Melissa Etheridge: Walking the Line of Heartbreak, Spiritual Healing & Unstoppable Swagger

Rock and freaking roll in The Coop! We have none other than the Grammy- and Academy Award-winning artist, Melissa Etheridge. Known as the queen of raspy soulful anthems, passionate activism, fearless openness as a gay woman, and unforgettable live performances, Melissa breaks it all down in The Coop (including revealing that she considered her good friend, Brad Pitt, as Bio Dad for her children!). 

Melissa opens up about surviving the rollercoaster of fame, triumphing over breast cancer, and enduring the heart-wrenching loss of her son to addiction. She's emerged stronger, more spiritual, and more deeply passionate about life than ever. Packed with wisdom, grit, swagger, and that unmistakable rock and roll spirit, Melissa’s resilience and clarity make this an episode you won’t want to miss.

Follow Melissa Ethridge @melissa_etheridge to find out about her latest album, tour and incredible work. 

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This episode was produced by Kit Hoover and Harper McDonald. Our Technical Producer is Christian Brown, and this episode was edited by Christian Brown. Writing by Harper McDonald. Business Development by Casey Ladd.

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Transcript

This transcript was generated by AI. Inconsistencies may be present.

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Kit Hoover:

Welcome to the Coop with Kit. My name is Kit Hoover and I have been lucky enough in my 30 years in this business to interview some of the most iconic badass women out there. We all know that girlfriends give the best advice and they're all coming to the coop. We're talking career, marriage, kids, sex, aging, all of it. I truly believe we are just hitting our stride. Alright, my chickens, let's get into it.

Rock and freaking roll. Today on the coop, we have none other than Melissa Etheridge. She's the queen of heartfelt anthems and the powerhouse voice behind hits like Come to my window. And I'm the only one you know, Melissa, for her raspy, soulful, sound, passionate activism and unforgettable live performances. Now with her new album, I'm Not Broken, and her doc, she's back and better than ever, this badass Grammy and Academy Award-winning woman has navigated the ups and downs of fame, battled and beat breast cancer, faced unthinkable heartbreak in losing her son to addiction and emerged a stronger, deeply spiritual and more vibrant artist, wife and mother. She's full of wisdom, grit, swagger, and that unmistakable rock and roll spirit. Here is the legendary Melissa Etheridge. There she is, but

Melissa Ethridge:

All in love.

Kit Hoover:

Bring me some water. My favorite, Melissa, I got to hear this part

Harper McDonald:

Slap. I know.

Kit Hoover:

This was my jam. Melissa, sorry. Someone else is making love to you. Hi, Melissa Ether. Are we recording? Christian, we are recording. We're in. Hi my friend. Hi. This is so cool for us. One thing we do on the coop here, Melissa, we start off every episode with one word to describe where you are in your life right now.

Melissa Ethridge:

Oh, anticipation, because it's a little less than two weeks away from the release of the documentary, and I'm about four days away from starting my tour and my new album comes out just after that.

Kit Hoover:

I'm not broken. I'm

Melissa Ethridge:

Not broken, and so I am just waiting, anticipating all the yummy stuff.

Kit Hoover:

Have you always been like this with all of your albums? Like we came in with Bring me some water from 1988, my Jam. Did you feel these same feelings back then?

Melissa Ethridge:

Oh, I was a completely different person. When you're 27 or 28, you want it to happen right now. You can't wait, and I enjoy it now. I'm like, Ooh, no. Let it take its time. I'm ready for it to just reveal itself as I'm going along. But back then I wanted it all right then and

Kit Hoover:

There. By the way, I read this great article in the Activist about you and I love how they described you. They said there's a swaggering, self-confidence and a soulfulness to Etheridge. She would make a great existential cowboy. Giddy up Melissa. That is so badass cowboy.

Melissa Ethridge:

I like it. I like

Kit Hoover:

It. Well, isn't that suite when I was on your Instagram and it gives your title and it says Mother Rockstar Activist. So let's dive in to your three components. Your mom growing up, you've talked a lot about this in your book. I'm really mad at her. She did the best she could. She did the best she could. She did. Listen, that comes with age, right? That's our southern. Bless her heart, let it

Melissa Ethridge:

Go, let it

Kit Hoover:

Go. But I think what's fascinating about you is here with your mom battling alcoholism, depression, you're sexually abused by your sister. Can't even get into that. But when I'm interested in Melissa, how did you pull yourself out of that? How did you stay rooted in love?

Melissa Ethridge:

Well, my first thing I did was to fall in love with music. Music heals so much. When you're little, sometimes you don't know. You kind of think it's all your fault and you get these weird beliefs in your head. And so in the beginning it wasn't easy, but music was the way to get out of it. I could be someone else when I sang. I could give that person all this swagger and confidence, and the more I did it, the more reward I got. I started actually singing in front of people when I was 12 or 13. And so my whole high school was a little strange in that I would go on the weekends and play in these bands and bars and stuff. My father would come with me. That's so cool. Then going out in the world in Boston and Los Angeles trying to make it, trying to get signed, trying to become whatever I was going to be. Then you're living life. You're living life every day and having relationships, getting to know yourself. And it wasn't until, gosh, cancer really kind of put everything like cancer when I was like 43 because in my thirties I had this fame in the nineties and it was really big. And fame is a funny thing. It kind of comes and goes, and you're left with, wait, what was that? And I liked what I do, so I just keep doing it and kind of get away from the fame. But

Kit Hoover:

Was the light always in you? I think of some other friends of mine that have grown up up. That's the question. That's the question. Did you grow into or was always in you so that your past doesn't define your future?

