Alice Cooper is Back on Tour and Rocking his Starkey Hearing Aids

Rockstar legend Alice Cooper is back on tour and not letting hearing loss get in his way. He talks with Dave about how hearing loss is an unfortunate reality for many professional musicians — particularly rockers from his generation — and shares stories from his long and storied career, including working with Johnny Depp and Paul McCartney. A proud wearer of “clearing aids,” Alice encourages young musicians to put their hearing first and not let the stigma of hearing aids and hearing protection be a barrier to better hearing health.  

To learn more about Starkey hearing aids, visit Starkey.com

Link to full transcript

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to Starkey Soundbites. I'm Dave Fabry, Starkey's Chief Hearing Health Officer and host of today's episode. I feel a little bit like both Wayne and Garth all rolled up into one with this guest, where they had the opportunity to meet him. And in the words of Garth, I get to stay and hang out with you.

SPEAKER_01 0:19

You're worthy.

SPEAKER_00 0:20

We're not worthy. Yes, and I get to kiss your ring. May I kiss your ring? Yes. So before we dive in, a quick note to our listeners. If you enjoy this conversation, we invite you to like, rate, and review the podcast, and so you don't miss an episode, please subscribe. Thanks in advance. So Alice Cooper is a rock star and artist and performer who really needs no introduction. You've had a 60-year, more than 60-year career. And I can tell you that I've been a huge fan since I was just a kid growing up in Green Bay, Wisconsin. The very first big concert that I went to was in 1975. Oh. Welcome to my nightmare tours. And I remember it vividly in terms of every song. There was a big spider that you had.

SPEAKER_01 1:04

There was nothing like that ever on any rock stage because that was the idea behind it. It was truly like a Broadway show, except it was a horror comedy, hard rock show. The band was amazing. And we just said, let's go for it. You know, let's let's make this different.

SPEAKER_00 1:22

It was transformative for me, I can tell you. I'm a drummer. Uh it's great to be sitting in this room surrounded by all of these amps. For those of you who are watching us on the YouTube channel, uh, there's a drum kit over on the side, and I it's taking every fiber of my being not to pick up the sticks. But um that I was a I was a drummer already by that time, and going to that concert, that performance, yeah, uh changed my life. And uh I want to thank you for that.

SPEAKER_01 1:48

Well, you know, and and this is the thing uh about that era, that was the golden era. You know, we were the next generation after the Beatles. And nobody expected your little band to last more than five years. Right. That was it. You know, if you got to 30, that was like, oh, you're ancient. You know, nobody saw the Rolling Stones going till they're 80 years old, or Alice Cooper till he's 75, 76 years old and still going. Uh Aerosmith. Nobody saw that. That would have been just so crazy and irrational. And yet that's part of the problem with a hearing.

SPEAKER_02 2:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:29

Uh we never took care of a hearing. No. We never wore uh in ears because they didn't exist. Right. You know, you turned it up and rehearsal was in a room this big with those blasting as loud as they could. Yeah. Because you didn't want it to be light. You wanted it loud.

SPEAKER_00 2:46

You wanted to hear and feel everything coming with the music.

SPEAKER_01 2:49

You wanted to feel the bass, you wanted to feel, and we were just too dumb to even think about our ears. Yeah. You know? So at this point now, I would say anybody that's in this business and still around after 60, 50 years, something like that, and there's a lot of bands that are out there, all have hearing problems.

SPEAKER_00 3:06

Yeah. And and and I can tell you that I work with a number of other musicians. None in my experience that has had you've been nominated or won awards in six decades. Yeah. I mean, did you ever think that that you would have that length of that career?

SPEAKER_01 3:21

Well, no, except for the fact that I always knew that the show was different than anybody else's show. And and more than anything else, we learned this very early. If you don't have the songs, don't do a show. Right. In other words, don't try to do something theatrical if you don't have the songs to back it up. Um, it's like don't dress elaborately if you can't back it. You have to be able to back that stuff up. We we grew up learning from the Beatles, learning from Bert Baccarac, learning from, you know, these incredible songwriters, and then we decided how do we make that ours? Right. Okay, you have to learn Chuck Berry first. You have to learn the Beatles, you have to learn, then you start developing your own your own plant, you know. And for us, we were more of a Yardbird's Who type of band, and then took it in our direction. But we borrowed a little from West Side Story, we borrowed a little bit from James Bond themes, we borrowed from TV themes, and we let them come into the music and be there because that that was our influence, John Barry and people like that, you know. But that's how it happened. But nobody expected 30 albums. No. 30 albums. It's just remarkable. And still going.

