Dan Reynolds

Dan Reynolds is the lead vocalist and founding member of Imagine Dragons. Alongside guitarist Wayne Sermon, he founded the pop rock band in 2008, releasing their debut album, Night Visions, in 2012. From the album, hit single “Radioactive” won a Grammy for Best Rock Performance and achieved RIAA Diamond Status. As the frontman of Imagine Dragons, Reynolds has led the band through a string of Platinum and multi-Platinum albums, including Smoke + Mirrors, Evolve, and Origins. In recognition of his songwriting talent, he received the Songwriters Hall of Fame Hal David Starlight Award in 2014. Outside of music, Reynolds founded the LOVELOUD Foundation to support and uplift LGBTQ+ youth through music. ------ Thank you to the sponsors that fuel our podcast and our team: Athletic Nicotine https://www. AthleticNicotine.com/tetra Use code 'TETRA' ------ Squarespace https://Squarespace.com/tetra Use code 'TETRA' ------ LMNT Electrolytes https://DrinkLMNT.com/tetra Use code 'TETRA' ------ Sign up to receive Tetragrammaton Transmissions https://www.tetragrammaton.com/join-newsletter

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

• 0:01Rick Rubin?

  Tetragrammaton.

• 0:24Speaker 01

  I really genuinely have never experienced writer's block. I don't know that feeling. And I don't say that in a way of like, "Ha ha, look at me." It's more just like, there's infinite sounds and they're always interesting to me. Yeah. And if you don't like one, well, there's another thing.

• 0:41Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 0:41Speaker 01

  I do experience writer's block if I'm not healthy. If I'm not living sober, I get less inspired to create. That's the first thing I find. If I'm drinking or if I'm like in a not good headspace.

• 0:54Rick Rubin?

  How often have you not lived sober? I think of you as a pretty sober individual.

• 0:58Speaker 01

  Yeah, um, I think that I'm so promoted as those values and I love that. And that is a big part of my life and I try to live sober all the time. So I think that is part of my life. But I would say in the last 10 years, I've been more not sober than sober. For whatever that, whatever that means.

• 1:16Rick Rubin?

  Is that usually as a form of celebration or as a form of escape?

• 1:22Speaker 01

  No, not celebration. If it was celebration, then I would not even say the word sober, right? Because I think that that's great. I think if you're with your friends and it's like, for me, I'm not, that isn't why I ever turn to any sort of substance. For me, it's always escapism. And that's where it's, I'm like, okay, this isn't healthy.

• 1:41Rick Rubin?

  The way you describe music, music is your healthy escape.

• 1:45Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:45Rick Rubin?

  Because that's when you can get away from your thoughts.

• 1:48Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, it is. And that's why I started writing when I was 12. Because my thoughts, at 12, I had a horrible spiritual crisis. Because I was raised with all the answers of religion. And then I, the second I started to get into my, like 12, 13, I was like, I had Google. Right, and then I'm like Googling things and, you know, and doing your own kind of searching process. And feeling like, oh, maybe all the answers that I have are not correct. And that made me spiral, and then I really didn't like to be in my mind. And I also didn't, I loved my home. My home life was great, but there was something about it that was so conflicting for me because everything revolved around this.

• 2:29Rick Rubin?

  So you were born into a spiritual community?

• 2:33Speaker 01

  Yeah, I was born into a really religious Mormon home. Eight boys and one girl. And my mom and dad and all of them are Mormon. And, you know, Mormonism is, it's a really beautiful lifestyle. It's very clean, it's very disciplined, very structured. And happy because it has so many great values to it. And it works for a lot of people, it works for my whole family. But it just never really sat with me good.

• 2:57Rick Rubin?

  Who do you think you would be if you weren't born into that situation?

• 3:05Speaker 01

  I would like to hope that I would have arrived somewhere where I am today. I'm really happy with with where I'm at in life right now. I'm really genuinely happy with it. I wouldn't change, I don't have regrets about it. But my honest thought, I think I could be self-destructive a little bit, but that might be a product of my life. Really, actually, you know what? I don't know. I don't, I really, my honest answer to that is I, I really don't know.

• 3:29Rick Rubin?

  Do you feel like you got any good things from that upbringing?

• 3:33Speaker 01

  So much. I wouldn't have this career if it wasn't for that. I really believe that. Because I became obsessed about going to that place and writing a song. I became so obsessed about that because I was running away from something. And I think if I didn't have anything to run away from,

• 3:54Speaker 01

  I would have just not run to that. It was a hard thing to run to. My, I did not grow up in a family of artistry. Artistry was not seen as a career. There's academia, and that's everything. Artistry is a hobby. It's not something you could say, I'm gonna, that's gonna be my career. It was doctors, lawyers. My brothers are anesthesiologists, plastic surgeon, dentist, lawyer, lawyer, lawyer, lawyer.

• 4:24Rick Rubin?

  And you?

• 4:25Speaker 01

  And me, yeah. And I knew at a young age I did not want to do any of those things.

• 4:29Rick Rubin?

  How do your siblings feel about what you do?

• 4:32Speaker 01

  They're all super supportive. One of my brothers is my manager now, and he was from the very beginning, one of the attorneys. And then the other attorney is my lawyer. So I work with two of them. They're all very, very supportive. I think, you know, I know that my mom worries about me a lot, and I understand it now. I have four kids, so I understand the worry. But she also just believes completely with all of her that her path is the path. That her religious path, if you don't take it, you will not have an eternal happiness.

• 5:10Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 5:10Speaker 01

  Really believes it, doesn't think it.

• 5:12Rick Rubin?

  No.

• 5:13Speaker 01

  We- wholeheartedly.

• 5:14Rick Rubin?

  She lives it.

• 5:15Speaker 01

  She lives it.

• 5:15Rick Rubin?

  She lives it.

• 5:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 5:16Rick Rubin?

  And I imagine if she lives it, she experiences it.

• 5:19Speaker 01

  Yes, yes. And so does my dad.

• 5:21Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 5:21Speaker 01

  So I think that, you know, they worry about me in that sense, but, you know, no spewing, never like. You're going to hell. Yeah, it's not like that.

• 5:31Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 5:31Speaker 01

  If it was that, that'd actually be easy for me.

• 5:33Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 5:34Speaker 01

  Because then I'd go, okay, cut off.

• 5:36Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 5:36Speaker 01

  But it's not that. It's more sadness, maybe, or something, and that's harder.

• 5:44Rick Rubin?

  Is there a part of your parents being proud for what you're doing?

• 5:47Speaker 01

  Yeah, definitely proud. They come to so many of the shows. They get emotional all the time at them in a really beautiful way.

• 5:55Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 5:55Speaker 01

  And my mom has said to me many times, like, maybe this was, you know, this is what God was, had you doing. I just, you know, and it's interesting because in the Mormon religion, there's one really cool part of it, which I always, I love like sci-fi and I love fantasy. And this sounds like I'm, me setting it up like that, sounds like I'm mocking it, but I'm not. I just like things that are curious. And when you're a teenager in the Mormon religion, you get a thing called a patriarchal blessing. And it's like the closest to like magic in Mormonism. There's a lot of things about Mormonism that are kind of magic and cool and interesting. But this one was really interesting. You meet with this patriarch who's a wise, like mysterious kind of figure.

• 6:38Speaker 01

  And they give you a blessing to lay their hands on your head.

• 6:40Rick Rubin?

  It's a human patriarch.

• 6:41Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, sorry, it's a human.

• 6:43Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, checking because you said sci-fi.

• 6:45Speaker 01

  Right, right, right, sorry, sorry, yes.

• 6:46Rick Rubin?

  Tell me about your patriarch, what was the, describe him.

• 6:49Speaker 01

  Okay, he was in a wheelchair, he was very old, very skinny, very quiet, very reverent.

• 7:00Speaker 01

  Asked me a couple of questions about morality, maybe, at the time, it wasn't anything about getting to know me. Nothing, you know, are you living by the commandments of God, are you morally clean?

• 7:15Rick Rubin?

  How old were you at this time?

• 7:16Speaker 01

  I was fourteen.

• 7:18Rick Rubin?

  Is that the age everyone does it?

• 7:19Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm, and you're supposed to be really clean at the time, and I remember lying a little bit when I did it because, first of all, you're not supposed to masturbate or look at pornography. And I remember being at that age and I was like, I'm not gonna tell this man that, because he was asking me. But I still got the, I still got the blessing, right? And he told me in it, it's like they tell you a bit about your future. You're gonna go on to do this and that, you're gonna have kids, and you're gonna go on a mission and do this. Two of the things, and it's supposed to be really sacred, you're actually not supposed to talk about it. But I think as I've gotten older, I feel comfortable with it.

• 7:57Rick Rubin?

  Okay.

• 7:58Speaker 01

  Two of the things.

• 7:58Rick Rubin?

  Whatever the line is that you feel comfortable with, go to and don't go past it.

• 8:02Speaker 01

  Okay, thanks, Rick. Uh, two of the things, one of which was to say, your voice will move lots of people. And I was fourteen, and my mom afterward was teary-eyed, and she said, I've been there for all your brothers and their patriarchal blessings, and I never heard anything specific like that. What do you think that meant? And I remember thinking, I have no idea what that meant.

• 8:23Rick Rubin?

  So your parents are in the room, or your mom is in the room?

• 8:25Speaker 01

  My mom and my dad were in the room for it, they're allowed.

• 8:28Rick Rubin?

  And that's always the case?

• 8:29Speaker 01

  Always the case, nobody else is allowed, and you're not supposed to talk about it. You're not even supposed to, it's like a very, then you're given the sacred.

• 8:35Rick Rubin?

  Even with the family, or you can talk about it?

• 8:36Speaker 01

  Even with the family.

• 8:37Rick Rubin?

  Okay.

• 8:38Speaker 01

  Even with the family. I think they say, when you get married, maybe in a very sacred setting with your spouse or significant other, you can share some of it. It said that, it also said that I would have power to control the elements. I'll never forget.

• 8:50Rick Rubin?

  Wow, that's pretty good.

• 8:51Speaker 01

  That was cool. And when we first were playing shows, we'd play, uh, festivals, and I always felt like the, the sun would come out when we go on stage.

• 8:59Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 9:00Speaker 01

  And even when I was losing my faith, I was like, you know, but then we've had a lot of thunderstorms lately, so I'm not exactly sure what that means.

• 9:07Rick Rubin?

  That sounds amazing.

• 9:08Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 9:08Rick Rubin?

  And you never discussed it with any of your siblings, their experience like that?

• 9:13Speaker 01

  Never, no. There's a lot of things in the Mormon church that are secretive is a, it sounds like a bad word, but sacred is the way it's said. For instance, when you go to the temple, you're given a sacred name that's unique to you, that's different than your name, and you're not allowed to tell anybody.

• 9:29Rick Rubin?

  Yes.

• 9:31Speaker 01

  Kind of cool.

• 9:32Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, who else knows it besides you?

• 9:34Speaker 01

  My ex-wife told her it. Because you're allowed to share it with, again, once you get married. So I like those kinds of things.

• 9:42Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, well, they have great power. I learned TM when I was 14.

• 9:46Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 9:47Rick Rubin?

  And you're given a mantra, which is just for you.

• 9:50Speaker 01

  Right.

• 9:51Rick Rubin?

  From that time, in that first time you learn it, you never speak it again.

• 9:56Speaker 01

  Right.

• 9:57Rick Rubin?

  It's part of, it's power is that it's sacred and it's yours and it's not to be shared.

• 10:04Speaker 01

  That's one of the reasons with the band that, it's an anagram. The band name was, you switched the letters and it made a different phrase. And then we agreed, we like made a pact as a band, we'll never reveal that. And that's between us.

• 10:23Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 10:23Speaker 01

  And then we switched up the words and we made, and we made a bunch of different phrases.

• 10:26Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 10:27Speaker 01

  And we came up with Imagine Dragons because it was just weird. And I was like, okay, Google, we'll own that on Google.

• 10:31Rick Rubin?

  But it's an anagram of a sacred phrase for your band.

• 10:35Speaker 01

  Yes, and we've kept that a secret.

• 10:36Rick Rubin?

  You created it yourself?

• 10:37Speaker 01

  Yes, I wrote it on a piece of paper in biology my sophomore year.

• 10:41Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 10:42Speaker 01

  At BYU when I was going to drop out.

• 10:43Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, how old were you at that time?

• 10:45Speaker 01

  21. There was a battle of the bands and I was like, okay, this is my opportunity to start a band. Obviously, I did not know they would do anything it did.

• 10:57Rick Rubin?

  Did you have another career path in mind? What were you gonna do?

• 11:00Speaker 01

  I wanted to be an FBI agent.

• 11:02Rick Rubin?

  Cool.

• 11:03Speaker 01

  Yeah, and they came to BYU, they love to hire Mormons because Mormons are very strict. No drugs.

• 11:09Rick Rubin?

  Trustworthy.

• 11:10Speaker 01

  God fearing, so you know, you're afraid of lying, maybe you're gonna go to hell. So they had come to the school and I attended a seminar. And I just more thought, I liked the idea of. Of a dangerous life because my life was so the opposite of that.

• 11:27Rick Rubin?

  That's interesting.

• 11:28Speaker 01

  And I also, in seeking a relationship, it was the same. I looked for something dangerous that was as opposite for me as I could find. Because I, I like to learn. I love meeting people who are fascinating and different than me and understanding them.

• 11:45Rick Rubin?

  That's how we grow.

• 11:45Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's my favorite part of life is meeting strangers and having dialogue and getting to know them.

• 11:53Rick Rubin?

  In Mormonism, is there a two-year mission that you go on?

• 11:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 11:57Rick Rubin?

  Did you get to do that?

• 11:58Speaker 01

  I did. I went on a two-year mission when I turned nineteen. And you have to be deemed worthy to do it. So I did, in leading up to that, I had to know, you know, no sex, no drugs, no anything. And they, it's a really, really serious thing. And if you do it, even during that two-year period, they'll send you home.

• 12:17Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 12:18Speaker 01

  Dishonorably.

• 12:19Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 12:19Speaker 01

  And all the Mormon culture finds out about it and you're kind of seen. Or if you just are sad and you want to go home, your scene is kind of weak. And all my brothers take on.

• 12:27Rick Rubin?

  Does that go for life or no? Are they treated poorly forever or it's just for a window?

• 12:33Speaker 01

  It's a scar that is with them forever. I have friends who were with me that got sent home because they had sex with a girl on a mission, which you can't do. Or because they were going to clubs at night and got caught, got sent home. Or because they just were depressed. A mission, every day, you wake up at six, you work out for a half hour, you study the Bible and the Book of Mormon for an hour on your own, I believe. And then it was a half hour with your companions. You're put with one person, you have to be within earshot, eyesight of, at all times, except when you use the bathroom. No phones.

• 13:09Rick Rubin?

  And they're on a mission as well?