Melissa Ethridge:

Oh yeah. But I think we all have that light inside of us. We all have that. Something that makes us want to make whatever we have in front of us better. I think that's what we're here to

Kit Hoover:

Do is choose. I don't think you're giving yourself enough credit. It's one thing I fell in love with in reading your story. I'm serious. I think about you as a child and you're just rooted in love. So in you that I marvel at people like you, Melissa, I really do. So I was thinking, how do you manifest gratitude?

Melissa Ethridge:

Gratitude is the key.

Kit Hoover:

Yeah,

Melissa Ethridge:

Gratitude is absolutely the key. You have to change your beliefs. Your beliefs are things like I said, that come from experiences in our childhood. Some of us have trauma inside of us, some of has just beliefs that we don't even know are there. And once you start saying, I'm having this experience, nobody else is having it but me and I can't make someone else's experience for them, everyone's in charge of that. They're all doing their own choices. And once you get yourself out of it, then it makes it easier to go, oh, well, there's things I can be grateful for. Because the act of being grateful brings on a feeling that then you can put more gratitude on and it grows. And

Kit Hoover:

Before

Melissa Ethridge:

You manifest know it manifest. Yeah. You're manifesting that and you're learning to instantly when you look at something, instead of judging it going, what can be fearful for me? What's going to hurt me? You look for, oh, what can I be grateful for? And then that's how you turn your life around because you don't give your manifesting power any momentum for scary, fearful things.

Kit Hoover:

Did you hear that listener? See there goes my badass existential cowboy right there. I'm not kidding. I'm not kidding. I'm putting that on a T-shirt for you. And then you're a mom yourself. Did you always want to be a mom, Melissa?

Melissa Ethridge:

Nope. No, it was not. It was on my radar. I knew very young that I was gay. I mean, I pretty much figured out at 15 or 16, but even before that, my mother was not your mothering kind of person. She was very intelligent. She did the best she could.

Kit Hoover:

She did the best she could. We'll just keep saying that. She did the best she could,

Melissa Ethridge:

But there wasn't a whole lot of mothering going on. So I didn't feel the desire to, Ooh, I really want to mother someone because I didn't know mothering. And then, oh, I'm gay. Well that takes care of that. I'm not going to have kids. And then in the nineties came and all of a sudden the gays were talking about marriage and things and my partner was like, Hey, I want to have a baby. And I went, really? Oh, this is interesting. And I was a little afraid that I wouldn't know how to mother, but man, once you start, there's no turning back. You're a mom.

Kit Hoover:

I love this story, Melissa. And you wrote about it in your book and you've talked about it. I love how honest you are with everything. Me, I've covered sports and I cover celebrities and everybody's so hidden in private and you're like, yep. And David Crosby's the sperm donor. Yes. Okay. You're in Hawaii, you're on a family vacation with the Crosbys. Tell me what you're wearing, where you're sitting, what you're drinking, what you're smoking, how this conversation came about.

Melissa Ethridge:

Okay, so before then, my partner at the time, we had decided, you know what? We want to have children. And one of the things was she had been adopted and she didn't know who her parents were and she didn't want her children to not know who their father was. They didn't need to be in their lives.

Kit Hoover:

Oh, that's interesting. Yes.

Melissa Ethridge:

Yeah, she just wanted them to know. So the idea of just an anonymous sperm donor wasn't in the cards for her. And I understood that. And so we had to start thinking, and my rule was, well, it has to be someone who doesn't want to father this doesn't want to be a parent in this childhood.

Kit Hoover:

No, it's going to be you and your partner. Yes. But we can know that. Yeah.

Melissa Ethridge:

So that's when we ruled out. My good friend Brad Pitt, he really wanted children. Hang

Kit Hoover:

On a minute. I always thought, by the way, my name is Kit. Of course. I thought Kit Pitt had a great ring, Melissa. It didn't happen. Come on. Okay. Wait. Did you ever talk about it with Brad? I know you sang it as wedding. We would joke. Yeah,

Melissa Ethridge:

We would joke about it. And I would say people would say, well, Melissa, what's Brad Pitt to you? I'd say the father of my children. And I would joke around it because he was kind of that friend at the time, and doesn't everyone want to have children with one of the most handsome men in the world? But I knew how much he wanted children, and I was like, he's going to be weigh

Kit Hoover:

Want too much of an involvement. Of

Melissa Ethridge:

Course, my daughter's like, I could have looked

Kit Hoover:

Like Brad. Haley's like, hang on mom. That's right. Wait, first of all, how did that friendship come about? I know you performed at Brad and Jen's wedding, but I don't even know how the friendship started.