SPEAKER_00 4:34

I've got another one coming out next, you know, end of this year. I know, and I looked at your tour schedule that begins in a couple weeks, and it's insane. So um, well, and I think really for me, that's what characterizes you too, is that if your music and your performances defy description. Yeah. Uh like you said, uh, and I'm uh bastardizing the Picasso quote, but he says, you know, you'll have to master the rules like a pro so that you can break them like an artist. And I think you've done just that. And I think even among your friends and admirers were both Groucho Marx and Salvador Dali. Yeah. And both wanted to take credit for the bigger influence. Who was more right?

SPEAKER_01 5:10

And that is really true. I mean, we were art majors in school. Most of the guys in the band were. And the other two guys were just total juvenile delinquents, you know, right out of the Bowery boys. These guys were right out of the Bowery boys. Uh, or or guys and dolls, you know. Uh, but the thing about it was was it was we would do the show, and Groucho Marks would be there. I don't know why, I don't know how. And he saw it as vaudeville. So, oh, it's vaudeville. You know, uh George Burns would, he'd bring George Burns. And George Burns would go, like, uh, yeah, Gracie and I uh used to work with a guy in vaudeville back in the 20s, used a guillotine like that, and you know, and we're sitting there going, you know, I'm these are the people I wanted to meet. Exactly. And they were coming to your show. May West, Fred Aster, oh, they all came to the show and they saw it as vaudeville. They were not shocked by what we were doing at all. Now, Dali comes to the to the to the show and sees it as surrealism. Sure. Because everything was about Dali. You know, and we were art majors, and he was our hero. So, yes, there was Dali in our show. There was crutches, there was all this stuff was influenced by those people. But everybody that saw the show saw it in the way they saw it, the way they wanted to see it. Sure. And and I went, that's what it should be.

SPEAKER_00 6:37

That's really great art, isn't it? If you see a reflection of what your belief structure is.

SPEAKER_01 6:41

As long as it's entertaining, as long as it doesn't when people leave the show, they go, I I love that. I don't know what it was, but I loved it.

SPEAKER_00 6:52

Well, and and and like you said, you're continuing to this in a couple weeks, you're gonna be going on your your North American tour. You were just in Europe, you'll go back to Europe again this fall. Yep, and that's with your band. And I know um in 2016, I think it was, you came and performed at one of the Starkey Galas with the Hollywood vampires. With the vampires. And you're gonna tour with them next year, too, right? So you've got all of the still interleaving uh different bands.

SPEAKER_01 7:17

That band was a everybody in every band that's made it. Now you got Joe Perry from Aerosmith, you've got you know guys from all these huge bands, and Johnny.

SPEAKER_02 7:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:27

You know, but the thing is, Johnny can play. I know guitar player. Yeah. And the idea was let's put a band together. It's just a bar band, opposite of what we all do, and let's just go play bars. But we'll play all of the songs from our dead drunk friends. All the guys that we knew that died, the Jim Morrisons, the Jimi Hendrixes, uh, these guys. And we said, okay, great. And, you know, uh immediately uh Duff McKagan, I'm in. You know, Joe Perry, I'm in. And all of a sudden I've got this all-star band. All-star band. So we played the very first show for 300 people at the Roxy in LA. The second show was Rock and Rio, 250,000 people. And we were doing, you know, covers. We were playing T-Rex, we were playing uh, you know, uh I Got a Line on You, you know, by uh by Spirit, all these great songs.

SPEAKER_02 8:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:23

And it was so much fun. And then we started writing our own songs. And then pretty soon now it's I wasn't expecting to be in two major touring bands. Right.

SPEAKER_00 8:32

It was just supposed to be this. Well, I loved the performance in 2016, the set that included original material and homage to your favorites. And I can't wait when you guys go on tour again.

