Toby Morse On Punk, Parenting & PMA

Tattoos. High intensity sound. Stage diving. For the unfamiliar, it's chaos. Scary. Violent, even. But to today's guest, being hardcore straight edge is magical — a grassroots community dedicated to art, not anarchy. Celebrating life. And making the world a better place. Best known around the world as the charismatic, energetic and always smiling front man for hardcore punk band H2O, Toby Morse was raised by a single mom in Massachusetts before moving to New York City in 1988 with a dream of becoming a musician. Immersing himself in the burgeoning punk rock scene of Manhattan's Lower East Side, he worked odd jobs. He was a roadie. And in 1994, inspired by Bad Brains, he formed a band that would ultimately become synonymous with the Straight Edge and Positive Mental Attitude (‘PMA”) movements. Their self-titled debut album came out in 1996. Over the years, H2O has played alongside acts like No Doubt and Misfits. In 1998 and 1999 they joined the Warped Tour. Still together, the band continues to pack venues the world over, including a recent European tour that featured Toby's teenage son Max on drums. A dedicated vegan who has never himself touched drugs or alcohol, Toby is also a family man, self-professed “Emo Dad” and the founder of One Life One Chance — a non-profit dedicated to inspiring elementary, middle and high school students to make healthy choices and live a drug-free life. Through public speaking engagements, Toby informs kids how possible it is to maintain PMA, break stereotypes, be a leader, and maintain self-respect. Toby first came on my radar a couple years ago by way of podcast favorite, Cro-Mags frontman and fellow hardcore PMA warrior John Joseph. A friend of JJ's is a friend of mine, so I got hip to Toby's Instagram and quickly fell in love with his consistent flow of uplifting posts. His family-centric high vibe. The gentle, beautiful and uncompromising way he celebrates individuality, honoring the misfits and uplifting the weirdos. And his unwavering commitment to serving kids with his enthusiastic message of hope and positivity. I needed to know more. So here we are. Of course, this is a conversation about Toby's life. Being raised by older brothers who taught him to skate, introduced him to the music that would define his life and scared him straight. It's about what he learned about life from Bad Brains, Cro-Mags and Napoleon Hill. It's about veganism. Parenting. Art. And, of course, PMA. But most of all, this is a conversation about honoring non-conformity — exalting what makes you uniquely you. It's about the importance of community and family. And it's about the courage to blaze your own path. The visually inclined can watch our entire conversation on YouTube here: bit.ly/tobymorse458 (please subscribe!) One thing is for sure — I've found a new friend in Toby. I'm inspired by his wisdom and example. And I'm honored to share his extraordinary life with you today. Peace + Plants, Rich Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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

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• 1:05Toby Morse?

  It's crazy because, yeah, it's automatically judged by tattoos, how you look, the sound of the music, the people stage diving, jumping on each other. If you see it as like a normal person, they're like, what is going on here? But when you're in it, and you're in the music and the message, and you're living it, it's something so magical and something so special to your heart that stays with you for the rest of your life. You know, people always say punk rock's sellouts and punk rock's on the radio, but the hardcore scene always stayed underground, still there. And there's still kids putting on shows and putting out fanzines and new bands. And like, it's this community, and it's always been looked at as this scary, violent thing, and it's totally opposite of that. You know, the punk rock originally was like anarchy in the UK and destroy everything, but hardcore was like, let's fix things, let's fix everything.

• 1:49Toby Morse?

  And that was, that's the difference to me of punk rock and hardcore. It's like hardcore was like, let's make the world a better place. That's Toby Morse, and this is the Rich Roll Podcast.

• 2:10Rich Roll?

  The Rich Roll Podcast. Hey, everybody. How you guys doing? What's happening? My name is Rich Roll. I'm your host. This is my podcast. Good to be with you all here today, right now, in the moment, the only moment that there is. If you enjoyed my many, many conversations with John Joseph, or my epic episode with Travis Barker, if you're into straight edge punk rock, if you're into PMA, Positive Mental Attitude, then you are in for a treat today, my friends. Today, my guest is musician Toby Morse. He's a longtime hardcore punk rocker, vegan, straight edge, role model dad. This is a guy who has never tried any drugs or alcohol.

• 2:53Rich Roll?

  And he's best known as the vocalist for a punk rock band called H2O. But he's also one of the vocalists for another hardcore punk group called Hazen Streets. And Toby is also the host of his very own One Life, One Chance podcast. JJ, John Joseph turned me on to Toby a while back. I've dug following him on Instagram for a while now. He's super cool, very authentic, grounded, enthusiastic about life, guy who is always putting out positive and uplifting content. I've wanted to meet him for a very long time. I had an inkling that he would make a great guest for the show, and that intuition proved correct. This is a really fun conversation, and it's all coming up in a couple few. But first.

• 3:46Rich Roll?

  Okay, Toby Morse. So, this was a really fun one. We talked about all kinds of things. We talked about what it was like for him growing up with a single mom, basically being raised by older brothers, how skateboarding and hardcore punks scared him straight edge. Again, this is a guy who has never drank or done drugs, ever. What it was like living in New York City, immersed in the burgeoning hardcore scene, how he was influenced by bands like The Bad Brains, people like Napoleon Hill, The Cro Mags, and ultimately, forming his own band, H2O. We talk about veganism, hip-hop, starting a podcast, being parents. His son, Max, is a great drummer who goes on tour with his dad, following in his footsteps. It's really quite charming.

• 4:32Rich Roll?

  We talk about toxic social media and so many more subjects. So this is Good Times with me and Toby Morse.

• 4:44Rich Roll?

  Super cool to meet you, man.

• 4:45Toby Morse?

  You too.

• 4:46Rich Roll?

  Yeah, thanks for coming out. I've been following you for a while. All the content that you put out, so inspirational and just high vibe, man. And it's just awesome to finally meet you.

• 4:57Toby Morse?

  You too. We have a similar group of friends.

• 4:59Rich Roll?

  We do. We, that Venn diagram overlaps. Of course, John Joseph, podcast favorite.

• 5:04Toby Morse?

  Yes.

• 5:05Rich Roll?

  He's your boy.

• 5:05Toby Morse?

  My big brother.

• 5:06Rich Roll?

  You guys go way back, right?

• 5:08Toby Morse?

  Yeah, I met John a long time ago, in the early 90s.

• 5:11Rich Roll?

  Wow.

• 5:12Toby Morse?

  We used to see him, we used to go to hip hop clubs and he'd be walking around by himself. We were like, oh my gosh, John Joseph. We were like the new kids on the scene. And so after, after seeing him a couple of times, he'd give us like the head nod. We're like, oh shit, John gives a head nod. And that's how we kind of met him. It wasn't through Hark, it was through like the hip hop shows.

• 5:26Rich Roll?

  Really?

• 5:27Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 5:27Rich Roll?

  That's so interesting. But you knew him from Cro-Mags and all that.

• 5:30Toby Morse?

  Oh, of course, of course. We were scared of that band, yeah, for sure. But like, yeah, we used to see him walking down the street. But yeah, I just, I have a really good story about John.

• 5:40Rich Roll?

  Tell it.

• 5:43Toby Morse?

  Me and my wife were crossing Second Avenue one evening and my wife, I was with my friends and my wife was with her friends. And they were ahead of us and there was a old man coming. He was kind of like handicapped and my wife started helping him across the street too. And these two DJ guys were coming by with all their gear. And they stopped and said something to my wife, like some derogatory stuff towards my wife. And I saw my wife like in this guy's face, like screaming at a guy on the street. And I was kind of stuck in the traffic and then this car pulls up super fast and a guy jumps out. I hear him say, that's my sister. And he punches both the dudes and takes their DJ equipment and jumps back in his car and drives away and it was John Joseph.

• 6:19Rich Roll?

  Oh my God.

• 6:20Toby Morse?

  I just got goosebumps telling that story. It was like, it was a surreal moment of like, oh my God, John's like a superhero. But he just saw it, jumped out, quick, just did it, protected her and then drove away.

• 6:31Rich Roll?

  Exited, man. Like a superhero move. That's crazy.

• 6:37Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 6:37Rich Roll?

  That's classic, though. I mean, one of my favorite things to do when I go to New York is just walk around his neighborhood with him. And if you pay attention to the way that he treats everybody that he encounters in one of those experiences, it's a, it's a, it's a life lesson. Like, he knows all the shopkeepers by their first name.

• 6:56Toby Morse?

  Yes.

• 6:56Rich Roll?

  He knows their family members. You know, he always asks in on everybody. He knows the names of the, you know, kind of local people that are living on the street in his neighborhood. He takes care of them. He looks after them. He brings them food.

• 7:08Toby Morse?

  Yes.

• 7:08Rich Roll?

  I mean, the dude is 110% of service and real through and through.

• 7:14Toby Morse?

  Yeah, I love him. He's a, he's a big brother. He's inspiration. Everything he's been through, Survivor, like you said, even with his veganism and his Ironmans and just like his band and just the shape that he's in, the way he performs on stage. At that age, I'm 49, he's 55, I think. And I want to be like that when I'm that age. And yeah, he just, like you said, he gives it 120% always.

• 7:33Rich Roll?

  Yeah. And you guys share the same, you know, ethos, pretty much. I mean, both, you know, influenced by the same bands, both kind of came up, you know, under the wing of Bad Brains and PMA and Napoleon Hill and Minor Threat. And, you know, that whole kind of scene, you know,

• 7:48Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 7:48Rich Roll?

  you cut your teeth in that world.

• 7:50Toby Morse?

  Hundred percent. Especially in the New York scene, that's where for me, I found out about vegetarianism and all that stuff is through the hardcore music. I think it's one of the most powerful types of music for me personally that's affected me. And it's one of the first genres of music that was singing about animal rights and vegetarianism in the eighties.

• 8:06Rich Roll?

  Yeah. So how, let's take it back, man. So you, you, you're originally from Massachusetts, right?

• 8:12Toby Morse?

  Yeah, born, uh, born in Taunton, Massachusetts. Yes.

• 8:14Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 8:15Toby Morse?

  And Boston, Mass.

• 8:16Rich Roll?

  Two older brothers.

• 8:17Toby Morse?

  Yes.

• 8:18Rich Roll?

  We were saying before the podcast, I was listening to, to, uh, Toby's got his own podcast. Uh, and you did, you, your first episode was interviewing your mom.

• 8:26Toby Morse?

  Yes.

• 8:27Rich Roll?

  With the heavy, you know, Massachusetts accent.

• 8:29Toby Morse?

  Tabby. Yes.

• 8:31Rich Roll?

  But like, talking about back in the day, like with your brothers growing up and discovering skateboarding and, you know, punk rock as little kids and, you know, suffering the loss of your dad at like, he died like really young, right?

• 8:42Toby Morse?

  Yeah, he was 33, had a rare heart condition.

• 8:45Rich Roll?

  Wow.

• 8:45Toby Morse?

  And, um, Yeah, so when that happened, it was, uh, I was kinda too young to realize, cause I was only three, you know, much, much about death, but soon after that, my mom was working several jobs to keep food on our tables or move overhead, and so she had three boys, and so, um, she worked from job to job, and then, uh, while my mom was working, my brothers would sneak me out to like punk shows and stuff, and they got me to skateboarding and punk rock. But at the same time, they actually, they were partying in the house and drinking and smoking, so they kinda scared me to be straight edge in a sense.

• 9:15Rich Roll?

  Uh huh.

• 9:16Toby Morse?

  And they turned me on to this crazy music that I could skate aggressively to, and then through the punk rock, like Sex Pistols and Black Flag and bands like that, I found Minor Threat or had more of a, a message I could relate to.

• 9:26Rich Roll?

  Right, so older brothers, always the ones who are, you know, the influential figures.

• 9:32Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 9:32Rich Roll?

  Here's the cool music, here's what you should be doing, like, we'll take care of you.

• 9:36Toby Morse?

  And here's the, and here's the drug you should never do.

• 9:38Rich Roll?

  Yeah. So were they out of control, or what was it about?

• 9:41Toby Morse?

  No.

• 9:41Rich Roll?

  About their behavior that, that made you say, like, I don't wanna, I don't wanna go that route?

• 9:46Toby Morse?

  I think I just, I mean, one time we came home and like the garage, the, um, the cellar doors were open, there was smoke coming out.

• 9:52Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 9:53Toby Morse?

  And they were downstairs with the neighborhood girls, like, smoking weed and stuff, and I never seen that before, I never smelled weed, I never seen it, and they were drinking stuff. Um, and just the way they acted, it just kinda scared me, cause I looked up to them, you know?

• 10:04Rich Roll?

  Uh huh.

• 10:04Toby Morse?

  Um, and then, and then once I saw it affected them, and then, you know, heard the lyrics to Straight Edge by Minor Threat, I was like, oh my god, I'm 13 years old, I never tried anything, and now I can skate to this band, they're super aggressive, I love the lyrics, and I made a commitment from when I was 13 years old, I'm never gonna try drinking alcohol ever for the rest of my life, and I did it, and I've been living like that my whole life.

• 10:26Rich Roll?

  That's so crazy, man.

• 10:27Toby Morse?

  I don't know, I don't even know how I did it.

• 10:29Rich Roll?

  Never drank alcohol, never smoked weed.

• 10:31Toby Morse?

  Never tried it.

• 10:32Rich Roll?

  Yeah, right before we start, I asked you if you wanted any coffee, you're like, I've only had coffee twice, makes me crazy.

• 10:37Toby Morse?

  Yeah, caffeine makes you a little crazy.

• 10:39Rich Roll?

  You are a pure vessel, my friend.

• 10:41Toby Morse?

  Yeah, it's crazy, man, except for my, except for my tattoos, that's whatever, how I express myself and hurt my skin, but, um, yeah, I just never tried anything.

• 10:47Rich Roll?

  Yeah, and never, never a moment where you almost went there, I mean, how did, so you, this music was like your buffer? To insulate yourself against the peer pressure, I would imagine, right?

• 10:57Toby Morse?

  Totally. It was that and skateboarding. I mean, I definitely got made fun of at school for like, only like loving skateboarding. I didn't have a girlfriend. People call me names at school. And you found out pretty fast in school who your friends are. We're not going to the cake parties. But I would go to cake parties. Actually, I would go to cake parties with my brothers and I'd be the young kid there and they would give me all the money. They would say, "Give Toby the money to go get, go and collect money for a beer run." And I would get all the money and I would go and never come back. I did it a couple of times and I bought like new skateboards and stuff. It was kind of lame.

• 11:28Rich Roll?

