Pod Insights The Tucker Carlson Show Aaron Lewis on Being Blacklisted from Radio & Why Record Labels Intentionally Promote Terrible Music About this episode Aaron Lewis on the sleaziness of the music industry, the attempts to cancel him and why he despises Bruce Springsteen.
(00:00) The Origins of Lewis’s Love of Country Music
(06:49) How Country Music Has Been Infiltrated
(12:06) Why Lewis Is Blacklisted From Radio
(28:36) How Record Labels Exploit Up-And-Coming Artists
(35:52) How Lewis’s Politics Have Impacted His Music Career
(49:52) The Joys of Nature, Fishing, and Hunting
(1:20:27) The Backlash Lewis Faced After Questioning the Ukraine/Russia War
Paid partnerships with:
Masa Chips: Get 25% off with code TUCKER at https://masachips.com/tucker
PureTalk: Go to https://PureTalk.com/Tucker to make the switchJoi + Blokes: Go to https://joiandblokes.com/tucker to get 20% off all products and therapies with code TUCKER
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Transcript 15,194 words · 6 speakers
Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.
0:01 Speaker 00 Now for a quick message from Anthropic, the team behind Claude, the AI built for businesses. Customers count on their bank, and banks count on their most important systems. Now those systems count on Claude, and nine of the Fortune 10 companies use it for critical work. See why leading companies trust Claude at claude.ai/span.
0:25 Speaker 01 How'd you wind up singing country music? Hmm, well,
0:32 Speaker 01 my childhood, the soundtrack to my childhood is all country music. That's all I heard, from the time I woke up in the morning until the time that the lights went out. It's funny, you're from northern New England, which I think people don't associate with country music, but it's... Oh yeah, for sure. Country, like out in the woods, everybody's listening to country music. For sure.
1:13 Speaker 01 But yeah, I would, I spent a lot of time at my grandparents' house. Where? In Wallingford, Vermont.
1:26 Speaker 01 Spent a lot of time there. It was a safe place for me.
1:32 Speaker 01 And my grandmother would wake up in the morning, and the very first thing that happened before an egg hit the frying pan or anything was the country radio got turned on. Wow. And it was on all day long. And the very last thing that got shut off before the light got shut off was the radio. So, I mean, it didn't matter if I was going fishing with my grandfather or whether I was at the house. If we were going fishing, I can still visualize the pile of 8-tracks on the floor of his Gran Torino with the boat tied to the top of the car.
2:13 Speaker 01 And, and it was just, it was permanent. There was always country music, always. And if we were in the boat, he was singing it. So... My whole childhood is just steeped in country music. So when I decided, excuse me, when I decided to do something different because I had gotten to the end of my contract with stained and I was now free to do whatever I wanted to do. I had always thought about putting out a solo record, if you will, a lot of lead singers do
2:53 Speaker 01 that. I didn't want it to be stained light. I wanted, I wanted to do something different and reinvent what I was doing without reinventing myself.
3:09 Tucker Carlson? Yes.
3:11 Speaker 01 And the only direction to go was country music because it was such a part of my being, part of my, my whole childhood memories and, and the landscape of it. So when I decided that I was actually gonna do something by myself, that was the direction that I went.
3:35 Tucker Carlson? It's funny, I think people think of country music as a regional music, southern Appalachian, you know, Tennessee, southwest Virginia, kind of the birthplace. They don't think of it as the music of the country. So it's like central California, Bakersfield, of course.
3:54 Speaker 01 Oh, yeah.
3:54 Tucker Carlson? Vermont.
3:55 Speaker 01 Bakersfield is a piece of Texas.
3:57 Tucker Carlson? Of exactly.
3:58 Speaker 01 In the middle of California.
3:59 Tucker Carlson? And you grew up in northern New England, which is, you know, very rural, one of the most rural places.
4:04 Speaker 01 And you get out of the cities in New England and it's as country as country gets and it's as red as red gets, even the state of Massachusetts.
4:13 Tucker Carlson? Oh, I know.
4:14 Speaker 01 If you look at the state of Massachusetts, broken down county by county, the whole state's red, except for Boston, Worcester and Springfield.
4:22 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
4:23 Speaker 01 You get outside those three big cities and in the state of Massachusetts, which is one of the worst.
4:28 Tucker Carlson? It is.
4:29 Speaker 01 California, too. You get outside those big cities, it's all red.
4:34 Tucker Carlson? Yeah, not a lot of Kamala voters up near Mount Shasta.
4:37 Speaker 01 No.
4:38 Tucker Carlson? No.
4:39 Speaker 01 No, not at all.
4:40 Tucker Carlson? It's, it's just, music is such a, a window into attitudes and culture and it's just, it's funny that country music is basically popular everywhere outside the cities.
4:53 Speaker 01 Mm hmm. Hundred percent.
4:56 Tucker Carlson? Interesting. So how was it weird for you to go from a one genre to a completely different one?
5:02 Speaker 01 Weird? Hmm, I don't know if it was, I don't know if it was weird. It was foolish by everybody else's accounts because I had already built something substantial in the rock industry.
5:20 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
5:21 Speaker 01 And I kinda walked away from that and went to a completely different genre that there might be some overlap of stained fans that also liked country music. But I was certainly in that moment, shooting myself in the foot and having to basically start over because my value in the industry was, was towards the rock industry and, and nobody knew who I was in the country industry unless they would listen to rock music too.
5:58 Speaker 01 So it kinda, in perfect me form, I, I took the hard road and decided I was gonna change genres along with putting something out by myself, which would have been hard enough as it is.
6:15 Tucker Carlson? How, how has country music changed itself as a genre?
6:18 Speaker 01 I don't really recognize country music anymore.
6:22 Tucker Carlson? Really?
6:23 Speaker 01 Well, what's playing on the radio, like they, how do you draw a line from what's on the radio now and called country music to what was on the radio when we were kids called country music? Like there's, there's no, there's no line to be drawn.
6:39 Tucker Carlson? I listen to Bluegrass Junction, so this is all, this is all outside my world, but tell me how it's changed.
6:48 Speaker 01 It's been infiltrated by California, just like everything else. Oh, really? When, uh, within my career, about halfway through it, everything changed in the industry and a lot of consolidation happened. A lot of people lost their jobs at whatever record label they were at, or they were in the top 40 side of things and everything got condensed and they lost their... Well, they all either went to Nashville or they went to country radio.
7:25 Speaker 01 And I truly believe that that has something to do with why country has become so popified, where it's like the land of the misfit toys, where it's not really country. It's not really pop. It kind of rides right down the middle of it and becomes its own thing. And they should call it its own thing, like it should have its own genre and classification. And instead they call it country. And I don't know how you can put George Jones and Merle Haggard in the same sentence as, as Morgan Wallen or, or, or the Rascal Flatts.
8:10 Speaker 01 I mean, how, how do you even, how does that correlate? How does that fall into the same category? Because it, it doesn't in any way to me. Which is better? Country. Yeah. We have pop music. I think pop music with a country twang is a little weird. Why'd they do, did that happen organically or do you think it was on purpose? It's the, it's the control mechanism. It's the people in, in power calling the shots and, and being the tastemakers, if you will, and, and...
8:46 Speaker 01 Choosing for us what we want to hear and then stuffing it down our throat until we accept it.
8:51 Tucker Carlson? You may have noticed this is a great country with bad food. Our food supply is rotten. It didn't used to be this way. Take chips, for example. You may recall a time when crushing a bag of chips didn't make you feel hung over, like you couldn't get out of bed the next day. And the change, of course, is chemicals. There's all kinds of crap they're putting in this food that should not be in your body. Seed oils, for example. Now even one serving of your standard American chip brand can make you feel bloated, fat, totally passive and out of it. But there is a better way. It's called masa chips. They're delicious. Got a whole garage full of them.
9:32 Tucker Carlson? They're healthy, they taste great, and they have three simple ingredients: corn, salt, and 100% grass-fed beef tallow. No garbage, no seed oils. What a relief. And you feel the difference when you eat them, as we often do. Snacking on masa chips is not like eating the garbage that you buy convenience stores. You feel satisfied, light, energetic, not sluggish. Tens of thousands of happy people eat masa chips. It's endorsed by people who understand health. It's well worth a try. Go to masa, M-A-S-A, chips.com/tucker. Use the code TUCKER for 25% off your first order. That's masa chips.com/tucker. Code TUCKER for 25% off your first order.
