Latest / The Other 22 Hours / Madison Cunningham on letting go of work, shifting ambition, and subconscious burner accounts.

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Madison Cunningham on letting go of work, shifting ambition, and subconscious burner accounts. · The Other 22 Hours

0:00
[SPEAKER_02]: contentment is so hard to achieve.
0:02
[SPEAKER_02]: Should I don't know what you've done, like for me, I'm like, I have a Grammy in my tiny apartment where my dog is yelling at me.
0:11
[SPEAKER_02]: And in my car, right now.
0:14
[SPEAKER_02]: The juxtaposition of that is really funny and I laugh all the time, because it's just not real.
0:23
[SPEAKER_00]: We often define artists by their output.
0:26
[SPEAKER_00]: Their records, books, movies, and the times they're on stage.
0:30
[SPEAKER_01]: But the art is made in the quiet, the struggle, and the mundane, the hours that no one sees.
0:36
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm McKayla Ann.
0:37
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm Aaron Kramer-Hase.
0:39
[SPEAKER_00]: This is the other 22 hours, an exploration of the creative life lived in between.
0:57
[SPEAKER_00]: This week, we're featuring our conversation with Grammy winning singer, songwriter, and guitarist, Madison Cunningham, who started making records at 17 and releasing those records on labels at 20 and she's been touring ever since.
1:11
[SPEAKER_00]: In addition to her own project, she's often featured as a high profile collaborator with some incredible musicians, whether that's in the band for live from here with Chris Thiele
1:27
[SPEAKER_00]: or Hozier, Collexico, Remi Wolfe, musicians from all over the spectrum.
1:32
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, Madison was right away so incredibly generous with her self-reflection and just honest, take on what it is to be a touring full-time musician.
1:46
[SPEAKER_01]: So we got to talk a lot about YouTube
1:50
[SPEAKER_01]: staying true to yourself, regardless of how your musical personal evolution might be received and trying to protect the sanctity of your individual creation.
2:03
[SPEAKER_00]: It's such an open conversation.
2:05
[SPEAKER_00]: One of my favorites here is Madison Kennedy.
2:11
[SPEAKER_01]: So we like to always start the beginning of the conversation with just how are you and how are you really today and where are you physically and creatively.
2:22
[SPEAKER_02]: How am I and how am I really I to be very candid I'm sitting in my car.
2:27
[SPEAKER_02]: It's really hot, so I'm wasting gas, but I also live in a really small apartment with a dog that's incredibly vocal and I love her, but of course, like her chaos makes me feel like it's a reflection of the way I have.
2:42
[SPEAKER_02]: for racists or something.
2:44
[SPEAKER_02]: So there's all of this added beside it being like a very non functional place to do things like this or to write or whatever it's like there's this added feeling of failure.
2:52
[SPEAKER_02]: So I feel like slightly like compressed and squeezed today and I feel overwhelmed.
2:57
[SPEAKER_02]: Like I feel overwhelmed and then on top of that physically I'm in California which is like
3:01
[SPEAKER_02]: We're experiencing one of the hottest summers we've had that I've experienced and I've lived your my whole life.
3:06
[SPEAKER_02]: And so there's that kind of compression too.
3:09
[SPEAKER_02]: Anytime you walk out, you feel like you instantaneously got skin cancer or you just part of you is wounded.
3:14
[SPEAKER_02]: So yeah, I guess the way to come at this conversation in the most honest way I can't as to say, I feel overwhelmed and squeezed and battling the feeling of having failed at a lot of parts of life.
3:28
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, we have T.I.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_00]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_02]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_02]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_02]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_02]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_02]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_02]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_02]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_02]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_02]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_02]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_02]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_02]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_02]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_02]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_02]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_02]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_02]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_02]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_02]: and T.I.
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[SPEAKER_02]: and T.I.
3:48
[SPEAKER_01]: What can you do?
3:48
[SPEAKER_01]: But also, I want to just thank you for sharing that honest reflection of how you're feeling because you could have just been like, I'm good and tried to cover it up.
3:59
[SPEAKER_01]: But you really went through how being in your car was making you feel and I want to assure you you are not the first guest of almost 200 interviews we've done.
4:09
[SPEAKER_01]: You are not the first time we've had somebody in their car.
4:13
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, he's had great reaction.
4:14
[SPEAKER_00]: Grocery store parking lots, cars, while driving.
4:19
[SPEAKER_01]: Was his name Ryan Ryan from Guster laid down and was just in bed?
4:23
[SPEAKER_01]: He's like, this is a therapy session now.
4:29
[SPEAKER_00]: Just went in.
4:30
[SPEAKER_01]: So you are in good company.
4:32
[SPEAKER_01]: Where are you creatively right now?
4:34
[SPEAKER_02]: me in the world.
4:36
[SPEAKER_02]: So I just finished this month-long songwriting course that I taught which is really funny because I my whole life very much swore off of teaching but I did it and it was so gratifying and fulfilling and I've never put that much work into anything besides making a record that was the only amount of work that I could compare the experience to.
4:57
[SPEAKER_02]: I wrote a song out of it as well
5:04
[SPEAKER_02]: There are so many things that are impossible to teach, but not everything is impossible to learn, and so trying to almost teach through a place that wasn't prescriptive, but was like encouraging people to learn in their own way.
5:17
[SPEAKER_02]: And because that's how I've always related to music in every way, from theory to anytime someone tried to teach me music I was last.
5:24
[SPEAKER_02]: But when I was taught like how to learn or where to go, how to think not what to think, then I was like cracked open and on fire, you know?