Melissa Ethridge:

In my twenties when my first album came out, the first girlfriend I had had worked on her, well, her husband had worked in the film industry, so she had a connection of a lot of these young actors and actresses, and two of them were, one was Dermot Mulroy and Catherine Keener. They were a couple. And when you're 27, 28 and you don't have any kids and you get together with your friends all the time, and Catherine was doing this low budget movie nobody really ever heard of with this actor that came from Missouri. And she said, Hey, it's his birthday. He's a big fan of yours. Will you sing him Happy Birthday. My first album was out and his name is Brad. So I sang to him when he was on the set and he was all excited. So when he came back home to la, I met him and we started hanging out and it was cool. He knew I was gay, and he sometimes really beautiful men, they really enjoy just hanging with a woman that has no interest in them and it's really a great relationship. And so we were just a group of young Hollywood. It was a cool group for that time from

Kit Hoover:

1980. Who else was in the group? I mean, this is the most badass group of all time.

Melissa Ethridge:

Yeah, no, no. It was amazing. It was Dert, Catherine, the Phoenix brothers River Phoenix at the time was still alive. And gosh, Megan Mully was, she was just this girl, a lot of people that were just trying really hard to get in at the time. Ellen DeGeneres was a good friend of mine and Rosie, they were just standup comedians, Benjamin Brat, he would come, by God, people would drop in and out. There was just a real nice core of people that for about six years we all hung together. Then we all got really famous.

Kit Hoover:

You all hit, I mean, there wasn't an egg sucker in the bunch. I mean this is unbelievable. In the mid nineties

Melissa Ethridge:

Just went bang. And it was really fun. It was great to see everybody.

Kit Hoover:

I think there needs to be a reunion that is super cool. Cool. It was

Melissa Ethridge:

A special time, but then we actually went on a separate vacation to Hawaii, but it happened to be the same island that David and Jan were on.

Kit Hoover:

Oh, so you weren't even with them, they just happened to be

Melissa Ethridge:

There. No, we weren't. We weren't. But they said, Hey, we were at this hotel and they were actually staying in Hanae Bay in the same area. And they said, why don't you come see us? So we kayaked over to

Kit Hoover:

Them with the idea to talk about this or no,

Melissa Ethridge:

With the

Kit Hoover:

Idea to just hang with them. Just hang out. Okay.

Melissa Ethridge:

They were hanging and they just had their son Django, and we were ooh and ing over the baby and it just sort of came out, Hey, we are also thinking about having children and we're thinking about donors. And Johan, David's wife said, well, what about David? And I was like, are you offering up your husband's

Kit Hoover:

What this night's about to get really interesting. I know.

Melissa Ethridge:

So it was like, okay. But it's like, well, well think about that. Well that's really great. And so we sort of went away and the more we thought about it, he's a musician, he's an artist, and he's close enough that he's okay with just being bio dad, which is what Bailey calls him. And also he has his own children. He's got more than even knows about and it fit. And I was like, wow. And at the time we weren't going to tell anybody. But then after Beckett was born, my second and also by David Paparazzi was getting kind of intense and I just didn't want my kids to go to preschool and someone hanging out, I go, who's your daddy? Something like that.

Kit Hoover:

So I was like, the way you handled it was perfect, and what a great story and what a great part of your life he was. And it's just awesome. And how would your kids, Melissa, describe you?

Melissa Ethridge:

Oh my God. Well, I'm listed. I was listed in Beckett and Bailey's, the iPhone. They had me in the address book under big popup. So yes to do with the rap song. It was crazy. I was like, okay. But that's the energy they've always felt is that they're safe with me. They know that I'm funny, they can joke with me, but they know that I'm there for them. And they've never once complained that I wasn't there when they needed me.

Kit Hoover:

Do they like your music?

Melissa Ethridge:

Some Miller, my son, he doesn't want to know anything about. He's 17-year-old boys. Not many of 'em are my fans

Kit Hoover:

By the way. So I have a 17-year-old son and I was playing, bring me some water and we were rocking out in the kitchen,

Melissa Ethridge:

So sometimes I can get him that way. But if it was you singing, he would not like it because it's your mom. But the girls, they are fans of my music and that's really nice.

Kit Hoover:

Well, you and I talked when we were together on set about your son Beckett, and there's so much to learn from this. And before we get in, you lost him to opioid addiction. And on that note, I think you and I spoke about that day, addiction waits for nobody. I've lost family members to it, but I want to know, tell me what made Beckett sparkle? What made him shine? Oh,

Melissa Ethridge:

Beckett. Beckett was a Scorpio and someone once described him as when he is happy, the whole room was happy. But when he was sad, the whole room was, you knew it. He was one of those people that man, he loved his brothers and sisters. He should have been born as a mountain man. He should have been born to fight the elements. He had that soul and it was tough for him in the cities. He really didn't like the cities, but we would go fishing and he would go snowboarding and he would go mountain biking. That's why I kept trying to get him to Colorado and let him really be with the other mountain man in Colorado and everything. He wasn't much for school. I'm sure if 20 years ago I thought about it and had him tested, he'd be somewhere on some spectrum or something. Organized school just drove him mad. It's

Kit Hoover:

Not for everybody. Yeah,

Melissa Ethridge:

He would look out the window even as a child and young child just couldn't do it. And he wanted so much, but it's called something. But it's when you look at something that needs to be done and it seems so far away that you can't even get started. And he would never be able to do that.

Kit Hoover:

He couldn't start the momentum with it.

Melissa Ethridge:

He couldn't start anything that he felt might be hard, but he was so delightful. He would make us laugh and laugh and laugh. He was amazing.

Kit Hoover:

For anybody dealing with a child with addiction, is there any advice, any sage advice you could share or anything you'd like to tell yourself going through it that you wish you had done differently?

Melissa Ethridge:

I don't know. It's the hardest thing you'll ever go through.

Kit Hoover:

It's the unimaginable.

