yeah, that's OK. One of your one of our reels
• 2:03
  from your first episode went nuts and it was the one that you
• 2:07
  talked about the straw cabbing, but then also the the was it the
• 2:11
  straw cab and the other thing? Yeah, it was straw cabin.
• 2:13
  And yeah, the the and the other one though, the yeah, the Glock,
• 2:18
  the power, but what is it? The polyglot?
• 2:20
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Those two are really good deals,
• 2:24
  man. Yeah, yeah.
• 2:26
  That was fun. My my brother is a really
• 2:28
  interesting guy for sure. I think I need to get him to
• 2:32
  sing, sing my back my songs backwards.
• 2:34
  That would be amazing if I could get him to.
• 2:35
  Do that dude. That would take backward masking
• 2:39
  to a whole new level. Yes.
• 2:41
  Remember, Remember that in the 70s, back masking like oh, play
• 2:44
  Led Zeppelin backwards, just so evil and satanic and shoot.
• 2:51
  Straw cab kissing, that would be.
• 2:53
  That's what it would be in English anyway, right it?
• 2:55
  Went all the way to the Supreme Court, right That's.
• 2:59
  That's crazy. So Mark Winters is on tour, or
• 3:02
  he's getting ready to go on tour because you're going to be in
• 3:04
  Arizona next month. Yes, Sir, I've got a a big show
• 3:09
  kicking off the tour here in town in in Houston, March 7th at
• 3:15
  the Armadillo Palace and then a couple of weeks worth of load in
• 3:19
  and and ready, getting the trailer and myself all ready.
• 3:22
  And then we're we're on the road at the end of March and, and,
• 3:25
  and ready to bring some. Positive vibes out there.
• 3:29
  Buddy. On the West Coast, the north,
• 3:31
  the east, everywhere. Man coming at y'all.
• 3:33
  That's awesome. That's awesome.
• 3:35
  Have you ever have you ever been to Bisbee?
• 3:38
  I've not been to Bisbee before, is it a rock and place to visit
• 3:41
  Chris? It is a small town.
• 3:44
  I was going to say that's one way of putting it.
• 3:47
  It's a small town. It's a really small town.
• 3:50
  It's kind of a hippie kind of commune vibe thing.
• 3:53
  I've, I don't know if I've ever been there, but I've know people
• 3:56
  I I and if we can make it to the show, it'll be my first trip to
• 4:00
  Bisbee. I have to look at the date again
• 4:02
  because I got to make sure it's a weekend because otherwise, you
• 4:05
  know, with the wife being a teacher stuff, it'll be next to
• 4:07
  impossible. But it's a small town.
• 4:11
  It's very, it's very, I don't know, I want to say eclectic,
• 4:15
  maybe eclectic story. That's a good word.
• 4:17
  Actually, that's a good word. Yeah.
• 4:19
  It's, it's, I think you're going to fit in there really well,
• 4:21
  Mark. Yeah, it's going.
• 4:22
  To be amazing. Yeah.
• 4:24
  Yeah, if there's a teeny bit of a nerdy vibe and people are down
• 4:28
  for some some extra protons in their life, you know, a little
• 4:31
  extra positive energy, I'm, I'm there, man.
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  I'm I sound like my kind of place.
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  Yeah, you will fit in well there for sure, man.
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  They would be what I would like to call open, open minded people
• 4:40
  for sure. Yes, there you go, open minded.
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  People, That's sweet. I met a ton of those on my last
• 4:46
  tour and I really man, I love people from diverse backgrounds.
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  I love people who are just sort of big melting pot.
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  It's like it's a, it's a phenomenal way to immerse
• 4:56
  yourself out in. The world we.
• 4:58
  Live in, you know. Yeah, absolutely, man, questions
• 5:03
  Mike For Mark. You're sitting there all
• 5:05
  stoically. God.
• 5:08
  He's freezing cold. I need my furnace.
• 5:11
  Where is my furnace? You guys look so warm.
• 5:15
  Yeah, Yeah. I was outside yesterday doing
• 5:18
  yard work because I live on an acre, Mark.
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  So it was, I think 8486 at one point in time.
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  I came inside and I was just sweating profusely, like I was
• 5:27
  in the shower. I'm like, yeah, here we go,
• 5:31
  Summer's coming. I actually like the, I like the
• 5:34
  warm weather, man. I'm, I'm all down for like a,
• 5:37
  you know, a good 70 or an 80° day, maybe even 90.
• 5:40
  It doesn't, it doesn't drag me down.
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  You know, my, my wife, she she'd rather be hanging up there with
• 5:46
  Mike in the cold weather. See.
• 5:48
  So would mine. Yeah, so would mine.
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  She's tired of the she's tired of the heat, man, especially in
• 5:52
  the summers. And everybody thinks our, our
• 5:53
  winter's going to our summer's going to be stupid hot because
• 5:56
  we really, we had like maybe a week of winter.
• 5:59
  Like, I think I wore a jacket twice and one of those when I
• 6:02
  was up in Muns Park last weekend for our 30th anniversary because
• 6:05
  it snowed. And I'm like, what the hell is
• 6:09
  this shit, man? You actually got to see quite a
• 6:11
  bit of snow based on. Yeah, yeah, My truck, when we
• 6:14
  woke up, my truck one day had probably at least a foot of snow
• 6:18
  on top of it. I'm like, all right.
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  That's crazy when? Is the last time you saw snow
• 6:23
  before that? Well, in 2019 it snowed and
• 6:29
  Carefree and I had a listing Carefree is just outside of the
• 6:33
  Phoenix metro area, Mark and it and, and like it legit snowed.
• 6:38
  Like it was like, yeah, that happened several times when I
• 6:40
  was there too. So that was the that was
• 6:43
  previous to that. That was the only other time
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  because I don't, I don't, I don't think there was snow when
• 6:47
  we no, I'm sorry. We don't have an Alaskan cruise
• 6:49
  in the valley, you know that time.
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  But we went to Alaska two years ago and it was, it was, we saw
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  snow there, obviously glaciers and stuff.
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  Alaska is is phenomenal. My my wife and I were just up
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  there. I know visiting, yeah.
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  Looking for a podcast? Looking for a little looking for
• 7:08
  a little cabin, You know, we're not moving there, but we're
• 7:11
  going to buy a little like some property in the cabin up there
• 7:14
  in the Fairbanks area and. Did you?
• 7:16
  We saw one, we found a property we like, so we'll see if the if
• 7:20
  the stars align for that, but. Yeah, 'cause that's, that's the
• 7:23
  day you were on the show, you were there.
• 7:26
  Yeah, it's pretty, pretty phenomenal.
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  So we're hoping to close in on that.
• 7:30
  Everything happens pretty fast these days.
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  So you know, Internet land purchases are are pretty fast.
• 7:37
  So I'm happy with that. Yeah, exactly.
• 7:39
  So you're just buying land, not on a cabin?
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  Or you're buying both? Yeah, land and we'll probably
• 7:44
  we'll put a cabin on it. Oh, there.
• 7:45
  You go. It's just, you know, there's a
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  lot of, there's a lot of DIY houses in Alaska, Sure.
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  And when you kind of get inside them, you're like, you know,
• 7:55
  there might be an electrical hazard here.
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  You're not sure that you want to live in it.
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  There's a lot. Of, you know, if you're in town,
• 8:02
  you know, there's a lot of professionally built things, but
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  when you get out in the in the country, it's a lot of people
• 8:07
  just like, hey, Chris and Mike come over.
• 8:09
  We're going to build a house today, right?
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  We build a house in an afternoon and you know, sort of like not
• 8:15
  quite square and, you know, but I guess it's a, it's kind of the
• 8:20
  Alaskan way. We had that we had, we had snow
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  in Houston probably four or five years ago.
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  It actually stuck like. You know, I think the first time
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  in maybe 20 years, it was amazing here.
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  We actually got to get the dogs and go run out in the snow and
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  build a snowman. It was like the whole.
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  City shut down for a week. We didn't know how to deal with
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  it. It was a phenomenal.
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  That's what I was going to ask. Did everybody just freak out?
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  Yeah, it was, it was pretty insane.
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  You know, we don't have, we don't have any salt trucks or
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  snow plows or we got nothing. So when it when it, when it, if
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  it snows and sticks, it's like all right people, y'all just
• 9:01
  hunker down for a while until all this stuff melts naturally.
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  There you go. So.
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  So if I heard, yeah, go ahead, Mike, with this tour that you
• 9:10
  got coming up, Mark, are you supporting an album that you
• 9:13
  just recorded or I kind of forgot what we talked about last
• 9:16
  time. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
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  For sure, yeah, I've been putting out singles from a new
• 9:22
  album. I have noticed that.
• 9:24
  Yep, the science in me is the name of the surprise with my
• 9:28
  Albert Einstein shirt on, you know?
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  But yeah, it's some songs that. Are.
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  You know, I guess. Some of them are a little more
• 9:37
  playful, like Fake Gravity. It's kind of got this cool
• 9:41
  groove. It's a little more pop centric.
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  And then I just released a release Velocity before that and
• 9:49
  a song called The Speed of Light.
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  And I have a few more. I just wrote the most.
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  The most recent release has been a song that I wrote about my
• 10:00
  brother Paul So. The the polyglot.
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  Kind of a sadder moment in my life, no?
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  I had another younger brother and he actually committed
• 10:12
  suicide which I'm still sorry. Super heavy and I need.
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  I was talking to some friends who had similar situations going
• 10:23
  on and their families and they encouraged me to, to write about
• 10:29
  it because it would help me and it would help other people who
• 10:31
  were who were listening to it. I haven't put a heavy piece out
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  like that before. So it was very emotional for me
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  to write it. The song is is called Let It
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  Rain. And it's I think a lot of the
• 10:48
  feelings in the song for me are about, you know, guilt like, you
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  know, how could I have been there more for my brother and
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  his time of need? I I thought I did everything
• 11:03
  that I possibly could to be there for him to.
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  But those are human emotions. We would all have those feelings
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  for sure. Yeah, just tough to write about
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  and tough to sing about. But let me tell you, I've gotten
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  just an enormous amount of outreach from everyone consoling
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  me about my brother's loss. It was a number of years ago,
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  but it's still very fresh for me and and people sharing their own
• 11:32
  experiences of loss and love. You know, for me, the, you know,
• 11:38
  the chorus and the vibe of this song, you know, sort of reset.
• 11:43
  I don't know, I don't know if you guys feel this or not, but
• 11:46
  water is a big reset button for me.
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  Like if I go, I go stand in the shower, I go stand out in the
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  rain. I I go swimming.
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  Just it's it, it, it just clears.
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  I don't know what it is. It's just like mystical.
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  I don't know but it. Resets in my mind for sure I
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  agree with you yeah. So, you know, the chorus is
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  like, you know, let it rain, you know, wash away my pride, help
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  me heal inside, you know, let it rain and make me clean again.
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  And I, I really feel that it's. I've played it live once.
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  I had a show yesterday and let me tell you, it was it was tough
• 12:29
  to get through that. And yeah.
• 12:32
  Yeah, the the video is playing in our background right now.
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  I've been watching the words as you're talking, Mark.
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  I love the lyrics. Yeah, yeah.
• 12:40
  Well. Thank you.
• 12:40
  MMM and Mike and I have experience with this too.
• 12:43
  We lost our, our drummer for Nemesis.
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  He he, he took his own life, which is one of the reasons why
• 12:48
  we wrap up every show as you know about, you know, if you're
• 12:52
  feeling suicidal depression, you need to find somebody to talk to
• 12:54
  you and you know, text 988 because somebody is there to
• 12:56
  help you through whatever you're struggling.
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  That's the biggest problem with suicide is these people don't
• 13:01
  talk about like that 25 year old Minnesota Viking wide receiver
• 13:05
  just killed himself in his garage like last month it's
• 13:08
  like. I mean, what's up with that,
• 13:09
  really? Like, and, and Nick and I talked
• 13:12
  about it, it could have been to where he finally reached that,
• 13:14
  that epic point, right? Because Mike and I've had this
• 13:17
  discussion and we've, we've talked about it's, it's a .0017%
• 13:22
  chance that every single college athletes going to make the NFL.
