#630 - Stephen Wilson Jr.

Stephen Wilson Jr. is a musician and songwriter originally from southern Indiana. He was recently nominated for “New Artist of the Year” at the CMAs and his new single “Gary” is out now. Stephen joins Theo to talk about memories from the midwest growing up, his dad’s legacy as a boxer and man, and why it’s never too late to rewrite your own story. Stephen Wilson Jr.: https://www.instagram.com/stephen.wilson.jr/ ------------------------------------------------ Tour Dates! https://theovon.com/tour New Merch: https://www.theovonstore.com ------------------------------------------------- Sponsored By: Celsius: Go to the Celsius Amazon store to check out all of their flavors. #CELSIUSBrandPartner #CELSIUSLiveFit https://amzn.to/3HbAtPJ Prize Picks: Prize Picks: Go to https://prizepicks.onelink.me/ivHR/THEO and use code THEO to get $50 in lineups when you play your first $5 lineup! Play Responsibly. Moonpay: Head over to https://www.moonpay.com/theo to sign up Shopify: Go to http://shopify.com/theo to get started. Valor Recovery: To learn more about Valor Recovery please visit them at https://valorrecoverycoaching.com/ or email them at [email protected] Perplexity AI: Ask anything at https://pplx.ai/theo and download their new web browser Comet at https://comet.perplexity.ai/ ------------------------------------------------- Music: “Shine” by Bishop Gunn Bishop Gunn - Shine ------------------------------------------------ Submit your funny videos, TikToks, questions and topics you'd like to hear on the podcast to: [email protected] Hit the Hotline: 985-664-9503 Video Hotline for Theo Upload here: https://www.theovon.com/fan-upload Send mail to: This Past Weekend 1906 Glen Echo Rd PO Box #159359 Nashville, TN 37215 ------------------------------------------------ Find Theo: Website: https://theovon.com Instagram: https://instagram.com/theovon Facebook: https://facebook.com/theovon Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/thispastweekend Twitter: https://twitter.com/theovon YouTube: https://youtube.com/theovon Clips Channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/TheoVonClips Shorts Channel: https://bit.ly/3ClUj8z ------------------------------------------------ Producer: Zach https://www.instagram.com/zachdpowers Producer: Trevyn https://www.instagram.com/trevyn.s/ Producer: Nick https://www.instagram.com/realnickdavis/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Coca-Cola. For the big, for the small, the short and the tall. Peacemakers, risk takers. For the optimists, pessimists. For long distance love. For introverts and extroverts. The thinkers and the doers. For old friends and new. Coca-Cola. For everyone. Pick up some Coca-Cola at a store near you.

• 0:30Theo Von?

  Today's guest is a musician and a songwriter. Originally by way of Southern Indiana. He's got that voice in him. He's got that power in him. He's got it. He's got it. He has a new single Gary that's out now. And a sold out tour in the spring. I'm thankful to finally get to sit down with Mr. Stephen Wilson Jr.

• 1:08Speaker 02

  Man, I'm just, I'm such a fan of yours on all levels. Your podcast and your comedy and

• 1:13Theo Von?

  Thanks.

• 1:14Speaker 02

  And your humanity. So, yeah, it's, it's, it's an honor to be here.

• 1:20Theo Von?

  I appreciate it. Stephen Wilson Jr. Thank you so much, dude.

• 1:22Speaker 02

  Thank you.

• 1:23Theo Von?

  Yeah, it's really cool. I think this is one of those moments where I feel, uh, yeah, like just so lucky that I get to, um, that some of this job has ended up like this. Like getting to talk to people that, uh, that, yeah, some people would love to sit down with, you know? So thanks so much, man. I appreciate it. You have, uh, you just had, you had a pretty decent run at the CMAs this year.

• 1:44Speaker 02

  Yeah, it was a, oh, you know,

• 1:46Theo Von?

  New Artist of the Year?

• 1:47Speaker 02

  Yes, I was nominated for New Artist of the Year, which blew my mind.

• 1:51Theo Von?

  And did you win a Red Clay Strays one? Who?

• 1:54Speaker 02

  Uh, Zach Top one.

• 1:56Theo Von?

  Zach Top one.

• 1:56Speaker 02

  Very well deserved. That man has had a big year and, um, I'm a big fan of his.

• 2:02Theo Von?

  Yes.

• 2:03Speaker 02

  I was very happy for him and I was really rooting for everybody. But myself, I didn't really think I even had a prayers chance in hell of winning, but I was just like, honestly, being nominated was a huge win for me because. You know, I wasn't supposed to be there on paper, you know, like, there's a lot of, there's a lot of things that, like, I contradict and, um, so just being there, you know, it meant a lot just to be out there and it was really wild when I remember when they said my name and like it didn't feel like, it's like, that's somebody else.

• 2:37Theo Von?

  Oh, yeah.

• 2:38Speaker 02

  That's not me. That's like a.

• 2:40Theo Von?

  Oh, for sure. Well, do you think of yourself as country music?

• 2:45Speaker 02

  Um, I do, yeah. Um, I am a country boy. I grew up in the country. Um, so I am very country just by, um, by culture.

• 2:55Theo Von?

  Mm-hmm.

• 2:55Speaker 02

  Um, and I cannot help but write country songs. I, I grew up listening to country music and classic rock. I grew up in body shops and it was all classic rock and country music, uh, old school and nineties. And so that was kind of my pedigree, my listening pedigree. Um, and then I, I grew up very country, very agrarian, um, kind of hunting for our own food and I ate a lot of squirrels growing up and, uh, rabbits and, um, yeah, we just grew up very country. It wasn't trendy at all either. It was like just a means of survival. My dad was raising three kids and on his own and so he just went out and killed food. It was a lot cheaper than buying it at the grocery store, like, you know,

• 3:39Speaker 02

  one slug, one deer slug could feed you for like three months. So like, that's the way he looked at it.

• 3:46Theo Von?

  Oh, there's a beautiful group right there. You guys' kids, huh?

• 3:49Speaker 02

  That's my dad and his, his three little ones and that's, that's me. And, uh.

• 3:54Theo Von?

  That you on the bottom left there, kind of the middle?

• 3:55Speaker 02

  Yeah, in the middle, yeah.

• 3:57Theo Von?

  And who's that dime on his lap, huh? And I mean that respectfully, I was just a child.

• 4:03Theo Von?

  Who's that beautiful young lady?

• 4:04Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's my little sister, Lacey J.

• 4:07Theo Von?

  Lacey J?

• 4:07Speaker 02

  Lacey J. Yeah, named after Lacey J. Dalton, another country singer and, um, but yeah, she's his little girl and, um, yeah, she is, she is beautiful. Um, and she's a beautiful person in general. She's really kept our whole family, like, me and my brother right there, we're like Irish twins. We're only like a year and a few months apart. So we're like, we were, uh, we grew up beating the hell out of each other. We were both boxers. My dad, right there in this picture, he had just won, you know, the Golden Globes for like the third or fourth time in a row. Uh, and you know, he was probably just running over to like Owen Mills or somewhere at Walmart. Oh, yeah.

• 4:48Speaker 02

  Grabbing his picture real quick. So just so like, just that there's proof that we existed and proof that he did this. And I always find it wild that he had time to even. Figure this out? Snap, snap that picture amidst his life. It was so crazy at the time. For a dad to put that together, that didn't say, you know, that wasn't really the dad world. So he was a single dad raising you guys? Yeah, he was driving a bus in the morning and then working at a body shop and training to be a boxer. He, he was wanting to be a pro boxer, but a lot of things, you know, he had to really kind of focus on being a dad. And kind of had to put his boxing career, cause he really had a very promising career ahead of him.

• 5:27Speaker 02

  And so a lot of my dreams, I live kind of, you know, for him and myself, but cause he put a lot of his dreams on the back burner. To raise me like, and he also created me. So like he, like he kind of had to do that. Right. You know, like so, but you know, a lot of people don't take that responsibility. And when I see that picture, uh, I have like, like you said, a memory, um. Well, he either got the day, he's got great dimples or somebody caught him with two good. No, yeah, he's got great dimples. He does. Okay, I was gonna guess. Has the same ones. And, uh, but yeah, I see that guy right there. And about a year from that picture, he would have been curling my little sister's hair and getting her ready for kindergarten.

• 6:09Speaker 02

  And, um, and even though his eyes were swollen shut from sparring the night before, I have like distinct memories of him like getting her ready for school. Oh. And being like a dad to a very young little girl, like, and like, you know, crimping her hair and curling it. And, um, you know, being. Being a dad. Being a dad, but also doing feminine things like, because there was no one to do the feminine thing. So he was like, oh, I gotta be dad. And he was really good and he knew how to do the dude, the dad dude part. Like he had me and my brother boxing every night and we were hunting and fishing and doing all the dude things. But he had also had to be a dad to a little girl that was like the light of his life. Wow.

• 6:51Speaker 02

  That was like quite the responsibility. And I, I look back on that and I, I have like, like I said, just such a distinct memory of him curling her hair. Like while morning cartoons are playing right before we got on the school bus. Oh. And, uh, yeah, he was quite the dude. What was his name? Stephen Wilson.

• 7:08Theo Von?

  Oh, he was.

• 7:09Speaker 02

  Senior, yes.

• 7:10Theo Von?

  You just never know. Sometimes they'll throw a junior on somebody just because they don't know what's going on.

• 7:14Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 7:14Theo Von?

  You know, or they're just NASCAR fan. They'll tack it on the back of their kid's name.

• 7:18Speaker 02

  Pick that, like a donkey tail that he's put it on there like a junior.

• 7:22Theo Von?

  Like, yeah, well, pin the tail on this child, you know?

• 7:24Speaker 02

  No, I'm very much a junior. It's very much a thing in boxing especially like, you know, I, um, I joke around that, you know, my, you know, my dad, um, you know, he was, he was named after a martyr in the Bible. Like my grandmother named him after a guy that was, um, had rocks thrown at him until he died in the Bible. Stephen with a P H, by the way, and, um, which makes a lot of sense because I'm pretty sure my dad was stoned when I was born.

• 7:56Theo Von?

  Was he?

• 7:56Speaker 02

  That's the joke.

• 7:56Theo Von?

  Oh, the pH level of his brain was probably weed, probably then. It might've been plus forty then. Depends on if he was some, on some serious gas or not.

• 8:04Speaker 02

  He did like perhaps the.

• 8:07Theo Von?

  Oh, you had to back then.

• 8:08Speaker 02

  Country cabbage.

• 8:09Theo Von?

  The story, the story of Stephen from, from the Bible. Stephen, the first Christian martyr, oh, the first Christian martyr was stoned to death outside Jerusalem for his faith, as described in Acts seven of the Bible. His executioners, including a young Saul, threw rocks at him after he testified about Jesus.

• 8:26Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 8:26Theo Von?

  Why did Saul not want him to testify? Did he not believe him or did he just not want him sharing the truth?

• 8:31Speaker 02

  Well, Saul at the time, this is pre-Paul, um, because Saul turned into Paul once he saw Christ. Like the, the spirit of Christ appeared before him and that's when he became Paul. But at that point, Saul was very much a, like a figure of, um, of the, of the Jewish religion. Like he was a very high ranking, um, Jewish official. So like, um, he was kind of, you know, like a high ranking individual. And so he was really, in, in his mind at that time, probably just doing his job.

• 9:03Theo Von?

  Right.

• 9:03Speaker 02

  Not really knowing why he was doing it. But then. He, you know, he had a very much a come to Jesus moment, no, no pun intended.

• 9:12Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 9:12Speaker 02

  That's when he became Paul. And he wrote literally probably two thirds of the, the New Testament. Or at least a lot of it.

• 9:20Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 9:20Speaker 02

  Or half of it at least.

• 9:22Theo Von?

  This says here, it says, and we use perplexity AI and it says before his conversion, Saul was a zealous pharisaic Jew.

• 9:30Speaker 02

  Yeah, he's a Pharisee.

• 9:31Theo Von?

  Pharisee. Was, was a zealous Pharisee who believed followers of Jesus were dangerous heretics. So from his perspective, Stephen's preaching against their rejection of Jesus and his criticism of their misuse of the temple was blasphemous and deserved death under the understanding of the law. That zeal led him to participate by giving approval and overseeing the execution, which he later remembered with deep sorrow when he became the Apostle Paul. Wow.

• 9:55Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 9:55Theo Von?

  Gosh, dude, that's, I mean, that's gotta be a lot to carry because if Stephen was the first Christian martyr and you had him stoned because your faith wasn't there yet and then to look back through a different perspective.

• 10:10Speaker 02

  Not much longer after that for him to be like, oh, now I'm preaching the same gospel without rocks being thrown at me. And now that's a, that has to be a, quite the thing to come to terms with. And I think that's what motivated him to write, you know, so many epistles of the New Testament and became such a huge figure of the New Testament. There's a lot of books that they believe were written by Paul, like the book of Hebrews, there's like no author, but they believe even he wrote like books that nobody has any author to, like they just, they can identify his style of writing and be like, it had to be Paul.

• 10:52Theo Von?

  Wow.

• 10:52Speaker 02

  So, yeah.

• 10:54Theo Von?

  People love your style of writing, man.

• 10:56Speaker 02

  Well, thank you. I grew up very religious. That's why I talk about, I grew up in a Pentecostal Nazarene kind of church, a lot of holy rolling. And I read a lot of the Bible.

• 11:05Theo Von?

  Well, yeah, I just started going to a Bible study. This is the first time I've ever been to a Bible study in my life. And so, um, it's been interesting to start to just learn about different characters from the Bible and just different stories and stuff. So, uh, yeah, I'm just glad that we even got to talk about that. And yeah, and that that's how your father was named from Stephen. I didn't know that story in hour or remember it.

• 11:21Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 11:21Theo Von?

  And so that's pretty cool. Um, what was that? Yeah, the church you went to, uh, cause you're from the Midwest. You're from Indiana?

• 11:29Speaker 02

  Yeah, I'm, I'm from where, I'm from Southern Indiana.

• 11:31Theo Von?

  Okay.

• 11:31Speaker 02

  Kentucky, Anna, they call that area like just north of Louisville, Kentucky, just close to where Trevin's from and, um,

• 11:37Theo Von?

  Okay.

• 11:38Speaker 02

  I would say that's where the Midwest and the South kind of chest bump or shake hands. It is literally a collision of two cultures. So people have Southern accents and watch NASCAR, but they also put noodles in their chili.

• 11:51Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 11:52Speaker 02

  Which is a very Midwestern thing. So, yeah, there it is. Uh, Jackson County, Indiana, right there in this southern part.

• 11:58Theo Von?

  Oh, yeah. The Midwest, they'll starch up a protein in a second. They don't give a dang, brother. They'll put a starch right in the middle of a protein.

• 12:05Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 12:05Theo Von?

  That's how they are there. They love that. I mean, I would go-

• 12:08Speaker 02

  It's long winters. It gets cold. You need them starches.

• 12:11Theo Von?

  Oh, yeah. I would grow, I mean, I would go, we used to go to the AC. It was an apostolic Christian church with my grandparents. Um, and some of their neighbors and it was in, uh, Illinois, like in pretty much Southern Illinois. And that was just part of the culture. Like people would eat their dessert at the beginning of dinner sometimes. So they made sure they got their dessert in. Like it was just kind of some of that culture.

• 12:30Speaker 02

  Yeah, you don't want to miss that. Like get too full and getting too excited on mashed potatoes. And they're like, damn, I ain't got nothing.

• 12:37Theo Von?

  It was almost a shame if you couldn't make, if you didn't have space available in your body for a beautiful dessert somebody had made. You almost felt a bit ashamed in a way.

• 12:47Speaker 02

  Yeah. And you should be like, think how much work was put into that cobbler compared to those mashed potatoes. Like you,

• 12:53Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 12:54Speaker 02

  You ate the like, the easy stuff.

• 12:56Theo Von?

  Oh, and sometimes you'd have somebody, you know, you'd have such skilled labor in there or you'd have a real cobbler making the cobbler. You'd have a damn shoelace going through a, uh, going through a peach, you know?

• 13:06Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 13:06Theo Von?

  You'd be in there.

• 13:07Speaker 02

  Some bootleg cobbler.

• 13:08Theo Von?

  Yeah, you'd find, yeah. You'd find half a soul in, uh, You know, you'd be like, oh, is this, is this crust or is this a, you know, part of an eleven and a half?

• 13:18Speaker 02

  Yeah, what is this cobbler, soulless?

• 13:20Theo Von?

  Yeah, like, nope, not so much. He's got real, real heels in the corner. You know, it was just, uh, but there was so much value, I remember in my grandmother's town on cooking and on having people over for meals. Um, just that midwestern culture, you know, on hard work. Uh, and religion was a big part of it, you know, even their neighbors, if my grandparents couldn't take us to church, their neighbors would offer, will take them to church, you know? And we'd go and, um, and just get to see what some of the different churches were like. And that was one of the bigger religions in the area was apostolic Christian over there.

• 13:51Speaker 02

  Did you see any exorcisms or any speaking in tongues or movements of the spirit?

• 13:56Theo Von?

  Let me think. No, they had good donuts. They braided their hair. The women, uh, did like one big braid. They didn't show a lot. You know, it was very kind of covered up with some of the female culture.

• 14:06Speaker 02

  They braid their donuts?

• 14:08Theo Von?

  Uh, they did have those one. What is that one that's braided?

• 14:12Speaker 02

  I don't know. It's, it's, I don't know what it's called. I don't love it.

• 14:15Theo Von?

  I don't either.

• 14:15Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 14:16Theo Von?

  It's too much braid and I don't think there's filling in it. You think there is when you're a kid.

• 14:19Speaker 02

  It's very deceiving. Yeah. Twisted donut. No, there's a word for it. And, um.

• 14:25Theo Von?

  It's, what is that? Kreller was one that I loved, but a, I don't think this was a Kreller. Well, Kreller often made from show pastry, French Kreller or yeast dough with a distinctive twisted shape. Well, maybe it was a Kreller.

• 14:39Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 14:40Theo Von?

  Maybe it was, but I, yeah.

• 14:41Speaker 02

  I'm thinking of something else though.

• 14:42Theo Von?

  It looked good as a kid, but it was, it was deceiving.

• 14:45Speaker 02

  It was always like, oh, I want that. And then you would eat it and you'd be like, man, this is trash.

• 14:49Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 14:49Speaker 02

  I should have went with that Bavarian cream.

• 14:51Theo Von?

  Yeah, or I should have went with the one with the frosting on it, you know? Um, but we had a beautiful time. Yeah. I didn't meet any, uh, there was no seance really. I do remember there was a mentally handicapped fellow who said he could drive. And he was a driver's ed instructor and he wasn't. He was just, uh. You know, and some people believe he was made in a handicap. Some were like, he's possessed by the devil. I'm like, well, he's not possessed by like a devil who just, you know, is sitting around this pick in his nose and just, you know.

• 15:18Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 15:18Theo Von?

  He was just a little bit off, this dude named Brandon, and he was awesome, actually. He was kind of this special guy between an adult and a kid, and he never left that zone. You know, so there was something kind of very approachable to him about kids. Because he was bigger than us, but he was just like us. And he, uh, he, he taught me how to, he said he could drive. And we drove right into a snowbank and the police came and everything. But it was just exciting, though.

• 15:45Speaker 02

  He was a, he was a liar.

• 15:46Theo Von?

  Yeah, he was.

• 15:47Speaker 02

  Which is a good place for him to be, a church.

• 15:49Theo Von?

  He was a Bears fan. I think it was a tough time for everybody.

• 15:53Speaker 02

  That's, that's, I mean, I gotta say, I, I saw quite a few demon possessed Brandons where I grew up. I saw a lot of Brandons get demons cast out of them.

• 16:02Theo Von?

  Really? So you would see that at your church?

• 16:04Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 16:05Theo Von?

  And what was that kind of like? Like, cause some, some places, that's a part of a culture. And I believe that, I believe in that type of stuff. Do you believe in it?

• 16:13Speaker 02

  I do, uh, you know, I have a, you know, that I've tried to deconstruct a lot of that through, cause I have a science background. I've had to really try to understand a lot of that and understand what is real and what is not. But there was a lot of it that was 100% real, and there was a lot of it that was 100% not. And, uh, you know, I believe there's theatrics, but I also believe, you know, God is everywhere. And I believe God did show up in those places, just like God will show up in any place.