• 13:10Speaker 01

  They're on a mission as well.

• 13:11Rick Rubin?

  Is it someone you know in advance or no?

• 13:13Speaker 01

  Nope.

• 13:13Rick Rubin?

  You're paired with someone?

• 13:14Speaker 01

  That day you arrive, here it is, you're together now for three to six months. You can call home twice a year, Mother's Day, Christmas, that's it.

• 13:22Rick Rubin?

  Wow.

• 13:23Speaker 01

  No flirting, no communication, no. You could write a handwritten letter once a week. You have a day that's called Preparation Day where you do your laundry. You can play basketball with like the locals or with your companion or something for like half the day and you can write a letter home. So I would write home every week.

• 13:39Rick Rubin?

  You can talk to anyone, in general, you can talk to people.

• 13:43Speaker 01

  Yes, that's what you do do all day.

• 13:45Rick Rubin?

  Just talk to people.

• 13:46Speaker 01

  Yeah, so after we do the hour of study together, we have breakfast. Then all day, you map out the entire city you're in. And you go one street at a time, knock every door. Check it off, knock the next door. Hello, I'm a missionary from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. My name is Elder Reynolds, and I'm here to share a message with you about Jesus Christ. Have you ever wondered why you're here and where you're going? And something like that.

• 14:10Rick Rubin?

  And what's, what type of responses do you get?

• 14:13Speaker 01

  In the beginning, you get basically every door shut because you're nervous, because you don't know any way to connect with people. And then you learn, just like any salesman or person would learn how to interact. You learn how to do the, not to just do that rote thing. Instead, kind of look at someone, talk to them, ask them a question about themselves. Pointed something in their house, ask them about it. People like to talk about themselves, so you as quick as you can get them to tell you something about themselves. So you kind of learn these things and then you, then you can start to get in to more doors. And then as you have more success, there's kind of this pyramid of leadership.

• 14:55Speaker 01

  There's 200 missionaries, for instance, in the state of Nebraska, which is where I was called to serve. They pray about it, like the prophet prays about it, supposedly every single person says, where should Dan Reynolds go? Nebraska. Apparently that's how it went.

• 15:10Rick Rubin?

  And you had never been to Nebraska?

• 15:11Speaker 01

  No, and I was hoping for somewhere different. My brothers went to England, the Philippines.

• 15:16Rick Rubin?

  Wow.

• 15:16Speaker 01

  Right, so I was like, I'm gonna go learn Tagalog in the Philippines.

• 15:19Rick Rubin?

  Yes.

• 15:19Speaker 01

  Down.

• 15:20Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, Nebraska, yeah.

• 15:22Speaker 01

  I was very sad about that.

• 15:23Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 15:24Speaker 01

  And you read it out loud in front of your whole family and you get it, it's a bit, you know, everybody come together for dinner, here we go, here's the piece of paper. Your call to serve for the next two years is Nebraska, and all your brothers were like, oof, sorry, man.

• 15:38Rick Rubin?

  Did you feel a sense of rejection when people would close the door in the beginning?

• 15:42Speaker 01

  Yeah, oh, for sure. I mean, I already went into it not knowing if it was true. Right, I was already conflicted about it since I was 12, and then you're telling people it's true all day.

• 15:52Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 15:52Speaker 01

  Which makes you think it's more true, because you're saying it's true all day, right? And as you repeat, that mantra becomes part of you.

• 15:58Rick Rubin?

  Mm-hmm.

• 15:59Speaker 01

  Do you know this is true? Of course I know it's true. Why do you know it's true? Well, I can't really make it logically make sense, but I can tell you when I practice these things, it makes my life better. I'm a bad liar.

• 16:11Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 16:12Speaker 01

  So I would tell them the things that I could find were true. Look, when I'm not drinking and smoking, I'm healthier. When I'm not having premarital sex, well, I'm not getting anyone pregnant.

• 16:23Speaker 01

  So I'm like looking for where can you, you know, where can you tell the truth?

• 16:26Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 16:27Speaker 01

  And then you just do that every day and then your goal is to baptize as many people as possible, to bring them under Jesus.

• 16:32Rick Rubin?

  Did you baptize any?

• 16:33Speaker 01

  I did. I baptized a lot of people.

• 16:35Rick Rubin?

  Really?

• 16:35Speaker 01

  Yeah, I got good at it. I got good at knocking on doors and becoming friends with people. And then you meet some people who are just like, sure, why not?

• 16:45Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 16:45Speaker 01

  Right? They're like, cool. I feel like if a Mormon knocked on my door, and they were interesting enough, and I enjoyed the conversation. You want to dunk me in the water? And yeah, so I would put my right hand to the square, I would baptize them. You go into a big kind of hot tub type thing in the Mormon church. And then you say-

• 17:02Rick Rubin?

  And you would do the baptism of them?

• 17:04Speaker 01

  Yeah, you dress up in all white.

• 17:05Rick Rubin?

  Wow.

• 17:06Speaker 01

  They dress up in white and then you put your hand like this, you do this. I Dan Reynolds, have been commissioned of Jesus Christ baptize you in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost. Amen. And you help them plug their nose. And you put them all the way underwater, and even if a toe comes out of the water, you have to repeat it. Everything, you have to have full immersion. Yeah, complete.

• 17:25Rick Rubin?

  When were you baptized into it?

• 17:26Speaker 01

  At eight.

• 17:27Rick Rubin?

  At eight.

• 17:28Speaker 01

  And that is the earliest you can be baptized, because Mormons believe that at that age, you have enough rational thinking that you know right from wrong, and now you're held accountable for your, for your words and deeds and actions.

• 17:39Rick Rubin?

  Who baptized you?

• 17:41Speaker 01

  My dad. Only men, because it's the priesthood is what it's called, and you have to have kind of the keys and authority that is given to you by someone else who had it. So, once you turn of age, then they give you this blessing, and now you have the keys to baptize.

• 17:54Rick Rubin?

  Did your dad do that for all of your brothers?

• 17:56Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm. And his dad gave it to him.

• 17:59Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 17:59Speaker 01

  And so it all goes back to Joseph Smith in the 1800s.

• 18:02Rick Rubin?

  Wow.

• 18:03Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 18:04Rick Rubin?

  Radical.

• 18:05Speaker 01

  It is, yeah. It's a cool, I mean, it's a cool story.

• 18:09Rick Rubin?

  I find it beautiful.

• 18:09Speaker 01

  Yeah, I do too. Especially as I get older. And I realize how unique it is. Because when you're going through, I just thought everybody. I really did. I mean, I just lived in a circle where everybody was Mormon in Las Vegas. I mean, I had a lot of friends that were not Mormon, and I just thought. Well, even though I didn't know it was true, I just thought. They'll come into the fold, of course. This is the truth.

• 18:32Rick Rubin?

  How did Mormons look at other Christians, let's say?

• 18:36Speaker 01

  You know, again, I'm trying to be really respectful, but I also want to give you honest answers. I can speak for my truth.

• 18:43Rick Rubin?

  Yes.

• 18:44Speaker 01

  Even when my faith was weak and I was still Mormon, I still saw other Christians as lacking the keys and authority. And that made my life so much more difficult to receive advice, because I would, I remember having friends and I'd be like, well, what do you think I should do? You know, normal discourse you have with your friends.

• 19:08Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 19:09Speaker 01

  They would tell me something and I would think.

• 19:12Speaker 01

  Did this come from God or not? This probably didn't come from God because they don't have the keys and the authority. Whereas maybe some Mormon person that I was like, they're really living clean. When they talk to me, I'm like, that's an answer to that prayer I was having. Because you pray every night, right? Like, God, help me to know, blah, blah, blah. And I felt like I never heard anything, nothing supernatural. And then you're taught, well, your answers can come through other people. So then I'm looking to find my answers, not in my gut. So I didn't learn to know my gut until I got older, which was really a difficult thing for me to to find. I was looking for answers through God from mom, dad, friend, who's Mormon, all Mormon.

• 19:53Rick Rubin?

  So your relationship to music was the thing outside of that?

• 19:58Speaker 01

  Yes, it was. Now I can say my doubts in this journal. And let me put it in enough metaphors that even if my family hears it, they won't know. But my dad knew.

• 20:12Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 20:12Speaker 01

  I didn't play any of my music for a while for them because I knew they would listen and think, "Oh, he's doubting his faith," and I didn't want to talk about it. I didn't want to talk about it.

• 20:22Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 20:23Speaker 01

  But eventually I showed it to my dad and he never asked me about the lyrics.

• 20:27Rick Rubin?

  Wow.

• 20:28Speaker 01

  And that felt good.

• 20:29Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 20:29Speaker 01

  And he just said, "This is great. This is really great."

• 20:32Rick Rubin?

  Supportive.

• 20:33Speaker 01

  Yeah, very supportive and he was really my guide to music. He was always listening to cool things. He was always listening to like Harry Nelson or Bob Dylan or Paul Simon and Cat Stevens. A lot of singer-songwriters. Then my brothers were listening to like grunge, so there was a lot of like Nirvana and Pearl Jam. And then I was really into hip-hop. And so between those three different things, that was what I grew up on. It was like singer-songwriters, hip-hop, grunge.

• 20:59Rick Rubin?

  You also, I imagine, went to the tabernacle and heard the choir.

• 21:04Speaker 01

  I sang in church every Sunday and everybody, you know, either singing like the treble or the soprano or... And my dad would do the parts and we would open the hymn books and I'd watch my dad follow the, you know... "I'll do serve him heavenly king of glory." Really good melodies, actually.

• 21:24Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 21:24Speaker 01

  A lot of gospel music has incredible melody writing, especially, you know, Mormons, their hymn book has a lot of the gospel standards too, which are fantastic. The Mormon songs themselves are maybe not as good. Also, when you're on a, side note, but when you're on a mission, you go to, every Sunday you can go to any church. So I would go to every different church every Sunday, just for fun.

• 21:45Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 21:45Speaker 01

  And like the Baptist church, for instance, had the best music and the best vibe. And then you go to like, uh, maybe the hardest church for me as far as the music went was, uh, Jehovah's Witness. Really bad music.

• 21:57Rick Rubin?

  What's the music in Jehovah's Witness?

• 21:58Speaker 01

  It was, it was similar, but it was just really bad. It was like you're in a very square, small room and the music was, it just wasn't the center of bringing the emotion.

• 22:08Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 22:09Speaker 01

  Where some churches, it's like, the Baptist church, it's like, this is what ignites the spirit in the room. Is how great this music is and everybody feels it and gets behind it and you're like, "Is this God I'm feeling or is this music just really fucking great?"

• 22:21Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 22:22Speaker 01

  Mormonism just kind of took from everything. So you, yeah, I was raised on a lot of gospel and that's all you get to listen to on your mission. So every day I listen to Mormon Tabernacle Choir.

• 22:32Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 22:32Speaker 01

  I wasn't allowed to listen to anything else.

• 22:34Rick Rubin?

  They can sing.

• 22:35Speaker 01

  I could sneak it, but if you sneak it, then you have, usually you'll have your guy rat you out and then you get in trouble. Unless you have a really cool companion, but most of the time they, they take like someone who's gonna be more naughty and put him with somebody who's more square and they have a way to do it.

• 22:52Rick Rubin?

  Did you have a good relationship with your partner?

• 22:54Speaker 01

  I loved every one of them.

• 22:56Rick Rubin?

  Great.

• 22:57Speaker 01

  Almost every three months I had someone new and that was in a two-year time period.

• 23:00Rick Rubin?

  That's always how it works?

• 23:01Speaker 01

  Typically, if they get along really bad or something, maybe a month and a half, but at least a month and a half. Unless there's like they get in a fistfight and there's an emergency transfer.

• 23:10Rick Rubin?

  But typically three months.

• 23:12Speaker 01

  Typically three months, which is two transfers, as they call it. And even the guys that I hated to begin with, I ended up loving. Because there was always something to love and I, it was a great lesson for me. I remember I had one in particular who was so difficult for me and he wouldn't shower, he wouldn't brush his teeth. And we had a week together. You live off $10,000 for two years that you saved up and paid for out of your own pocket.

• 23:41Rick Rubin?

  $10,000 in two years?

• 23:42Speaker 01

  For two years and that's your food.

• 23:44Rick Rubin?

  Did they tell you where to stay?

• 23:46Speaker 01

  You have set places that match that amount of money so that you can do it. And it's pretty much all government housing. So I was in, I was in projects for almost my entire mission. And I saved up by working as a janitor growing up from the beginning of high school, saved up $10,000 and then you use that to live off. And that's your food too. $10,000 for two years for your food, you can do the math. It's you live off ramen and white bread. I would get two pieces of white bread, I'd put ramen in the middle, crunch it up and that's what I would eat. Almost every meal, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and then those big cereal bags.

• 24:21Speaker 01

  But I loved it. Uh, going back to that companion, I, after a week, I finally learned to say to him, hey, man.

• 24:28Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 24:29Speaker 01

  You need to brush your teeth.

• 24:30Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 24:30Speaker 01

  And you've got to have good hygiene.

• 24:33Rick Rubin?

  Really? Why, bub?

• 24:34Speaker 01

  Because your breath is bad. And nobody has told him this and that way, and you, and you end up having hard conversations and getting rejected all day. Spit on, you get sucker punched. I got slurpees thrown at me. Oh, yeah, yeah. When you're the Mormon missionary boys with the ties and...

• 24:50Rick Rubin?

  You're wearing a suit and tie?

• 24:51Speaker 01

  You have to every day.

• 24:52Rick Rubin?

  Mm-hmm.

• 24:53Speaker 01

  And you're walking the streets, you're just a target for every rich kid. It was rich kids. I never was fucked with by, especially when I was in low, like, the most low-income areas were the safest places to be because everyone fears Jesus. So everybody's like, you don't mess with the Jesus people.

• 25:13Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 25:14Speaker 01

  You could fuck with anybody, but you don't mess with Jesus people.

• 25:16Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 25:17Speaker 01

  Except for rich kids and like, that was scary. You would group of them, throw things, throw rocks at you, punch you, like, just no regard for... You were just a target. You were a target. Yeah.

• 25:31Rick Rubin?

  That's crazy. What a life. It's amazing.

• 25:35Speaker 01

  But that's, going back to, I guess, your original question was, that, if I didn't have all of that...

• 25:40Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, it has to form who you are.

• 25:42Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 25:42Rick Rubin?

  Has to.

• 25:43Speaker 01

  Yeah, it did, and it drove me to music.

• 25:45Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 25:46Speaker 01

  And you know, I will tell you something, every, when I was still praying, I prayed, but I pray a lot different now, and I don't, and I'm not praying to somebody. I'm praying to like, everything or something. But at the time, when I was on my mission, I would pray every night, and my prayer, you know, it's always different. You, you don't do repetitive praying as Mormons, but I would say, you know, please, help me to find truth in this. First of all, please, I know you're not supposed to ask for a sign, I'm not gonna ask for a sign, but please just help me to find this to be true because my life would be so much better if I believed, all my family believed. But also...