• 13:26
  It's that it's that difficult, right?
• 13:29
  So to get to that level, Nick and his conversation was, well,
• 13:33
  maybe when he got to the level, it wasn't what he what it wasn't
• 13:35
  everything he thought he was going to, it was going to be.
• 13:38
  There was something to surface later that when he played for
• 13:40
  the Cardinals that I think it was JJ Watt.
• 13:43
  I forget which one, but I think JJ Watt was talking to him on
• 13:47
  NFL's Hard Knocks because he dropped a pass.
• 13:49
  And the dude was obviously just distraught that he dropped a
• 13:52
  pass. He's like, man, it's practice,
• 13:53
  man. Did you?
• 13:55
  Well, like it's it's practice. Like This is why we're here.
• 13:58
  Just don't do it when it counts. And the dude was just, that's
• 14:01
  the pressure that he was putting on himself.
• 14:04
  Yeah, right. So is that the level of pressure
• 14:07
  he carried with him every single day, which forced him at 25 to
• 14:11
  be like, I'm just done with this to me, I can't anymore, right.
• 14:14
  To me, I just we've all, I think we've all had those thoughts at
• 14:18
  some point in time or life, maybe about all of us.
• 14:19
  I've had it a couple times for sure, you know, and and I didn't
• 14:24
  do anything about it. I didn't, I didn't, you know,
• 14:26
  even go down the path of attempting it.
• 14:28
  It was just, you know, just one of those things.
• 14:31
  But yeah, it's it's sucks. And it it the whole that it
• 14:34
  leaves in your heart and you a sibling like Mike and I wasn't a
• 14:37
  sibling. It was, it was a brother in
• 14:39
  music. And when I find out about I, I
• 14:41
  didn't find out about till well after the fact that I'm like,
• 14:43
  that just kind of hit me for a few days because I was like,
• 14:45
  what the fuck, you know? Yeah, I don't know.
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  I and I, I, you know, just personally, I have such a
• 14:51
  positive view of the world and I'm always seeing possibility
• 14:56
  and, and, and, you know, white space in front of people.
• 14:59
  I just, I, it was so foreign to me, right?
• 15:03
  I, I never knew that he was thinking about taking his own
• 15:08
  life. And I and I and I tried to do
• 15:11
  all the things that I, I could. I, I even read books and talked
• 15:14
  to people and coached my family and, and his all of that.
• 15:18
  And he still took his own life. And it, you know, he left me a
• 15:22
  voicemail like take care of mom right back.
• 15:25
  It's like, Oh my God. OK, really wow.
• 15:29
  And it's, it's a, it's a four. It gives me the chills right
• 15:32
  now. Still.
• 15:33
  I'm just talking about. It well, that's heavy, man.
• 15:36
  But like, I still don't understand.
• 15:38
  I don't, I'm I'm trying to think of a, a situation that would put
• 15:43
  me in that frame of mind. I've never it's just a foreign
• 15:46
  concept to me and and I wish I understood it better so I could
• 15:49
  relate and support people who are going through that.
• 15:52
  I just. I'm not sure you do because I
• 15:55
  think Chris would agree with this.
• 15:57
  The fact that him and I do understand it for just like, and
• 16:01
  I mean microscopic moments in time, I'll allow myself to
• 16:05
  remember that moment, but you don't want to understand it
• 16:09
  because somebody that's that close to it, and I've always
• 16:12
  heard this and we've experienced it.
• 16:14
  If somebody's going to commit suicide, they're just going to
• 16:17
  do it. The people who are talking about
• 16:19
  it or crying out for help, right?
• 16:21
  You've heard those people. I'm just going to kill myself.
• 16:24
  Very few of those people do it. It takes getting to a point in
• 16:28
  your mind where you feel like there is no other option and the
• 16:33
  weight of the world is on top of you.
• 16:34
  And I can't go on at, you know, I was in the throes of my
• 16:38
  addiction. I had no money, no job, no place
• 16:41
  to live. I was living in my car, you
• 16:43
  know, where do you go from there?
• 16:45
  That that was that moment in time for me.
• 16:48
  Yeah, You know, I, I think, you know, the fact that you've
• 16:51
  experienced it, Mike, maybe that makes you better able to help
• 16:56
  someone who's living in that moment.
• 16:59
  You know, I know. I, I, I recently did a, my, my
• 17:02
  first ever prison show. It was.
• 17:05
  A it was like, OK, I had a, a minister in the area reach out
• 17:09
  to me and hey, we got, we got this holiday thing going on.
• 17:14
  We'd love you to come out and be a part of it and.
• 17:18
  I tell you, yeah. First of all, it was it was a
• 17:20
  phenomenal experience for me. Oh, I bet anything with Mark
• 17:24
  Winters is a phenomenal experience.
• 17:25
  You come on, they say. You'd have to find an insurance
• 17:28
  seminar where everybody's asleep.
• 17:29
  Man, yeah, I'm like, OK, let's do actuarial, let's come on,
• 17:32
  guys. Mad time.
• 17:33
  No, this prison thing, Let me tell you what, let me.
• 17:35
  Yeah, sorry. First of all, I had so many
• 17:37
  amazing moments in this. It was a holiday show, so we did
• 17:40
  Christmas carols and. Or Christmas.
• 17:43
  It was had a. It was a Faith Ministry prison
• 17:47
  show at one of the bigger prisons here in Houston.
• 17:53
  And they had it. You know, it's so many amazing
• 17:55
  things going on. But the thing that really struck
• 17:57
  me was the fact that the three ministers who preached, right,
• 18:02
  so wait, think about this. Out of this giant population,
• 18:05
  they have about 300 guys in this giant Chapel, all inmates.
• 18:12
  And they got these three priests who come up and these priests,
• 18:17
  they had lived the life man. They had, like Mike, they had,
• 18:21
  they had, you know, addiction. They've been arrested for every
• 18:24
  possible thing they had. They just they had done it all
• 18:27
  wrong. And like some of them multiple
• 18:30
  times. And then they found their way
• 18:32
  out and each person found their way out at a different way.
• 18:35
  And what a great story for everyone to say.
• 18:39
  OK, you know what you can? You can be sort of down in the
• 18:42
  pit. And you can find your way out.
• 18:45
  And, you know, to me that was it was amazing.
• 18:48
  We had another amazing moment in the in the service.
• 18:51
  It's like, so we're playing, we played a few songs.
• 18:55
  Hark the Herald Angels. Sing and then we played another
• 18:59
  song. I can't remember then, but one,
• 19:01
  the one that stuck out to me was we started playing Feliz
• 19:03
  Navidad, right. So I'm up there with the church,
• 19:06
  with the with the the prison ban.
• 19:09
  So we got a we got 2 keyboard players, we got a bass player,
• 19:13
  we got a drummer and we got four guys singing in the choir with
• 19:16
  me, right? So, and we got like a one hour
• 19:18
  to rehearse. And so we're sort of doing this
• 19:20
  like fluid baby. It was like, all right, so we
• 19:23
  were doing the. Thing and then we start singing
• 19:26
  Feliz Navidad and everybody was singing along everybody, all
• 19:30
  these. Voices.
• 19:31
  How can? How can I mean?
• 19:32
  So much. Fun.
• 19:34
  I mean, you know, chorus, first chorus.
• 19:37
  And then when we get to the second one, the the lead
• 19:40
  minister looks up at me, right? He's like, you know, like amp it
• 19:43
  up. So we drop all the instruments
• 19:47
  acapella. We're singing Feliz Navidad,
• 19:51
  acapella, 300 men in this amazing Chapel singing Feliz
• 19:59
  Navidad. We get through a verse, we get
• 20:01
  through a chorus. Phenomenal.
• 20:03
  Everybody's just right in there. And then the minister invites
• 20:06
  these three guys up. They start break dancing.
• 20:09
  No shit. To Feliz Navidad being sung
• 20:12
  acapella. It's like what?
• 20:14
  OK. The power of community.
• 20:17
  You're like, on this wave together, you're writing all
• 20:19
  this shared energy together. You're like, Oh my goodness,
• 20:22
  what does it I want to live in? Yeah.
• 20:23
  Music. Yeah.
• 20:25
  Well said. Music man power else you get
• 20:27
  that. Yeah.
• 20:28
  Anyway, Yeah, it's. That just proves it though.
• 20:32
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 20:32
  Just just music. Just absolutely.
• 20:36
  That's amazing dude. Yeah, it's I, it, I, it just, I
• 20:40
  just get so full of amazing energy just thinking back at
• 20:46
  that event. It's it's, it's phenomenal.
• 20:50
  Yeah, and while you're talking, I'm scrolling your tour dates
• 20:53
  just so OK people that are with us, they can see what's going
• 20:56
  on. When are you going to release
• 20:57
  your full album, Mark? In October.
• 21:00
  So the the last song is the most nerdy of all the songs in The
• 21:06
  Science of Me. It's called triangulation.
• 21:10
  OK, OK, that's awesome. So you got to get in a vibe,
• 21:13
  right? So triangulation.
• 21:15
  Might be how you find like an object like if a if a cell
• 21:20
  tower's trying to figure out where your location is and they
• 21:22
  use triangulation to ping you from three different.
• 21:26
  Spots and that gives them the ability to pinpoint your
• 21:29
  location. So here I am thinking about this
• 21:35
  school dance that I had back in, in, in high school.
• 21:39
  And I'm like, there's this girl that I really want to ask out to
• 21:42
  dance at the dance to go to dance with me.
• 21:45
  And I see her across the room, right?
• 21:48
  And I start thinking like, all right.
• 21:51
  You know, I've got to I've got to keep an eye on her position.
• 21:54
  So I have to ping her, right? I got to triangulate where she
• 21:57
  is. I got to wade through the crowd.
• 21:59
  I can't look too obvious, right? I've got my hands in my pockets.
• 22:02
  I got to get the courage. I have to come up and talk to
• 22:04
  her. And so I'm in this, you know,
• 22:07
  triangulation mode, taking me closer to her, right, Making me,
• 22:12
  making me feel her. And it's like this super nerdy,
• 22:17
  the triangulation moment in my little science brain that sort
• 22:21
  of makes me live life in a certain way.
• 22:25
  But I did have to clip out some of the the physics terms to make
• 22:30
  it more relatable. So it's we'll see how it does.
• 22:33
  But it's a it was a fun song to make, and it was, it reminds me
• 22:36
  of that moment, you know? That's awesome.
• 22:39
  I just noticed on your tour that you're going to be in Tempe on
• 22:43
  May 20th so that I will be there because even if Nikki has to
• 22:49
  work, Tempe is not too far from me.
• 22:51
  I'm going to check to see what day of the week that is.
• 22:53
  And you're playing at the Yucca Tap Room?
• 22:56
  Spent many a nights in my youth in the Yucca Tap Room.
• 22:59
  Spent many a nights in my youth in Yucca Tap Room.
• 23:01
  So did Mike. Some good, some not bad.
• 23:04
  It's a Wednesday, which is fine because now what time do you go
• 23:07
  on because it's a Wednesday. Oh, she may be, she may, you
• 23:09
  know, I think she's done with, I think she's done with school by
• 23:12
  then. That would be cool.
• 23:14
  Yeah, that'd be awesome. We, we have a a line up there.
• 23:19
  There are three of us on the ticket there.
• 23:22
  OK. So I'm guessing I'll be on
• 23:25
  around 8:00. OK.
• 23:26
  Cool. We're going to and we're going
• 23:28
  to do a collab as well. I love I have 3 or 4 songs that
• 23:31
  I'll send out that are community oriented collabs and I think
• 23:35
  we're going to sing. We're going to sing Lean on Me
• 23:38
  together, man. So.
• 23:39
  Right on, dude. You got, you got to, you got to
• 23:41
  come. You got to come.
• 23:42
  I'll come up. There for that, I'm going to
• 23:44
  tell you you're you're going to have to you're going to have to
• 23:46
  vibe for this man, that'd be good.
• 23:47
  Come sing that with you, OK? I'm cool with that, dude.
• 23:50
  I can sing, you know? I'm a singer.
• 23:52
  I, I, I knew that. I heard you, brother.
• 23:54
  You got some fights, dude. So we're ready to roll, man.