10:17 Tucker Carlson? Highly recommended.
10:18 Speaker 03 Imagine if every time inverse Kramer or another top investor bought a stock, you bought it too, in your own brokerage account, automatically. Well, that now exists and it's called autopilot. Built by the team behind the viral Pelosi stock tracker, autopilot lets you browse their marketplace of strategies run by proven investors or AI-driven models. Just find one with a high return, connect your personal brokerage account like a Schwab or Robinhood, and every trade they make, you make automatically. Your money never leaves your own account. Autopilot just mirrors the moves. So now no more guessing, no more staring at charts, and no more checking the market between meetings. Also, over 1.3 billion is already invested.
11:01 Speaker 03 So if you wanted to check it out, search autopilot in the App Store or go to joinautopilot.com. That's joinautopilot.com. Investing has risks like the loss of principal.
11:12 Speaker 04 We all hear the radio ads about the IRS. They tell you to be afraid, to be scared, and they try to frighten you into calling. I'm not here to do that. Tax Relief Advocates is different. TRA is here to tell you that if you owe money to the IRS, whether it's $5,000, $50,000, or $500,000, we have a solution. It doesn't matter if you're sitting in your car, at work, or with your kids. No matter where you are, call now. 800-576-4705. Don't lose hope. TRA can eliminate or reduce what you owe to the IRS. Generous programs are now available that can give you a fresh start. Our passion is taxes and helping individuals fix their IRS problems. We have over 1,000 5-star reviews on Google and an 8+ with the Better Business Bureau. You don't need to be afraid of the IRS any longer.
11:57 Speaker 04 End your tax nightmare today by visiting us online at TRA.com or call 800-576-4705. That's 800-576-4705. Tax Relief Advocates: Real Solutions for Real People.
12:12 Tucker Carlson? There's something a little radical, well, maybe more than a little radical, about traditional, you know, Johnny Cash doing, you know, a live show from the Folsom Yard. You know, it's like, it's pretty, it's pretty untamed in a lot of ways. I mean, there's like a true outlaw, not a fake outlaw element, but like a real outlaw element.
12:32 Speaker 01 I think that country music is Americana. Like, it's the, it's the genre that we, as the country of America, are certainly responsible for. It came from here.
12:48 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
12:49 Speaker 01 It didn't come from somewhere else. Where, where rock had a lot of English influence, all those English bands from back in the 60s and stuff. And, but,
13:01 Tucker Carlson? They brought up-
13:02 Speaker 01 Country music is, country music still isn't worldwide. It's, it's big in Germany. It's, it might have, it's got a listening audience in, in England and in Germany, but it doesn't expand much further than that. Like, country music is an American genre.
13:22 Tucker Carlson? And it's become less American and more international, more, more like Barcelona. It's just everyone's city.
13:29 Speaker 01 Right.
13:29 Tucker Carlson? Like it's like.
13:30 Speaker 01 So it's nobody's city. It's like the land of the misfit toys. That's the best way to describe it where it doesn't fit in pop, doesn't fit in country. Just kind of, but you can push it in either direction and it would, and it works, but it has no,
13:52 Speaker 01 it doesn't have its own soul, if you will. It's not, it's definitely not pure to the genre.
13:59 Tucker Carlson? Do you think that there's still a demand for it? I mean, could.
14:03 Speaker 01 Country music?
14:04 Tucker Carlson? Yeah, real country music. Could Merle Haggard make a living today?
14:08 Speaker 01 Whew, I don't know. I mean, I would certainly hope so. But if you listen to the landscape that's on country radio right now, I don't see where he would fit in at all.
14:23 Tucker Carlson? Hmm.
14:24 Speaker 01 I don't see where I fit in at all.
14:26 Tucker Carlson? Are you on the radio?
14:27 Speaker 01 No.
14:28 Tucker Carlson? Really?
14:29 Speaker 01 No, they won't play me. They don't like my, my, my thoughts on things.
14:34 Tucker Carlson? Really? How important is, well, it's obviously you, how many shows you do last year?
14:39 Speaker 01 Oh, probably a hundred and 75, 180 shows last year.
14:44 Tucker Carlson? Yeah. So obviously you're.
14:46 Speaker 01 Pretty much, pretty much all of them sold out.
14:48 Tucker Carlson? You're doing fine.
14:50 Speaker 01 I'm doing just fine. It's nice to not have to bow down to the powers that be. It's nice to not have to undermine my value in a market because the radio station wants to get as much out of my show as they can. So they sell my ticket for a low dough $10 ticket. And they've just devalued my value in that market by selling such a cheap ticket when I can sell hard tickets.
15:28 Speaker 01 I don't, I don't need to sell, sell myself short by, by doing favors for a radio station.
15:39 Tucker Carlson? Is that how it works?
15:40 Speaker 01 Oh.
15:43 Speaker 01 First you sell your soul to the record label and then you sell everything else you've got to the machine, which is the radio that drives music.
15:53 Tucker Carlson? Really? Is it satellite or terrestrial radio?
15:56 Speaker 01 Like all of it. All of it. Satellite just took over.
15:59 Tucker Carlson? Yeah, but it's the same idea.
16:00 Speaker 01 Same concept.
16:01 Tucker Carlson? So how does, if you don't mind revealing the sleazy underbelly of the business, like that you don't participate in apparently, how does that work?
16:10 Speaker 01 Um, we're the, we are the, the indentured servant. I mean, I think that indentured servitude laws are literally still on the books in California so that they can get away with what they do with us.
16:29 Tucker Carlson? The performer, the artist you're talking about?
16:30 Speaker 01 Yeah, everything, every, every penny that we ever get paid from a record label is all a loan. It's all a loan. They, they, to give you a, just a conceptual breakdown. This is all just kind of a, take a dollar.
16:48 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
16:49 Speaker 01 So 25 cents of that dollar, let's just say, is probably more, goes to the record label, just because, because they invested. The rest of it, business management takes their percentage, lawyer takes their percentage, management takes their percentage, business manager takes their percentage.
17:16 Speaker 01 Then the government takes their percentage and then the overhead and then what's left? Let's call it 10 cents at the end of the day, that goes back to the record label to pay back the loan that they gave you of the money that they gave you upfront.
17:45 Speaker 01 Actually, any money that I've actually made from the record label, I've, I've made them 80 times as much.
18:00 Speaker 01 Like, that's it of a dollar. Let's just say there's 12 cents left. The 12 cents actually goes to pay back the record label for the money that they gave you. It's insane.
18:12 Tucker Carlson? How does that still exist?
18:14 Speaker 01 Because of the laws on the books.
18:17 Tucker Carlson? Hmm.
18:18 Speaker 01 It's like, it's insane.
18:20 Tucker Carlson? Are the record label people adding a lot to the process? Are they creative geniuses?
18:26 Speaker 01 No.
18:28 Tucker Carlson? I just love how all the people who are getting rich from creativity-
18:33 Speaker 01 Are the ones that can't do it.
18:34 Tucker Carlson? Are the least creative people.
18:35 Speaker 01 Yeah, they're the ones that can't create, but they are making the most money off of the creatives. We're here because who wouldn't want a record label? Who, who wouldn't want to live this dream? Who wouldn't want to make music if they're a musician? Who wouldn't want to make music as their livelihood? So we're in a very, a very fucked up situation where there's a thousand people behind me.
19:01 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
19:01 Speaker 01 That would kill me to have my freaking job.
19:04 Tucker Carlson? Yes, exactly.
19:05 Speaker 01 So I'm in, I got no leverage.
19:07 Tucker Carlson? Television's the same.
19:08 Speaker 01 I got no leverage with the, with the industry.
19:11 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
19:11 Speaker 01 Because I'm, I'm a, I'm a, I'm a, I'm a, I'm easily chewed up and spit out. Because there's a thousand people behind me waiting to get chewed up and spit out.