5:32
[SPEAKER_02]: And so creatively, I'm in this place where I feel in turn, cracked open by the reflections of these people who signed it for the class.
5:41
[SPEAKER_02]: And honestly, by all parts of it, there was a lot of disappointment.
5:44
[SPEAKER_02]: There was a lot of people expressing like, I'm stuck.
5:46
[SPEAKER_02]: So I'm
5:47
[SPEAKER_02]: about to do one last leg of my album cycle basically I'm touring this album that I put out called Ace we're doing one final push and then I'm back to like a blank slate so that I feel this sadness laced with a little bit of dread laced with a ton of curiosity and hope and remembering that that's the most exciting part is when you don't know what the next project is yet just all dreams.
6:11
[SPEAKER_00]: I love that all dreams it really it like anything's possible.
6:14
[SPEAKER_02]: Anything is possible and that is completely paralyzing and it's galvanizing.
6:18
[SPEAKER_02]: It causes both reactions in me.
6:20
[SPEAKER_02]: I love that.
6:21
[SPEAKER_00]: I normally approach like the impending space on my conder with pure anxiety and fear.
6:27
[SPEAKER_02]: Yes, yes, because that's natural.
6:31
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it's like I can't stop.
6:32
[SPEAKER_00]: I can't slow down.
6:33
[SPEAKER_00]: Look at all the momentum, even if it's just normal life.
6:35
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like I can't get the boulder to roll this fast again.
6:38
[SPEAKER_00]: I can't slow down.
6:39
[SPEAKER_02]: It's the run or time mentality.
6:41
[SPEAKER_02]: If I stop, I'm going to feel pain.
6:43
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm never going to do it again.
6:45
[SPEAKER_02]: But I believe in cycles.
6:47
[SPEAKER_02]: The older I get, it's very important to have a fear cycle.
6:52
[SPEAKER_02]: Where you're like, I don't know, I don't know.
6:53
[SPEAKER_02]: It's just like, I think it causes you to look at really important value systems again.
6:58
[SPEAKER_02]: And if you don't do that, then you're dying.
7:00
[SPEAKER_02]: Like, if you're not growing your dying, yeah.
7:03
[SPEAKER_02]: So it's a conflicting place every time you feel small, you just feel so small compared to like how big your goals and dreams are and that's accurate.
7:12
[SPEAKER_02]: You are that small really and lie in the world and there's something that happens when you start to feel larger and stronger, the more you commit to going up it.
7:22
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, one of the things we talk about over and over with guests is for musicians, the cycle of right music, record music, package and promote music, go on tour.
7:35
[SPEAKER_01]: They require so many different parts of our personalities and beans and we might feel more natural with the writing part or the touring part where you're really in contact with a lot of people and running on a
7:52
[SPEAKER_01]: some people don't like that, but you have to be able to somehow manage all of it.
7:58
[SPEAKER_01]: And like you said, recognize the cycles and I don't think enough, I don't think enough attention is given an especially musicians to be trained in a way to be able to like emotionally withstand all of that different change.
8:14
[SPEAKER_01]: And I think that's incredible.
8:16
[SPEAKER_01]: How old were you?
8:17
[SPEAKER_01]: Because you've been
8:21
[SPEAKER_01]: started young, but how long have you been in the cycle of create release, promote, perform, quite fear, repeat?
8:31
[SPEAKER_02]: In, I guess, a more professional sense about a decade, which is so weird, that happened incredibly fast.
8:37
[SPEAKER_02]: It's not a novel thing to say, but it's a novel thing to feel.
8:40
[SPEAKER_02]: Like, wow, people are really correct and how quickly cycles go in like a decade just as gone.
8:46
[SPEAKER_02]: I started, signed with my label when I was 20, and that was the landmark of where all of their things started to happen.
8:53
[SPEAKER_02]: Like, when on my first tour after that, she doesn't 18, and so yeah, I guess it's just shy of a decade.
8:58
[SPEAKER_02]: But for me, I've been playing and making records since I was 17, but just not always in light of people watching, not in light of pressure.
9:07
[SPEAKER_02]: not true pressure.
9:09
[SPEAKER_02]: I always put pressure on myself, but I think everything really had to be thought of in a sustainable way when there was actual pressure.
9:16
[SPEAKER_02]: An actual chance to really fail at something or to not be recognized or to be recognized and then free to lose people.
9:23
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm talking against about a fan base or whatever.
9:25
[SPEAKER_02]: Just always that possibility.
9:27
[SPEAKER_02]: And now that I recognize that, I'm like, it's all pretty elastic too.
9:31
[SPEAKER_02]: A friend said to me, there's no such thing as now or never.
9:34
[SPEAKER_02]: When you say no to something, you do say yes to something else.
9:38
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, you don't know what you're saying yes to, but there's these other things that do come up.
9:41
[SPEAKER_02]: And I've just started to believe in the cycle and that I'm super out of control.
9:46
[SPEAKER_02]: And all I can control is like the things that I love.
9:49
[SPEAKER_02]: And I've been in that cycle for a, it's going to be, I turned 30 this year.
9:54
[SPEAKER_02]: So I feel like I'm saying goodbye to this very specific decade of, you can kind of just be messy.
10:00
[SPEAKER_02]: And you can figure it out as you go and you can be
10:03
[SPEAKER_02]: and of course that's allowed later in life too, but you have to justify it in a different way.
10:07
[SPEAKER_02]: And I don't know if I'm prepared to do that yet.
10:10
[SPEAKER_02]: And that's been interesting.
10:11
[SPEAKER_02]: I can either resist it or I can grade it with open arms and be like, I don't have to freak about a new chapter or aging or whatever it is.
