Tommy Vext on Bad Wolves, “Zombie”, Heavy Metal, Rock Music & His Journey as a Frontman | Nick Egan Times

Tommy Vext joins Nick Egan Times for a conversation about heavy metal, rock music, songwriting, touring, and his career as one of modern rock’s most recognizable vocalists.

Known worldwide as the former lead singer of Bad Wolves, Tommy gained international recognition through the band’s chart-topping success and their acclaimed rendition of Zombie, which introduced the group to a global audience. Throughout his career, Tommy has also performed with bands including Divine Heresy and Westfield Massacre, establishing himself as a powerful presence in the hard rock and heavy metal scene.

In this interview, Tommy discusses his musical journey, life on the road, the realities of the modern music industry, songwriting, recording, and the experiences that shaped his career as a vocalist and performer. He also reflects on his influences, creative process, and the dedication required to build a lasting career in rock and metal music.

With decades of experience performing in front of audiences around the world, Tommy continues to connect with fans through his music, live performances, and passion for artistic expression.

This episode explores Bad Wolves, Zombie, heavy metal, hard rock, rock music, songwriting, touring, live performance, music production, vocal performance, and the evolution of the modern rock industry.

A fascinating conversation for rock fans, metal enthusiasts, musicians, songwriters, and anyone interested in the stories behind today’s biggest rock artists.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Hi guys, thanks to this episode of Nick Egan Times. On this episode we have an awesome guest. We have Tommy Vex. Tommy is a multi-talented heavy metal singer and songwriter. Tommy's well known as a former lady vector of Bad Wolves and Restrield Massacre. Tommy's family cheering and doing amazing music. Uh welcome Tommy. Thanks for coming on the podcast. Thanks, Nick. Thanks for having me. You're welcome.

SPEAKER_00 0:21

How's it all been going over there? Uh it's okay. I mean, it's I'm in Los Angeles, so uh things are relatively normalized here. You know, uh we still have some some kind of restrictions going on as far as I think there are certain neighborhoods where restaurants and gyms are requiring COVID um passp uh, I guess vaccine passports or whatever. But most of the county is not uh is not doing that. So and you you're in what part of Australia are you in? I'm in Sydney.

SPEAKER_01 0:57

So we just recently came out of lockdown as of Monday. So we're locked down for about three or four months, or we couldn't leave our houses unless exercise.

SPEAKER_00 1:06

Uh I don't know how you guys have done it. I I feel like the like Australia's had some of the most severe lockdowns on the planet.

SPEAKER_01 1:14

Yeah, it's been crazy. It's um been extremely tough, like, to get through it. But I'm just glad personally that we're out of it, you know, go to the bar and have a drink and stuff and have dinner and just do normalized things again.

SPEAKER_00 1:26

Yeah, do you know have they said when you guys are clear for international travel and stuff?

SPEAKER_01 1:31

Uh yeah, so they're looking at um December, mid-December, um we can start travelling again. Um so that's really exciting. So definitely gonna start doing traveling and go to the States um next year. Um, the only thing is though, we've got to do still seven-day home quarantine. So for example, if you're gonna go overseas for say a week, um, and you come back, you've still got a home quarantine for seven days, so I guess you've got to lay out like if you're gonna go overseas, you want to do it for a long time, or like a little while anyway, to justify being locked up again for seven days.

SPEAKER_00 2:05

Yeah, and so are you guys do they make you quarantine at home or 'cause I saw some videos where people were staying at hotels.

SPEAKER_01 2:12

Yep, so for since we've obviously had the pandemic hit, we've always had 14 days um quarantine, and that was actually now you have to pay that out of your profit. The government subsidized it subsidized it initially, um, but then they brought in you're gonna go do quarantine and come back, you have to do 14 days inside a hotel. Um they're actually gonna remove that now because we've hit our target of currently 70% vaccination rate uh across uh New South Wales, the state that I'm in. Um and they're gonna when we do the uh international borders opening again, we're gonna have to do seven days home planting.