• 16:44Speaker 02

  But yeah, I did see a lot of, you know, grown ass drywall dudes get like demons cast out of them before lunch. And I'd be like sitting there with half a pop tart in my stomach, watching this dude literally like throwing dudes around and like exhibiting some superhuman strength.

• 17:03Theo Von?

  Oh, they're popping the tart right out of that dude.

• 17:05Speaker 02

  Yeah. Yeah.

• 17:06Theo Von?

  You know what I'm saying? That's the original Pop-Tart dude is a damn exorcist.

• 17:09Speaker 02

  Yeah, he just, he created the original Pop-Tart. That cherry flavored Pop-Tart was from a demon exorcism. That's why it's red.

• 17:16Theo Von?

  Yeah, you just know they could have gone with a lot darker flavors, but they're like, let's make this available to children. But dude, a Pop-Tarts and exorcism shit, I'm, I am there, dude. I'll sit on your lap.

• 17:26Speaker 02

  Speaking in tongues, I actually went, we, you know, some, you know, in our town, like an evangelist could like show up to your church and like a traveling evangelist and be like, we're having revival here this week.

• 17:39Theo Von?

  Oh, yeah.

• 17:39Speaker 02

  And literally the church would shut down and be like, we're having revival, y'all. Uh, this is what we're doing. And the whole week would be a revival just because this dude showed up and said, God told me to have a revival here. And they would have a huge like big tent revival.

• 17:53Theo Von?

  No way.

• 17:53Speaker 02

  Absolutely.

• 17:54Theo Von?

  Dude, it's always been my dream to be a part of something like that.

• 17:56Speaker 02

  No.

• 17:56Theo Von?

  Leap of Faith was my favorite movie growing up.

• 17:59Speaker 02

  Dude, that movie changed my life. It's one of the greatest movies ever made. Literally changed my life. Oh, my gosh. I'm so glad you know about that movie. Like very few people I've, I've been able to talk to about that movie. Cause it had one of the most profound impacts on me.

• 18:14Theo Von?

  Really?

• 18:14Speaker 02

  As a kid, just because of how I grew up and, and the music business and seeing performance and theatrics and, you know, where is God and where isn't God? And, uh, that movie is just brilliantly done. But I remember I went up, this dude showed up and, uh, he said, tonight, everybody's getting slain in the spirit. You come up, you're getting slain. And I don't know if you know what slain means, like you, you stand up there and the dude hits you and you fall down and you're just out for however long. And, um,

• 18:42Theo Von?

  Oh, yeah.

• 18:42Speaker 02

  Everybody lined up and I was like, I'm getting slain tonight. I've never been slain.

• 18:47Theo Von?

  That's a freaking religious Percocet right there, boy.

• 18:49Speaker 02

  Yeah, I would, I would wanted it bad. And, uh, he can just knocking people over left and right. Boom, boom, boom. I'd seen him go down. It's like, he's coming to me. He got to me and he started speaking in tongues and I remember he tapped me right in the forehead boom like that I was like That was that was kinda hard and I was like training for the Golden Gloves at that time so I was like A little bit like what's up like he just like hit me right in the forehead with his fingers.

• 19:15Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 19:15Speaker 02

  And then he started, you know, it didn't work like it didn't take. And so he did it again even harder and I was like kind of like mad about it at that point because it actually kinda hurt. I was like, is this dude trying to knock me out?

• 19:27Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 19:27Speaker 02

  Or like, is he trying to slay me in the spirit and anyway?

• 19:31Theo Von?

  Yeah, let's look at the judge's cards.

• 19:33Speaker 02

  And I'm just like getting hit in the forehead by him and then he just moved on. It was one of the most heartbreaking things. He went to the next guy and knocked him out, next guy down, down.

• 19:41Theo Von?

  Were you being defiant, do you think?

• 19:42Speaker 02

  I don't know. I thought like, man, I guess I don't believe uh in my, did I like snap out of it? Was I, you know, was I not in the moment? I didn't I didn't really know what to think because I was like a nineteen year old kid just trying to feel God and try to get closer to God and everybody seemed to be doing that. And what was wild is like he knocked everybody up and there was all these bodies all over the floor, people like putting modesty cloths all over him and stuff and And they're just out there asleep. So I had to like walk all over all these bodies to get back to my.

• 20:15Theo Von?

  Like, oh.

• 20:16Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 20:17Theo Von?

  And it's kind of embarrassing. It's almost the walk of shame at church.

• 20:19Speaker 02

  It was, it was the most shameful walk I've ever taken at church.

• 20:23Theo Von?

  I guess I'm not.

• 20:24Speaker 02

  I guess I'm not. And what really made me laugh at least kinda helped break me out.

• 20:28Theo Von?

  Missing the spirit.

• 20:29Speaker 02

  Yeah, I remember thinking like, what if I step on, because everybody had their hands out, just kinda laid on the floor. What if I step on someone's hand? Will I snap them out of it and they'll be like, ah, and then they'll go back in or would they be out? Like, oh, you stepped on my hand and now I'm no longer slain. I was like, how did?

• 20:45Theo Von?

  Or like Steven, the center, you know, old Steven Wilson Jr. Who can't even get the dark arts exercised out of him. Is there be a waking up people who are doing well?

• 20:53Speaker 02

  Breaking fingers with his. With his steel toe boots, shamefully walking back to his pew.

• 20:59Theo Von?

  I never thought about the walk of shame at church. What is a, um, what is a modesty cloth?

• 21:06Speaker 02

  Well, like, sometimes a lady would get slain and she's wearing a skirt. You know, it's a Pentecostal church and they, they cover and make sure like.

• 21:15Theo Von?

  Oh, that's a lot of skirt, dude. We used to call them skirtens because they were so long, you know? And some of them would be actual curtains that they had taken off of a window somewhere. Some of them you'd even see like that stick, you know, the stick that's on the edge of a curtain that you can like, if you turn it, it'll go up. Some of them even have those. You're just sitting over there. Yeah, if you're trying to get a, you gotta spin that thing for a long time.

• 21:37Theo Von?

  Yeah, they got blinds, those vertical blinds.

• 21:40Speaker 02

  Really? Yeah, it cure you from blindness.

• 21:43Theo Von?

  Yeah, that's pretty funny, dude. Thinking about something like that. Thinking about something that's funny together with somebody is something that's awesome, dude.

• 21:50Speaker 02

  Yeah, it was like, it helped me get through it like the, cause like you said, there was a shamefulness to it, but it actually was kind of funny.

• 21:57Theo Von?

  So they put that modesty blanket on them.

• 21:59Speaker 02

  There's a modesty cloth.

• 22:00Theo Von?

  But that's good for that. Good for that, that at least, yeah, because there's some guys, some lurkers that would just be up there.

• 22:07Speaker 02

  Yeah, you never know. And, and like, like I said, in the, those churches, like nothing, you didn't even show below the knee. So like if, if your skirt went, started to show some knee, they better get a cloth over that. You can't be seeing that kneecap.

• 22:19Theo Von?

  Oh, yeah, boy. Those, oh, oh, I remember being young and just, God. I was kind of like a, I guess like a little bit of a peeping tom or whatever. I was like visually stimulated, I called it, and had a step stool. But, um, I remember for Christmas one year, I wanted a ladder. My mom was like, what do you want a ladder for? Like, why do you want this little ladder? And I wanted to go, I'd go watch people and just watch in their houses. And I wasn't always looking for perverse stuff. I was just looking. I liked watching people live, right? Like, I think I hated being at our house. It was like, it was like, uh. It wasn't fun. It was just painful kind of a lot and it was like always like aggressive

• 23:02Theo Von?

  and um defensive. Like the second you were around, you had to be defensive. Uh, and so I would go watch as other people live, like watch somebody just be, you know, or just watch some dad sit there in a chair, some mom make something or some kid just, you know, like use it as like the living room or something. I wouldn't get real weird, but, but I love that kind of stuff, man. I love just kind of absorbing how other people operated.

• 23:27Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 23:27Theo Von?

  Uh, that kind of stuff was interesting.

• 23:29Speaker 02

  You're a OG people watcher.

• 23:31Theo Von?

  Yeah, I was a bit of a, yeah.

• 23:32Speaker 02

  I mean, that's, I mean, if.

• 23:34Theo Von?

  Get your ladder together, you know? Yeah, but get half a pop tart in you and get over there and just see what the.

• 23:39Speaker 02

  I find comedians are, and songwriters in general are just like, they're people watchers and then they watch so much people that they end up, these narratives start to show up.

• 23:50Theo Von?

  Hmm.

• 23:50Speaker 02

  And uh, so you were probably just harnessing your skills for what was to come.

• 23:58Theo Von?

  Yeah, I think sometimes, yeah, you look back on your life and you're like, oh, so much of that was to uh, was ammo to provide something.

• 24:05Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 24:06Theo Von?

  You already know it, but you should be reminded that PrizePix is America's number one sports picks app. The app is really easy to use. To create a player lineup, all you have to do is pick more or less on a few player stats. That's it. PrizePix will give you fifty dollars in lineups when you play your first five dollar lineup. Win or lose, you get fifty bucks in lineups. Use promo code Theo when you download the app and sign up today. And on top of making lineups, you can now also pick teams on PrizePix. Pick the winner total and spread on everything from college football playoffs to combat sports to football and

• 24:49Theo Von?

  basketball. Team picks are now available in thirty states, including California, Texas, and Florida. Lastly, PrizePix is in the middle of their holiday Pixmas promo. For seven days leading into Christmas, look for daily discounts, boosts, and even a max discount dropping on Christmas Day. PrizePix, it's good to be right. Play responsibly. I want to let you in on some information here. When I need more Bitcoin, Moonpay is always the first app that I open. Because it doesn't force you to buy a whole coin, and it's super easy to use. Moonpay is one of the biggest partners on this show, and I'm excited to share that I've made the decision

• 25:32Theo Von?

  to accept my compensation from them in Bitcoin instead of US dollars. I'm planning to hold and save that Bitcoin in my Moonpay account. The Bitcoin will sit in a digital Moonpay wallet that nobody can access except for me. The US dollar continues to fluctuate in value, so by making this decision, I'm diversifying my portfolio and hopefully earning more from our partnership than I would have otherwise. Remember, while Moonpay makes buying crypto straightforward, it's essential to do your own research and understand the risks involved. Crypto trading can be volatile, and you could lose your investment. Moonpay is a tool to facilitate your transactions,

• 26:16Theo Von?

  not a source of financial advice. Trade responsibly. One thing you said that was interesting a little bit ago is you said that your dad, like your dad was a boxer and he did these things, and then sometimes you're living out some of your dad's dreams. And I find that to be interesting, that we feel like that as sons, or that some sons feel that way. And then also that some dads will make sacrifices, like you're saying, like, you know, and it wasn't like it was his choice that he made, you know? It wasn't like a sacrifice, but sometimes even with choices then come sacrifices that you don't see. And then you have to make another choice then as to what do I do here?

• 27:00Theo Von?

  But that, like by even by giving birth to a son, by having an offspring, you are creating something that can go the next leg, almost like it's one of those races where they pass the baton. What is that called? I think a baton race. Yeah, a baton race. And, yeah, so, yeah. It's not hard. It's not as hard as it seems.

• 27:17Speaker 02

  I'm not sure. It may not be called that. It may be something, something, uh, something way more complex. There it is, a baton, a relay race.

• 27:24Theo Von?

  Baton race, uh, relay race. Um, but it's like, I can, this is as far as I can get. And let me put this into you with, but then it's interesting as the next runner, as the next generation is, what do I, like, how much do I owe to this previous generation to carry on their dream? Do I owe anything? You know, what does it mean to be a son? Like, all those things kind of were popping into my head as you were saying that.

• 27:47Speaker 02

  Wow. A generational relay race is not something I've put, you know, to thought regarding all that. But that, that is very, very accurate, um, observation there because you, when you see a relay race, like the first runner or whatever, the runner before you, the runners before you, like dictate how fast you're going to run and they dictate your position in the, in the race.

• 28:12Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 28:12Speaker 02

  So like if they're running with everything they got, well, then you're only like, doing a disservice to their effort by not running with everything you got.

• 28:22Theo Von?

  Right.

• 28:22Speaker 02

  And so, yeah, that, that baton becomes something bigger than just this thing you're holding in your hand. It's like the, the sum of all their efforts.

• 28:30Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 28:30Speaker 02

  And, uh, you know.

• 28:32Theo Von?

  Yeah, I think we used to hear a lot more, I think, when families, and this is a hypo- hypothetical, but when families seemed closer and, uh, and we needed low, more entertainment from our fathers and forefathers, and we got lore passed down and family history, when there was more storytelling, when you couldn't get as much storytelling from like phones and television and stuff as we can in the past few generations. But when it came from like those, uh, the predecessors of ours and our forefathers and mothers, that, that kind of stuff, it like beat inside of us like a drum, you know? Um, yeah, what, what kind of, did you feel a pressure like, um, and did something, your father passed away?

• 29:11Speaker 02

  Yeah, he passed away seven years ago at the age of 59 and. It happened, yeah, he was very young and it was a sudden thing and it was.

• 29:22Theo Von?

  Was he sick?

• 29:23Speaker 02

  Yeah, well, he had like this pulmonary fibrosis thing that was starting, but he ended up dying of a pulmonary embolism, like a blood clot in his lungs and so, yeah, it was, it was a very sudden thing that I don't think anybody really expected and.

• 29:41Theo Von?

  He was living in Indiana?

• 29:42Speaker 02

  He was living in southern Indiana and he was, you know, he was, you know, doing quite well and like, you know, everything kind of changed in about six months and then

• 29:54Speaker 02

  he, you know, suddenly this, this embolism showed up and I tried to get there because he, it was, his, his body was like shutting down.

• 30:03Theo Von?

  What do you mean, so an embolism? Can you bring it up just so I know, Trevon? Sorry to interrupt you, Stephen.

• 30:07Speaker 02

  No, don't.

• 30:08Theo Von?

  I'm just like, sometimes I, I've let information fly and I don't know what it is. An embolism, a pulmonary embolism is a blood clot that travels to and blocks an artery in the lungs, cutting off normal blood flow and oxygen exchange and creating a potentially life-threatening emergency. So had this been happening for a while and then it got bad?

• 30:27Speaker 02

  Yeah, and so he'd had some, obviously some things going on that he never knew was happening. And, and then, yeah, it got to that life-threatening emergency point and then there is a point where they can only do so much.

• 30:44Speaker 02

  And, you know, he was a bit of a cowboy and, you know, those kind of classic dudes that don't want to go to the doctor and, oh, tough it out kind of thing. I'm sure there was a lot of that mentality going into it. Also, there was poor healthcare, you know, that's, he was a victim of the American healthcare system too in that regard. I won't get into all that, but, but yeah, like that was, that was a big part of it.

• 31:08Theo Von?

  We've talked, we've talked about that a lot over the years. It's a nightmare and the stress they put people through trying to deal with their own taking care of themselves. It's like.

• 31:15Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 31:15Theo Von?

  It's a nightmare.

• 31:16Speaker 02

  Especially at his age, at 59, he was starting to feel like, oh, you're just like a forgotten human. They don't, you know, like, you know, they don't really want to take care of you. They want to do everything but that. Like you gotta fight tooth and nail to take care of yourself and that. At least where he was at that time. And, yeah, I, I gotta. A really panicked call from my sister that morning said, you need to get here like now. Like dad is very sick and we don't know what's happening and they rushed him to the emergency room.

• 31:51Speaker 02

  I jumped in my car and sped up there and I said goodbye to him in the middle of Kentucky on the side of I sixty five on iPhone eight on the side of a highway and um.

• 32:03Theo Von?

  Pulled over to make it quieter?

• 32:05Speaker 02

  Yeah, and just so I didn't lose signal. I was so worried that because you know, the middle of Kentucky is the middle of nowhere. Like what if I dropped the call like yeah and um you know, there was so I just pulled over just. I mean, it was insane. I just the the the sound of like semis flying by me like ninety miles an hour, but literally being in a I felt like I was in a bubble like not like the world was like the world stopped around me in that little car like. A semi could have taken the side of that car off. I wouldn't even had known it or you know, I would have just. I was in a state of absolute shock and and horror. It was a very traumatizing experience, but.

• 32:47Theo Von?

  And you were on a FaceTime call?

• 32:49Speaker 02

  No, I was just on a video or a normal phone call.

• 32:53Theo Von?

  Was he able to speak to you?

• 32:54Speaker 02

  He was and he uh.

• 32:56Theo Von?

  Did he know that it could be like his last moment?

• 32:58Speaker 02

  He knew he was dying.

• 32:59Theo Von?

  Bothering you by asking you this?

• 33:00Speaker 02

  No, I I talk about it a lot on stage. I kind of relive it every night and um that's been a a challenge for me like mentally kind of but it's been but it's also been like the beautiful part of unpacking trauma and grief because you know, I'm not like our our music like really um. It it finds the grieving and I think it's it's important for me to grieve as well um like I I I go through grief every night and uh. But you know, um he was such a gangster in that moment. He knew he had maybe ninety seconds left on this earth.

• 33:39Speaker 02

  He knew he was going, not just going, but going fast. He even told me he's like, I'm I'm going Stephen and um.

• 33:49Speaker 02

  Sorry. But yeah, he was uh, he was so calm about it. Um, he said, everything's gonna be okay. Oh. That was his first thing he said, like such a dad thing to say. And um, and he said, write a good song for me, Stephen. And he said, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, four times. And He wanted you to know for sure. Yeah, like he wanted there to be no doubt. And uh, so I say it more than once all the time now, because I, I, from that experience, I kinda realized that people are counting.

• 34:27Speaker 02

  And uh, I, I was counting and, and um, and it was weird, like on that last, I love you, it's almost like his voice got quieter. Like he was literally being pulled, like God was snatching him from the universe in that last, I love you. Wow. And he was gone thirty seconds later. And uh, and that was it. I was the last person he spoke to and um, I'm really grateful that I got to speak to him. And in that moment, in that car, um,

• 34:59Speaker 02

  I, I, I was so angry at God. I was so angry at him, even my dad. I was like, how dare you die on me like this? Like, like that's, it wasn't supposed to happen. Like, none of it was supposed to happen like that. Like, I was under the impression he was invincible, first of all. And he was just so young and he was just such a, you know, just such a lively, such a bright light. So it just, it didn't seem possible. And then even to people in my hometown, they were in disbelief when he died. Like, it was like, cause his, his life force was so big that like, people were in denial. It's like, that's impossible. There's no way he could be dead. Like, and I was like, no, he, he really is.

• 35:44Speaker 02

  And it was a, a tough thing to really come to terms with. But um, with any great reaction or any like chemical reaction, there is a catalyst. Um, and I have to say, everything, the reason I'm here and the reason I'm anywhere right now is because of that conversation. It was uh, you know, you have a product and a reactant, and then there's a catalyst and um,

• 36:11Speaker 02

  And that that conversation is what catalyzed my whole career.

• 36:15Theo Von?

  Really?

• 36:15Speaker 02

  And, uh, yeah.

• 36:18Speaker 02

  That write, write a good song for me, Stephen.

• 36:20Theo Von?

  Oh.

• 36:23Speaker 02

  That was like a lifetime's worth of jet fuel for me to charge across the galaxy and, and do everything I could to try and keep him alive. To try and, um, just tell the world about him that, you know.

• 36:40Theo Von?

  Carrying out his wish.

• 36:41Speaker 02

  Yeah. And what, and what I found out is like, like carrying out his wish and, um,

• 36:49Speaker 02

  and keeping him alive was keeping so many other people that, that other folks have lost, other humans have lost alive. You know, he was resurrecting other people at the same time. And these people were coming to shows with this, um, with this bounty of love that had no place to go. And that's what grief is essentially. And, uh, and I gave them, you know, you know, the, these songs have given them a, a home for at least maybe three and a half or four minutes. And, uh,

• 37:22Theo Von?

  Oh, yeah.

• 37:23Speaker 02

  And that's been, um, that's really been the charge of all of this. That's been, um, the mission statement is, um, you know, at, at the very beginning was just keep dad alive. Keep him alive at all costs. And, you know, like, kind of a psychotic denial for the first couple of years that he was even gone. I was like, no, he's, he's still around. And I, and a lot of times I felt them on my shoulders like a little kid. It was really weird. It was like this weird reversal of roles and, uh,

• 37:56Theo Von?