Melissa Ethridge:

It tears you up inside because this is your young adult, your young who's still a child to you. The only thing I could say is you have to take care of yourself. You cannot be any help to anyone else. If you yourself are depleted and constantly worrying, constantly trying to fix it for your child is such a stress. It will make you sick. It'll make you sick and you'll be sick. And then your other children or your partner will suffer. Everyone's going to suffer. The family suffers so much when someone's going through this because it's like, well, we need to be away from this, but I love this person. It's really, really hard.

Kit Hoover:

I dunno if you talked about or wrote about it, but I love how you described now sort of navigating the grief that you like to focus on, the positive and the good memories when you feel closest to him and if you focus on the death or the addiction, you feel further away from him. Can you elaborate on that? I have a friend who just dealt with this and I just wanted to share that with her because I think that's so poignant.

Melissa Ethridge:

Yeah. I have a deep belief that we are our spiritual beings and we're all having a human experience. We're all physical, but we have something, people call it soul, spirit source, whatever we are. This being inside this physicalness. Now when this physical, I call it a meat suit, when it is done, when it expires, your soul does not. Your soul is eternal. And I believe that. I don't know the way to describe it, but I believe that there is a physical manifested reality that we are in, that we are experiencing through these meat suits. And then there's also a nonphysical space, which is actually more than this reality that we're creating and experiencing. But that nonphysical place is a place with no resistance and there is no, there's no conflict. And it's all love. And there's the pain that we know in this focus because this focus is duality. It's good and bad, and it's these two things so we can experience it. The non-physical where everyone is, that's just love. So the only time I can vibrate with that non-physical experience, my father, my son, my son, my mother, now my grandmother, all these beloved people is to vibrate with love. And that's remembering and bringing them in. And that's when they're the closest because they don't have the grief anymore. They're are out of pain. The struggle. Pain does not exist

Kit Hoover:

There. I like to think of Beckett up in heaven with your dad. Oh yeah.

Melissa Ethridge:

Oh yeah.

Kit Hoover:

They're fishing. They're fishing, they're

Melissa Ethridge:

Biking, they're walking, running

Kit Hoover:

Wild in the mountains. What about Melissa, you talked about shame. How do you let go of any shame that might creep in for somebody that loses a child to addiction?

Melissa Ethridge:

Well, the big part that really helped me get through is that I had been sick before. I had had breast cancer 20 years ago, cancer free now 20.

Kit Hoover:

I hate effing cancer. I hate it so much. I really do.

Melissa Ethridge:

And yet we're figuring it out more and more what it is. And stress has a big part in it. I know now when I stress myself and shame is big, big. And it was big while back. It was alive. I was ashamed that he couldn't stay in high school. I was ashamed that he got kicked out. It's like, what are people going to think about me? And when you start worrying about what other people think about you, you're lost. You are lost in shame. That's not going to work. And it's hard because we were raised being told to care about what other people think about you. But 20 years ago, I put it in my head, what other people think about me is none of my

Kit Hoover:

Business, none of my business. And you're one that you really practice what you preach. So anybody that can take a little nugget away from that, I just appreciate because it works. Because it works. Okay. I want to talk about your career, but you got discovered if my facts are correct, a mile from where I live, Melissa, I live in Pasadena. So you got discovered, was it Vernon's? What was the name? Harper S Vermins Bar. Give me what you're wearing, your foxy hairstyle and what do you remember about that night? I

Melissa Ethridge:

Had a mullet.

Kit Hoover:

It was kind of a spiky mullet. It was good.

Melissa Ethridge:

Yeah. Yeah, it was good. And I loved it. And I really wish I could wear it for the rest of my life because it kept hair out of my face. One, you shave the side and you've got all spiky spi counter. We loved it, but man, I knew how to do it and I could do it up and I look great. And man, when it went away, I was like, wait, what am I going to do with my

Kit Hoover:

Hair now? I got this gorgeous blonde hair, bring it back.

Melissa Ethridge:

But it was the 1980s and I got discovered in like 86, but my album didn't come out until 88. So man, it was eighties. It was vintage clothes. We were thrifting before anybody knew what thrifting was. And I was just that sort of off the beaten path, lesbian singer. But I was really against the lesbian song

Kit Hoover:

Folks on C that that was not me. Folksy. Folksy. No, no. I was rock. You're bringing it in. You're having fun. So when you got discovered, was there ever a time any music execs or anybody tried to put you in a box? Is there anything that they were not ready for your or told you to be something else?

Melissa Ethridge:

I was turned down by almost every single record company turned me down because they had to go out to the women's bar to see me play. Interesting. And they were always men, always men. One guy would come out and then he'd bring another the next weekend and they'd talk about it. And then like Warner Brothers and a and m and EMI, they all Virgin too. I'm like, oh, this is going great, going great. And then they would bring the head guy and then they would all go, no, we don't hear a hit song.

Kit Hoover:

Please, please. I don't know. It

Melissa Ethridge:

Might be the drunk lesbians around you. I'm not sure. But it just over and over what happened until finally Chris Blackwell walks into a woman's bar. It's not a joke, but he walks into the bar and he sees me and he sees me sing four songs. I take a break and go over to, he goes, I don't know why you're not signed. I'm going to sign you to my label right then and there it was just boom.

Kit Hoover:

During that time, did you ever get discouraged and think, I'm not going to do this anymore. It's in your soul.