• 26:19Speaker 01

  Please let me do music as a career. I prayed for it every night on my mission.

• 26:24Rick Rubin?

  Wow.

• 26:24Speaker 01

  Every night, every time. I know I'll be able to handle it.

• 26:28Rick Rubin?

  You thought you were gonna have a straight job. You were preparing to have a straight job.

• 26:33Speaker 01

  I was preparing to have a straight job and it was a pipe dream.

• 26:36Rick Rubin?

  But your dream was to have a musical life.

• 26:39Speaker 01

  It was my dream. And my brother had told me before my mission, he said, Dan, your mission is gonna be the hardest thing you ever do. But because I did my mission, I got such a hot wife.

• 26:51Rick Rubin?

  He said that?

• 26:52Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 26:52Rick Rubin?

  The music.

• 26:53Speaker 01

  And I always remembered it. On the hardest days, I was like, you know, I'm gonna have some blessings. Something, something good is gonna come from this.

• 27:01Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 27:01Speaker 01

  And so my hot life was, please, please let me have a career in music. That's all I want.

• 27:08Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 27:08Speaker 01

  And the worst mistake I made was telling that to my mom. Cause she holds that over my head all the time. Well, God gave you what you want and then you turn your back on him. I'm like, Mom, I didn't turn my back on God. It just looks a little different, you know? Yeah.

• 27:19Rick Rubin?

  Yeah. Would you say you still have a connection to something, a higher power, let's say?

• 27:24Speaker 01

  Before every show, I always connect to something. I don't know what I'd call it, but I feel like it's something, something grand. I, I feel like God for me is happiness. It's, it feels like something. I wouldn't say it's someone, but it feels like something. Maybe it's everything, you know, all of the, it's, I can't personify it, but I feel like I'm connecting with something that is yet to be known.

• 27:53Rick Rubin?

  Yeah. Would you say it's energetic?

• 27:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, and maybe it's in my head, but I feel when I connect to it, then my show is great. And that's why I do it. Especially before shows because I feel that if I, it centers me and I acknowledge my intention to the universe. My intention is to make these people happy. My intention is to make myself happy, to feel love, to facilitate love, and to just have fun and sing. And then I'm trying to just rid myself of any energy on me that just feels that it doesn't match that.

• 28:28Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 28:28Speaker 01

  Anything of my ego, any hard conversation that I've had with someone, I'm trying to just shed it off of me. And I almost feel like I see it go, and I just feel connected in a magical way. And then when I really am able to do that. Then it's a great show. So then I believe in it. I believe in whatever that is.

• 28:47Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, it works.

• 28:48Speaker 01

  Yeah. But that's different than, you know, when I, when I was Mormon, it's, you know, dear heavenly father. It's your father. I pictured a man in a white robe with a beard, like the thing that you're taught as a Christian, it looks like this. And then Mormons believe there's the father and then Jesus Christ, and they're two separate beings. And Jesus is the son of God. And then there's the Holy Spirit, which is kind of this like spirity ghost guy that's kind of like. And that's, that's what Mormons believe. It's whereas in other faiths, they believe that the three are one. It's not that way. Mormons believe it is actually a person. That's up there pulling the strings and, uh. And that's a cool story. I liked it and it was fun and maybe it's true. I don't know. I don't, the last thing I claim to know is what's right and wrong and true.

• 29:32Rick Rubin?

  The fact that you can connect to something and it works for you is a great blessing. Whatever it is.

• 29:40Speaker 01

  Yes, yes. And my greatest thing that I've been working on is trying to just listen to my gut. And I've had to relearn that because of how I had formulated my sense. But now what feels good?

• 29:57Rick Rubin?

  You wrote your first song when you were 13. Did that start a cascade of songs right away? When did that start?

• 30:04Speaker 01

  Once I wrote the first song, it was like an addiction. I wrote the next day and the next day and the next day. And I have all these songs, it's thousands and thousands of songs. I'm sure that a clinician of some sort would say, this is this thing.

• 30:18Rick Rubin?

  Obsessive compulsive.

• 30:20Speaker 01

  Compulsive, yeah. And I've met, I've met with therapists throughout the years and I've been told I have severe ADHD and I have severe depressive disorder and, but I've never done medication, not that I'm against it. I'm too fearful of it. I'm too fearful of change. I, I can operate here and it's got me here.

• 30:37Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, and it's working.

• 30:38Speaker 01

  And it's working. And I, and I find, I've found things that help me to manage. Like I said, like sobriety and things that really help me.

• 30:46Rick Rubin?

  I remember when you guys reached out about us working together. And I said, send me some songs, you know, you wrote. And you sent me, I think, ninety-three songs, which is very unusual. Like typically,

• 31:04Rick Rubin?

  five or six songs is what someone has when they're preparing to make their next album. Not in the nineties.

• 31:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:12Rick Rubin?

  And then when I didn't question it, I think I got another twenty after that. It was like, oh.

• 31:17Speaker 01

  Well, I had narrowed down to that because I was like, I don't want them to think I'm weird.

• 31:20Rick Rubin?

  You listened to ninety-three, so let's send them more, maybe even twenty-five or thirty. A lot. The fact that you have this practice of writing, and you say typically a song a day, is that average?

• 31:31Speaker 01

  If I'm in a healthy spot, I'm writing every day.

• 31:34Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 31:34Speaker 01

  Sometimes I'll go through a full month and I won't write a single song.

• 31:37Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 31:38Speaker 01

  But if I were to average my life since thirteen, I'd probably say I write a song once every three days or something like that. It's probably something like that.

• 31:46Rick Rubin?

  That's a lot.

• 31:47Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's a lot.

• 31:48Rick Rubin?

  Would you say your connection to music has changed since you were thirteen to now? Is it any different or is it same?

• 31:56Speaker 01

  It's pretty similar. Yeah, I get it's a certain feeling that I love, which is there's nothing.

• 32:05Speaker 01

  And let me create something and it's, let me listen to it and see how that feels. Oh, that feels good. Let me share that with someone. Did it make them feel something? Wow, what a magical thing. And that interaction of nothing to something to sharing, I love. And it's just the majority of these songs were never heard by anybody except at least one person.

• 32:28Rick Rubin?

  Mm-hmm.

• 32:28Speaker 01

  Right? I always share it with my dad or my brother.

• 32:32Rick Rubin?

  Mm-hmm.

• 32:33Speaker 01

  And they might just go, cool, or I didn't like that one that much. My dad sometimes will say, you sound angry and I don't really like angry music. You know what I mean?

• 32:43Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 32:43Speaker 01

  Doesn't matter what their response is.

• 32:45Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 32:46Speaker 01

  It's about sharing it.

• 32:47Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 32:48Speaker 01

  It doesn't matter what the response is.

• 32:49Rick Rubin?

  You're doing self-expression. You're finding these things and through sharing them.

• 32:57Rick Rubin?

  You're saying this is who I am.

• 33:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 33:01Rick Rubin?

  That's what it is.

• 33:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, and it feels great when it does give someone a good feeling, right?

• 33:07Rick Rubin?

  Absolutely.

• 33:07Speaker 01

  Or a connected feeling.

• 33:09Rick Rubin?

  You never know.

• 33:09Speaker 01

  You never know.

• 33:10Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, and you do it often enough where if someone doesn't like a song, it's no big deal because tomorrow there's gonna be another one.

• 33:16Speaker 01

  Exactly. That's a great point. I've never really thought about that. I think that has given me a lot of armor.

• 33:22Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 33:22Speaker 01

  Is doing so much. Yeah, you're free. It's not, nothing is precious to me.

• 33:26Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 33:26Speaker 01

  Nothing is precious. It's, the experience of it is precious. But whether it's received or not, I think, especially as I've gotten older, has become non-precious to me.

• 33:37Rick Rubin?

  That's great.

• 33:38Speaker 01

  I, I, of course, I always hope.

• 33:40Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 33:41Speaker 01

  But that's not the reasoning.

• 33:43Rick Rubin?

  No, it's secondary.

• 33:44Speaker 01

  Yes, yes.

• 33:45Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, the primary thing is to make it and to feel it and for you to feel it and then share it.

• 33:51Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 33:51Rick Rubin?

  And whatever happens after that's out of all of our control.

• 33:53Speaker 01

  Yes, yes.

• 33:55Rick Rubin?

  You said there was a battle of the bands. Did the band already exist?

• 33:59Speaker 01

  No, there was a battle of the bands. I saw a poster for it. I, that day, went to lunch and I was in the cafeteria at BYU. I was sitting next to a couple, a guy and a girl, who looked different than everyone else in the cafeteria. They were like very non-Mormon looking, and I was at BYU, which was all Mormon. And again, I'm always gravitating towards whatever looks the most different than me. I just, it's interesting to me. He just had an energy. His name was Andrew. And I sat at the table next to Andrew and I said, "Hey, I don't know what my first sentence is, but something like, do you play music or something? Are you an artist?" "Yeah, I am. Have you heard about this battle of the bands?" "Yeah. Should we like jam out sometime or something?" He said, "Well, yeah, this is my cousin Aurora."

• 34:43Speaker 01

  And the three of us went back to their house that day, sat down and started writing. At the time, it was very folky and kind of theatrical, I think, is the way I'd explain it. And that's she was a

• 34:55Rick Rubin?

  What would be the reference, like if you say what, name some artists that work in that vein, so I could picture?

• 35:00Speaker 01

  Like Queen, maybe, Queen-esque, kind of like

• 35:03Rick Rubin?

  Operatic?

• 35:04Speaker 01

  Yeah, she was a theater major and she sang with me. And the three of us wrote together and there wasn't a primary songwriter at this point, it was just kind of like the three of us in a room writing.

• 35:14Rick Rubin?

  And you were already used to seeing harmony from church.

• 35:16Speaker 01

  Exactly. It was very just theatrical and then maybe the next day, when I was sitting in biology, I was like writing down band names and then I had this phrase that was meaningful to me. And I brought it to them and I said, what are you guys thinking about this? Uh, yeah, but I don't know if that's a good band name. We're like, alright, well, what if we made an anagram? And keep it a secret, we'll never tell anybody, because I love secrets too. So we're like, okay. And through them, we met the guitarist and through the guitarist, we met the drummer. Anyway, we did the battle of the bands and we won it. But we were really bad. Like, I think we won because our heart was so, it was so jovial and it was so fun and we all had Sharpies and drew like mustaches on our face and it was very theatrical and it was so different

• 36:02Speaker 01

  than everything else. Everything else was like

• 36:04Rick Rubin?

  Square.

• 36:04Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was just like bands. And we were like, it was like a theater event.

• 36:09Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 36:09Speaker 01

  And we were immediately best friends. I loved them. There was so much chemistry between us that I think people just voted for us because they were like, they're having fun.

• 36:17Rick Rubin?

  Yeah. Did you ever hang out with musicians before? That was the first time.

• 36:21Speaker 01

  Uh-uh, yeah. I really grew up around pretty much with all Mormons, except for my best friend since middle school was very not Mormon. He was the scariest kid at school and I made friends with him because I was so scared of him. And then he became kind of my protector. I was a really nerdy, small kid with bad acne and braces and an expander and I played the saxophone. I played no sports. I played the tenor saxophone and it was bigger than me.

• 36:49Rick Rubin?

  That was your first instrument, saxophone?

• 36:50Speaker 01

  Well, no, I took piano lessons from six to 16, just at home. My mom read something that was like kids play piano, they're do better in math and science.

• 36:57Rick Rubin?

  Did you love it or was it more, this is what you're gonna do?

• 36:59Speaker 01

  I didn't love it. I didn't love it, but uh, I credit it for a lot of my melodic sense because it was all Mozart and Beethoven and it was all just the classics.

• 37:09Rick Rubin?

  Great.

• 37:09Speaker 01

  So that was good. But saxophone in middle school is my first, like, I chose this instrument. And yeah, that was kind of my upbringing. So my best friend was very not Mormon. And he was into drugs and he was, it was, it was that first sense of me getting to choose something outside of Mormonism.

• 37:25Rick Rubin?

  Yes.

• 37:26Speaker 01

  And being thrilled by it. This is thrilling. This is exciting. He's getting in fights every day. I'm not getting in the fights. I'm not even helping him. I'm just sitting there like scared and hoping he wins, you know?

• 37:36Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, but you got to experience life outside of your bubble.

• 37:39Speaker 01

  Yes, and I lived absolutely in a bubble. No cable television. So I'd go to school and I'd be like, Boy Meets World. I'm like, I don't even know what that is. And I'm glad for that because we didn't ever have TV on in the house. So music was my TV.

• 37:54Rick Rubin?

  Did your dad play music a lot in the house?

• 37:57Speaker 01

  Every once in a while quietly, my dad would play his guitar and sing in his room. And it was always kind of just really peaceful music. I don't know if he ever wrote any songs, but that was my only person I saw doing that. But he was always playing.

• 38:12Rick Rubin?

  Records.

• 38:13Speaker 01

  Constantly.

• 38:13Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 38:14Speaker 01

  Constantly records in the house. And then my older brothers, when they got into high school, they had bands. And it was primarily ska bands. They were really into like, at the time, there was a Mormon band that was taking off called, uh, The Aquabats.

• 38:27Rick Rubin?

  Oh, yeah.

• 38:28Speaker 01

  I'm your girl. I don't care if we live in a garbage can. Mormons.

• 38:31Rick Rubin?

  Cool.

• 38:32Speaker 01

  Actually, super cool guys too, and I've gotten to meet them over the years. And they ended up doing Yo Gabba Gabba. So my brothers were into ska. And I didn't really like ska music, but it was just before my time. But then I played, that's why I played the saxophone, so I could play for them in their ska bands, because it was all horns.

• 38:48Rick Rubin?

  Makes sense.

• 38:48Speaker 01

  Yeah, I just wanted to be cool with my brothers. And then I started to play drums. I took drum lessons for a couple of years.

• 38:53Rick Rubin?

  In the eighth?

• 38:54Speaker 01

  I'm the seventh son. So six older brothers, two younger. I have a younger sister and a younger brother.

• 39:03Rick Rubin?

  What was the name of the band that you joined the battle of the bands with?

• 39:07Speaker 01

  Imagine Dragons. Yeah, we came up with the name for the Battle of the Bands. And we won the Battle of the Bands and then there was a Utah's Got Talent thing. That was right around the corner and we were like, well, let's do this too.

• 39:18Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 39:19Speaker 01

  And then we entered that and we won the Utah's Got Talent.

• 39:23Rick Rubin?

  Really?

• 39:23Speaker 01

  Uh huh.

• 39:24Rick Rubin?

  First two things you did?

• 39:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 39:26Rick Rubin?