  And they just probably forget that they gave you the money.

• 11:30Toby Morse?

  Exactly. But you found out pretty fast who your friends are and by like 10th, 11th grade, people knew, "Oh, he was just a breakdancing, hyperactive skateboarding kid who didn't drink." And they loved me for who I was. And that's, that's my whole point about everything I'm about is just to be yourself because, you know, your friends will love you for who you are, not if you drink or smoke or not, you know?

• 11:49Rich Roll?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that's like a big part of the message that you take to young people now.

• 11:52Toby Morse?

  Yes, for sure, man. The peer pressure and the being yourself. It sounds so cliche, but

• 11:59Toby Morse?

  I speak at schools and that's one of the main things I talk about is the peer pressure and not having to fit in and be a follower.

• 12:06Toby Morse?

  And not being a follower, but be a leader.

• 12:07Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 12:08Toby Morse?

  And follow your heart, not people.

• 12:10Rich Roll?

  So, did you ever go through like a preachy phase? Because you're a very like nonjudgmental dude. You're like to each his own, but was there, did you get a little holier than now though? As being like the only kid who wasn't partaking?

• 12:22Toby Morse?

  I don't know. I think, I think that's the biggest misconception about me, that I am preachy. I call myself teachy, not preachy. And nobody in my band is straight edge. Not in all of our songs about being straight edge. I'm surrounded by people, my wife's not straight edge. We've been married for almost 25 years. I'm not just hanging out with vegans and straight edge people. My message was never like, "You shouldn't do that." You know, because I know what it was like to have like a dare or scared straight come to your school and tell you not to do something. When you like force out that on people's throats, it's like, they're gonna do exactly that. You know what I mean? Like, so my approach has always been leading by example. People ask me, "Why I look young? Why I have so much energy?" "Well, I haven't ate meat since 1988." Or, "I never tried drugs, alcohol." I'm trying to be an example of that.

• 13:05Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 13:05Toby Morse?

  Not trying to be like, because I feel like sometimes... Vegans can be the worst enemy, you know, and they're so preaching down your throat and telling you what to do and like forcing it down you. I feel like people kind of react.

• 13:16Rich Roll?

  It's a problem, man.

• 13:17Toby Morse?

  It is.

• 13:17Rich Roll?

  It's a big problem. And, you know, I'm empath- I'm a member of the community and I'm empathetic to that sensibility, but at the same time, it just works across purposes with the bigger goal, which is getting people enthusiastic about a lifestyle that means so much to me.

• 13:31Toby Morse?

  Hundred percent.

• 13:32Rich Roll?

  But the minute you start telling people they're doing it wrong, or telling them they should be doing this, or should be doing that, like you just, the lines of communication just shut down completely.

• 13:41Toby Morse?

  I know. It's like when people try to go vegan, but they're not a hundred percent, like maybe they're wearing leather shoes or wearing something, and people like all of a sudden attack them. And these are like, big people who are trying to make a difference. It really buns me out because nobody's perfect. It's impossible to be a perfect vegan. All the stuff they put in your mouth at the dentist has been tested on animals. You're sitting on leather seats on airplanes, you're sitting on leather seats in Ubers. It's impossible to be a perfect human, let alone be a perfect vegan. You know, we just do our best.

• 14:06Rich Roll?

  Yeah. Well, there's, just like there's always somebody who's more woke, there's always somebody who's more vegan, and they're, they're pretty much ready to tell you about it.

• 14:13Toby Morse?

  And it's usually the ones, and it's usually the ones that are super new. They're like six months vegan, like all gung ho, like, relax, man. It's like.

• 14:21Rich Roll?

  We're all human beings on this spinning planet right now, trying to figure it out together.

• 14:25Toby Morse?

  Yeah. And I feel like you want to scare people away because whether it's a trend or not, or you're doing it for health, or, or for vanity, whatever you're doing it for, we're saving lives by you being vegan. So I'm happy that that's super popular now. You know, I mean, it's helping everything. It's the most positive, healthy trend for everyone.

• 14:41Rich Roll?

  It's crazy how much it's grown and exploded in recent years. Like, we were talking just before the podcast, like Burger King and Carl's Jr. And all these like fast food chains are now offering, you know, vegan, plant-based burgers and, you know, more and more kind of notable cultural figures are jumping on board. And it's like, it's really shifted

• 14:59Rich Roll?

  culture in a huge way. In recent years, I mean, but you've been doing this forever, man.

• 15:04Toby Morse?

  Yeah, it's amazing like not to have to eat like falafel all the time and not have like those old hockey puck. I still love Bogey Burgers. Just the stuff we had to do the first, first Not Dogs that came out in the nineties. And it's just having all these options, especially with them in California. This is like not even real life here. Cause it's vegan everywhere, but just seeing around the whole world, all things are changing and people being more conscious. And it's funny because all the bands that I was loving, Youth of Today and Gorilla Biscuits and Minor Threat, and these bands were singing about these messages in the eighties. It's all coming, even Chromax, all coming full circle now. It's crazy, man.

• 15:37Rich Roll?

  Right, right, right. Well, let's go back to that time. So you're skateboarding around, you've, you discover punk rock. You got these older brothers who are messing about and you start, you gotta start moving around, right? Like you end up in Newport for a while.

• 15:49Toby Morse?

  Yeah, moved to Newport, Rhode Island, lived there during the Americas Cup races, got really heavily into skateboarding there. I met a bunch of great bands from that scene.

• 15:58Rich Roll?

  But that's like, you know, a lot of pop collars and, you know.

• 16:01Toby Morse?

  It was. Yeah. On Bellevue, all those mansions on Bellevue.

• 16:05Rich Roll?

  Crazy houses.

• 16:06Toby Morse?

  But we weren't living in the crazy houses.

• 16:08Rich Roll?

  But you were skateboarding their front yards and stuff like that? Or what, you know, what is this? I can't imagine skateboarding was like a thing.

• 16:14Toby Morse?

  Yeah, there was because there was like the subculture of like skateboarders. There was half pipes. There was ramps on First Beach. There was like a store that had a half pipe. And there was bands like Verbal Assault and Vicious Circle and Positive Outlook and Proletariat, all these like hardcore bands who were skaters. Fred Smith was from the area. He was like a pro skater for Alva. And, um, yeah, and I got, started getting heavily into skateboarding and doing contests. I was a freestyle skateboarder. I got in Thrasher in 1983. It's like my biggest thing ever happened for second place in a skateboard contest and now again it's at Rhode Island. And I was like, you know, just skating all the time. We'd skip school a lot and go to thrift stores and buy thrift store clothes and skate around and go to the shows. But yeah, there was this element of like a different level of people there. And then when the Americas Cup came.

• 16:57Toby Morse?

  There was an old lady who had her ankle broken by a skateboard, so they banned skateboarding in Newport, Rhode Island, and we all went and we marched to City Hall, we protested. I was like a super young kid and we got, we got the law changed back to we could skate again.

• 17:09Rich Roll?

  Uh huh.

• 17:10Toby Morse?

  It was pretty cool.

• 17:11Rich Roll?

  Yeah, you got picked up by the cops, right?

• 17:12Toby Morse?

  Yeah. Yeah, I went down the story, gave my mom like a pack of cigarettes and there was no phones. Went to the liquor store and a cop car came by and he said, he put the lights on, asked me to come in the car and they put me in the car, I was freaking out, I was like crying. And as he took me around the corner, there was more skateboarders, because they were everywhere. And I think I even said like, you can pick them up too, and they picked them up too, and end up going to this, the police station was like stacks of skateboards and all my friends were in there, I was like, holy crap.

• 17:34Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 17:35Toby Morse?

  They just banned skateboarding like that.

• 17:37Rich Roll?

  But you guys got it overturned.

• 17:38Toby Morse?

  Got it overturned, it was the first time I ever like protested against something.

• 17:41Rich Roll?

  That's like your first like punk rock like thing that you did, right?

• 17:44Toby Morse?

  Yeah, I went to City Hall, it was crazy, man.

• 17:47Rich Roll?

  That is crazy.

• 17:48Toby Morse?

  And then my mom didn't even come get me for hours, I think she had to go to work, there was no phones.

• 17:52Rich Roll?

  It seems like your mom put you on a pretty long leash.

• 17:55Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 17:56Rich Roll?

  She's pretty permissive.

• 17:57Toby Morse?

  Yeah, I think that-

• 17:58Rich Roll?

  She wasn't like grinding you for being a skater kid or anything like that.

• 18:02Toby Morse?

  It's really true, and she talks about it now with me, like, no regrets, but like, she let my brothers watch me, I mean, she was trying to like, keep, you know, keep us alive and shit, so it's like, I can swear, right?

• 18:12Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 18:13Toby Morse?

  So, um, you know, my brothers took me under the wings.

• 18:16Rich Roll?

  We're not, we're not on Rapaport's show, but it's pretty cool, you can do whatever you want.

• 18:20Toby Morse?

  We're not rap. Um, so yeah, I mean, yeah, my mom let me hang with my brothers, yeah, and she trusted me, I guess, and she knew I was, she knew I didn't do any drugs, she knew I was a skateboarder, she knew I was a punk rocker, and she still let me go and go to these shows, she never went to one of the punk shows to check it out for us, we went and seen so many great bands and-

• 18:36Rich Roll?

  Were they like all ages shows?

• 18:37Toby Morse?

  Yeah, all ages shows, yeah.

• 18:38Rich Roll?

  Yeah, that's the other thing, like, there's so many interesting things about, like, this sector of music and that scene, like, it was, you know, open, it was their, the all ages thing was unique about it.

• 18:49Toby Morse?

  Great.

• 18:50Rich Roll?

  The no drugs and alcohol, straight edge thing was unique about it, like, the vegan aspect of it, the positive mental attitude, like, all of these things are emblematic of the hardcore scene that I think people miss or don't understand because they see all these aggressive, heavily tattooed dudes screaming-

• 19:05Toby Morse?

  Hundred percent.

• 19:06Rich Roll?

  And they think it's violent and, you know, and they're scared of it.

• 19:09Toby Morse?

  Yeah, it's crazy because, yes, it's automatically judged by tattoos, how you look, the sound of the music, the people stage diving, jumping on each other, the pig piles. If you see it, as like a normal person, they're like, what is going on here? You know, but when you're in it and you're in the music and the message and you're living it, it's something so magical and something so special to your heart that stays with you for the rest of your life. And it's something that, you know, people always say punk rock's huge and punk and this stuff, it's like, um, it's, it's sellouts and there's punk rocks on the radio, but the hardcore scene always stayed underground, you know, it's still there and there's still kids putting on shows and putting out fanzines and new bands and like, it's this community and it's always been looked at as this scary, violent

• 19:52Toby Morse?

  thing and it's, it's totally opposite of that. You know, the punk rock originally was like anarchy in the UK and fuck your parents and destroy everything, but hardcore was like, let's fix things, let's fix everything. And that was, that's the difference to me of punk rock and hardcore. It's like hardcore is like, let's fix, let's make, let's make the world a better place. It's, it's not just sing about it, let's like this march, let's, let's, uh, protest, there's pamphlets at the shows. I saw the first PETA videos was at a hardcore show, that's where I first saw like the slaughtering of animals. I was like, holy shit, you know, and, um, so yeah, there's this powerful message that people might never, ever get to experience to this day because they're always gonna look at hardcore as something like violent. And meanwhile, people would look at me in the train covered in tattoos of a wife beater on and they were like, I'd be, I'd try to give a seat to

• 20:35Toby Morse?

  an old lady, she wouldn't sit next to me or people pulling their children. Like, I'm thinking like, I don't even eat meat, I haven't ever tried a drug, you guys are looking at me like I'm a piece of shit. I never been arrested. You know what I mean? Like, there's so many stereotypes, especially with tattoos.

• 20:47Rich Roll?

  Well, I mean, you know, in fairness, I mean, look, tattoos are ubiquitous now, but back then, it, it was like, it was different. It was like, it's like, what's going on? It's confusing for people. It's scary because they're not, they don't know what it is.

• 20:59Toby Morse?

  Yeah, it's supposed to be like sailors and criminals.

• 21:00Rich Roll?

  And like, what is that relationship between body art and like the music and why do those things go hand in hand with PMA? Like, it's just a recipe of things that, that are just new and different for people, you know?

• 21:14Toby Morse?

  Yeah. And for us, it was just like how we expressed ourselves. We actually wear our hearts on our sleeves and we saw the other bands like the Chromeags and Nosic Front, these bands with tattoos and, oh my God, looks so cool. And then you want to get stuff like, one of my first tattoos is like a Meat is Murder tattoo in 1988, you know, it's one of my first tattoos on my arm. And I remember I got a job at Subway and they had ordered me a long sleeve shirt because they didn't want me promoting that kind of message at Subway. And that was in Maryland.

• 21:40Rich Roll?

  Serving up like cold cuts.

• 21:41Toby Morse?

  It's a true story.

• 21:42Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 21:43Toby Morse?

  Yeah. And that was in the South.

• 21:44Rich Roll?

  How old were you when you got your first tattoo?

• 21:46Toby Morse?

  I was 18.

• 21:47Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 21:47Toby Morse?

  And all kids should be.

• 21:48Rich Roll?

  Are you still getting them? Do you have any room left?

• 21:50Toby Morse?

  I just got this a couple of weeks ago, X.

• 21:52Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 21:53Toby Morse?

  Yeah, I'm starting to go here. I waited my whole life to go here, but yeah, I've been getting tattoos since the eighties, man.

• 21:58Rich Roll?

  X for like straight edge.

• 22:00Toby Morse?

  Yes, sir.

• 22:00Rich Roll?

  Yeah. So where does, uh, where does, um, the music start to come in for you as a performer?

• 22:07Toby Morse?

  Well, I became a roadie in, um, 1989 for a band called Sick of It All. For a couple of years, I traveled the world with them. I didn't go to college. That was my college, moving to New York.

• 22:14Rich Roll?

  So you moved to New York when you finished high school?

• 22:17Toby Morse?

  Moved all by myself at 18. My yearbook says, move to New York City, support the scene and keep skating. I didn't know what I wanted to do.

• 22:23Rich Roll?

  That was the life plan?

• 22:24Toby Morse?

  Yes.

• 22:25Rich Roll?

  What's mom doing? Good luck.

• 22:27Toby Morse?

  I know, exactly. Um, my mom had already kicked me out of the house. I was living with my girlfriend in her attic because my mom got a new boyfriend. The game of like ultimate, I'm like, get a job by this day. And I got a job at like Solomon Steakhouse or something, being a dishwasher. Three days later after they kicked me out. Anyway, I moved to New York, got dropped up at CBGB's. It was really scary.