19:24 Tucker Carlson? How long did you participate in that system?
19:27 Speaker 01 Uh, it was 2012 or 13. That last stained record that we put out was, was the, the last record where I really had to do the dance and, and play the game with radio and, and not ruffle any feathers and not offend anybody and- And play the game. And then, once that contract was done, I tried to play the game with country music. And then I released a song called That Ain't Country that was basically talking about the
20:10 Speaker 01 whole industry that has created this amalgamation of music that doesn't really fit in a genre.
20:19 Speaker 01 And that was the end of it. I put out a song, trying to get country radio to play it about them. And they didn't like that very much.
20:29 Tucker Carlson? Okay, so you attacked the distributors and then were surprised when they didn't distribute it?
20:33 Speaker 01 Yeah, super smart. Yeah, super smart.
20:36 Tucker Carlson? I admire your purity.
20:40 Tucker Carlson? Exactly, but principled. That's hilarious. So that didn't, that didn't work. So what did you do?
20:48 Speaker 01 Did it work?
20:49 Tucker Carlson? Well, I don't know.
20:49 Speaker 01 It basically, it didn't work to my advantage to be getting played on the radio. But it certainly freed me from being a servant to radio.
21:04 Tucker Carlson? Yes.
21:05 Speaker 01 So it's
21:11 Speaker 01 I, it is so freeing to not be under that thumb.
21:18 Tucker Carlson? Yes.
21:19 Speaker 01 I can write songs that are over three and a half minutes long. I can
21:27 Speaker 01 put lyrics in songs that that I want to put there, you know, I'm just, I, I'm no longer
21:39 Speaker 01 held to the industry standard because I'm not necessarily trying to participate in the industry game. I go out there, I play successful shows. I have a fan base that seeks out my music and doesn't just listen to what the radio stuffs down their throat. And I'm very, very blessed and very, very lucky to that I don't have to participate in the game anymore.
22:12 Tucker Carlson? How has Spotify changed it?
22:17 Speaker 01 I'm a Spotify billionaire. I have over a billion spins on Spotify. If I only had a penny for every spin on Spotify, that would be fantastic. A dollar, a quarter, a penny from every spin with over a billion spins on Spotify. All I have is a plaque.
22:46 Tucker Carlson? You never got paid?
22:48 Speaker 01 It's so, by the time Spotify plays it, there's so many people in the middle. I don't even think a penny comes my way, to be honest with you.
22:59 Tucker Carlson? For a billion spins, you made no money?
23:01 Speaker 01 I don't think so. I don't, that's not how Spotify works.
23:03 Tucker Carlson? Well, how does it work?
23:04 Speaker 01 I'm not sure. I'm just, I just know that, that it cuts a lot of people in on my financial stream. That's all I know.
23:16 Tucker Carlson? A lot of people who are not you.
23:17 Speaker 01 Right. That once again, aren't the creatives and they're the ones making all the money.
23:23 Tucker Carlson? So you think some-
23:24 Speaker 01 They were creative in how they came up with something to get into somebody else's money stream.
23:30 Tucker Carlson? What's called creative accounting, which is a form of creativity. Long unrecognized in the West.
23:37 Speaker 01 I would call it being a leech, but-
23:39 Tucker Carlson? Yeah, I would, I would say the same. If it ain't broke, don't fix it's a cliche for a reason, because it's pretty good advice. But sometimes it's not true. Cell phones are a glaring exception. You've got your cell phone, you've had it for years. You don't change. Sometimes your cell phone battery life fades, or maybe your processor can't keep up. But your phone is bound to run into trouble eventually, no matter what the problem is. And replacing it early is much better and often far cheaper than replacing it too late. Enter Pure Talk. This month, if you switch to a qualifying $35 plan, 35 bucks, Pure Talk will give you a Samsung Galaxy A36 completely free, literally free. Just 35 bucks a month for talk, text and data.
24:23 Tucker Carlson? And you get to restart your phone lifecycle without paying for a brand new device. So it's a scam-free deal. All on America's most dependable 5G network. It's like a cell phone that works as well as any other. It's just way cheaper and they're not scamming you. So switching is a win for everybody. You save money on your cell phone bill.
24:42 Speaker 01 Pure Talk grows to hire more Americans and support more veterans, which it does. So go to puretalk.com/talker to get your free phone today. That's puretalk.com/talker to switch to our wireless company. It's America's wireless company.
24:56 Speaker 00 This podcast is supported by Anthropic, the public benefit corporation behind Claude. Everyone's got a hard question about AI. Anthropic was built to surface those questions and share what it finds along the way, because there's hope in hard questions. Ask yours at claude.ai/spotify and keep thinking. That's claude.ai/spotify.
25:24 Speaker 05 Visible puts the ultimate wireless hack in the palm of your hand. With unlimited 5G wireless data and hotspot designed to keep you connected. Powered by Verizon's 5G network. And no contract holding you back. Plans start at $25 a month. Or get the premium Visible Plus Pro Plan and save $10 on your first month when you use promo code hack. Make the switch at visible.com. Terms apply. See visible.com for details.
25:53 Speaker 01 Pure Talk.
25:54 Tucker Carlson? That's amazing to me.
25:57 Speaker 01 It's a billion plays more than and you don't get paid. I don't, I mean, I might have. It certainly wasn't enough for me to, to notice, whoa, where the hell did all this money come from in my bank account? Oh, I got spun over a billion times on Spotify. That's why. Mm hmm. No, I mean, do I know for sure that no money came in? No.
26:21 Tucker Carlson? Well, if you don't remember, then obviously.
26:24 Speaker 01 It's miniscule comparatively speaking.
26:28 Tucker Carlson? That is so interesting. Have there been?
26:31 Speaker 01 That's basically the whole thing. The amount of money that we generate as the artist, what we get back for that is miniscule, comparatively speaking, to what everybody else with their hands in the cookie jar makes.
26:47 Tucker Carlson? So whenever I hear people talk about the.
26:49 Speaker 01 I'm not complaining.
26:50 Tucker Carlson? Well, you should complain.
26:52 Speaker 01 Well, I'm very blessed and I'm very lucky and I, and I'm, and, and, you know, obviously God has a plan for me because this, the way that all of this has just happened and I am just a passenger and, and I'm not driving this ship.
27:08 Tucker Carlson? Yes.
27:09 Speaker 01 Um, but.
27:12 Speaker 01 And I'm, I'm very lucky and very blessed, but I can still recognize the faults to the system and not necessarily be complaining about how amazing of a ride I've had doing this.
27:26 Tucker Carlson? It's just, it's interesting. I mean, but I should just say Spotify has been such a huge blessing for us on this podcast. I mean, it's just crazy.
27:33 Speaker 01 It's an amazing new way for people to consume.
27:37 Tucker Carlson? Yeah. And it's run by a guy I know, um, who owns it and I think is a good guy and committed to, to speech. And, and so I'm, I'm very pro Spotify, but I just didn't understand that, um, the creators on the music side were cut out of the benefits.
27:55 Speaker 01 Again, not cut out.
27:58 Tucker Carlson? No, but I mean, a billion, that's a lot.
28:00 Speaker 01 I mean, I should have, I should have seen a pretty significant deposit into my account for that many spins.
28:06 Tucker Carlson? Well, what's interesting is they probably paid somebody, but not you. So you hear the-
28:09 Speaker 01 Yeah, probably. I'm sure my record label got paid.
28:12 Tucker Carlson? Well, you see the accounting of the US economy, like what's our GDP? You know, how much money is the United States economy generating? And like a lot. So the question is not, you know, is the engine functioning? The question is where's the money going? And my complaint about the US is not capitalism, which clearly works. It's about who benefits from it. And it does seem like the least useful, least creative, least, certainly least patriotic, but least decent people make all of them big money. And I think that's, this is another example of it. Like, how did Larry Fink get so rich? Like, what did, what did Larry Fink do for America? Et cetera, et cetera.
28:55 Speaker 01 Figured out a way to completely leech off of everything that's already there.
29:02 Tucker Carlson? Well, that's, that's certainly the way it seems to me.
29:05 Speaker 01 Certainly does, right?