  Was the first gig, the Battle of the Bands, the first time you ever played in front of an audience?

• 39:29Speaker 01

  First gig ever, yeah.

• 39:31Rick Rubin?

  And then was the other one the second or no?

• 39:33Speaker 01

  Second.

• 39:33Rick Rubin?

  Second gig?

• 39:34Speaker 01

  Maybe one gig locally, but in between, but it was within a month or something. And we started to play at this local place in Utah called The Valour, which was like 200 people. And we started to just sell it out all the time. And we made an EP and sold it.

• 39:47Rick Rubin?

  How often did you play there?

• 39:49Speaker 01

  Once a month. And once we started to sell that out, then I begged my mom and I, and we won the Utah's Got Talent. And I said, Mom, can I defer a semester and come home and live at the house? And try to play in LA? And see if we can get signed for one semester. Just give me a chance.

• 40:05Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 40:05Speaker 01

  She really, really did not want me to do it and I just was like begged her and she finally said yes. We went home, the band all moved in. And we started to play our first gig in LA, we booked. The Hollywood Cabana Club, I think it was called, nobody came, zero people. We, and then we played the Cat Club and had to hand out flyers and I think we got like 50 people just from handing out flyers. Then just moved up and moved up and started to make another EP. We put out like four EPs.

• 40:36Rick Rubin?

  Did you move to LA or you commuted to LA for the shows?

• 40:40Speaker 01

  Commuted to LA.

• 40:41Rick Rubin?

  Still living at home?

• 40:41Speaker 01

  Yes, and then we started playing Vegas, LA, Arizona, Utah. And we would just rinse and repeat and then every day we would practice for eight hours. We were like, if we're all doing this and we're taking out, and they were all from Berkeley at that point. In the first month, we had like five people come in and five people come out. Cause it was like, okay, now we're getting serious, who can move to Vegas? Well, I can't move to Vegas, okay, you stay here, it's fine. So if you actually look at the band's origins, it's like there were probably 10 members in the first month. But then the final four was like right in the beginning and has been the same always since. Then we moved to Vegas and uh and then just started to practice every day.

• 41:22Speaker 01

  And we were totally broke and so then we went to the hotels and asked if we could play cover gigs to make money. And and they agreed. They said if you do six, there was a six hour.

• 41:32Rick Rubin?

  Which hotels?

• 41:34Speaker 01

  O'Shaes. We couldn't even get to the hotels first. We got O'Shaes, which was the cheapest beer on the strip. And so you can imagine what that's like. It's all slot machines and there was a stage. It was so tiny, barely off the ground, and we played from ten P M to four A M. And we were allowed to do eighty percent covers, twenty percent originals.

• 41:54Rick Rubin?

  And what would be some of the covers?

• 41:56Speaker 01

  Anything we wanted. So we did everything from the Cars to Britney Spears to. Michael Jackson.

• 42:05Rick Rubin?

  Pop and rock music?

• 42:07Speaker 01

  Yeah, pop, rock, a lot of nineties, just because I love the nineties. It was it was basically whatever we thought was interesting and what could capture a bunch of drunk people playing on the slots.

• 42:18Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 42:18Speaker 01

  Attention. And then we would just try to sell our E Ps.

• 42:21Rick Rubin?

  By doing those shows, do you feel like it may be better?

• 42:24Speaker 01

  A hundred percent.

• 42:25Rick Rubin?

  Because you're playing in front of an audience.

• 42:27Speaker 01

  And you're picking your songs and you're studying them and learning them.

• 42:29Rick Rubin?

  For eight hours a day?

• 42:30Speaker 01

  Six hour gigs. Ten P M to four A M and then we would band practice every day and I swear I'm not exaggerating. Eight hours we would practice. We'd go to the guy, we had a basement in my mom's house, then we ended up being able to rent. A house, a block down from my mom where all the band lived. And we would just practice all day, every day and wrote, wrote, wrote, wrote, wrote.

• 42:49Rick Rubin?

  Tell me about the first E P.

• 42:51Speaker 01

  Our first E P was self titled and that was the theatrical one. Because that was recorded when we first did the Battle of the Bands, because we wanted to have something to give out at the Battle of the Bands. So I don't really, I mean, I, you can count it, but it's like, it was a very, very different, very different. And then our E P after that was, I believe it was just self titled Imagine Dragons. And that's when we had gone to Vegas and it was the lineup that now we have. It was really just me trying to be The Killers, I'd say. I loved The Killers and my older brother at that time had just found The Killers and was managing them.

• 43:25Rick Rubin?

  Cool.

• 43:26Speaker 01

  And they blew up. And I loved Brandon Flowers and I loved The Killers and I thought they were the best band ever. And so I was like-

• 43:32Rick Rubin?

  And they were a local band, so that also was like-

• 43:34Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 43:35Rick Rubin?

  It can be done.

• 43:36Speaker 01

  Yeah, a hundred percent.

• 43:37Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 43:38Speaker 01

  I wrote that EP with the guys and we recorded it in Vegas. And the reason we got signed actually is because we ended up playing in the Viper Room and we're like an LA buzz band. And one night, a guy came out who was the assistant to Alex the Kid, who's a hip-hop producer. And he had heard about our show, came, got the EP, gave it to Alex the Kid. He played the CD. And it had Its Time on it and Hear Me and a couple of the songs that ended up making our full-length record. And said, "Hey, this kid's a good writer. Have him come in and write on my hooks." And so then we got an email that was just from Alex the Kid to my manager that was like, "Yo, I like your writing. Come in." It was like that. It was just that.

• 44:22Speaker 01

  I don't even think it said Alex the Kid in it. It was just... And then we Googled and, "Oh, it's Alex the Kid. He just did Love the Way You Lie with Rihanna. This is a big deal." So then I drove out to LA just to write with him. And then I ended up staying in a hotel for a month and writing every night hooks for him that were supposed to be for Rihanna or, yeah, whoever, whoever. And then he just, after a month of writing, he was like, "You're a great writer. I want to sign you. And have you just be a solo artist." And I was like, "I have a band that I've been with for years, but you can sign us."

• 44:55Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 44:55Speaker 01

  And he was like, "All right, let me meet the guys." He met the guys and he was like, "Okay, I'll sign you guys."

• 44:59Rick Rubin?

  Great.

• 44:59Speaker 01

  And then we proceeded to make our first record, Night Visions. And it was half of the songs were from the EP we had already put out. And the other half were songs that we put out with Alex. So it was very disjointed also. I think sonically, it was like hip-hop with Imagine Dragons and pre-hip-hop with Imagine Dragons. So it was very sonically different, but it's kind of what made the record cool and interesting. It was just genre hopping because of that.

• 45:28Rick Rubin?

  Let's go through each release and just pick a song and we'll listen.

• 45:32Speaker 01

  Cool.

• 45:33Rick Rubin?

  So the first one, 2009 Imagine Dragons?

• 45:37Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 45:38Rick Rubin?

  Okay.

• 45:40Rick Rubin?

  Pick a song. I Need A Minute, Uptight, Cover Up, Curse, Drive?

• 45:44Speaker 01

  Uh, why don't you do Drive? I've always liked Drive. That one is out with me still well.

• 46:10Speaker 02

  Give me right, all it takes is silent night. I want my eyes to see these lights. Hold, hold, hold on, hold, hold on. But when it comes, it goes. I am on my knees. Oh, forgive me. Give me right, look at these people flying in kites. They seem to live forgotten nights. Hold, hold, hold on, hold, hold on.

• 46:55Speaker 02

  But when it comes, it goes. I am on my knees. Oh, forgive me. Drive, I got my head on a ride. I got my people strapped tight. I got my head on a ride. Oh, I, I got my head on a ride.

• 47:48Rick Rubin?

  What do you remember about recording it?

• 47:52Speaker 01

  I remember being really nervous because it was our first time in a studio. And it was in Vegas and I really hated being in a booth. Because all my recordings since my youth had been by myself. I didn't like standing up, having a mic, having an engineer, having a band sit in a room. Delivering a vocal was really nerve wracking for me like that. I didn't enjoy it. And I could hear it in myself when I listened to that. So I'm mainly nervous. But excited at the same time because it was actually happening, I felt. I was recording something in a real studio, you know?

• 48:28Rick Rubin?

  How soon was this after the Battle of the Bands?

• 48:33Speaker 01

  Within a year. So really early, but within six months. Yeah.

• 48:37Rick Rubin?

  And then this one, how did you get this around to people?

• 48:41Speaker 01

  We just made copies of it, put it in a sleeve. And I remember this, we were, thought it was so cool that we made a magic eye out of the front where you can see a dragon.

• 48:49Rick Rubin?

  Oh, cool.

• 48:50Speaker 01

  Like, you remember when you put your nose to it? And then when we played our cover gigs, we just had a big stack of them. That we had just printed on our own and we would just give them to people. And people, the thing about Vegas, people coming from all over the world.

• 49:01Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 49:01Speaker 01

  And take their CD and go home and spread it. And that ended up booking us a lot. Our first gig that we got in Norway, which was international, was because of that. It was like people coming in and then bringing the CD home and falls into someone's hand who's a booker for some Norwegian festival and then brings Imagine Dragons in based off our EP. Went from unsigned, yeah.

• 49:20Rick Rubin?

  How do you think growing up in Vegas affected you?

• 49:24Speaker 01

  Vegas is such a juxtaposition. It's the city of sin and Mormons. Vegas was established by the mob and the Mormons.

• 49:33Rick Rubin?

  Really?

• 49:33Speaker 01

  Uh huh. If you look into the history of it, it was the Mormons moved from Utah into Vegas, same time that the mob came in from the east coast and started the gambling. And so you have this interesting intersection of faith and sin. And it was fun to grow up like that because I got to see both sides of it.

• 49:52Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 49:53Speaker 01

  You know, we would like drive on the freeway and it'd be like naked ladies on the billboards. And my mom would be like, "Shield your eyes, children." And you're, you know, I'm like, "This is great." Um, so it was cool because I was able to meet a lot of interesting people and then also be surrounded by Mormons too. So I just, I got to see very, very different lifestyles, which was good.

• 50:17Rick Rubin?

  Yeah. What's the next EP?

• 50:20Speaker 01

  Maybe it was Hear Me was next?

• 50:22Rick Rubin?

  Hell in Silence?

• 50:23Speaker 01

  Hell in Silence. Is Emma on that?

• 50:25Rick Rubin?

  Uh, yes.

• 50:26Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think Emma.

• 50:27Rick Rubin?

  Let's hear Emma. So this is 2010.

• 50:42Speaker 01

  Production getting a little better, cleaner.

• 51:41Speaker 01

  Dinner bells and loaded gun. Innocence is bound to run. Enemies and playing fun. But don't you touch that golden sun. All your sense and sentiment is all I have that's paying. Baby, it's my love too, all for you. Am I out for you?

• 52:04Speaker 01

  Am I out for you?

• 52:16Rick Rubin?

  Beautiful.

• 52:17Speaker 01

  Yeah, kind of a little sleazy Vegas. Feels like Vegas to me in a way that I really love. It's like nostalgic Fremont street. I'd still enjoy that one.

• 52:29Rick Rubin?

  Anything different about that experience of recording than the first one?

• 52:33Speaker 01

  First time working with a producer.

• 52:34Rick Rubin?

  Yeah. This was another thing that you made independently or you guys made this yourselves?

• 52:39Speaker 01

  Independent, unsigned, and...

• 52:41Rick Rubin?

  And how did you get this one out? Also still at live shows?

• 52:44Speaker 01

  Still at live shows. Just printed on our own, made the cover in Photoshop. You know, that's leaving, we're still playing cover gigs and passing them out at cover gigs.

• 52:53Rick Rubin?

  You feel like the band was getting better just from the more of those shows you did?

• 52:57Speaker 01

  Hundred percent. Yeah, my voice was, I was starting to find, I still hadn't found my voice. I did not know who I was on a microphone. I was pretending. I was playing pretend, I think.

• 53:09Rick Rubin?

  And you're doing covers, but that's how everybody starts.

• 53:11Speaker 01

  Right.

• 53:12Rick Rubin?

  That's the beginning.

• 53:13Speaker 01

  Right. We would have never made it anywhere if we hadn't had those cover gigs. We could have practiced eight hours a day and I think it would have never happened.

• 53:21Rick Rubin?

  It's a different thing.

• 53:22Speaker 01

  You're in front of people.

• 53:23Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 53:24Speaker 01

  Something can sound great in a room when you're playing it in a room as a band, but when you play it in front of people, suddenly you're like, oh, this is bad.

• 53:29Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 53:30Speaker 01

  This is not well received. Or this, this song works and it, I thought it didn't work at all.

• 53:35Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 53:35Speaker 01

  Something about introducing the unknown factor.

• 53:39Rick Rubin?

  Yeah. And when you put your own songs in the context of essentially hits by other people.

• 53:46Speaker 01

  Right. You're really judged hard.

• 53:48Rick Rubin?

  Absolutely. Like it has to really stand up.

• 53:52Speaker 01

  Such a great point.

• 53:53Rick Rubin?

  When you're putting it next to a known, loved song.

• 53:57Speaker 01

  Hundred percent.

• 53:57Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, so it forces you to...

• 53:59Speaker 01

  Up the game.

• 54:00Rick Rubin?

  Have to.

• 54:00Speaker 01

  I think it's also why we write so to our strength and to our detriment. Everything I write is very bombastic, I think is a word that I've seen associated with a band that I always hated. But it's big.

• 54:15Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 54:16Speaker 01

  And that's because those were our roots and you're competing with noise, you're competing with beer, you're competing with slot machines and all the greatest hits.

• 54:25Rick Rubin?

  So you want to get the attention of the audience?

• 54:27Speaker 01

  Yeah, if we would have played something smaller, it just would have, nobody would have heard, even if it was great.

• 54:34Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 54:34Speaker 01

  Didn't matter. You're in Vegas.

• 54:36Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 54:37Speaker 01

  People are wanting to be entertained.

• 54:40Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 54:41Speaker 01

  And so I wanted to entertain them, you know?

• 54:45Rick Rubin?

  If I'm ever stopping the songs too short, feel free to say.

• 54:47Speaker 01

  I love that you do that. No, I would, I would have you do the same.

• 54:49Rick Rubin?

  But if there's any time where you feel like.

• 54:51Speaker 01

  Oh, the good parts coming up. Yeah, yeah, I will.

• 54:53Rick Rubin?

  Just like, just tell me.

• 54:54Speaker 01

  No, these early songs too are, it's, I mean, it's not painful to listen to them, but I'm like, you know, it's like listening to your.

• 55:01Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 55:02Speaker 01

  Earliest stuff.

• 55:03Rick Rubin?

  It's interesting and I would say they're pretty great.

• 55:05Speaker 01

  Thanks, man. Thank you. It's very different because so much changed when Alex came in and it's like, it changed our trajectory in a lot of ways.

