Episode 075 - Can’t Stay Numb: Asa Anderson on Music, Mental Health, and Feeling It All

The Sober Creative Podcast · Oct 31, 2026 · 46m · transcript

Asa Anderson grew up in an affluent neighborhood around Brentwood and the Palisades, where kids had more resources and easier access to substances. His parents divorced when he was three, and he learned early that drawing, and later music, was how he processed big feelings. He picked up the tenor saxophone in seventh grade and taught himself drums at 14. That same year, he and a friend finished 40s at the UCLA arcade before playing video games.

He studied jazz at USC and used cannabis and alcohol as a starting point for writing and performing, partly to ease stage fright. A cannabis-induced…