  Well, now that he's free, he kinda could do as he wants, you know? He could be on your shoulders.

• 38:00Speaker 02

  Yeah, he would show up like that. And the reason why I play this song, Stand By Me, it's just literally I, two weeks after he died, I was scheduled to play this songwriter festival in Deadwood, South Dakota. And it's a, you know, it's in the Black Hills and it's a very spiritually charged area. Just in general.

• 38:19Theo Von?

  Yeah, for sure it is.

• 38:20Speaker 02

  And the guy that runs it says, you don't have to play any music. I know you're in a bad, bad spot. I hadn't slept in a week and, and, uh, he's like, just come here and, you know.

• 38:32Speaker 02

  See what happens, you know, just be around people like there's nothing but love for you here. And we know you've gone through it.

• 38:40Speaker 02

  And at the end of the festival, they asked, you know, all the writers and stuff there. If you wanted to play a cover, what's your favorite cover that you love? And they did this big finale. I'd been for some reason, for about a year prior to my dad's death, I'd been singing this song, Stand By Me in my living room, the exact way I play it now.

• 39:01Theo Von?

  It just popped in your head to come, it just kind of came into you?

• 39:03Speaker 02

  Yeah, like for some reason I was like, that song has haunted me my whole life because of the movie, Stand By Me.

• 39:08Theo Von?

  Oh, for sure. Yeah, that's a big part of a lot of people's, that movie was huge in people's lives for so many little moments.

• 39:15Speaker 02

  Yeah, like I very much saw myself in the kid on the left.

• 39:18Theo Von?

  The Gordilla?

• 39:19Speaker 02

  The Gordilla Chance, no.

• 39:21Theo Von?

  Oh, um.

• 39:22Speaker 02

  What was his name, Will Wheaton, like the writer, the writer that was trying to find a voice, the nerdy little writer kid on the left.

• 39:28Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 39:29Speaker 02

  And that song like was threaded so brilliantly throughout that film. And it's obviously the title, but because of that movie, which is also a Stephen King story, that movie is based off a Stephen King novella called The Body. So, you know, it was obviously a very haunting and dark theme, but you know, that song really haunted me because of that movie. And I just started playing it. I was like trying to, I don't know, kind of deconstruct it, try to process it in a different way. And when my dad died, fast forward to Deadwood, all I could play was Stand By Me.

• 40:05Theo Von?

  Wow.

• 40:06Speaker 02

  And I started playing it and I'd really never played it for anybody like that. And the whole place like just went crazy. Like, and at that point I was not an artist. I, I'd just quit my job as a scientist. I'd just, I'd been a published writer for maybe two years at that point, just trying to get other artists to sing my songs. And I never really saw myself as an artist, even though my dad did. Like he would always be like, why don't you just sing these songs? You sound great singing them, but I would always argue with him like, no, I don't do that. I write them, someone else sings them. But when I went up there to sing Stand By Me, I swear to God, he was like on my shoulders like a little kid.

• 40:48Speaker 02

  And I got so addicted to that feeling again.

• 40:52Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 40:52Speaker 02

  Like, cause he, I mean, he was there. He showed up and I, I truly believe he showed up at Bridgestone at the CMAs. Like he, he did. He showed up that night and uh.

• 41:03Theo Von?

  Well, I bet he was so proud. Do you feel like he's proud of you?

• 41:06Speaker 02

  Uh, yeah, I think so. Yeah. He, he was so proud of me before he died, before any of this happened and um, I think, yeah, he, yeah, he would be very proud. Um, I've been trying to make him proud my whole life, but.

• 41:22Theo Von?

  What did he said? Write a song for me or make a, what did he say?

• 41:24Speaker 02

  Write a good song.

• 41:25Theo Von?

  Leaking over here.

• 41:26Speaker 02

  No, man, I leak all the time. I.

• 41:28Theo Von?

  I, yeah, dude, I listen to stuff that makes me cry all the time because I think I'm just full of tears and I gotta get these bitches out. Even though I'm dehydrated half the time. So I'm like, I don't even know what's going on here, dude.

• 41:38Speaker 02

  No, uh, it's good for you. Like I, when my dad died, I swear all I did was cry for two years. Uh, I, like, it's all I did. Um.

• 41:47Theo Von?

  Yeah, you gotta get it out.

• 41:48Speaker 02

  And if you have, if you can find the tears, find them. Like right now, I, I can't find them.

• 41:53Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 41:53Speaker 02

  I mean, even though I, I get emotional, don't get me wrong, but.

• 41:57Theo Von?

  Yeah, sometimes you have tears and sometimes you don't. It's like, almost like seasons, you know? It's almost like an ocean. Sometimes it comes up on the shore and sometimes it's out to sea, you know, even though it's, you know, it lives right.

• 42:06Speaker 02

  It's a tide.

• 42:06Theo Von?

  Yeah. So it's like, um, and especially I think people that have had like a lot of things in their life that have happened that haven't been processed.

• 42:17Theo Von?

  You know, it takes a long time and I think I've gotten grateful in my life over, over, over time where there, if I find something that helps me process, I'll sit there and process it. My brother says a lot of times, he's like, yeah, getting rid of grief and like, like trauma, like that old stuff. And people use trauma as a buzzword, but getting rid of grief and stuff from the past, he's like, it's like taking panties out of a bathtub one at a time. He's like, you know, it just, it takes a long time and it's slow and it's just kind of arduous work. But uh, but you just be grateful that, that it can kind of happen over time. Um, what he said, make a good song for me?

• 42:53Speaker 02

  Write a good song.

• 42:54Theo Von?

  Write a good song.

• 42:54Speaker 02

  Yeah. Cause he knew that's what I was, that's all I could think about and.

• 42:58Theo Von?

  That's the baton, man. That's the baton.

• 43:00Speaker 02

  Yeah. He used to come to my, like all my shows, and when I say shows, like playing for seven people at writer's round. Or like, and he came to the Bluebird Cafe. I remember like had his giant, you remember when they had those giant phones? That were like the size of laptops, you know?

• 43:17Theo Von?

  Oh, those T-Mobile sidekicks? Yeah, baby, them bitches was beautiful.

• 43:20Speaker 02

  Yeah, he had one of those bad boys and he would just hold it up and record the whole show. But he used to drive me crazy.

• 43:26Theo Von?

  Oh dude, there's nothing crazier than watching like a boomer kind of like record something. Or even just somebody from a generation above or just, we went to the UFC fight the other day and some guy was recorded every single fight. I'm like, he had a front row seat and he was recording and there was a TV right next to him playing the fights. I'm like, you can just go home and watch, like I just didn't understand what was going on. But the fact that he was there and that he cared so much about it and that he loved watching you do it.

• 43:52Speaker 02

  Yeah, I, um, there was this one song that's on the record called I'm A Song.

• 43:57Theo Von?

  Oh, yeah.

• 43:58Speaker 02

  And he, he watched me play that for the first time at Bluebird Cafe. I'd just written it like that week.

• 44:03Theo Von?

  Right over here?

• 44:04Speaker 02

  Yeah, Bluebird Cafe and he had his gigantic, gigantic phone. I'll never forget and I was like, Dad, please put your phone down. But he recorded that whole song and then he called me, um, like, you know, a week later, kept talking about that song and,

• 44:22Speaker 02

  and about a month before he died, it was Father's Day weekend, I came up to see him. And we went to a tractor pull and then we went home and watched some fights. And, uh, and he goes, hey, Steven, you know that song you played at the Bluebird like a month ago? It's called I'm A Song. And I was like, whoa, how do you even know that? Like I, you know, cause I was in that point of like writing, you know, 200 songs a year. I was writing, you know, 10 songs a week. So like a month ago, like that, I'm a song was like 50 songs ago. So I was like, uh, oh, yeah, yeah, I know that. And he's like, yeah, you played at the Bluebird Cafe. And, uh, he's like, that's, that's my favorite song. And I was like, oh, thank you, Dad.

• 45:05Speaker 02

  And you're like, I thought you meant like, it's my favorite song, his favorite song and mine. And he was like, no, you need to listen to me. That's my favorite song.

• 45:15Theo Von?

  Wow.

• 45:16Speaker 02

  And I was like, how are you even listening to it? He'd been listening to me play it on the Bluebird, at the Bluebird on his gigantic T-Mobile, T-Mobile, whatever that thing is. And, and that's how he was, he was, he was actually my first fan. And he was the, you know, he, he, he would breathe so much life into me. He, he believed in me so much more than I ever believed in myself. And, and I remember him saying, you should sing that song. And when he died, I, I sang it at his funeral.

• 45:51Theo Von?

  Oh.

• 45:51Speaker 02

  And it was one of the hardest songs I've ever sang. But in that moment, like, that was, that was when, you know, I, I knew things were about to change. And, but yeah, and that song has helped so many people. And it's, I don't know, it's been a bit of a thesis statement for me. And so when he said, write a good song for me, he knew, he knew I had already written one, at least in his eyes, because it was his favorite song ever. So he knew, at least he had proof on his phone that I was capable of writing something great. And he, I guess his last charge was to please keep going and don't stop. And as a, you know.

• 46:35Theo Von?

  It's gotta feel good for him to be, like, even in a moment, like, I mean, that's crazy to say this. What am I talking about? But in a moment of leaving the earth to know that you have a son or someone who can, who, you know, you've created that's capable, you know, you have a child that you believe is capable. I wonder if, you know what I'm saying, or something like that?

• 46:56Speaker 02

  No, I, yeah, and my other siblings are also very capable. He's very proud of all of us equally, but I think he. He knew something about me was different. Very young, I was a very quiet kid, a very nerdy kid. I was, I had his name and his eyes, but you know, outside of that, we were so different. So he, he, I think he just knew I was gonna do something different.

• 47:21Theo Von?

  He's probably intrigued, I bet.

• 47:22Speaker 02

  Yeah, and I like picked up guitar and taught myself and he was like just always mesmerized by like my musical ability. Cause it seemed like magic to him. Because it was, it was God given, like I, nobody taught me how to do this.

• 47:37Theo Von?

  Really?

• 47:38Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 47:38Theo Von?

  Oh, you just picked it up and started playing?

• 47:40Speaker 02

  Yeah, for the most part, yeah, I learned some tablature and, and, but you know, I sucked real bad then.

• 47:46Theo Von?

  This is you right here?

• 47:47Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's probably like a week after I got my first guitar, if that even.

• 47:51Theo Von?

  Let me see some of this.

• 48:01Speaker 02

  Then we're watching mom's family. Yep. Yeah, that's lithium.

• 48:06Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 48:07Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 48:09Theo Von?

  Who is that? Is that your dad now?

• 48:11Speaker 02

  No, that's just some random old dude and this is after my dad had passed away. Like none of this, like on my whole music, none, I didn't have any music out when he was alive.

• 48:21Theo Von?

  Oh, okay, so they're just packaging this all up?

• 48:24Speaker 02

  Yeah, this is all like old VHS footage from when I was a kid. That's me getting my first guitar for my sixteenth birthday, even though I look like I'm twelve.

• 48:31Theo Von?

  Look how hot, like, go back. Look, hold on, yeah, hold on, right? A little more, right there.

• 48:37Speaker 02

  Ah.

• 48:38Theo Von?

  Look how, you can see though how happy it cool.

• 48:40Speaker 02

  Hands through the air.

• 48:41Theo Von?

  Yeah, you can see for a second, see if you can catch his face a second earlier, maybe a second later.

• 48:45Speaker 02

  It was pure joy.

• 48:47Theo Von?

  You can just see how happy he is, you know? That's cool, dude.

• 48:50Speaker 02

  Thank you.

• 48:51Theo Von?

  I'm gonna be cool now.

• 48:52Speaker 02

  No.

• 48:52Theo Von?

  Oh, it's so fun, dude.

• 48:54Speaker 02

  Yeah, I might actually have, you know, I might actually be able to talk to a girl now.

• 48:58Theo Von?

  Oh dude, yeah, at least if you walk up with a guitar, at least you're rocking a side day. At least they'll be like, hey, what, what do you do? You know what I'm saying? At least you have some sort of semblance, instead of hide and putting hair in your eyes and hiding behind it.

• 49:09Speaker 02

  That's what I did, I said nothing to nobody.

• 49:12Theo Von?

  Oh dude, that was most of my childhood when I, when I was growing up. I was thinking about, what do you, um, what are the responsibilities of a son? You know, people don't think about that a lot. I think about what do my parents owe me a lot as a kid, or I have probably? You know, like, my parents didn't do this, or my parents didn't do that, you know? That's been. You know, or some things didn't happen and should have happened, that's fair. But when I start to harp on the other stuff and it gets into this like, oh, woe is me, or pity me type of thing, you know, that can be kind of a unsafe area to go into. But the two can be easily connected, like things that, yes, a parent should do these things, or those things should be. A child's life should include these things, and they don't happen.

• 49:55Theo Von?

  And then, well, a parent, they don't owe you these things, but attaching those together. But I never think about like, what is it, what are my responsibilities as a son, you know? Or as a child, you know what I'm saying? You don't think that. Cause at a certain point, you do have some responsibility in it yourself, you know?

• 50:11Speaker 02

  Yeah, I mean, I've, I've had a lot of thought about that and, um, you know, I grew up thinking the same thing as you, like, maybe, you know, things should have been different, or, um, but at the same time, I, I tend to think about my parents as children because they had me as children. They were like, it was a shotgun wedding, my mom was six months pregnant, they were teenagers having babies and, uh, so I also think about them like, oh my gosh, like, I, I have a lot of sympathy for them as I, I was older, but, you know, growing up, I had, you know, anger and resentment towards certain things that I did not understand. But I've kind of tried to, um,

• 50:56Speaker 02

  you know, under, you know, understand that, you know, it's, it's very like, um, biological,

• 51:04Speaker 02

  about like, kind of how fathers and sons are just children and their parents.

• 51:10Speaker 02

  In, in the, in the beginning of, of, your, your, your father is like, superhuman, or he's a superhero, um, like, humanize, demonize, and idolize is kind of how I put it down. So in the beginning, you idolize your father.

• 51:28Speaker 02

  And you idolize everything they do. I remember idolizing my father, like wanting to be a boxer just like him, wanting to do so many things like him. And I would hide in his shadow and I idolized him my whole childhood. And then, once I got into my teen years, that's when that separation starts to begin. And you start to demonize your parents. And, um, and you go through this whole demonization of your father or your parents where, and, and it's actually very biological. This is how like, you know, genetic diversity was spread because we're a tribal species. So, like, the young boy, your young man, in his reproductive years, would start to demonize the parents and get away from

• 52:13Speaker 02

  the tribe and go join another tribe.

• 52:15Theo Von?

  So he can procreate.

• 52:17Speaker 02

  So he can procreate and create genetic diversity.

• 52:19Theo Von?

  Right, because if he procreates too close to his own tribe, you also risk like a...

• 52:23Speaker 02

  Yeah, inbreeding.

• 52:24Theo Von?

  Yeah, like the guy that taught me how to drive.

• 52:25Speaker 02

  Yeah, exactly.

• 52:26Theo Von?

  And I'm not saying no shade, Brandon. I think he was bred properly. It was just, you know, God put some odd paints in his, in his palette.

• 52:33Speaker 02

  We love you, Brandon.

• 52:34Theo Von?

  Yeah, we do, we do love you. And actually, he passed away a few years ago, and we do love you. He's a special guy.

• 52:38Speaker 02

  I'm so sorry, Brandon. But, but yeah, and then, uh, as, you know, I think eventually you come back home, there's always like this prodigal son kind of moment. And that's where you humanize your father. Because that's what happened with me. Like, you know, you start off as a kid idolizing it. You get to teenage years, those years that I, you know, he got me that guitar. I was probably gonna start demonizing him soon. And, uh...

• 53:00Theo Von?

  He wanted you to at least have a backbeat for it.

• 53:01Speaker 02

  Yeah, exactly. Something to like, put all those, those angsty lyrics into it.

• 53:06Theo Von?

  Put those, put that anger to lyrics.

• 53:08Speaker 02

  Yeah, at least make it a bop. And then, uh, and then I remember when I was 25, like, I was sitting on the porch with my dad, and I just remembered, I was like, "You're just a dude."

• 53:19Theo Von?

  Oh, yeah.

• 53:20Speaker 02

  And that's when I, the humanization hit. And I was like, "You're just another dude doing the best you can." And, and I could see it in his eyes. And we were just kind of like, we were, you know, the father and son dynamic was still there, but he was now a friend and something bigger than a father.

• 53:36Theo Von?

  Well, he's another human, like you're saying.

• 53:37Speaker 02

  He was just another human.

• 53:38Theo Von?

  And that's a tough moment. And it's an interesting moment, too, to look at because... It's almost, it almost breaks down the wars you were fighting or the whatever. You know, it breaks down like.

• 53:49Speaker 02

  Breaks down everything.

• 53:50Theo Von?

  Right. It breaks down the pedestal you held this person on in a way, in a way, some of it. But it also breaks down if you've been demonizing it like, well, who am I fighting? I'm not fighting against, you know, the twenty, the thirty-two-year-old dad, the guy that I knew who like, walked by me and didn't glance or whatever your thoughts are, whatever your, um, whatever, like you're envisioning, that's not there anymore.

• 54:11Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 54:12Theo Von?

  You know, and it's like then what, then this whole like baton that I'm still carrying of anger, it's not even real.

• 54:17Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 54:17Theo Von?

  So what's really happening here with me? And that's like a moment you kind of have to look at yourself as well, and that's kind of painful.

• 54:24Speaker 02

  Yeah, it was, it's very much a self-reflective moment and you kind of start to see kind of like, man, I was a selfish little shit. Or I was, you know, maybe you were justified in certain areas, but or, yeah, at the end of the day, they're, they're just another human doing the best they can, just like you.

• 54:42Theo Von?

  And who am I gonna be now? That's the thing too.

• 54:44Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 54:44Theo Von?

  And sometimes I go back and I put on my old, my,

• 54:48Theo Von?

  sometimes I go back and I'm the same person, but more often than not these days, I do a decent job of like, well, let me be the leader instead of saying you should have led me or you should, let me, let me grow up. It's like, how many times do, am I gonna fucking miss the grow up bus, you know? Like, I'm on it, but still, I'll sometimes I'll be there at the stop in the morning and I'll be like, nah, I'm gonna let that bitch go today. You know what I'm saying? I ain't getting on that bitch today. So some of that's interesting and it's interesting to look at and you're still just a human looking at it and trying to figure it out.

• 55:21Speaker 02

  Yeah. Yeah. Well, it's, it's, I think all part of the journey and like,

• 55:24Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 55:25Speaker 02

  it all, it's, it's rooted in something very old. Like I always thought like that teen angst thing was like, something created in the nineties or something. It's like, no, this is pre-biblical. This is, this is something that's been going on for a long time.

• 55:39Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 55:40Speaker 02

  If you study primates enough and you, you, uh, you can really kind of see a lot of, you can learn a lot about humans by studying primates because they're also, you know, we're technically primates too.

• 55:52Theo Von?

  Yeah, there's rumors.

• 55:53Speaker 02

  There's rumors. Yeah. I mean, we're all part of the animal kingdom, kingdom, animalia, and we are.

• 56:00Speaker 02

  Of the, uh, we're technically of the greater apes. That's what they call us.

• 56:04Theo Von?

  What do you think happened? Do you think, um, do you think we? What do you think there about evolution? Cause it's so tricky, you know? It's so like, cause we're the only people that are out here. It feels like suffering like this sometimes.

• 56:17Speaker 02

  Can I take a piss and get back to this question? Cause this is gonna.

• 56:21Theo Von?

  Yeah, let's take a break and piss, man.

• 56:23Speaker 00

  Coca-Cola. For the big, for the small, the short and the tall. Peacemakers, risk takers. For the optimists, pessimists. For long distance love. For introverts and extroverts. The thinkers and the doers. For old friends and new. Coca-Cola for everyone. Pick up some Coca-Cola at a store near you.

• 56:54Theo Von?