• 55:16Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 55:16Speaker 01

  For better and worse, and I, I think for better because we're here and we get to make a living doing.

• 55:21Rick Rubin?

  No, absolutely. Absolutely. Okay, next is It's Time.

• 55:28Speaker 01

  Okay, what are the songs on that one?

• 55:30Rick Rubin?

  It's Time, Amsterdam, Tokyo, The River, Leave Me, Pandemime.

• 55:34Speaker 01

  The River is my favorite on that one.

• 55:36Rick Rubin?

  The River.

• 55:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 56:11Speaker 02

  When doubts begin to rise And the world is at your feet You gotta get up

• 56:23Speaker 02

  Reach It's not as bad as it seems

• 56:34Speaker 02

  I'll cleanse in the river

• 56:39Speaker 02

  For somebody else For anyone but myself

• 56:56Speaker 02

  I'm not a selfless man I'm not a man of wealth If I had all the world Probably give it to myself But the trees begin to walk And the ground begins to talk But myself

• 57:19Speaker 02

  Reach It's not as bad as it seems

• 57:30Speaker 02

  I'll cleanse in the river For somebody else

• 57:39Speaker 02

  For anyone but myself

• 57:47Rick Rubin?

  What do you remember about that? What was different?

• 57:50Speaker 01

  I mean, all of these songs, I was really, really spiraling in a faith crisis. I was still wearing Mormon garments underneath everything. I remember my mom, I remember we started to play a couple of festivals and it was really hot and I didn't wear the garments underneath it. It's like you wear this special underwear. It's like a t-shirt and long kind of underwear that are like sacred to Mormons underneath everything at all times. And I remember my first show that I played without them, my mom noticed and was really upset with me. And was like, "I noticed you didn't wear your garments." I was like, "Mom, it was like 100 degrees on this stage." I couldn't, like, because it keeps you modest, right? It's all built in a way it's not supposed to show so that you stay modest.

• 58:30Rick Rubin?

  Yes.

• 58:31Speaker 01

  So in listening to that song, for instance, I hear so many references to me. Struggling with faith. And I hear it a lot in the lyrics in a way that

• 58:43Speaker 01

  I wouldn't say it makes me sad, but it more just makes me

• 58:48Speaker 01

  remember when it was, I was so conflicted.

• 58:52Rick Rubin?

  Yeah. And the recording process, anything different?

• 58:56Speaker 01

  That we self-produced at The Palms in Las Vegas. It was our biggest studio we'd been in. I remember it being such a big deal that we got in there. And it was a really fun experience. And we also worked with Brandon Darnar, who's in one of my favorite bands called the Envy Corps. And he helped produce that record. I feel like that record is maybe the closest to like, we understood what Imagine Dragons was at that iteration.

• 59:28Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 59:29Speaker 01

  It was our best body of work and and we recorded its time there, which ended up being our first single that blew the band up. So it's good memories.

• 59:40Rick Rubin?

  At this time, were you playing your own shows, where you're doing your own material or still doing covers?

• 59:46Speaker 01

  We're still doing both. We're doing our own shows and covers still at this point. Cause that's how we paid for rent, the house. So we, until we got signed, we were playing covers. Until we signed.

• 59:57Rick Rubin?

  So was that three or four years, would you say?

• 59:59Speaker 01

  Yeah, three or four years.

• 1:00:02Rick Rubin?

  And were your own shows growing at this time?

• 1:00:05Speaker 01

  Yeah, every show that we played, every time we'd go back.

• 1:00:08Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:08Speaker 01

  We'd go to St. George in Utah, we'd go to Provo, Utah, Salt Lake City, Phoenix, Arizona, Iowa. And every time we'd go, we'd get bigger. And we played like The Roxy in LA, which was a step up from The Viper Room as far as capacity and more buzz. So we were seeing progress, but it also was really hard progress. So much so that the drummer at the time and his wife, who you hear singing on everything, she played the synth. They finally were like, guys. We gave it, we had one more year.

• 1:00:37Rick Rubin?

  Too much work.

• 1:00:38Speaker 01

  It's too much work, we're gonna go have a baby. And we were like, no fault, we understand it. And we almost broke up.

• 1:00:44Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:44Speaker 01

  And I had a call with Wayne, our guitarist, and was like, do we give this another six months together? Because it was just such a grind, and we were like, well, every show has more people.

• 1:00:54Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, it's building.

• 1:00:55Speaker 01

  It's building.

• 1:00:56Rick Rubin?

  But it's not really sustainable.

• 1:00:58Speaker 01

  It's not sexy, it's not fun, it's hard, you're loading all your own gear, and you're also doing it for four years, or three years, or whatever it was, and and it's scary. You're playing shows all the time, you're like, are people even gonna come tonight? And sometimes not. Even though we were growing, you go play in some no-name place, nobody knows you, and you're playing at a bar to five people, and you drove 300 miles to get there. And it's not sexy, it's not fun. And he was like, yeah, I think we should, if you're down, I'm down. I was like, alright, I'm down. So they had dropped out of the band, and then, I think two months later, we got signed. They dropped out of the band, and then Daniel Platsman, who came in, the guys knew him from Berklee, they had all gone to Berklee School Music for Jazz. Wayne and Ben. It was me, Wayne, Ben, Andrew, Brittany.

• 1:01:43Speaker 01

  Andrew, Brittany said, hey, we're gonna go have a kid. Platsman moved to Las Vegas. Alex the Kid came to like, the next, you know, remember his guy came to the show? Then I went and wrote with him for a month, and we got signed within the next two months.

• 1:01:58Rick Rubin?

  Did you listen to the radio growing up?

• 1:02:01Speaker 01

  Really, how I consumed almost everything was radio. I'd sit by the radio, and I had a tape cassette, and I would make mixtapes, I'd record whenever a song came on, and I'd listen to Mix 94.1 in Las Vegas, which was alternative music, and then 98.5, 97.5, which was hip-hop. And I would just go back and forth, and I would wait for a song to come on I liked, I hit record. I had just made tons of mixed tapes that were all just radio songs. So I grew up really on singles. So when people are like, what's your favorite album? I'm like, I didn't have a lot of favorite albums, favorite songs. Like, I love this song by The Fugees, it's gonna be their most popular song. I love this song by Nirvana, it's their most popular song. Like, it's just, that's what I grew up on, and I think, again, that's probably why I love big melodies, I love big sounding songs, for better or for worse.

• 1:02:46Speaker 01

  I just don't, I didn't consume albums because I couldn't buy albums. Because my mom would never let me buy, you know, those albums.

• 1:02:53Rick Rubin?

  It could say anything, those albums.

• 1:02:55Speaker 01

  Yes, yes.

• 1:02:56Rick Rubin?

  Okay, so next is the fourth EP, which is after you've signed, yes?

• 1:03:02Speaker 01

  Yes, and that's, um...

• 1:03:05Rick Rubin?

  Continued silence?

• 1:03:06Speaker 01

  Continued silence, yes, because we had a song called "Hell in Silence", off the earlier EP.

• 1:03:10Rick Rubin?

  It's got radioactive demons on top of the world, "Round and Round, It's Time, or My Fault."

• 1:03:16Speaker 01

  Let's do "Round and Round."

• 1:03:18Rick Rubin?

  Okay.

• 1:05:30Rick Rubin?

  Beautiful.

• 1:05:30Speaker 01

  Thanks.

• 1:05:31Rick Rubin?

  So what was different about that?

• 1:05:34Speaker 01

  I think just honesty. Yeah, it actually made me a little emotional listening to that because I haven't listened to that since, I don't even know the last time I listened to that, but I really stayed in Mormonism for a long time because I was so afraid of letting down Mormons.

• 1:05:47Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:05:48Speaker 01

  And just religiosity in general. I was afraid of letting down my family. I was afraid of letting down my mom. And it's interesting because I know a lot of times I wrote these songs in the moment I didn't even know what I was singing about. And I think the reason it was moving to me to listen to it is because I know what I was singing about now.

• 1:06:05Rick Rubin?

  Tell me what it means now when I listen to it.

• 1:06:08Speaker 01

  What I'm talking about, I'm afflicted by fiction. Mormonism became fiction for me. And then the pre-chorus is you don't have to hold your head up anymore. And I just felt like I was so tired of living something that was not true for me and living it because I didn't want to let my mom down, I didn't want to let my family down, I didn't want my friends down. All these people who, you know, you're taught as a religious person that

• 1:06:32Speaker 01

  be wary of becoming prideful and learned, be wary of becoming educated, be wary of riches because this worldliness will take you away from God. And I was, that was so imprinted in my brain that when the band started to take off,

• 1:06:50Speaker 01

  I almost wanted to just stay in it, just be.

• 1:06:53Rick Rubin?

  Yeah. Did you say yourself guilty about it?

• 1:06:56Speaker 01

  Oh, yes. I was ve- I felt very guilty about like leading people astray. And it seems probably silly to other people, but the people I cared about the most by far was my family and friends. And not to think like that everybody's gonna follow me away and I hold that much weight, but just the fact of here's my buddies and my best friends and my sister, all these people that I loved. Like, I was the first one in that group to be like, hey, guys, I might not do this anymore.

• 1:07:26Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:07:27Speaker 01

  And that's a really sad thing when it's your whole culture and it's your people. It's beyond just religion. Mormonism is your everything. You do it every day, not just Sunday, not holiday. It's every day.

• 1:07:36Rick Rubin?

  Yes.

• 1:07:37Speaker 01

  My sister like wept when I left the church and had a call with me. It was like, this has been really hard on my faith. It's shaken my faith to watch you leave because so much of my faith was in you doing it. You're my older brother.

• 1:07:47Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:07:48Speaker 01

  That was a really hard conversation for me, feeling like I was letting her down.

• 1:07:52Rick Rubin?

  Yeah. What did you say to her? Do you remember?

• 1:07:54Speaker 01

  I tried to explain to her that I'm not leaving anything. I still believe in greater things and I'm still gonna be looking to be a good person and love and and we're gonna go to the same place. It's all gonna it's all gonna work out. But I think that when you're really in it, it's I remember how that felt when people told me those kinds of things when I was really in Mormonism and it kinda just feels like words. You're like, no, but we're not. You know Mormons believe in three heavens. And if you're in the top heaven and you're in the second heaven, you don't see the people in the top heaven. They're hanging out in a different room. There's a celestial kingdom, terrestrial kingdom, telestial kingdom.

• 1:08:36Speaker 01

  The lowest kingdom is supposed to be so good that if you if man were able to see it, they would kill himself to be there. That's what you're taught. And that's the lowest level and that's filled with murderers, rapists, you know, robbers.

• 1:08:47Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:48Speaker 01

  Like, that's the lowest level. Hell is reserved in Mormonism's belief only for people who die, see God, so they have a perfect knowledge and reject. I don't wanna I I reject you. I now have a perfect knowledge. I reject you. Those are the only people that go to hell Mormons and I was like, cool, this is awesome. So even the murders and stuff like that kinda makes sense cuz maybe if I was raised that way and I was had this happen to me, who knows? Maybe I'd be a murderer. I don't know. And so I was always like, that makes sense to me more than like people being punished for their upbringings for maybe maybe they'd be a better person than me if they were born in my shoes and had mom and dad. But Mormons really believe that you don't get to travel up, but up can come down. So if my parents, for instance, are in the celestial kingdom and I'm down here with the rapists and murderers,

• 1:09:33Speaker 01

  they can come down and be like, hey, what's up? Good to see you down there. I mean, you're not up here with us, you know, creating new worlds.

• 1:09:38Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:09:39Speaker 01

  There's that's a whole nother thing we can get into, which is cool Mormons believe you get to like make new worlds and like was envisioning myself like making fishes and stuff.

• 1:09:46Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, that's great.

• 1:09:47Speaker 01

  But it's it's a great religion for somebody who loves fantasy and sci-fi and stuff like that, you know, it's cool.

• 1:09:56Rick Rubin?

  You were signed by that fourth EP. Why did you decide to make another EP instead of an album?

• 1:10:02Speaker 01

  To build buzz into the album, I think was the label's feeling. Like, you have a small following, but why don't we make it a bigger following? I think it was also probably for them to save money. They're like, let's see how this does.

• 1:10:16Rick Rubin?

  I see.

• 1:10:16Speaker 01

  And they put it out and it just started to blow up. It's Time got put in, like, the perks of being a wallflower. I remember was like a big movie that used it for its trailer. And then it just started to blow up. And then Radioactive, on the heels of that, just took off. And then Demons, it just put more momentum. And then here's the record now. So it worked.

• 1:10:36Rick Rubin?

  How long was it between the last EP and the first album?

• 1:10:40Speaker 01

  Three, four months, because we did the first, that EP that we just listened to was when we signed. So probably two months after we signed, we put that out. And then we waited like three months and let that build.

• 1:10:50Rick Rubin?

  Had you already recorded the first album or not yet?

• 1:10:53Speaker 01

  We were recording it during that process.

• 1:10:56Rick Rubin?

  Okay, so the first album, 2012, Night Visions. What should we listen to?

• 1:11:04Speaker 01

  What are the tracks on that?

• 1:11:06Rick Rubin?

  Radioactive, Tiptoe, It's Time, Demons, On Top of the World, Amsterdam, Hear Me, Every Night, Bleeding Out, Underdog, Nothing Left to Say.

• 1:11:18Speaker 01

  I liked Tiptoe a lot on that record.

• 1:11:58Speaker 02

  In the morning light, let my roots take flight Watch me fall above, like a vicious dove They don't see me come, who can blame them? They never seem to catch my eye, but I never wonder more I won't fall asleep, I won't fall asleep

• 1:12:24Speaker 02

  Don't let them know we're coming. Hey yeah, tip top higher. Takes some time to simmer down, keep your head down low. Hey yeah, tip top higher.

• 1:12:46Speaker 02

  From your slanted view, see the morning dew sinking to the soil. Watch the water pour. They won't see me hurt, oh, can't blame them. They never looked to see me fly, so I never had to learn. I won't fall asleep. I won't fall asleep. Hey yeah, don't let them know we're coming. Hey yeah, tip top higher. Takes some time to simmer down, keep your head down low. Hey yeah, tip top higher.

• 1:13:34Speaker 02

  Nobody else.

• 1:13:38Speaker 02

  Nobody else.

• 1:13:42Speaker 02

  Nobody else can take me higher. Nobody else can take me higher. Nobody else can take me higher. Nobody else.

• 1:13:58Speaker 02

  Hey yeah, don't let them know we're coming.

• 1:14:03Rick Rubin?

  Can you remember about that recording?

• 1:14:07Speaker 01

  Me and Wayne recorded almost all of that just in his room, which was really fun. We didn't often do that. Usually he would write stuff and send it to me and I'd write stuff in my room. Where I would do stuff and send it to him and he'd add guitars. Or I would go in with a producer and I'd write and then Wayne would come in and add. It was always kind of like that. That was one of the rare times where him and I were in a room together, creating from the ground up.