• 22:45Rich Roll?

  Had you been to New York before?

• 22:46Toby Morse?

  With my uncle, like in the early eighties, like Empire State Building or something. And I'd seen these in the.

• 22:50Rich Roll?

  The one place you're like CBGB, that's the one place I know. Just take me there and drop me off?

• 22:54Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 22:56Rich Roll?

  You know where you were gonna stay that night?

• 22:57Toby Morse?

  Yeah, yeah. So, so basically this man called Token Entry played DC. I became pen pals with them, literally writing letters to Timmy Chunks, the singer who lived in Queens. It was over a year span. And he told me like, you want to come out, you can live with me. For him, it was no big deal, but for me, I was leaving everything, my mom, my brothers, my love of my life. But I didn't care about Maryland. I wanted to get out. So yeah, I got dropped up at a Token Entry show at CBGB's and it was totally scary. Had all my shit with me. And after that, we drove out to Queens and I ended up, I moved in with my friend, Timmy Chunks. I lived there for a couple of months and they told me I had to move because the landlord didn't know I was living there.

• 23:29Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 23:30Toby Morse?

  So I ended up being like sleeping on couches all through Queens.

• 23:32Rich Roll?

  Right, right, right. And just showing up at the shows and starting to, you know, make friends with the community?

• 23:37Toby Morse?

  Yeah, make friends with the community. They took me under the wing. There was like a lot of New York ball breaking. They called me like the girly man from Maryland. There was a lot of teasing. I got a lot of thick skin from moving to New York. I didn't have that kind of tough love growing up. But all these people, my peers, they really took me under the wing. And after I became a roadie for a couple of years, I. Realized I had things I wanted to say, so I started writing lyrics on tour. And that's where my band started.

• 23:57Rich Roll?

  Yeah, that's kind of like how John started, right? Like being a roadie for Bad Brains and having JR kind of take him under.

• 24:03Toby Morse?

  Totally.

• 24:03Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 24:03Toby Morse?

  Traveling the world with John, yeah.

• 24:05Rich Roll?

  Yeah. So at some point, you're like, I can do this.

• 24:09Toby Morse?

  Yeah, I mean, the good thing about hardcore is like, you don't have to be the best singer. As long as you have, as long as, no disrespect. But as long as you have a message and you have the passion and you want to get it out. That's the best thing about that. Like, the guys in my band, everyone played instruments really before till we started playing guitar with us. So, yeah, I just started writing lyrics, named my band H2O, had made stickers, started spreading the word through the community. There was no internet. And I would jump on stage, I had one song, and I'd play it on different people's sets. And I'd play this one song and start getting a little buzz. And then, uh, yeah, things really took off fast after that because started getting on all these bigger bills. And then we got a record deal, made a deal, it just happened really fast, man.

• 24:48Rich Roll?

  Right. Like, how fast? Like, in a, in a year?

• 24:51Toby Morse?

  Yeah, I mean, like, our first show was in Queens with Murphy's Law. And our second show was with the Chromeags at the Limelight, a massive venue. And then after that, our friends Siv and Sick of It All took us to Europe for six weeks. We had five songs and one t-shirt. Just happened so fast.

• 25:05Rich Roll?

  Wow, that's crazy.

• 25:05Toby Morse?

  And I was singing. And the way I look, the way I looked in the scene I was in, people weren't really singing. And I've always been into melodic music, so when it came out, I'm a more singer than screamer. So people were like, holy crap, that's the roadie from Sick of It All. And just the way I looked and hung out with, I think they didn't expect to sound like H2O. We had a love song on our first seven inch.

• 25:24Rich Roll?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, your stuff is definitely more melodic than the typical hardcore stuff.

• 25:29Toby Morse?

  And I got that from the DC scene, which I loved, and the California scene. And, uh, yeah, I mean, here I am 25 years, 25 years later in the same band.

• 25:37Rich Roll?

  It's crazy, man.

• 25:39Toby Morse?

  It's crazy.

• 25:39Rich Roll?

  And you're touring.

• 25:41Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 25:41Rich Roll?

  All the time.

• 25:42Toby Morse?

  Yeah, it's crazy. Like, we didn't have any hits on the radio, we didn't sell a lot of records. And, um, it's just the community and the longevity and people love the message. And now people are bringing their children to our shows. People have grown up with this band. My son comes on tour with me now, he plays a song for a night on drums with us.

• 25:56Rich Roll?

  Yeah, I saw on Instagram, you took him out, like, you went all over Europe with him, right?

• 26:00Toby Morse?

  Yeah, he's been around the world, he's been to Japan, he's been everywhere.

• 26:03Rich Roll?

  Experience.

• 26:03Toby Morse?

  Yeah. It's awesome to be able to do that for him, too.

• 26:05Rich Roll?

  Yeah. Well, he seems like a really, I mean, not that Instagram is a window into truth and reality or anything like that, but he seems like a really unique, cool, expressive kid.

• 26:16Toby Morse?

  Yeah, he's a very compassionate. Loving kid. I'm really lucky. Me and my wife did a really good job, especially growing up in LA. I was from East, my wife's from Chicago. It's kind of scary raising a kid in California.

• 26:27Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 26:27Toby Morse?

  Especially with social media and just all the different pressures, but he's, it's cute because he did this IG poll on his stories, like just people asking questions like, are you gay? What's your favorite shoes? Like just random questions and somebody's like, do you vape? He's like, no, I'm straight edge. And I read it like last week, I was like, oh my God. Like I, I wasn't supposed to see that. He was just doing that for like the people that follow him.

• 26:45Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 26:46Toby Morse?

  And I've never preached to him, like you have to be like this. Like he's never had meat. He'll never eat meat. He hates it. He thinks it's disgusting. He won't even eat, he won't even eat possible burgers or beyond. Won't even eat it.

• 26:54Rich Roll?

  Wow, he doesn't even eat that? Wow. That's, that's gonna take like a lot of courage and strength and, you know, composure and, and self-confidence to kind of navigate, you know, your peer group and have that kind of conviction.

• 27:08Toby Morse?

  Yeah. And now, now there's a bunch of friends at school who are vegan because of him. It's really cool. And they cater to him at school, um, with his, with his diet at school and, um, I don't know, just, it's more conscious world, man. I think more people, more younger kids are too.

• 27:20Rich Roll?

  Yeah, it's cool, but still where, how do you, how have you sidestepped like that kind of natural urge that I'm sure you had when you were his, his age to kind of rebel and push back against, you know, the parental unit?

• 27:33Toby Morse?

  I know. It's, it's crazy because he, he listens to this crazy death metal music that me and my wife have never played in the house. It's the only type of music me and my wife do not like. So he found this genre of music on his own that he loves.

• 27:46Rich Roll?

  Uh huh.

• 27:46Toby Morse?

  And it's totally insane music that's like, I can't even explain it, but he found it on his own. So it's kind of his rebellion against us in, in a way.

• 27:54Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 27:55Toby Morse?

  And he has a band and the band sounds like Mr. Bungle and like some grunge 90s stuff. Has nothing to do with my music. So that's cool.

• 28:01Rich Roll?

  Right. And what do you think, uh, you did or, or are doing as a parent that has, you know, kind of created this creature who, who feels good about himself and, you know, can kind of make his own way without succumbing to all of these, you know, pressures that lead us astray?

• 28:18Toby Morse?

  For us, it's communication. It's the number one, number one thing we talk about in my house is, uh, we talk about everything with my son from day one, um, about any kind of bullying, just anything, any pressure. We, we have such an open, open relationship. It's kind of insane. Like sometimes like, okay, cool. That's enough. I don't want to hear about that. But we, we talk about everything and there's this, we're a total tight unit family, man. And, um, my wife grew up. You know, just her mom, you know, I grew up just with my mom, basically. And so Matt, to have like a full family structure is so important to us. And, you know, I can't really, I can't call my dad and say, hey, maybe he took me fishing. I can't get any advice from my dad because I don't have one. So I do the best with all the values I've learned from growing up in punk rock to like instill them in my son. And it's just, it's just a lot of honesty and communication and love, tons of love.

• 29:03Toby Morse?

  And it's interesting because a lot of his friends like to come over, hang at our house because we have like the drums in the room, like I skate, like it's, it's a good vibe, you know, and um, I don't know. I think it's just being honest with them. And um,

• 29:15Rich Roll?

  The non judgmental.

• 29:16Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 29:17Rich Roll?

  You know, kind of perspective. But no matter how cool you are and like you're super cool, like your kids don't think you're, you're cool, right? Like you're just dad and mom.

• 29:26Toby Morse?

  Yeah. I mean, I feel like his friends think I'm cooler than he thinks I'm cool.

• 29:30Rich Roll?

  I'm sure that's the case.

• 29:31Toby Morse?

  Yeah. And I think that, you know, one day when he's on his own, looking back, he realizes like, wow, I get to travel the world and do this cool stuff. I know he sees it now, but it's hard when you're in it.

• 29:39Rich Roll?

  It like just based on the posts that you put up and that he puts up, like I, I get the sense that he understands that.

• 29:46Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 29:47Rich Roll?

  And I just think like, when he did that thing where with Kat Von D, where he like did the makeup thing with her. I was like, wow, what? That's like amazing that he not only did that, but like shared it, like he's basically putting on makeup and dressing up like a woman and like, just here I am, man.

• 30:04Toby Morse?

  Yeah, that took, that took a lot of, a lot of heart to do. He, so he did a campaign for Kat for Divine. It was a tribute to Divine. And um, yeah, he was a full drag queen and it was, she asked him, he was like, sure. He didn't hesitate about doing it. He was nervous when he went there, but once he had all the makeup on, he started like feeling himself. He was like, he was in it. Like he really, he loved it. I mean, there was a lot of, he got a lot of negative stuff from some of those posts, but he doesn't care about any of that stuff. But like people were just like, oh my God. But I was getting texts and random people like, that's so amazing. Your son so proudly do that. And people hit me up saying, you know, my, my kid is transgens, my, my, just all people hit me up from all different walks of life saying, this is so amazing and so powerful that your son had the balls to do that and he did it. And yeah, it was a really proud moment, man.

• 30:44Rich Roll?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, the anti bullying thing and, and you know, is so central to like your message and even like on all your merch and your swag. It's like, end racism and all that kind of stuff. Like, and that's just, seems like an outgrowth of just this PMA sensibility that goes way back to the day.

• 31:01Toby Morse?

  Yeah, 100%. I mean, I feel like it's very contagious to be a positive and to be, and do the best you can. Like, I also posted, "I'm not perfect. I don't wake up every day like everything's wonderful and I get depressed, I get sad, I go through anxiety, do all that stuff. I try to work out and push through it." But, you know, the main thing is trying to push positivity because I feel like it's really helped me in my life. I feel like you put negative energy out there, it comes back to you. It comes back to you and who you surround yourself with. And positivity has always been something I live by with my band, with my marriage and being a father. It's really helped me and just seen the good in everything.

• 31:33Rich Roll?

  It would be wild to like wake up Napoleon Hill from the dead and go, "Dude, do you realize like how your work has like permeated this subculture in a certain way and still lives on?"

• 31:44Toby Morse?

  Yeah. You see that like somebody's family members, they have an Instagram for him now.

• 31:48Rich Roll?

  Oh, they do?

• 31:49Toby Morse?

  Yeah, it's really, it's really popular. And so they do like live feeds and stuff, but somebody from his family are running that. Yeah, it's just with that book in the 60s, it's "Think and Grow Rich" and "Success Through a Positive Mental Attitude." I always try to push those books because those are the, those are the ones that inspired the Bad Brain, so then inspired me, you know, and John and stuff.

• 32:05Rich Roll?

  Right, right. That's wild, man.

• 32:07Toby Morse?

  Yeah, just that thinking, that mentality. It's, it's really powerful, man.

• 32:10Rich Roll?

  Well, growing up without a dad, did you, you know, seek out like father figures in the scene? Like, who were, who were the guys that kind of, you know, washed out for you?

• 32:20Toby Morse?

  100%. The scene, Kevin Seconds from a band called Seven Seconds, one of my favorite bands. He was a total father figure to me. He knows it. I'm friends with him now. Ian McKay from Mind and Threat, 100%. You know, I lived with the Gorilla Biscuits guys in Queens. That's where I got into vegetarianism. So like Gorilla Biscuits and Youth of Today, they were big impacts on my life. And even like Rusty Pistachio, the guitar player in my band, he was like a father figure to me, looking out for me. But definitely in the music, yeah, I looked up to these bands. Milo from Descendants. You go to these shows and you see these guys on stage and you love their music and their lyrics and they inspire you. And then after they're done playing, they're standing right next to you at their merch booth and you get to go say hi to them and talk to them. And that's so powerful in the punk rock community that, you know, everybody's all equal, you know, and to be

• 33:04Toby Morse?

  able to talk to your heroes like that, it was really impactful in my life, for sure. I write them letters. I got postcards from Ian McKay, postcards from Ian McKay from the 80s. It's awesome.

• 33:13Rich Roll?

  It's crazy.

• 33:13Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 33:21Rich Roll?

  So where does the vegetarian veganism thing start to happen for you?

• 33:26Toby Morse?

  So that kicks in in 1988. You know, I was a hip hop kid and punk rock kid and KRS wanted this song called My Philosophy.

• 33:34Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 33:34Toby Morse?

  We talked about vegetarianism and I loved KRS-One, I thought he was one of the, still one of the greatest rappers ever. And he started singing about that and I was living with Gorilla Biscuits and I became vegetarian because of them. And then I sang on the record Start Today and had a song called Cats and Dogs and the chorus was Thou Shall Not Kill. So that was really powerful being part of that record.

• 33:52Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 33:53Toby Morse?

  And we're all part of this like straight edge vegetarian hardcore scene. And there was pamphlets at all the shows and then there was Shelter became, they brought Christian into the scene. So it was like around 88 where everything changed for me. Being in New York at that time was just, it was so powerful.

• 34:08Rich Roll?

  Yeah, John always says, "Aital is vital."

• 34:14Rich Roll?

  Did you ever go to Angelica's Kitchen?

• 34:16Toby Morse?

  Oh, yeah, man.

• 34:17Rich Roll?

  But he, I think he worked there, or he worked somewhere, he worked at some like natural food market, but that must have been earlier.

• 34:23Toby Morse?