SPEAKER_00 2:52

Oh, okay, I got you. That's not too that's not too rough. I Hawaii was kind of doing the same thing, because I mean the the islands have to be have to be more strict about what's coming in and out, and so I I guess they were Hawaii was doing a 14-day for most of the year, and now I think it's down to a few days um with a with a negative test. So it's everywhere's different. You know, you go to Texas, like, you know, I've been I've been touring this whole year, and so, you know, Texas is just it's like nothing happened. Florida is like nothing happened. Um, you know, most the Dakotas, I think, it's it's just a lot. Like I I think that it's more I I think the nature of COVID is a little bit more scary for people who live in big cities because there's so much uh so much condensed population in one spot, and then you know, obviously people who live in cities and public transportation is a higher uh possibility of people getting sick, so it's just been interesting to see the different places how it's affected people differently.

SPEAKER_01 3:59

Hundred percent. So even um in Australia, we can we're actually but there's actually it's gonna happen. We'll be able to travel overseas, so for example, I'd be able to come to the States in after mid-December if I wanted to, but I wouldn't be able to go to Queensland, which is another state, because they're fully blocked it off from um any travel into state within Australia. It's just crazy how it's all every state and every place has its own, I guess, um, procedure of what can come in and what can't get out.

SPEAKER_00 4:28

Yeah, I mean I have friends who live in Melbourne and and they said they they had like over two hundred days of lockdown. It's crazy, yeah. Yeah, I I I don't even that's almost a year, you know. That's lose a whole year of your life inside. It's like kind of crazy.

SPEAKER_01 4:45

Yeah, they've got the record for the longest, um the longest place on the planet for having lockdown, you know, um since the pandemic's gone.

SPEAKER_00 4:52

Yeah. I I've saw I've seen there's been some on on the on Instagram and Facebook people have been posting there's been like some pushback and like peop like I think it was the the construction workers' union, like they want to go back to work and you know. It's a weird time.

SPEAKER_01 5:10

What a time to be alive. Um how has I guess on a personal and I guess your professional um lot, how has the pandemic affected you?

SPEAKER_00 5:21

Uh I mean a lot. I've I mean, you know, I've s I'm in in the the next two weeks I go into uh I'm in a lawsuit. I sued my record label and um and my former business partner in Bad Wolves over discrimination and um uh uh um a multitude of different things. We had very uh a difference of political opinions, and then they kind of went about trying to separate me from the band in a way that was illegal, and they got caught. So we're trying to hammer all those details out in court in the next two weeks, because those guys they want to move, you know, they want to put out a record with another singer. They actually stole a bunch of my songs, which is another thing that we're kind of arguing over, because the band's in Badwolves, nobody in the band plays on the records except me and the drummer. So there's uh we have a studio guitar player named Max that does a lot of the heavy writing, and then I work with a couple other different producers on on the songs that are kind of autobiographical about my life. So there's been a huge issue since the company and the band is is more like nine inch nails, so it's it's affected a lot, you know, and it's it's you know, I've been very outspoken. I have, you know, my opinions and stuff, uh and I respect everyone else's beliefs, and I think that the problem f in America in 2020 is we didn't have enough open dialogue. Um, and obviously our election, it was like, you know, you guys watched it as like one of the craziest election years in our modern history. Um so it was very divisive, you know. I think people got too invested in what party instead of what was best for the country, you know.

SPEAKER_01 7:14

Yeah, for sure. Where where do you see the United States um at it going into the future with everything's happening?