• 1:14:36Rick Rubin?

  For the majority of the album, the band didn't go into the studio together and play the songs?

• 1:14:42Speaker 01

  Depends on the song.

• 1:14:43Rick Rubin?

  Right.

• 1:14:44Speaker 01

  Every song they ended up coming in and playing on after the fact, if they weren't in it. Uh, like for Radioactive and Demons, I think both of those were just me in a room, creating with the track and then the guys came in and added after. "Tiptoe," "Amsterdam," "It's Time," were all us in a room creating those songs. "It's Time" started with just me on a laptop and then we went into the studio and the guys all, we all recorded it together. But "Hear Me" was just Wayne sent me a guitar.

• 1:15:13Speaker 01

  And I just recorded on my own. That one was him and I in a room together. And it was fun. And it was where I really felt like I started to really connect to Wayne in a, in a deeper way. When I hear that, I, that's my first memory.

• 1:15:27Rick Rubin?

  Yeah. Based on that being a good experience, did you start doing more of that?

• 1:15:31Speaker 01

  Yeah. Wayne and I have a really interesting relation. We're best friends. Never have gotten in a fight. Never, which is really rare for a band. We're just like fiercely loyal to each other. But Wayne is the opposite of me. He's very organized with his thoughts. He's a very kind of introverted, deep thinker, quiet, introspective, beautiful, amazing person. Such a good dad, such a good friend, so loyal. And so he just, oh yeah, he kind of represents to me like the opposite of what I am in a way that's very calming for me.

• 1:16:10Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:16:11Rick Rubin?

  And makes for a good partnership.

• 1:16:14Rick Rubin?

  Oh, tell me how the first album was received in the world.

• 1:16:17Speaker 01

  First album came out and it just did gangbusters. It was like just massive. And it felt like this weird moment where Wayne and I, I remember so many times throughout the years when we were not signed, we're like, are we crazy? Maybe we're not good enough.

• 1:16:33Rick Rubin?

  Give it six more months.

• 1:16:35Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:16:35Rick Rubin?

  There was a chance you could have broken up.

• 1:16:37Speaker 01

  We kept having these conversations. We were like, I think we're like, people who have the EPs tell us they listen to it all the time, that they really enjoy it. But maybe that's not good enough. Uh, and we had a couple of labels that passed on us before that label. They would be interested. Atlantic was really interested, like took us to Disneyland and like, you know what I mean? They were like courted us and then didn't pull the trigger.

• 1:16:59Rick Rubin?

  Interesting.

• 1:17:00Speaker 01

  So we had all these kind of like, could, are we? Almost. But just never happening. And so when the record came out and it just went huge, we were both like, we weren't crazy. These songs that we're writing, they're big songs, whether it's good or bad, they're big and they're connecting with everyone around the world. And we had always thought that for years. So it was this feeling of like, but also so overwhelming. Totally like throwing a Mormon missionary boy into the just lions den.

• 1:17:31Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:17:32Speaker 01

  It was really, and then like meeting all my heroes and people that I love and being like, oh, I really don't like a lot of these people and this sucks, man. And this is not, this isn't what I thought it'd be, you know, and I hated the, everything else that came with it, like, it sounds like a cliche to say it, but I really genuinely hated like the fame side of it. I hated the weirdness with your, changes your relationships with your family, change your relationship with your friends.

• 1:17:58Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:17:58Speaker 01

  People don't know how to act around you or at least it feels like it. Yeah.

• 1:18:01Rick Rubin?

  It's weird.

• 1:18:02Speaker 01

  I hated all of that.

• 1:18:03Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:18:03Speaker 01

  And you can't go back.

• 1:18:04Rick Rubin?

  No.

• 1:18:05Speaker 01

  It's like you've signed the blood oath and here you are. I was like, damn. And I remembered, I had this thought in my head all the time where I prayed on my mission. I was like, God, if you let me do it, I promise I can handle it. I would say that every time, I promise I can handle it. And I remember just being like, I can't handle this. I can't handle this. It's like ruining my relationship. It's ruining my, like, and now I want to turn to drugs. Like, I was like, I can't actually handle it. And I thought I could. I was like, I bet everybody thinks they can.

• 1:18:30Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:18:30Speaker 01

  But you can't, man. Really, you gotta be like.

• 1:18:33Rick Rubin?

  It's crazy.

• 1:18:34Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:18:35Rick Rubin?

  And no one is prepared for it.

• 1:18:39Speaker 01

  Right, then you can never explain that in a way that it's ever gonna make sense.

• 1:18:43Rick Rubin?

  No.

• 1:18:44Speaker 01

  So you can't, you don't even try.

• 1:18:45Rick Rubin?

  Because it seems like that's what you want.

• 1:18:46Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:18:47Rick Rubin?

  But then when it's there, yes, there's definitely great stuff about it.

• 1:18:50Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:18:50Rick Rubin?

  But it's not all great.

• 1:18:51Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:18:52Rick Rubin?

  Yeah. How did shows change once the album came out?

• 1:18:58Rick Rubin?

  Up until that point, were you still doing the circuit?

• 1:19:00Speaker 01

  We were still doing the circuit. We never stopped doing the circuit. Even when we got signed, the label was like, just keep building.

• 1:19:05Rick Rubin?

  Did you spread the circuit? Did it get bigger?

• 1:19:07Speaker 01

  Yeah, we didn't have a tour bus at first. Even when we got signed, we had a Sprinter van. And we started just, you know, Midwest festivals, radio festivals. Anybody who wanted us anywhere, we were there. Then it was like, in order to make that one, you gotta get on a flight. And we were just ping ponging everywhere, around the globe.

• 1:19:25Rick Rubin?

  How many shows did you do in that first year, you think?

• 1:19:27Speaker 01

  I, I remember the year end came out and there was like a polestar thing that was like top touring. Most shows this year, and we were number two.

• 1:19:36Rick Rubin?

  Wow.

• 1:19:36Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think it was us and Kendrick that year.

• 1:19:38Rick Rubin?

  Wow.

• 1:19:38Speaker 01

  That were the, played, it was like, we played 300 plus shows or something.

• 1:19:42Rick Rubin?

  Amazing.

• 1:19:43Speaker 01

  So we just went everywhere and did everything.

• 1:19:46Rick Rubin?

  Was that harder work than the work before?

• 1:19:50Speaker 01

  Yeah, oh, yes. First of all, you're in the spotlight of everything suddenly. And everything hurt. Everything hurt to me. I was like, suddenly this artist who was like very sensitive. Any review, any, any criticism felt just like the end of me. It was like, okay, never mind, I don't wanna do this actually more. I wanna go back to just writing for my dad.

• 1:20:10Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:20:11Speaker 01

  Like, I don't wanna, can I go back? How do I go back? But also, this is everything I've always wanted. Like, the very conflicting thing of like, very scared, but also continually trying to remind myself of like, remember who you are, love yourself, it's okay, I don't listen. Like, it was just like, I was not built for it.

• 1:20:27Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:20:28Speaker 01

  There were a lot of people in bands who were like, fuck it, I don't give a fuck. I was not that. I, I, everything hurt, everything felt, everything.

• 1:20:35Rick Rubin?

  Would you talk about it with the other band members?

• 1:20:37Speaker 01

  Yeah, me and Wayne would.

• 1:20:38Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:20:38Speaker 01

  And it was hard for Wayne, too. Both of us, it was, the spotlight of it all was like, both of us wanted to just hide. Ben, nah. Ben, it was built for it. Easy. He was like, I don't care, he's funny. Everything was funny to him. It was just like, this is awesome, who cares? And I love Ben for that, and he's always been that presence, like very calming presence of like a rational presence.

• 1:20:59Rick Rubin?

  And then how many people would be at the shows that he'd be playing?

• 1:21:02Speaker 01

  Everything was sold out. The set, and once that EP came out. So we started at clubs, so three hundred. And then I remember we played at six hundred, people sold out, and that was a huge deal. It was like a, it was like a large club.

• 1:21:17Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:21:18Speaker 01

  And then we did all large clubs, and then we did all theaters. And then it was amphitheaters, arenas, and everything sold out always, it was just.

• 1:21:27Rick Rubin?

  And arenas even at the end of the first album?

• 1:21:30Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:21:30Rick Rubin?

  Wow.

• 1:21:31Speaker 01

  And also I remember us having to play festival slots where we didn't even have enough songs to fill up the time. We were like, we were high up on the bill enough that we had like an hour and a half set. And we're like, we only have forty five minutes of material, we have an hour of material, I don't know, how are we gonna do this? Do a couple of covers too, I guess?

• 1:21:46Rick Rubin?

  The fact that he was selling out big shows is interesting too, because you were having hit songs. But there's a lot of artists who have hit songs and don't sell any tickets.

• 1:21:55Speaker 01

  I think the band has thrived on our live show. We were ready for it.

• 1:22:00Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:22:01Speaker 01

  And I've seen the opposite now, because now I've gotten to sign a couple of acts. And I've seen young acts now that have a hit and go on a stage and they just, they don't know what to do. And it doesn't translate.

• 1:22:11Rick Rubin?

  But it's because of all those years of doing all those hours, six hours a night.

• 1:22:16Speaker 01

  A hundred percent. Figuring out who you are on stage, and then suddenly when you're put on the big stage at the festival, you're ready for it. We were ready, we were like, let's go, let's put on the best damn show and we can do it.

• 1:22:27Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, the ten thousand hours.

• 1:22:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, the ten thousand hours, yeah. I think that's what changed it for us. People would come to our show and then they go home and say, hey, we gotta go to their next show. Tell their friends, hey, you should go see Madame and Dragons Live, it's a good show. That word is really what took the flame and just stoked it, stoked it up.

• 1:22:43Rick Rubin?

  What's the first time you played outside of the United States?

• 1:22:46Speaker 01

  Norway.

• 1:22:47Rick Rubin?

  And when was that?

• 1:22:48Speaker 01

  Bergenfest.

• 1:22:50Speaker 01

  And they flew us out to play it and we were the only like American act.

• 1:22:55Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:22:55Speaker 01

  And it was just.

• 1:22:56Rick Rubin?

  How was that experience?

• 1:22:57Speaker 01

  Amazing. Still to this day, maybe my favorite international experience. Cause it was my first time out of the States ever. And my eyes were just so open as this Mormon boy of like, wow, look at all these people and they're happy and they're not Mormon and like, there's not even one Mormon and everybody's living this.

• 1:23:18Rick Rubin?

  And it's okay.

• 1:23:19Speaker 01

  And it's okay.

• 1:23:19Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:23:20Speaker 01

  In fact, it's great. And wow, there's culture and like Vegas is not a cultured place.

• 1:23:25Rick Rubin?

  No.

• 1:23:26Speaker 01

  So I couldn't be further from it. So I was seeing like, healthy living, farmers markets and people out walking and staying out late at a dinner table and eating food till 5 a.m. and drinking wine and walking home drunk together and singing and all these things that I, and cobblestone roads. And I was just like, this is amazing.

• 1:23:46Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:23:47Speaker 01

  Amazing.

• 1:23:48Rick Rubin?

  That's great.

• 1:23:48Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:23:49Rick Rubin?

  And then the next album?

• 1:23:51Speaker 01

  Smoke and Mirrors.

• 1:23:52Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:23:54Speaker 01

  So this was kind of probably what happens to most artists, which is you kind of have your first album and it does this huge thing and you're like, what do we even do? And then we just decide, okay, we're gonna self-produce a whole record. And we just, every song on that record probably has 200 tracks.

• 1:24:11Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:24:12Speaker 01

  It just was so dense.

• 1:24:13Rick Rubin?

  Overdone, you'd say?

• 1:24:14Speaker 01

  So overdone.

• 1:24:15Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:24:16Speaker 01

  So overdone, but still maybe my favorite of our records.

• 1:24:19Rick Rubin?

  Oh, that's interesting.

• 1:24:19Speaker 01

  Because it was darkest time period for me. Heavy, heavy depression on a level I'd never experienced. Really, really bad depression.

• 1:24:28Rick Rubin?

  In success.

• 1:24:30Speaker 01

  In success.

• 1:24:31Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:24:31Speaker 01

  My deepest depression.

• 1:24:32Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:24:33Speaker 01

  And it's called Smoke and Mirrors because the whole thing was just, now I've left Mormonism. Now what? My whole life was based on smoke and mirrors. My whole life was just based on a lie.

• 1:24:42Rick Rubin?

  Wow.

• 1:24:43Speaker 01

  And so, kind of I was just like, fuck everything. I'm just like, I have no,

• 1:24:49Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:24:49Speaker 01

  No guide, no.

• 1:24:51Rick Rubin?

  You were lost.

• 1:24:52Speaker 01

  Lost. It was a very lost record.

• 1:24:56Rick Rubin?

  What song?

• 1:24:56Speaker 01

  Maybe, maybe it's the title track, Smoke and Mirrors.

• 1:25:15Speaker 02

  This is my world, this is my way Show me a sign, sweep me away This is my world Heartbreaker, gatekeeper I'm feeling far away, I'm feeling right Deep in my heart, deep in my mind Take me away, take me away This is my world Dream maker, life taker

• 1:25:50Speaker 02

  All I believe is in a dream That comes crashing down on me All of it all, is it just smoke and mirrors?

• 1:26:07Speaker 02

  I wanna believe

• 1:26:15Speaker 02

  But all of it all, is it just smoke and mirrors?

• 1:26:24Speaker 02

  All that I've known, buildings of stone All of the ground, without a sound This is my world Heartbreaker, gatekeeper I'm feeling far away, I'm feeling right I'm starting to cave, I'm losing my flame I wanted your truth, but I wanted to fade To disappear Dream maker, life taker

• 1:26:59Speaker 02

  All I believe is in a dream That comes crashing down on me All of it all, is it just smoke and mirrors?

• 1:27:17Speaker 02

  I wanna believe

• 1:27:25Speaker 02

  But all of it all, is it just smoke and mirrors?

• 1:28:16Rick Rubin?

  Sounds very vulnerable.

• 1:28:18Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah, I think it was the first record that I was like, no more metaphors. And I'm not gonna hide anything from my parents anymore. This is what it is. Yeah.

• 1:28:30Rick Rubin?

  Would you say the songs are typically autobiographical even when they're metaphorical?

• 1:28:35Speaker 01

  Always. I think I don't know any other way to write, really. I'm not a great storyteller. I just write as a journal.

• 1:28:42Rick Rubin?

  What's happening in you?

• 1:28:43Speaker 01

  What's happening?

• 1:28:44Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:28:44Speaker 01

  I don't know. I've tried to like, one of my favorite songwriters of all time is Paul Simon.

• 1:28:49Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:28:49Speaker 01

  Because he can do that. So, "A man walks down the street..."