  He worked at Prana Foods maybe. That's where Chaka worked and Mark Subasch, tons of bands worked there. And then there was, you know, Down to Earth where Siv worked and Purcell worked, like all the hardcore dudes worked at these vegetarian

• 34:34Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 34:35Toby Morse?

  health food stores.

• 34:36Rich Roll?

  You could always go get like a scrounge of free mail.

• 34:38Toby Morse?

  Yes. And then there was Kate's Joint. Yeah, there was, man. But I'd see John, yeah, Angelica's was great. A good friend of mine worked at that place for a long time. Angelica's was great.

• 34:46Rich Roll?

  R.I.P.

• 34:47Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 34:48Rich Roll?

  It's no longer.

• 34:48Toby Morse?

  I know. But now it's Organic Grill. It's a great place too.

• 34:51Rich Roll?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Val.

• 34:52Toby Morse?

  I like Candle though. Candle 79?

• 34:54Rich Roll?

  I do. Yeah, it's great. I mean, it's, that's like the, that's like the crossroads of New York.

• 35:00Toby Morse?

  Totally.

• 35:00Rich Roll?

  It's like the fancy, the fancy place.

• 35:02Toby Morse?

  Yeah, that's where Tal used to be too, so.

• 35:03Rich Roll?

  Right, I know. Tal's the man. So you know Tal from that scene as well, right?

• 35:08Toby Morse?

  Yeah, I know Tal from the New York scene. Yeah, he used to come to our shows and Funny story is that I think in 1989, he hadn't, he didn't have enough money and he went to go buy a T-shirt from Sick of It All and I was at Rhodey and he was a little, he was a younger kid. And he only had five bucks, so I sold him that T-shirt. And when I reconnected with him like nine or 10 years ago, I, he told me that story and how he still had the same T-shirt and never forgot that day. It's pretty amazing, man.

• 35:30Rich Roll?

  That's crazy.

• 35:30Toby Morse?

  And that's how we reconnected, actually.

• 35:32Rich Roll?

  And for people that are listening, Tal Ronan is the, the chef and the proprietor of Crossroads, which is like not only the best vegan restaurant in LA. It's like the best restaurant in LA, period.

• 35:43Toby Morse?

  Yes, agreed. Hundred percent.

• 35:44Rich Roll?

  Travis Barker, who's been on the show as part owner. You just had your birthday party there, right?

• 35:49Toby Morse?

  Yep.

• 35:49Rich Roll?

  Fifty?

• 35:50Toby Morse?

  No, forty-nine.

• 35:51Rich Roll?

  Forty-nine. All right, man. You got another year. Forty-nine. But that was like a who's who of like musician vegan people.

• 35:57Toby Morse?

  Yeah, it was awesome.

• 35:58Rich Roll?

  Moby in there, Travis.

• 36:01Toby Morse?

  Yeah. It was a good vibe. I love Crossroads and I'm so proud of Tal and everything he's done and his whole approach to veganism. Yeah, it's just, the world piece starts in the kitchen. It's so smart and so true.

• 36:11Rich Roll?

  Yeah. So how do you think about that, like spiritually?

• 36:16Toby Morse?

  What, the veganism?

• 36:17Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 36:18Toby Morse?

  I mean, I feel like living a cruelty-free life and not harming animals and not harming the planet and doing the best you can every day is such a spiritual life and it's such a positive thing to be involved in. I feel like it makes you a better person. It makes me feel happy with what I'm doing for the planet. For, I don't know, I just feel like everything about it is a, it's been a spiritual journey, especially seeing how the world's changing and seeing how it affects other people. And I don't know, I just, I don't know, I feel like if everybody was living this way, it'd just be such a different world, man. It's just, I know, I know we're getting there. I know someday it could happen when I'm gone and my sons don't walk on this planet that, you know, a lot of houses are gone and all that stuff. But I feel like the spiritual journey for me has been knowing every day that

• 37:03Toby Morse?

  I'm not hurting anything or hurting anyone and doing my best to be a perfect human, which I'm not. But I don't know, for me, it's, I don't know. It's just something positive. It's something that I feel like is no brainer. I feel like there's so many options. It's 2019. I can't stand when people say, where do you get your protein from? Makes me so angry. It's just, it's just

• 37:25Rich Roll?

  As a non judgmental dude, you should be able to like manage that one because you know it's coming. It's an opportunity. If like, look, sometimes somebody's throwing that at you, but sometimes they really don't know.

• 37:37Toby Morse?

  It's true.

• 37:37Rich Roll?

  You know?

• 37:37Toby Morse?

  Yeah, I like to post stuff about that a lot and put proteins up and pictures of gorillas and stuff.

• 37:45Toby Morse?

  But yeah, I mean, it's, it's an amazing time to be vegan. It's amazing time to see the planet change. And I never expected to be like this with the fast food spots and just people that I grew up with and people that known I've been like this. All of a sudden they are, and not because of me. Maybe it's because of health reasons or they watched what the health or something, but they changed. I'm like, oh my God, really? You didn't you know that was me the whole time next to you, but I never said anything to them like, be like me. It's just cool to see people more conscious, you know? There's a song by Youth of Today called No More, and it was an anti meat song in the eighties. And they're like, they're like smashing hamburgers and stuff. And one of the lyrics is, um, we'll have a more conscious, caring society. And that's exactly what we're having right now. It's crazy, man.

• 38:25Rich Roll?

  It's pretty cool.

• 38:26Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 38:26Rich Roll?

  What was the kind of freestyle that you threw down in your podcast where you're like, no meat, straight, no drugs? Did you just make that up or was that from the song?

• 38:36Toby Morse?

  I thought you were just No, I just made it up on the whim. I did a freestyle for my first podcast. Yeah. I never get into, I, I, I love hip hop so much, but I would never rap because I respect the culture too much. But Veggie T would be a good name though.

• 38:48Rich Roll?

  Yeah. Do you, uh, I mean, you, you're like a grounded, you, you seem like you have a good, like healthy grasp on, on like humility and gratitude. Like, is that a, is that a practice? Does that come natural? Is that an outgrowth of just kind of like this lifestyle that you've been living for so long? Or how do you think about that?

• 39:06Toby Morse?

  I don't really think about it. I mean, I definitely, I definitely feel that I'm very lucky to do it at love for this many years. And I've built this life for myself through, through pretty much nothing. And I'm very, um, I, I, I appreciate it and love it. I worked hard to get to where I am with my band and, um, but the fact that I have no boss and I get to do what I want and still play music at 49 years old. I'm very lucky. I hate to say the word, hate, hate to throw the word blessed around because that's thrown out around a lot. I definitely paid my dues and I'm blessed to be still doing what I do. And I feel like the key to being positive and being happy. It can't happen for everyone, but if you do, doing what you love is the key to that, man. I feel like doing what you love keeps you positive and happy, keeps you young. Um, I know there's people that are positive that work crappy jobs from nine to five and they hate it

• 39:51Toby Morse?

  and they work in a cubicle and they, and they're, and they're, and they're positive too. But I feel like to really have control of your life and be your own boss and do what you love. I really, I feel like there's no reason why you shouldn't be happy and be positive.

• 40:03Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 40:03Toby Morse?

  Cause you get to do what you love and I feel like I'm very lucky to still do that. I didn't really have a plan B. I never really had a plan B. I just live my life. And that's kind of stressed my wife out for a whole marriage. Um, is that I just, I just live and I just, I never had a plan. I just did it. I did the band and it's 25 years later. I have a nonprofit. I speak at schools, have a podcast. I have a couple of things I do. My merch does really well. I'm thankful for that. But I just get to live this life and I think it kind of, kind of bugs people out a lot. Cause I'm like, if like, you're just a hardcore dude in a band. How are you doing this? I just, I hustle, man. I really, I really focus on trying to do good and put good out there. And I don't know. I mean, I just, I live a good life. I'm, I'm very lucky. I'm healthy.

• 40:45Toby Morse?

  Let's get all my blood checked. Get my heart checked. Cause I was always worried about my dad and get all that done. And every time I get that done, my doctor's like, you're healthy. I was an 18 year old girl. I'm like,

• 40:53Rich Roll?

  Nice.

• 40:54Toby Morse?

  Vegan life, man.

• 40:55Rich Roll?

  Yeah. Well, no plan B. I mean, I would imagine when you said, I'm going to New York, there were a bunch of people rolling their eyes. They're like, we'll see how long this is going to last. But to like show up and like create something out of nothing. And you know, if, if you could like go back and, and, and talk to that 18 year old kid as a 49 year old, who's still like doing the thing that you were trying to do at that age, it's like insane. I mean, what an incredible gift.

• 41:20Toby Morse?

  Yeah. It's, and it's like, I wasn't, I'm not a singer. Like I just, it just, it just started singing. I didn't plan that. I, I went to New York. I had to do some music, worked at record labels, was a roadie, then started the band and then. Yeah, I met my wife on tour, like so many good things happened when I got involved in this scene in New York, because I'd already been in Rhode Island and DC, but New York was something way special.

• 41:40Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 41:41Toby Morse?

  And, um, yeah, I just, I feel like it is the positivity, it's not giving up, it's focusing on what you love, it's sticking to it, it's staying relevant, it's, uh, keeping the passion. I still love what I do, my band and my brothers, I hang out with them on a daily basis, I talk to them every day, we love each other, it's not going on stage, going through the motions for money, we love each other, we love these songs, we still live these lyrics that we wrote over 25 years ago.

• 42:04Rich Roll?

  It's the same guys in the band from day one?

• 42:06Toby Morse?

  Yeah, everybody except for my brother, yeah. He goes back and forth, he's in the offspring now.

• 42:09Rich Roll?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 42:09Toby Morse?

  So, yeah, it's the same guys, man.

• 42:11Rich Roll?

  I mean, most bands, you know, don't make it past, you know, the first year or two, right? And to be still doing it together and to say you love those guys, like, that's, like, what is that, what is that, like, recipe?

• 42:23Toby Morse?

  I don't, I think it's just, we never took ourselves too seriously, we're not the tightest band, we are pretty sloppy at times, but it's about the message and how we get it out, we love each other, we're just friends and we love what we do, and we've had different, a million managers and booking agents, we're on a major label, independent label, we're on Conan O'Brien, we're on MTV, but all that stuff didn't affect who we were as people. Like, it didn't matter what label, we were still the same dudes and we always stayed humble and really appreciated where we were. We played Conan O'Brien, had John Joseph in the audience, he was like the only friend we had in the audience, he was like yelling in between takes, and on all the amps.

• 42:59Rich Roll?

  Yo, Toby!

• 43:00Toby Morse?

  Yeah, he was so proud, and we wore like all of our friends' favorite band tees, we took tape and did shoutouts and tags all over amps because we knew that this may never happen again, and it didn't, but we were the first New York hardcore band to be on late night television, we were so excited, man, and we appreciated it, and that, just those moments like that, we've never took for granted, and, um, I think people can relate to our lyrics and they know it's coming from somewhere real and real experiences, I've always warmed my heart on my sleeve, I had my wife on the cover of my first seven inch, I've always put my family out there, I've always shared my life with people, I have nothing to hide, I'm just, this is who I am, and, um... I don't know. I just feel like that resonates with people and we're lucky that people can connect to it, you know?

• 43:40Rich Roll?

  Well, I think it's anchored in the DIY roots of of the hardcore, you know, subculture, because you weren't, you didn't set out to become a pop star or like a huge rock and roll band.

• 43:53Toby Morse?

  No.

• 43:54Rich Roll?

  That world is all about stickers and flyers and your friends.

• 43:58Toby Morse?

  Band jeans.

• 43:59Rich Roll?

  And it's like, you're not, you're not in it to like, get huge.

• 44:02Toby Morse?

  No.

• 44:02Rich Roll?

  Right? So anything that comes out of it is like gravy. So it's almost like the healthy gratitude for anything that happens is packed into it.

• 44:12Toby Morse?

  Hundred percent. Like, yeah, there was, there was no goals of like, we need to be on television, the radio. It was none of that. So we just want to play music and tour.

• 44:19Rich Roll?

  Was there, was there, was there some backlash, though, after Conan, like, like the sellout?

• 44:23Toby Morse?

  Oh, yeah, for sure. Because we just signed to a major label and that was like right with the internet and the message board started popping and people would talk a lot of crap on there. But I think we got a lot of, you know, a lot of shit for that record. But once again, we took a chance and we did a record that was with a bigger producer and we had a more polished sound because we were listening to not just hardcore, we were listening to other types of music and we had opportunity and we went to AMC and we tried it and it didn't work out. We tried it. And then, but, but the Conan O'Brien thing happened at the same time that, oh, now they're on television.

• 44:52Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 44:53Toby Morse?

  And it's like, you, you, wouldn't you want like your favorite band to like, get their message out further? If you believe in their message, wouldn't you want other people to hear the message too and get it out to a bigger audience? And that was the whole thing for us. Like, we wouldn't just tour with hardcore bands. We tour poppy bands. We, we take chances and have an audience that never heard us before. I love the challenge to win them over. And we just want to get the message out. And that was the whole point from day one, using this band as a vessel to spread our message.

• 45:17Rich Roll?

  Uh huh.

• 45:17Toby Morse?

  And so, um, we tried with a major label. It wasn't a horrible thing, but we got, we got caught up in the mix of the other bands and the timing and stuff. But it was, it was a fun experience, you know?

• 45:26Rich Roll?

  Yeah. Well, as somebody who lives their life pretty transparently online and is as somebody who's all about positivity, how do you navigate like the treacherous waters of like toxic social media?

• 45:40Toby Morse?

  It's, it's hard. It can be really draining. Like, sometimes I tell my friends that I'm too, I'm too emo for Instagram. I'm too emo for that because sometimes I do let it get to me.

• 45:48Rich Roll?

  Emo dad.

• 45:49Toby Morse?

  Emo dad. And sometimes I do even like, it could be like a hundred amazing comments and then one negative one. I'm just like, I don't know, I just get bummed that sometimes I'll DM like, hey, I try to have a conversation because I want to know what the problem is. I want to talk to him about it. I don't just want to delete them or block them. I actually try to see what your beef is with me first. Because I do take it, maybe I take it personally because it's my everything. It's my heart and what I put out there is really me. It's like, I'm not, I'm not candy coating anything I post. It's really me. And sometimes people take that as, really, that's you? Like, some people get bummed, like Coldplay, they get so offended by that because I'm supposed to be a hardcore dude. I can't like other types of music. But yeah, it's hard, man. It's a really positive tool to promote yourself and promote a message and promote your merchandise and, you know, spread everything you're doing. And on the other hand, it's like a real negative, dark place, man.