  With the new year upon us, sometimes you gotta think about your new moves. How are you gonna do things different? Especially if you're running an online business or considering it. Whether it's dropping new stuff or looking over how you did and strategizing from there. Or just figuring out why the heck those pocket t-shirts sold out? Shopify is like your co-founder that doesn't ask for a cut. Helps you plan, keeps the whole situation rolling smooth. And lets you keep building your empire without pulling your hair out over spreadsheets. Shopify makes it easy. That's why we use them. It's just less chaos, more, hey, I can actually do this.

• 57:38Theo Von?

  You don't need to be a coder or a designer. Shopify has got templates galore. Pick what fits your vibe, make your shop look smart, no sweat. Whether you've got an idea rattling around or you're really just about to launch your own brand. There's never been an easier way to do it. Check out Shopify.com/ Theo and see just how simple it is to get your thing out there. Let's see what you can build with Shopify riding shotgun. Is pornography causing a problem in your life? Do you find yourself watching porno for longer periods of time and having trouble stopping? Is porn affecting your relationship or dating life? Well, you're certainly not alone.

• 58:22Theo Von?

  Watching pornography has become so commonplace today and oftentimes men use porn to numb the pain of loneliness, boredom, anxiety, and depression. Shame and stigma prevent men from talking about these issues and getting help for them. I want to introduce you to my friend Steve. Steve is the founder of Valor Recovery, a program to help men overcome porn abuse and sexual compulsivity. Steve is a long-term sexual recovery member and has personally overcame the emotional and spiritual despair of abusing pornography and has dedicated his life to empowering men to do the same. Steve is an amazing person and he is a close friend of mine. I mean that.

• 59:07Theo Von?

  Valor Recovery helps men to develop the tools necessary to have a healthier sex life. Their coaches are in long-term recovery and will be your partner, mentor, and spiritual guide to transcend these problematic behaviors. To learn more about Valor Recovery, please visit them at www dot Valor Recovery Coaching dot com or email them at admin at Valor Recovery Coaching dot com. Thank you.

• 59:43Theo Von?

  There you go, brother. Popping into that Celsius, brother. I'll have a little with you.

• 59:49Speaker 02

  Let's do it.

• 59:50Theo Von?

  There you go, Steven Wilson Jr. right there.

• 59:55Theo Von?

  Yeah, I remember I came to, um, and we just took a bathroom break and Steven put on a nice sweater.

• 59:59Speaker 02

  I did, it's, uh, it's nice. It looks like my, my grandma's curtains, so it feels...

• 1:00:05Theo Von?

  Oh, yeah, dude, my grandmother...

• 1:00:09Theo Von?

  She, my grandfather worked at a factory in their town. It was a small town called Wyoming. Illinois is real small and but it was nice when we went there because it just the world kind of made sense there a little more. It was like a safe place to be. They had a park right across the street and they had a garden where like most people had gardens where they grew like strawberries and tomatoes. Everybody had tomato plants, cherry tomato plants and the summers, the roads would bubble in the summer from the tar. And so it was like kind of crazy because every now and then you'd somehow you'd be an idiot at least once a year and you would run across to the park, but you would not have your shoes on and you would hit that road and you would literally, you would have what we called NAACP feet, you know, and it was, I don't know if that's a racially

• 1:00:54Theo Von?

  charged term or not. I don't think it is. I think it's safe. But yeah, you would get, you would just, and but the crazy part is, once you got the NAACP, you'd be faster at the park. And that was the craziest part, too.

• 1:01:04Speaker 02

  Yeah, we got that extra soul.

• 1:01:05Theo Von?

  Oh, that's what it was.

• 1:01:07Speaker 02

  Yeah, you're like, you got something to grip now.

• 1:01:10Theo Von?

  Oh, you went home. My grandmother knew.

• 1:01:12Speaker 02

  Bio souls.

• 1:01:13Theo Von?

  Yeah, you were locked.

• 1:01:14Speaker 02

  Like you got a free pair of Nikes.

• 1:01:16Theo Von?

  Yeah, you did, bro. But there was so many fun things just about being in like a small Midwestern community. The safety of it, the bike riding, the like, um, baseball cards. Dude, we would go to this place.

• 1:01:30Speaker 02

  Baseball cards, man.

• 1:01:31Theo Von?

  They had a dime store.

• 1:01:32Speaker 02

  The smell of them. The shitty chewing gum in the pack. That was so stale.

• 1:01:36Theo Von?

  It was so gross. You'd eat it anyway.

• 1:01:37Speaker 02

  I chewed it every time.

• 1:01:38Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:38Speaker 02

  Like every time. I don't care how bad it is.

• 1:01:40Theo Von?

  Sometimes it would just disintegrate.

• 1:01:42Speaker 02

  Yeah. Sometimes you'd like break off and like, like you could, you could open a box with it.

• 1:01:47Theo Von?

  And yeah, you could, dude. And it's, every card was Mark Grace. I felt like every card was Mark Grace or Sean Dunston or, um, Chris Sabo. They were all.

• 1:01:58Speaker 02

  Wade Boggs.

• 1:01:58Theo Von?

  Yes.

• 1:01:59Speaker 02

  Yeah. Sabo. Gosh, man, you're dropping heat.

• 1:02:03Theo Von?

  Well, dude, I mean, your song, uh, 1994 was like, it's just one of the best pieces of nostalgia. Like, I remember, yeah. I remember like, um, when I was a kid, my mom had this rug in her room and it was like a, I think it was a cow. I don't know where, where she got it from or something. But it was kind of like a prized possession. It was just like a cow skin rug. It could have been a day on Dalmatian or something. I don't know. It looked like it, it could have, it could have been a big Dalmatian. It could have been.

• 1:02:31Speaker 02

  Dalmatian rug.

• 1:02:32Theo Von?

  It could have been a Great Dane and we got swindled. But anyway, uh. She said it was a cow and I would lay there and I would like put my face right and I would inhale it and like, cause I didn't get to spend a lot of time with my mom, but sometimes at night like she would put on hand cream or something and that was like a big thing. Um, when I was a kid, hand cream came out for women and so women were always just put, I mean, God, I'd be like, Mom, do you love me? And she'd be like, well, hold on, let me put this hand cream on, you know? It was, yeah, it was just that she had, every woman at the time had to have hand cream. It's like she, they couldn't even cook anymore because they couldn't open the, the, the cupboards because they just were

• 1:03:15Theo Von?

  too, they, they would slip out of their hands. I think women were just looking for an excuse to get out of the kitchen. Like, I can't pick up a pot.

• 1:03:21Speaker 02

  Absolutely. I'll drop it.

• 1:03:22Theo Von?

  I have too much hand cream on.

• 1:03:24Speaker 02

  Everything's cast iron back then.

• 1:03:25Theo Von?

  It was like, we can't, we can't afford to lose any of this. Um, but I would lay in there and I would like put my face on the carpet, like on the rug and I would inhale that smell of like leather and uh, and I would just kind of pretend that like I lived in like a different world or that like, like we didn't have a dad around. So I, I don't know if I'd pretend like there was like this manly energy or just something, you know, it would kind of like, the smell would fuel my uh, imagination, you know, and I would just fantasize that like we lived on like a ponderosa or that we lived out in like New Mexico or Texas or something, you know, or like, I don't know, just that things were different.

• 1:04:07Theo Von?

  But there was something about when you were a kid or when you were young and just putting your face on the carpet. It was like we used to do, there wasn't, you weren't on your phone all the time and TV, you couldn't just have whatever you wanted. So you, you would just do kind of crazy things.

• 1:04:21Speaker 02

  You'd look under the couch just to see what was under there. Like, nobody does that anymore.

• 1:04:27Theo Von?

  Yeah, that was exciting. That was almost like taking a vacation or whatever, just looking under there.

• 1:04:31Speaker 02

  Get a flashlight, man, blow your mind. Like, there's a whole other world under here. Like spiders, there's like.

• 1:04:37Theo Von?

  Yes. You'd be curious about your own world. You were curious about the things you had in your own world and you'd ask, Mama, what is this for? Why do we have this? There was just a lot more like the storytelling you needed. It was like more prevalent, you know? And you had to tell a story. You had to have some value. Like, we created the stories. There wasn't like the internet where you could just go and like, oh, share this link, you know? We, like. That's why the storytellers were so valuable then, because it was like, oh, you gotta ask him. The only way you're gonna hear this is if you ask him, you know? Or her, and they're gonna tell you about it. And man, that was the best, dude.

• 1:05:11Speaker 02

  What do you think, uh, this may be, uh, maybe out of place here, but, um, you know, because I feel like stand-up comedy and songwriting is kind of our last, kinda, that's our, that's our, you know, that is our storytelling now. Cause yeah, like you're right, people don't pass down those stories generally anymore like they used to. I wonder if people are craving comedy and creating songwriter, craving songwriting in the, in the same way that, you know, we, we used to because there maybe is a lack of that. Those stories being passed down and that, cause I feel like, you know, great comedians are great storytellers and great songwriters are great storytellers.

• 1:05:53Speaker 02

  And, and that is something that our culture is really not latching on to is telling stories. Even like a good joke, you know, it's hard to find somebody, you know, when I was growing up, there'd always be like somebody that would just have like a thousand jokes. And they weren't comedians, they weren't professional comedians and they, they weren't wanting to be and, but they just had a myriad of jokes, which are basically stories. Like they would go, you know, they would infuse the jokes into the stories. Like you wouldn't know if they were telling the truth or not.

• 1:06:25Theo Von?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:06:25Speaker 02

  And that was like, it's kind of a lost art that you don't really see like happening a lot anymore.

• 1:06:31Theo Von?

  Yeah, they had good storytellers. Well, storytelling was a big thing. Well, I think this is a, this is a more general way to look at it. I think we've lost some creativity.

• 1:06:39Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:06:40Theo Von?

  And I think we've lost creativity in a lot of ways. I think it's one of the reasons why Los Angeles has struggled in some ways. Because in the, in Hollywood, Hollywood has kind of struggled in some ways. And I say this like in the sense that it started to feel super uncreative out there, right? And I don't mean to speak bad on that, but I just think it's a note for.

• 1:07:02Theo Von?

  Ah, that we've just, we've, we're missing some creativity in the world. And I think the gatekeepers of creativity are starting to fall. So I think you are like, I think we're in a desperate place for creativity and for authenticity. Where creativity, you feel like it's, there's something genuine about it.

• 1:07:20Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:07:20Theo Von?

  Maybe. I don't know.

• 1:07:22Speaker 02

  I agree.

• 1:07:23Theo Von?

  Man.

• 1:07:24Speaker 02

  You know, I think authentic is, like you said, is, because it's really hard to authenticate anything anymore. Uh, it's kind of hard to find out what is real and, and what is not. And, um, you know, I, I, I tend to authenticate things with, um, emotions and experience. Like if I write a song, I, I kind of have to write it from, I can't write or perform anything that I cannot authenticate from my own experiences and my own emotions. So.

• 1:07:55Theo Von?

  Was it, did that make it tough for you to write songs for other people?

• 1:07:58Speaker 02

  I think that was a big challenge for me, trying to get other people to see the authentic, authentication of my emotions and, and finding that authenticity within themselves perhaps. And, and that alignment happening.

• 1:08:13Theo Von?

  For sure.

• 1:08:14Speaker 02

  Was a difficult challenge and.

• 1:08:16Theo Von?

  And for you, say you write a song, you, somebody takes it or somebody accepts it, you know, as a, and they're gonna cut it. Um, and then you're like, it doesn't really fit that person. That's a nightmare too, that you don't think about. And then it's really tough.

• 1:08:28Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:08:28Theo Von?

  Did it ever happen to you?

• 1:08:30Speaker 02

  Yeah, it did. And, I mean, and, but you know, I think a lot of it is they weren't able to authen- authenticate the emotion that I, that, that the music had come from, that it had originated from. And that's not their fault and it's really not mine. It was just kind of the nature of the business. Um, but yeah, I think, you know.

• 1:08:51Theo Von?

  It's tough.

• 1:08:51Speaker 02

  If I've had any advantages, like the only way I can create a song is, is, is I have to authenticate it in something truly real. I can't like, I can't do fantasy music. I can't like, I can't be like something, I can't be Superman. I can't be a Marvel character and write, I can't. Play something I'm not.

• 1:09:12Theo Von?

  I think it's because there's too much of you already who you are. That I don't even think, you know, it would fit. You're just a rare foot. You know what I'm saying? So it's like a rare foot. It's like, yeah, some feet, it can be like, oh, we'll put it in something. It'll look good here. It'll look good here. But I think when you're like, no, that's, that's.

• 1:09:29Speaker 02

  Yeah, I was called different a lot as a kid. It was not a compliment. Most of the time it was rarely, but. I have to say it has been an advantage of as of late and like being the weirdo finally helped out and.

• 1:09:43Theo Von?

  Oh, for sure. You know, for so long you're Clark Kent and you're in there just, you know, changing clothes in a phone booth or whatever. And people are like, this guy is a pervert or whatever. And then eventually you come out and things, some things start to fit.

• 1:09:56Theo Von?

  I've heard you say, I've heard you say that songwriting kind of was like a survival tool for you. If that's the right words.

• 1:10:04Speaker 02

  No, yeah, it was like, it was my therapy, especially in those first couple of years after my dad died. Like I.

• 1:10:12Speaker 02

  I kind of, I used science and songwriting at the same time because I have a lot of training in science. I went and got a science degree. I worked.

• 1:10:21Theo Von?

  Where'd you go to Purdue?

• 1:10:22Speaker 02

  No, I went to MTSU.

• 1:10:24Theo Von?

  Oh, you did?

• 1:10:24Speaker 02

  Yeah. And I worked at Mars, the food company and R and D for them as a food scientist.

• 1:10:30Theo Von?

  No way. Mars candies?

• 1:10:32Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:10:32Theo Von?

  Research and development for them?

• 1:10:33Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:10:34Theo Von?

  And y'all make Snickers, huh?

• 1:10:36Speaker 02

  They do, but I actually worked in, I worked in pet food for them, which is based out here in Nashville. Um, the Nashville area at least.

• 1:10:43Theo Von?

  Oh God, you were snacking on that, huh?

• 1:10:45Speaker 02

  Yep, that's me right there.

• 1:10:46Theo Von?

  Shit, I wouldn't even go to work if that's all they had in the damn snack bowl.

• 1:10:49Speaker 02

  Yep. And they, they did. They had like buckets of Snickers. I put on like 30 pounds.

• 1:10:53Theo Von?

  Oh, I was talking about pet food.

• 1:10:55Speaker 02

  No, oh yeah.

• 1:10:57Theo Von?

  I'm like, if I ate that much fat food, I'd wear a damn, I'd wear a damn helmet too. That's insane.

• 1:11:02Speaker 02

  Uh, people did eat pet food there. I saw it.

• 1:11:04Theo Von?

  Would they? Would some people try a little? Got used to it?

• 1:11:06Speaker 02

  Yeah, I'd see some people do it. Like some, sometimes like, you know, you'd see some high level people do it too. Like it's like, you don't need to do this dude.

• 1:11:13Theo Von?

  Oh shit, that's just Cracker Jack Russell, you know?

• 1:11:16Speaker 02

  They're just trying to like, you know, get down. You know, get down with us a little bit.

• 1:11:20Theo Von?

  Oh, yes. Some people love animals so much. They'll have a, you know, there's people that even videos of people that will snack with them and have those little treats.

• 1:11:27Speaker 02

  Yeah, I don't advise it from a microbiological perspective.

• 1:11:30Theo Von?

  Really?

• 1:11:31Speaker 02

  Cause I have a micro degree as well. I wouldn't eat raw cat, like wet cat food. I mean, it does go through like a

• 1:11:38Theo Von?

  That shit makes my wings soft, brother. I'll tell you that out the gate.

• 1:11:41Speaker 02

  But I did see dudes eat it.

• 1:11:42Theo Von?

  Would you?

• 1:11:43Speaker 02

  Yeah, like with a spoon, like wet cat food.

• 1:11:45Theo Von?

  Why?

• 1:11:47Speaker 02

  I, I think it was a flex.

• 1:11:49Theo Von?

  No.

• 1:11:49Speaker 02

  It was a flex, yeah.

• 1:11:51Theo Von?

  Is there one type that's the good type? Take me through some of that.

• 1:11:54Speaker 02

  No, it's all, uh, as far as like cat food to eat.

• 1:11:58Theo Von?

  Yeah, gets a little snack.

• 1:11:59Speaker 02

  No, I don't want to try none of it, cause I knew what was in that and, uh, and I knew like what was in like, like proteins and like all that that goes into those foods and, uh, I understood all the kill steps and stuff were there, but I also know that my digestive tract is far different from a felines or canines and we ain't made to eat what they're made to eat. And so, um, so yeah, I didn't really, I did not partake, but yeah, you'd see a dude like take a big spoonful of cat food and then like drive off in his Lamborghini. Cause you know, it was usually like a high level person.

• 1:12:35Theo Von?

  Yes.

• 1:12:36Speaker 02

  Like, it wasn't, it was a power move. Yeah. It was impressive though. I was like, damn.

• 1:12:41Theo Von?

  Dude, I was just talking to my friend this morning at breakfast about things that the powerful do. And why they operate certain ways because it's like, yeah, what can I do? How weird or could this get?

• 1:12:49Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:12:49Theo Von?

  If you have everything, if the, if the basic, like, I need to make money to survive. I need to feed my family or once you have like, I have seven wives living in different cities. I'm in a, live in a jet or I live in a, some people might be living on other planets now. They don't even know.

• 1:13:04Speaker 02

  Got their own islands.

• 1:13:05Theo Von?

  Yes. And it's like, then what, yeah, at this point, yes, I'm having cat food, but I want the greatest cat food ever. I want cat food that cats can't even afford to eat.

• 1:13:13Speaker 02

  Yeah. And, and sometimes they pretend like they could discern between, be like, mm, they're not gonna like this. It's like, You're not a cat.

• 1:13:21Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 1:13:21Speaker 02

  Yeah, like, how you?

• 1:13:23Theo Von?

  Already eaten, he's eating, that's for cats.

• 1:13:25Speaker 02

  He's like saying, like, he's basically stating he's eaten so much of this food, he can now discern between what will work and what will not.

• 1:13:33Theo Von?

  He's, oh, that's good.

• 1:13:34Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah, this is.

• 1:13:35Theo Von?

  Oh, that's good, huh?

• 1:13:36Speaker 02

  Oh, that's good. They're gonna love this, yeah. The Himalayan cats are gonna love this.

• 1:13:40Theo Von?

  That's a loppy aftertaste. What, uh, what was a product that you guys made while you were there? Do you remember one product that kinda came through?

• 1:13:46Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's called Dentistix Fresh. It's still on the market, I see it out there.

• 1:13:50Theo Von?

  And it's for animals?

• 1:13:50Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's for dogs. It's a, it's a, basically a teeth cleaning dental chew.

• 1:13:56Theo Von?

  Oh, it's pretty cool.

• 1:13:57Speaker 02

  Very digestible. Uh, there it is, that's my baby right there.

• 1:14:00Theo Von?

  Oh, yeah, I've seen that before.

• 1:14:02Speaker 02

  Yeah, um, that was one of my products that I launched from start to finish and, um, yeah.

• 1:14:10Theo Von?

  It's cool.

• 1:14:10Speaker 02

  It's cool, it's cool to see it kinda out there still, still doing its thing.

• 1:14:14Theo Von?

  Yeah, at the end of a show, you hum, hum some of those out in the audience.

• 1:14:17Speaker 02

  Yeah, I probably need to start chucking them out there. Like, take a bite out of them.

• 1:14:21Theo Von?

  I'll catch one, dude, I'll come on stage, catch one in my mouth.

• 1:14:24Speaker 02

  No, I would eat one of those if I had to, but I wouldn't eat none of that cat food.

• 1:14:28Theo Von?

  That's fair, and look, I love to hear that kinda.

• 1:14:29Speaker 02

  That's mostly like flour, that's mostly wheat flour and, and it got, you know, it ain't got the same ingredients that cats.

• 1:14:36Theo Von?

  Did you ever pitch a product that they didn't like, or are you allowed to pitch products?