SPEAKER_00 7:23

What do I think's gonna happen? I think that uh I think China's gonna be the new world power eventually. I think it's a matter of time. Um, I think that our country is I think Joe Biden is is uh I don't think that it's fair that he is being pushed to do all this stuff and and uphold office because I think it's obvious that he's he's in his older years and he needs he needs to be in care. You know, and and I get it, you know, it's an honor to become the president, but you have to kind of decide on taking care of your health and living out the rest of your years uh, you know, in a way that's peaceful to you than than um constantly having this guy who's you know, I think it's obvious to everyone in the world that, you know, we know he's not in charge, but they that they should have some decency and l and let him have a rest. You know, he's he did his time. He's he was you know, he's a vice president, he's been in politics for forty years, like he he deserves a rest. It's enough is enough, you know. So I I think that other countries like Russia and China are looking at us as very weak now as a result of Joe Biden's mental and emotional um uh just his state, you know, so and then I you know, obviously I don't think he'll make it through the four terms, and we'll have to pray that Kamala Harris does a good job for the nation, uh, but there's kind of a bit of a you know, there's a there's a lot of a lack of faith in the Democrats because they promised a lot of things and didn't deliver any. And they've kind of been making matters worse and worse and worse and worse. So you know, we'll see. We'll see what happens.

SPEAKER_01 9:11

Yeah, that's really insightful. Thanks for sharing. Alright, let's just um jump straight into it. Talk to me about well, take us back to where you grew up and how I guess you got into the heavy metal scene and even how you got the name Tommy Bex. How did all that transpire?

SPEAKER_00 9:27

Uh, well, I mean, I grew up in South Brooklyn. Um, you know, my I'm I'm a twin and my brother and I, our mom was a crackhead and she abandoned us when we were born, and so uh we wound up getting uh we got we both got adopted together, so we got to grow up together, so that was uh advantageous to a degree. And um, you know, my father was a Vietnam veteran, my mom was a stay-at-home uh stay-at-home mom. And we live in South Brooklyn, and you know, we didn't have very much. You know, my dad was a working-class guy, he was a janitor trying to feed a family, and he I think I inherited his work ethic. He'd sometimes work two and three jobs just to just to make ends meet and to get us by. And then uh I found music like my cousins were into Metallica and Pantera, and I started getting into that, and I liked grunge, and then obviously I've I'm from the birthplace of hip-hop, so everybody was into rap. So, you know, music just took a big form of my life, and I think, you know, it's like I call it the 1994 effect, because in 1994 almost all like you know, the downward spiral from 90s nails came out, Ready to Die, Biggie Smalls came out, um Far Beyond Driven from Pantera came out, Machine Ed's Burned My Eyes, Korn's debut album, you know, Fear Factory dropped in manufacture. So like all these kind of um, you know, legacy albums all seemed to pop out at the same time. Marilyn Manson released uh um Portrait of American Family that year. So it was kind of like in the you know, there was still MTV still played music too. They didn't just have TV shows. And so uh, you know, all that stuff kind of I got, you know, enraveled in in the mixed culture of of music. And I had uh my my aunt and uncle lived next to a kid who had a band and they played in his garage and one day I went over there and auditioned and I joined the band and been going ever since.

SPEAKER_01 11:43

Wow, that's incredible. That's incredible, especially where you come. What about um the groups that you've been in? Obviously, um where you where I guess where you became obviously into the heavy metal scene where the band and when you joined those groups, how'd they transpire?