• 23:57
  That'll be, that'll be. And I will tell you what though,
• 23:59
  if we do that, that'll be the first time I've sung in public
• 24:02
  probably since 2009, because we with the 2008 Road to Sturgis
• 24:10
  tours, my last band that kind of fizzled away.
• 24:13
  I think 2009, I just finally was done with all the egos and shit
• 24:16
  that was being garnered by the guitar player.
• 24:18
  And I'm like, I'm just out, man. So you know, just saying.
• 24:23
  No. Karaoke.
• 24:24
  No, nothing. Chris come.
• 24:25
  Here, I don't, I don't do I won't, I won't do karaoke
• 24:27
  because I don't, I can't hear myself.
• 24:30
  And I'm and I'm, I'm, I'm that much of, I don't want to say a
• 24:35
  perfectionist, but I'm that much of if I'm going to do it, I have
• 24:38
  to do it the best I can. And I'm not going to go up there
• 24:42
  and be a cheesy karaoke singer. It's just not.
• 24:44
  And I can't actually, I take that.
• 24:46
  I take it back when we went to Alaska, we were on the cruise
• 24:51
  and I entered this game show in the big grand ballroom in the
• 24:54
  center of the boat and it was I killed the game show.
• 24:58
  It was pretty cool. It was kind of stupid because I
• 25:00
  was like when I grew up in, I grew up 6, I watched TV so much.
• 25:03
  It was commercial jingles and I just knew every single one of
• 25:05
  them was the stupidest thing. I just kept hitting the buzzer.
• 25:07
  So then the final thing was we had to do the, the there was 3-2
• 25:13
  other people myself. It was a trivia type thing where
• 25:16
  we had to sing a song, but I had to sing the song when the music
• 25:21
  was cutting in and out. So there's like 20 songs to
• 25:23
  choose from. So I chose Bryan Adams Summer
• 25:26
  69. So if you can imagine, if you
• 25:29
  can imagine like say A2000 seat venue with, with a double
• 25:32
  balcony, right? So I'm on the stage down here
• 25:37
  and I start singing the song and then the music cuts out, which
• 25:40
  is fine because I know the song. I have the entire crowd going.
• 25:45
  They're singing the chorus with me.
• 25:47
  Mike can attest to this kind of shit I used to do with the band.
• 25:51
  So I, I mean, I rocked the house, right?
• 25:53
  I mean, the entire, both balconies, everything was
• 25:55
  singing along with by the time we got 3/4 to the song, right.
• 25:58
  So song is over. It's it's standing room only
• 26:01
  type applause type shit. You know, it's, it was a blast.
• 26:03
  Nikki was just sitting back here watching in awe.
• 26:06
  She's like, yeah, that's his element.
• 26:08
  You know, this is what he does. So everybody's, you know, then
• 26:13
  the other two perform and then this, this other couple winds up
• 26:16
  winning because they did some weird dirty dance and shit.
• 26:18
  Everybody booed when they, when they chose them as the winners,
• 26:22
  they they booed them. And it was and it the, so the
• 26:26
  three judges were, were ship people.
• 26:28
  And I think they were pissed off that here's a guy that's not
• 26:31
  affiliated with the ship that's getting the crowd roaring and
• 26:34
  into a song more so than what their entertainers do and just
• 26:39
  kind of put them all to shame. So as the rest of the crews,
• 26:43
  when people would see me, because I'm pretty recognizable,
• 26:45
  you know, there's not a lot of bald men walking around on a
• 26:47
  cruise. Ship so.
• 26:49
  I told you, Ross, you should have won.
• 26:51
  You should have won, isn't it? That was just fun.
• 26:54
  What a great story, yeah. Yeah, so that's the last time I
• 26:57
  sang in public live, and that was just purely on AI.
• 27:02
  Don't know, just you got to do this to win the contest.
• 27:04
  I'm like OK, so. I'm in.
• 27:06
  You'll be you'll. Be this.
• 27:07
  Yeah, yeah. I'm, I'm not, I'm looking for
• 27:09
  sorry I've interrupted you. I'm looking forward to to having
• 27:11
  you. You're good.
• 27:11
  You're great. You're good.
• 27:12
  Yeah. It'll be fun.
• 27:14
  And I'll make sure I know. Lean on me.
• 27:15
  I make sure. I'll make sure that I'm.
• 27:16
  I'm refreshed. I know it.
• 27:18
  But I'll make sure I know it. Know it.
• 27:20
  Yeah, yeah, for sure. And we, yeah.
• 27:22
  That'll be fun. Yeah, we, we did a, a karaoke.
• 27:25
  This is funny. Like we were on a cruise ship
• 27:27
  and we did a karaoke as well. And one of the things I'm always
• 27:31
  amazed at, like when you do like random karaoke, I, you know,
• 27:36
  sometimes you just can't find a song that, you know, but this we
• 27:41
  started playing. What was the song?
• 27:44
  John Denver song Lucky Mountain High.
• 27:51
  Country no. Country roads.
• 27:53
  Country roads. So you think OK country?
• 27:54
  Roads, that's easy but yeah, we got to know that one brother
• 27:57
  that right so we started. Yeah, Oh my goodness, it was in
• 28:02
  this. Funky key.
• 28:04
  They had this garbled up. I don't know what it was like
• 28:07
  pitch down 5 steps. It was the weird, the weirdest
• 28:11
  intro. You're like, what key am I
• 28:13
  singing in? Right?
• 28:14
  So you're like trying to, you know, catch the, and the song
• 28:17
  doesn't have much of an intro, so catching the key in your head
• 28:19
  to still translate it was like, OK, right.
• 28:21
  So that was and then so that was really hilarious, just trying to
• 28:24
  get him the vibe of that. And then this guy came up and he
• 28:27
  sang Tennessee Whiskey. OK.
• 28:30
  Oh my God, Yeah. He sang it better than Chris
• 28:34
  Stapleton. He crushed it.
• 28:38
  He crushed it, and everybody was just watching their mouth
• 28:43
  hanging open. This dude, that's awesome.
• 28:45
  I don't know. He was phenomenal.
• 28:47
  And he sang one of the song later that night.
• 28:50
  I don't know what his background was, but probably like you
• 28:52
  Chris, like he was like rocking it because he that's what he did
• 28:54
  for a living or something. So right, right.
• 28:56
  That's. Cool.
• 28:57
  So Mike, I got a question for you man.
• 28:58
  What What song would you get up and sing a karaoke to?
• 29:01
  He doesn't sing. But now there's got to be 1.
• 29:04
  There's got to be 1. Well, I guess the only song I
• 29:08
  ever sang on stage was Cat Scratch Fever.
• 29:10
  Yes, this is true. OK.
• 29:14
  Right. I have done karaoke to Garth
• 29:17
  Brooks and Bon Jovi. If I had help, you know, like I
• 29:20
  got up there a couple last time I was in Catalina Island before
• 29:24
  I left Arizona. I went over there for a wedding
• 29:27
  and we got up and did that. That's awesome.
• 29:30
  I can sing, I just Can't Sing in front of people.
• 29:35
  That's. That's awesome.
• 29:38
  You can't learn to play an instrument and not not know how
• 29:41
  to hit notes with your. Voice, it's almost not possible.
• 29:43
  It's like a like I call it like a producer's ear, right?
• 29:46
  Mike is like, you know, my producer and he's not a trained
• 29:49
  vocalist, but he know, he knows every pitch, right?
• 29:53
  He's like, yeah, you know, he'll, he'll say, here's the
• 29:56
  note, it's up there, it's over there, whatever, as we're sort
• 29:58
  of working through a a melody and it's like, OK, he's got an
• 30:01
  amazing ear, but you know, he doesn't sing.
• 30:05
  But he knows, you know, kind of like most great guitarists who
• 30:08
  you can, you can sing the melody that you're playing, right?
• 30:13
  You sing along with it in your head or, you know, with your
• 30:15
  falsetto voice or whatever you're doing.
• 30:17
  Yeah, when you do that, and I would when, yeah, when him and I
• 30:20
  would write songs and he'll describe it.
• 30:22
  We might describe it differently, but I might play
• 30:26
  something that catches his ear and he'll sing that melody that
• 30:30
  he heard me play. But we would do it in reverse,
• 30:33
  too, where he would have the melody in his head and he would
• 30:36
  sing it to me and I would write the guitar part to his melody.
• 30:39
  We did it both ways. Yeah.
• 30:42
  How do you write? Because you said you're in
• 30:43
  Houston right now writing song. It's writing song day.
• 30:45
  So what's your approach? What's your approach?
• 30:47
  Yeah, You know, I, So if I'm writing by myself, you know how
• 30:53
  I write poems every day? We talked about that.
• 30:56
  So, yeah. So I'll, I'll think about, you
• 30:59
  know, what's. So first of all, I'll just, I
• 31:01
  have this, this 100 breath ritual that I go through.
• 31:06
  So I'll, I'll, I'll stop what I'm doing.
• 31:09
  And I'll sit in a comfortable position and I'll just take 100
• 31:13
  breaths and just let it all out. Whatever you know, however many
• 31:18
  tabs I'm I'm closing tabs man XXXXX until it's all clean.
• 31:24
  Right. And it takes me about 100
• 31:25
  breaths to do that. I wish I could do it faster.
• 31:28
  And then I'm like, OK. I come out of that, I'm like,
• 31:32
  all right, what am I feeling? And have I written something
• 31:36
  recently about that feeling? And if I, I'm, I'm feeling that,
• 31:39
  then I'll go to that poem or that set of notes and I'll pick
• 31:43
  that up as sort of a vibe, you know, if not, then you know,
• 31:46
  I'll think about what, you know, what, what do I have?
• 31:50
  You know, what am I looking forward to?
• 31:53
  And so that'll stimulate something.
• 31:55
  And so it always starts with a feeling.
• 31:58
  And then for me, I start doing, I learned this three years ago
• 32:04
  in Andrea Stolpi's songwriting retreat.
• 32:08
  I learned this free thinking exercise.
• 32:11
  It was just an unlock for me. And so I, I hit my voice memo
• 32:16
  and I just start talking about whatever it is I'm feeling.
• 32:19
  And I just let it go, Go, go, go, go, go until I, until I the
• 32:22
  spit gets empty, right? And then I'll close it and then
• 32:26
  I'll translate it to text. And then I'll start reading it
• 32:31
  back to myself and catching the vibes from within it, right.
• 32:36
  And then once I've gotten one or two little bits from that, then
• 32:42
  I'll start humming a little bit of a melody.
• 32:45
  And then I'll think about, you know, any of the feelings that
• 32:49
  might go with that melody that I've kind of isolated.
• 32:52
  And then I'll grab my guitar and start thinking about it.
• 32:57
  I'm going to call it like a groove or a rhythm, actually
• 33:00
  start with a, a rhythm first. Just something that gives me a
• 33:03
  little bit of a time signature thought.
• 33:06
  And then I'll, you know, sort of pull underneath that, you know,
• 33:12
  then everything just starts. It's like pulling the bat, the
• 33:14
  strings of a bag together. It'll, all of it will just start
• 33:17
  kind of, you know, shifting together, which I find to be,
• 33:23
  you know, just super rewarding. So if I'm writing a song by
• 33:27
  myself, it's kind of the overall process that I use.
• 33:30
  If I'm, my hope is when I finish with my songwriting time that
• 33:36
  I've got, usually I allow myself around 3 hours.
• 33:41
  And then at the end, I'm hopeful that I got to a verse and a
• 33:46
  chorus from that session, right? Maybe it's more, but that's what
• 33:50
  I'm hoping for, yeah, If I'm running with someone else, I
• 33:53
  have a completely different process for that.
• 33:55
  Well, you have to. You have to.
• 33:57
  Yeah. So, so do you.
• 33:59
  Do you purposely? Like when I write?
• 34:02
  I did. There's not purposeful meaning.
• 34:04
  Meaning that that if if I'm going and when I was in Nemesis,
• 34:08
  have it all fucking time and drove me nuts.
• 34:10
  I would as soon as I'd laid my head down on the pillow, a song
• 34:13
  would pop into my brain. And then I'd have to get up and
• 34:16
  I'd have to go in the other room and I'd have to start, keep
• 34:19
  repeating what I, what was in my head, those two or three lines
• 34:22
  that popped in my head and then get into my office and start
• 34:25
  writing it down and just let it free flow.