Melissa Ethridge:

Yeah, I got discouraged. It was the only thing I knew, and I was making enough to make a living so I didn't have to do anything else. I didn't have to. So I was like, I'm just going to do this in a bar, singing my whole life. Great. I'll be singing and that makes me happy.

Kit Hoover:

When do you write, Melissa? What's your process? For me over here, I don't have a musical bone in my body. So for me it's magic. How do you create this? Do you set a time to do it or just comes to you sporadically? Morning night. How do you do it?

Melissa Ethridge:

Before I had children, I would write all day long. I would write in the bus. I would have a guitar on my bed all the time, and I would just write all through my twenties and early thirties. Then I had children and it takes up a lot of your time. And I had to start planning out. So now I actually go through phases. I haven't written a whole album in about five years, which has been the longest I've ever gone. I've written a song here and there, so I have to make time. And that's like from 10 to two, I'm like, this is my time. I'm in here working. Leave me alone. You can't.

Kit Hoover:

I'm not. So, wow. So is it always flow for you or

Melissa Ethridge:

No, but I let it be. Okay. If it's not flowing. I don't ever think of it as writer's block. I just think that I haven't made myself in the mood enough. I'm not aligned enough with a good feeling to be able to write. So I don't ever force myself if it's not there. After about half an hour, I leave and I say, okay, I'm available now.

Kit Hoover:

If you had to think of your career before we get to your new album and the docuseries, what would be the rose and Thorn of your career?

Melissa Ethridge:

Oh,

Kit Hoover:

I know my Rose. Don't get me going on the inauguration. When you came out with that bald head, Melissa, I was going bananas. The Grammys. The Grammys.

Melissa Ethridge:

The Grammys, yes. That's what I was trying to pick between that when I sang with Bruce Springsteen on Unplugged.

Kit Hoover:

Remember how great unplugged was? God, that was awesome.

Melissa Ethridge:

And this documentary too, but that hasn't happened yet. So those I'm really, really proud

Kit Hoover:

Of. Okay. Wait, so the Grammys, tell me about that moment.

Melissa Ethridge:

Well, I had been diagnosed in October of 2004, and then I started chemotherapy treatment in November. So I was doing chemo November and December was long. It was horrible. It was stage three, it was just hideous. And I was like, I can't do this anymore. And I finally stopped my chemo treatments. I was like, my chemo's going to kill me. I didn't have any cancer in me. It was just the prophylactic chemo and it was just really horrible. So the day that I had said that, the next day I got a call from the producers of the Grammys who said they're doing a tribute to Janis Joplin and they wanted me to do it. And it was like in two weeks. And I was like, okay, well tell 'em I'm going to be bald because I don't have any hair and I might be a little weak.

I had to start radiation. So the morning of the show, I went and got radiation. What? Yeah, and then I went to the rehearsal and I rehearsed, and then I got up and did it with stone, and I just didn't want anyone to laugh at me of my head. And then I didn't realize no one was laughing, didn't realize, I know nobody was laughing at all. And I'll tell you, it's still to this day, people come up to me and say things about that performance and how they saw it or their mother. And a couple years ago, I was in Barnes and Noble and I was headed up to the desk that they help you find the book at. And there was a man talking to someone, and right next to him was a young teenager, probably 12, 13 years old in a wheelchair. And she had bald hair. And I feel so, especially a young person going through it. And I just leaned down and I said, Hey, I don't know what I said, but the father turned and looked and saw me and he said, oh, hey Celia, that's the woman from the video I showed you.

Kit Hoover:

And I love that. Didn't even That's the woman. You're the woman. Oh yeah. Wow. See, there we go again. Badass existential cowboy. Okay. Do you see the through line? And by the way, I love that I confuse the two stories. I love the Bill Clinton inauguration where you came out with the bad, bad, that's your life. It's like, okay. It's like there's so much, Melissa, there's so much. I'm like, I'm all over the map. Okay, wait. So for that moment for the inauguration, was it even planned or did you just get caught up? Take me inside.

Melissa Ethridge:

Well, that was, so it's 1992 and my third album is kind of running its course. And I had been doing some interviews with people and they would change the pronouns to my boyfriend. And I was like, I didn't say

Kit Hoover:

That.

Melissa Ethridge:

I was always trying to be real vague and wasn't gender specific. And I just started thinking, man, this is wearing me out. I want to be out. But especially because I had some great friends that were leaders in the gay and lesbian community. They were the ones that were

Kit Hoover:

Leading the

Melissa Ethridge:

Charge, Reagan and Bush about aids. They were Act Up and all this sudden, and they were laying their lives on the line for this. They're like, here, come to this, do a fundraiser for that. And I was like, I've got to do something. I can do something. I had no idea what would happen. And I just started thinking, I don't want to be in the closet. I don't want people to, if they knew I was gay, they wouldn't listen to my music. That's like, that's weird, then don't listen to my music. And so I was thinking about it and I thought, okay, when my next album comes out, I'll go on Arsenio Hall and I'll come out

Kit Hoover:

The dog pound.

Melissa Ethridge:

Yeah. And he was cool and he was modern and I knew that I could do it there. But before that happened, I was invited to the Clinton inauguration and I was invited by the gay and lesbian political organizations. It was called The Triangle Ball, and it was fabulous. It was all us gays and we're dancing and most of those balls are really stuffy. This one was really rocking and I was up on the balcony and they handed me a microphone and people were talking. Katie Lang had just talked and I was like, wow, I'm so happy to say I'm a lesbian moon.