29:06 Tucker Carlson? So how do you make money? By getting on the road.
29:09 Speaker 01 That is how, and that's why I work as hard as I do, because that is where I make my money. I don't make money on record sales. I don't make money off of spins. I make money off of merch. And actually playing shows.
29:29 Tucker Carlson? Wow. Um, but that's a much, it feels like that's a much more direct transaction. Like you're renting the venue, you're performing for two and a half hours or whatever. You're getting a cut of gate. Like there are fewer middlemen in that, right?
29:44 Speaker 01 There seems to be less of a, less of a machine that puts itself in between.
29:52 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
29:54 Speaker 01 But there is this thing that has taken place since I got my record deal. 28 years ago, 27 years ago.
30:06 Speaker 01 Is called a 360 deal. Where now the younger artists, they're sharing the profits for everything. The record label gets a cut of their merch. The record label gets a cut of their live performance pay. The record, record label gets a cut of 360, everything.
30:30 Tucker Carlson? Why?
30:30 Speaker 01 No matter what you generate, because they can. Because there's a thousand people behind every single person with a record label, with a, with a record deal. That wants it as badly as you did before you got it. And they can give you the shittiest deal on the planet. Because if you don't take it, the guy behind you will.
30:54 Tucker Carlson? Wow. And they're not only greedy and dishonest, ruthless. They're also very political, right? The record labels.
31:04 Speaker 01 And usually in the wrong direction. And I don't understand how a record label that.
31:11 Speaker 01 I mean, it certainly isn't capitalism with a conscience. But it is, it's certainly capitalism where the record label is in it to make money. And it's not necessarily about what's the art.
31:31 Speaker 01 That is being created by the creative. It's about the money that that creative artist is going to generate for the record label to cover the 15 failures that they brought to the table.
31:46 Tucker Carlson? Yes.
31:47 Speaker 01 And dumped all this money into.
31:48 Tucker Carlson? I get it. Publishing is the same way.
31:51 Speaker 01 Yeah.
31:52 Tucker Carlson? So, um, you know, you've been in it your whole life. You've toured with everybody.
31:57 Speaker 01 Pretty much everything.
31:58 Tucker Carlson? Everybody. You were telling me last night about smoking weed with Willie Nelson on his bus many years ago. So you've toured with everybody. Um, how many creators, artists, performers in your business in private hate and resent the record companies?
32:16 Speaker 01 Most.
32:17 Tucker Carlson? Most.
32:19 Speaker 01 Most, if not all.
32:23 Speaker 01 I don't know that in a private setting, in a private conversation where things aren't going any further, I don't know of anybody that I know in the business that would have good things to say about it.
32:38 Tucker Carlson? Would it be possible for a decent person to start a record company and record label?
32:46 Speaker 01 I would think so. I would think so, but the problem is, is that the, the, the, um,
32:55 Speaker 01 the operating system,
33:01 Speaker 01 it's just, it's not decent.
33:04 Tucker Carlson? Right.
33:04 Speaker 01 So a decent person could start a record label, but unless they change the entire formula and in the entire way that the whole business is ran, the business itself is lecherous. So a good person could start it. But unless they change the whole thing, it's going to be the same. Right. It's like getting elected to Congress. Yeah.
33:30 Tucker Carlson? It's pretty obvious now that this country is getting weaker than ever, meaning the population is unhealthier. That's what Maha is about, trying to counteract this long-term trend that's culminated in a disaster. Americans are so unhealthy, we can't staff the military. And it's really, really sad. Why is this happening? Maybe because sick people are easier to control. Whatever the reason, there are answers to it. And one of them is Joy and Blokes. They are revolutionizing supplements with smart supplements that are personalized for you. They're based entirely on your genetics, your biomarker data. They're not guessing. So they use labs, advanced labs, that measure up to 110 key biomarkers. Then their clinicians
34:11 Tucker Carlson? design a precision supplement plan that's updated as your body changes. So it's not just off-the-shelf vitamins. It's much more precise and therefore much more effective. So there are about 3 billion possible combinations. And the effect is you get exactly what you need and you get nothing that you don't need. You also get 60 to 30-minute consultation, depending on how much time you need. You get access to expert-guided hormone care, including testosterone optimization for both men and women, longevity medicine, cutting-edge peptide therapy, and you get it all from home. Right now, new customers get 50% off all diagnostic labs, plus 20% off all products and therapies. You also get a free 15-minute Health Coach
34:55 Tucker Carlson? consult. And the effect is the desired effect, stronger, sharper, more energy. You get it right away. Go to Joy and Blokes, J O Y and Blokes.com/Tucker. Root cause medicine is the way healthcare ought to be.
35:11 Speaker 00 Now for a quick message from Anthropic, the team behind Claude, the AI built for businesses. Customers count on their bank, and banks count on their most important systems. Now those systems count on Claude, and nine of the Fortune 10 companies use it for critical work. See why leading companies trust Claude at claude.ai/span.
35:35 Speaker 05 Visible puts the ultimate wireless hack in the palm of your hand. With unlimited 5G wireless data and hotspot designed to keep you connected. Powered by Verizon's 5G network. And no contract holding you back. Plans start at $25 a month. Or get the premium Visible Plus Pro Plan and save $10 on your first month when you use promo code HACK. Make the switch at visible.com. Terms apply. See visible.com for details.
36:05 Tucker Carlson? So when, um, when, when did you start having conflict with your corporate masters over politics?
36:13 Speaker 01 Hmm.
36:17 Speaker 01 Obama getting elected.
36:19 Tucker Carlson? That was a moment, wasn't it? And you weren't fully on board?
36:22 Speaker 01 Huh. Hell no.
36:24 Tucker Carlson? You didn't worship black Jesus?
36:25 Speaker 01 I, I immediately recognized it as a, as a horrible blow to our country. Immediately, not even knowing why yet.
36:36 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
36:36 Speaker 01 Like I just knew.
36:37 Tucker Carlson? Instinct tells you.
36:38 Speaker 01 Instinctively, in my gut, I knew that we had made a massive, massive mistake as a country.
36:45 Tucker Carlson? Yeah, that's for sure.
36:46 Speaker 01 And so many balls got rolling during that timeframe that we're still, that we're still trying to slow down.
36:52 Tucker Carlson? Oh, I know.
36:53 Speaker 01 It, it, but yeah.
36:58 Speaker 01 When TMZ would get me when I landed in Los Angeles and I was walking through the airport and they'd, they'd, they'd get me and ask me questions and, and that was, that was when I started expressing my, my feelings and my opinions on politics.
37:16 Tucker Carlson? You know how they get you? Do you know the answer to this question? I found out. I've been gotten a few times at LAX by TMZ and other airports. And, um, I once asked like, how did you know I was on that plane? Like, you know, cause they, they know because they bribed the airline. The guy told me this. They bribed the airline to give them the manifest.
37:37 Speaker 01 Makes sense. Now that that makes sense.
37:39 Tucker Carlson? It's so corrupt.
37:41 Speaker 01 Out of nowhere, they're like, hey.
37:44 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
37:44 Speaker 01 Like, what? Where? How? What? How'd you even know I was here?
37:48 Tucker Carlson? Thanks, United. Bless you, American. Um, you know, it's, it's pretty. Anyway, so they would, you'd roll off the flight at LAX, someone come up to you and ask you a question. What did you say?
37:59 Speaker 01 Oh, I was, I have, I have, I had no issues then, nor do I have any issue now telling anybody exactly how I feel. And, you know, I, I was already talking about the unconstitutionalness of Obama's actions and what he was doing and
38:27 Speaker 01 I mean, mentioning that what he was doing was borderline treasonous and
38:33 Speaker 01 and that was how I started the ball rolling.
38:36 Tucker Carlson? And what kind of responses you get? Cause you weren't allowed to criticize Obama there for a while, or else you were, I can't remember the word racist.
38:43 Speaker 01 Yeah, I know. I've been, I've been labeled that.
38:45 Tucker Carlson? Racist!
38:46 Speaker 01 And then there was, there was one time I was, I was playing a show down by the, down by the border and
38:55 Speaker 01 I mean, I've played a lot of shows and I've played a lot of shows back before I had a record deal.