SPEAKER_01 8:43

So much better now. The band is like well, here's a good example. We're in Johnny's in Johnny Depp's uh house has got a 72-track studio in it. And we're in there, and there's myself, and there's Joe Walsh, and there's Joe Joe Perry, and all these guys. And we're playing a song, and McCartney walks in. Paul McCartney walks in. This is royalty now. Now I've known Paul for a long, long time. But being in a studio with Paul is a different world. That's like being in an acting class with Sir Lawrence Olivia. You know. So he walks in, he looks around, he goes, Okay, you guys should do this song. He sits down at the piano, and he goes, If you want it anytime, come and get it. And we and when he turns around like this, everybody in the band goes, yeah. Yeah. And we're all just like and as soon as he turns around, we're all, uh yeah, okay, okay, Paul. And seeing him look like all about it. But when he turned us out, that was the beetle. Not just a beetle. Yeah. That was the beetle. And he's the sweetest guy in the world, and he's a vampire now. He's a Hollywood vampire. That's awesome. So, but I mean, you know, that just shows you that we can be just as starstruck, you know, as you'd think that we would go, oh yeah, hey, we're going, oh my God.

unknown 10:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:10

He said, Alice, you sing this part, and I'll sing this part, and I'm going, okay. Okay, whatever. Inside I'm going, okay, okay. Outside I'm going, oh, okay.

SPEAKER_00 10:18

Hope I don't screw up. Well, transitioning from one rock star to another, uh, our own Bill and Tanny Austin. Yeah, I know you've been a huge friend and supporter to them for a long time. You mentioned rock and Rio. I think the first time you met Bill and Tany or traveled with them was in Rio.

SPEAKER_01 10:35

Yeah. We just happened to be down there doing that, and they were coming down and invited us to come in and do the fitting, you know, for the for the whole thing. There was not a dry eye in the house. You had, they taught us how to fix the things, you know, and some of these people that had never heard, some old ladies that were 90 years old that never heard their sons or daughters or grandchildren, and they you know, and little kids that have never heard, and suddenly hear their mother's voice for the first time. And we're just and I'm going, Bill, you do this all the time? And he goes, Yeah. You see, we do this people that can't afford these, people that can't that have no chance of ever hearing. And we did it again in Portugal. Yeah. Uh and so I have been a fan of them forever. Yeah, it's it's both their life mission. How can you not?

SPEAKER_00 11:31

How can you not? And that's I think the coolest thing about the work that they do is people and we're happy when people want to provide resources, money or whatever to assist. But everyone wants to also see the magic happen. Yeah. And that's what's cool. People from all all walks of earth want to go along. I've been to Africa uh countless times. Yeah. And and seeing you never get tired of it. It's it's in fact it's addictive. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:55

But a great addiction. We couldn't wait to do it again in Portugal. And we would do it again. Anytime he wants to do it and we're on tour, you know, we would be the first to jump in and say, hey, we're in. Yeah. You know, but I mean, that's not just because we're such good guys. It's the fact that it really is something that you that's you are never going to ever experience again. No. It's like people hearing for the first time.

unknown 12:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:19

And it's free. Yeah. They're getting this for free.

SPEAKER_00 12:21

And they had never, and they never had a chance of ever getting this. Yeah, never. Most most, I mean, you know, that's that's exactly right. Most of my work um with Candy and Bill um has been uh I wanted to go to Africa. I wanted to go back to the same place again and again and again. And then you really see people come back and they talk about the impact that better hearing has had on their life. It's it's an amazing thing. It's an amazing work.

SPEAKER_01 12:44

When you when you think of Rock and Rio, you'd say, wow, we went down there and played Rock and Rio and we killed him. Everybody says, this thing we did with the hearing that was more important than the show.

SPEAKER_00 12:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:55

That was everybody talked about that, yeah, not the show.

SPEAKER_00 12:59

Well, and I think it's particularly important for musicians. You talk about the fact, the the comedic horror, uh, the cruel fate of musicians who devote their life to their passion is that often they lose their hearing as a result of pursuing their passion. And so I think for them, uh it's the understanding of how important the ears are to the heart and to the brain.

SPEAKER_01 13:21

And we never realized it.

SPEAKER_00 13:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:22

That was the crazy thing. We're so used to doing it every day that we never realized what it was like to actually hear again. We were so used to tinnitus.

SPEAKER_02 13:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:33

It's just part of I have tinnitus all the time. I just ignore it.

SPEAKER_02 13:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:37

But I know it's there.

SPEAKER_02 13:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:39

And I'm the one turning the TV up so loud. And my wife comes and goes, Why is it so loud? And I go, perfect. I got my stuff, I got my stuff from uh uh Starkey, I put it in, and I turn it on to about there, and it's blasting.

SPEAKER_00 13:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:57

You know, and I'm hearing it, and it's not, and I told him, I said, it's not a hearing aid as much as a clearing aid. I know it. I love that term that you've used. Because it took all that fuzz and focused it.

SPEAKER_00 14:07

Focused it. And so I wear mine all the time. Yeah, I think we need a better name than hearing aid. That still sounds old-fashioned. The guy with a horn, you know, going Beethoven, right? Still musician, but different era.