• 34:27
  So I, I can't purposely, like you just talked about, I, if I
• 34:31
  sat down and breathed 100 times, I, I would go into a meditative
• 34:34
  state and probably fall asleep. So, so, I mean, so, so do you
• 34:39
  ever have those moments where the muse just speaks to you?
• 34:42
  Because I know you're and, and OK, cool.
• 34:44
  Because. And I'm not, I'm not, I'm not
• 34:46
  downplaying how you write because you're creative as as,
• 34:50
  as that's the analytical side of his, right?
• 34:52
  That's what I was getting at. But that's the analytical.
• 34:54
  I'm an aerospace engineer, right?
• 34:55
  You know, I can look at the protons in the universe and I'm
• 34:58
  like, you're splitting at it. I'm exactly like you, Chris.
• 35:02
  Not purposeful. I've never heard it put that
• 35:05
  way. That's a great way of putting
• 35:06
  it. When he heard me jamming when he
• 35:09
  first logged on, I don't ever sit down to write a song.
• 35:12
  I just pick up my guitar and start playing.
• 35:14
  And then all the sudden you're like, oh, that's cool, Let's
• 35:18
  explore that for a minute, you know?
• 35:20
  Yeah, that's cool. I, I, I, I have moments.
• 35:22
  That's what I just want to know. Yeah, if, if, if, yeah, yeah, if
• 35:26
  you have a muse aspect too. But I mean, I get, I mean, all,
• 35:29
  all musicians have deadlines, especially when we get to the
• 35:33
  level where they're touring and and they're signed labels.
• 35:35
  And you know, that's why a lot of the sophomore albums are
• 35:37
  sophomore slumps because the entire you spent 15 years,
• 35:41
  right, working on your first album.
• 35:43
  Yep, right. And it's fine-tuned and it's
• 35:45
  it's down to every single note is perfect.
• 35:48
  And then all of a sudden you're you're that that rock at the
• 35:52
  stardom. Everybody thinks it's overnight
• 35:53
  sensation. It's like, well, no, not really,
• 35:56
  but you've you haven't focused on anything other than these
• 35:59
  1520 songs, right? So then all of a sudden you're
• 36:01
  next Dom, you got to write while you're on the road.
• 36:03
  So then you're under time constraints and pressure and
• 36:05
  you're not really in the right mindset for the most part, which
• 36:08
  in my eyes is why you have the sophomore slump.
• 36:11
  So I think, I think, I think some people forcefully write and
• 36:14
  I've guilty. I've done it.
• 36:16
  And then I realized I'm doing it and I stop and they go back and
• 36:19
  look at them. That was fucking stupid.
• 36:22
  Yeah, I. Think I learned a ton, you know,
• 36:25
  Andrea Stolpi told me, you know, while, while I was there, most
• 36:29
  people who are, have long term successful careers, you know,
• 36:34
  they, they write all the time and it's a muscle and they keep
• 36:38
  it going. And so they put, they, they
• 36:40
  learn to put themself in a state where they can write and, and,
• 36:44
  and not just, you know, put out something, but, you know, stay,
• 36:49
  stay with your voice and your message and write.
• 36:52
  And you're going to write, you know, 60 songs a year and you're
• 36:55
  going to pick eight that you might actually put out.
• 36:59
  And so there's going to be a lot of, you know, all your little
• 37:00
  babies that never see the light. And so I think just for me
• 37:04
  writing often I, I try to write two or three songs in a month,
• 37:08
  maybe maybe four or five if I'm feeling like I have more to say.
• 37:15
  And then, you know, sometimes I get like, like today I was out
• 37:19
  running this morning with my dogs.
• 37:22
  And you know, like you said, I'm, I'm running, I'm doing my
• 37:25
  thing. And all of a sudden, boom,
• 37:27
  something hit me, right? And all of a sudden the words
• 37:30
  just started coming to me, right?
• 37:32
  Like I'm this conduit that they're just flowing through.
• 37:34
  And I'm like, oh, what do I, you know, So I, I carry my, my
• 37:37
  phone. Oh yeah, on my arm, right.
• 37:41
  And then I just pop a memo and I sing while I'm running whatever
• 37:45
  I'm hearing. And then I'll that'll catch it
• 37:48
  in the moment, right? That's what's, that's what's
• 37:50
  great about technology. Now I always, I always wish for
• 37:53
  the concept of if, if we could create an app that could read my
• 37:58
  mind. It's common, you know, 'cause I
• 38:02
  'cause. Everything I want that.
• 38:04
  Right, 'cause the the voice, the voice app itself is, is pretty
• 38:08
  cool because once you, like you said, once you get the first or
• 38:11
  second line in your head and the ability just click voice record,
• 38:14
  then it just flows. I've done that with Mike.
• 38:16
  I've seen with stuff like that over the years, but really to be
• 38:20
  able to kind of just sync something to your your head that
• 38:23
  can pick up. And I really, I don't know how
• 38:26
  they would ever do it, but it would be cool because there's so
• 38:29
  amazing songs that I've written in my brain, in my head that
• 38:33
  never made it to paper. Elon's inventing A neural link.
• 38:36
  Yeah. OK, there you go.
• 38:38
  Way to go. Elon coming at you, that's what
• 38:39
  it is coming at you quick. And I found it was a big
• 38:41
  impediment for me when I was learning about, you know, like I
• 38:46
  say, I was a guitarist before a vocalist, right?
• 38:49
  I was a lyricist before being a guitarist.
• 38:51
  So to me, I had to get all of my skills close enough to be on par
• 38:58
  so that I can sit down myself and do the things right.
• 39:02
  It was very clunky when I was writing early because I would, I
• 39:05
  would get the, you know, the lyrics and I would get the, the
• 39:08
  guitar part and I would put them in a DAW and I would get the
• 39:11
  melody and play around with it. And it was sort of, it was this
• 39:14
  iterative process inside of technology, which I don't like.
• 39:18
  And then when I finally got everything sort of, you know,
• 39:21
  trained up well, two or three years ago, I can sit down with
• 39:25
  my just my guitar or piano and I can, I can write and sing and
• 39:30
  and voice dictate And it it all comes to it feels natural now.
• 39:34
  It feels organic and less like I'm, you know, clunking through
• 39:38
  steps, you know, which I think has been great unlock for me.
• 39:41
  Well, I liked what you said earlier about it being a muscle.
• 39:44
  If you don't, you know, when people find out that you play
• 39:48
  and then they're like, wow, you're, you really do play.
• 39:51
  It's because you do it every day.
• 39:53
  You know, people don't realize that you don't just set it down
• 39:56
  and pick it up a month from now and be that same player, right?
• 40:00
  And you have to do it every day, just like brushing your teeth or
• 40:04
  taking a shower or whatever. You know, it's, it's something
• 40:06
  that has to be routine. How many hours do you play your
• 40:10
  guitar a day? Mike I.
• 40:12
  I never it's not in hours anymore.
• 40:15
  I always make sure I play at least 15 minutes every day.
• 40:19
  OK, so sometimes that 15 minutes turns into two hours, and
• 40:23
  sometimes that 15 minutes is literally 15 minutes.
• 40:26
  But I forced myself, and I have my entire playing career since I
• 40:30
  was nine years old, to make sure I picked it up every day for at
• 40:33
  least 15 minutes. Yeah, I, I think when I'm,
• 40:37
  because I, I started learning, you know, in 2011, all these
• 40:40
  things, you know, I've had to go through the 10,000 steps that
• 40:44
  you did probably from age 9 to 10.
• 40:46
  I had to do all of those myself. You know, for my, for my voice,
• 40:51
  for my, my, my guitar work and. For my When did you start
• 40:53
  playing guitar, Mark? 2011.
• 40:56
  I knew it was recently, so yeah. So just just.
• 41:01
  Sort of learning 10 years and now but.
• 41:03
  Yeah, yeah. I feel, I feel confident on it,
• 41:06
  you know, I, I, I feel confident, you know, playing.
• 41:09
  The reason I ask is because the music that I have heard you
• 41:12
  release, I really like your styling, for lack of a better
• 41:16
  term. You know, your voice on the
• 41:17
  guitar is really cool. Well, thank you.
• 41:20
  Thank you. I have a lot of people around me
• 41:22
  that help help help me learn that, you know?
• 41:24
  Yeah. And the other cool thing,
• 41:26
  obviously you're comfortable enough with what you're doing
• 41:27
  that you're touring. So that just shows you right
• 41:29
  there that you you have no problem stepping on a stage and,
• 41:33
  you know, kicking ass. Now when you go on tour, is it
• 41:36
  just you or do you have a band backing you up?
• 41:39
  It's just me solo. So, you know, at the moment my
• 41:43
  show is is very much, you know, like a Jason Mraz show or like
• 41:48
  a, you know, an Ed Sheeran or John Mayer solo show, right?
• 41:52
  So it's very much like that. I have a trio at home that I
• 41:55
  play with and my big show here in town actually is a five
• 41:58
  piece. So at some point in time I'd
• 42:01
  love to be able to up to your the the venues that I'm playing
• 42:04
  where I have enough of a following in certain areas where
• 42:06
  I can do like I do here in Houston.
• 42:09
  I'm a community. Guy, I would love to have a
• 42:11
  stage full of people with me just sharing in the moments.
• 42:14
  Yeah, absolutely. But you know, people have to be
• 42:17
  able to take off from their work, you know?
• 42:19
  Right. Does does your wife go on the
• 42:20
  tour with you? She comes out a week out of
• 42:23
  every month. We learned, you know, I'm I'm
• 42:26
  playing it. If you look at my schedule, I'm
• 42:27
  playing a show. Every day I'm driving 5 hours
• 42:31
  and I'm playing a show every day and she hears my music at home
• 42:34
  all the time too, so it bless her heart right?
• 42:36
  It's like, OK, so we. Learned the week she comes out.
• 42:40
  I only book like 4 shows that week and then we go hiking three
• 42:46
  of the days right And so we come out and we.
• 42:49
  Is it good for? Her.
• 42:50
  And then it's like, OK, it's time to get home again, you
• 42:53
  know? She's heard all the songs so
• 42:54
  many times. It's more of just supporting.
• 42:56
  Me, you know, my wife's the same way.
• 42:58
  That's my wife's the same way. Totally.
• 43:00
  You know, Yeah. That's the flip side of being in
• 43:02
  a relationship is your fans find out, you know, your family life.
• 43:06
  And they're like, oh, what? They don't want to be a part of
• 43:09
  it. It's like they lived it.
• 43:10
  They heard it incessant, you know, they don't need to hear it
• 43:14
  or want to hear it again. And I respect.
• 43:17
  Yes, that's a yeah. A good friend of mine who's a
• 43:19
  songwriter in the area, he told me early in my career when I was
• 43:23
  observing him, he said, you know, Mark, the most important
• 43:26
  thing I can tell you for the relationships in your lives, do
• 43:29
  not expect your family and friends to be your fans.
• 43:35
  No, now I the way that the way that's a little different for
• 43:37
  me. My son, when he heard the the
• 43:41
  album I put out with the band Hollow Council, absolutely loved
• 43:45
  it because he was at that age where he was just learning music
• 43:48
  and to this day he he loves the song Empty Man, which is about a
• 43:52
  serial killer from the eyes of a serial killer.
• 43:53
  Shocking. I know Mike, but just like love
• 43:57
  that there's so much so that he hasn't in playlists and stuff
• 43:59
  and he'll screenshot it to me to this day that's.
• 44:03
  Really cool. You know that's a blessing, man,
• 44:06
  that's amazing. Right, right.
• 44:07
  And then and then Nikki, because she's heard everything from
• 44:10
  Nemesis all the way every band I was ever in, she goes back to
• 44:13
  saying Nemesis was the best group of guys ever played with,
• 44:15
  which I agree. And then when I wrote my my
• 44:19
  third book, she was helping me write it because she helped me
• 44:22
  with I'm second geography. So she's helping me with certain
• 44:24
  things and she's never read it and people give her shit because
• 44:26
  she's never read it. I'm like, look, she was sitting
• 44:28
  next to me half the time was being written because we'd go on
• 44:30
  these Rd. trips and I'd be she'd be driving, I'd be typing on my
• 44:33
  iPad, you know, this is what I'm type talking about, blah, blah.