• 1:14:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, I did, I pitched a lot of products, um, but at the end of the day, I was the geeky scientist and they're like, you need to make what you, you need to make and they, they have a, a much, I think, a greater understanding of what the market requires than some of us geeky scientists do. I had my own lab and I would, I would come up with these new things and new designs and pitch them in my, my free time and there was a lot of creativity to it and, um, and, you know, that was, you know, there's actually a lot more creativity to analysis than you think and there's a lot more analysis to creativity than you think. I think the two can work very well together and like, back to what I was saying, but like, when my dad died,

• 1:15:21Speaker 02

  I was able to kind of apply science and songwriting, um, because I was like so devastated, but like, I was kinda able to metaphorically put a lab coat on and go into researcher mode and, um, and that's kinda where the songs came from. I just started like looking at my pain from.

• 1:15:46Speaker 02

  Another perspective, like trying to look at it from the outside in as an observer. And then just kind of documenting my findings as I went. Like I spent four years making this record, Son of Dad. And like two or three of those years were research years, just me documenting everything I was going through.

• 1:16:06Theo Von?

  Wow.

• 1:16:08Speaker 02

  And keeping, you know, meticulous records like scientists do. But I was channeling that into songs instead of like, you know, a pet food product. But I was still using the same methodology, like, cause I, I had to be true to it. Cause that's the thing about science, it's just a truth detection tool. It's not an ideology or a paradigm. It's just, it's just an effective tool if it's used correctly.

• 1:16:32Theo Von?

  It's like a metal detector.

• 1:16:33Speaker 02

  Yes, exactly. Or a chainsaw, even if you use it great, it can be great. But if you use it right, it can be great. If you use it wrong, it might cut your damn hand off. Like science created the atomic bomb. It's also created cures for incurable diseases that we thought. It's a beautiful thing, but at the end of the day, it's just a tool for detecting truth. And I used it like that. So I would have this question and I'd have my observations and then I'd create a hypothesis, as you would say. Which would basically be a song, a song title, an idea. And I would go out and test it in the world. I'd play in front of seven people here, 10 people there, seven people here, seven people there. And I would get instant data.

• 1:17:17Theo Von?

  Feedback.

• 1:17:18Speaker 02

  Feedback, which is data that in the scientific field, we can spend six months before we, it can be six months before you get your first result from an experiment. So I was getting instant results. So I love that part of it. You know?

• 1:17:32Theo Von?

  Yeah, I think that instant feedback is, I mean, yeah, it helps you know what's going on. It's even like working with jokes, you know?

• 1:17:37Speaker 02

  Yeah, absolutely.

• 1:17:38Theo Von?

  It's pretty fascinating how like the parts of your life, like to be a scientist, to have like a methodology, to then use it to channel your emotions and look at them, you look at your emotions, look at your life, look at the path of things. You know, to put like. To almost like take a template of science and apply it to something as emotional as music.

• 1:18:01Speaker 02

  Yeah, I kind of joke around calling myself a song scientist, but that's essentially what it is. I mean, because, you know, user bias is like, it can so easily contaminate your results and contaminate your entire experiment and experience. And so I really was trying to use user bias because I was trying to authenticate something in one of my own emotions and experiences, but also take user bias out of it. Because at the end of the day, you gotta find the truth. And just because you don't like the results doesn't mean they're not true. And that's where user bias like gets in the way because you want the results to be different.

• 1:18:43Speaker 02

  Maybe you really like this song, but you're not getting the results that you thought it was gonna get. So you start, you start adjusting your formula. And then before you know it, you got conclusive results. Either conclusively, this is not the truth, or conclusively, this is the truth.

• 1:18:59Theo Von?

  Ah.

• 1:19:00Speaker 02

  And then you run with the truth, whether it's good for you or bad for you. And that's...

• 1:19:06Theo Von?

  Yeah, I was just looking at this right here. It says, "User bias refers to cognitive tendencies that distort how individuals perceive, interpret, or respond during research." What are examples of user bias?

• 1:19:18Speaker 02

  For example, you, you think that this is going to work. For whatever reason, you have a hunch, like that this whatever thing is going to work. And you've now like attached an emotion to it because you almost need it to work now. Now, now it's more about you than it is about the truth. Like, so when you go into like an experiment, it doesn't need to work out for you. Like, your feelings have to be completely separate from this.

• 1:19:49Theo Von?

  If you're doing true research.

• 1:19:51Speaker 02

  If you're gonna be a true researcher and using the scientific method the proper way. So, you know, that's, I guess, when you get into a song, especially a song about your dad or a song about loss, it's easy to be like, well, it needs to be like this. It needs to say this, or it needs to say that, because that's what's gonna make me feel good. But that's, may not be the truth.

• 1:20:13Theo Von?

  Yeah, I think your songs don't really take me on like a, they don't take me on a typical journey of like a beginning, middle and end, I guess. And some of them are different than others, of course. But yeah, I guess sometimes you think of a song, especially if it's a country song, I think, of having like a beginning, middle and end, almost like a journey. Whereas yours sometimes sort of like take me on a, a ride down, a ride past something or through something.

• 1:20:39Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:20:39Theo Von?

  And it's not as much of like, you're giving me this story as much as you are providing some things and I'm the stor- I'm remembering the story of mine that pertains, that associates with it sometimes.

• 1:20:54Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:20:54Theo Von?

  Maybe.

• 1:20:55Speaker 02

  I feel like my favorite-

• 1:20:56Theo Von?

  And I'm not trying to ju- like, what the fuck do I know? But some of that happens with your music, that's what I'm saying.

• 1:21:01Speaker 02

  Well, that's, uh, if, if there's any goal I've ever had as a songwriter is to basically do that. Because I, I remember I heard this song called "Don't Take The Girl" on a school bus when I was a kid.

• 1:21:12Theo Von?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:21:12Speaker 02

  It made a mess out of me. And, um-

• 1:21:15Theo Von?

  Yeah, cuz everything, it's like, and this is now he's 20 years older and then he now it's the end of the time.

• 1:21:20Speaker 02

  But I was able, in the weirdest way, cuz my mom was, you know, uh, my mom and dad divorced when I was really young and she was with some abusive men. And, um, and she lived in Tennessee when I was a kid and I was always, I spent most of my childhood very worried about her, like-

• 1:21:37Theo Von?

  Really?

• 1:21:38Speaker 02

  Very worried about her getting killed or hurt really badly.

• 1:21:41Theo Von?

  Why did she like abusive men, do you think?

• 1:21:44Speaker 02

  Um, I think probably, um, a lot, her childhood was very, very hard.

• 1:21:50Theo Von?

  Oh, so maybe something happened and then she were related to it.

• 1:21:52Speaker 02

  Yeah, I think, I think it was-

• 1:21:53Theo Von?

  Oh, she's a beautiful lady. What's her name?

• 1:21:54Speaker 02

  Kathy, Kathy Lynn.

• 1:21:56Theo Von?

  Kathy Lynn, there she is.

• 1:21:58Speaker 02

  Yep. And, uh, you know, she was just a baby, having a baby and, uh, you know, trying to, and my dad was in a, you know, a great- A great man, but they were also teenagers and they were kind of like forced to wed because of religion, you know, like she was six months pregnant when they got married with me. There's no way they were gonna have a child out of wedlock.

• 1:22:19Theo Von?

  Right, that was in.

• 1:22:20Speaker 02

  Not gonna happen. And then they ended up having two more kids and before they know it, they're 22 years old and they got three kids and it's like crazy. And so that, you know, I have to, you know, give her a lot of, you know, a lot of grace because of, you know, her life was very hard and she was very young. And I don't understand a lot of the, you know, some of those choices she made, but I remember, you know, spending most of my childhood and.

• 1:22:47Theo Von?

  In fear?

• 1:22:48Speaker 02

  In fear of her, of getting that call that she was, she was gone.

• 1:22:52Theo Von?

  Yeah. Is she, your mother still alive?

• 1:22:54Speaker 02

  Yes, she is.

• 1:22:55Theo Von?

  Oh, beautiful.

• 1:22:56Speaker 02

  Yeah, and she's had a wild year and she's, she's very much with us and.

• 1:23:02Theo Von?

  She's had a wild year?

• 1:23:03Speaker 02

  Yeah, she almost got killed this year on an ATV accident. It's wild that you brought that picture up, but she literally, um, yeah, she, she had a very much a near death experience. She spent two months in the ICU and, um, yeah, it was, it was, it's been a wild year for all of us, especially her.

• 1:23:21Theo Von?

  ATV deaths happen to so many people?

• 1:23:24Speaker 02

  Yeah, I don't.

• 1:23:24Theo Von?

  People don't realize how popular it is.

• 1:23:26Speaker 02

  I don't want one of them damn things anywhere around me.

• 1:23:28Theo Von?

  We're not saying we're getting you one this year.

• 1:23:29Speaker 02

  No, please don't.

• 1:23:30Theo Von?

  I'm just saying, yeah.

• 1:23:31Speaker 02

  I'll sell it on anybody.

• 1:23:34Theo Von?

  Yeah, we can, yeah, yeah, skip, go with that one, you know? That one can go on to the next. In the United States, ATV related deaths typically range from 300 to 900 annually.

• 1:23:45Theo Von?

  But yeah, it's, I don't know why we're even talking about this and I'm sorry, but I'm glad to know that she's doing well. What, when you guys were young, what kind of stuff, was she struggling with stuff or?

• 1:23:54Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, she had a lot of struggles and.

• 1:23:57Theo Von?

  That young age is so tough. Can you imagine that? When your mother, can you imagine? Like when I was 22, I was just concerned if I had enough, you know, time in my day to jerk off without somebody bothering me. And here there were people feeding children.

• 1:24:12Speaker 02

  She liked, I mean, she had no business having children and, uh, but yeah, they had these, you know, they very much had these children and, and she was going through some really tough stuff and, um, you know, like my dad got custody of us, which was kind of.

• 1:24:28Theo Von?

  Rare at the time.

• 1:24:29Speaker 02

  Rare at the time and, but I remember hearing that song and. I was able to put her in that song. Yanni's daddy. It was like, and it didn't make no sense that, you know, like, why is my mom in this song? She shouldn't be like, it doesn't follow the storyline. Oh, but your head put her in there. But my head put her in there and I was able to copy and paste all of my emotions into that song. And three and a half minutes later, I was a wreck. Like, like, not because of the song, but because of my mom being in the song. Right. And I was like, okay, that's, like, to me, that's what the, the wizardry of songwriting is. Like Craig Martin and Larry Johnson wrote that song, not knowing that some southern Indiana boy was gonna be like,

• 1:25:15Speaker 02

  you know, be balling on a school bus with around a bunch of FFA kids, wasn't a good look. And, um, Yeah. And so, yeah, I mean, that's really what, I, I mean, I would say that was the moment that I really got bitten by, or like song bit, so to speak, because I, I realized that music was more than just beats and sounds and making words rhyme. It was literally taking a sto- like, like taking someone's life and making it part of a piece of art. And, uh, Wow. And that's, that's really what a, a great song does.

• 1:25:52Speaker 02

  And I think the real great songs out there, um, and, and me as a songwriter, the only thing I've tried to pay forward was that. So when you said that, like, I was, you're able to put yourself in those songs. That's really all I've ever hoped to achieve. Not so much to put, just put myself in those songs. I want to put other people in those songs and let them be the star of it, not me. Got it. And I feel like that's, if it's, if it's anything, that's what, how people respond to the music. It's about them. It's, that has nothing to do with me up there. I'm just a, a vessel. Yeah.

• 1:26:34Theo Von?

  No, I think, and I think there's a lot of guys that are trying to feel. I think especially for a lot of young men, it's been like, there's a lot of feeling and processing that we've missed somehow, or we haven't found a way to do it. I think it's the same thing that I noticed with some of Red Clay Strays music. And it's different. You guys' stuff is totally different. But if you go to their show, they're great. Their show, it's a lot of men, probably kind of adult men, who are trying to find ways to process stuff. That's what I believe, anyway.

• 1:27:10Theo Von?

  And it's interesting to see that. It's interesting to see like, where do we go to process stuff and how do we do it? And yeah, I think your music does a lot of that for people. Yeah, and that's why I was saying that, yeah, it would be hard for you to write for somebody, which makes it a little bit tougher to have a career in some ways, because you don't have like,

• 1:27:30Theo Von?

  you're you. And you can write some songs and, but man, your stuff is so personal, it feels like, to your brain and perspective and attitude that it'd be hard for a regular foot to fit into it, you know?

• 1:27:45Speaker 02

  Yeah, that was the challenge. You know, like, there's, you know, this sounds so much like you. That was.

• 1:27:52Theo Von?

  Right.

• 1:27:52Speaker 02

  And, you know, but at the same time.

• 1:27:54Theo Von?

  And it hurts at the time because you're like, well, fuck, I'm just trying to do this. But then, in the end, it's like, oh, well, I'm the, I'm the instrument.

• 1:28:02Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:28:03Theo Von?

  And that just takes, yeah. And then that's a gift that you are. Because if you'd have found this other avenue that was for songwriting, and I know you've had some success in it, but if you found this other avenue that was hugely successful, then you may not have continued to nurture, or the energy may not have been on the seed that was you. You know, the sunlight might have not focused on you to keep that growing.

• 1:28:24Speaker 02

  Honestly, if my dad was still alive, I mean, none of this would have happened. I mean, really, you know, I'd probably be just writing songs, trying to get cuts and probably still failing at it. And.

• 1:28:36Theo Von?

  Yeah, your dad would be selling merch for you. It'd be nice, huh?

• 1:28:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, he might. He would. I mean, he would still be there with his giant phone, probably. Recording every bit of it, proud as hell.

• 1:28:46Theo Von?

  Man, my, I was just thinking about my dad. So my dad was very old when I was born, and so I remember like, I was ashamed of my dad, so I had a lot of shame about him, you know? But I grew up in a lot of fear too in our household, like my sister was real sick and so I was always scared that she was gonna pass away. And then my dad was old, so he was in his seventies when I got to know him, so I was always afraid he was gonna pass away. So it was like this constant thing of like,

• 1:29:12Theo Von?

  you know, it just felt like somebody was just going dang dah, you know?

• 1:29:16Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:29:16Theo Von?

  So it made everything kind of dour.

• 1:29:18Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:29:19Theo Von?

  I think, or, I don't know, it made it like the perspective was dim, that's what it was. And my brother would mess with me, he'd come in the room and he'd be like, dude, dad's dead. And I'm like, what? He'd be like, go in there dude, go in there right now. And my dad would fall asleep all the time because he was like seventy-six or seventy-seven. And those people like to sleep a decent amount during the day. And I don't know if he'd be asleep or he'd just be laying there with his eyes closed, you know what I'm saying? A lot of old people like, I'm awake, I'm at work, you know? Yeah, yeah, I'm married, you know? That is, they're not forgetting that things are important, you know? Uh, but I would go up and I would have to go like, and he would be alive. And I would be like, fuck you, you're full of shit. So then it got to this weird part where my brother would come in the room and he'd be like, dude, dad's dead.

• 1:30:05Theo Von?

  And I'm like, dude, he better be dead when I go in there. Or I'm gonna beat your ass. So it became, and it flipped this whole perspective of like what was normal in the world. So my friends would be like, dude, what do you mean he better be dead? Fight your brother. You know, but no, he does this all the time, dude, he's not fricking dead.

• 1:30:25Speaker 02

  You were like, I don't know, you were combating the dark arts with other dark arts?

• 1:30:30Theo Von?

  Yeah, or my mom would be like, go spend time with your dad because he's probably gonna die soon. He'd be like, alright, you know? And shit like that, but she was just doing us to get us out of the room so she could tidy up or something, you know, some trick. But it was just weird shit, you know, and so, and it was true too, he probably was gonna die soon, so I was like, well, get in there and spend some time with him or draw a picture of him. We probably have like seventy pictures of him we drew with crayons. But if she'd like, go in there and draw a picture of him, you know, you're gonna want it, you know, and it's horrible pictures, you know? And sometimes he'd be drawing like as a black guy, it's like, you know, just like, because it would seem more exciting or whatever, but.

• 1:31:02Speaker 02

  Were you, uh, were you quiet as a kid?

• 1:31:04Theo Von?

  No, I don't think that I was. I think I was like kinda curious.

• 1:31:08Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:31:09Theo Von?

  And I like to make excitement somehow. Like I like to create ambiance for things.

• 1:31:18Theo Von?

  But I think I was probably, I don't know, my mom says she didn't tend to me that much because it seemed like I was doing fine.

• 1:31:24Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:31:24Theo Von?

  So she didn't think I needed like a lot of attention because she felt like I was doing okay, you know? Because we've had like some conversations about that stuff.

• 1:31:33Theo Von?

  But yeah, I think that was a big regret I had was that I had like a lot of shame about my dad's age. And so I didn't even embrace him really that much. You know, because I just, I was ashamed of it.

• 1:31:44Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 1:31:45Theo Von?

  But it's just, life's just harrowing like that.

• 1:31:47Speaker 02

  You, you and I had like polar opposite dads. My dad was like a baby and I was like a, I guess I was kind of, I wouldn't say I was a, I was, yeah, it was, they, yeah, they were just kind of totally different perspectives to think about. Like my dad was like a child, like honestly, like a big brother.

• 1:32:05Theo Von?

  Really?

• 1:32:06Speaker 02

  A lot of ways because he was only eighteen years older than me.

• 1:32:09Theo Von?

  Oh yeah, that's pretty normal.

• 1:32:10Speaker 02

  I mean, I was like, there's actually, there's actually siblings out there that are like fifteen, fifteen years older than their siblings, you know?

• 1:32:18Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 1:32:19Speaker 02

  So, yeah, I mean, that, that had to be, that had to be tough. I find that people that are, that's why I asked, you know, people that are spending, I know I've, I spent my whole childhood in a state of fear of loss. Fear of losing someone.

• 1:32:35Theo Von?

  Really?

• 1:32:35Speaker 02

  Unlosable at that time.

• 1:32:37Theo Von?

  What would make that happen? It is such a, oh, because your mom being gone?

• 1:32:40Speaker 02

  My mom, yeah, I was like, like, losing her was not, like, something I was willing to bear, but it seemed like it was.

• 1:32:48Theo Von?

  Inevitable?

• 1:32:49Speaker 02

  Like something that was like just around the corner too. So like it made me like retreat as a kid. It made me like really quiet. And observe it, like observe everything.

• 1:32:59Theo Von?

  You gotta make sure everything's okay.

• 1:33:00Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:33:01Theo Von?

  God, yeah.

• 1:33:01Speaker 02

  And keep my mouth shut because I, I didn't want to say something or, you know, like, you know.

• 1:33:07Theo Von?

  That could cost me her?

• 1:33:08Speaker 02

  Yeah, it could cost me her or, um. You know, I didn't want to

• 1:33:14Theo Von?

  Draw any attention?

• 1:33:14Speaker 02

  Draw attention to it or speak anything into existence about it. And, and I didn't want anybody to know about it either. So it was like my own little, you know, my own little thing.

• 1:33:26Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 1:33:26Speaker 02

  And my dad didn't know about a lot of her, what she was going through with her other husbands. Like, that was something that I knew about.

• 1:33:36Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 1:33:37Speaker 02

  And that was a tough secret to carry. Because, you know, it was, you know, he would have never, he wouldn't have wanted me around that. And God knows what he would have done to those dudes. And he probably would have killed him or something. And so I was, I was always worried. I was always trying to protect my dad from himself. And I was trying to protect my mom from herself. It made me grow up real quick. And I bet your dad's situation probably made you grow up quicker.

• 1:34:06Theo Von?

  Makes you aware. That's the thing. And the worst thing to be as a young kid in some ways,

• 1:34:10Speaker 02

  Is aware.

• 1:34:10Theo Von?

  It's just so aware. Because you're living on this different timeline. You're living on this other thing.

• 1:34:15Speaker 02

  It's good to be oblivious in those years, like,

• 1:34:17Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 1:34:18Speaker 02

  And, and really ignorant to like the pain and, you know, the magnitude of, that is the weight of loss as a kid. Like, we, we insulate and protect, we protect children from that.

• 1:34:28Theo Von?

  Yes.

• 1:34:29Speaker 02

  We don't even bring them to funerals because we don't want them to see the, that's something my dad, I gotta say, I gotta give him a lot of credit because I've, I've been, I've seen people die from a young age, from grandparents, the family members. Like, he would bring me to funerals, probably because he couldn't find a babysitter. Like, what's he gonna do? Like, get a babysitter so that we have us wait in the car? He's like, no, you're gonna come and look at this dead body. You're gonna see this dead person because one day it could be me.