• 46:34Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 46:34Toby Morse?

  And sometimes you get caught up in that, just getting caught up going down these

• 46:38Rich Roll?

  Rabbit holes.

• 46:38Toby Morse?

  Dark spirals. Yeah, even like political stuff, just everything. It's like, it's draining, man. I guess you could check on your phone how many hours you spend on that. I haven't done that yet.

• 46:47Toby Morse?

  My wife tried to make me do it the other day.

• 46:48Rich Roll?

  Probably shouldn't.

• 46:49Toby Morse?

  I know, but like, at the same time, it's like, I, I, I tell, when, when Instagram went down a couple of weeks ago, for like that 15 hours or whatever, I had a drop I was dropping on Friday and I just realized in that day, like, holy crap, this is how I make my living. It's really scary. That's how I promote all my stuff. I'm on Twitter too, but like, and Facebook, but like, I'm like, wow, this is such a powerful tool and like, I hope it's up so I can promote my new thing dropping Friday. It's kind of scary, man.

• 47:15Rich Roll?

  Yeah, that if it, if it got taken away, then you're, you're cut off at the ankles.

• 47:19Toby Morse?

  Yeah, that's kind of scary, man.

• 47:22Rich Roll?

  Yeah. But you probably, do you have like an email list and stuff like that? Like, that's

• 47:25Toby Morse?

  That's old school.

• 47:26Rich Roll?

  Yeah, you should, man. I would think like, anybody from hardcore would have like some crazy email list of people that goes back to, you know, the 90s.

• 47:34Toby Morse?

  Maybe Facebook we could do it. Yeah, that was a scary moment. I was like, holy crap, this is kind of, obviously I make money from touring, that's all.

• 47:40Rich Roll?

  Yeah. But I like that you're like a lover. You're like, yeah, I love Coldplay. Like you did that bit, you put that, that post of that thing about the Backstreet Boys.

• 47:47Toby Morse?

  Love Backstreet Boys. And it's funny because like the toughest dudes.

• 47:51Rich Roll?

  Gets people off guard.

• 47:52Toby Morse?

  I know. And the toughest dudes be like, you're like that too. Like I'll see some of the comments is like, it's okay to like other types of music. You can be hardcore, you can be tatted up. But it's okay to like other music, man. You shouldn't live your life with blinders on. It's like.

• 48:04Rich Roll?

  How about just celebrating any artist that's putting themselves out there, trying to do something?

• 48:08Toby Morse?

  Hundred percent.

• 48:09Rich Roll?

  You know?

• 48:09Toby Morse?

  Hundred percent, man. Like, dude, if people knew all the band tattoos I had on my body of like U2 and Madonna and all this stuff, they'd be like, what? I mean, people do know. I have like a hundred band tattoos and it's not just hardcore. Like, I like everything. I like to keep my mind open.

• 48:22Rich Roll?

  Where did the, uh, walk me through how you got involved in, in doing the public speaking thing with kids?

• 48:30Toby Morse?

  Oh, yeah. So I have a nonprofit called One Life One Chance. It's, it's named after one of our songs from our record, uh, FTTW 1999. Basically, there was a girl at a school in far rockaway Queens who was a fan of H2O. And, um, she made a PMA mix CD for her, her students for her spring break. And it was like all a bunch of bands and just one song by H2O is called Sunday. It's a heavy song about my dad, um, and becoming a dad. And so when they came back, the number one song on this PMA mix CD they connected to was this song called Sunday. And so she's like, I'm gonna send you some letters. So she sent me letters from every kid in the class breaking down to me why they love that song. I, I could get through maybe the third one. I was bawling just reading these letters. These kids knew nothing about hardcore or punk rock, nothing.

• 49:14Toby Morse?

  She's like, next time you come to New York, come by me. You should talk to them. I'm like, about what? She's like, are you straight edge? You're vegan? You're a dad? You're fully tattooed? Stereotypes? I was like, okay. So I started writing all these notes and cue cards. I put a PowerPoint presentation together, which I'd never done in my life. I was so freaking, I was.

• 49:30Rich Roll?

  Like your TED Talk.

• 49:31Toby Morse?

  I was so nervous, man. I went to the school, there were metal detectives. It was super gnarly. Get into the classroom, have my power, my PowerPoint, have all my cards. And I just have my mic and then like, I just start talking. I start doing my thing. I didn't look at my cards one time ever again. Never had to. Started telling my story and then like, after that, did a Q and A and everybody stood up and asked me questions. They read me their letters. It was hugging. It was crying. It was such, it's, it's a connection I had never experienced in my life. It's not like playing a show where kids know who you are. They come see you. They pay the money. They sing along. These kids didn't know who I was. I'm some tattooed freak in the front of the class. Telling my story and I talked about, I talked about my friends who passed from drugs and alcohol, growing up with no dad, racism, positivity, punk rock, skateboarding, everything. And, um,

• 50:14Toby Morse?

  It's just really connected. And I remember walking out of that school, my friend Von Lewis, who took me, and Tal was there too. And I said, I want to do that. I want to keep doing this. And then immediately, once I posted about it, every single punk rock hardcore kid who was like on the PTA, or like a teacher, or counselor, or principal, all hitting me up. So just on the strength of me and my bands, I started going to all these schools.

• 50:35Rich Roll?

  Wow.

• 50:36Toby Morse?

  And so-

• 50:37Rich Roll?

  Tal drove you to that first one.

• 50:38Toby Morse?

  Yeah, he did. He was like talking. I was so nervous.

• 50:41Rich Roll?

  So what were you, what was the message? Like, what were you imparting that that connected so deeply with these kids?

• 50:47Toby Morse?

  I think for those kids that I'm up there with a t-shirt, I'm covered in tattoos. As soon as I walk in, there's no way in the world, even though it's straight edge, is we would ever imagine that somebody who does what I do and looks like I look, would never try drugs and alcohol. That totally bugged out the kids, first and foremost. I wasn't saying I'm a recovering addict. I lost my wife and my kids to drugs. I never experienced any of it. Most of the kids I spoke to probably had more experience with drugs than I did. And then I just told this story. These are my friends. These are some people you might recognize who are celebrities, who live a straight edge vegan lifestyle, whatever. I had a bunch of friends in there. And they were connecting with that. And I think it was just a connection to me just being real and honest. And then the Q and A is my favorite part, because that's when people actually ask you really serious questions. Some people pull me to the side after the, after the thing,

• 51:32Toby Morse?

  and they start crying, telling me about like, how their mom and dad fight in the house and smoke weed, or my, my daughter lost her life to drunk driving, just crazy intense stories, like, and by the time I'm out of there, kids are like handing me, from the time I do the second presentation, they're like writing One Life on Chance, and straight edge, and drawing me all these pictures. They're DMing me. It's an immediate connection. It's so overwhelming. And I don't know, my main fear going there was like, I can't swear. I'm such a sailor on stage, I can't say fuck, I can't swear. I was so scared about swearing the whole entire time. I've never sworn at any schools. I've done like 36 schools. I never swore once. But, um, yeah, it was really, I think John came to one, I think in New York. We gave away a drum set to a school needed. Travis, I did a video with Travis, we surprised a school

• 52:15Toby Morse?

  and gave a drum set. I started asking schools what they needed for their music departments. It got really good, but it was just really hard to do that, because there's a lot of red tape involved. It's not like booking a show. They want you when they want you. And so I was trying to do H2O shows and then do a school, but I'd be like so tired by the time I got to the school. It's hard, man, because the schools really want you to have no money to get you there.

• 52:34Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 52:35Toby Morse?

  So that became really frustrating for me and I haven't done one in a minute because I got really busy with my band. And I don't know, I just love it. So I just spiraled from that. Then I just took like a year to get my nonprofit status. That's amazing. I have a board of directors right now.

• 52:49Rich Roll?

  And how are you raising money and what are you doing with the money that you raise for that?

• 52:53Toby Morse?

  I haven't raised really any money. Travis Barker stepped in. It's really hard. Travis Barker stepped in the first time and he helped me out. We had merchandise and all this cool stuff he raises. Thank you Travis for that. For a couple of schools he got me. And then just, I've just been doing it myself. I do it for free. I just go out and play a show and a book around it. I'm not, I wasn't trying, I'm not trying to make money off it. I love talking to the kids and spreading the message. But in reality, it's really hard to get me across the country to do that, you know, and.

• 53:17Rich Roll?

  So just basically using the nonprofit to underwrite the expenses required so that you can show up at these schools.

• 53:23Toby Morse?

  Totally.

• 53:23Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 53:24Toby Morse?

  I mean, I would do was talk. I've met with so many different people in the course of 10 years about what they could do and wanted to do. And it all fell through or just different ideas and like this traveling school tour, which we tried to do, which have been awesome. Like I wanted, I still want to do it. I love doing it. I still get hit up about doing it all the time. It's just frustrating because it's just hard to do it, especially with my tour schedule and everything else going on. Trying to balance it all, but I love doing it and all the people that got me to the schools, the first ones, I appreciate them for believing in me to come there. Because I didn't have any, I didn't go to college to be a speaker or anything. It's like I didn't have any background for this. Sometimes I say college or anything. I'm just me. I'm just a singer in a punk band.

• 53:59Rich Roll?

  Yeah, but that's what's powerful. That's what connects with people.

• 54:01Toby Morse?

  That's what I think.

• 54:02Rich Roll?

  That truth and authenticity and that lack of judgment and, and just having your guard down and speaking to them like human beings.

• 54:09Toby Morse?

  Yeah, I think that's what it was. It was very, it was very real and just honest and I just, I just told everything about my life. It just, yeah, I mean. So I think that's really what connected with it originally and yeah, it was really fun doing that. I want to keep doing it. It's just, it's just hard. It sucks because I waited so long to get my nonprofit and now I have a nonprofit and really not. Do anything with it now. So yeah, I'll definitely get back to it. Once I'm done.

• 54:30Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 54:30Toby Morse?

  On my touring life.

• 54:32Rich Roll?

  Well, I've got a teenage daughter and a preteen daughter. I've got two older boys that are musicians that just moved out. They live in Echo Park now.

• 54:38Toby Morse?

  Awesome.

• 54:38Rich Roll?

  Pursuing the music thing.

• 54:40Toby Morse?

  That's awesome.

• 54:41Rich Roll?

  I'll tell you more about that later.

• 54:42Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 54:42Rich Roll?

  But with the daughters, especially the teenage daughter, like I'm, I'm really in touch with just how intense.

• 54:52Rich Roll?

  Like the peer pressure is and the sort of

• 54:57Rich Roll?

  pressures that come with adhering to kind of a certain social structure and how important it is like where you fall in that kind of like pecking order of your friends and it's so intense and it's just exacerbated by, you know, the phones that we have in our pockets that basically allow, you know, young people to kind of see where everybody is at all moments and who's doing well and who's not and the FOMO and like who the cool kids are like, it's just.

• 55:25Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 55:26Rich Roll?

  I can't imagine having to contend with that when I was at that age.

• 55:30Toby Morse?

  Yeah, we didn't have phones. We like played outside. We skated. We did creative things, went to shows. We did all kinds of cool things. We got to do that. And so it's like my son would never know a world without phones or social media. And it's crazy to see him on his phone and I, I don't know what he's, I, I try, I try to like be in the mix on what he's, I totally trust him. I know I say do anything crazy, but it's just the pressures and the different things. And it's just like this Kardashian world of like expectations for women to look a certain way and be a certain way. And yeah, you're looking at people and seeing what they're doing. Are they really doing that? Are they not doing that? Like the whole, that whole, um, whole fire festival thing. That is a perfect example of it. But just like the realness of it. And like you said, like being accepted and being down and everybody's at Coachella just to get their picture taken at Coachella.

• 56:09Rich Roll?

  Right.

• 56:10Toby Morse?

  Really don't care about the music. And I feel like.

• 56:12Rich Roll?

  Somebody posted the other day, I saw like, um, if they just had those like fancy backdrops at, at Coachella and there were no bands, like all the same people would still show up.

• 56:21Toby Morse?

  It's true, man.

• 56:22Rich Roll?

  Instagram pictures.

• 56:23Toby Morse?

  It's true, man. It's like that. And like also just with the bullying too, like you, we, we would go to school and people would talk crap to us. And then we'd go home with our parents and we'd be safe. It just continues now on the phones all night long, whether at home, on the phone, social media. I think the kids can't escape any kind of pressure or negativity now.

• 56:39Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 56:39Toby Morse?

  It's with them 24 seven. And um, it's scary. It's definitely scary being a parent. Definitely scary with that, but that's what I'm saying. The communication is super important. As long as you're communicating with your kids, you know exactly what they're going through and dealing with. Hopefully, they tell you everything. But I see my son taking selfies all day. I'm like, what are you doing? He's like, oh, I'm doing my, I'm doing, I forgot what it's called, man. My streams or something.

• 57:00Rich Roll?

  The streaks.

• 57:01Toby Morse?

  The streaks. I'm doing my streaks. It's like, and like, my friend, my friend is like.

• 57:05Rich Roll?

  But that's like, the program is designed to keep you on it by like, creating this pressure around these streaks. It's insane. You're just playing into their own game, like their game that they set the rules to.

• 57:16Toby Morse?

  I think Steve Jobs said like, he wanted to create like the human extension, the extension of the human body. I think that's what he was saying about the phone. It actually.

• 57:22Rich Roll?

  Yeah, but he wouldn't let his kids use the phone or the iPad.

• 57:26Toby Morse?

  Really?

• 57:26Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 57:27Toby Morse?

  I didn't even know that.

• 57:27Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 57:28Toby Morse?

  Wow, man. Yeah, it's, it's, it's intense. I feel like there's so much before, like, for young girls, it'd be the magazines they got and like, see the skinny models on the front. They'd have to go like to the, get a subscription to go buy the magazines in the mall. Now it's just like scrolling. I look like that. I need to look like that. Get my lips like that. I can't even imagine. I can't even imagine, man, the pressures, especially where we live.

• 57:49Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 57:50Toby Morse?

  We're like in the heart of it, man.

• 57:51Rich Roll?

  I know. It's the belly of the beast.

• 57:53Toby Morse?

  It is.

• 57:53Rich Roll?

  Kardashians are right down the road here. You know what I mean? They're like literally down the street from us.

• 57:59Toby Morse?

  And then they had the lip challenge that one time. The people were cutting their faces. They were sucking on glass to make the lips pop. That was a crazy thing, too.

• 58:04Rich Roll?

  I don't know about that.