• 44:36
  And she'd give her a little insight.
• 44:38
  So it's the same concept. Like she doesn't need to read
• 44:40
  it. She, she understands it because
• 44:42
  she was with me when I was doing it.
• 44:44
  And I, I guess I would put it differently in that it sounds
• 44:48
  bad to say that don't expect him to like it.
• 44:51
  I think you have to put it into perspective in that, like Chris
• 44:55
  said, and that's why I started saying that Nikki told him I
• 44:58
  lived it. You know, it's like, that's an
• 45:01
  important distinction from your fans versus the people who are
• 45:05
  there every day that love you, Mark.
• 45:07
  And you, Chris and me, Mike, as a human being, right?
• 45:11
  Because some of my friends are like, yeah, you're a great
• 45:13
  guitar player, but I love you, dude.
• 45:14
  You know, I love you as a human being.
• 45:16
  I love being around you. I don't give a fuck if you play
• 45:19
  guitar or not. I'm still going to hang out with
• 45:20
  you. Yeah.
• 45:21
  Those are the people you want in your life as an artist.
• 45:25
  Yeah, and I think it's a, you know, that whole the energy, you
• 45:28
  know, at some point I'm going to say, you know, you guys
• 45:31
  experience this. I'm I'm starting to experience
• 45:33
  it. You know, your your brand
• 45:34
  becomes relatable to people that don't know you and people come
• 45:39
  out to see you because they like your message and your brand and
• 45:42
  your show. They they're not there because
• 45:44
  they love you as a person, right, Although they may, they
• 45:47
  may. But I think going, you know, as
• 45:51
  you move into that, that phase, you know, it's, it's
• 45:53
  interesting. I mean, like, like early for me,
• 45:57
  like validation, right? I do art.
• 46:00
  I really love my grandma. I love my, my parents.
• 46:03
  I love my friends. I love to share my art with
• 46:06
  them, right? But you know, and they'll,
• 46:08
  they'll like, oh, you know, we love you, Mark.
• 46:09
  And that's a great little piece of art, but it, I think it takes
• 46:13
  another artist to really understand when some, when, when
• 46:18
  an artist is sharing something with you, there's a level of
• 46:21
  intimacy and respect that you have to have for each other to
• 46:25
  share your feelings and, and to stop and take a moment to
• 46:29
  appreciate the other person's art.
• 46:31
  And I think if you have that, then you're able to, to relate
• 46:35
  to artists in your life better. If you're not an artist, I think
• 46:37
  you just don't know, you don't know how to, how to appreciate
• 46:39
  something in that way. Right.
• 46:41
  True. You're burying your soul to that
• 46:43
  person. Yeah, yeah.
• 46:45
  There's no more vulnerable place in your life than sharing a
• 46:50
  piece of art with somebody because it means so much to you.
• 46:55
  And if it doesn't mean that to anyone else, then you're
• 46:59
  crushed. You know, it's like, what did I
• 47:00
  miss? Yeah.
• 47:01
  Yeah. Yeah, yeah, it's and.
• 47:03
  That, and that's why I asked how you, how you're doing your tour
• 47:06
  because to me a stripped down basically, whether it's acoustic
• 47:11
  or or electric guitar, you're still on a stage by yourself
• 47:15
  with the spotlight that's as vulnerable as you're going to
• 47:19
  get. So I, I, we never did a lot of
• 47:21
  acoustic stuff in Nemesis, the last band I did, we did a we did
• 47:24
  a few a few shows like that. And I remember thinking it's a
• 47:27
  really weird dynamic because I'm used to having this this loud
• 47:32
  force behind me, right. And you use that energy.
• 47:36
  Oh yeah, big time. So the first time I sat down and
• 47:40
  did an acoustic set with that guitarist, it was really is
• 47:44
  weird to me because I sing loud like I don't I don't sing within
• 47:49
  a talking range. Mike can attest that I sing
• 47:52
  loud. I'm a loud singer.
• 47:54
  I had to step away from the mic or I do my mic checks and stuff
• 47:57
  before the shows. So I know.
• 48:01
  So for me to tone it down acoustically, it was just, it
• 48:05
  just really didn't work. I, I there was a time he didn't
• 48:08
  understand what that meant. We had.
• 48:10
  To tone it down. We had to work on.
• 48:13
  He became the honestly mark. He became the best person at mic
• 48:17
  control. That's why I give him shit now
• 48:18
  when I tell him, hey, you got to get up on your mic.
• 48:20
  Jesus Christ. He became one of the best I've
• 48:24
  ever been around. Because when you sing that loud,
• 48:28
  you are making your sound man's life a living hell if he doesn't
• 48:33
  cooperate with what you agreed to in the beginning, right?
• 48:37
  Right. Once that show starts, he has to
• 48:40
  do what he told the guy he was going to do or there's feedback
• 48:43
  coming through at a level you can't understand.
• 48:46
  So I completely agree with what he's saying.
• 48:49
  It's weird for his style to go to a soft a soft, but it's
• 48:54
  almost the musicians responsibility at that point to
• 48:58
  accommodate him, right? You know, here's how we're going
• 49:01
  to make it work. I found myself a Sir.
• 49:04
  Good. No, I was just to say my sound
• 49:06
  checks I would do, I would sing a couple lines from Pearl Gems,
• 49:11
  Wild Eyed, Crazy Mary, because that was my low register.
• 49:13
  And then I legit would do the high register.
• 49:18
  I don't know what song I would pick, but I was I was loud.
• 49:20
  I was I was back off the mic. I think you did the scream at
• 49:24
  the end of Freeman. Yeah.
• 49:25
  OK, there you go. Yeah, because he needed to
• 49:27
  understand. And I never knew what octaves
• 49:30
  and range I had because that wasn't important to me at all.
• 49:32
  I mean, something like the 67, I don't give a shit.
• 49:34
  I just, He was looking Mark to look at how much compression he
• 49:37
  needed to dial up at that moment in time because Chris's dynamic
• 49:42
  range was insane. He would go from this guttural
• 49:46
  low growl to just piercing the speakers high.
• 49:53
  Yeah, that I think the the, you know, when you're when you're up
• 49:58
  and it's kind of vice versa too. Like I played a bit with a four
• 50:02
  piece band, like I'll call it like mild rock, right.
• 50:06
  So we had a crucial full drum kit and whatever.
• 50:08
  And so the feeling of that was very different, you know, when I
• 50:13
  had the drummer banging on the rides behind me or the snare,
• 50:17
  you know? How do you?
• 50:18
  Even hear yourself as a vocalist to a more intimate setting.
• 50:23
  What I found myself I found in ears, which were super helpful
• 50:27
  no matter what Now, so no matter what venue I play, I have a
• 50:30
  little teeny in ear patch that I use.
• 50:34
  It's actually a cable from my guitar.
• 50:37
  It runs side by side. It runs down to my pedal board,
• 50:41
  right? And it's just a, it just feeds
• 50:42
  my vocal out to the mains. So my basically my mic just
• 50:46
  plugs in to a it's a little teeny Beringer patch.
• 50:49
  That's all it is. And so I can hear myself
• 50:52
  completely. If I want to put the front of
• 50:53
  house in there, I could, but that usually comes through the
• 50:56
  monitor just fine. And so I hear myself just fine.
• 50:59
  But I found myself, you know it when I'm up in that intimate
• 51:02
  environment, you know, I love storytelling.
• 51:05
  I love the whole, you know, vibe of being on a journey where I'm
• 51:09
  actually talking to people. And so just learning to nurture
• 51:12
  that in my first set of tours last year was a great skill.
• 51:16
  And I found a lot of personal satisfaction in that level of
• 51:19
  intimacy. Right.
• 51:21
  And so now when I do a the trio show or a bigger show, it still
• 51:24
  has a, the energy level is, is muted.
• 51:27
  It's not, you know, full on rock band.
• 51:30
  It's, you know, it's a muted vibe.
• 51:32
  Yeah. And see, I would love to be able
• 51:34
  to be comfortable and confident and sing at that level just from
• 51:37
  an acoustic standpoint because I do it in my head all the time
• 51:39
  and I do it with with bands and I know they can pull that off.
• 51:43
  I'm just not confident enough with it.
• 51:44
  Like I know I could do it and pull it off, but it's not
• 51:47
  something that's my confidence level because whenever I step to
• 51:49
  mic, to me, it's got to be and, and not screaming, mind you,
• 51:55
  singing in key. But again, I'm, I was a loud
• 51:58
  singer. It's it's just the only way I
• 52:01
  can explain it, you know, And so here's the technical term
• 52:04
  because I know Mark likes the technical term, right?
• 52:07
  He did what they call frying his vocal cords.
• 52:12
  So they call it vocal fry, right?
• 52:14
  So he would. You're actually making your
• 52:17
  vocal cords rattled together until you hit the pitch, right.
• 52:21
  So you're getting that rock'n'roll Southern draw.
• 52:26
  Yeah. That power.
• 52:28
  I'm trying to think of the word that it's, it's a feeling more
• 52:32
  than anything, right. You're in key.
• 52:34
  But he was able to add his own character to it as well, right.
• 52:38
  I guess that's the word I'm looking for is, yeah.
• 52:40
  Chris Dunham would come out, you know, it's in key.
• 52:43
  The iron Dog. The Iron Dog would show, but you
• 52:45
  also got his personality as well.
• 52:47
  Yeah, you guys know Chris Lipe? LIEPE.
• 52:52
  He's a vocal coach. She's also a singer and he loves
• 52:56
  the rock genre. He's he's a phenomenal singer
• 52:59
  and he's a phenomenal vocal because he's got a big following
• 53:02
  on his YouTube channel. But he talks a lot about what
• 53:04
  you were just saying, like I love the technical.
• 53:06
  Explanation He tells you what's happening.
• 53:09
  He's a baldy like you Chris. So he's like you know you'll be
• 53:12
  right there in the camp with you and he does a lot.
• 53:15
  Chris Cornell is his is his all time favorite singer, but if you
• 53:20
  go check his channel out you'll hear him doing a lot of that
• 53:23
  heavy. Cool compression and fry in his
• 53:28
  in his training too so. So you obviously know the song
• 53:32
  Temple of the Dog, right? Yes, I do.
• 53:34
  OK. So I can do both those parts
• 53:36
  flow. I can be a better.
• 53:38
  I can be Cornell. It's harder strike.
• 53:41
  Yeah, yeah, yeah, harder strike. It was harder.
• 53:43
  For me to do it, yeah, it. Was harder for me to do it
• 53:46
  singing both parts in the same song, but I could still, I could
• 53:49
  still do that. So that gives you an idea of how
• 53:51
  I could play musically. And I had a vocal coach.
• 53:54
  I had a vocal coach the entire time I was in Nemesis because I
• 53:57
  looked at it and a lot of singers, well, I, you know, I'm,
• 54:00
  I don't do 1 words because I talk all day.
• 54:02
  Well, yeah, OK, but it's still an instrument so.
• 54:06
  And I went when I was in college going through theater, when I
• 54:08
  first started going to this to become a theater major, one of
• 54:11
  the first classes I took was voice and diction because I
• 54:13
  wanted to make sure I was enunciating and I wanted to
• 54:16
  learn how to use my voice because I'm on a theatre stage.
• 54:19
  There's no microphone, man. You have to project.
• 54:23
  So that's where I kind of learned that skill of projecting
• 54:26
  and being loud. So when I ended up being in a
• 54:29
  band, I never stopped. I never stopped him projecting.
• 54:32
  Well, I think that's people would find that fascinating
• 54:35
  because I remembered you did that.
• 54:37
  I went and I, I took Blues lessons from Chuck Hall of Chuck
• 54:41
  Hall, the brick wall. Scott was taking jazz drum
• 54:44
  lessons and Rick was always educating himself, right.
• 54:48
  All of us were taking lessons along with being professional
• 54:51
  musicians at the same time, so. I love, I love.
• 54:54
  That level of seriousness, you know?
• 54:55
  Thank. You.