39:02 Speaker 01 And this was the rudest crowd I had played to in, I don't know, 15 years. I'm playing completely acoustic, all by myself. Not even any extra musicians on stage or anything, just me and my guitar. I could not get them to shut up all night, just talking over me like I was the jukebox.
39:26 Speaker 01 And I made the mistake
39:29 Speaker 01 of
39:31 Speaker 01 back then, at the end of the show, I would do a song completely unplugged, where I would pull a chord out of my guitar and I'd walk away from the microphone and I'd go stand right on the edge of the stage. And I would acoustically play the last song
39:50 Speaker 01 with no microphone, with no nothing, just belting to the crowd.
39:55 Speaker 01 And for some strange reason, after such a rude evening, I decided I was gonna do that and try to prove everybody wrong. I have, they're gonna listen to me whether they want to or not. So I attempt to try to start the song. I explained to them what I was gonna do through the microphone before I stepped away from the microphone. And I attempted to start the song. As I got to where I started to sing, the volume had gone up and not down. Now, mind you, there's no sound system anymore. It's just me singing to the room. So I stop. I walk back around, I go to the microphone.
40:39 Speaker 01 I explained to everybody what I'm gonna do again. I start again. Volume goes up. So I go back to the microphone and I was, and I'm gonna, I was like, you know, listen, I don't have to do this. I was trying to do something. And a lady that was standing right there in the front row, like four people from the center. She's like, tell them to shut the fuck up in Spanish. And I said, close to the microphone. I wasn't necessarily talking into them. I was talking to her, but it was close. And I said, I'm sorry, ma'am. I don't speak Spanish. I'm American.
41:24 Speaker 01 The world ended for like a week, all over the, like, broke the internet. Aaron Lewis a racist. Aaron Lewis this.
41:34 Tucker Carlson? A racist?
41:35 Speaker 01 Right. Because I said, I'm, I'm sorry, ma'am. I don't speak Spanish. I am American. That was what I said. Beats me. But that's what went around. Perez Hilton did a hit piece on me about how much of a racist I am. Put the video connected to it. And if you watch the video, you see that the whole interview is, I mean, the whole piece is a complete bullshit and a complete fabrication of all of it. And they would write these hit pieces and actually attach the video that completely contradicted the hit piece.
42:11 Tucker Carlson? Yeah, it doesn't matter.
42:12 Speaker 01 But it doesn't matter because people wouldn't actually, they just read.
42:15 Tucker Carlson? Perez Hilton? Boy, I haven't heard that name in a while. Is he still alive?
42:18 Speaker 01 I don't know. I don't know, maybe the vax got him. I don't know.
42:22 Tucker Carlson? Possible. That's wild. You are a racist for saying.
42:27 Speaker 01 That I don't speak Spanish, I'm American. When America, it says clearly in the books, in the naturalization process, that you have to have a full working knowledge of the English language before you can become a citizen in this country.
42:42 Tucker Carlson? Yeah. Well, you know, English is not a race. The United States is not a race. There's nothing about race in that sentence or sentiment.
42:52 Speaker 01 I know.
42:52 Tucker Carlson? Right. Um, yeah. Oh, boy. Well, you just brought me back to an earlier time. I don't think that would happen now.
42:59 Speaker 01 I don't know.
42:59 Tucker Carlson? People are so over that.
43:02 Speaker 01 People are over it, but I think that that side of things probably still would have tried.
43:07 Tucker Carlson? Well, now they call you an anti Semite, probably.
43:09 Speaker 01 I'm a, I'm a, I'm any of the ifs.
43:13 Tucker Carlson? You're right. Oh, wow. That's wild. So how did, how did your manager and a, a sort of handler's record label feel about this?
43:22 Speaker 01 Um, I mean, it was just one of those things where you just had to kind of let it go by.
43:30 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
43:30 Speaker 01 Just let it die out. Let it, let it play its course and go away.
43:35 Tucker Carlson? Was the crowd mad when you said that?
43:38 Speaker 01 No.
43:39 Tucker Carlson? Yeah. Right.
43:41 Speaker 01 No. And then I tried one more time to sing the song and they wouldn't listen. And I put my guitar down on the stage and walked off stage.
43:52 Tucker Carlson? Ooh. What'd you do?
43:54 Speaker 01 I was already two plus hours into a show. It's not like they, they, they, they were like, it's not like any of the show got taken away from them.
44:02 Tucker Carlson? Right.
44:02 Speaker 01 At all. I was done. I was just trying to do something special and, and they didn't want it. So.
44:11 Tucker Carlson? So did you ever have con, like direct conflict with an employer over politics?
44:16 Speaker 01 With an employer?
44:17 Tucker Carlson? Yeah, with the label.
44:18 Speaker 01 I mean.
44:21 Speaker 01 My record label president, we've had some pretty heated discussions about politics and, and he, I mean, when you do the whole breakdown and you start talking really bare bones basics, there's a lot of things that he agrees with me on, but when you bring all the rest of it in, we don't see eye to eye on much of anything.
44:53 Tucker Carlson? Right. I get that a lot. Reasonable people, similar values actually, but they're just, they see themselves so differently and they're just committed to some weird partisan addiction.
45:07 Speaker 01 It's almost like a feel-good addiction, like a, like a, like it's a virtue signaling addiction that people seem to have that for some reason feel so guilty about their own life that they need to create these, these things to, to virtue signal and, and make themselves feel like a better person because at the end of the day, how they present themselves
45:42 Speaker 01 and, and behave in life is, is, is unfulfilling for them. So they somehow have to virtue signal to make them feel better about their unfulfilled lives. It's, it's a very strange, strange thing. I, I have found as a 53-year-old man, looking at the people that are younger than me that are going to take over this country when I'm gone.
46:19 Speaker 01 They just want to be a victim. Like it's the craziest thing happening with with our culture where all of our younger generation, there's more pride taken in being a victim than there is in getting over and getting through and moving past whatever it is that you are a victim of. It's not pull your bootstraps up and and and stand up and and keep moving forward anymore. It's it's lavish in the victimhood as long as possible. And that just doesn't compute with me.
47:00 Tucker Carlson? No.
47:00 Speaker 01 Like I don't, that's not what I was taught at all.
47:04 Tucker Carlson? At all.
47:05 Speaker 01 At all.
47:06 Tucker Carlson? You weren't encouraged to whine as a child?
47:09 Speaker 01 No.
47:10 Tucker Carlson? I wasn't either.
47:14 Speaker 01 Honestly, if I was whining, I don't think that my my voice was even acknowledged.
47:20 Tucker Carlson? Of course not, as it shouldn't be.
47:23 Speaker 01 Right.
47:24 Tucker Carlson? Do you feel guilty about growing up as rich as you did, going to Hotchkiss and Yale and all the advantages that you had?
47:32 Speaker 01 I I grew up very much like most in this country. We were lower middle class at best. The first memories that I have are living in a single wide trailer in a trailer park in Castleton, Vermont.
47:57 Tucker Carlson? Charming place.
47:58 Speaker 01 Super charming.
47:58 Tucker Carlson? It's not, it's not the Vermont of weekend getaways, is it?
48:02 Speaker 01 Not so much. It's not stow, really.
48:08 Speaker 01 And my dad, back in the sixties, he bought a hunting camp up on the side of a mountain in Shrewsbury. And he moved us from the trailer park to that hunting camp. It's, it's in the, it's in the song Country Born. My, my dad picked the place up for 1,500 bucks back in 1964. He bought this hunting camp on the side of a mountain for $1,500. And he moved us into that hunting camp. And by the time we moved, he sold that same place for 85 grand, I think.
48:49 Speaker 01 And that was what put us in a regular, middle-class neighborhood at that point. That was the up, that he, that he turned that $1,500 investment into 80 something.
49:06 Tucker Carlson? I've always wanted to live at my hunting camp. I think that's the dream for a lot of people. I would just like to live in a hunting camp. What was that like? As good as?
49:14 Speaker 01 As, as a kid?
49:15 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
49:16 Speaker 01 Lonely.
49:17 Tucker Carlson? I bet.