• 1:34:55Theo Von?

  My dad would drop us off at funerals in our town if there was, to, to, to, in order to get time away from, he dropped me off at two funerals in our town. I didn't know, know anybody at, and he would take us to leave us at Burger King for eight hours, like they were a babysitter. He had no, I'm like, and every time we'd be like, Dad, they do not want us there anymore. We ate like eleven Prince Toast Sticks that people gave us. And they don't even have a play place. He like, he enjoy the play place. And he'd be like, it's the wrong one. Burger King doesn't have it, dude.

• 1:35:24Speaker 02

  They don't have it everywhere.

• 1:35:25Theo Von?

  No. So this lady named Ms. Wanda, she was always like the lady that would take care of us in there. And we would just drink those syrups when people left in there. But we'd be at the fucking Burger King for like eight hours talking to people. Me and my sisters. And it would just be bizarre. But you'd end up in bizarre shit like that, you know? My dad would ta- he'd be like, drive me over to the post office because I was kind of tall. When I was ten or eleven, maybe twelve. So I'd drive him over there. But I didn't have a driver's license or anything. And there'd be no parking spots. He'd be like, well, just do a couple laps around the block while I'm in here. And I'd be like, and there was this huge cutlass, this Delta eighty-eight. And so I was like, I can't drive this bitch. And it didn't have power steering. Dude, I would hit, and the car was so banged up. I, I fucking hit probably seven cars going around that block.

• 1:36:04Speaker 02

  Totaling cars with that thing.

• 1:36:06Theo Von?

  Oh dude, just hitting all kinds of shit because.

• 1:36:08Speaker 02

  Yeah, because those things are solid cars.

• 1:36:09Theo Von?

  And there was no like mirrors or, there was no uh.

• 1:36:12Speaker 02

  Driving a house around.

• 1:36:13Theo Von?

  There was no mirrors for sure after I hit the street. But there was no um, cameras. Nobody knew what had happened, you know? And I would just be in there. And if dad had to wait to buy stamps, I'd be out there. I'd fucking hit fifty cars, dude. But dude, it was just, you would be in crazy scenarios. Odd environments put you in crazy scenarios that other people couldn't fathom. And then it would just kind of get your brain to like a different place.

• 1:36:35Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:36:36Theo Von?

  So your brain was kind of operating in some wild territory. Um, one of the things you said. Yeah, yeah, I wonder how many kids are quiet because they're, they, they're worried if they just tall, if they affect the world in some way. That it could alter, that they could, you know, because when you're a child, things are very balanced in your head. Like I remember, I would swallow on both sides of my mouth. I would be careful how I stepped. If I counted one, I had to count one on the other side of my brain. I always had like these two sides inside of me. And I'm like, one over here, one over here. Like these little things I had to do, right? And um.

• 1:37:11Speaker 02

  I did the same thing.

• 1:37:12Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 1:37:12Speaker 02

  Ticks.

• 1:37:13Theo Von?

  Little ticks. And it was because I had to keep things even. Everything had to be even. And so I wonder how many times kids operate in this space where it's like. I just can't affect anything too much because things, as far as I recognize them, are already like kind of on a, on a uncertain fulcrum, on a one-footed fulcrum. And it's gonna get weird, you know?

• 1:37:34Speaker 02

  Nah, I think you. You just hit, you hit the nail on the head right there.

• 1:37:39Theo Von?

  It's interesting.

• 1:37:40Speaker 02

  Yeah. I think that was, I think you articulated it far better than I did or could have.

• 1:37:47Theo Von?

  Being a kid.

• 1:37:47Speaker 02

  Yeah, you're afraid to affect the world because

• 1:37:50Theo Von?

  Yes.

• 1:37:51Speaker 02

  you might change it for the worse. So like, I'm gonna stay Switzerland and keep my mouth shut.

• 1:37:56Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 1:37:57Speaker 02

  And I did that for most of my childhood and then.

• 1:38:02Theo Von?

  But then a lot of the world happens inside of you then.

• 1:38:05Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:38:05Theo Von?

  If it's not happening inside of you, a lot of the conversations and stuff, they happen inside of you.

• 1:38:08Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:38:09Theo Von?

  Which is interesting.

• 1:38:10Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:38:10Theo Von?

  And it's, I think it can be painful and scary, but also kind of fascinating.

• 1:38:15Speaker 02

  It allows you to be by yourself a lot and, and it, it teaches you and trains you to be alone and thrive in loneliness. And if there's anything, or like with boxing, songwriting, I'm assuming comedy, you know, there's a lot of loneliness to it. You gotta be inside your own head a lot. In order to do it properly. Like, it's not like, you know, you just go up and play a baseball game and hit a homer and then, you know, it's, it's this, it's this thing you gotta stay in all the time.

• 1:38:48Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 1:38:49Speaker 02

  Uh, it's not event-based. It's, it's just kind of this state of mentality.

• 1:38:55Theo Von?

  That's a good point, especially with boxing, because boxing, most of it is the training.

• 1:38:58Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:38:59Theo Von?

  The fights are very rare.

• 1:39:00Speaker 02

  Yeah, the, the fights are rare and short compared to the training.

• 1:39:04Theo Von?

  So, uh, your father was a boxer. How, how, how did he get into it? Do you know how?

• 1:39:10Speaker 02

  Yeah, um, well, he started, um, probably a year before I was born. Um, he saw Muhammad Ali fight. Uh, Muhammad Ali was like his hero, hero. Um, he's from Louisville, Kentucky, so very, almost like a, almost like a local dude too. Um, yeah, my dad just idolized him. He just watched all his fights, loved everything about him in and out of the ring.

• 1:39:36Theo Von?

  Hmm.

• 1:39:37Speaker 02

  Um, and, um,

• 1:39:40Speaker 02

  I think, yeah, he was just really inspired by Ali's story and he literally just wanted to start boxing. And I think the movie Rocky probably just came out around that time too. I bet that probably had something to do with it. A lot of whites got caught up in that. Yep, and um, but I think with the combination of Muhammad Ali and Rocky Balboa. Yeah, um, my dad said, hey, I want to put on some gloves and before he knew it, he was, he was fighting. And he started on his own, just like literally fighting anybody, like signing up for tough man competitions. And then he ended up finding this great gym up in Indianapolis and fighting under this um, coach named Champ Chaney. That's what, that was his name.

• 1:40:25Speaker 02

  Champ Chaney, bring him up, let's get a gander at him. I'd like to see this man today. I can still smell the cigar smoke. That's him, dude. There you go Champ. Ah dude, I haven't seen him in forever. Let him have it Champ. That second picture right there, that's exactly how I remember. He'd have that same sweater on every time I'd see him. Oh yeah. Yeah, Police Athletic League, that was the, the power clubs we would fight at. Like, we would open up for our dad's fights. Like, when he got into like Champ's tutelage, that's when he started like really doing well. Because he didn't have any really good training. And uh, very much like how Apollo trained Rocky, Champ trained my dad. He, he like reformatted his whole style. He taught him footwork, he taught him head movement, he taught him

• 1:41:10Speaker 02

  all the things that he lacked fundamentally. Cause my dad was just a tough guy with a mean punch and a, and a heart of a lion. And uh, he could just train, train, train. He loved to train, he loved to work and Champ loved that about him, his work ethic. He'd show up to Indianapolis, he'd spar anybody. I remember him getting up in the morning and literally having to peel his eyes open to see us because of just sparring, not from a fight, just sparring those dudes in Champ's gym. Dude, my, go ahead. You know, I was just gonna say, I mean, he had a lot of guys that didn't care for him and I remember. You know, um, him talking about that, like, he really had to fight for his spot at that gym.

• 1:41:51Theo Von?

  Your dad did?

• 1:41:51Speaker 02

  He did.

• 1:41:52Theo Von?

  What reasons would they have not to care about him? Or care for, care for him?

• 1:41:56Speaker 02

  I think, you know, he just, I think Champ maybe favored him because he really put in a lot of work.

• 1:42:01Theo Von?

  Got it.

• 1:42:01Speaker 02

  And he, I think Champ saw what he was going through. He was bringing his kids to the gym and, you know, and he was very much out of sorts there culturally and he was, he was fighting an uphill battle and he was, and the wind was in his face and he just still kept going forward. And, um, I feel like, um, that's what Champ saw in him. And so when we started boxing as a kid, I mean, my first memories are the sounds of these fights, like that right there, like I can smell that picture.

• 1:42:32Speaker 02

  Like I can smell the room. I can, it's cigar smoke and isopropyl alcohol with menthol in it. And, um, it's, it's all those, and a lot of sweat and leather and the sound of like, um, cops under the table gambling, screaming red and blue. Cause that's where you, you'd be like red and blue. They'd have like red headgear. Like this was an exhibition fight. Me and my brother were fighting each other in this one. So we didn't, we didn't have an opponent, so they'd just have us fight each other. So that was one of the fights we, that was one of the fights we opened up for my dad.

• 1:43:06Theo Von?

  They gave both y'all a trophy too, which is fucking shit.

• 1:43:08Speaker 02

  Yeah, it was like a participation trophy, because it's an exhibition fight.

• 1:43:11Theo Von?

  But if you both get one, yeah, I could see that. Just tell them both are the winner.

• 1:43:14Speaker 02

  There's, there's exhibition fights and then there's competition. These are exhibitions. So in an exhibition fight, you both get a trophy.

• 1:43:20Theo Von?

  Got it.

• 1:43:20Speaker 02

  You're just exhibiting the sport of boxing. Not really, it's not going, nothing's going on your amateur record or anything like that. But then we ended up fighting other kids and when they could find a boy our size to fight, we'd fight him. Um, and so we would open up, like the first two or three fights on the card would be kid fights.

• 1:43:39Theo Von?

  Oh, that's fun.

• 1:43:40Speaker 02

  So I've. I joke around, I've been an opener for a long time and uh, but yeah, I really have.

• 1:43:45Theo Von?

  There's nothing fun than watching a kid smoke cigarettes or fight another kid, a little kid.

• 1:43:50Speaker 02

  I did both of those things.

• 1:43:51Theo Von?

  Hell yeah. There's something about that. I think they should have a zoo where you get to watch people do unique shit.

• 1:43:56Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:43:57Theo Von?

  If they had a section where a couple of kids are sitting there smoking, like, don't have them smoke all day, cause I know it's bad for them.

• 1:44:02Speaker 02

  It's bad for them.

• 1:44:03Theo Von?

  But they get two cigarettes a day each. And it's like, at a certain time, they smoke and you all get to watch it.

• 1:44:08Speaker 02

  If like fifteen minutes a day, you get to come in and watch it.

• 1:44:11Theo Von?

  And you could stream it too. If you didn't wanna go in person, you could stream it. But you're telling me some kid's smoking it on my launch day at twelve fifteen PM today. Uh, you know, Gary or Robert or whatever's gonna smoke.

• 1:44:21Speaker 02

  Yeah, if you find a little Gary, let me know.

• 1:44:23Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 1:44:24Speaker 02

  Bubble wrap him. Protect him. We don't, that's a, that's a precious, that's a Gary breed right there.

• 1:44:29Theo Von?

  Oh, that's, yeah, that's Gary, Indiana, isn't it? Gary, Indiana's a wild place, I've heard. Um, but yeah, I would watch a kid, I would love to watch a kid smoke, you know? Um, so, and that's, maybe that sounds very Russian to me, I don't know. I've been online a lot. Um.

• 1:44:46Speaker 02

  No, I think smoking's a very American thing, dude.

• 1:44:49Theo Von?

  But yeah, I just love, like, I don't know, I love nostalgia too. That's something that I love, dude. I remember the first, uh,

• 1:44:56Theo Von?

  yeah, going to funeral, like, I just, I love the first of everything. Because after the first time of everything, everything lost a lot of luster for me in life, I think, a lot of times. And I don't know why that is. And I don't mean it like, super negatively, like, I'm not down in the dumps or anything. But I just, it's the first, it's like, there's something fascinating about the first time of everything.

• 1:45:18Speaker 02

  Yeah. Yeah, nostalgia is a, it's a really effective tool as far as, you know, making people go back to memories. Um, like, whether it's smell.

• 1:45:30Theo Von?

  When you get in your own memory, you're attached.

• 1:45:33Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:45:33Theo Von?

  You know, it's like, um, Yeah, there's just something that attaches you there.

• 1:45:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, and you can use senses to like as an appendage to nostalgia, like a sense of smell, a sense of sight or sound and touch, all that. And I think if you kind of use those senses and appendage them to a certain type of nostalgia, you can unlock a memory within any human.

• 1:46:03Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 1:46:03Speaker 02

  Like all humans. It doesn't have to be your memory. You can, you suddenly have a key to so many memories, so many minds. And, uh, and yeah, you open up these memories that people have had vaulted for years. And when they come out, it's like, it's almost like seeing that toy that you got for Christmas when you were seven years old that you were so excited about. But seeing it again for the first time when you're in your 30s or 40 and you kind of relive that excitement for at least a second, like, oh, man, I remember that feeling.

• 1:46:34Theo Von?

  Yes.

• 1:46:34Speaker 02

  I haven't seen that in 30 years. And when you can unleash that memory, it's, it's such a beautiful thing. You see it on people's eyes. You see them traveling through time. And, um, yeah, it's.

• 1:46:50Theo Von?

  Yeah, it's like the first time you hear a song kind of that really touches you, you know? Like, uh.

• 1:46:54Speaker 02

  It's a human thing.

• 1:46:55Theo Von?

  Why I got a new complaint.

• 1:46:58Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:46:59Theo Von?

  Who are ever in that? Who sang that song, you know?

• 1:47:01Speaker 02

  Nirvana, it's Heart Shaped Box.

• 1:47:03Theo Von?

  God, that song was fucking good.

• 1:47:04Speaker 02

  Oh, it's incredible. Yeah, I hear that song.

• 1:47:07Theo Von?

  Staying home from school to listen to that song, dude.

• 1:47:10Speaker 02

  And watch the video. Like, I remember watching the video and just being like. Uh, I remember like Kurt rocking back and forth in that chair. Just everything about it, like that whole record in utero was just like life changing for me.

• 1:47:24Theo Von?

  That was huge.

• 1:47:25Speaker 02

  Scentless Apprentice. Oh, my God. Yeah, this is the video.

• 1:47:27Theo Von?

  Oh, I do remember some of this now, dude. Uh.

• 1:47:33Theo Von?

  I've been locked inside your heart, shake ball dude. When Soundgarden came, bro.

• 1:47:40Speaker 02

  Soundgarden changed my life.

• 1:47:41Theo Von?

  Stone Temple Pilot.

• 1:47:43Speaker 02

  I actually learned how to play guitar from Soundgarden. People, if they're like, if I could like, give anybody like, who taught you how to play guitar? And literally, like, if I could credit anybody, it would be the band Soundgarden.

• 1:47:55Theo Von?

  And I feel, is that Soundgarden?

• 1:47:57Speaker 02

  That's Stone Temple Pilots.

• 1:47:59Theo Von?

  They were also good. What was Soundgarden, um, what's a Soundgarden song?

• 1:48:03Speaker 02

  There's so many, like, as far as hits, you got like Black Hole Sun, Fell on Black Days. Like Blow Up the Outside World, one of my favorites. Rusty Cage, Pretty Noose, The Day I Tried to Live. Uh, Fourth of July is heavy as hell. I love Fourth of July.

• 1:48:19Theo Von?

  Fourth of July.

• 1:48:21Speaker 02

  Limo Rec, oh, that slaps. Super heavy. Well, that's Fourth of July.

• 1:48:28Theo Von?

  Blow up the outside.

• 1:48:32Speaker 02

  Dude, one of the greatest rock and roll vocal performances ever is Blow Up the Outside World. Like, listen to that Chris Cornell vocal and just talk to me after. It is like a clinic of rock and roll.

• 1:48:46Theo Von?

  Put these on, let's play it real quick. We gotta get, you're gonna play a couple of songs for us today, what did you think, Steven?

• 1:48:51Speaker 02

  Yeah, let's do it. Come on, I ain't scared.

• 1:48:52Theo Von?

  I wanna, let's listen to this together if we can.

• 1:48:58Speaker 02

  There's so much like John Lennon influence in this song, you can really.

• 1:49:01Theo Von?

  Ooh.

• 1:49:05Theo Von?

  This seems to kill me. Ah.

• 1:49:31Theo Von?

  Remember how videos were so much too then?

• 1:49:45Theo Von?

  Oh, riding, dude, riding somewhere, just listening to a song by yourself? There was nothing like it!

• 1:49:57Theo Von?

  Used to, my buddy would smoke cigarettes in his car and he'd just throw them in the backseat when he was done smoking them.

• 1:50:04Theo Von?

  Whole backseat, it burnt up like 70 times in the back of his car. He would just, he'd have a little water bottle from his mom's hair salon and he'd zap it out.

• 1:50:12Speaker 02

  Zap it.

• 1:50:27Theo Von?

  Bro, his voice was like nobodies.

• 1:50:29Speaker 02

  Oh, it's insane. And then, I mean, it didn't even seem human that he was doing this.

• 1:50:35Theo Von?

  No.

• 1:50:39Speaker 02

  Very few people had like that range of being able to go that high, but also like go low and make it meaningful. And then go back down to this world.

• 1:50:50Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 1:50:52Speaker 02

  And take you there. A lot of, a lot of those high singers would lose you when they go down like that. They can't.

• 1:50:57Theo Von?

  Yeah, it's all, I mean, just so enveloped, like you just, like you wanted to be in their world. Smashing pumpkins together, there was a lot of good, and I always, one thing I've never liked, I don't like music where you can't hear the words, right?

• 1:51:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:51:12Theo Von?

  Sometimes the way they do mixes or something, it loses me.

• 1:51:16Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:51:16Theo Von?

  If I can't hear the words, that's the part that I need the most, right? Cause I need to feel something, like the beat and stuff helps, it's cool for me. But for me, I've always been like, um, what are the words telling us, you know?

• 1:51:27Speaker 02

  Yeah, you wanna know the story.

• 1:51:28Theo Von?

  Yes, I wanna feel something from it.

• 1:51:30Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:51:31Theo Von?

  You know?

• 1:51:34Speaker 02

  Yeah, I'm with you that, I mean, that's, I'm a word nerd, so.

• 1:51:38Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 1:51:39Speaker 02

  I'm assuming you are too.

• 1:51:40Theo Von?

  Oh, I love to write. That was like my favorite thing. I think like one of my goals maybe the next couple of years would be to try to finally get a book done. Like I've written a lot of stuff and I've written probably half of maybe two books, but I would like to finally get it done. But once video became so popular, it was just like, and once podcasting became busier, it was hard to focus on that.

• 1:52:00Theo Von?

  Is there anything good in the news right now that we want to check out? Dude, I did, will you look up an article, Trevin? I saw something about Facebook. I did research and then they canceled it after it started to find beliefs that they didn't want. We were talking about that, um, what were we talking about a few minutes ago about research?

• 1:52:17Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:52:18Theo Von?

  What kind of?

• 1:52:19Speaker 02

  User bias.

• 1:52:20Theo Von?

  Oh, about user bias?

• 1:52:21Speaker 02

  On boxing, you, have you done any boxing?

• 1:52:24Theo Von?

  No, I've never done. I've go to a lot of MMA. I go to a lot of MMA stuff. I love it. As soon, I, you know what? I wouldn't mind getting into something more. The past year has been tough for me. I didn't invest in a lot. The past couple of years were touring. I kind of should have invested more of like having a trainer with me on the road or things like that. I kind of took some of that for granted. And I think in the future that I'll do it differently. But this year I'd like to get more into focusing more on my health and stuff like that. I really burned myself out pretty good. But I used to take MMA classes and I have a feeling that I'll get back into it. I've also had traveled. I was moving a lot too, but now I'm going to be here more. And so I need to put some roots more in some places like that.

• 1:53:08Theo Von?

  So it's like I'll be able to have more of a system, like a pattern. And so it's been tough for me to have that.

• 1:53:13Speaker 02

  It's so hard to find that. I mean, I, I box a lot here in town, or a lot. I, when I'm in town, I try to as much as I can, but it's, it's helped me so much just try to, even if it's two days a week. I only brought it up. I went to the UFC Performance Institute in Las Vegas.