10:20
[SPEAKER_02]: This is what happens whether you sign up
10:25
[SPEAKER_00]: Hey, just a quick pause from this conversation.
10:28
[SPEAKER_00]: The other 22 hours is an independent production built entirely on the idea that he's quiet honest conversations matter.
10:34
[SPEAKER_00]: The best way to support our work is simply to share it, so if you can think of one person who would appreciate this show, please pass it along.
10:40
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10:46
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a small action that we say massive difference for us.
10:49
[SPEAKER_00]: Thanks for being here.
10:49
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's get back to our conversation.
10:53
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm so glad that you brought up the idea of creating with the outside expectation or with eyes or your previous darker D1 Grammys.
11:01
[SPEAKER_00]: It seemed like to me on the outside, it did incredibly, we live in Nashville and I would turn on, there was like eight different radio stations I would hit that your songs would come on.
11:10
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, oh wow, that's cool formats here and there.
11:13
[SPEAKER_00]: And here and there.
11:14
[SPEAKER_00]: And then with this new record with ACE, it's incredibly beautiful, deep and intricate.
11:20
[SPEAKER_00]: But to me, like, it sits in a different spot you did on the last record, you know, I guess those are remix.
11:25
[SPEAKER_00]: You had like people like Remi Wolf, you were collaborating with and all of that, like mainstream more popular artists.
11:31
[SPEAKER_00]: And then shifting to something that to me on the service level appears more introverted, more spacious and quiet.
11:38
[SPEAKER_00]: And doing that in the context of outside attention.
11:41
[SPEAKER_00]: and eyes on you.
11:43
[SPEAKER_00]: Was that present while you were creating a secreting this new record?
11:46
[SPEAKER_00]: Did you have to like do any work to be able to make this new record and do that shift?
11:50
[SPEAKER_02]: So the record that I had made before reveal or that record was just the hardest thing I've ever done and the pressure was more intense than it had been before.
11:59
[SPEAKER_02]: Like I think it was also just like this collision with COVID and everyone that know what was going on and I think there was so much more pressure on artists to have extensive amounts of output and I just lost myself in a lot of different ways and that record was like climbing out of that and there's parts of it that I'm really proud of another parts of it and like I can still hear that struggle in myself.
12:20
[SPEAKER_02]: with ace.
12:21
[SPEAKER_02]: I was like no one gets to be in on this process.
12:24
[SPEAKER_02]: Because it was such a personal thing that I knew if anyone said anything in one direction that made me doubt it, I would have lost all steep.
12:34
[SPEAKER_02]: I was so ready to just be pushed over and to give up.
12:37
[SPEAKER_02]: So I just protected that, noted that.
12:40
[SPEAKER_02]: And everyone that I invited in were dear friends.
12:43
[SPEAKER_02]: I didn't make any demos.
12:44
[SPEAKER_02]: They were all shitty iPhone recordings all by design because I didn't want anyone to get attached to something that they'd heard before I didn't want myself to get attached to a demo.
12:54
[SPEAKER_00]: So it was.
12:55
[SPEAKER_02]: crazy I've never had the experience where like the record happened so seamlessly and easily was so much joy and then on top of that when I went to bring it to my label they were like no notes and we think these things are the singles and I was like that's literally what I thought and we've never agreed that hard on anything so
13:14
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know, I felt like all of the times that I felt that rub of being like, I disagree, and this is my artistic conviction or what I like fighting for that feeling like bloody Eden bruised just by that tension.
13:26
[SPEAKER_02]: I felt like all of those years amounted to this chapter being so much easier because I was willing to be like, no.
13:36
[SPEAKER_01]: And now I know how to say no a little bit better.
13:38
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I'm not perfect at it at all.
13:40
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm a people pleaser by nature, but I'm learning how to be like, nope, you don't get to come into this until I say that it's time.
13:48
[SPEAKER_02]: And that's felt really, really nice and liberating, but I was super surprised that Ace went down like that.
13:53
[SPEAKER_02]: Everything surrounding making that record was so hard in my life personally.
13:58
[SPEAKER_02]: So I was expected that to be battle to it.
14:00
[SPEAKER_02]: for some reason it wasn't.
14:01
[SPEAKER_00]: How is your experience been now letting the public in to that?
14:05
[SPEAKER_00]: Have you been able to keep that steadfastness in yourself?
14:08
[SPEAKER_02]: You're in there?
14:09
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
14:09
[SPEAKER_02]: It's challenging.
14:10
[SPEAKER_02]: I, again, just felt like releasing a record is so much different than the process of really letting it go.
14:17
[SPEAKER_02]: And I'm in the process of really letting it go.
14:20
[SPEAKER_02]: And going, okay, I've got to depart from something that felt really special to me.
14:24
[SPEAKER_02]: And not everything happened the way I thought it was going to.
14:27
[SPEAKER_02]: And I'm going to find more things to say.
14:29
[SPEAKER_02]: and continuing to, yeah, like committing, again, what we're talking about at the beginning to like being at the very bottom of something and feeling really small again.
14:36
[SPEAKER_02]: And then that process of feeling really small.
14:38
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm just going, okay, I'm letting it go.
14:41
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm not going to make that the defining moment of my life, even though I'm so proud of it.
14:45
[SPEAKER_02]: I have to find other ones because I'm in a different present.
14:47
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm in a different time.
14:49
[SPEAKER_02]: The other half of this that's been the reason like letting it go has been important is I feel like there was a new level of.
14:55
[SPEAKER_02]: respect that I received that was jarring and beautiful and then a new level of resistance.