49:17 Speaker 01 Lonely. I had to keep myself occupied, for sure. I was out in the middle of the woods as a five-year-old kid.
49:26 Tucker Carlson? What's your mom say? What does a woman say when her husband moves her to a hunting camp?
49:30 Speaker 01 I don't think my mom minded. I don't think my mom minded. There was like, she had the garden out front and, and they were always, I mean, my parents were kinda hippie-ish.
49:41 Tucker Carlson? Yeah, that sounds.
49:42 Speaker 01 I mean, my dad got arrested at the Yankee Nuclear Power Plant for protesting back in the day, before it was up and running.
49:49 Tucker Carlson? Yes. Was it, I mean, what was deer season like if you already live in the hunting camp?
49:56 Speaker 01 It wasn't there. We would go to, to Wallingford and to Danby and up where, up where the family was. And the Lewis farm was in Danby and was, you know, half of the, Danby is almost like a, almost like a volcano, like an inactive volcano where at the top of, of the mountain, there's a valley. So it's like an old, like an ancient, ancient volcano that at some point blew off, but you would never know. But there's a valley on the top of the mountain. And that was the valley that Lewis, the Lewis farm was in. And it was like,
50:39 Speaker 01 Top 10 dairy farms in Vermont.
50:45 Speaker 01 And so the farm is where we would go and everybody would gather up and we would do the classic drives and pushes and, and all that stuff. And it was always rifle. I didn't get into bow hunting until, until later in life.
51:05 Tucker Carlson? Yeah. Well, it didn't, there wasn't much of it.
51:07 Speaker 01 Not really, not then.
51:08 Tucker Carlson? No.
51:09 Speaker 01 No, I mean, bows have really come a long way.
51:15 Speaker 01 Since like the mid eighties to now.
51:17 Tucker Carlson? I remember the first time I heard it, I thought it was like one of the, not, not bad. I wasn't against it, but I was like, wow, you kill a deer with a bow?
51:24 Speaker 01 Hmm.
51:25 Tucker Carlson? Like Hiawatha? Like that was wild. Huh. Do you still hunting fish?
51:31 Speaker 01 I do all the time. I'm so completely ate up with upland bird hunting and, and I'm from New England, so I had never hunt quail before. And I earlier this year went on my first quail hunt and oh my God, that was it for me.
51:51 Tucker Carlson? Really?
51:51 Speaker 01 That was it for me. Like I have gone, I, I went probably 15 times since I found, found quail hunting and, and I hunted all the way up until the last day of the season in Florida is April 15th. 15th or 20th, maybe, or somewhere around there and literally hunted all the way through to the last day. And uh,
52:15 Tucker Carlson? What do you like about it?
52:19 Speaker 01 Everything. The tradition, the tradition is the biggest thing for me. Like I'm, I'm all about it. I'm, I'm hunting with, with a gun that, you know, should be in a museum or in a, in somebody's private collection and, and I, those are my hunting guns.
52:39 Tucker Carlson? What do you hunt with?
52:41 Speaker 01 I'm a big four 10 guy. I love the four 10.
52:45 Tucker Carlson? It's the smallest of the shotgun gauges?
52:47 Speaker 01 It is the smallest of the shotgun gauges. It is the most gentlemanly, if you will.
52:55 Speaker 01 And but I'll be out there and full Filson regalia and and and looking like I just came out of a out of a safari or something and and I'm all about it. I'm I I I respect the tradition of it. The camaraderie, the dogs. Oh, my God, I love watching the dogs work.
53:23 Tucker Carlson? They're unbelievable.
53:24 Speaker 01 Watching a dog slam into a point like that, like like somebody just shot him with electricity. Just it's amazing.
53:34 Tucker Carlson? It is amazing.
53:35 Speaker 01 It is amazing. It is amazing that that's that's almost as enjoyable as the actual flush and the shot is actually watching the dogs.
53:49 Tucker Carlson? I totally agree with that.
53:50 Speaker 01 That's that's half, three quarters of the enjoyment is experiencing that whole thing with with the dogs and how amazingly trained they are. I mean, just how does a dog know to do that?
54:05 Tucker Carlson? I don't know.
54:05 Speaker 01 It's amazing.
54:06 Tucker Carlson? It's latent. I mean, I think it's in the dog and your job is to bring it out.
54:09 Speaker 01 It's instinctual and then you got to bring it out. That's it. It's amazing.
54:14 Tucker Carlson? Can you hit a quail with a 410?
54:17 Speaker 01 Almost every time.
54:18 Tucker Carlson? Really?
54:19 Speaker 01 Yes, sir.
54:20 Tucker Carlson? You're doing 180 shows a year. How'd you get to be such a good shot?
54:27 Speaker 01 I had
54:31 Speaker 01 I I was hunting with my dad, bird hunting for ruft grouse and and woodcock, just like you love so much.
54:43 Speaker 01 At seven, eight.
54:47 Tucker Carlson? Yep.
54:48 Speaker 01 I think I got my first double for woodcocks at 10 or 11. Got my first double on grouse at like. 12 or 13.
54:59 Tucker Carlson? Wow. I've never done that.
55:02 Speaker 01 The grouse one was like, it couldn't have been more perfect. Three grouse all went up at the same time and they all flew straight away from me. I probably could have got a triple if I was using a semi-auto and not.
55:13 Tucker Carlson? If you had another barrel.
55:16 Tucker Carlson? So for people who don't, I mean, I'm sure we're going to lose an audience point here, but for people who don't know what New England grouse hunting is, can you describe it?
55:27 Speaker 01 Grouse is a big woodland bird, about the size of a chicken. About the size of a chicken and they, they, they strut like a turkey does.
55:37 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
55:41 Speaker 01 And they've,
55:43 Speaker 01 they're one of the most beautiful birds. And they're one of the hardest.
55:50 Tucker Carlson? Yes.
55:51 Speaker 01 They're as fast as an F-15 and you literally have, if you get two seconds as a window of opportunity for that shot.
56:04 Tucker Carlson? It's a lot.
56:05 Speaker 01 That's a lot.
56:06 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
56:06 Speaker 01 That's a lot. They, they go off and it's like,
56:11 Speaker 01 and they're gone. You, you literally have that much, and they're gone. And the noise I'm making is what it sounds like when they take off from their bird, from their wings hitting their body. And it'll, it will stop your heart like.
56:26 Tucker Carlson? Yeah. And they're no pen-raised rough grouse. I mean, they're just all wild birds.
56:31 Speaker 01 A hundred percent. And they're as wild as wild gets. And for you to go out and have a successful day of roughed grouse hunting, or partridge, as they're also called.
56:44 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
56:46 Speaker 01 You've, you've accomplished something.
56:48 Tucker Carlson? That's for sure.
56:49 Speaker 01 You, you, you get a limit and you're actually done for the day and can't keep hunting for the day with roughed grouse. You are, you have accomplished something.
56:57 Tucker Carlson? If you're doing it on foot, I, I've never done that, but, never limited out on grouse, but like, how many, how far per bird do you think you walk in grouse?
57:06 Speaker 01 Miles.
57:08 Speaker 01 Miles, unless you, unless you have found a, a, a thick population, you will cover some ground and you will put in a lot of work.
57:18 Tucker Carlson? It's probably why I like quail hunting.
57:21 Speaker 01 Right. You get older. Cause I'm, I'm, I'm 53. I, I don't necessarily want to walk into a piece of woods that is up and down and the thickest, they, of course, they live in the thickest crap.
57:38 Tucker Carlson? Oh, yeah.
57:39 Speaker 01 So you're really, really, really, really putting in a lot of effort to possibly put up one bird. Where with quail hunting, if you go to a plantation where that's their deal is quail hunting, with a nice leisurely stroll, nice leisurely gentlemanly stroll through the woods, you can put up a hundred birds instead of possibly one.
58:09 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
58:11 Speaker 01 In that sense, the, the, the hot and heavy action is what kind of keeps, makes the, the quail hunting thing kind of at the top. If, if you will.
58:26 Tucker Carlson? Quail hunting is a rich man's sport. Rough grouse hunting in New England is a, is a poor man's sport.