Kit Hoover:

And

Melissa Ethridge:

There it was. The next day it was in small print at the bottom of the paper, but it eventually just came. And then I

Kit Hoover:

Feel like everywhere you went, you had the Laverne LI dunno if you know that you signed up that that is L, there you are right there. I

Melissa Ethridge:

Had to talk about being gay and I was the only one talking about being gay for about five years.

Kit Hoover:

Right? Isn't that wild to look back at now, like, God, that's just bizarre to me. I

Melissa Ethridge:

Love how many artists, I love how many people are out. I love that it's like gay people born every day. This is just going to happen. We've been here since the beginning of time. We're not going away. Just

Kit Hoover:

Love, love. Just

Melissa Ethridge:

Understand the difference. Yes. Let's just understand

Kit Hoover:

What would be the thorn in your career if you had to come up with one?

Melissa Ethridge:

Wow.

Kit Hoover:

Maybe there's not one.

Melissa Ethridge:

I can't think of

Kit Hoover:

One. Okay. We don't need to go that way. You mentioned cancer and today, Melissa. Oh my gosh. One of my best friends called me. Now her cancer's gone to stage four, triple negative. This is again, it affects everybody. You went through it. My mom, all my best friends. But anyway, I told her I was talking to you today. Again, everybody's cancer is different. Treatment's different. I'm interested in your light. That is you. What tools can we share with our listeners? Anything on the inside that helped you pull through all of this? Any light, any fun weed? Give me something. Whatever you did, I need to know.

Melissa Ethridge:

Yeah, I would say most of it is in your mind. Most of it you can do in your mind, and it's about changing your mind and whatever it takes. I found plant medicine to be extremely helpful. I didn't really smoke cannabis before I was diagnosed. I smoked a little bit. I was starting to kind of smoke it just like months before, but not regularly like I do now. And also, there's psilocybin. Now what these things do, this is not a cure, this is an alignment for a person. It's my belief. And again, always different. Everybody's different. But my belief that cancer and all degenerative diseases, which are just dis-ease that all of them stem from us being out of alignment with ourselves, us being away from ourselves, us not doing what we know we want to do, and what is going to bring that light, what's going to make that light shine in us? Because that's the only thing. We can't save anybody. We can't change anybody. All we can do is clear the crap out so we can shine our light. That's in all of us. And that's where plant medicine comes in. It helps us, helps us get out of our left brain, which is I got to do this, which is all the future worry and the past regret. That's your left brain. It quiets your left brain so that your intuitive brain that knows you are not your body,

You are a soul that you just want to be connected with.

Kit Hoover:

I think that's so beautiful. Melissa, anybody, any of our listeners, if they get the diagnosis, they just got it, let's just say, what would you say to them?

Melissa Ethridge:

Well, I would say what the woman that did my biopsy said, she was the radiologist, I think the one that looks, and she was a friend, but she wasn't a good friend. I just had known her. She helped us with our couple babies. So she said, Melissa, oh, usually we wait, but I know what this is. I've seen enough of this. And mine was really thick and hard and everything. And she knew and she said, I just want to tell you you're going to be fine. You are going to be fine. And she then unbuttoned her blouse and showed her double mastectomy that I didn't know that she had. And she goes, this is the worst that can happen. And she goes, and I'm fine. And I started my journey with that. If you start your journey with, okay, I'm going to be fine,

Kit Hoover:

Fine,

Melissa Ethridge:

I'm not dying tomorrow. This is a sign. My body is giving me a sign, a it's time to change. And I had enough doctors tell me sort of offhandedly that I always go, nobody knows why, but people that make a change are the ones that survive.

Kit Hoover:

I really believe that. My mom is a survivor. She had a double mastectomy years ago, Melissa, before people were even talking about it. And she believes cancer has eyes and her thing is positivity. She's like, you got to choose where you're going. And it can't hurt to at least be that way. So thank you for that. Let's talk about your new album. I mean, you Johnny Cash this thing by Love. Let's talk about, I'm Not Broken. Do you want to talk about the music first or performing in the prison?

Melissa Ethridge:

Oh, that's funny. Well, it all kind of goes together because the project was something I'd wanted to do for decades. It started when I was a kid in Leavenworth, Kansas. If you know Leavenworth the prison, oh, that's where the prisons. Prisons. The federal penitentiary of the army, the state. So within 20 miles of my home was five prisons. Wow. So when I was very young, when I was about seven years old, Johnny Cash came to our federal penitentiary, which was about two or three blocks from my house. I could see it at one point from my backyard. And he came, but nobody else got to see him, just the prisoners. And so he came and left. And I thought, wow, prison must be a place of fine entertainment

Kit Hoover:

Because that's a big deal. Forget the Hollywood Bowl. I know where I'm going. Yeah.

Melissa Ethridge:

No one's ever come. So I was like, someday I'm going to perform in a prison. Well, a few years,

Kit Hoover:

I know that needs to be a T-shirt. That's great.

Melissa Ethridge:

A few years later, I was a teenager and I actually got to go into those prisons with some variety shows that were around the town and I would sing and play for them. And they were so appreciative and delighted and excited no matter what we did. And I thought, these people are just aching for entertainment. And that really stayed with me. And in the nineties, I actually befriended Tammy Wynette and for a while we were going to do it. And then she got sick and died. Oh

Kit Hoover:

Man.