15:01
[SPEAKER_02]: I really experienced from the first time people being like, man, I don't get it.
15:05
[SPEAKER_02]: And then people being like, I know what you're doing and I'm with you.
15:10
[SPEAKER_02]: And I felt like that was the way that I knew it was right.
15:13
[SPEAKER_02]: If you're right in the center and you're making something that feels true and true or to you, you do get more people being like, I don't see it.
15:20
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know if this is my cup of tea, but for me I was like, I'm getting more and more at peace with myself and with my voice and like I have to follow that thing.
15:28
[SPEAKER_02]: It's been a huge lesson to put something out there that is a very graphic piece of your life.
15:35
[SPEAKER_02]: and of your heart break and that's what I believe in.
15:38
[SPEAKER_02]: I want to do that for the rest of my life, make work like that.
15:41
[SPEAKER_02]: But to have people in the face of that be like, yeah, I don't it's cool or like be offended by certain that I just was like, well, this is a lot to take.
15:51
[SPEAKER_02]: I've just been in this mode of feeling like I've given too much or too little.
15:55
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know if I've ever given the right amount and I'm also, I've made peace with that.
15:59
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm still very proud.
16:01
[SPEAKER_02]: of that record and like all the lessons that I've learned in the tension of experienced people being like so incredibly on board and then the yeah and then the other resistance that's what making art is.
16:13
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah that feels like such a challenging part of building your career on your music on your creativity because you are going to evolve as a person which is then all of the experiences you have in your life that you have no control over
16:30
[SPEAKER_01]: then inevitably influence your art, depending on your choices of how if you want to just keep making the thing you were making before or if you want your life to lead your artistic expression.
16:45
[SPEAKER_01]: and accepting that you will lose people that some fans just want you to stay the same and want you to keep making the thing that they loved from the last time.
16:53
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's painful, like getting to the place of understanding or radio stations, or different people in the industry that were your biggest supporters on the last record, and this record are like, not for me.
17:05
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I'm also speaking from personal experience of, you can't then get distracted by how do I make the thing that you wanted me to make so that you could stay with me because then you're pulled in like a million different directions.
17:19
[SPEAKER_01]: So you just have to accept like this is part of it and on the next record they might love it again and you just can't be attached to anyone's reaction.
17:27
[SPEAKER_02]: There is one moment I had been sort of like called out by a fan on Instagram.
17:33
[SPEAKER_02]: They started up by like giving me a lot of compliments and then they just twisted it with, but I will never be listing to your music again.
17:39
[SPEAKER_02]: And I was like, wait, what?
17:41
[SPEAKER_02]: At first it was really painful and then I played it out all the way to the end.
17:46
[SPEAKER_02]: And I was just imagining me like tracking that person down and begging them for forgiveness and being like, what music should I make?
17:53
[SPEAKER_02]: Tell me what to make and that
17:55
[SPEAKER_02]: scenario made me laugh so hard.
17:57
[SPEAKER_02]: I just was like losing my mind laughing thinking like that's what it's like to chase down all of these people who come into your life that don't know you they don't even know my middle name and he's like I really think you've lost the plot here.
18:12
[SPEAKER_02]: What do I do either I like yeah either I let you dictate what I'm
18:26
[SPEAKER_02]: That's the prettiest part of me coming up.
18:28
[SPEAKER_02]: It's human.
18:29
[SPEAKER_01]: It's very human.
18:30
[SPEAKER_01]: It's also so tricky when we have so much access to each other.
18:33
[SPEAKER_01]: Fans feel entitled to give us their opinions and write us and messages and comment and we can see all of it and we can write back and like it's really messy and it takes a lot of self-discipline.
18:48
[SPEAKER_01]: To just decide what you want to give your attention or energy to and we express things because we also want connection and we want affirmation and we want love and that's a slippery slope of where we look for those things.
19:03
[SPEAKER_02]: it's so true and we get tested over and over again of what we will accept as love why am I looking to YouTube comments to validate me.
19:13
[SPEAKER_02]: Why am I doing that?
19:14
[SPEAKER_02]: Like having a really investigate those moments and then go, I'm looking away because I always say like the people who are like bullies online, it's just my subconscious that started to burn our account.
19:25
[SPEAKER_02]: I've been meaner to myself, I have to turn myself off and the truth is you can't trust praise and you can't trust people's hate hatred.
19:38
[SPEAKER_02]: You have to just go neither one or correct.
19:41
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
19:42
[SPEAKER_02]: And move forward.
19:43
[SPEAKER_01]: And the helpful thing about this stuff is there are people out there who think Madison Cunningham is the like, end all be all greatest musician in the world.
19:52
[SPEAKER_01]: Nothing you make is anything less than perfect.
19:55
[SPEAKER_01]: And they now get to hear you talk about how wounded you can feel when somebody
20:00
[SPEAKER_01]: It gives you a negative comment and then that humanized as you it makes me feel better I've been putting out records for 10 years and I got my first that I'm aware of my first written bad review from a blog And it was just a blog.
20:13
[SPEAKER_01]: It wasn't even like the New York Times or Rolling Stone or something But I still saw it and the guy called my songs boring
20:23
[SPEAKER_01]: pedestrian and my record is I have two children and like my life transformation through motherhood has been really life altering for a lot of other reasons and the record is about that and like trying to find the magic and the romanticism of just everyday life and full human messiness I was really hurt when I saw it and then I was like oh well maybe he cannot relate at all
20:51
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's okay.
20:52
[SPEAKER_01]: I remember I like shared it online after I got out of my shame spiral of being like maybe he's right.