58:34 Speaker 01 Quail hunting is a rich man's sport because of the fact that the majority of the quail hunting that you can do at this point in, in our, in our society and in our growth as a country, everything else. It's really hard to actually find wild quail to begin with.
58:57 Tucker Carlson? Yes.
58:58 Speaker 01 So what you're hunting is a put and take situation.
59:05 Speaker 01 So there's an overhead to it.
59:08 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
59:09 Speaker 01 And you're paying anywhere from a thousand to astronomical prices to go and hunt this place.
59:20 Tucker Carlson? Yep.
59:20 Speaker 01 Some places are insane and so exclusive and so private that even if you had the ridiculous amount of money to pay, you can't.
59:33 Speaker 01 But yes, yes, it's a, it is a rich man's sport in the sense that it's hard to go do it on your, your own time with no dime.
59:46 Tucker Carlson? For sure.
59:47 Speaker 01 You, you, you gotta go to a place that, for the most part, you gotta go to a place that it charges you because there's a massive overhead for the cost of the birds and the cost of everything.
59:59 Tucker Carlson? So if, you know, musician, if you had to pair a musician with these two kinds of up on bird hunting, you'd say Bruce Springsteen, who's the representative of America's working man.
1:00:14 Speaker 01 Oh, yeah, totally.
1:00:15 Tucker Carlson? Would be a grouse hunter.
1:00:16 Speaker 01 Like I, I would put him as my representation any day.
1:00:21 Tucker Carlson? Do you know Bruce Springsteen?
1:00:22 Speaker 01 No, thankfully.
1:00:23 Tucker Carlson? What do you think of him?
1:00:26 Speaker 01 I, I think that, that he is a, a disgusting display
1:00:36 Speaker 01 of not appreciating what was handed to him for as in this country as being an American, the success that he has had.
1:00:53 Speaker 01 The fact that he duped us all with one of the most anti-American songs ever and called it Born in the USA as some sort of celebration of how great it is to be born in the USA.
1:01:13 Speaker 01 I'm angry at myself for not seeing it for so long and actually giving him, in my mind, the credit of being a representation of blue collar America.
1:01:30 Speaker 01 I think that he has forgotten where he came from.
1:01:35 Tucker Carlson? Yep.
1:01:36 Speaker 01 I think that if you're not careful doing this, this career that that me and him have both been so blessed to have had, if you're not careful,
1:01:52 Speaker 01 it will consume you. And and it's obvious that it creates a situation where you've lost sight
1:02:03 Speaker 01 of the reality of the country that you live in. Because you've you've lived such a cush.
1:02:21 Speaker 01 You've had so much, you have so much, that it's really easy to take a stance that is so anti everything. That that you that you were lucky enough to have, lucky enough to create, lucky enough to to be to change your your situation in life.
1:02:56 Speaker 01 And he's just lost touch with the struggles. He's lost touch with the struggle.
1:03:05 Speaker 01 And it seems like
1:03:08 Speaker 01 most people who have lost touch with the true struggle of life, those are the people that vote for these fucking idiots. Those are the people that feel like they have to virtue signal. Those are the people that.
1:03:28 Speaker 01 Somewhere along the way, they feel guilty for the success that they have had. So they somehow have to make it up with this nonsensical bullshit that
1:03:45 Speaker 01 like you grew up at the same time, Tram, I did. It was the most unracially driven, the, the, the, the verbal beating that we took over and over and over our whole childhood of you don't judge a man by the color of his skin, you judge a man by the content of his character and, and like,
1:04:19 Speaker 01 it was the best that our country has ever been.
1:04:24 Speaker 01 And I think that that didn't work well for the Democrats and the communists.
1:04:29 Tucker Carlson? Why?
1:04:31 Speaker 01 Because they thrive in the chaos. They, they want us at each other's throats. They want us bickering internally so that we have no sense of, of shared country pride, that we have no sense of, of shared morality because they've created so many things artificially for us to fight about. I mean, there is no doubt in my mind at this point. It's not coincidental. It's purposeful.
1:05:12 Speaker 01 Like, there is definitely a, a, a power center in this world that definitely does not want to see us as the, the shining light on the hill.
1:05:27 Tucker Carlson? No, no.
1:05:28 Speaker 01 At all.
1:05:29 Tucker Carlson? They're against peace and prosperity and
1:05:31 Speaker 01 Well, because there's no money in it.
1:05:32 Tucker Carlson? Self-sufficiency and God. Um, yeah, no, I, I couldn't
1:05:36 Speaker 01 There's no money in it. If we're all, you know, how can they exploit us if we're all united and getting along? When we're all looking out for each other as human beings, how can they exploit us? They can't. So they have to, they have to keep us in a constant state of conflict.
1:05:54 Tucker Carlson? When did you start to realize this?
1:06:02 Speaker 01 As I got old enough to be carrying the weight of that responsibility on my shoulders. Yes. Like knowing full well that, okay, it's my turn now. I have assumed the responsibility, which we are all supposed to do, that the country is in my hands. It was in my father's hands before that. It was in my grandfather's hands before that. And as, as our, as our generations grow and get older, each generation, it's now their turn to become and take over as the stewards of this amazing, beautiful country.
1:06:46 Speaker 01 And we forgot about that for a little bit. And we haven't been doing that over the, probably the past 30 years.
1:06:56 Speaker 01 And that's not okay with me. Like, it is my responsibility now, as a father and a proud patriot, it's my responsibility now to make sure that what I hand over to the next generation behind me is better than I found it, because that's, that's what we're supposed to do. That's, that's what we were taught our whole lives. You walk into the woods, you leave it cleaner than you found it. You find one piece of trash. It doesn't even matter. One piece of trash and you pick it up and you put it in your pocket. You have left that better than you found it.
1:07:37 Speaker 01 And our generation, that's what was instilled in us, beaten into us. That's for sure.
1:07:46 Speaker 01 Yeah, that's, that's, that's the moral imperative. I come from the generation of, of, still, it's probably the last generation of, as a kid, now, did it fuck me up? And, and make me feel like my, my voice doesn't get heard? And, and I like, I, and like a, an incessant thing for me is to be heard? Because I didn't feel like my voice was heard as a kid at all? Because I was like the last generation of kids that are, kids are to speak when they're spoken to. And that's it. Like, I got that from my grandparents. Like, children are only to speak when they're spoken to. That's fair. And children are to be seen and not heard.
1:08:26 Tucker Carlson? Also fair.
1:08:29 Tucker Carlson? Unless they have something interesting to say.
1:08:30 Speaker 01 Sure.
1:08:31 Tucker Carlson? But if you don't, I think in general, if you don't have something interesting to say.
1:08:34 Speaker 01 I think that all that all supports the whole thing of because I said so.
1:08:43 Speaker 01 It doesn't, I don't have to give you a reason as my child as to why.
1:08:50 Speaker 01 Like, because I said so. There's a huge lesson with that in life. Your boss isn't going to explain to you why you have to do something. He's going to tell you to do something and you need to just do it. There's going to be situations in life where if somebody tells you to do something and you hesitate and don't do it, your life could be in danger.
1:09:17 Speaker 01 It's just a
1:09:20 Speaker 01 it's a lost art form. It's a lost art form. Parenting is a lost art form. I said that all the way back in 2001 on the cover of Rolling Stone. Parents have forgotten how to be parents. Like, I realized that all the way back then. And it's only gotten worse.
1:09:40 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
1:09:42 Speaker 01 The, the average kid these days, the biggest parental figure in their life is their computer or their phone. It's not their parent.
1:09:53 Tucker Carlson? Yeah, it's the internet.
1:09:54 Speaker 01 It's insane. We are knowingly and willingly flushing everything down the toilet out of convenience. It's so convenient to have this fully operating computer in my hand at all times. It's so convenient.
1:10:16 Speaker 01 Every important piece of thread that makes up the fabric of this country is being picked out one at a time.
1:10:30 Speaker 01 And it's going to leave us with this empty shell that nobody knows what to do with it now. Because we've already discarded and thrown away everything that kept us on a, on a path, on a good path in life.