SPEAKER_00 12:02

Uh boy I mean I did bands pretty much my whole entire adolescence, and then when I was about twenty-four, I joined a band called Divine Heresy, and I had auditioned online, and they lived in California, and it was uh Dino from Fear Factory, Tim the drummer Morbid Angel, and Joe from Nile. So they were all like very extreme death metal background guys, and I was more of a metal core like Kill Switch and Pantera influence, you know, and Fear Factory and Mishiva and stuff. So I I wound up going to California. I literally, you know, packed a bag and I had 300 bucks saved up and and then moved to California like a 24-year-old would. You know, and I got jobs and I I got jobs working in nightclubs and I slept in my friend's closet at his house because that was the only place that he had for me to sleep. And uh we made a record and then Divine Heresy came out and uh we got signed to Roadrunner, and that was the first time I went to Australia. So we we got booked to play um Soundway Festival in 2008. And so we came out there on that tour, and uh things that band didn't really last too long. Me and the the guitar player really butted heads a lot, and this was before I got sober, and so I was drinking and and I was just not in a good spot, and we wanted to get into a fight, and basically I w I left that band. And then I joined another band called Snot, and Snot was a band from the nineties that I'd gone I grew up going to see, and the singer had died, went straight. He had died in a car accident in 1998, so now it was 2008 and it was the ten-year anniversary. So I auditioned for that band. I I was such a fanboy, like I already knew every word, and I went to the auditions and I I booked that j that gig and uh and then went on just went on tour from there. And that one of the the guitar players in the band had been sober for seven years at the time, he's sober 19 years now. And, you know, he I think he recognized that like my drinking and drugging was a serious problem, and about a year of being in the band, I asked him for help, and and that's kind of how, you know, that was twelve years ago. And uh that's how I got into recovery, and that really changed my life a lot. You know, and I changed I I basically took my first year of recovery off from the music industry and uh I got a year silver. I wound up moving back to New York City to try to be s be more of service and more available for my family. And um, you know, in September of 2010 I was actually murdered during a home invasion. So, uh there's a song on the Bad Wolves record called Remember When, and the video was shot by Wayne Isham, um, who's worked with like Backstreet Boys and Michael Jackson and Brivy Spears, and it was it's an autobiographical story about what happened because um it was my twin brother who was strung out on drugs that assaulted me and almost killed me. And so he uh beat me with a crowbar, uh broke my left arm, fractured my skull, and my spleen was uh ruptured. And so uh I died in the ER, they brought me back to life, I had emergency surgery, and uh it was just kind of a wild ride from there. And then I can't and then I wound up, you know, going through that whole process. I stayed sober. Um, you know, my brother unfortunately is serving 20 years for attempted murder in prison, and uh, we never really reconciled after all that. And I moved back to California to start a nonprofit organization, started doing snot shows again, went in the studio with Bill from Trans Siberian Orchestra, made the Westfield Massacre record, went on tour with that. Five Finger Death Punch called me. They asked me if I could if I was still in in in that whole interim, I became a public speaker and then I became a uh drug and alcohol counselor. So when I wasn't touring, I ran a men's rehab facility in Santa Monica called Madden House, and I was doing sober coaching, so I I got to work with actually a couple of like really high A-list celebrities, and I lived with them and helped them get through their first 30 to 60 days clean. And so that job funded all my recording projects. And then Five Finger Death Punch called me. I remember Zoltan called me in in April of of 2017 and asked if I was still doing sober coaching, because we'd we'd gone we've known each other for probably 15 years. And I said, Yeah, and they asked me to come hang out with Ivan and and try to help him get sober. And so I said, Okay. So I wound up going on tour with Fivefinger. Uh we went on tour for a month together, and uh Ivan was really having a hard time, and you know, we went out, we came back home for a couple weeks and then went to Europe, and a few days into the European tour, he he had cut drank so much he had to go to the hospital. So the band was in this position where they either had to cancel the tour or find somebody to fill in, and since I already was a s a heavy metal singer, they were like, Alright, can you just do it? So I basically had a few days to learn all the songs, and then uh all of a sudden I was like singing in Five Hangard Death Horns like So I went from playing the bike room to, you know, playing with Lincoln Park at Hellfest in front of two hundred and fifty thousand people. You know, that's incredible, that's amazing. Yeah, so and then um and Bad Wolves was like one of my it was a uh like a music project that I'd been working on uh with John from Devil Driver and he and the and the studio guitar player Max Karen, uh who's he actually is a guitar tech for Faith No More. And so, um the record label was so impressed with the way that I took over for the shows that they s they signed me, and uh Westville Massacre and I wind up s wound up parting ways and I did Bad Wolves full time, and then so Bad Wolves got the record deal. And um, you know, I had recorded a version of Zombie and I brought that in and the Dan Wade at the record label was friends with Dolores and sent it to her, and then she wanted to sing on it, and most as most people know, the story with Zombie that you know, Dolores was scheduled to record the song uh and she flew to we flew her to London and she actually died the night before she was scheduled to record tragically. So, you know, we got I got the call the next morning and you know, I talked to the label and we had a decision to make of whether we should, you know, shelf the song or put it out and you know I told them I don't I don't want any money, like it doesn't f like it doesn't feel like like this is the right thing to do unless we give all the money to our kids. So that's what we did. We started a trust and all the proceeds from the recordings uh that I would have made, I donated to her children. And then the song went wound up going viral and then you know, it's million millions and millions of copies later and you know, billions of streams. Um you know, and then it was uh it was the biggest rock song in I think in twelve years when it came out in 2018, it was the the most old single in rock in the past twelve years.