20:58
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm terrible.
20:59
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't know how to write songs.
21:01
[SPEAKER_01]: And how many other musicians and friends reached out musicians that I greatly admire and were just like, dude, welcome to the club and don't listen and like another friend called me and was like, oh man, I remember when I got my first bad review from the LA times.
21:19
[SPEAKER_01]: and other friends are just like, we're in this.
21:22
[SPEAKER_01]: It's okay.
21:24
[SPEAKER_02]: It's a right of passage.
21:25
[SPEAKER_02]: It just happens.
21:27
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh my god.
21:28
[SPEAKER_02]: Yes.
21:29
[SPEAKER_02]: No, it is.
21:29
[SPEAKER_02]: And then I feel like I've been personally hurt by things where like people will literally tag me in a blog post or like a mean.
21:37
[SPEAKER_02]: And I've just been like really
21:38
[SPEAKER_02]: Really like, you knew I was going to see this and you felt okay with, and then I just go, this might be their job.
21:46
[SPEAKER_02]: My job is not to agree with that or to live or die by these words.
21:51
[SPEAKER_02]: And it's funny like that example you gave.
21:52
[SPEAKER_02]: It's like someone saying, this is boring.
21:54
[SPEAKER_02]: Very mundane or pedestrian.
21:56
[SPEAKER_02]: You're like, actually, wait, yes, maybe from the perspective of everyday life.
22:01
[SPEAKER_02]: Maybe that was also the fucking point.
22:03
[SPEAKER_02]: Yes, you're thinking about that.
22:07
[SPEAKER_02]: but to talk about things that are like every day.
22:10
[SPEAKER_02]: And a dude might not relate to those struggles.
22:13
[SPEAKER_02]: You're so correct in that.
22:15
[SPEAKER_02]: And I think we just measure success by like masses relating to what we do.
22:22
[SPEAKER_02]: And it's like not everybody has that.
22:25
[SPEAKER_02]: voice and not everybody even wants to have that voice, like I think for me, I've gotten to the place where I'm like, I just don't think I want the kind of fame that I see happening for a lot of people that I am told I should want.
22:36
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't think I want that grind or life or power.
22:40
[SPEAKER_02]: I want something else.
22:41
[SPEAKER_02]: It's just all of us defining what success means for ourselves and that's what we have to do.
22:46
[SPEAKER_02]: we have to engage in that cycle, too.
22:48
[SPEAKER_02]: And like, going, ooh, I actually do want that thing.
22:51
[SPEAKER_02]: So I got to figure out what that means for me.
22:55
[SPEAKER_02]: Or going, I thought I wanted that thing, and I don't anymore.
22:58
[SPEAKER_02]: And I have to just let it lie.
23:00
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, or realizing, like, I thought I wanted that thing, but I then realized that I don't want to do what is required to get that thing.
23:09
[SPEAKER_01]: so I'm okay with that consequence.
23:12
[SPEAKER_01]: I feel like that was a process for me.
23:14
[SPEAKER_01]: I may be wanted these different levels of success or fame or whatever, but then I got to a point where I was like, oh, I now know all of the inner workings of the industry and what kind of things are required, and I realize I don't want to do those things.
23:31
[SPEAKER_01]: So that's okay.
23:33
[SPEAKER_01]: I want reprieve from that more than I want the pedestal or whatever.
23:38
[SPEAKER_01]: It is really understanding what kind of daily life you want, what kind of personal life you want to have space for, and where you're kind of balance lies and what you're willing to sacrifice.
23:52
[SPEAKER_01]: for that.
23:53
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I don't want to tour that many days out of the year, so therefore I'm probably not going to grow a live business to the extent that I maybe my younger self thought I would.
24:04
[SPEAKER_01]: Those kind of negotiations that change all the time.
24:07
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, exactly.
24:08
[SPEAKER_02]: There's so many different facets of life where those ideas change, you know?
24:13
[SPEAKER_02]: We're kind of like catching up to speed in real time.
24:15
[SPEAKER_02]: What we really actually yearn for.
24:18
[SPEAKER_02]: It's funny how there is a grieving process.
24:21
[SPEAKER_02]: Even when you realize you make the connection, I don't want to do what it takes to get what I want it.
24:26
[SPEAKER_02]: They're still a grieving phase of what you wanted being put to rest and just going, okay, I'm going to learn how to live without that.
24:34
[SPEAKER_02]: And to be content, this contentment is so hard to achieve.
24:38
[SPEAKER_02]: It's no matter what you've done, like for me, I'm like, I have a Grammy in my tiny apartment where my dog is yelling at me.
24:47
[SPEAKER_02]: And in my car right now, the juxtaposition or that is really funny and I lap all the time because it's just not real.
24:56
[SPEAKER_02]: It got me some things and it was a beautiful moment, but if I live my life by that thing that I'm gonna be.
25:02
[SPEAKER_02]: completely lost.
25:04
[SPEAKER_02]: So yeah.
25:05
[SPEAKER_00]: And like, I don't really think it's as a front person.
25:08
[SPEAKER_00]: I've always been whether it's a side man on tour or now producing and mixing records and all I like to remain behind scenes.
25:14
[SPEAKER_00]: But in my observation of working with all these other artists, we're not a normal business where if you do XYZ, then you're going to get this.
25:21
[SPEAKER_00]: even these things that you don't want, you might not want to jump through those hoops.
25:24
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, absolutely.
25:25
[SPEAKER_00]: There's the grieving process, the letting go of that definition of yourself to find what is new.