SPEAKER_01 14:20

Well, and you always pick these big transistor radios with wires going everywhere, you know.

SPEAKER_00 14:24

Well, you know, sadly, a lot of the media to this day. I just saw a recent uh commercial where they had someone that said a patient is being fit with hearing aids. It looked like it was out of the 70s. We had like a wire going up. We haven't fit hearing aids like that for decades.

SPEAKER_01 14:38

No. And the great thing is, is these are the the one thing that's negative, because it's me, I travel a lot and I go, what did I do with it? Oh. It's only this big.

SPEAKER_00 14:49

Yeah. Yep. Well, we talk about the technology. We now, you know, you have find my iPhone or find my phone clip. You can find your hearing aid that way and and and and search for it if it's connected to the phone. Bill's starting to go, you know, again? Yeah, yeah. So it you know, you mentioned uh ringing in your ears. It's funny that uh your first band name was Earwigs. So earwig is a tune that that sticks in your head. Now, unfortunately, you've got a tune in your head all the time.

SPEAKER_01 15:18

And and it's a bug that actually crawls in your ear and lays eggs. Yeah, yeah. And we figured we were in high school and we were just goofing on the Beatles, you know, and uh said, well, the earwigs, that'll be funny. Yeah. That'll be a funny name. Uh not realizing then we'd be the spiders. Right. And that's when we got to be a good band, really good band. You know, uh we honestly, none of us, I don't think, ever thought we were going to do this forever. And every guy in the original band is still a musician. Yeah. You know, they're all still musicians. They still write together.

SPEAKER_00 15:52

Um, some of them still are alive. We call us lifers. Lifers.

SPEAKER_01 15:56

Are you a lifer? Yeah, I'm a lifer. In other words, there's no retirement.

SPEAKER_00 16:00

Yeah, and and well, because again, it's you're pursuing your passion writing, performing all of that. Yeah. Why would I stop? Yeah. Um Huey Lewis uh is also somebody that has worked with Bill and Tanney. In in mini years, uh he's given permission to talk about that, but he wants to say hi. He said he was on one of your um radio uh uh shows uh Nights with Alice Cooper.

SPEAKER_01 16:28

Yeah, and now it's called Alice's Attic. Alice's Attic. I love it. So you're coming up into my attic. Got it. You know, and it's more of a Friday night horror show because I have characters up in the attic. Yeah. And I get to play whatever everything I want to play.

SPEAKER_00 16:41

Love it. Yeah. Well, so many of those you know, uh rock stars who are around loud sounds now are similarly losing their hearing. If you're if you work in a factory or a music factory for long enough, you're gonna lose hearing if you don't wear hearing protection. That's right. When you were young, as you said there was no such thing, people weren't doing anything.

SPEAKER_01 16:59

There were the great big ear things you could put on if you were working in a factory, they would give you the big, you know. And rock and roll, you didn't have that. No. You just turn the guitar up. We just the worse our hearing got, we kept turning the guitar up.

SPEAKER_00 17:13

Now it made it worse. I noticed in here, this is reminiscent of the the scene from Spinal Tap where they're walking around the music room. The only thing I noticed is none of these amps go to 11.

SPEAKER_01 17:23

Yeah, they actually the the Princeton does that. When we were kids, that was the amp.

SPEAKER_00 17:28

Love it.

SPEAKER_01 17:29

The you know, the that and the Marshalls came later.

SPEAKER_00 17:32

Marshalls, I think. They had the PV, those were the low-cost one in the day.

SPEAKER_01 17:35

Oh yeah, the super, the super reverbs, though.

SPEAKER_00 17:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 17:37

Uh the twin reverbs were the that was the amp.

SPEAKER_00 17:41

Yeah. Yeah. And and and just, you know, I remember seeing Nugent perform when he was young. He'd stick his, he'd stick his ear right in the uh in the speaker, and now that one doesn't, uh, along with Townsend and some of the other, those don't hear very well anymore.

SPEAKER_01 17:53

Townsend lost a lot of his hearing when Keith Moon put a half of a stick of dynamite in the drum thing, and when he hit it, it it on the Smothers Brother show. Oh my goodness. He was just supposed to put a couple of, you know, when he hit it with a couple bang. You know, that was Keith. He hits it and it blows the blows him off the stage and and it blows out Townsend's ear. No, I've never heard that before.

unknown 18:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 18:20

That was that one show.