• 54:56
  Well, yeah. And that is amazing, yeah.
• 54:59
  And it's more so from a singer standpoint because because we're
• 55:02
  out there more, more so than the rest of the band, the voices
• 55:07
  are, this is our instrument. And if you can't perform, you
• 55:09
  have to figure out, OK, how can I?
• 55:10
  Because there's nights we went on, we had shows and I was sick,
• 55:13
  I had the flu or I had a cold or whatever.
• 55:16
  And so I had to learn how to navigate having those little
• 55:18
  weird nuances that everybody gets and still come across the
• 55:22
  best product possible. And that was the that was the
• 55:24
  thing to me about a vocal coaches.
• 55:25
  It taught me how to use my diaphragm because MMM said I
• 55:29
  never heard vocal fry, but that's, that makes sense.
• 55:32
  But I learned how to use my diaphragm, my breathing and my
• 55:34
  throat at the same time. So I wasn't damaging my throat.
• 55:38
  I, I, you know, it, it, the power is not there like it used
• 55:41
  to be in 9590, you know, 93 when we were playing.
• 55:45
  But I can still get up there. If, if I started back into the
• 55:48
  nuance, OK, I got to start doing my vocal training and my vocal
• 55:50
  exercise and stuff. And I did if I did that every
• 55:52
  day for a month, then I know everything would kind of fall
• 55:55
  back into place because of muscle memory.
• 55:57
  So I think, I think from all musicians standpoint, it's like
• 56:01
  you taking lessons since 2011. You have to do that.
• 56:03
  You have to understand your craft and how to make it's the
• 56:07
  best craft that you can present to the world because otherwise,
• 56:09
  why are you doing it? Yeah, I I love that.
• 56:12
  And I think the, you know, I'm curious anyway, so I want to
• 56:15
  know. But you got to get the right
• 56:16
  people to, you know, teaching you.
• 56:18
  I think you know, my, my, my vocal coach Wes Landry here in
• 56:23
  town. He sings for the use in opera.
• 56:24
  He's got lots of degrees in vocal performance and he's
• 56:27
  taught me, you know, a ton. I would never have made it
• 56:30
  through my tours last year playing every night, two or
• 56:34
  three hours a night, right? Singing never would have
• 56:37
  happened if I hadn't had his training.
• 56:39
  I think just, you know, having the right mentality about, about
• 56:44
  learning and about being serious, you know, for me,
• 56:48
  that's just been my approach to things.
• 56:50
  I'm not doing. It's not a hobby for me, right?
• 56:52
  You know, it's an extension of me and and and this is.
• 56:56
  The next part of your life, man. Yeah.
• 56:58
  Here's the here's the best example I can give for vocal
• 57:01
  coach. Why you need one.
• 57:01
  The first time we went to Nashville for the last band and
• 57:04
  recorded, it was supposed to just record 4 songs and I was
• 57:07
  just singing along to them. I wasn't supposed to be
• 57:10
  recording the actual sessions. 12 hours with a lunch break.
• 57:14
  I sang those 4 songs and then we were done.
• 57:16
  He's like, OK, you guys are done.
• 57:17
  I got all it takes and we're like, well, don't I have to
• 57:19
  sing? He's like, no, you, you sing all
• 57:21
  day. I got it and I was fine.
• 57:24
  I'm I was tired, my throat was tired, my voice was tired.
• 57:28
  But legitimately we would run through a song and the beginning
• 57:33
  of Empty Man on the CD is will you stop, fuck around and get it
• 57:36
  right. And I chuckled because we get to
• 57:37
  this point in the song where I'm holding out the scream and they
• 57:40
  kept fucking up the trans, the transition from it.
• 57:43
  So about 6 times into it because that's the first time we get out
• 57:45
  of the gate. Tony and me, Gloria the producer
• 57:48
  is like OK, you guys ready? I was like wait a minute, I'm
• 57:50
  like you guys got to stop fucking around and get this
• 57:52
  thing right like you're killing me.
• 57:54
  And that stop fucking around and get it right made the final cut
• 58:00
  like it's there is the first song on the CD.
• 58:02
  That is the. First thing you hear, right?
• 58:05
  The first thing you hear is that it's that word that that
• 58:08
  sentence, and it's. But it takes you back to that
• 58:11
  moment in time because it made it through all the cuts.
• 58:14
  That's phenomenal. But that's that's why, that's
• 58:16
  why vocal coaches are important. That's why practicing your
• 58:19
  guitars important practice piano and drums and bass.
• 58:21
  I can attest to what he's saying because I engineered and
• 58:23
  produced quite a number of his vocal tracks and we didn't ever
• 58:29
  have to do too many takes. Yeah, it's just it blew my.
• 58:33
  Mind. But something I'm learning right
• 58:34
  since I'm a newer vocalist. The first set of tracks that I
• 58:38
  did. Were, you know, the first album
• 58:40
  I released was many, many more takes.
• 58:42
  Now it's, it's two or three takes and, you know, maybe,
• 58:47
  maybe something for doubling or something for harmony.
• 58:51
  Right. Yeah.
• 58:51
  But it's getting, I'm getting better, you know?
• 58:54
  And it shows your songs, your songs, your songs show growth.
• 58:57
  That's the cool thing about technology now that we didn't
• 58:59
  have then. Like we cassette recorded our
• 59:02
  practices and we had cassette tapes and I'd take the tape home
• 59:05
  and go, MM, put that down for me.
• 59:06
  He's like, what? Just put it down for give it to
• 59:08
  me. And then I'd go listen to it for
• 59:09
  days, you know? And by the end of the week, I'd
• 59:11
  had the song nailed because I just listened to it over and
• 59:13
  over. And over and I love you guys you
• 59:15
  guys are hard working you're serious about what you do right
• 59:18
  that's amazing right I mean everyone approached that their
• 59:21
  life that way right think about how much more people could
• 59:24
  accomplish I've. Been saying this a lot lately,
• 59:26
  Mark. I'm quite confident.
• 59:27
  I mean, I'm way better now, but I'm quite confident that I had
• 59:30
  my life way more together when I was 19 than I did when I was
• 59:34
  like 3735. You know, after the music fell
• 59:39
  apart, my life fell apart because that was my fault.
• 59:42
  You can see where my focus was for all that time, right?
• 59:45
  And when I met Chris and his work ethic as a singer, I had
• 59:50
  never found before, right? Most singers were like, I got
• 59:52
  this. I can just show up and do it.
• 59:54
  And no, you can't. He was the 1st about, he was the
• 59:58
  first guy I ever met that like he said it just like that.
• 1:00:02
  And he's like, give me that riff, you know?
• 1:00:04
  And I'm like, why? And he's like, I just need to
• 1:00:07
  listen to it, man. I know what I want to do, but I
• 1:00:09
  can't do it yet, right? Three days later he would show
• 1:00:13
  up and he's like, you remember that thing you played the other
• 1:00:15
  day? Play it, not play it.
• 1:00:17
  And there we would go. He would take off and my eyes
• 1:00:19
  would go like, Jesus. He said, I told you I heard it.
• 1:00:22
  I just had to practice it. Yeah.
• 1:00:24
  That's that's inspiring. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:00:25
  Go. Ahead.
• 1:00:27
  Go ahead, Mark. Go ahead, Mark.
• 1:00:29
  That's inspiring. I think for me, you know, that's
• 1:00:32
  something it was hard for me to understand as a vocalist.
• 1:00:36
  It was much easier for me to understand as a guitar player,
• 1:00:39
  right? I was trying to get a a a riff
• 1:00:41
  down and I would play it and play it until I got exactly all
• 1:00:45
  the, the way out the energy I wanted into it when I was
• 1:00:48
  singing. It was so hard for me to I felt
• 1:00:50
  like this, you know, this awkward turtle, right?
• 1:00:53
  I'm like, I got to get the pitch right and then I missed the
• 1:00:56
  breath and then I missed the transition and then I didn't say
• 1:00:58
  that. And so then you get all the
• 1:01:00
  things you think right and you listen to and you're like, that
• 1:01:02
  sounds terrible. I didn't.
• 1:01:04
  You get I'm unintelligible. I didn't.
• 1:01:06
  The diction wasn't right. You didn't.
• 1:01:08
  So it was so it was so much of an internal element for me to
• 1:01:14
  learn to do that. That, you know, I, I, it took a
• 1:01:17
  lot of growth for me to be able to, to sort of get there.
• 1:01:22
  I you know, I still go ahead. No, but see, there's the thing
• 1:01:26
  like you're self-taught for the most part, right?
• 1:01:28
  When you have lessons and things like that.
• 1:01:30
  But to go from where you were then to where you are now, the,
• 1:01:33
  the, what is it 14 year journey, you have to be able to look at
• 1:01:37
  that, right? You have to be able to look at
• 1:01:38
  that. Like, look, I started here and I
• 1:01:41
  was terrible. Now I'm here and I'm going on
• 1:01:43
  tours. You're not terrible.
• 1:01:45
  Not. No, but that to me, that to me
• 1:01:49
  is just it's, it's fantastic because it shows your love of
• 1:01:52
  music and love of creation. Part of it's your analytical
• 1:01:55
  brain and and who you are as a very intelligent, but it also
• 1:01:58
  shows his work ethic as well, right.
• 1:02:01
  And a very lifelong learner who can do so many different things.
• 1:02:05
  We learned from the first time you're on the show, and then now
• 1:02:07
  you're taking all of this, all this, Matt, like you probably
• 1:02:09
  use like 90% of your brain, right?
• 1:02:11
  Yeah. Real quick, people, if you
• 1:02:12
  didn't listen to Mark's first episode, go listen to it right
• 1:02:16
  now because yeah, that's after this one.
• 1:02:19
  After this one. Yeah, after this one.
• 1:02:21
  Because it is, man. It's just it amazes me when we
• 1:02:23
  come across Someone Like You because I call it a life resume.
• 1:02:26
  Your life resume before music was amazing.
• 1:02:29
  And now you have this. Now you have this life's resume
• 1:02:31
  before music and one after music.
• 1:02:33
  And like kid you not, you can come back on the show once a
• 1:02:36
  year for all we care, just to update where you're at in life
• 1:02:39
  because it's it's it's such a great conversation.
• 1:02:42
  Actually, we got an assist. Right and you got you know, I
• 1:02:45
  love y'all it's. Like 10 minutes.
• 1:02:47
  I I could hang out with y'all for hours.
• 1:02:48
  We could just keep chatting, right?
• 1:02:50
  It's like, I'm so amazing. And we're still chatting.
• 1:02:52
  I'm not, I'm not saying we have to stop the show.
• 1:02:53
  I'm just saying it's, it's been an hour and it feels like 10
• 1:02:56
  minutes because you're just that easy to talk to.
• 1:02:58
  And you, you have that much love for just being a human.
• 1:03:03
  It's not necessarily just being a musician.
• 1:03:05
  You just that's, that's rare, man.
• 1:03:07
  It's a rare, it's rare in the world to find somebody like you
• 1:03:11
  that has all these passions. And you've been able to kind of
• 1:03:13
  go through those different phases of your life and achieve
• 1:03:16
  the level of success that most people just dream of for one
• 1:03:19
  thing. And you've done it on so many
• 1:03:22
  different levels and so many different scales.
• 1:03:23
  It's just, it's cool, man. I'm excited to come hang out
• 1:03:26
  with you, Yucatop on the 20th. It's going to be a lot of fun.
• 1:03:28
  And you know, I really think, you know, we're headed into this
• 1:03:31
  world where there's so many tools available to us to chase
• 1:03:36
  our dreams and passions, right? It's like it's just your level
• 1:03:41
  of energy and discipline that is really holding you in a
• 1:03:45
  situation where you want to grow from, right?
• 1:03:47
  I mean, all these tools now with AI and whatever else you can,
• 1:03:50
  you know, I think what does it mean to be human?
• 1:03:53
  It means to be, you know, to feel, it means to be alive.
• 1:03:57
  It needs to to to breathe. We need to connect, right?
• 1:04:00
  But you can also pursue all these things with all this
• 1:04:03
  technology now that was impossible two years ago.
• 1:04:07
  And it's just going to get, you know, more and more amazing.
• 1:04:09
  That way you can unlock your mind, you know?