25:30
[SPEAKER_00]: There's so many examples of, well, I'm not going to do XYZ, so I'm just going to do like LMNOP over here.
25:35
[SPEAKER_00]: And then all of a sudden, LMNOP gets you what you want it over here.
25:38
[SPEAKER_00]: And everybody's like, yeah, look, that's genius.
25:40
[SPEAKER_00]: You should have just done this to begin with.
25:41
[SPEAKER_00]: And all you did was just what felt right.
25:43
[SPEAKER_00]: And it gets you to the same place.
25:44
[SPEAKER_00]: It's such a weird business.
25:46
[SPEAKER_02]: We are just like fumble and around and then we stumble onto something and you're like, oh, maybe I do this now with my whole heart, maybe.
25:55
[SPEAKER_02]: And see what happens.
25:56
[SPEAKER_01]: I think also the perception that we a lot of us grew up with of like what a Grammy for instance would mean for somebody's life.
26:05
[SPEAKER_01]: like visually but also financially.
26:08
[SPEAKER_01]: It's heartbreaking to know that the industry has changed so much that those things don't mean the same.
26:16
[SPEAKER_01]: Friends that have been nominated for Grammy's and like can't afford to go on tour barely at all.
26:21
[SPEAKER_01]: It just doesn't equate the way that like when we were all young kids you were thinking if you want to Grammy you'd be like living in a mansion and a
26:34
[SPEAKER_02]: way, some people get nominated for the Grammys.
26:37
[SPEAKER_02]: They don't have enough money to go to the Grammys.
26:39
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes.
26:40
[SPEAKER_02]: That's how it's set up now, like you can go.
26:43
[SPEAKER_02]: But if you want to bring anyone, you got to pay a thousand bucks.
26:46
[SPEAKER_02]: And it's like, all right, so you just go into the Lines Dan alone.
26:49
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, or you've heard your broke or it's just such a weird fucked up.
26:54
[SPEAKER_02]: system.
26:55
[SPEAKER_02]: Yes.
26:55
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
26:56
[SPEAKER_00]: Absolutely.
26:57
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like you don't need to generate revenue off of us.
27:00
[SPEAKER_00]: Everybody is watching your show and coming to your show because of the art that we made and because we are nominated and yet you're charging us to also be that like we are not a revenue point.
27:10
[SPEAKER_02]: And we are in so many other ways, I mean, this is a dark tangent, but just the music that we're making and putting out on streaming platforms and the people who own those streaming platforms are just laughing all the way to the bank.
27:23
[SPEAKER_02]: They're not having to create things that really keep their platform going.
27:28
[SPEAKER_02]: It's like all the artists on the platform that are doing it and they're benefiting they're the ones benefit it.
27:40
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know what it is, but I have no answers today, but from my car, I say, we got to do something.
27:48
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
27:49
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, yeah, you said, you said you're about to turn 30 and that your 20s is, it was this kind of like time to be messy, but that is like the interesting part of growing up to me, we both are 40.
28:01
[SPEAKER_01]: And what I wanted at 35 and what I wanted at 30, you know, the deals that I was willing to sign,
28:09
[SPEAKER_01]: whatever it helps get me the ability to put out a record and to go on tour and whatever, what I was willing to do changed as I got older and the stakes got higher.
28:20
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, we started wanting a family, your perspective shifts as you gain experience and you gain insight,
28:27
[SPEAKER_01]: For me, the longer I'm in this business, the more I feel like the curtain has been pulled back on a lot of the industry stuff, so it makes me feel like my soul is at odds with the business of music, but never been more aligned with the importance of artists being able to make and share music.
28:48
[SPEAKER_01]: So it's that challenge of how do you keep grounded and then always navigating how much you want to participate in the industry business commercial side to sustain your life and your ability to create but keep your soul.
29:06
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I'm very comforted by the idea that you also have to build your version of the industry.
29:13
[SPEAKER_02]: You just do.
29:14
[SPEAKER_02]: And that's by the people you surround yourself with who you give your time and mind to who you entrust with your creative ideas, what label you're assigned to.
29:25
[SPEAKER_02]: It's like you have to build it.
29:26
[SPEAKER_02]: And sometimes it feels like options are slim or something.
29:30
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, you just do what is presented.
29:32
[SPEAKER_02]: But I also like there's so many other ways to build
29:35
[SPEAKER_02]: community and sustainability and I'm starting to think in those ways and see that yeah you do have to ultimately say no to the things that do make you feel morally conflicted hard to do but like important to.
29:50
[SPEAKER_00]: try to stick with and yeah no one's perfect at this no one's ever perfect at this I agree entirely and I think it ties in with the making the music that speaks to you in the moment and the record of where you are and planting that flag the episode will come out in a few weeks but you know Dolly Parton passed away yesterday and she entirely
30:10
[SPEAKER_00]: planted a flag and said, I believe in this.
30:12
[SPEAKER_00]: I think this is who I am and she stayed there in the face of all of these sides and she was like loved by literally everybody.
30:20
[SPEAKER_00]: Um, doesn't matter.
30:21
[SPEAKER_00]: They're background, their ideology, their location, their gender, anything because she planted a flag like this is what I believe in and was welcoming and open and left the door open.
30:32
[SPEAKER_00]: there was something to grab onto.
30:33
[SPEAKER_00]: You knew where Dali stood.
30:34
[SPEAKER_00]: You knew who Dali was.
30:35
[SPEAKER_00]: You knew what she represented and it created this massive community around her because she planted that flag.
30:41
[SPEAKER_00]: It was so in integrity with herself.
30:43
[SPEAKER_02]: You can't speak about building a community and doing it in your way without thinking about her.