SPEAKER_00 18:21

And and usually it's more insidious than that. It's gradual. That one was an abrupt hearing loss.

SPEAKER_01 18:26

Well, with Keith Moon, everything was over the top.

SPEAKER_00 18:30

That was a Tuesday for him, by the way. Yeah. That was uh just a random Tuesday.

SPEAKER_02 18:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:36

So, you know, talking about now with the hearing loss and with your hearing aids, has it impacted your ability to monitor your voice and sing and perform now? Have you had to make any adaptations?

SPEAKER_01 18:48

Well, on stage, uh we use in monitors now. Yeah. Yeah, you have to take them out. But when I'm doing my radio show, when I'm just daily life, if if if I don't have this charged, yeah, like I forget to charge it, I go, oh luckily I have backups that I use. But it really is irritating now if you don't, if you forget to to charge it. And it charges for a long time and you just forget to charge it again, you know. But that's why I always have four or five of them on the road.

SPEAKER_00 19:17

And it does make you appreciate when you don't have them over. It does, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:20

And I I get so tired of going, what?

SPEAKER_00 19:23

Huh? Yeah, and and everyone says when they find out I'm an audiologist, people will say, Huh? What? What is it they are? It's like, oh, that's the very first time I've ever heard that. But uh when you talk about you know noticing your hearing loss for the first time, do you recall the moment when you began to accept it? Was it Cheryl, your wife, that raised it?

SPEAKER_01 19:44

When it was honestly, when um I would say maybe 15 years ago is when I started really going, I'd be watching TV and I'm going, I'm only picking up half of what they're saying. Okay. And I'd go, is everybody else having a problem? They go, no. No. I go, wow, that's weird. You know. But still, it didn't drive me to the, you know, to the why. But I I I just knew I was gonna be that night, I was gonna be blasted by a 10 million decibels. Yeah. And so I kind of you kind of give up. You kind of just say, well, what are you gonna do? It's just a consequence of what I do. Yeah. And I said, someday I'll probably have to get a hearing aid. They did check my hearing and I found out how much hearing I had lost. And then they put one of these in, and I went, I could hear perfectly again. And it was just like being reborn again with your ears. I had the same thing done with my eyes. I had symphonic lenses put in. Okay. So my eyes are like 2010. I can read everything on that paper from here. Wow. It's 76 years old. You know, so I said, I want my eyes or my ears to be as good as my eyes. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:57

So what would you say to some of your contemporaries who may be struggling with hearing loss but aren't doing something about it?

SPEAKER_01 21:05

I I told Sammy Hagar, you know, I saw Sammy and Maui, we both have houses over there, and and you see the, I said, Sammy, I said, these are the deals right here, and I'll give you the number. I'll give you the.

SPEAKER_00 21:15

Sammy knows us.

SPEAKER_01 21:16

He was he did a mission with us down uh in the city. Yeah, uh I was surprised to know how many people had already been with you. Elton had been with you and a bunch of guys that that that are out there who wised up a little sooner than I did. Yeah, you know. But I mean, especially metal bands. Yeah. I mean, metal bands like Metallica and bands like that. 15 years ago there was no such thing as in ears. Right.

SPEAKER_00 21:40

It was just Or if they had them, they fit poorly into the if ever you saw a performer, they were on their shoulder rather than in the 70s, eighties, 90s, nobody ever heard of in airs. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 21:50

And then all of a sudden they said, You gotta try this. And I went, Okay. I'd put one in. Yeah. Which because at that time you put the in-ears, and it sounded like you were. Singing through a transistor radio, and I said, I hate that. I gotta hear the band. So I would put one in, and that would just keep me or I could or I could hear sharps or flats. In other words, if I was going a little sharp or a little flat, I said, Well, that's good, but I'm not gonna put two in. Right. And then I would switch it the next night. So this one was in, and that helped a little, but you're still damaging one ear at a time. Exactly. And now they've come out with new ones that you put in and you go, Oh, that's the guy mixes it, and it's a band.

SPEAKER_00 22:32

Yeah. Yeah. You know. So so prevention is one thing, the monitors preventing the loss. What about those who have a loss but have been resistant because of whatever stigma or something that's in their head? I think that they almost have to.

SPEAKER_01 22:45

There's no way of not coming to grips with it. Yeah. You know, if they want to stay, if they want to record, if they want to keep playing, they've got to come to grip. And now we're not kids. Yeah. Now we're a little smarter. Yeah. We go, well, wait a minute, if they make something that makes this better, why wouldn't I go get it? I can certainly afford it.