SPEAKER_01 20:33

Wow, that's incredible. I mean, I love that song too, that is the dumb zombie like it's amazing, mate, like it's a really incredibly dumb as well. I really like that. Thanks, man, I appreciate it. What are um what are some of the key learnings that I guess you've taken out of your career so far that really stand out for you?

SPEAKER_00 20:53

Um, I mean, unfortunately I've learned that, you know, and I've I've own I've had my own business before, so you know, when I was a sober coach, I wound up opening up my own company, and then I took on other coaches and put them with clients and managed them, and I think the music industry, how it's different is it's the only business where you're allowed to be ripped off, and it's everyone's like, oh, it's like not a big deal. You know, and so unfortunately the artists are normally not business savvy, and so they get taken advantage of, and there are a lot of backdoor deals, and you know, lawyers in will s will work as AR, and then they'll be, you know, trying to get their artists to sign with a label, but it's in their own best interest because they're getting paid on the side to go scout out on, you know, and it's just like a lot of shady shit that goes on. So the the record labels will spend money from your budget thinking. you don't know that you have to pay it back and they c and they kind of in order to control the artists they they keep you in debt so they make a debt racket so you're kind of never okay so you keep happening to go in the studio you can never really take a vacation or take a break um and that's just kind of how they they put people to work so it's it's not um I I wouldn't recommend it you know as somebody who's had you know gold and platinum and and diamond and double platinum success I still would not recommend it because I when I I the funny thing was is I I left when the band split in January I you know I focused on starting a merchandise company and and then uh I did a GoFundMe to fund my album and in in the first three months of the 2021 I I had brought in more money than four years of being on a major label. It's that severe the the financial extraction um you know and the the problem is is that the psychology of the managers and the labels in in this in particular Better Noise Music is that they they kind of abuse you and then expect you to be grateful. So when you know accounting and and you you know you're looking at spreadsheets and you're looking at expenses and you're seeing all these mistakes being done and you're calling it out they're like well you should just be grateful. Like look at all the success we got I'm like well I provide the material that is successful. You know what I mean? So why don't I get paid you know so it it's uh it's definitely a treacherous industry you know and I I think that any any musicians that are serious about their career, I think that it would do e any artist a great deal um a great deal of service to read legal volumes on the music industry so they can get antiquated with what all the tricks and all the all the ways that they're gonna potentially attempt to take advantage of you if you're not well versed in in how the industry works.

SPEAKER_01 24:29

Yeah that's really great advice um yeah 100% that's it's really great advice. What um tell me about the process of the songs that you've written and that you're gonna obviously write in the future what makes a good song? How do you how do you get inspiration and motivation to write the song?