30:48
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
30:48
[SPEAKER_02]: Like she's so beloved but so many people were disappointed by her too and we're very vocal about it.
30:54
[SPEAKER_02]: One of her skills was somehow she just knew
30:59
[SPEAKER_02]: bigger and kinder in light of all that criticism.
31:03
[SPEAKER_02]: She just knew how to not be like, oh, no, you're right.
31:05
[SPEAKER_02]: I believe that she just was like, that's not correct and you don't know me, but I also like, I love you too.
31:12
[SPEAKER_02]: And I've been so emotional about her for obviously the last 24 hours as has the world, but just this morning woke up and was watching all of these videos of her and everything that she said and then just caught me in my own
31:25
[SPEAKER_02]: negative self-talk spiral.
31:27
[SPEAKER_02]: And I was like, how right, we all get so caught up on our mistakes and our regrets.
31:31
[SPEAKER_02]: And we're like, oh, I should have done this.
31:32
[SPEAKER_02]: I could have done that.
31:33
[SPEAKER_02]: And it's like, but maybe there is a cycle to why we come to make these decisions in our life.
31:38
[SPEAKER_02]: And maybe it all does turn out all right.
31:40
[SPEAKER_02]: And despite the limited knowledge that we might have at any given moment, and the decisions that we make out of the limited knowledge.
31:47
[SPEAKER_02]: But it's like she closed her eyes and saw the world with her heart.
31:53
[SPEAKER_01]: more and more and I want to just operate out of that and not second guess.
31:56
[SPEAKER_01]: I know because also you look at someone like dolly and I've always thought like somehow she just never missed step.
32:02
[SPEAKER_01]: She's just magically perfect and I also been watching so many videos and interviews and she was like
32:08
[SPEAKER_01]: No, I failed all the time.
32:10
[SPEAKER_01]: I just don't let the failure or the thing that didn't work out that I tried stop me because I don't think of it as failure.
32:17
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm learning and gaining from every single thing.
32:20
[SPEAKER_01]: And also she was like, I had everything to gain and nothing to lose the way that I grew up.
32:25
[SPEAKER_01]: So I'm just always going to keep trying.
32:28
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm never failing.
32:29
[SPEAKER_01]: Like,
32:30
[SPEAKER_01]: Again, a reminder of, yeah, she's a human.
32:33
[SPEAKER_01]: You sat down and asked her million questions.
32:35
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm sure there were so many times where she was like, if I could go back, I would have maybe done something differently.
32:40
[SPEAKER_01]: But she, maybe she never would have said that because she'd be like, why did what I did?
32:44
[SPEAKER_01]: And I learned from it.
32:45
[SPEAKER_01]: Even if it was deemed a failure, but
32:48
[SPEAKER_01]: All of that stuff is so hard to grow enough to feel comfortable and confident.
32:55
[SPEAKER_01]: And some of us really just are, I think she was probably just born with a lot of magical self-security in her self-security and maybe or maybe she like learns that because of how she grew up in the self-reliance and who knows, but she's an incredible example for all of us.
33:13
[SPEAKER_02]: She's a mystery.
33:14
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
33:15
[SPEAKER_02]: What a profound person.
33:17
[SPEAKER_01]: I know we're like nearing the end, but I wanted to go back to something you mentioned in the very beginning about your teaching, the songwriting class because you said your whole life you had sworn that you would never teach and how inspiring it's been.
33:33
[SPEAKER_01]: I wonder if you could share more about that, of what was the rejection of teaching for you?
33:39
[SPEAKER_02]: I think firstly it's because I just always would rather be the student, maybe I would like ownership over the messiness of being a student, but the reason that I loved teaching was I was like, oh, that is what this is still.
33:53
[SPEAKER_02]: You are the student with the loudest microphone for this period of time, and I just think teachers are
33:59
[SPEAKER_02]: have such a profound respect for them in the light of this experience because there was so much research that was done on my part and so much rolling over ideas and deleting and resurrecting and moving things around.
34:11
[SPEAKER_02]: I was so dizzy in a wonderful way, but to imagine teachers who do this on the daily and then they have students who are in the most triggered place of their life.
34:21
[SPEAKER_02]: College students just being like, yeah, I disagree with you.
34:25
[SPEAKER_02]: And I think this is bullshit.
34:26
[SPEAKER_02]: I can't even imagine the type of fortitude and kindness that it takes to sit there and go, okay, yeah, well, what's your perspective?
34:34
[SPEAKER_02]: You have no experience at all, but I would love to hear you out, you know, like, and this experience was not like that in any way, but I just was so afraid and resistant to look like an idiot, or like, I didn't know what I was talking about.
34:45
[SPEAKER_02]: And I was like,
34:46
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, all I have to do is talk about things that I do know.
34:50
[SPEAKER_02]: They're not instructions.
34:51
[SPEAKER_02]: They're ideas.
34:52
[SPEAKER_02]: And that's how songs work.
34:53
[SPEAKER_02]: That's how life works.
34:55
[SPEAKER_02]: Like, I don't ever want to tell anyone what's in sync.
34:58
[SPEAKER_02]: Or I don't ever want to give advice.
35:01
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, I have experience.
35:02
[SPEAKER_02]: But it's like, I'll talk about that if I'm asked.
35:05
[SPEAKER_02]: And I think that perspective shifts everything for me.
35:08
[SPEAKER_02]: And I still feel like I got to be completely myself.
35:10
[SPEAKER_02]: And I didn't have to embody this professor or this teacher all of a sudden.