SPEAKER_00 23:06

I think that's the difference with the boomers in our generation is we're not as stigmatized, but we have higher expectations about what they can do. You said you're, you know, uh technophile, but a techno, you know, slow to adapt, but but also at the same time, the technology that we have in the devices, we use artificial intelligence and machine learning. And you just kind of put them in and just wear them and count on them to provide that benefit in everything.

SPEAKER_01 23:32

I'll write the songs, I'll record the songs. You make my ears better. I don't know how it works. You don't have to tell me how it works. Yeah. I don't have to tell you how I wrote the song. It's the song. The song is there. Yeah. And then I pick this up and I go, and if they start telling me, and I go, ah, it works.

SPEAKER_00 23:50

That's all I care about. Well, your willingness to sort of say, hey, I have a hearing loss, which is expected after playing music all this time, and to raise awareness for the importance of hearing, for being willing to talk about hearing aids and use of those, and wearing hearing aids is not a big deal, that will be inspirational to so many people like myself who've admired you for years. Oh, thank you. And uh and know that you want to hear the very best you can at every point in life.

SPEAKER_01 24:16

And I know that it's coming. Yeah. I know this is coming because of technology. But when I have this in and I'm in Germany watching Star Trek and I go boom and it's in English, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:27

We already want to see. We already can do translation, which is cool. I want that. Before we finish, and I really appreciate the time with you, I want to talk a little bit about your solid uh rock foundation. We're sitting in this beautiful facility. Tell us a little bit about what the mission is for that. I'll tell you how it started.

SPEAKER_01 24:44

I was uh I I watched a very awkward drug deal go down with two 16-year-old kids on bicycles. And I went, how does that kid not know he might be the best guitar player in town? And the other kid might be the best drummer. And it dawned on me there was no way that was ever going to happen because there was no facility to ever make that happen, especially in a lower income area. You know, they can't afford to go to a music school, even if they're talented. I said, so I got a bunch of it's a Christian nonprofit, and I said I got a bunch of Christian businessmen together, and I said, I I want to open this mini Juilliard, except I want it to be free for everybody. Wow. Any teenager, and we say any teenager. I love it. And so we get kids come in and they kind of like, you know, well, I don't know. And I said, Well, try everything. It's a good thing.

SPEAKER_00 25:42

Try everything and find what's your jam.

SPEAKER_01 25:44

And then every once in a while they'll they'll come in and they'll they'll go, I don't want to do that. It's not good. Oh. Wait a minute. Well, I got natural rhythm. Drama. And then next thing you know, these kids are I got some guitar players I'd put in my band in here that that are that good. And they started out not knowing one end of the guitar to the other. And they're just because they were naturals, and we have good teachers. Yeah. You know, they they get them in the going the right direction. Let the kid take off then. Got a pretty good dance teacher, I think you're saying. Oh, yeah, yeah, sure. My wife is uh uh, you know, there's there's two or three great dance teachers in here, and they're all professionals. People would think, well, because it's free, it can't that you know, the the teaching can't be that good. It's top of the line.

SPEAKER_00 26:30

Yeah, I mean, these people are top of the line people. I think this facility is phenomenal, and I think what you're doing is impressive. I saw Cheryl uh briefly a little bit earlier today, and congratulations, you're on your 48th year of marriage, which is unusual in music and in Hollywood. You got any big plans for the 50th that you can do? Oh, yeah, it's coming up.

SPEAKER_01 26:49

Yeah, well, you I don't know what exactly we're gonna do, but one of the guys in Cheap Trick, uh Rick is is like um 52 years.

SPEAKER_02 26:59

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 26:59

D. Snyder is up there. There's some long, long marriages in rock and roll.

SPEAKER_00 27:05

And that's the way it should be. Well, and I think don't don't you wear a bracelet that only Cheryl has the key to? This is my yeah. We got married, she gave me a gold handcuff. That's really cool. A gold handcuff, and she has the key, and she's the sole owner of the key.

SPEAKER_01 27:19

You should see where the other one is.

SPEAKER_00 27:22

Okay. Um, and we'll leave it on that uh because with this is PG rated. Um, the you got me there for a minute. Um but uh thank you so much for sitting down with us today. Thanks for all that you do, and I really appreciate it. And to our listeners, uh, if you enjoyed this episode, please like and review it, subscribe so you don't miss a single episode, and listen carefully, and we'll look uh to see you and hear you again really soon. Okay, good rehearsal. Let's do it for real now. Thank you so much.