• 1:53:31Theo Von?

  Oh, that's what I heard.

• 1:53:32Speaker 02

  And, uh, cause we played in Vegas last week and they invited me in. It was so cool.

• 1:53:36Theo Von?

  The fights? No.

• 1:53:37Speaker 02

  No, I was just, it was after the fights, but I saw Sean Strickland there. It was crazy.

• 1:53:42Theo Von?

  You did? Oh dude, he's a really amazing guy. He's an interesting guy.

• 1:53:45Speaker 02

  Incredible.

• 1:53:46Theo Von?

  He's a deep soul.

• 1:53:47Speaker 02

  He is a deep soul and, uh, and just such a nice guy. Everybody there was so nice.

• 1:53:52Theo Von?

  They're so great. Did you get to work out there or train there at all?

• 1:53:55Speaker 02

  Yeah. Yeah, I did. I, I trained with Brandon Jenkins there and.

• 1:53:59Theo Von?

  You did?

• 1:53:59Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:54:00Theo Von?

  Dude, bring up Brandon Jenkins. I went to. I try to, I did.

• 1:54:03Speaker 02

  Yeah, Forrest Griffin basically gave me the tour and like he met me there and I was like, holy hell, there he is.

• 1:54:11Theo Von?

  Nice dude.

• 1:54:13Speaker 02

  Yep. Yeah, he, he put some work on me and uh.

• 1:54:17Theo Von?

  That's awesome.

• 1:54:18Speaker 02

  I was really out of shape, you know, but it was cool. I got to learn some new things like he, you know, cause I, I only train with boxing guys and he's an MMA guy. So like it was just, there was a lot of different angles, a lot of new things I had to learn and take it, you know, kind of slow and kind of start from scratch. It was, it was humbling. And uh, and I was like four weeks on the road and very like four weeks, uh, having not trained is too much time off to like go back. I felt like a total piece of crap.

• 1:54:46Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 1:54:47Speaker 02

  I, I looked real bad and I felt like I looked real bad.

• 1:54:50Theo Von?

  That's a tough thing as you get older too. It's like, you gotta catch me, give me a couple of days to prepare for anything. I can do it, but do not catch me. If I've had four or five diet cokes and you want me to box or whatever, bitch, I'm staying in the car. You know what I'm saying? Like.

• 1:55:03Speaker 02

  Way too much ass to contain.

• 1:55:05Theo Von?

  Yeah, that's what it is, dude. It's like I look like a damn teddy bear or something, you know? Cause also my body style, my God given body style is uh, I'm built kind of like a gingerbread cookie a little bit, you know? Like I'm sturdy. Bring up a good G bread on me, daddy. It's seasonal anyway.

• 1:55:20Speaker 02

  I'll bet you can throw.

• 1:55:21Theo Von?

  You know what? I can survive, dude. I'll do okay. Put me, give me a couple of weeks of uh, of uh, MMA, that's how I'm built right there. Now sturdy, I got a sturdy base on me.

• 1:55:32Speaker 02

  Yeah. Do your legs look like that?

• 1:55:33Theo Von?

  Well, I think those.

• 1:55:35Speaker 02

  Bow legged like that?

• 1:55:35Theo Von?

  No, they're, this one, this one had a bad, uh, this one might've had been in a bad oven, but.

• 1:55:41Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:55:43Theo Von?

  I got a little bit more frosting on me than that one, but uh, but yes, anyway, I, maybe the one, they don't really make a perfect cookie, dude, but we should, do you know what would be interesting? What if we made cookies of like people that have been on this show and we saw it was like a fun, like we could do part of it as like a fundraiser or something for moms or something?

• 1:56:03Speaker 02

  That's good. We eat each other's cookies.

• 1:56:05Theo Von?

  And you just get a batch of them or something. Yeah. You can get a batch of the Steven Wilsons.

• 1:56:09Speaker 02

  Like they can bite my head off? I love that.

• 1:56:12Theo Von?

  If you're angry at your husband, he'll just get you a batch of them Steven Wilsons and chew his head off. So that's pretty crazy. Did your Brandon Jenkins met you out there? And Forrest Griffin met you out there?

• 1:56:23Speaker 02

  Yeah, and they gave me a tour of the whole facility.

• 1:56:26Theo Von?

  Oh, it's cool, huh?

• 1:56:27Speaker 02

  Oh, man, it was like I was a kid at a candy shop.

• 1:56:30Theo Von?

  Did they take you through like not just the gym part, but also the UFC building and stuff?

• 1:56:34Speaker 02

  Yeah, I got to go into like the lunchroom and everything.

• 1:56:37Theo Von?

  Dude, it's nice.

• 1:56:38Speaker 02

  Yeah, I was like, this is so nice. And yeah, like you don't, this is like the most dangerous lunchroom you'll ever walk into. Like, seriously, like, like, everybody was so nice and so friendly, but it was like, you'll never walk into a cafeteria that could hurt you so bad.

• 1:56:54Theo Von?

  Yeah. Oh, even the line cooks will have like cauliflower. He's like, you want cauliflower? And you're like, oh.

• 1:56:58Speaker 02

  I'm good on that. How about the broccoli?

• 1:57:00Theo Von?

  Yeah, yeah, dude. Even like, yeah, I think like the head chef in there last week was like Brandon Roy Valas. I'm like, they got some gangsters in here. I'm being careful what I asked for in here.

• 1:57:10Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:57:11Theo Von?

  Oh, that's hilarious, dude. Meta buried casual evidence of social media harm. U.S. court filings allege. Oh, yeah, this was it. This was about information bias. Somebody says this. Meta shut down internal research into the mental health effects of Facebook after finding causal evidence that its products harmed users' mental health. According to unredacted filings in a lawsuit by U.S. school districts against Meta and other social media platforms. So, so would that be information bias?

• 1:57:37Speaker 02

  Turn all research into men off.

• 1:57:40Theo Von?

  In a 2020 research project codenamed Project Mercury, scientists worked with survey film, survey firm Nielsen to gauge the effects of deactivating Facebook. According to Meta documents obtained via discovery, to the company's disappointment, people who stopped using Facebook for a week reported lower feelings of depression, anxiety, loneliness, and social comparison.

• 1:58:01Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:58:02Theo Von?

  Rather than publishing those findings or pursuing additional research, the filing states Meta called off further work and internally declared that the negative study findings were tainted by the existing media narrative around the company. Privately, however, a staffer insisted the conclusions of the research were valid according to the filing. Is that user bias?

• 1:58:22Speaker 02

  Uh, I would, I'd say it definitely could be user bias, but I would actually have to see the research. I mean, there's so many other variables, like you want to know the, how many like participants were involved? Like, what's your statistical in, um, meaning like how many participants were there, therefore? You know, your bell curve is gonna be a lot more, I guess, a lot more valid. You're gonna have more statistical significance. The higher number of participants are involved in the research. For all we know, there's 20 people that they did research on, on Facebook.

• 1:58:57Theo Von?

  Right.

• 1:58:57Speaker 02

  But if they said like, no, we did research on 200,000 people. Okay, now you got statistical validity, but I need to see this research paper. Cause one person's saying that there's user bias and then there's another person saying, no, the results are actually scientifically valid. So that person may actually have bias because they're like emotionally attached to all the research they did. Who knows?

• 1:59:18Theo Von?

  Ah, that's what you're saying.

• 1:59:19Speaker 02

  This could be like a user bias on top of user bias. A user bias sandwich.

• 1:59:24Theo Von?

  Yeah. Oh.

• 1:59:25Speaker 02

  Bias the sandwich, user bias.

• 1:59:27Theo Von?

  It's the new Bon me, dude. Um, bring it back up. I wanna see a little bit more information on, let me see if it tells us. Because it is interesting to think though, that I noticed after only a week, people were getting better. This is allegedly, the full record will show that for over a decade, we have listened to parents, research issues that matter most, and made real changes to protect teens. Go further, see. Uh. Okay, the allegation of Meta burying evidence on social media harms is just one of the many in late Friday filing by Motley Rice, um, a law firm suing Meta, Google, TikTok and Snapchat on behalf of school districts around the country. Wonder if we get in touch with them? That sounds like kind of an interesting lawsuit, doesn't it?

• 2:00:05Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 2:00:05Theo Von?

  Just to see like, what are they learning and what, what information have they learned? Broadly, the plaintiffs argue the companies have intentionally hidden the internally recognized risks of their products from users, parents and teachers.

• 2:00:17Speaker 02

  I wanna see the research and I wanna see if they conducted it or if it was conducted by a second party or third party. Um, that's gonna be a huge part of it. And, I mean, Australia just recently did a social media ban.

• 2:00:31Theo Von?

  I saw that.

• 2:00:32Speaker 02

  On kids under ages 16, I believe.

• 2:00:34Theo Von?

  Um, why is the Australian government banning social media for under 16s? The government says it will reduce the negative impact of social media's designed features that encourage young people to spend more time on screens. Ten platforms are currently included in the ban. Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Threads, TikTok, X, YouTube, Reddit, and streaming platforms like Kick and Twitch. A study commissioned earlier in 2025 found that 96% of children aged 10 to 15 use social media, and that seven out of 10 of them have been exposed to harmful content. This includes misogynistic and violent material, as well as content promoting eating disorders and suicide.

• 2:01:13Theo Von?

  One in seven also reported experiencing grooming type behavior from adults or other children, and more than half said they've been the victim of cyberbullying. I think, shit, I'm not even a child and all that's happened to me on there.

• 2:01:25Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:01:26Theo Von?

  I'm a damn adult and some of that shit hurts.

• 2:01:28Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:01:29Theo Von?

  What, do, well, to say how will it work or when they're imposing it? I just want to get that information out in this.

• 2:01:35Theo Von?

  Dude, go back up. It takes Meta about an hour and 52 minutes to make a, to make $50 million in revenue. That's Australian revenue. That's crazy.

• 2:01:45Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 2:01:47Theo Von?

  Australia's social media ban for children under 16 officially started on December 10th. So they're in it.

• 2:01:53Speaker 02

  They're in it.

• 2:01:54Theo Von?

  If you're an Australian kid, shit, I don't think this is legal to have kids call. But call and tell me honestly, what do you think? Do you think it's good? Are you pissed about it? What are the feelings right now?

• 2:02:03Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:02:04Theo Von?

  Hit me with a couple, uh, hit the hotline, 985-664-9503, and just let it, drop, drop, and don't be some fake weirdo pretending with an Australian accent.

• 2:02:13Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:02:14Theo Von?

  Who's obviously a pervert or whatever. We want, we want real kids to call in, okay?

• 2:02:19Speaker 02

  No, I mean, Australia, when it comes to science and research, they, they are very thorough. I went to school there for a year.

• 2:02:25Theo Von?

  You did?

• 2:02:26Speaker 02

  I did my junior year and, like, they have, like, I went there for their science programs. Their research programs are some of the best in the world. So if they've actually done proper research to back this up, I, I believe that it's probably valid science.

• 2:02:40Theo Von?

  And was that in Sydney?

• 2:02:41Speaker 02

  It was in Brisbane.

• 2:02:42Theo Von?

  Oh, yeah.

• 2:02:43Speaker 02

  Get out Brizzy and, uh, yeah.

• 2:02:46Theo Von?

  Dude, the Brisbane Lions, dude.

• 2:02:47Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:02:48Theo Von?

  My AFL squad.

• 2:02:49Speaker 02

  No way.

• 2:02:50Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 2:02:50Speaker 02

  I love the Lions.

• 2:02:51Theo Von?

  Dude, the Brisbane Lions, bring them up.

• 2:02:53Speaker 02

  And the Wallabies.

• 2:02:54Theo Von?

  Uh, oh, yeah, the Brizzy Lions, dude, fucking legends, dude. Bring up Mitch. There he is, boys. Class.

• 2:03:03Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:03:05Theo Von?

  Dude, yeah, I love the Brisbane Lions, dude. I went over there one night with Mitch, had a good time. I love Australia, brother. It's great.

• 2:03:11Speaker 02

  Yeah, I miss it. I'm gonna go back some, hopefully next year.

• 2:03:15Theo Von?

  Did you find, are you married?

• 2:03:17Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:03:18Theo Von?

  Okay.

• 2:03:18Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:03:19Theo Von?

  Is there a Steven Wilson III?

• 2:03:21Speaker 02

  No, there isn't, no.

• 2:03:22Theo Von?

  There isn't?

• 2:03:23Speaker 02

  No, I don't have any biological children. I have a stepson named Henry.

• 2:03:27Theo Von?

  Okay.

• 2:03:28Speaker 02

  I've been helping raise since he was about four years old.

• 2:03:32Theo Von?

  Oh, nice.

• 2:03:34Speaker 02

  He's my boy and, um, yeah.

• 2:03:37Theo Von?

  Pretty cool kid?

• 2:03:38Speaker 02

  Incredibly cool kid. He's such a great kid. I'm very, very blessed.

• 2:03:43Theo Von?

  What do you admire about him?

• 2:03:45Speaker 02

  Um, he's, well, he's so different from me in, in the best ways. He's, he's very, um, very intelligent and very collected and calm, um, and very, um,

• 2:03:59Speaker 02

  I, I would say he, he's more ordered than I am, um, in, in a lot of ways. He's, he's got, I, I think this incredible constitution about him and, uh, he's, he's got a very calm constitution, uh, which is not what I grew up around. Like, I grew up around a, a lot of noise and a lot of chaos and a lot of energy. And, uh, he is, he's like, um, he's like a rock in a raging river that will not move. You know, and I just, I love that about him and he's, he's a, a very strong and smart young man. Very much into Muay Thai kickboxing and, uh, we started in boxing and, yeah, he's, he's my dude.

• 2:04:43Speaker 02

  And my dad was a, a stepfather, not just a father. He had, he, he remarried after my mother and a couple of times. He didn't have the best luck with the ladies, but, uh, uh, a couple of his wives had stepchildren and, um, And he really taught me how to be a good stepfather, I gotta say, well, not by teaching me, but just by example, like, his faith was led by his works, not his words.

• 2:05:07Theo Von?

  What's one of the toughest things about being a stepfather, kind of, that people don't really see, or that they may see, and you may have your own, that you may have some specific thoughts about?

• 2:05:15Speaker 02

  Um, well, I mean, I was not just a step, I'm not just a stepfather, I was a stepchild. So I remember the perspective as a stepchild. So I go into my stepparenthood as a stepchild.

• 2:05:29Theo Von?

  Oh, okay.

• 2:05:30Speaker 02

  So I have something that a lot of stepparents don't have. I have like a really unique perspective of what it was like to grow up with stepparents.

• 2:05:39Theo Von?

  R and D, you've done the R and D.

• 2:05:40Speaker 02

  Yeah, I've done the R and D, I've had the experience. I've had multiple stepparents. I didn't just have, I didn't just have one set.

• 2:05:46Theo Von?

  You have a trial sample.

• 2:05:46Speaker 02

  I had like, yeah, I had a lot of variability.

• 2:05:49Theo Von?

  Variables, yeah. Okay, there we go.

• 2:05:51Speaker 02

  So I've got some good data there. And, um, and one thing I just remember, and this was never a conversation, um, my dad just loved his stepchildren like us. There was never like, I feel like a lot of stepparents, if they have biological children and stepchildren, they will be like, well, I love you just like I love him. And they'll say that, he never said that, that I can remember, he just did. That, that was what his, that's the lesson that I learned, is that it has nothing to do with the words, it has everything to do with your actions. And, um, so I've really just tried to

• 2:06:33Speaker 02

  be the best stepfather I can, not talk about being a stepfather.

• 2:06:37Theo Von?

  Got it.

• 2:06:38Speaker 02

  Talk about anything, just like, just be, and, um...

• 2:06:42Theo Von?

  Yeah, I think it's, I think it's tough, it's like, it's sometimes easier for me to love a stranger than it is like, somebody close to me, I feel like, in a weird way.

• 2:06:50Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, I mean, there's, you know, familiarity breeds contempt, that's an old saying. And, you know, the more familiar you become with somebody, the more contemptuous you can become.

• 2:07:03Theo Von?

  Oh, yes, massive disputes.

• 2:07:05Speaker 02

  Yeah, so like a stranger is without contempt, because there's no familiarity there, and, um...

• 2:07:12Speaker 02

  You know, that's, I guess, the kind of the battle of love because the more you love somebody, the more familiar you become with them. And like, I guess that is like, how do you balance contempt and love? Because contempt is gonna kind of creep its way in or some somehow.

• 2:07:30Theo Von?

  Resentment, something will get in there.

• 2:07:31Speaker 02

  Something negative will come in there. The more and more you love somebody and, and, you know, maybe that's just, you know, the darkness balancing out the light. But, you know, I think just acknowledging it and knowing that it's there is really the big part of it. Cause like, the fear or the panic behind it is the lack of understanding behind it. Really, fear is most of the time just a lack of understanding.

• 2:07:57Theo Von?

  And, and fears, sometimes they're standing there and you don't, it's like, if you really looked at it for a bit. But sometimes I'll just feel a fear and react. I'll do that for decades without really looking at, well, what's going on here? What's really got me here? What am I, you know? And sometimes just you could figure it out and you're free of it, you know? You can at least have a, see when it's standing there, you know? But I'll let a damn thing Michael Myers me out there forever. And I won't even go out there and realize, oh, this is just a damn cardboard cutout of some old bullshit. This isn't even fucking, nothing's even in this costume anymore. And I've still been acting this way because part of me, I get something out of pretending that that's still real too. I get an excuse, you know?

• 2:08:41Theo Von?

  I get to keep living my life a certain way when I pretend that that old boogeyman is still new, you know? Not saying that that happens a lot, but I'm just saying that that, that hasn't not been a part of my story at times probably. And sometimes I didn't realize it.

• 2:08:57Speaker 02

  It's wild what the mind can do. Like my dad took me deer hunting and I think that was the best thing he could have done for me. Not, it's just the boxing, you know, you, you deal with a lot of fear in boxing because you don't understand certain things. But I remember like, you know, when you go deer hunting, you go out, especially if you, if you morning hunt, you, you go out about an hour before sunrise into the pitch black woods. And you'll walk a quarter mile into a pitch black woods. And my dad would post me up against a tree. With a shotgun in my hand, not even a tree stand or anything.

• 2:09:35Theo Von?

  Damn.

• 2:09:36Speaker 02

  Posted me up against a tree and then he would go off about 500 yards the other way. Cause he'd have to be far away, cause I could shoot him or he could shoot me. Like you gotta be, you can't be in range of each other's shot. Cause we're shooting slugs. And um, but I just remember like, okay, getting out there and an hour before sunrise. It would be pitch black and he would walk me out to this tree. And you couldn't see nothing.

• 2:09:59Theo Von?

  Oof.

• 2:09:59Speaker 02

  And like, I remember thinking like, he would walk out here by himself all the time. And I was like, man, that's crazy. And uh, and he would sit me up against a tree in the pitch black and it would just be pitch black. And then he would go off into his tree. And I would be there for at least 45 minutes in the darkest woods you can imagine.

• 2:10:19Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 2:10:19Speaker 02

  Hearing everything crick and crackle and you know, move around shuffle through leaves. Is that a wild boar? Is that, is that, you know, is that a?

• 2:10:30Theo Von?

  Is that a hooker?

• 2:10:31Speaker 02

  Is that a cougar? Had a?

• 2:10:33Theo Von?

  You'd hope it was a hooker, but it never was dude. It was like a boar.

• 2:10:36Speaker 02

  Yeah, or just a squirrel.

• 2:10:38Theo Von?

  Yeah, or a raccoon, like it had gotten shoes somewhere, like a.

• 2:10:41Speaker 02

  Yeah, a rabid raccoon. Yeah, but, but no, I just remember then, then the, the sun would slowly start to come up and the light. You would start to understand the woods that you didn't have understanding of like 45 minutes ago. And you'd start to see it. And then it was like, okay, it become, literally as the more and more light crept into the woods. The more understanding you, you got of the woods and what it looked like. What it was made of, what kind of trees, what kind of animals that were making all these sounds. And by, you know, by the time the sun was up, there was nothing in that woods that was scaring you anymore. So it was really, you know, your fear was what you didn't understand and what you couldn't see. The woods did not change in the presence of light.