35:14
[SPEAKER_02]: could come to them with all of my questions too.
35:17
[SPEAKER_02]: And that was just as affirming to everyone as it was to myself.
35:21
[SPEAKER_02]: My resistance to it, I think, was also from some past experiences where people were like, you've got this, you can teach, and I was like, no, I don't.
35:28
[SPEAKER_02]: That's specific skill.
35:30
[SPEAKER_02]: And then I had fallen flat in my face at a certain time of my life trying that.
35:34
[SPEAKER_02]: And then in this context, I just had a different reframe of how to do it.
35:40
[SPEAKER_02]: And I think that's why I loved it.
35:41
[SPEAKER_01]: I love all of that because I think we can misunderstand teacher to mean authority, and especially when we're in creative endeavors that if you take on the role of teaching, there's this inherent, or at least for me, this insecurity of, do you think that I think I'm the authority on this, rather than just being a facilitator or a helper or a guide,
36:07
[SPEAKER_01]: I do a lot of songwriting, coaching and teaching, and it's hard for me to even say the word teaching because like what you were saying, it feels hard to be under the idea that you're instructing someone how to write a song, but really offering tools and permissions and coaxing and ideas, and it's such an interesting restructuring versus the kind of teacher
36:36
[SPEAKER_01]: And I think it's really beautiful and I love hearing how reciprocal your experience was too of just like you said you're the one with the loudest microphone, but you are also learning and gaining inspiration and it's just such a beautiful interaction that happens.
36:51
[SPEAKER_02]: And like the people who have taught me in my life who were not ever saying to me like I'm teaching you now, they just were showing me different perspectives, that's how I learned just like little ideas that unlocked a whole new world of ideas that were mine, but like people might like I have one person in my life name Mike Baila who is one of my favorite songwriters and
37:15
[SPEAKER_02]: every time I saw him work or we would have conversations, you would just say something that I'd be like, now I know how to do it or I know how to look for it or whatever it is.
37:23
[SPEAKER_02]: So I feel like I modeled the entire class off of just like, how can we have conversations that just inspire each other and make each other realize that we do have the power and the imagination to create the worlds that we want to say the things that we need to say and yeah,
37:44
[SPEAKER_02]: being okay.
37:45
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
37:46
[SPEAKER_01]: That's amazing.
37:48
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, we'd like to be respectful of all our guests times in their days, but we do end every episode with the same question and it's kind of a choose your own adventure question.
37:58
[SPEAKER_00]: We're interested in either something that somebody has told you or that you've read absorbed along your journey that continues to keep you inspired and keep your cup full.
38:09
[SPEAKER_00]: or conversely something that you wish this 17-year-old you knew when you first started making records and touring and trying to make a career out of your creativity.
38:19
[SPEAKER_02]: I wish that my 17-year-old self knew that giving into things that gave you joy was always a good thing.
38:26
[SPEAKER_02]: I feel that way now as an adult knowing how fragile everything is.
38:31
[SPEAKER_02]: Mary Oliver says that I think the poem is called don't hesitate.
38:35
[SPEAKER_02]: That poem I think about all the time when I'm stuck or heavy or burdened it's just like life is far too fragile and short to not given to the things that make us feel whole and we resist them because we feel like they're irresponsible or we need to be adult whatever it is and it's like
38:53
[SPEAKER_02]: Now, we need to, we need to be kids too.
38:55
[SPEAKER_02]: We need to enjoy play so anyway.
38:59
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I think that that's what I wish you knew and that's what I am continuing to tell myself.
39:04
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I was gonna say, I wish the me of now knew that more frequently too.
39:08
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
39:09
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
39:11
[SPEAKER_02]: We all need to know, we all need to remind ourselves of it.
39:14
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, we have a five year old and a 21 month old and watching them is definitely a helpful reminder.
39:21
[SPEAKER_01]: But then there's the layer of, but remember to then take your time to play in the way that you want to play as an adult of like seeking the joy and the play even in music as well as you get further down the line of it being your job.
39:35
[SPEAKER_01]: Returning to that playful beginner's mind, we need those reminders a lot.
39:40
[SPEAKER_02]: Yep.
39:40
[SPEAKER_02]: They're the most important ones.
39:42
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
39:43
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
39:43
[SPEAKER_00]: Well Maddie, thank you so much for taking time this morning to sit with us and to be so open and present with us in this conversation.
39:50
[SPEAKER_00]: It was a real joy for us.
39:52
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
39:53
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you so much.
39:54
[SPEAKER_01]: Me too.
39:55
[SPEAKER_02]: Thank you guys so much.
39:56
[SPEAKER_02]: Appreciate you.
40:00
[SPEAKER_00]: We know your time is valuable and we're grateful you chose to spend this hour with us.
40:04
[SPEAKER_01]: If this conversation resonated with you, know that it is just one of many.
40:08
[SPEAKER_01]: We have an archive of over 140 conversations.
40:11
[SPEAKER_01]: So if you're looking for a way to go to next, you can find curated playlists by topic on our YouTube channel or simply scroll back in the speed to find our conversations with Rose and Cash, New York Times bestselling author, Maggie Smith, Lucius, J.D.M.E.Ferson, and many others.
40:25
[SPEAKER_00]: This show is produced by me, Mary Shaffer based with Help From A Kayla and all the music here is written, performed and produced by me as well.
40:33
[SPEAKER_01]: Our show is edited and mixed by Leland Holden at Pod Punch and we are proud members of the Bluegrass situation podcast network.
40:40
[SPEAKER_00]: Thanks for being here.
40:41
[SPEAKER_00]: We'll see you next time.