• 1:04:12
  Yep. Mike, you had something I was
• 1:04:14
  going to say. I just thought of this.
• 1:04:15
  Mark is our Brian May. Oh, there you go, right?
• 1:04:21
  Brian May is an astrophysicist. Yeah, I was thinking.
• 1:04:24
  Yeah, who else do I know that is that smart but that cool at the
• 1:04:27
  same time? Because that is rare.
• 1:04:29
  You're like. He's way cooler than me.
• 1:04:30
  He plays with a silver dollar, right?
• 1:04:32
  Doesn't he plays a guitar with a silver dollar?
• 1:04:33
  He does something like, shit, I didn't know that.
• 1:04:36
  Really. Yeah.
• 1:04:37
  He lost his pick one time and that's all he had.
• 1:04:39
  So he just kept doing it from that point forward.
• 1:04:41
  Wow. Wow.
• 1:04:44
  I'm just saying it's rare where you find somebody, and I'm not
• 1:04:47
  saying there's anything wrong with being mathematical and
• 1:04:50
  analytical. We need those people.
• 1:04:52
  But it's very rare that you find somebody that their brain works
• 1:04:55
  that hard in that direction and equally as hard in an artistic
• 1:04:59
  direction, because most analytical brains don't
• 1:05:03
  understand art. They may appreciate it, but
• 1:05:05
  their brain doesn't work that way.
• 1:05:07
  So I find that so rare, man, and he's the only other person I can
• 1:05:10
  think of that falls in that category.
• 1:05:13
  Well, that's an immense compliment.
• 1:05:14
  He's, I think Brian May is like way up here in that category and
• 1:05:17
  I'm. He's had a lot more years to
• 1:05:19
  practice. But yeah, he's a pretty
• 1:05:23
  phenomenal guy. No question.
• 1:05:25
  Yeah. So when do you start this tour?
• 1:05:31
  I know Chris had the dates up, but what's your first official
• 1:05:33
  date? March 24th.
• 1:05:37
  So that's the that's the kickoff.
• 1:05:40
  And like I said, we have a pre show here March 7th at the the
• 1:05:44
  Armadillo Palace in Houston. So that'll be sort of me and my
• 1:05:49
  friend Roxy and a good friend of ours, Jimmy Yunus, a Mexican
• 1:05:55
  country guy. We're all we've got.
• 1:05:56
  We're on a ticket together here in town and it's going to be an
• 1:05:59
  amazing way to gear myself up to get hit the road.
• 1:06:03
  So because we haven't really talked about it, walk us
• 1:06:06
  through, you know, you've been thinking about what you're going
• 1:06:08
  to do and you know, you have a plan for this tour.
• 1:06:12
  Walk us through like what people are going to experience when you
• 1:06:15
  hit the stage. Yeah.
• 1:06:17
  So, you know, it's important for me, you know, when I'm inviting
• 1:06:21
  people out that they, first of all, they understand, you know,
• 1:06:24
  we're, we're talking about an intimate style show.
• 1:06:27
  Yeah, it's going to be acoustic. Me and my voice.
• 1:06:32
  I have a piano and so I play a few songs.
• 1:06:34
  On the ohh, right on. I love that you just went up
• 1:06:37
  another level with me. Just think from.
• 1:06:39
  Here you're already here, and now you're here because you can
• 1:06:42
  play piano. It's one thing I wish I would
• 1:06:45
  have learned when I was a child growing up, a piano, because
• 1:06:47
  piano to me is just the ultimate instrument because you do so
• 1:06:51
  much with the piano and and musicians that play piano.
• 1:06:54
  It's it's kind of like a female singer.
• 1:06:56
  You automatically got cred. Yeah, like automatically,
• 1:06:58
  automatically. Now you got piano.
• 1:07:00
  Great. There go.
• 1:07:00
  So go ahead. Sorry, go ahead.
• 1:07:01
  Sorry, no, no, no worries. And so.
• 1:07:03
  You got excited. I've got a little, I got some, a
• 1:07:06
  few pieces I'll play on the piano and then I've got an
• 1:07:10
  electric guitar as well. So for my longer shows I'll play
• 1:07:14
  most of it on my acoustic. I'll start and then I'll
• 1:07:17
  transition over for a few songs from the piano.
• 1:07:19
  Usually I'll loop some piano chords and play a little bit
• 1:07:22
  electric and then I'm back on my acoustic.
• 1:07:25
  You know, you'll hear songs from my my newest album release as
• 1:07:30
  well as my previous release, acoustic me.
• 1:07:33
  So I have a few covers I play usually that are signature
• 1:07:37
  covers of mine that remind me of people in my life or my
• 1:07:40
  influences in my writing. So I'll play a few of those.
• 1:07:45
  You know, as you come in, you might hear me read a small bit
• 1:07:48
  of poetry about just sharing the room with you and sharing some
• 1:07:52
  energy. And then, you know, I think
• 1:07:56
  having, I guess just having a great energetic, thoughtful set
• 1:08:04
  to share with everyone's stories from the road.
• 1:08:08
  You know, if it's a, if it's a listening room or a theater,
• 1:08:11
  you'll hear, you know, a few stories from the songs that I'm
• 1:08:14
  playing and, you know, a lot of thankfulness for for being there
• 1:08:19
  with me. And maybe sure, you know, a call
• 1:08:22
  out to, to add a few extra protons to your life and make
• 1:08:26
  the world a little better as you leave the the show from from my
• 1:08:30
  point of view. And a few people I'm going to do
• 1:08:34
  some volunteer events with as well.
• 1:08:36
  I love doing those if my schedule permits.
• 1:08:39
  So should be a, you know, a fun evening, Upbeat.
• 1:08:44
  I'm not a sad storyteller. I'm an upbeat storyteller.
• 1:08:47
  So good. Should be a lot of fun.
• 1:08:50
  Yeah, a lot of shows. I'm scrolling the tour dates as
• 1:08:52
  you come. I used to do a little bit of
• 1:08:55
  poetry, introducing some songs we have when we were playing
• 1:09:00
  just, you know, I really wish that you and I would have
• 1:09:02
  finished that spoken word thing that you we started and never.
• 1:09:06
  That was so cool, man. Right on.
• 1:09:08
  Yeah, I would. I did this thing called Welcome
• 1:09:10
  to my Mind, Mark. That was huge.
• 1:09:13
  Doors fans was kind of played off off Morrison's stuff, but it
• 1:09:16
  was it was poetry, lyrics and beliefs, and it was called
• 1:09:19
  Welcome to my Mind and it. And so I did the first one and I
• 1:09:23
  wasn't done. I wanted to do another one.
• 1:09:24
  So Mike and I kind of started that process and it just kind of
• 1:09:27
  fizzled. It would have been amazing.
• 1:09:30
  He was the first person, Mark, that did stuff like that, that
• 1:09:34
  it wasn't bullshit. You know, I met a lot of people
• 1:09:36
  in my life where they were like, yeah, I'm deep, man.
• 1:09:39
  And I write real deep lyrics. And I like to, you know, turn
• 1:09:42
  the black light on and get high and write deep.
• 1:09:46
  You'd read it and it would just be like, total horseshit.
• 1:09:49
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 1:09:50
  He gave me that to read. And I was like, holy crap, man.
• 1:09:53
  Now this is someone who understands what's going on,
• 1:09:55
  right? Yeah, I love that thought.
• 1:09:58
  I I was I was in a a workout class and this it was like a
• 1:10:05
  spin class. So I'm spinning and the the lady
• 1:10:08
  does a ton of remixes and whatever it was in the class.
• 1:10:10
  And she's like, she she dropped this, this spoken word amazing
• 1:10:17
  anthem about finding the positive energy in life.
• 1:10:23
  And this guy was from Africa as the speaker was and just.
• 1:10:27
  And that, yeah, the beat behind it was amazing.
• 1:10:29
  But just to it, it really inspired me a lot that it's OK
• 1:10:34
  to share your thoughts and your feelings through spoken word,
• 1:10:37
  especially in a musical context. And that's when I added that to
• 1:10:41
  my to my show. Not to interrupt you, but you're
• 1:10:44
  on the road until November and you jump back on after a break
• 1:10:48
  and start up in April. Yeah.
• 1:10:50
  Like he says, I'm gonna work. Yeah, baby, I'm coming out there
• 1:10:54
  to. See, y'all like, you know, like
• 1:10:56
  you, you got to, you got to have a stop in Illinois, don't you,
• 1:10:59
  for Mike to check you out or do we got to put that on?
• 1:11:01
  There's hey, you don't see a show that you don't see a place
• 1:11:04
  I need to come to. Yeah, we're going to have to
• 1:11:05
  fill in a date there because wow, dude, it's just I'm, I'm
• 1:11:08
  scrolling while you're talking. I'm like, wait a minute, He
• 1:11:10
  started this in March like you're I don't have.
• 1:11:14
  A connection in Illinois yet that I recall for a show.
• 1:11:16
  OK. You know, I'm the new guy, so I
• 1:11:18
  got to keep knocking on doors. Guys like, OK, come on baby, you
• 1:11:22
  can, you can have me. I'm going to rock it.
• 1:11:24
  Isn't isn't Lemoyne in Chicago, Mike?
• 1:11:26
  Yeah. Is that where?
• 1:11:27
  Yeah, I bet we could. So we could probably hook you up
• 1:11:31
  with somebody. Yeah.
• 1:11:32
  Yeah. So we'll let Mike reach out to
• 1:11:34
  Lemoyne and be like, hey, dude, we need to have him back on the
• 1:11:36
  show too, just to see where he's at.
• 1:11:38
  Yeah. This is just non-stop, man.
• 1:11:41
  This is just, this is insane. And you're right, it's like May
• 1:11:45
  25th you're doing 2 shows. Did you know that?
• 1:11:47
  Yeah, yeah, I got a noon and then an evening.
• 1:11:50
  So Yep. OK, do you do all your own
• 1:11:52
  booking and? Yeah, I have.
• 1:11:55
  I have a guy who helps me with some of the outbound, but for
• 1:11:58
  the most part, you know I I'm out knocking on the doors and.
• 1:12:03
  I'm. Working hard to so I want people
• 1:12:06
  to understand that's a whole nother job.
• 1:12:08
  Just so you know, that's a full time job on to itself.
• 1:12:11
  It's crazy. And I find myself, yeah, I'm
• 1:12:15
  actually working, I've been working on a project to, to
• 1:12:18
  connect with more colleges, Not not universities, but colleges.
• 1:12:21
  I I find a lot of great synergy in a college.
• 1:12:25
  Environment. Absolutely.
• 1:12:26
  And I'm, I'm looking to add more of those.
• 1:12:29
  So if you guys know anyone out in the college circuit that
• 1:12:31
  would love to know that for sure.
• 1:12:32
  Yeah, yeah, because really with what you who you are in the
• 1:12:36
  whole positive vibe thing, I can see why college, the college
• 1:12:39
  atmosphere would totally like gravitate to you for sure.
• 1:12:42
  I'll tell you a funny story, Mark.
• 1:12:44
  I actually booked a gig and when we showed up, the guy said,
• 1:12:48
  well, I didn't know you were in the band, you know?
• 1:12:51
  That's how differently I've conducted myself when I booked
• 1:12:55
  the gigs versus being the guy that was the guitar player in
• 1:12:57
  the band. I tried to be professional, you
• 1:12:59
  know. Yeah, that's that's awesome.
• 1:13:01
  I applaud that. It doesn't surprise me, Mike,
• 1:13:03
  you and Chris have an amazing work at the game.
• 1:13:05
  When you do something, you guys want to do it right.
• 1:13:08
  I love that about y'all. Well, well, as to you man, you
• 1:13:12
  know life is like riding a bicycle, man.
• 1:13:14
  To keep your balance, you got to keep moving.
• 1:13:16
  Yeah, I feel yeah, there's a song in.
• 1:13:18
  There. That's an Albert, right?
• 1:13:19
  There, that's an that's an Albert Einstein quote.
• 1:13:21
  Yes, it is. It is and that and that is
• 1:13:24
  their. That's the basis for my song
• 1:13:26
  Speed of Light. It's the relativity and the
• 1:13:29
  bicycle. There you.