• 2:11:24Theo Von?

  Hmm.

• 2:11:25Speaker 02

  The lack thereof. It's, it was the exact same woods that it was 45 minutes ago. Cause the squirrels don't care about dark and light, you know, they just, they live, you know.

• 2:11:36Theo Von?

  Oh yeah, they're always up to some bullshit or whatever.

• 2:11:38Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:11:39Theo Von?

  They just.

• 2:11:41Speaker 02

  They ain't afraid of the dark.

• 2:11:42Theo Von?

  Yeah, they ain't afraid of other men either, apparently, some of these young bucks. I've seen a lot of squirrels.

• 2:11:48Speaker 02

  Gerbils, gosh.

• 2:11:49Theo Von?

  Oh, he catches me a little bit of.

• 2:11:52Speaker 02

  Richard Gere.

• 2:11:53Theo Von?

  Baby, oh. Those are the old days, dude. Remember how there was crazy rumors when a kid?

• 2:11:58Speaker 02

  We were just talking about that.

• 2:11:59Theo Von?

  Like Richard Gere's gay, he used to put squirrels up his butt or whatever, and people like, what? But somehow that made it around society.

• 2:12:06Speaker 02

  No, I know. Yeah, I don't know. Yeah, that was, that made it to my tiny little small town in southern Indiana.

• 2:12:13Theo Von?

  We were just like, what are we talking about?

• 2:12:15Speaker 02

  I guess maybe that is the downside of social media is that those old bullshit rumors don't come up anymore. Cause someone would, eventually they would shoot them down immediately. It would, it'd be all over TikTok in a day and then someone would be like.

• 2:12:28Theo Von?

  But you, yeah.

• 2:12:28Speaker 02

  Someone be like, this is a bunch of bullshit.

• 2:12:30Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 2:12:31Speaker 02

  And then be like.

• 2:12:31Theo Von?

  He used to be able to lie to people.

• 2:12:33Speaker 02

  Yeah, my dad's a skydiver.

• 2:12:35Theo Von?

  Yeah, like, oh, he'll be home any minute. Lie to people all the time. You'd be like, I'm a lawyer. They'd be like, you're in seventh grade. What are you talking about? You're like, yeah, whatever. The defense rests.

• 2:12:46Speaker 02

  Doogie Howser, you heard of it?

• 2:12:48Theo Von?

  Doogie Howser was good, huh? That show?

• 2:12:49Speaker 02

  You could become a doctor at like age 12.

• 2:12:52Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 2:12:52Speaker 02

  Like, man, the world is wild. They just did whatever they want to in the 90s. Richard Gere, gerbils, children, doctors, Doogie Howser.

• 2:13:03Theo Von?

  To be young, huh?

• 2:13:04Speaker 02

  Yeah, say by the bell.

• 2:13:05Theo Von?

  Oh, I saw, I was at the UFC fights the other day and I saw, uh, Mario Lopez.

• 2:13:11Speaker 02

  Oh, wow.

• 2:13:11Theo Von?

  Crazy, every time he seems, looks, he looks younger than when he was on, when he was working.

• 2:13:15Speaker 02

  He's got like his mullet back. He's just walking through.

• 2:13:18Theo Von?

  Look, what grade is this? He's like in seventh, eighth grade now.

• 2:13:21Speaker 02

  Still wearing like those leotards and stuff.

• 2:13:23Theo Von?

  The unitards.

• 2:13:24Speaker 02

  Yeah, the unitard.

• 2:13:25Theo Von?

  Yeah, bro, he looks even better than that now. I don't even know what happened.

• 2:13:27Speaker 02

  It was incredible.

• 2:13:28Theo Von?

  Yeah, he was like, yeah, he's every ethnicity too.

• 2:13:31Speaker 02

  Looks like he's still captain of the wrestling team.

• 2:13:34Theo Von?

  Oh, dude, dude, I, oh, God, yeah. Oh, jeez, sorry. But yeah, guy looks healthy. What I'm saying is this, whatever, dude, I like women. But what I'm, what I'm telling you is, um. Will you have, will you have the kids? You're on your thing.

• 2:13:49Speaker 02

  Um, I don't know. I'm, I'm pretty good. I think, you know, we've, we've talked about it. Um, we've also talked about adopting kids, but, but you know, I don't know. I've, um, I got a lot going on right now. I got Henry. I've, I've raised, I mean, I know what it's like to raise a child. I know what it's like to love a child. I know what it's like for a child to love me. I'm not missing anything. Um, so, um, but you never know, you know, you never know. You know, that we, we could have a child.

• 2:14:20Speaker 02

  But right now my life is very, very busy and, um, I, I think I have other things that I'm supposed to be doing right now, uh, rather than raising a baby at the, at this particular moment in my life. And, um, and I have some, I have a lot of work to do right now and, uh, maybe, maybe a child will be in the future.

• 2:14:42Theo Von?

  That's fair.

• 2:14:43Speaker 02

  But, um, but you asked about nieces and nephews? Yes, I do. Um, I have quite a, like, all my siblings have children and, um, yep, I'm a wild Uncle Steven that goes around the world singing his songs. They're a little bit, I'm sure they're like, what the hell is this dude? Because all my family like are still in my hometown. They work on cars and they're very, it's very much a small town life. And then my weird ass does what he does, but they, they love it though.

• 2:15:14Theo Von?

  Oh, but they're so proud of you. It's cool.

• 2:15:15Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah. They, they, I don't think they know what to think about any of it because they've seen me kind of live multiple lives in front of them. That's been one wild thing to see because my siblings had their children very young, just like my, my parents did. And so my niece, a lot of my nieces and nephews are older now so that they remember me when I was a scientist and that's all I was doing. And then they remember when I, when I quit my science job and I was waiting tables and bartending. And just trying to get a publishing deal and then they remember the guy that got a publishing deal and was writing songs for other people and my dad recording them on the big phone and all that. And now there's this chapter. So they've kind of got to see their uncle go through

• 2:15:57Speaker 02

  multiple identities. So if anything, I hope that it's been, you know, helpful for them to see that you're not stuck in any particular life. Like you can live multiple lives. You can do all kinds of things, you know.

• 2:16:12Theo Von?

  Amen, man.

• 2:16:13Speaker 02

  And I think it's important for them to see that, you know, you know, life has chapters. It's not one chapter. You know, and you you're writing your own book and you can make the chapters as long as you want, but there are only so many pages and.

• 2:16:30Theo Von?

  Amen.

• 2:16:32Speaker 02

  Amen, indeed.

• 2:16:33Theo Von?

  Well, thank you for helping us think about stuff, man, for giving us some of your music over the years. Dude, I'd love to get together and we could talk again sometime. I feel like there's other avenues of things we could talk about. And sometimes I realize it's better, you know, to just get together and talk again sometime.

• 2:16:47Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:16:47Theo Von?

  So that way we could go down different roads and think about other stuff. I think today it's been nice to just to be talk about like we have relate like familiar relationships and how some things can influence you. And yeah, what it's like living like your father's dream out. Um, we never talked about the theory of evolution, but we can get to that next time, maybe.

• 2:17:06Speaker 02

  Yeah, we can. I'll put a whole presentation for you together.

• 2:17:10Theo Von?

  Well, I'll do the more and D while you're gone. I think I might hit a petting zoo or something while you're gone and see if I get a little bit more.

• 2:17:17Speaker 02

  Come on.

• 2:17:18Theo Von?

  Research done, dude.

• 2:17:19Speaker 02

  Well, I gotta say, I probably owe you money because I feel like I could have paid a therapist a lot of money. I've never had therapy in my life, but I probably do need it, have it. But you said something that was so like insane earlier about the quiet part, you know, about, do you think?

• 2:17:39Speaker 02

  You know, you were quiet because you didn't want to affect the world around you.

• 2:17:45Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 2:17:46Speaker 02

  I think, like I said, that really rocked my world, so to speak. I'll be thinking about that for a long time. There's certain things that we as songwriters say to some, sometimes to somebody and it, it kind of flips a switch or it makes them think about something they've thought about for a long time totally differently. And that, that was a paradigm shift and I thank you for it. So if anything, I walked away with a, an incredible piece of knowledge that I, like I said, I could have, could have never even found in therapy. And if I had, it would have cost a lot of money. So, thank you. I owe you one.

• 2:18:25Theo Von?

  You're welcome, man. No, you've, you've already, you've paid me, you've paid in advance, dude. So many times I've listened to your songs in moments where I needed something or to process something or just to remember my father, you know? Like, like, you know, one thing about my dad, I remember he liked to whistle and he had change in his pockets all the time. So if I hear change, you don't hear change in people's pockets anymore. That used to be a thing, you know? Like an older man, he'd have change in his keys in his pockets. And now like a lot of car doors are just auto entry and it's hooked to your phone and people don't have change anymore. But that, like, when I want to think about my dad, I'll like, that's one of the first things I'll lay there and think about is the sound of change in somebody's pocket, kind of, you know? But, um.

• 2:19:04Speaker 02

  That was his song.

• 2:19:05Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 2:19:06Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:19:06Theo Von?

  That was his song.

• 2:19:07Speaker 02

  That was, like, my dad always whistled. He always had a song in his head. He was always whistling a song or humming a song or singing a song. He like, he was a song, like, you know, he was either riding a song wave or, or just, you know, being a song without being one.

• 2:19:23Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 2:19:24Speaker 02

  But, you know, like, you know, but yeah, there, there was always like a sound to him. It sounds like your dad had the same sound.

• 2:19:30Theo Von?

  Oh yeah, he was a joyous instrument. But yeah, if we think of ourselves as a song, it's like, what song am I when I go into the room with people and, you know? And you can be different songs. Sometimes you're a separate song, maybe when it's just you by yourself or, or your music's kind of off and you're just sort of listening. But yeah, it's like, what kind of song do I bring into the world? You know? And then do I just play the same song over and over again? And maybe I do that because I just, it's therapeutic to myself, you know?

• 2:19:53Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:19:54Theo Von?

  I don't know. It's, but it's been fascinating, man. It's been fascinating to be a fan of yours. It's been fascinating to, um.

• 2:20:00Speaker 03

  Get to share your music with other people. I've done that a bunch to connect with them.

• 2:20:03Speaker 02

  Thank you.

• 2:20:04Speaker 03

  You know, tell my brother like, hey, man, I love this song, you know, and, and then he can call me back and like, oh, I see why you like it, you know? And just things like that, that, uh, that can bring people closer together. So thank you so much, man.

• 2:20:15Speaker 02

  Thank you. You've shared this mu- our music, my music a lot on your show and you've talked about it a lot.

• 2:20:21Speaker 03

  I remember Miranda Lambert was in and we both loved you and we, yeah. Well, everybody loves to talk about you behind your back, Stephen, so I figured we would do it in front of you.

• 2:20:28Speaker 02

  Well, I'm grateful either way that anybody is talking about this music and you've, you've been an early champion, Theo.

• 2:20:35Speaker 03

  Oh, well, I don't know if that's true, but thank you, dude. And Evan Bartels is another great guy. Have you listened to any of his music?

• 2:20:41Speaker 02

  Yeah, absolutely.

• 2:20:42Speaker 03

  I mean, there's just some people that can just make me feel something, you know? And, uh, so thank you, dude. Thank you for helping us feel. Would you honor us and play a song or two before you leave?

• 2:20:51Speaker 02

  Let's do it.

• 2:20:52Speaker 03

  Let's go.

• 2:20:54Speaker 02

  All right, let's do it. We'll play some Gary.

• 2:20:56Speaker 03

  Let's do it, man.

• 2:20:59Speaker 03

  Ladies and gentlemen, Stephen Wilson Jr.

• 2:21:03Speaker 02

  Thank you, sir.

• 2:21:14Speaker 03

  Gary these days been lying in his bed, man.

• 2:21:20Speaker 03

  Working on a same car going on a decade.

• 2:21:26Speaker 03

  Scribbles on drunk men don't draw attention. I never really noticed, but now that I mention it. Ain't a lot of boys named Gary these days. Born with a cigarette glued to their face. Fixing bout anything a hammer can't handle. Saving on the money 'cause a Gary don't gamble. Ain't a lot of girls going by Debbie anymore. They got the same nicotine for and after tours. Time leaves town, but the men at hand stays. There ain't a lot of boys named Gary these days.

• 2:22:12Speaker 03

  Gary these days been worried bout the bad news.

• 2:22:19Speaker 03

  There ain't a lotta teenagers fillin' up the church fuse, no. Burnin' bush lights, don't talk to his brother. The people even still say grace before supper. There ain't a lotta boys named Gary these days. Born with a cigarette glued to their face. Fixin' bout anything a hammer can handle. Savin' all the money 'cause a Gary don't gamble. Ain't a lotta girls goin' by Debbie anymore. But they got the same nicotine pourin' at their pores. Time leaves town but the man at hand stays. Ain't a lotta boys named Gary these days.

• 2:23:13Speaker 03

  Hey, no, man, it's a damn thing. Runnin' takes it out for a spin for sneakin' in.

• 2:23:25Speaker 03

  He believes in God, but believes in little black panties on the stove on his day.

• 2:23:47Speaker 03

  I had a weird suspicion with the light out on the front porch.

• 2:23:53Speaker 03

  Hard medication poured down where the drain pours. He holds his left arm while his parakeet prays.

• 2:24:08Speaker 03

  Has anybody seen much of Gary these days?

• 2:24:16Speaker 03

  Has anybody seen much of Gary these days?

• 2:24:31Speaker 02

  It's just fun, huh? It's almost like the door closes on it or something.

• 2:24:33Speaker 04

  It's like the, you know, Gary dies and it's almost like the door closes on Gary. It's Gary said.

• 2:24:40Speaker 02

  It is, and there's enough Gary's out there.

• 2:24:42Speaker 04

  There's not, I mean, they're a Gary breed.

• 2:24:44Speaker 02

  Dude, well, they should have a, uh, they should have a, um, a museum that has Gary's in it.

• 2:24:51Speaker 04

  I agree. You know, I always thought there would be a, a great idea for a Gary Busey museum called the Gary Museum.

• 2:24:59Speaker 02

  Ooh, I like that.

• 2:25:00Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 2:25:00Speaker 02

  The museum, yeah.

• 2:25:01Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 2:25:02Speaker 02

  He should have that.

• 2:25:03Speaker 04

  I think so. And you go in and it's just like a bunch of point break memorabilia.

• 2:25:08Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:25:08Speaker 04

  And like just Buseys.

• 2:25:11Speaker 02

  Yeah, a lot of good Busey stuff.

• 2:25:13Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 2:25:13Speaker 02

  He was in, uh...

• 2:25:14Speaker 04

  Make it two.

• 2:25:15Speaker 02

  Yeah, a lot of movies and some of his cameos even does now could be in there.

• 2:25:20Speaker 04

  Yeah, he like breaks the fourth wall. I love that about him. He, he looks at the camera. You ever notice that, like in movies, like he like looks at the camera?

• 2:25:28Speaker 02

  I don't know if I've noticed it as much, but now that you say it, he breaks the fourth wall just of existence of being human.

• 2:25:32Speaker 04

  He does, yeah.

• 2:25:33Speaker 02

  He shatters right through it.

• 2:25:34Speaker 04

  He speaks in acronyms and, uh...

• 2:25:37Speaker 02

  It reminds me of a rare name dude that I, or Debbie, we had, was it Debbie in the song?

• 2:25:41Speaker 04

  Debbie, yeah.

• 2:25:42Speaker 02

  We had, um, what was it?

• 2:26:44Theo Von?

  Miss Robin. That was our lady at our kindergarten. And I would not sleep. I couldn't nap time or whatever. So she started to notice it and she'd let me go outside and watch her smoke when we're kids. And her hair, she goes, if you can't sleep, you can come watch me smoke. And sometimes I would need-

• 2:27:01Speaker 02

  That was your Debbie.

• 2:27:02Theo Von?

  And sometimes I would need some sleep. So I'd be like, I'm gonna sleep today or whatever. But then probably two days out of the week, I'd go out there.

• 2:27:08Speaker 02

  And watch Robin smoke.

• 2:27:09Theo Von?

  Tell me about her husband and stuff like that. And her hair was kinda like this feathered sort of kinda cut.

• 2:27:14Speaker 02

  That's a total Robin.

• 2:27:15Theo Von?

  She looked like, I think she looked exactly like a man, but she was beautiful out of me. She was probably one of the hottest. She was a woman that would talk to me, so she was stunning.

• 2:27:23Speaker 02

  It was incredible.

• 2:27:24Theo Von?

  God, there was something like that.

• 2:27:25Speaker 02

  Just to watch her Robin smoke, not the bird.

• 2:27:28Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 2:27:28Speaker 02

  The human, a human Robin.

• 2:27:31Theo Von?

  Um, we talk a lot about your quote, and I know it's not your quote, but grief is only love that's got no place to go. We talk a lot about that, man, on here. We've mentioned it a few times. Um, you think you could play that for us?

• 2:27:42Speaker 02

  I could, yeah. I'd be happy to.

• 2:27:43Theo Von?

  Would you mind?

• 2:27:44Speaker 02

  It'd take just a second for me to tune up for it.

• 2:27:46Theo Von?

  Okay.

• 2:28:03Theo Von?

  Life is a battlefield. And it'll drag you right through hell. Lights like a rattlesnake. The kind that you just don't see on the trail. And I miss my father every day.

• 2:28:23Theo Von?

  The kind of pain I pray don't fade away.

• 2:28:30Theo Von?

  For the ones, oh, guiding me down a road. Yeah, grief is only love that's got no place to go. Put my great granddad in the ground. All the ghosts in my hometown, yeah, they're the ones that find me down a road. Yeah, grief is only love that's got no place to go. Yeah, grief is only love.

• 2:29:11Speaker 04

  The world is a cannonball, So deal with the feelings you can't hide. God gave us alcohol When we need to leave them all inside. And I don't feel like crying, But I just keep crying For the ones above To guide me down a road. Yeah, grief is only love That's got no place to go. For my great-granddad in the ground,

• 2:29:55Speaker 04

  All the ghosts in my hometown, Yeah, they're the ones That find me down a road. Yeah, grief is only love That's got no place to go. Yeah, grief is only love.

• 2:30:18Speaker 04

  Grief is only love.

• 2:30:24Speaker 04

  Grief is only love.

• 2:30:39Speaker 04

  And I don't feel like crying, But I just keep crying For the ones above To guide me down a road. Yeah, grief is only love That's got no place to go. So hang on to the hurting And let it go. And the only thing for certain Is it's out of my control. And grief is only love

• 2:31:21Speaker 04

  That's got no place to go. Yeah, grief is only love That's got no place to go. Yeah, grief is only love.

• 2:32:16Theo Von?

  That's awesome, man. Thank you so much.

• 2:32:18Speaker 02

  How do you feel? Sound okay?

• 2:32:20Theo Von?

  It sounds great, dude. Yeah. Just thank you. Yeah. It's just nice.

• 2:32:23Speaker 02

  Thank you, Theo, for everything, man. Thank you. Trevin, is that okay?

• 2:32:29Theo Von?

  Dude, he's never used profanity in here. So he's gonna get into merit.

• 2:32:34Speaker 02

  He's never cussing his life.

• 2:32:35Theo Von?

  Hey, that's what's going on, dude.

• 2:32:38Speaker 02

  Theo, thank you so much.

• 2:32:39Theo Von?

  Thank you so much, dude. You're awesome. And I love it. And thank you for sharing and helping us feel and making it okay for people to feel stuff and yeah.

• 2:32:48Speaker 02

  Yeah, I think, um, yeah, it's, it's time to feel things because what else do we have if we ain't got feelings? I think it's the only thing that separates us from the robots at this point.

• 2:32:59Theo Von?

  Yeah.

• 2:33:00Speaker 02

  So let's lean into what we got.

• 2:33:01Theo Von?

  Amen. Lean into what makes us real.

• 2:33:03Speaker 02

  Yes, sir.

• 2:33:04Theo Von?

  Steven Wilson Jr., thank you so much, brother.

• 2:33:07Speaker 02

  Thank you. God bless you.

• 2:33:08Theo Von?

  You too.

• 2:33:08Speaker 02

  Thank you, Theo.

• 2:33:09Theo Von?

  Thank him.