• 1:28:53Rick Rubin?

  Story.

• 1:28:53Speaker 01

  Yeah, and I love that. Can't do it. When I try to do it, it just sounds bad.

• 1:28:57Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:28:57Speaker 01

  So for me, it's just...

• 1:29:01Speaker 01

  What am I feeling?

• 1:29:03Rick Rubin?

  What do you remember about recording the second album?

• 1:29:07Speaker 01

  Yeah, remember feeling like we had so much pressure on us. It was like, hey, your record just went seven times platinum or whatever it was, like... What's the next single?

• 1:29:17Rick Rubin?

  Now what are you gonna do?

• 1:29:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:29:19Rick Rubin?

  Show us.

• 1:29:19Speaker 01

  There was also a sense of, maybe everything we do is just huge.

• 1:29:24Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:29:24Speaker 01

  There were so many huge...

• 1:29:25Rick Rubin?

  It could go either way.

• 1:29:26Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was like, Radioactive did Gangbusters, then Demons did Gangbuster. It was just doing these crazy numbers at the time. It was like breaking all these records and...

• 1:29:34Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:29:34Speaker 01

  And I think I was like... Did we just get really lucky or just do I just know how to write really big songs?

• 1:29:42Rick Rubin?

  No way to know.

• 1:29:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, and so I think I was just confused. I also I didn't understand how big it was just everywhere suddenly in the world, everywhere.

• 1:29:54Rick Rubin?

  Were you touring around the world at that time?

• 1:29:56Speaker 01

  Mm hmm. We went everywhere because my brother was like, if you don't hit these markets now.

• 1:30:03Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:30:04Speaker 01

  You won't be able to hit them later. It doesn't matter how big you are. He's like, there's ginormous artists that never went to Asia and now they go to try play it and Asia doesn't care because you didn't grow with them.

• 1:30:13Rick Rubin?

  Yes.

• 1:30:14Speaker 01

  So go everywhere. So we went everywhere and because of that now the band, America's like our smallest market.

• 1:30:19Rick Rubin?

  Really?

• 1:30:20Speaker 01

  We just we just played in China and did six stadiums and sold it out in under a minute. Under a minute, six stadiums in China. We've only been to China like two times before that.

• 1:30:30Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, but you went at the right time.

• 1:30:32Speaker 01

  But we went at the right time. They felt like we've grown with them.

• 1:30:34Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:30:36Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, Europe, South America, everywhere is bigger than the US even for us. And the US is a huge market for us, but that's to show you how international the band is and it's because we did that, but it almost killed us. Genuinely, the amount of ping ponging and it was only humanly possible because we were such young kids. We were like twenty two.

• 1:30:57Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:30:58Speaker 01

  And anytime there wasn't a show that we couldn't do, just someone would just pump me with predazone. It was like predazone in the ass. Get on the stage, go do it. And it was just, we just did it. In our first five years, we canceled one show, Rick, one in five years. Because we just, no matter what, we just did it. Because we knew what it was like for to be a broke musician for years and we were so afraid, even it was almost like trauma of like, it could all go away, but it won't, it won't, guys, we're big enough now. It won't go away. You can be okay. But I felt that on the second record. It was like, no, no, you're gonna be a one hit.

• 1:31:35Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, well, it happens to a lot of bands.

• 1:31:37Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 1:31:38Rick Rubin?

  They have a great first album. They had their whole life to write it.

• 1:31:41Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:31:42Rick Rubin?

  And then can't follow it up. It happens.

• 1:31:44Speaker 01

  And we put out Smoke and Mirrors and it did. I don't know, one tenth maybe of what the first record did.

• 1:31:50Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:31:51Speaker 01

  It was not.

• 1:31:52Rick Rubin?

  It would be successful by any normal metric if the first album wasn't a phenomenon.

• 1:31:57Speaker 01

  A hundred percent. And so it was like, okay, this is what happens when we self-produce everything. Our fans loved it. Our fans, most fans of the band will say Smokin' Mirrors is their favorite record.

• 1:32:07Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:32:08Speaker 01

  Because it's so dense and because it's so, maybe because it's so vulnerable, maybe because it captured a really specific time in our life or something. But it sold so much less. Then we're in a weird spot where it's like, okay, well, what do we, what do we do now?

• 1:32:25Rick Rubin?

  Let's see what's next.

• 1:32:28Rick Rubin?

  Evolve.

• 1:32:29Speaker 01

  Yeah. So this record ended up selling more than Night Visions. So this is like, it's like we went gangbusters and then we went to Smokin' Mirrors and then we did Evolve and this was our biggest record to date.

• 1:32:41Rick Rubin?

  What do you think was different? What allowed that to happen?

• 1:32:45Speaker 01

  Changing things up.

• 1:32:46Rick Rubin?

  Like what?

• 1:32:47Speaker 01

  Worked with new people, brought in new producers. So I tried writing with different producers. That changed the sound. It brought out like a new variation of the band. Like the first record was very influenced by Alex the Kid. So it kind of has these heavy hip hop things going on. Second record was just the band really self-produced and so it was very like band-y, I would say. Third record was, we primarily worked with these Swedish producers, Matt Man and Robin, who, we'd just come off Smokin' Mirrors, it was like two hundred tracks. They were like, a song should be like six tracks. And every track should matter so much and it should sound perfect.

• 1:33:26Rick Rubin?

  Wow.

• 1:33:26Speaker 01

  They were very meticulous. It was a completely different approach.

• 1:33:30Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:33:30Speaker 01

  And they really challenged me in ways that were difficult. They're Swedish and they're just these two really quiet, sweet guys, but very specific. And they don't tell you if they don't like something, but you just know.

• 1:33:46Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:33:47Speaker 01

  It's just kind of like, okay. But very smart with sounds. Very, like every sound, every drum.

• 1:33:57Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:33:57Speaker 01

  Interesting, fun to listen to, clean, Swedish.

• 1:34:01Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:34:02Speaker 01

  And so that was an interesting juxtaposition because we were so big and my voice was so big and then it's over these very clean things. It was just a new take on Imagine Dragons. Again, for better or for worse, it just was different.

• 1:34:13Rick Rubin?

  Yeah. Did you like the experience other than the fact that it was difficult?

• 1:34:18Speaker 01

  I liked it as much as everything. I like most when I'm just writing a song by myself on my computer. That's when I like most. But I liked that like equal to liking every other experience in a studio. Because also there was a lot of fun and they would light up when something was great. So it was still like working with someone who's great, just someone in the room who was like helpful. And I, because of the language barrier maybe, I felt I could still like write my lyrics and not be judged upon. That felt nice. Uh, like I was able to be vulnerable, I think, still. I don't think I've ever approached a record trying to do something different.

• 1:35:02Speaker 01

  Trying to, like even Smoke and Mirrors, we were trying to make a great record. We weren't trying to make a cool record.

• 1:35:07Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, every time it's the same. You're going in, let's do our best.

• 1:35:10Speaker 01

  Let's make our biggest best songs. And by the way, let's comb through your 300 songs and find if there's some gems in there. And if not, let's create on top of that. It's always, there's so much material and we're just trying to find the best of what is. Yeah, so then Evolve came out and then it did Night Visions again, all over again.

• 1:35:32Rick Rubin?

  What's a good song for us to listen to?

• 1:35:34Speaker 01

  You know, I really like, I Don't Know Why off that record.

• 1:35:36Rick Rubin?

  Let's hear it.

• 1:36:14Speaker 02

  When we're caught in the headlights. Dangerous. Your love is always dangerous. And now I'm lost in hearts. We're living in a lying trance. I don't know why, but I guess it's got something to do with you. To do with you. I don't know why, but I guess it's got something to do with you. To do with you. I was a fake an alibi.

• 1:36:54Speaker 02

  Trading the truth in for a lie, oh.

• 1:36:58Speaker 02

  We were the essence of desire.

• 1:37:02Speaker 02

  And we're caught in the headlights.

• 1:37:06Speaker 02

  Dangerous. Your love is always dangerous. And now I'm lost in hearts. We're living in a lying trance. I don't know why, but I guess it's got something to do with you. To do with you. I don't know why, but I guess it's got something to do with you. To do with you. I don't know why, but I guess it's got something to do with you. To do with you. I don't know why, but I guess it's got something to do with you.

• 1:37:51Speaker 02

  To do with you.

• 1:37:54Rick Rubin?

  Do your personal relationships work their way into the songs?

• 1:37:59Speaker 01

  Yes, but not often.

• 1:38:02Speaker 01

  I think when I write about personal relationships, I often write in fantasy. Only in that sense.

• 1:38:08Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:38:08Speaker 01

  And I think.

• 1:38:11Speaker 01

  For a lot of complex issues, it's like, first of all, when you're living with someone and they're listening to everything you do, it's weird if you're like having a fight and then they hear your song and it's like, and maybe that song's heard everywhere now.

• 1:38:24Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:38:25Speaker 01

  And, you know. But there's a couple songs that I've written throughout the years. One of them, I think my favorite song I've ever written with the band is a song called "Next to Me." And it's very much about our relationship and it's about my relationship with my ex, Asia. And it's a really sad, so it's a really vulnerable song. So I do sometimes, but mostly not.

• 1:38:46Rick Rubin?

  Next is fourth.

• 1:38:48Speaker 01

  Origins. Origins was really like a B-sides of Evolve. We had so many songs, it was just like, okay, Evolve just went big. I mean, there were so many other songs that didn't make that record.

• 1:39:01Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:39:02Speaker 01

  And it did so good, why don't we just continue on that? I think it came out a year later.

• 1:39:07Rick Rubin?

  Mm-hmm. Most of it recorded during the same period of time?

• 1:39:10Speaker 01

  Some during the same period and some right after while I was on the road. Because even when I was out recording Evolve, I was still, I brought out a laptop with me and I recorded in a lot of hotel rooms.

• 1:39:19Rick Rubin?

  Do you do that typically when you're on the road?

• 1:39:21Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm. Yeah, because when I'm on the road, I'm actually a real reclusive person. I know for some bands, the road is, it's not. For me. I, I really love to experience food. So we'll, we'll find some really cool place to eat always as a band. And then I like to walk around the streets by myself.

• 1:39:44Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:39:44Speaker 01

  I really like to just go wander. But we don't party, none of us party. None of us have been into that ever, so we're never like going to after-parties. We're never going to clubs, we're not, nothing like that. The other thing, if I'm in the hotel room, that I want to be doing is writing. So I'm always writing.

• 1:40:00Rick Rubin?

  It's also grueling, flying from show to show.

• 1:40:03Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:40:03Rick Rubin?

  Putting on a long show. The workload is such that if you were to try to do something else while you were on the road, the whole thing could cave in.

• 1:40:12Speaker 01

  You know what's crazy is I recently got this Oura ring that tracks your sleep. And I brought it on tour with me to just see what happens.

• 1:40:21Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:40:23Speaker 01

  Whenever I have a show, my sleep that night is horrible. Even if I sleep the amount of hours after the show. Even if I sleep the exact same amount of hours, something about the cortisol.

• 1:40:33Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:40:34Speaker 01

  Yeah, I really think it's probably one of the main reasons that musicians turn to drugs, sleeping drugs at night.

• 1:40:40Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:40:40Speaker 01

  Or anything to escape because I think a lot of people think, oh, you're on this high and you just want to get more high. For me, at least, it's not that. It's actually you're on this high and for me, I wouldn't even say it's a high. You have some really intense experience. For me, it's very emotional, very intense. Now you're in a room by yourself.

• 1:40:57Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:40:58Speaker 01

  Something about that juxtaposition is not healthy.

• 1:41:00Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:41:00Speaker 01

  You're in a dark hotel room by yourself.

• 1:41:02Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:41:03Speaker 01

  Here you were, now you're here, and time to go to sleep.

• 1:41:05Rick Rubin?

  It's certainly unnatural.

• 1:41:07Speaker 01

  Not natural.

• 1:41:08Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:41:08Speaker 01

  So my sleep that night, even if I sleep totally.

• 1:41:11Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:41:12Speaker 01

  Bad. The next night, if we have a day off, sleep's great. My resting heart rate is completely different. I think it's cortisol. I think it's something that I don't, I don't know. But I think it's probably taking years off my life to be playing so many shows.

• 1:41:24Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:41:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:41:25Rick Rubin?

  Is the tour schedule intense as it's always been, or do you?

• 1:41:29Speaker 01

  No, I've really set rules now of like, I will only play one show and then one day off. If I play two in a row, then two days off. Vocally, I can't sustain otherwise. Our shows now are two hours and the songs are operatic. Imagine Dragons is not.

• 1:41:48Rick Rubin?

  No, it's not easy.

• 1:41:48Speaker 01

  Yeah, so when I was young, trying to do three or four in a row, I could do it barely, but it was miserable. And it was always hard and always like, I probably had to go on prednisone like four times a year. Would have to have a doctor come.

• 1:42:01Rick Rubin?

  Didn't you have to have surgery at one point, too?

• 1:42:03Speaker 01

  I'd have, I had a polyp that I surgically removed.

• 1:42:06Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:42:07Speaker 01

  So, yeah, now I do one day on, one day off, one day on, one day off, two days on, two days off.

• 1:42:11Rick Rubin?

  Yeah. Does that feel more manageable?

• 1:42:14Speaker 01

  Totally sustainable.

• 1:42:15Rick Rubin?

  Great.

• 1:42:15Speaker 01

  And we could put on two hour shows. I could sing everything, feel good and strong.

• 1:42:18Rick Rubin?

  Beautiful.

• 1:42:19Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:42:19Rick Rubin?

  How is the response in different parts of the world? Tell me any interesting niches around the world that are particular experiences.

• 1:42:27Speaker 01

  Everywhere is different. You know, we just played in China, so I guess that's the most recent to me.

• 1:42:32Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:42:33Speaker 01

  They're such a wonderful crowd. They all made pamphlets that they made on their own so they could see all the words and sing every song with.

• 1:42:39Rick Rubin?

  Really?

• 1:42:40Speaker 01

  And they all bring out these books.

• 1:42:41Rick Rubin?

  Like hymn books?

• 1:42:42Speaker 01

  Yes, like hymn books, all through the crowd.

• 1:42:45Rick Rubin?

  But they're made by themselves.

• 1:42:46Speaker 01

  Yes. So respectful. You know, a song ends and it's dead silent. Listening, reacting. New song, let's all have it together and sing. It's similar in Japan in that way. South America, it's like, everybody's just there to have the greatest night of their entire life. Nobody cares what anybody thinks. Everybody's sweaty, hot, just life. A lot of Europe is like that too. Very much like, we're, let's live tonight like it's our last night, let's have the best. Italy, France, those are two of our biggest territories, France and Italy.

• 1:43:17Rick Rubin?

  Cool.

• 1:43:18Speaker 01

  Again, just incredible amount of zest for life. Americans are the most self-conscious, for sure.

• 1:43:23Rick Rubin?