• 1:13:30
  Go Albert Einstein. He also said if you can't
• 1:13:33
  explain it to a six year old, you don't understand it right,
• 1:13:37
  right. And see, I always love the
• 1:13:38
  imagination is more important than knowledge quote.
• 1:13:40
  I thought that was I carried that with me my entire life.
• 1:13:44
  Yeah, I love that about him. His musical influences as well.
• 1:13:48
  Just, you know, yeah, a lot, lot of crazy here.
• 1:13:51
  It's all good, man. I'm.
• 1:13:52
  I'm. Good.
• 1:13:53
  Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.
• 1:13:55
  Yeah. Strive not to be a success, but
• 1:13:57
  rather to be a value. That one's, that one has some
• 1:13:59
  serious meanings right there. That's a legit quote.
• 1:14:01
  Yeah, that's awesome. Strive not to be a success, but
• 1:14:05
  rather be a value. Yeah, I can relate to that
• 1:14:08
  completely. Lots of things.
• 1:14:09
  That's, you know, that's, that's why I'm, I'm, I'm supporting
• 1:14:13
  his, his gear right now. I think there's a lot of great
• 1:14:17
  lessons from studying him. OK, as a person who their brain
• 1:14:23
  thinks in those realms, where do you put Elon Musk in brain?
• 1:14:27
  Yeah. Oh, good question.
• 1:14:29
  I just thought of that. You know it's a, it's a good
• 1:14:32
  question, you know, is. He on that par.
• 1:14:35
  You know, I, I think from a, an imagination point of view, yes,
• 1:14:42
  I think he's just imaginative. He's creative.
• 1:14:46
  He's not lazy. You know, he, when he sees a
• 1:14:49
  thing, he goes for it, you know, So he's got a lot of the same
• 1:14:53
  characteristics. I don't know that today the
• 1:15:00
  level of of specialization to advance a field that was present
• 1:15:05
  when Einstein was around is just insane.
• 1:15:09
  And so I think we, in my mind, we have to think about genius in
• 1:15:13
  a different way now because I don't know, I heard a quote,
• 1:15:17
  people in medical school today are learning 100 times more than
• 1:15:22
  people did 20 years ago. That's the body of knowledge.
• 1:15:26
  It's just gotten more. And so I think we have to think
• 1:15:29
  about Genia in a much more broad sense so that, you know, like
• 1:15:33
  you said, you know, creativity is the important thing, right?
• 1:15:36
  And the ability to think tangentially and outside the box
• 1:15:38
  and the motivation and the discipline to, to reach for
• 1:15:42
  something like that. I think, you know, Elon Musk has
• 1:15:44
  a phenomenal amount of that. And so I would say in his own
• 1:15:48
  way, he's certainly up there in that, in that category.
• 1:15:52
  Maybe just not in a situation this, you know, where we are now
• 1:15:55
  that he could advance a field in some way like like Einstein.
• 1:15:59
  So you ask a brilliant person a brilliant question, right?
• 1:16:03
  And you get a brilliant answer because that is not how I
• 1:16:06
  thought he was going to answer that question.
• 1:16:08
  But that was amazing, Mark. That was a great answer.
• 1:16:10
  Thank you. Thank you.
• 1:16:11
  It is Mark. It is Mark Winters, man.
• 1:16:13
  You know, you just, you know, you can't, you can't just it's
• 1:16:18
  not going to be yes. It's going to be no, which is
• 1:16:21
  why we love you, man. Which is why I love you.
• 1:16:23
  You know, that's why this is conversation.
• 1:16:24
  It's not an interview. And, and I made sure Mike
• 1:16:27
  understood that when we started this thing, when we first start
• 1:16:29
  talking about it, it's never an interview.
• 1:16:31
  It's a conversation because if you interview somebody that's
• 1:16:33
  boring, it's dry, it goes nowhere.
• 1:16:35
  When you have an organic conversation and it's real and
• 1:16:37
  it's raw, then things just take this really cool dynamic,
• 1:16:40
  regardless of who you're talking to, they're entertaining, you
• 1:16:44
  know, And then Someone Like You just, you're entertaining just
• 1:16:46
  because you're entertaining. So then you take it to a whole
• 1:16:48
  new level with everything we've been able to talk about.
• 1:16:50
  It's just it makes it that much more of a fun thing for us to do
• 1:16:54
  as often as we do it. Listen Mike, you guys have an
• 1:16:57
  amazing show. You know y'all, y'all are fun.
• 1:16:59
  Anyway, you bring out the best in everyone.
• 1:17:01
  I just I think y'all have an amazing.
• 1:17:03
  Show we described it as like the hang that we had after the band
• 1:17:07
  practice or show, you know, those were some of the most
• 1:17:10
  amazing conversations we had. Yeah, because we were just
• 1:17:15
  sitting there at we're just sitting there after, after you
• 1:17:17
  expend all your creative juices, you know, then you're just kind
• 1:17:21
  of decompressing and, and talking about what you just did.
• 1:17:25
  Yeah, real. Yeah.
• 1:17:27
  Yeah, and that right. And that a conversation always
• 1:17:30
  went so many different directions.
• 1:17:31
  Just, you know, see that chick in the crowd?
• 1:17:33
  What the fuck was that about? And then the next person might
• 1:17:36
  say, are aliens real? Yep.
• 1:17:43
  Yep. So if you want to find Mark
• 1:17:45
  Winters, just go markwinters.com.
• 1:17:47
  Right. Or Mark Winters music.com.
• 1:17:51
  Mark Winters. Music.com.
• 1:17:53
  Dot com yeah, plural, and and we showed some of his stuff
• 1:17:56
  earlier. His his his website has his all
• 1:18:00
  the music's that the biography's got the shows, the merch.
• 1:18:02
  See how I can contact him. You can join the positive vibe
• 1:18:06
  tribe e-mail group. I think we've I think I signed
• 1:18:08
  up. I signed up for something while
• 1:18:09
  we were on the show. I'll have to sign up to that and
• 1:18:11
  see if it if it Chris and Mike will do that because we like to,
• 1:18:15
  we like to promote obviously everybody that comes on our show
• 1:18:18
  and help you grow your audience. Thank you so much for that.
• 1:18:22
  That's, that's amazing. Yeah, I I share some behind the
• 1:18:25
  scenes stuff and, you know, some thoughts, maybe some poetry
• 1:18:27
  every now and then on my e-mail list, so.
• 1:18:30
  Now you got you got the content from your last show, right?
• 1:18:33
  Did I? Did I send that to you?
• 1:18:35
  I got a couple and I got a shared reel, so I'd love to love
• 1:18:39
  to continue to get it. Thank you so much for that.
• 1:18:41
  Yeah, yeah, I should have emailed it to you.
• 1:18:44
  You may have emailed me the the full content and y'all were
• 1:18:47
  doing some really great clips too, so I'd love to talk about
• 1:18:51
  how best to share that with my community and give you guys a
• 1:18:55
  thank you shout out too. Yeah, he'll send you the reels
• 1:18:58
  and then I try and tag you on Instagram too.
• 1:19:01
  I think I did that the last time.
• 1:19:03
  Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah, so if I didn't send you 10
• 1:19:06
  to 15 reels, I'll get on that from your first appearance, and
• 1:19:08
  then you can have those for whatever you want to do.
• 1:19:10
  And then once, once this show gets to where it's edited down,
• 1:19:13
  I'll do the same thing. I'm usually really good about
• 1:19:14
  doing it, but sometimes life gets in my way and I I forget.
• 1:19:17
  It's possible. I I don't remember, but you guys
• 1:19:21
  have been amazing, yeah. Yeah, you're good.
• 1:19:23
  You don't. It's all good, man.
• 1:19:24
  No, that's part of why we do this is to promote.
• 1:19:27
  We always say if we didn't want to promote you, we would just
• 1:19:29
  talk to each other because we can do that forever.
• 1:19:32
  You know so. We might as well take advantage
• 1:19:34
  of promoting, voting our guests right?
• 1:19:36
  Yeah, that's, that's awesome. Yeah, and anybody you come
• 1:19:40
  across that you find interesting and fun, especially on your
• 1:19:42
  travels, if you're going to be on the road forever, dude, if
• 1:19:45
  you run into people that you think would benefit from this,
• 1:19:49
  you know what we're into. We like people with, like Chris
• 1:19:51
  said, cool life resumes. I'd love to introduce.
• 1:19:54
  I've got some some people in mind.
• 1:19:56
  Do I text you or e-mail you? What's the best way to do that?
• 1:19:59
  Just have them go to the website thecrystalmicshow.com and then
• 1:20:01
  have them register as a guest. Because in that that that comes
• 1:20:05
  to you, Mike, it comes to me. And then I send it to Chris and
• 1:20:08
  he plugged you. He'll plug that person into a
• 1:20:10
  date. Yeah, so check.
• 1:20:12
  But do you want to know it's coming from me or do you want me
• 1:20:14
  to send them your way? Tell them that you referred
• 1:20:17
  them. Yeah, OK, they can fill.
• 1:20:18
  They can fill because that means something coming from you to
• 1:20:21
  both. Absolutely.
• 1:20:22
  Exactly. Just say it's referred by Mark
• 1:20:24
  Winters. Yeah.
• 1:20:25
  And check your e-mail, Mike, because I think a couple people
• 1:20:28
  have have have sent registered because we have a we have a
• 1:20:31
  comedian coming on the show in a couple weeks, which I know you
• 1:20:33
  love comedians too. I do.
• 1:20:34
  Is it Dan Rathburn? It is Dan Rathburn.
• 1:20:37
  Yeah. I'm a good guesser.
• 1:20:40
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 1:20:41
  No, it's, you know, it's cool, man.
• 1:20:42
  He's Buddy Mark. Matt Ferrell.
• 1:20:44
  He is. We talked about that, Mark.
• 1:20:47
  Mark, you're, you're freaking awesome, dude.
• 1:20:48
  I can't wait to see you and meet you in person.
• 1:20:50
  Amazing. Going to be amazing.
• 1:20:52
  I can't wait to sing with you too, Chris.
• 1:20:53
  I got to find a way to do something with you, Mike, when I
• 1:20:55
  go up to Illinois, maybe we can, maybe you can sit down on
• 1:20:57
  electric with me or something. That'd.
• 1:20:59
  Be great. There you go.
• 1:21:00
  I would love to go. That would be awesome.
• 1:21:02
  And then I'll get content for it too, so we can put on the Chris
• 1:21:04
  and Mike page. Anything else?
• 1:21:07
  Anything else you want to share, Mark, before we wrap this puppy
• 1:21:09
  up? No, I am thankful for you guys
• 1:21:12
  having me and I would invite everyone to add a few extra
• 1:21:15
  protons to your life to. Make the.
• 1:21:17
  World shine a little more. Yep, love it.
• 1:21:20
  Yep. And remember, if you're feeling
• 1:21:22
  suicidal, depressed, don't do it.
• 1:21:24
  Go scream in a pillow. Go journal, go for a run, go
• 1:21:26
  workout, go find somebody to talk to.
• 1:21:28
  If you cannot find somebody to talk to, text 988.
• 1:21:30
  Somebody's standing there waiting to help you cut off that
• 1:21:33
  ledge. You will leave a hole in
• 1:21:35
  somebody else's heart, as we can all three attest to if you don't
• 1:21:37
  wake up tomorrow, tomorrow is a better day with you in the
• 1:21:40
  world. So remember that for a for Mike
• 1:21:43
  and and myself, Chris, and this is Mark Winters, this is Chris
• 1:21:45
  and Mike. So we truly appreciate your
• 1:21:46
  time, Mark. We know it's valuable.
• 1:21:48
  It's the only commodity we have that you're running out.
• 1:21:51
  That being said, love you both have a great rest of your day
• 1:21:54
  and just have a fantastic tour. Mark Winters, excited to talk to
• 1:21:57
  you again buddy and see you May 20th at the Echa Tap Room.
• 1:22:00
  Thanks again Mark, I appreciate it.
• 1:22:02
  Love you guys. Thank you guys.
• 1:22:03
  Appreciate it man. Don't leave yet, Mark.
• 1:22:06
  OK, Don't leave. We don't wanna fly