SPEAKER_00 24:46

Um I mean I I predominantly in in Bad Wolves um so songs like like Zombie I did with my buddy Philip Naslin who's a Swedish producer uh and we we actually put that idea together uh in 2016 and so I was sitting on it for a while and and you know I brought and then when obviously when I signed with the label I brought it to them as a potential single and they thought it was great. You know and then uh it was interesting because the band the guys in the band didn't want to have a cover on the record to begin with. And so I was kind of like if I could get her to sing on it then they'll be okay with it you know uh but then songs like Remember When uh I wrote with Drew Falk who's a uh he's a producer and and uh a songwriter Zoltan Bathory actually helped a little bit with the with the format of the song uh Sober is a song that I did with Drew Killing Me Slowly is a song that I did with Drew Hear Me Now is a song that uh the top line was written by a guy named Brandon Sammons. It originally was just piano and a vocal um and then I I I took it and redid the whole thing and then brought it to Max our studio guitar player then took it to Philip and then had Diamante sing on it. You know I'd I had played it for the CEO of the label and he wanted to you know help get his artist trajectory so we remember making it a duet. Yeah and uh there's you know there's all different ways that sometimes you know my drummer would write songs with Max and they would just send me the songs and I'll I'll sing on them but I'll also edit them because there might be too many parts or it might be meandering and kind of condense and cut the fat out and trim it because I I have a good like overview of how the song should flow. I think sometimes instrumentalists they get to inside their head when they're so close to it and the things that they think are super intricate and important to the song the average listener doesn't even know what that is you know or it or it messes with their focus or their attention. So you know there's just all different kinds of ways. Awesome what uh what inspires you daily I mean right now I mean I think everybody who's gone you know I think the the everybody who's gone through you know 2020 and 2021 can relate to you know the mental health aspect of what COVID has done to us and how we feel separated from our loved ones and you know I mean a lot for the lockdown, you know that the the definition of a lockdown is a course of action to ensure containment of prisoners. That's uh the actual w Webster's dictionary definition of a lockdown. So you know people feel like they're in prison you know and it's it's kind of it's kind of hard and I think I've always been an advocate for mental health uh you know I've I'm an attempted suicide survivor and uh anti-suicide has been a big part of my songs and a big part of my s my what I talk about on stage and I think you know I people you know when I was going through the worst times of my life it was music that pulled me through it and and the people that I looked up to that made it and so I think artists definitely have a social responsibility and I think that's just kind of what has motivated me. I I wound up making four albums during quarantine. You know I did a double covers album and then I recorded and wrote ninety percent of the new Bad Wolves record and then when the band had the split they confiscated all my songs and and got a new singer to resing them. So I went in the studio and I made a whole other record. So I just stay busy you know that's I think you know I think that uh telling the truth is the most important thing that I can do and so I try to do that with my platform. I try to do that with my music. It gets a little bit more and more difficult um you know because I I never shy away from touching on hot topics. And I think that humanity's better when we're able to have those discussions Yeah for sure.

SPEAKER_01 29:38

What's the what's the best advice you've ever received? The best advice?

SPEAKER_00 29:44

Yeah Um courage is not the absence of fear you know so it's it's like anything that you know you don't need courage to do something you're not afraid of you need courage in the face of fear and I think you know a decision to be courageous when there's a high risk builds character. It it says a lot about who you are.

SPEAKER_02 30:19

Yeah for sure.

SPEAKER_01 30:21

Tell me about um your SLA3 now and what you're currently up to Uh I mean basically I have a a few things going on.