• 58:05Toby Morse?

  Oh, yeah. It was like the lip challenge where they put their lips in a glass and they suck it out and then the lips would pop. And then just to get fat lips for a minute.

• 58:12Rich Roll?

  Oh, my God.

• 58:13Toby Morse?

  It's just cra- it's, and it's, and it's just like, and the people like not really working hard to be famous. They want to be famous on social media and make money off that, but really have no, you can be pretty and stuff. It just, like the work ethic is all that's so different now. In YouTube, just be famous, do a couple goofy videos. You can be like multimillionaire. My son's telling me about all these YouTubers and stuff. I'm like, what? With these big houses and all these cars and just doing YouTube silly videos. It's crazy, man.

• 58:40Rich Roll?

  Crazy world out there.

• 58:48Rich Roll?

  Well, one of the things that you talk about all the time is like role models. Like, how can you be a role model? Like, some people don't want to be a role model. A lot of musicians are like, "I'm a musician, I'm not a role model." But you've kind of like stepped willingly, like kind of embraced this role. And one of the things you talk about all the time is like, "Look, we don't have, we need healthier role models out there for young people, especially, you know, given what you just said."

• 59:11Toby Morse?

  Hundred percent. And like, first and foremost, not just a role model as a musician, but as a parent. I think it's our number one job to be role models for our parents, for our children. Because if we're not their role models, they're gonna find it in somebody else that may not be so positive, inspirational, and compassionate. They're gonna look outside their household for some, I don't know, some other artist or just whoever, maybe somebody at their school. So it's really important to be a role model for our children so they can look up to us. They don't have to look up to us, but we want to lead by example. Just like I say in my music and everything I post, I want to lead by example, be living proof that you can live a certain way and still have a fun, successful, happy life. But yeah, I mean, as far as role models concerned, I don't consider myself one maybe,

• 59:55Toby Morse?

  I try to be the best in my, as a husband and as a father. And if I am one in music, that's great. I feel like, not to toot my own horn, but if I was to be a role model for somebody, maybe I'm a good example because I don't do drugs, I don't party, I don't eat animals, I exercise, I try to be positive, I try to get a good message out there. I'm not telling people to look up to me, I'm not telling people that I should be their role model. But, you know, when you have this platform and you're singing in a band and you inspire people, you do have some sort of role of like accountability. Not accountability maybe, if you're writing these lyrics that people love and you should be living by those lyrics. Some people just don't live their lyrics or live what they're talking about or singing about. And I live those lyrics.

• 1:00:40Toby Morse?

  And so if people look up to me for a certain song that I wrote, yeah, I wrote that song and I meant it and I live it. And so, yeah, I mean, I'm just me and I'm not trying to be like, "Look at me, you should look up to me and I should be your role model." But as far as my son is concerned, like, he tells me all the time that I'm his role model and I'm like his hero or whatever. And that's just me being me. I'm not trying to portray a certain image or portray a certain thing to make myself look better, because I'm not a perfect person, like I keep saying. But, yeah, for role models for my son...

• 1:01:13Toby Morse?

  Oh man, he likes.

• 1:01:14Rich Roll?

  I mean, it doesn't get better than that for your son.

• 1:01:16Toby Morse?

  I know, but you like some hip hop and it's like, oh my god.

• 1:01:19Rich Roll?

  But that's what they're supposed to do.

• 1:01:21Toby Morse?

  I know.

• 1:01:21Rich Roll?

  They're supposed to, listen, you know this as well as anyone. The next generation is supposed to fall in music, in love with music that you don't understand.

• 1:01:30Toby Morse?

  True, but like everything I represent is the total opposite of the hip hop he's listening to.

• 1:01:35Rich Roll?

  You have an expectation that you're like, I'm the most open minded person in the world when it comes to music. So of course he goes and he finds the one kind of music that you can't wrap your head around. You gotta like celebrate that because that's.

• 1:01:49Toby Morse?

  It's true.

• 1:01:49Rich Roll?

  Your DNA.

• 1:01:50Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:51Rich Roll?

  You know.

• 1:01:51Toby Morse?

  And you know what's true? And I say this at the schools too, like I met, I met Snoop Dogg. I love Snoop Dogg, but I don't smoke weed like Snoop Dogg. That's what I say at the schools. You can love an artist, look up to them, love their music. We don't have to try to be exactly like them. So it's like, yeah, my son listens to like Little Pump, but my son doesn't do any drugs. So that's, that's a good thing.

• 1:02:07Rich Roll?

  Loves like some pretty hardcore hip hop where they're just, I mean, dude, I, you know, I don't even know, like that's how old and out of it I am. But like, it's all about like, you know, smoking weed and like, you know, the bitches and like, and she's like a very strong,

• 1:02:25Rich Roll?

  convicted person. Like I don't worry about her. She's a, you know, she knows what she wants out of life and like she.

• 1:02:30Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:31Rich Roll?

  She doesn't take any shit from anyone and like she's, you know, got her stuff together in a big way, but I'm like confused.

• 1:02:38Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:38Rich Roll?

  Like why, why are you into this like misogynistic, you know, kind of music and like, you don't understand, like it's, it's the same thing, right?

• 1:02:46Toby Morse?

  Yeah. I mean, I, I love Snoop Dogg. I never smoked weed. I love gangster rap. I never been arrested. I never, I never, you know what I mean? So that kinda, I like a lot of hard stuff too. It doesn't mean that I think I'm hard or I think I should be like them. I appreciate, appreciate their story and the message where they come from, uh, the music, the beat, the lyrics. That's how much, I mean, I love hip hop, but I obviously I don't, I didn't grow up in the way certain rappers did, but I, I respect it and like it. So she might be like, I, I get this vibe. It's coming from a different perspective and a different. Community in life, I don't know. I mean, it's weird how the kids are connected to some really crazy hip hop, man, like really like violent and.

• 1:03:25Rich Roll?

  It's weird also how in the Me Too era, like all of that stuff somehow gets a pass.

• 1:03:29Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:30Rich Roll?

  Like, why aren't we like up in arms about some of that stuff?

• 1:03:34Toby Morse?

  It's true, but it's been going on for so long too, like with Two Live.

• 1:03:38Rich Roll?

  Just like how Snoop gets to smoke dope wherever he goes, like it's just their grandfathered in or something.

• 1:03:43Toby Morse?

  Yeah, maybe. Grandfathered phone plan.

• 1:03:47Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:47Toby Morse?

  Yeah, that's true. Yeah, that's true. It's just part of, it's part of his persona. It's part of who he is. I mean, it's interesting.

• 1:03:53Rich Roll?

  It's weird, right?

• 1:03:54Toby Morse?

  Yeah, everywhere. Yeah, I go have a green juice. I'm like, green juice.

• 1:04:00Rich Roll?

  One of the things that I, that I do worry about with the phones and the technology and all of that, and I'm interested in your perspective as a creative person is, is it seems like you have to really have discipline and erect boundaries around these things in order to find like the internal time to kind of tap into that creativity. Like you got, in order to be an expressive person, you have to allow yourself to be bored. Right?

• 1:04:26Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:26Rich Roll?

  We, we no longer, never have to be bored again. We're always entertained. And I feel like that, and I see this in my own self, like that can be a barricade or a block to actually tapping into the things that, you know, are percolating under the surface that I want to express. But if I'm just scrolling all the time, standing in lines or whatever, like I never get to connect with that. And when you have a younger generation that's coming up that doesn't know what it's like to have those kinds of experiences, what is that going to look like 10 years from now, 20 years from now, in terms of the kind of art that's going to get created?

• 1:05:03Toby Morse?

  I know. It's scary because I, I saw like when Kanye West was doing his record, he like totally turned off and went to Montana or something like to get away from all that. And I think that's what people have to do, to turn off their phones. Yeah. And go to some secluded area and try to get inspired. It's kind of, for me, I don't know if I could go to some like woods and try to get inspired to write a song. I don't know. I like the energy of the people around me. I like. Living and being involved in things and being inspired like that.

• 1:05:27Rich Roll?

  Well, life, life enriches art, but that's different from being addicted to your screen.

• 1:05:31Toby Morse?

  I know. I feel like kids now, they, they, they click through and they say, oh, I want to be like that or sound like that or look like that. And that's how they get inspired. They kind of want to kind of copy it. I don't know. The originality is kind of.

• 1:05:42Rich Roll?

  But there's a difference between consuming that content, and it's fine to be inspired by certain people versus, you know, using those devices to create because they're also super powerful for that. Like you see kids that are 12 years old that look, you know, that could like edit a feature movie.

• 1:05:59Toby Morse?

  Yeah, that's true. That's true. That's crazy, man. And think about all the photographers now, maybe losing jobs and money because phones are just, right? You take photos with that, like all the photography use on phones and just the different things you could do with the phone. They don't really have to have an education for a skill for and just, I don't know. It's, yeah, man. I haven't, I haven't wrote a record in a while, but when I do, I definitely don't get inspired by my phone for sure. I start just writing stuff and go in my backyard of my picnic table and just start writing ideas and things that I want to sing about and what I'm inspired about.

• 1:06:32Rich Roll?

  How does that process look for you?

• 1:06:35Toby Morse?

  I just, I just write down, basically when I write songs, I take a notebook like that and I just write down these things that I'm feeling or thoughts or even like an idea like I'm writing a song about skating or this and that. I just write it and just start writing stuff and then I put it all together and make it sound right. You know what I mean? I just, I just write and then I try to put everything together and make it make sense. But yeah, I just think about things I'm going through in life. It's for me, it's like, I don't know if I'm going to make another record. We did our record like, I don't know, four years ago. And it was like, I felt like that was like one of our last records and we never forced records. Like we've been together 25 years and maybe have six albums. That's really bad for a band's career. That's not a lot of records. So I feel like we, we make records when we're inspired. We don't, we're like, some bands just put records out every year so they can go tour, but we don't do that. We just wait to inspire, but.

• 1:07:20Toby Morse?

  Yeah, I've been really inspired to really write about things, I feel like.

• 1:07:23Rich Roll?

  But you still tour like every year, right?

• 1:07:25Toby Morse?

  Yeah, touring is different, for sure. We have like a catalog of songs, and we're celebrating 25 years this year, we're celebrating 20 years of one of our other records. So every year we have an anniversary, which is awesome, when you become an older band, you can go and go on these tours.

• 1:07:38Rich Roll?

  And celebrate all the records. Do those like summer festivals and all that? Like, what are some of the good places where you have huge fanbase?

• 1:07:44Toby Morse?

  Um, Europe's amazing, South America's incredible. That's our biggest places is Europe and South America. America's great, it's just been oversaturated with bands for many, many years. We have great places, and we play in the US, but it's not like it is in Europe, in South America, and Southeast Asia.

• 1:07:59Rich Roll?

  Would you have thought that like hardcore would still be kicking it like this, this many years, you know, after?

• 1:08:06Toby Morse?

  I don't, I never even thought about that, and I have friends who've been in bands for like over 30 years, and they still kill it. They tour full-time, they're older than me, they're still great live, and they still make records, and people still care. And it's, it's an amazing genre of music, man. There's something about hardcore punk that it just goes for generations and generations, and nobody has to be selling millions of albums or on television. It's just this underground family, very lucky.

• 1:08:29Rich Roll?

  You can make your living, you can make your way.

• 1:08:32Toby Morse?

  Totally.

• 1:08:32Rich Roll?

  It's crazy.

• 1:08:33Toby Morse?

  Yeah, I'm very lucky, the festivals in Europe are amazing, and the thing about Europe is like, they stack a festival, so it could be like H2O, Wu-Tang Clan, Agnostic Front, Chromeags. It could be all these bands together on one festival that would never happen in America.

• 1:08:46Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:47Toby Morse?

  Like, it's crazy, like in Czech Republic or in Belgium, there's like, I end up playing with my friends mostly overseas than I do in America, because you cross paths with them all summer long. It's really awesome. I check the schedule, oh, I'm gonna play with those guys, those guys. It's really cool.

• 1:09:00Rich Roll?

  You've toured with some big bands, though, over the years.

• 1:09:03Toby Morse?

  Yeah, we definitely, uh, we did some great tours with some diverse, poppier bands, yeah, like, uh, I remember, um, what's that band? 30 Seconds of Mars was opening up for us on one of the tours we did before they blew up with the Used, and we did Boxcar Racer, New Found Glory, Blink-182, Rancid, The Mighty Boss Tones. They took us on our first couple of tours. Yeah, we're very lucky.

• 1:09:25Rich Roll?

  On that, on that note of like, you don't have to be the biggest band in the world if you have like just a devoted fan base and you can like make a living and do your thing. The 30 Seconds to Mars guys really like figured that out. Like, just go direct to their audience and not worry about, you know, Billboard and like record companies and all that kind of stuff. And one of the things that they do, maybe you know about this or have been to it, they do this annual thing called Camp Mars.

• 1:09:50Toby Morse?

  Yeah, I heard about that. Yeah, I watched your doc too.

• 1:09:52Rich Roll?

  It's right down the street here. They ran out like this camp campground. I think it's like a former like YMCA camp or whatever. And for a couple of days, like an extended weekend, they open it up to like their hardcore fans who come from like all over the world, who get to like live in these cabins for a couple of days.

• 1:10:11Toby Morse?

  Oh, wow.

• 1:10:12Rich Roll?

  And the band is like there and they perform at night and they're kind of available and they hang out.

• 1:10:16Toby Morse?

  That's awesome.

• 1:10:16Rich Roll?

  And they have cool people come in and speak and it's all very like positive and there's no like, there's no booze. It's like totally clean. And it's just like, they're hardcore people that like love them. And then they do like basically these like private concerts for them at night and they film it and they made that, you know, they make little movies out of it and stuff like that. But I was like, that's, that's the future.

• 1:10:36Toby Morse?

  Yeah, that's really cool. Like a personal is hang with them.

• 1:10:39Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:10:40Toby Morse?

  That's awesome.

• 1:10:40Rich Roll?

  And just be like, we don't need all that other, all the machinations of the industry. Like, we have our people that love us and let's like take care of them.

• 1:10:47Toby Morse?

  Yeah, they were really cool. There's, there's a story that I think they'll never forget. Two stories is that one, during, during that tour with them, my guitar player stole one of the tour buses while the bus drivers were sleeping in the hotel. And us and 30 Seconds to Mars and all the bands cramped into the bus. And we drove to Bam Margera's house for like a party that night. And Rusty, our guitar player, was driving the bus and we came back to the parking lot and all the bus drivers were standing there in the parking lot, so bummed. And another thing is that we were about to play in New York City and this is when 30 Seconds to Mars was like blowing up and growing. And they asked us a favor. They said, do you mind if we play after you in New York? And that's like a big favor to ask, especially with, that's our hometown. And we were like, sure. So we let them, it was a no big deal for us. We knew we were gonna have a good show. They have a good show.