Melissa Ethridge:

I know. So then years go by and I had a new management and I told them, I said, this is one of my lifelong dreams. I would really like this to happen. And after a few years, then about three years ago it started, okay, we got a green light from the prison. So then Paramount Plus and MTV said, okay, we want to film it so great because that's going to give us the money so we can actually put up a whole concert. And then we got Sun Records who said, Hey, we'll record it and we'll release it. So I got enough money to go in and do a really full on concert in this prison. And it was

Kit Hoover:

The acoustics,

Melissa Ethridge:

It was lights, it was the sound, it was the full band. I've always wanted to do a live album too. So this whole, like I said, I'm anticipating, it's so exciting for me.

Kit Hoover:

It's your heart. Did you feel Tammy at all when you're in there performing?

Melissa Ethridge:

Did I,

Kit Hoover:

Did you feel Tammy at all channeling you? Who did you say you were going to sing in there with? Did I, Tammy Wynette. I was like, God, did I fuck up that name too? God, Melissa? No. My

Melissa Ethridge:

Second wife was named

Kit Hoover:

Tammy. I was like, oh God, no Wynette, why not? But wait, not her jumpstart. This shit's getting wowed. Did you feel Tammy Wynette at all? Was there a moment? Did you think about her? Yes, I

Melissa Ethridge:

Did think

Kit Hoover:

About her. Not the ex. Scratch that. Oh my gosh. What part of activism and awareness are we going to see in the doc?

Melissa Ethridge:

I hope it makes you think about a new way to think about crime and punishment and how our thought that, oh, prisons are filled with people who did bad things. A woman's penitentiary is filled with 90% of women who had childhood trauma that then they turned to drugs to numb that pain, and then they committed a crime for the drug habit.

Kit Hoover:

They never had a chance. And

Melissa Ethridge:

There they are, 90% of them. So basically it's mental health. The warden told me that. She goes, this is mental health that I'm doing here. This is not punishment. We are trying to get them to a place where they can get past their trauma so they don't go back to the

Kit Hoover:

Drugs. I'm so excited about your new album, your new music, the doc. I'm still laughing. Melissa, that was so funny. You looked at me like, what the hell is this girl doing? I like, did she just, it was me.

Melissa Ethridge:

Didn't

Kit Hoover:

Remember. I panic didn't brain. I'm like, Tammy Wynette. Right. But I was like, should I just screw this? That's so funny. Okay, one quick game before we go. My rock star existential cowboy. Let's get random. Melissa. Here we go. Favorite vice. Yeah.

Melissa Ethridge:

I dunno. Would you call cannabis a vice?

Kit Hoover:

No. It is really fun. I don't think so. I think it helps me very much. Yeah, but that could be good. That could be your one to me,

Melissa Ethridge:

But to me, vice is like sugar. That's a vice for me. So the Bento box at Nobu is probably my favorite

Kit Hoover:

Vice. That's a winning one. What scares you?

Melissa Ethridge:

Ooh. The only thing I'm afraid of is fear. I know it's the old Roosevelt. The only thing we have to fear is fear itself. But it's so true because it is people who are fearful that will give other people their power. And that's where politics becomes harmful to gays and lesbians, people of color, because there are so many people that don't understand that are fearful because they don't know them. So the damage comes from the fear. So the only thing I'm really afraid of is fear.

Kit Hoover:

What is your favorite guitar and what's her name? Is that her behind you? I like that one way in the back. Oh, this

Melissa Ethridge:

Is a nice one. This was in my nowhere to go. One that's fun, but not my favorite

Kit Hoover:

Probably. What's your favorite? One

Melissa Ethridge:

Of my favorite is on the road with me, and it's always on the road. It's this certain color, it's like a sea foam, green turquoise color. And it's a 12 string. And Jerry Jones made it. It's his branded guitar and he only made guitars for a few years, and it's the only guitar it, he made it, especially for me. And I called it Trouble back then. It was 90, I think I got it 94. And I recorded. I want to come over on it, but I still play it live. Nothing sounds like it. So

Kit Hoover:

That's probably, do you name all your guitars or No,

Melissa Ethridge:

I name my electric guitars. I have so many acoustic ovations. That's the Ovation. Adamas. I get one every couple of years. I say I can't name.

Kit Hoover:

I can't name it too many. I

Melissa Ethridge:

Go through them too quickly.

Kit Hoover:

Craziest celeb. Hookup.

Melissa Ethridge:

Now when you say

Kit Hoover:

Hookup, just a kiss. Any fun make out.

Melissa Ethridge:

She wants me to kiss and tell

Kit Hoover:

Or you don't have to. Or you can or you can. My producer's saying because she's like, come on, Foxy. Or you can don't have to, can plead the fifth. You want to move on. Moving on. That means it's good. That means it's a good one. That means guys we know. Really. Okay. That'll be from when you and I go for drinks. Okay. How do you blow off steam?

Melissa Ethridge:

Oh. Oh, huh. Music I usually pick up, if I'm in a situation which I rarely get anymore, where I get really worked up about something, I'll definitely walk away. Confrontation is ridiculous. That's just asking for more. I'll walk away and I'll either listen to it or go outside. Just change where I am. That's what I do. And I can usually breathe.

Kit Hoover:

Breathe. What's in your bedside drawer? Ooh,

Melissa Ethridge:

There's some books. There's some stuff. Yeah.