SPEAKER_00 30:32

So you know I did I did twenty two covers in twenty twenty and we're currently fighting over who's going to you know who's gonna release them and am I gonna get them and that's uh part of the legal battle with the label as well as a bunch of songs that were written for bad wolves that they've confiscated um whether I'm gonna get ownership of those again. And then I've just been busy working on material. You know, I I wanna I just want to stretch you know I think once I'm free I won't have so many boundaries and I don't have to specifically do rock or specifically do this. There's a lot of hip hop artists that want me to do collaborations um and I and I with without a label I can col I can collaborate with whatever artists I want to. You know I've I you know I got Buster Rhymes in my DMs asking me about stuff and he's like one of my favorite rapper of all time but I can't do anything because the label has the potentiality to ruin it. You know? And so there you know unfortunately in this industry there is very slavery is very much alive and well and a lot of these CEOs view their artists as slaves and they want you to say what they want they want you to do what they want they want you to represent and speak on behalf of the views that they want and the problem is is that f as me for me coming from a work as being a working class family um and I don't have the same values as someone who was born with a with a billionaire father. I don't have the same values of someone who was born rich. The things that are important to me are not important to it's not the same as what's important to someone who's never known struggle, you know, or never known hardship and I think that it's increasingly frustrating for v people who are born with a silver spoon and have a lot of money and power and are very spoiled to understand the needs of the everyday man, woman and child because they're so separated from us. I think that's that's where the disconnect happens in the industry unfortunately really good uh insights well um you've obviously done a bit of touring what's some of the best tours and best memories you can recall so far I've had so many um I mean we uh we toured in Australia we did three shows uh with Bad Wools we did three shows with Nickelback and I had actually just been in Australia because my my ex-girlfriend's from Brisbane so I was spending a lot of off time there and I I completely fell in love with with the country and I made so many friends and you know I think uh Australia is a very special place to me. I the people are very special and I I think I I feel like Americans can learn a lot from Australians on how you guys deal with each other and treat each other and it's just a very um it's just a more easygoing place. You know I feel like people are are you know less drama and and more about what's important in life um especially versus Los Angeles so uh I definitely yeah like I definitely have great memories of Australia. I definitely loved going to Europe you know the past um the last tour that I did with Bad Wolves in Europe was with Megadeth and you know Dave is as you know uh Dave Ellison the bass player Megadeth is like a mentor of mine and Five Finger Death Punch was on the tour and you know I I had I had taken a girl that I was dating with me for two weeks on the on the European tour. She had never been to Europe so it's also exciting when you get to share stuff like that with somebody who's never been there because it makes it new all over again for you. You know and so that I think it was good you know it was I think it was cool. It was like we had a really good time it was comfortable and we got to play Wembley for the first time. You know and I I don't know I just I I think too like in 2020 in April of 2020 I I played uh a small tour in Texas as a as a solo artist and I think the first show you know I hadn't stepped on a stage in in like 16 months and I broke down crying on stage you know at the end of the set I just was like so you know there was like a thousand people there. It wasn't like a big huge show but it was it was just like you could feel the energy in the room of how much people needed to be together again you know and to experience music again and to to connect. You know, we're not supposed to be separated from each other. We're not meant to be in cubicles or or live on the internet you know we we have to touch base we have to have contact.

SPEAKER_01 35:50

That's what makes our lives good we're you know we're social species. We need to be connected so I couldn't agree more with you with that that is so true. If you uh if you could go back in time and you were eighteen again and you could change anything, what would you change?

SPEAKER_00 36:08

Oh if I could change anything I mean I would have uh you know I I didn't have very much direction you know my family was a broken family and my dad uh kind of he relapsed into alcoholism when I was about 13 or 14 and then my mom uh my sister left you know and and so I kind of was like left to fend for myself and I got involved in a lot of you know bullshit to be honest you know I was hanging out in the streets with the wrong kinds of people doing the wrong kinds of things getting in trouble and I didn't have anybody older than me who cared to tell me to do better. And I think that if I could go back I probably would have given myself some structure and saved myself a lot of uh a lot of scrapes and bruises so to speak Yeah that's really good.

SPEAKER_01 37:06

And where do you see yourself contenders um what does the future look like?

SPEAKER_00 37:13

For me? Oh I don't know. We'll see I don't know. I feel like the future's so uncertain you know I think I think America's gonna have a revolutionary war. I think there's gonna be in the next year, probably in the next eighteen months to two years the I you I can feel the temperature, you know, and people are people are really, really angry and there's a lot of confusion still and uh I just think it's gonna it's bo it's boiling up. You know and the and the media has done a fantastic job in America of completely dividing the country uh to the point where, you know, they i it you know it's almost like they have there is like a whole generation of kids who hate America but they don't know anything else, you know? So it's it's kind of strange to me. So I don't know where I'll be in ten years. I'll I'll probably live in the woods in the middle of nowhere with a family and guns and farm my own vegetables like to be honest. I'm I'm just kinda like I've lived a really interesting life and I'm not an old man yet but I have like old man soul and I just like I want to be all away from everybody. I just want to work out every day and go be in nature and you know eat steak.

SPEAKER_02 38:45

That's it.

SPEAKER_01 38:47

Right. Um thanks for coming on the podcast I do appreciate it. Um I think you've done amazing things and the trajectory too everybody's doing is amazing and yeah thanks for coming on the podcast. Thanks man I really appreciate it. Uh