  Interesting.

• 1:43:24Speaker 01

  Very much like, when the person next to them is warmed up, then they'll feel more warm. But once they get going, it can be a fantastic crowd, but, like, more stress maybe.

• 1:43:35Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:43:35Speaker 01

  I'm not sure, maybe because Americans work so mu— I'm not exactly sure what it is, but definitely different.

• 1:43:39Rick Rubin?

  Is language ever a barrier?

• 1:43:41Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:43:42Rick Rubin?

  People sing along wherever you are?

• 1:43:43Speaker 01

  Anywhere, e- even in China, which is the most alien place, and the, eh, English is not spoken there at all. You, I, I would ask someone where the toilet is and they don't know what I'm saying.

• 1:43:51Rick Rubin?

  But they sing along?

• 1:43:52Speaker 01

  But they sing every word. They have a book and they sing along, they want to, they wanna show you that they, yeah.

• 1:43:58Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:43:59Speaker 01

  It's really a beautiful thing.

• 1:44:00Rick Rubin?

  You think that they appreciate that you're there?

• 1:44:03Speaker 01

  For sure, oh yes. And also the way that we were treated was like, it took, I went and saw these seven temples that were so beautiful. You know, you pray and you light these things and you bow to the north and south and east and west and it was such an incredible experience and, but the amount, I could feel everyone looking at me to be like, you like this? What, do you think this is weird? Do you enjoy this? Like, and when I'm enjoying it, I see so much joy and I'm like, wow, this is cool. Like, I think that, uh, we're so foreign to each other.

• 1:44:37Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:44:37Speaker 01

  That it's almost like an alien on a different world. And it's like, let me show these things that are really important to me. And do you see why they're important to me? What a beautiful thing to be a part of that interaction, I really enjoyed that. So yeah, I, everywhere's so different, but also the same, right? It's, uh, it's still—

• 1:44:56Rick Rubin?

  People.

• 1:44:56Speaker 01

  People, wanting to have a communal experience and enjoying singing something along together that was important to them in their quiet moments.

• 1:45:05Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, beautiful, let's see what's next.

• 1:45:10Speaker 01

  Origins. I think, birds.

• 1:45:14Rick Rubin?

  Okay.

• 1:45:15Speaker 01

  That's one we still perform all the time, I, I like that one.

• 1:45:20Rick Rubin?

  It's not here. I'm looking at the regular version.

• 1:45:23Speaker 01

  Oh, sorry, I'm on the deluxe version.

• 1:45:24Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, okay.

• 1:47:00Speaker 02

  Love will never die, die, die.

• 1:47:09Speaker 02

  Birds fly in different directions.

• 1:47:37Rick Rubin?

  Do you remember lyrically what that was going on at the time?

• 1:47:40Speaker 01

  Yeah, actually, that was a relationship song. I'd just gone through a separation. Me and Asia had been together for seven years and then broke up and didn't see each other for seven months. Why so many sevens? It's the sevens and I'm seventh son. So we didn't see each other for seven months. And I went and I toured Evolve as us broken up. And that was a really strange, wonderful, hard, weird time for me. Finding myself, re-finding myself out of a relationship. Just everything about my life at that time was weird. But that song was really just about lamenting about the end of it,

• 1:48:23Speaker 01

  but also seeing the beauty in having someone come into your life and still being able to love them from afar. And then after seven months, I came home. We did ayahuasca together and got back together.

• 1:48:39Rick Rubin?

  It doesn't sound like an angry song. It sounds like a beautiful song.

• 1:48:44Speaker 01

  We've never had anger. Even after our divorce, there's never been anger with me and Asia. I think that there's such a deep sense of love and respect between the two of us that we never fought, never anger, never. Just two artists trying really hard to make things work and coexisting. And a lot of heartbreak, a lot of joy, a lot of everything, but never anger.

• 1:49:12Rick Rubin?

  You said, in your mind, this album's really a continuation of the last album.

• 1:49:17Speaker 01

  It really was, sonically and time-period-wise.

• 1:49:21Rick Rubin?

  Okay. Next is Mercury.

• 1:49:24Speaker 01

  Mercury, yeah, that's such a long one, too, because we did one and two.

• 1:49:28Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:49:29Speaker 01

  My general feeling of Mercury is just fun, joy. I really was in a very happy, joyful, healthy spot when we wrote that record. Like, even coming here today, I just only have good feelings associated with this. I think also just the time period it captured.

• 1:49:49Speaker 01

  I was entering kind of, for the first time in my life, like, a spiritual, healthy place. I was starting to find footing.

• 1:50:00Speaker 01

  And I felt like it was a very effortless experience. We were just kind of having fun.

• 1:50:04Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:50:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:50:05Rick Rubin?

  What song do you want to hear?

• 1:50:08Speaker 01

  I think because we've listened to so many kind of sad, nostalgic ones, I mean, I think maybe "Cutthroat" would be fun to listen to.

• 1:51:21Speaker 02

  I've been waiting patiently. I was young, my ancestry was marching martyrdom across the dumblin' plains of Utah. I can't lie, I've been played by powerful people who get their way. But I in time will climb my mountain, I in time will rise. I'm so misunderstood, but I live for this. My money's good and I came to win. So step on in, I promise you, only one of us gonna make it out alive and it's not you. Only one of us, only one of us gonna make it out alive and it's not you. Only one of us. Only one of us gonna make it out alive.

• 1:52:13Rick Rubin?

  Drive me.

• 1:52:30Rick Rubin?

  Drive me. Only one of us, only one of us, not you. Only one of us, only one of us, only one of us.

• 1:52:50Rick Rubin?

  It's pretty aggro.

• 1:52:51Speaker 01

  Yeah. I love that song.

• 1:52:53Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, me too.

• 1:52:54Speaker 01

  It really, that has aged well with me.

• 1:52:59Speaker 01

  I just feel like we just had a lot of fun on that record.

• 1:53:04Speaker 01

  And it also brought out, it was the first time ever that somebody has sat down with me and gone over all my lyrics with me. That was a hard experience for me, even though I tried to act like it wasn't, it was really hard for me. Just because it's something about, it's already so vulnerable when you're seeing something. Something about words on a page and your face to look at every word.

• 1:53:26Speaker 01

  That was, you know, but it was a real learning experience for me too because

• 1:53:32Speaker 01

  I don't pay a lot of attention to what I write.

• 1:53:35Rick Rubin?

  It just comes out.

• 1:53:36Speaker 01

  It just is out and it doesn't matter if it's bad or good.

• 1:53:39Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:53:39Speaker 01

  Right? Like, I'm not a writer, for better or for worse, who goes, "That line could be better."

• 1:53:45Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:53:46Speaker 01

  I write it and I go, "That line is what it was supposed to be."

• 1:53:48Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:53:49Speaker 01

  Right?

• 1:53:49Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:53:50Speaker 01

  And-

• 1:53:50Rick Rubin?

  Because it's what came out.

• 1:53:52Speaker 01

  Yeah, but it was good for me to have

• 1:53:57Speaker 01

  to be challenged and to approach something with "Look at it twice." Rewrite. Rethink. And I think that, um,

• 1:54:13Speaker 01

  that was my big takeaway from that record, was feeling like it's okay to do that.

• 1:54:18Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:54:19Speaker 01

  In fact, it could be more meaningful. It could actually be more special. You know, it doesn't always have to be captured uh, in that moment, in order for it to be relevant for always, or something. Yeah.

• 1:54:31Rick Rubin?

  Also, after you do that experiment, if you like the original version, you use the original version.

• 1:54:36Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:54:37Rick Rubin?

  You lose nothing-

• 1:54:39Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:54:40Rick Rubin?

  -in seeing if it can do even more.

• 1:54:42Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:54:42Rick Rubin?

  You know?

• 1:54:43Speaker 01

  Yeah, and also, I, it's interesting because I think Mercury, Mercury is also, fans love that record. I think it's probably Smoking Years and Mercury are the two, like, fan favorite records.

• 1:54:55Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:54:57Speaker 01

  Because it's somehow, also, it's just so much material. I think they enjoy that, but it was, there was a lot of storytelling. There was a lot going on where I think sometimes, to a fault, it can be very concise in our records. It can be very one, because already it's autobiographical, right? So if it's like autobiographical and you wrote it during a time period where you're nostalgic, there you go, it's a nostalgic record.

• 1:55:23Speaker 01

  Or it's a record about losing faith. It's like Mercury covers a lot of ground. And that's why I'm glad we did it in two acts.

• 1:55:31Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:55:32Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:55:32Rick Rubin?

  Cool. Next is Loom.

• 1:55:37Speaker 01

  Loom is our most recent record. Loom is really, was an effort to capture just a happy Imagine Dragons record, I think.

• 1:55:49Speaker 01

  Maybe we'll play one and then we can talk about it. I think my favorite off this record, as we've just toured it, is probably "Fire in These Hills."

• 1:55:57Rick Rubin?

  Okay.

• 1:55:59Speaker 02

  I don't think that I'm strong enough.

• 1:56:07Speaker 02

  I don't think that I'm enough.

• 1:56:14Speaker 02

  And I know you think about everything that I did wrong, but I do too.

• 1:56:22Speaker 02

  Staying up these nights, drinking everything, I got nothing without you.

• 1:56:30Speaker 02

  I fear I might die alone. I fear I might knock in no one's home. Staying up these nights, thinking everything that I did wrong to you. I don't think that I'm strong enough. I'm never enough. Cause there's fire in these hills. And I think I've lost the will. The more we try, the more we fail. But after everything, you're here with me still. Cause there's fire in these hills. And I think I've lost my will. The more we try, the more we fail.

• 1:57:14Speaker 02

  But after everything, you're here with me still. Gonna turn this car around, open up, sit down, tell you all the truth.

• 1:57:27Speaker 02

  Gonna fade myself, I'll talk myself down, lighting up this view.

• 1:57:35Speaker 02

  I fear I might wreck this home. I fear I might knock and no one comes. And I know you think about everything that I did wrong, but I do too. I don't think that I'm strong enough. Cause there's fire in these hills.

• 1:58:22Rick Rubin?

  So that's Happy Imagine Dragons and the opening line is, "I don't think I'm strong enough." And, "I think I've lost my will."

• 1:58:31Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:58:31Rick Rubin?

  And it's just interesting.

• 1:58:33Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's a good point. That's a good point. Yeah, you know?

• 1:58:39Speaker 01

  Maybe that's my old, that's my, that's my happiest song already. Yeah, I don't know. I think, um, maybe just overall the feeling of the record to me, when I walked away from it was like, it felt happy. But maybe, um, you know, the one thing that I'm, that's so interesting to me, because I haven't done something like this, where I've sat and listened to each record in like this. I think my big realization right now is that I don't actually know what a record's about until a few years later.

• 1:59:07Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:59:07Speaker 01

  I really don't. And I have ultimate clarity on it now. When you're in a spoken verse, I'm like, "Oh, yeah." You're playing me those, "Oh, yeah, that's exactly." So this record, maybe, um, maybe, uh, maybe in a couple of years, I'll be like, "Oh, that was like a false happiness." I don't really know, because I'm just in it. And that's the beauty of the music for me is it's like,

• 1:59:27Rick Rubin?

  You don't think about it.

• 1:59:27Speaker 01

  I don't think.

• 1:59:28Rick Rubin?

  It just comes out.

• 1:59:29Speaker 01

  I don't think about it, it just comes out and then it's a lesson to be learned later.

• 1:59:34Rick Rubin?

  Yeah.

• 1:59:34Speaker 01

  It's a feeling for me to have now and a lesson for me to learn later.

• 1:59:38Rick Rubin?

  Yeah, it's like a dream.

• 1:59:40Speaker 01

  Yes, yeah, it's exactly like that. You're in a dream, you're not thinking about, "What does this mean?"

• 1:59:43Rick Rubin?

  No.

• 1:59:44Speaker 01

  No. You're having a dream.

• 1:59:45Rick Rubin?

  And when you wake up, you usually don't know what it means.

• 1:59:47Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:59:47Rick Rubin?

  But maybe years later it'll make sense.

• 1:59:49Speaker 01

  Right. I do think, I, I'm very much like that. It's a great analogy.

• 1:59:53Rick Rubin?

  Yeah. Cool, man. Well, thanks for doing this.

• 1:59:56Speaker 01

  Thanks for having me.

• 1:59:57Rick Rubin?

  Shall we go in there and see what you do, what you cook up?

• 2:00:00Speaker 01

  Let's do it. Use the restroom first.

• 2:00:03Rick Rubin?

  Yeah. Take off this mic.

• 2:00:05Speaker 01

  Yes. That was fun, man.

• 2:00:07Rick Rubin?

  Really fun.

• 2:00:07Speaker 01

  I didn't know you'd do it like that. That's fun.

• 2:00:10Rick Rubin?

  Well, there's no right way. I just like, I thought it'd be interesting to kind of walk through. What's interesting to me is that as different as all of the changes were.

• 2:00:20Speaker 01

  Right.

• 2:00:20Rick Rubin?

  It really sounds like you all the way through. Like, it's, it's.

• 2:00:24Speaker 01

  Right.

• 2:00:24Rick Rubin?

  The thread that runs through it is thicker than the differences along the way. Right from the beginning.

• 2:00:32Speaker 01

  Right. Yeah, that is interesting for me here too, because I always have been like, oh, we're so.

• 2:00:37Rick Rubin?

  It's a whole new thing now.

• 2:00:38Speaker 01

  Yeah. It is pretty three-winded.

• 2:00:42Rick Rubin?

  It really is.

• 2:00:43Speaker 01

  It's like, maybe I'm just singing sad, the same sad song over and over.

• 2:00:47Rick Rubin?

  Fifteen years.

• 2:00:48Speaker 01

  Yeah. You know, just dressing up.

• 2:01:17Speaker 03

  Tetragrammatin is a podcast. Tetragrammatin is a website. Tetragrammatin is a whole world of knowledge.

• 2:01:32Speaker 02

  What may fall within the sphere of Tetragrammatin? Counter-culture? Tetragrammatin. Sacred geometry? Tetragrammatin. The avant-garde? Tetragrammatin. Generative art? Tetragrammatin. The tarot? Tetragrammatin. Out-of-print music? Tetragrammatin. Biodynamics? Tetragrammatin. Graphic design? Tetragrammatin. Mythology and magic? Tetragrammatin. Obscure film? Tetragrammatin. Beach culture? Tetragrammatin. Esoteric lectures? Tetragrammatin. Off-the-grid living? Tetragrammatin. Alt spirituality? Tetragrammatin. The canon of fine objects? Tetragrammatin. Muscle cars? Tetragrammatin. Ancient wisdom for a new age.

• 2:02:19Speaker 02

  Upon entering, experience the artwork of the day. Take a breath and see where you are drawn.

• 2:02:32Speaker 03

  tetragrammaton.com