Kit Hoover:

We've gotten the funniest answers to that one in this podcast, Melissa. Oh my gosh. That's some good stuff. All right. How about this one? Bucket list artists you'd love to collab with that you haven't yet. There's been so many great ones, but is there's just somebody on your list?

Melissa Ethridge:

Oh my God. I was listening to the radio the other day and Chris Stapleton came

Kit Hoover:

On. I was like, he's just at the

Melissa Ethridge:

Bowl. I want to sing with

Kit Hoover:

Him. My producer just saw him last night at the bowl with her son, and she was talking about the way his wife looks at him, Morgan, they lock eyes and they don't look away. Yeah,

Melissa Ethridge:

He's the one I want. He sings from his soul. Yeah. So I'd like to do that

Kit Hoover:

Just like you, my friend. Okay. Fill in this blank. Aging is what?

Melissa Ethridge:

Aging is delightful. I learn so much and it gets easier. And you let go of the silly crap that I used to drive me crazy about how I looked or what my body looked like or what I was wearing. All that stuff that I spent so much energy on, you can let that go and go silly, silly me and really, really get to the Juice of Life.

Kit Hoover:

Final question, my love. And I can't thank you enough again for coming on. What makes you happy?

Melissa Ethridge:

Life? The thought of life. The thought of how life works, what this reality is and how it works, and how I absolutely have all the control and I have all the power and it's up to me. I have so much power that I can be powerless, but I know that it's all up to me and it's my choices.

Kit Hoover:

Melissa, what a life full of love. Full of everything. Your new album, the new show. It's all better than ever. I just thank you for the bottom of the heart for coming on and sharing all this. Just everybody here at the coop is freaking out that you're on. This is a big day for us, so thank you so much.

Melissa Ethridge:

Yay. Well, it was fun and fun and you all got to come see

Kit Hoover:

Me. We're coming and we're coming backstage and it's going to get rowdy. I'm ready. Thank. I'm ready. Thank you so much my friend. Love you. Bye-Bye. Love you. Be well. You too. The best. Wow. Wow, wow. Let me bring in my producer Harper McDonald. Is she the most soulful human being you've ever met on this planet?

Speaker 4:

I want to absorb every single word that she says. She lives in such a clear, beautiful way

Kit Hoover:

And she's been through so much to come out with such light with every aspect of her life.

Speaker 4:

Motherhood, music, activism. I mean, she's just always lived so purely and so out in front of who she is. I loved the story about David Crosby. Oh my gosh.

Kit Hoover:

The paddle boat or

Speaker 4:

Paddling. Paddling. A kayak over to meet her sperm donor

Kit Hoover:

With some my ties.

Speaker 4:

Didn't even know that was going to come out of the night, is young and so early that rendezvous, but

Kit Hoover:

Really think about in the world we live in that she was so open that Yes, David Crosby's my kid's sperm donor. I thought that was so incredibly badass. So I agree that it could have been

Speaker 4:

Brad Pitt. It could have been. It could have been in another life. In another life. Those would be beautiful kids too.

Kit Hoover:

And what about her talking about being a mom? You and I talked a lot before going on the podcast to lose a child anyway and lose a child from addiction and how she's navigating it.

Speaker 4:

It's the most painful thing to go through. And also to think about that he's a soul that is living beautifully and freely. And it affected me a lot listening to her talk

Kit Hoover:

About it. Her view on that I think will help a lot of people. It brought us such comfort. I agree. Anybody that's lost a loved one, I thought as she said it, we are just in these meat

Speaker 4:

Suits. I know it's just a moment in time. And at the very end when she was just speaking about just that we are in this life, that is the thing that brings her happiness. Life is the thing that brings her happiness and how powerful she feels and that it's all of our choices and it is our life to live to the fullest, which she has since she was a young child playing in Pasadena, playing in

Kit Hoover:

Pasadena, right around the corner with that beautiful mullet. But I would Harper's so sick of me to play and bring me some water. I mean, I have it on full blast 24 7. I can't get enough of it. What about what she said about aging?

Speaker 4:

It's delightful. It's delightful. And we can just shed all that crap that we don't need to think about that. Everybody

Kit Hoover:

Worries about that. Doesn't matter. It doesn't make sense.

Speaker 4:

Delightful. I love listening to truly every single thing that she said. It just was so clear and so soulful and thoughtful and I wanted more.

Kit Hoover:

And she's got that swagger more than ever. Her new album is incredible. And the doc, she's just got it. Our soulful, existential, badass cowboy. Yeah,

Speaker 4:

Exactly. She embodies all of it. Anyway, I can't wait to re-listen. And because there was so much in that that was just so real.

Kit Hoover:

We're still digesting and everybody, she's incredible. Harper and I will be going to the concert. We cannot get enough of her. Thank you so much, Melissa Etheridge for sharing your time with us. Hope you enjoyed it on the Coop. We'll see you next time. Thank you for joining us, my Chickens. If you like this episode, please give us a five star rating, drop in a great review and tag us at the coop with Kit Hoover as well. You can follow us on social media at the coop with Kit Hoover for behind the scenes content and updates. We will see you next time in the coop. And remember, as my mom bug always says, life is not a dress rehearsal. Make it count. Today's episode was produced by me, kit Hoover and Harper McDonald. Our technical producer is Christian Brown, and today's episode was edited by Christian Brown, business Development by Casey Lad. And a special thank you to all of our sponsors.