• 1:11:31Toby Morse?

  But I think they never forgot that, that we let them play after us because their label was gonna be there. And I really, that was, that was a really good time. And every time I see them, they're always so awesome to me and stuff and it was cool. And then I haven't seen them after. They like blew up after that. It was just pretty amazing though.

• 1:11:45Rich Roll?

  What's the, what is the day to day like reality of like, you know, being like a hardcore punk, you know? Rock and roller versus like, you know, what someone imagines it might be, you know?

• 1:11:57Toby Morse?

  I, I, I don't know, man. It's the same thing you say about rock and rollers too. You think that these rock and rollers are like partying all day and stuff. But the hardcore dudes are totally opposite.

• 1:12:05Rich Roll?

  Yeah, like you've been married for a long time. All you do is talk about like how much you love your wife and your kid, you know?

• 1:12:10Toby Morse?

  Yeah. So I just, for me, for my, my daily life is a hike every day. I eat every day. I work out. I do my, I do my online sales. Work on my podcast. I book all the tours come up. I design all the merch for all the tours. Like me and Adam, my bass player, been managing the band for over 10 years. We do everything DIY. And, uh, yeah, I go to bed like at 10 o'clock at night.

• 1:12:32Toby Morse?

  I'm gonna, my, my wife stays up later than I do. Like, people think it's, it's not what people think it is. Um, especially even rock and roll, but I, I honestly feel like John Joseph and like all of us hardcore dudes, everybody's eating like salads and greens stuff and we're stretching before we play.

• 1:12:46Rich Roll?

  John's like chanting Hare Krishna.

• 1:12:47Toby Morse?

  Yeah. It's totally not what people think it is, man. It's, it's, it's especially just musicians in general. People think it's this glamorous, wonderful. You go to Europe all summer to the festivals, but the traveling is brutal. Those 23 hours until you get to play, like trying to find food in a town, getting sleep. You're jet lagged, but you have that 45 minutes to an hour every night just to give it everything you got. That's, that's the best part of tour. But there's other 23 hours. When you're not with your family can be really dark and depressing. Luckily for FaceTime and this phone, which is a powerful thing. It changed everything for touring, having FaceTime to call your family. That's amazing. But touring is not all glamorous, especially when you're older. It's,

• 1:13:26Toby Morse?

  even if you're vegan, you're in great shape. It doesn't matter, man. It's just the strenuous of touring and, you know, having that energy. So yeah, and when I'm home, I'm just chilling. I'm so lucky when I'm home. I do everything out of my house. I don't have to leave my house really. I go to my only crossroads, like to my little spots. I do my running, I stay in my little P and M bubble and just do my little rounds and like. Um, take my birds. I like taking the birds around. You have birds? No, those little bird things, those little bird scooters. Oh, the bird scooters. Yeah, I like to get my son to take those. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, but I do live in this, I do find myself guilty of living this like PMA bubble of everything's wonderful. And we all love each other and I don't really look at the news that much. I check out Vice from time to time.

• 1:14:06Toby Morse?

  And, um, but I, in my world and my community, as long as I know my friends and my family are good and I'm trying to like, you know, I go to the vigils, the pig vigils and do that. I try to do my part. But I do live in this little world that I'm, that one day everybody's going to be all united and wonderful, like a perfect Benetton ad. We're all going to be together and it's going to be like this, like I, I do, it's not, I do live in a little fantasy world of that. I'm guilty of that, like. Well, you can't be PMA and not be optimistic. Totally. But you can't be Pollyanna either. Yeah, I, I know my wife's like, I'm a realist and you're this and, um, so yeah, I, I just, yeah, my, my daily life is just. Do you go to shows? Yeah, I went to, I went to a show last week and I actually sang a song with Gorilla Biscuits, one of my favorite bands.

• 1:14:50Toby Morse?

  I did a minor threat song with them at, at two of their sets at the Roxy. It was awesome. So that was fun. Went to Sarkome. I see my boys when they come to town, they go to those shows and, but I also go to like bigger shows with my son. Like I took him to see Travis Scott and that was crazy. There was a mosh pit. People were diving. It was like, I looked at my son, I go, uh, why is there, he goes, I can't believe it's a mosh pit here. He goes, why? There's one at your show. And I had no answers for him. I'm like, okay, that's a generation. Like there was, so I'd go to like Katy, I love Katy Perry. She like sign my finger. I have a KPM crazy. Um, so, um, I go to like these other bigger shows with my son and just check those vibes out. I like going to concerts. Uh huh. Um, yeah, I'm, I'm out and about. I do my thing, you know? What did, what did Max think, your son think about going on tour with you?

• 1:15:34Toby Morse?

  I mean, his first tours, he was super young. It was Japan twice. So he was like three and then six. I have to take him back to Japan. He can appreciate it now. But yeah, he's been to South America. He's been to Ireland. He's been everywhere. He loves it. Now I'm making him work. Before he was a little kid. Now it's like, yo, you need to get the towels, the water. I'm making him work for his per diem. You know, like he's got to hustle now. He knows it and he plays one song per night. He's like, where's my money? I played one song. So he, he, he loves seeing the world and like, obviously I don't think that our parents were happy that we're taking our son on tour. But it's like. This is what happened to me when I moved to New York. I got to see the world at a very young age. It opened my mind to see different cultures. It made me who I am today.

• 1:16:15Toby Morse?

  And to be able to bring Max on tour at this young age and see the world and play live, it's amazing that can be able to do that. With even the band, I'm not even in a big band. The fact that I can take him to have that experience. He loves it. He looks forward to it. He's 16 now. We're going this summer. I'm not sure when he's 17, I'm gonna be cool enough to go on tour. But this one's a 21 day one. It's a really big one. He's so psyched. And I always plan his tours a week after he gets out of school. So he has like a week with his friends and then I take him away for the summer. But yeah, I'm lucky to do that. He loves it, man. It's definitely made him a more rounded human. Well, to see the world in that way. Yeah. What a unique, cool experience. Yeah, the different cultures, different foods and just the people and like. Does he have a sense of what he wants to do?

• 1:16:56Toby Morse?

  Man, he's an amazing drummer. He only wants to play music. He's exactly like me. When I was in that, when I was his age, he can't, he does not like school. He's struggling with his grades and the things he doesn't care about. He does great in science and history. He just, he's in a magnet program. So the band recorded, they have an Adidas Sound Lab, which is amazing. They recorded their first single. They have a manager who's in 11th grade at their school, throwing the school label. The band played two shows. It was packed. I don't even know what's happening. He's an incredible drummer and that's what he wants to do. So I gotta support it, man. He just. I love that their manager is in 11th grade. I know. He calls me on the phone, asks me questions. It's like, it's crazy. So he's exactly like me. I was, I was into music and skate when he's exactly like me. It's so scary.

• 1:17:41Toby Morse?

  But I'm like, listen, you have two more years left. You just have to get out of school. You just have to graduate. I'm only asking for Cs, man. Bs and Cs. Just get out. I've been there. Just get out. Get through the school and then we'll figure what you want to do like. It's hard because I, and he knows, cause I, obviously he knows everything about me. He's like, I remember you got these grades and you, I'm like, but that's me. You're different. I want you to be a better, better who, I don't know, a better example of what I was. Like it's just, but it's hard when like. I know exactly what he's going through, man. He's playing air drums on the table. He's just like.

• 1:18:12Rich Roll?

  Yeah, drummers, they're, they're just, they come out that way, man, you know?

• 1:18:15Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 1:18:15Rich Roll?

  You can identify it right away and you're like, oh, that's a drummer.

• 1:18:18Toby Morse?

  I know. So it's, it's, you know, what's interesting, he played a school concert last week and it was all like this girl singing, amazing singers at the school. And then I'm standing in the crowd and then I hear a kid's going, his band's called Ren. They're like, Ren's up next. And all the kids are running into this room. And they're starting like mosh pits at a school musical thing. Like they're in, next to me like slam dancing for my son's band. And then three of his teachers came, that he's not doing so good in the classes. And they said to me, they go, I get your son now. I totally get it. They saw how amazing of a drummer he was. And they're realizing why he's such a spaz. And they know that he's like, maybe on this path to be musician.

• 1:18:52Rich Roll?

  Uh huh.

• 1:18:52Toby Morse?

  And I got to meet them and then one of the, one of the two was like, yeah, I like Black Flag and Huskadoo. He was trying to ball with me about punk. It was really cute. And then, um, but I, I see that he's on this musical path and like, he's an incredible drummer and, and they get it now.

• 1:19:05Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:19:05Toby Morse?

  Cause they only seen Max in the classroom, you know, like.

• 1:19:07Rich Roll?

  His uncle Travis giving him some tips?

• 1:19:09Toby Morse?

  Yeah, Travis has for sure, for sure. Um, Travis gave him his first cowbell, actually, too, as a cowbell. And Mackie from the Chromeags is another one to really tell him a lot of really great staying in the pocket and the rhythms and. He's got all these people around him, the new musicians. It's, I'm not surprised at what's happening, you know?

• 1:19:26Rich Roll?

  That's pretty cool.

• 1:19:27Toby Morse?

  Yeah, it's pretty, it's pretty, I'm pretty lucky, man. And, uh, we'll see what happens with, everybody needs a drummer, you know?

• 1:19:34Rich Roll?

  It's not going out of style.

• 1:19:35Toby Morse?

  It's not going out of style.

• 1:19:37Rich Roll?

  But usually the drummer is the guy who's trouble.

• 1:19:39Toby Morse?

  It's, it's true. Yeah, it's true. But he's not. He's like totally like, he's just like, it looks like a model playing the drums. Like he's just. Yeah, it's, it's, uh, it's, it's, it's cool, man. But yeah, the grades thing's a little stressful and just gonna make it through, man, cause I've been there.

• 1:19:54Rich Roll?

  Yeah. But that modeling of.

• 1:19:59Rich Roll?

  You know, being the example for your kid and kind of walking the talk, I think is like the key thing like there's, you know, look, like you said, like, none of us are perfect, but we can't tell our kids to do one thing and then behave differently like those things have to be in alignment and you've got to create enough trust so that they feel safe and they they have the willingness to come to you and be honest, you know, because I feel like, you know, when kids start to get into adolescence, like the walls start to come up and then you got to work like extra hard to make sure that channel stays open because it will close so easily if you're not like, you know, on top of it.

• 1:20:37Toby Morse?

  Yeah, he came up, he came home a couple of weeks ago and said, can I get a hand poke tattoo? I was like, first of all, you're 16 and these kids are giving tattoos in the back of the classroom now. It's like a trendy thing to give a hand poke tattoos.

• 1:20:48Rich Roll?

  I heard about this.

• 1:20:49Toby Morse?

  Even on girls. And I'm like, listen, you can have any tattoo artist in the whole world. Look at me, just ask me anything. You have to wait till you're 18. But he's like, my friends are getting them at 16. I'm like, oh, I'm not your friends. I'm not your friends, you know, but I can't say you can't get tattooed, obviously. But I'll take you to a shop and you're 18, like I did, and you get a professional tattoo and like, but because all the kids are doing the hand pokes, he's like, we forget one little one. I'm like, no, but at least he's asking me. You know, it's even cute. He'll be like, he's gonna be so embarrassed. I'm even talking about this, like, he'll text me, go, all my friends are skipping seventh period. Can I skip seventh period? He'll ask me permission to skip a class, man. Oh, man, I just got emotional thinking about that. None of these kids are asking their parents if they can skip a class. They're just skipping the class.

• 1:21:29Rich Roll?

  And that that open channel of communication is so much more important compared to whether he's going to skip that class or not.

• 1:21:36Toby Morse?

  100%. The fact that he's asking me like and cares if I be bummed, I'm like, sure, like, what class is that? What's your grade in that class? Like, it's crazy because I know that no other kids are having that conversation.

• 1:21:46Rich Roll?

  No.

• 1:21:47Toby Morse?

  And so I never want that communication and I want, it's such a strong bond me and my son have. I know we're not gonna be together forever. And that reality for me is really, it's a hard pill to swallow because I know he's 16, though a couple of years, he's gonna be 18. I know my mom kicked me out when I was 17. I'm never kicking my son. He can stay there till he's like in his twenties.

• 1:22:03Rich Roll?

  But separation is natural, like, and you need, he needs that, you know, at some point.

• 1:22:08Toby Morse?

  I know. I saw something, somebody out there that's saying like, we don't own our children. Like, they're with us now, but we don't own them. They get to leave and just, it's crazy because I want that, that bond forever. And I'm sure it's gonna be a different bond, you know, distant bond, whatever. But we're so lucky to be parents, man, you know?

• 1:22:24Rich Roll?

  Why, uh, why start a podcast?

• 1:22:28Toby Morse?

  Because everybody's been telling me to start a podcast for years and all my friends

• 1:22:30Rich Roll?

  You can definitely talk.

• 1:22:32Toby Morse?

  And all my friends have them and I feel like I started too late, but it's been so therapeutic, man. Like the way I'm doing it in chronological order of my life and interviewing every single person that's met me up until now, like I'm sitting on like 50 episodes done. Like it's been so awesome to have these conversations and like especially with my mom and digging up stuff about my dad and my brothers. Like we, none of us had therapy. We all need therapy, 100%. That's a different story, but it was very therapeutic to start that way and then get into all my friends and start talking to them. And it's been, it's been interesting, man, to have these conversations. And um, I don't know why I started doing it and it's, it's been really fun. Yeah. Why did you start one?

• 1:23:10Rich Roll?

  That's cool. Uh, I started it. Well, first of all, I started in 2012.

• 1:23:14Toby Morse?

  You're old school.

• 1:23:15Rich Roll?

  Like no one was doing it, you know, like it was not, I say this all the time, but like it definitely was not cool to have a podcast back then. It wasn't like people were clamoring to start one. And you know, when you told people you had one, they just looked at you strangely. So it's odd, and I never would have predicted that it would become like this medium that people would want to be involved with. But I will say that I got into it because I was an early adopter as a consumer of the media. Like I've gone and trained for these races. I'd be on my bike like all day. I can't listen to music, you know? So many audiobooks at the time. So I started listening to podcasts and I was like, holy shit. This is like, there's like incredible information here for free. That's like, right? Why isn't

• 1:23:55Rich Roll?

  everybody listening to this? So I really enjoyed it and it really enriched my life at that time. And I've been evangelizing it ever since and been frustrated that more people couldn't understand like what, you know, I was experiencing. And a part of that was because the technology wasn't seamless enough for people to make it, you know, easy for them because you would have to download them on your laptop and then bounce it to your iPod. This is like pre iPhone. So it was like, you had to really kind of like want to do it. But I started it just because I'd written a book and

• 1:24:27Toby Morse?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:24:27Rich Roll?

  The book did its thing. And then when that was done, it was like, all right, well, what's next? And I was like, well, I could start a podcast. Nobody was really doing anything all that compelling in the health and fitness sector. And it was an opportunity to kind of continue the conversation that the book started.

• 1:24:40Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 1:24:41Rich Roll?

  I was like, I know some interesting people and but kind of like you going to New York, like I was like, I did an episode. It wasn't like, I'm going to bank all these episodes and here's my strategy and this is how it's going to be a business.

• 1:24:52Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 1:24:52Rich Roll?

  No, it was like, I just turned a mic on and my wife and I had a conversation. I was like, that's cool. Let's do it tomorrow.

• 1:24:57Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 1:24:58Rich Roll?

  But when I did it, I didn't know if there would be a second episode.

• 1:25:00Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 1:25:01Rich Roll?

  I didn't really know what I was doing. And I did it for years before it became a thing that actually, you know, I could

• 1:25:08Rich Roll?

  make money off of to like, you know, support my family.

• 1:25:11Toby Morse?

  Wow.

• 1:25:12Rich Roll?

  So it started for, I feel like I started for the right reasons.

• 1:25:15Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 1:25:15Rich Roll?

  And it's kind of remained true to what it always was from the beginning, which is an opportunity for me to just connect with people that inspire me in different ways and learn from them.

• 1:25:25Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 1:25:25Rich Roll?

  And what's been cool about it is that so many of these people then become my friends, you know, and my advisors and people that are like in my life, which has been like the greatest gift of the whole thing.

• 1:25:35Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 1:25:36Rich Roll?

  Plus, it gives me an excuse to like call people up like you and go, hey, you gotta drive to my house and I'm gonna hold you hostage for the afternoon.

• 1:25:42Toby Morse?

  I love it though. Yeah, it's really, it's really been fun having conversations and talking to people, getting to know people. Yeah, I didn't expect it to go the way it's going to. It's doing pretty well for how long it's been out and

• 1:25:52Rich Roll?

  Well, the chronology thing is cool. Like, let's start at the beginning and just like work through your life and all these people that have impacted you.

• 1:25:58Toby Morse?

  Yeah, it's been really fun, but it's kind of hard tracking people down. I don't like doing the ones over the phone, but I have to do because people are spread out. But yeah, it's been interesting to hear people's stories and how we met and then stuff we've evolved in together and did one with John. I can't wait for that one to come. Yeah, they didn't. Yeah, it's been really, really fun. I have such a diverse group of people too, like skaters and actors and musicians too. Just like you and just to talk to people. It's been really fun. But the reason why I did a bunch in advance because I'm gonna be touring all summer and I don't know how this is gonna go. If I was even gonna keep doing the podcast, but now they have them ready, I can just go on tour and not worry about it. That's what's cool about it.

• 1:26:31Rich Roll?

  Yeah, yeah, that's cool.

• 1:26:32Toby Morse?

  But it's fun to get to know people and, um, yeah, man, just

• 1:26:35Rich Roll?

  Have you had, have you had, have you done one with Brolin?

• 1:26:38Toby Morse?

  I'm gonna do one.

• 1:26:39Rich Roll?

  You gotta do one.

• 1:26:40Toby Morse?

  I'm gonna do one over him, yeah. OG, OG Dogtown.

• 1:26:43Rich Roll?

  How'd you become friends with that guy? I love following him on Instagram. His posts are unbelievably amazing.

• 1:26:48Toby Morse?

  He's amazing, man. I met, I met him outside of Crossroads, actually. He wasn't even going to Crossroads. I was with my friend, my friend Luke Westman, and he had his lowrider out there. And he was taking photos in front of the lowrider, and we just met that day. And then, I don't know if I followed him, he followed me, he started following, then I hung out with him a couple of times since. And he's, he's awesome. He texts all the time, he hit me up today, he's doing great things. He comes from the Dogtown, old school community. He's in a band called RKL, he played drums. He was a punk rocker, comes from the same scene. It's pretty awesome.

• 1:27:16Rich Roll?

  I mean, he's like an artist and a poet trapped in a movie star's body.

• 1:27:20Toby Morse?

  He writes books, I know, man.

• 1:27:21Rich Roll?

  His writing is incredible.

• 1:27:22Toby Morse?

  So incredible, so humble, so nice, so happy from all that stuff he's doing, the superhero stuff, like killing it. He's a super cool dude, and he's very grounded, you know, like, I love that. But yeah, I mean, it comes from the art world, it's, it's pretty crazy. I didn't even know that, I didn't know that about him, sorry, I meant about the RKL thing, Rich Kids on LSD, that old punk band.

• 1:27:41Rich Roll?

  Yeah, he's written about it a little bit. Yeah. I've seen it, it's pretty cool.

• 1:27:44Toby Morse?

  He's, he's good people, man, he's good, uh, he's good, he's somebody like on that level of talent and in Hollywood, that's like one of us, it's really cool, man.

• 1:27:52Rich Roll?

  He just, he just seems, he's got his wits about him in the right way.

• 1:27:55Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 1:27:55Rich Roll?

  You know, and you, and when you see, like, when you read his stuff and you kind of follow him, you can't help but like, root for him.

• 1:28:02Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 1:28:02Rich Roll?

  You know what I mean?

• 1:28:03Toby Morse?

  Yeah. Dude, his writing's so amazing, man. We're gonna get him on here, we're gonna get him on here.

• 1:28:09Rich Roll?

  Well, what about a book for you, man? You, you got a book in you.

• 1:28:13Toby Morse?

  Yeah, I was thinking, I was thinking that this podcast is almost like an audiobook of the book I haven't written yet.

• 1:28:17Rich Roll?

  Yeah.

• 1:28:17Toby Morse?

  You know, I just feel like, I think that might happen when I get a little bit older, I'm, I'm down to do that. I could see myself doing some, I don't know, man, it'd be cool. But this, this podcast definitely helped those stories and helped me focus on that. I started writing one, like, maybe like a year ago, just writing different chapters and stuff, but I'll do one.

• 1:28:33Rich Roll?

  Yeah, cool.

• 1:28:34Toby Morse?

  It'd be cool.

• 1:28:34Rich Roll?

  Well, I want to land this plane, but I can't let you go without kind of leaving some parting words for... You know, somebody who's listening, who's out there, who feels stuck, maybe they're in that cubicle job, or they're living a life that, you know, they feel like they didn't even consciously choose for themselves, and they're just having trouble, you know, accessing that font of positivity that seems to come so natural to you, or they're feeling creatively stymied, or, you know, powerless in their life.

• 1:29:02Toby Morse?

  Yeah.

• 1:29:02Rich Roll?

  And somebody who, you know, spends a lot of time like connecting with young people, and encouraging them, and trying to be, you know, this sort of receivership for positive energy and possibility, like, how do you speak to that person?

• 1:29:14Toby Morse?

  I mean, I would say first and foremost, look up Napoleon Hill, rethink and go rich, success through a positive mental attitude. And I feel personally that I was in crappy jobs too, before everything changed for me. I was working in mailrooms, I was working with asbestos, building the sound factory in Manhattan. I was doing a bunch of stuff that I was so miserable at doing, that I just, one of the last ones I did was like, I can't do this anymore, there's something I really want to do, I just went for it. I feel like nobody's really trapped in a miserable job. You just always like, you always have opportunities to do something else, nobody's forcing you to do that. I know people have bills, and families, and they're, and they're, they're going through a lot of stuff, but everybody goes through stuff, and I feel like, you just gotta, it's so corny and cliche to say like, believe in yourself and push through it, but like,

• 1:29:59Toby Morse?

  I'm living proof that you don't have to do something, like, I was doing stuff just to get by, and I wasn't happy doing it when I was a, before I was a roadie and stuff, and um, I just feel like, you just gotta believe in yourself and push through, and realize that you don't have to, it's about being happy, we're only here temporarily, and this is, like, this could end tomorrow, and being happy, and loving your life and being healthy, it makes everything so much better, your perspective on life so much better. It's easier said than done, granted, but, I feel like if you're working at a job, and you're miserable, you gotta, you gotta quit that job, you have to leave that job, you have to take a chance, one life, one chance, that's my motto, you have to take a chance, and try to do something you love. Like, my band wasn't supposed to make it, my band was a total joke, I wasn't a singer,

• 1:30:42Toby Morse?

  we had so much backlash, my first band started, but we kept doing it, because we believed in the message we were doing, we believed in everything we're doing, and because of that, it Worked and if you just believe in yourself and and say you're at some job and you believe you want to do something else, just just do it, do it now. Don't wait, don't procrastinate because life could be over tomorrow. And I do live in the moment a lot, and I don't really think about the future a lot, which is a bad thing, but

• 1:31:06Rich Roll?

  It's worked out okay for you.

• 1:31:07Toby Morse?

  It's worked out okay for me, but like, there's no reason to be miserable. There's no reason to be miserable in a job and hate what you're doing. Like, somehow you got yourself in that position. There's a way to get yourself out of that position. Nobody forced you into that position. If you guys understand what I'm saying. So you have all the power to do what you want to do. You might not get there right away. You might have to work for it and maybe work at a different job to get into the space you want to be in. But just don't give up. Believe in yourself. It all sounds corny and cliche, but I'm a 49 year old man who's been doing everything I love almost my whole entire life, because I never gave up and I believed in myself when other people weren't believing in me. And that's the key to a happy life is doing what you love, I think. And so get yourself out

• 1:31:47Toby Morse?

  of that job and try something else and push yourself and don't give up, but don't quit. That's all I can totally do. Thank you very much.

• 1:31:55Rich Roll?

  Boom. I think you just put a punctuation mark on the end of the podcast. Perfect way to end it, my friend.

• 1:32:03Toby Morse?

  Thank you, man. Thank you, thank you.

• 1:32:04Rich Roll?

  Yeah, that was epic.

• 1:32:05Toby Morse?

  Thank you for having me. I'm honored to be here, man. I'm honored to meet you in real life.

• 1:32:08Rich Roll?

  Super cool.

• 1:32:09Toby Morse?

  It's like to hang out with you after this.

• 1:32:10Rich Roll?

  Yeah, yeah, definitely, man. More, more will be revealed and to be continued. Come back and talk to me anytime, man.

• 1:32:17Toby Morse?

  It'll be awesome.

• 1:32:17Rich Roll?

  I look forward to getting to know you even better.

• 1:32:19Toby Morse?

  Thank you, Rich.

• 1:32:20Rich Roll?

  Toby Morse, you're an inspiration. Appreciate you.

• 1:32:23Toby Morse?

  Thank you. Can I plug my podcast?

• 1:32:25Rich Roll?

  Yeah, of course.

• 1:32:25Toby Morse?

  One Life One Chance Podcast. That's it.

• 1:32:27Rich Roll?

  There you go. It's everywhere and at Toby Morse on all the social media channels. And it's onelifewonchance.com for the nonprofit, correct?

• 1:32:38Toby Morse?

  And I want you on my podcast, too.

• 1:32:39Rich Roll?

  And yeah, anytime, man. Well, I'll have to be the last episode because I'm the most recent person that you've met.

• 1:32:46Toby Morse?

  You're gonna come to Hollywood, too.

• 1:32:47Rich Roll?

  It's gonna be season 20 or something like that.

• 1:32:48Toby Morse?

  Next year, yeah.

• 1:32:49Rich Roll?

  I'll come to Hollywood anytime. Also, Toby's got amazing, super cool merch. So if you want to find that, it's h2o merch.com, right?

• 1:32:57Toby Morse?

  Yes, yep, thank you.

• 1:32:58Rich Roll?

  Anything else coming up? You want to plug or anything?

• 1:33:01Toby Morse?

  It's our 25th anniversary. H2O will be on tour all summer in Europe. We play in all around the States. We have a secret surprise show, May 18th in Los Angeles. I don't know when this is coming out.

• 1:33:08Rich Roll?

  Super secret.

• 1:33:08Toby Morse?

  I'm gonna have you there. Yeah, just look up on our website, look on our Facebook, which is H2O Family. And yeah, we're around. You can find us everywhere. Thanks to these phones, the social media world.

• 1:33:19Rich Roll?

  All right, peace and plants, my friends.

• 1:33:21Toby Morse?

  Peace and plants.

• 1:33:21Rich Roll?

  We're out, bye.

• 1:33:22Toby Morse?

  That was awesome.

• 1:33:25Rich Roll?

  Right on, we did it. How'd that one land for you? He's a super cool guy, right? I really dug that. Really enjoyable to talk to Toby today. Hope you guys enjoyed it. Please check out the show notes on the episode page to extend your experience of Toby and immerse yourself in his world by exploring all of the links that we put together there for you. We put a lot of time into that, so check it out. And let Toby know how this one landed for you by sharing your thoughts with him directly. You can find him on Twitter and Instagram at Toby Morse. And check out his podcast, One Life, One Chance. If you'd like to support the work we do here on the podcast, just tell your friends about the show or your favorite episode.

• 1:34:06Rich Roll?

  Leave a review on Apple Podcasts, subscribe on Apple Podcasts, on Spotify, on YouTube, leave a comment on YouTube, Google Podcasts, wherever you listen to this. And you can support the show on Patreon by going to richroll.com/donate. I appreciate everybody who worked together to put this show on today. I certainly do not do this alone. Jason Camiolo for audio engineering, production, show notes, interstitial music. Blake Curtis and Margot Lubin for videoing today's show. Blake doing double duty as an audio engineer today as well. Jessica Miranda for graphics. Ally Rogers for portraits and DK for advertiser relationships. Oh yeah, theme music by Analemma. Appreciate all of you out there. I can't do this without you and I do not take your attention for granted.

• 1:34:50Rich Roll?

  So I will see you back here in a couple of days with an amazing conversation with singer, songwriter, musician, author, performance artist, so many other things. The one, the only, the great Amanda Palmer. It's an awesome conversation. You're not going to want to miss it. So until then, PMA all day, people. Peace, plants. Namaste.