1:10:48 Tucker Carlson? It feels like new people will rebuild a new and different society in place of the Americans who were here when you and I were born.
1:10:57 Speaker 01 And that's scary.
1:10:58 Tucker Carlson? Oh, I know.
1:10:59 Speaker 01 That's scary. If, if, if we hand this country off as the stewards of today, if we hand this country off to the younger generation without fixing it first, and they're able to do what they've been taught to do, this country will cease to exist. Certainly will not be the shining light on the hill anymore. I don't know that it is already. I mean, the, the, the love and want and desire for this country to go back to where it was for a lot of people is still strong.
1:11:42 Speaker 01 But I don't know if we have the wherewithal as a society, as an entire country, to pull our heads out of our asses long enough to fix it. It's scary. I'm scared. I'm scared for my kids. I, I lose sleep over what this country is going to be for. Good Lord, my grandkids. It's bad enough for my kids.
1:12:12 Tucker Carlson? Yes.
1:12:12 Speaker 01 But another generation, my grandkids? If this doesn't, if this ship doesn't get righted, what are they even going to have? Is their life going to even have the, even the slightest semblance of what our lives were? Do our kids now, is their life even the slightest semblance of what me and you had as kids? No fucking way.
1:12:40 Tucker Carlson? How's it different? You've got three kids.
1:12:42 Speaker 01 We were latchkey kids. You didn't even have to lock your door. It like, you came home and, and, and so many parents weren't even there.
1:12:54 Speaker 01 And there was no worry, like.
1:12:57 Tucker Carlson? I never had a key to my house. I don't have a key to my house now, actually.
1:13:02 Speaker 01 Because of where you live.
1:13:03 Tucker Carlson? Yeah, well, right. No, that's right.
1:13:05 Speaker 01 And I love it out here. This is like.
1:13:07 Tucker Carlson? No, I agree. No, but you're, you're right. I mean, the feeling of safety.
1:13:14 Tucker Carlson? What was kind of unquestioned.
1:13:16 Speaker 01 The feeling of trust, just overall trust of your fellow man. There's, there's, that's.
1:13:27 Speaker 01 That's instinct. It's.
1:13:32 Speaker 01 It's, it's extinct. It doesn't, it doesn't really exist anymore.
1:13:39 Tucker Carlson? So you travel by vehicle, by bus through America?
1:13:42 Speaker 01 I don't like to fly. I literally have not flown on a commercial plane since everything shut down for COVID.
1:13:51 Tucker Carlson? Wow. Good for you.
1:13:54 Speaker 01 I'm, I will, I drive everywhere.
1:13:59 Speaker 01 Unless I absolutely have to fly. And then I am guilty. I won't fly commercial. But once, maybe twice a year, when I absolutely have to fly. I will, I will be bougie and.
1:14:18 Tucker Carlson? Get a plane.
1:14:19 Speaker 01 Get a plane.
1:14:21 Tucker Carlson? But because you're traveling overland the majority of the year.
1:14:27 Speaker 01 I see what this country is.
1:14:29 Tucker Carlson? Exactly. So that's, what do you see? And you've been doing this for what, 30 years? You've been on the road across America?
1:14:35 Speaker 01 I have watched the flyover states just crumble. You go into a small town, half the businesses are boarded up.
1:14:50 Speaker 01 You know, those small, classic, what you would think of as Americana, those Norman Rockwell towns. They're all boarded up. There's nobody downtown. There's no commerce. There's, there's, there's a Dollar General down the street.
1:15:12 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
1:15:13 Speaker 01 There's a Walmart 10 minutes away, but every mom and pop shop is all gone. Family businesses that have, that have provided for that family and provided for the town with the business that they provide, it's all gone.
1:15:31 Tucker Carlson? Everywhere?
1:15:32 Speaker 01 Pretty much. Pretty much.
1:15:37 Tucker Carlson? What are the, you, you play in every region of the country?
1:15:40 Speaker 01 Yeah.
1:15:42 Tucker Carlson? What are the toughest parts of the country right now?
1:15:46 Speaker 01 Rural.
1:15:47 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
1:15:48 Speaker 01 Rural.
1:15:50 Tucker Carlson? Second, you leave the cities.
1:15:53 Tucker Carlson? And that was.
1:15:54 Speaker 01 And it's in, and it's undeniable visually right there in front of your face. You have to close your eyes to not see it.
1:16:04 Tucker Carlson? So why does no one ever mention that? I never, I, every US Senator I know, I know all the Republicans, I mean, they're very upset about Iran or Ukraine, but I don't ever hear them mention their own states outside the cities.
1:16:20 Speaker 01 I know, it's disgusting. And these are supposed to be the people that are the representatives of that area.
1:16:26 Tucker Carlson? You wonder, has Tom Cotton ever been to the Delta in Arkansas? Like, when was the last, seriously, when was the last time he was in El Dorado, Arkansas?
1:16:34 Speaker 01 Right. And I've been through all of Arkansas.
1:16:40 Speaker 01 And it's, it's poverty stricken and falling apart.
1:16:46 Tucker Carlson? Yeah, I know.
1:16:46 Speaker 01 And, and that's anywhere, Tennessee.
1:16:50 Tucker Carlson? I know.
1:16:51 Speaker 01 Like, anywhere.
1:16:52 Tucker Carlson? I know. 30 years ago, 40 years ago, Pine Bluff, Arkansas was a real town.
1:16:58 Tucker Carlson? And now, you know, it's one of the most dangerous places in the country.
1:17:02 Tucker Carlson? I just wonder, like, what do they think?
1:17:05 Speaker 01 I don't know. And I don't understand why
1:17:10 Speaker 01 their policies never work.
1:17:13 Speaker 01 Like, they never, ever work. I don't know of a single
1:17:19 Speaker 01 communist policy
1:17:22 Speaker 01 that has actually done good for whoever it was that the policy was designed for.
1:17:34 Speaker 01 None of them.
1:17:35 Tucker Carlson? Right. It's only about destruction.
1:17:37 Speaker 01 It is. It's only about destruction.
1:17:39 Tucker Carlson? Well, here's a story you probably haven't heard a lot about. The Chinese mafia is exploiting rural America to create a drug empire. This is not available on cable news. The network's not telling you about this, but it's totally real. Communist affiliated drug gangs destroying parts of the United States, the parts that Washington ignores, to sell drugs, laundering money and building a black market network inside this country's most beautiful but least served areas. We've got a brand new documentary on this. It's called High Crimes: The Chinese Mafia Takeover of Rural America. It's available now on TuckerCarlson.com. It's excellent. The purchase of churches and schools to aid the operation, the jerry rigging of power boxes to steal electricity,
1:18:24 Tucker Carlson? foreign pesticides, collusion with the Mexican cartels. It's unbelievable. By the way, one of the drug houses is like walking distance from my house. I didn't know that. It's a layered and fascinating story. Head to TuckerCarlson.com to watch now. We think you'll love it.
1:18:43 Speaker 01 So here's a
1:18:46 Speaker 01 here's one of my favorite quotes, my favorite Aaron Lewis quotes.
1:18:50 Tucker Carlson? My book of Aaron Lewis quotes. Um, you know, everyone want, you know, everyone in music is like an outlaw, a rebel. And they all say the same thing and they all mouth the same pieties, read the same stupid bumper stickers, kiss ass to the same powerful people. Um, so this, this actually is kind of an outlaw thing to say, and here's what you said in 2022. And I'm quoting you. You know, as fucked up as it sounds, maybe we should listen to what Vladimir Putin is saying.
1:19:16 Speaker 01 I got, I got so, I got in so much trouble for that.
1:19:19 Tucker Carlson? And I can, let me, I will continue to quote you back to you. Maybe when Klaus Schwab and George Soros and every other earth destroying MF'er all jump on the same bandwagon, maybe just maybe we should take a good look at that. Why are they trying to protect Ukraine so much? What do they all have to lose? So I would think like in a, in a country with creative people, a free country, that you'd be one of many people asking the single most obvious questions. Why can't we listen to what the other side is saying? And why are all these people who were pretty obviously bad, also vested in this one far away country? Like, what do they have to lose? I mean, first of all, bless you for saying that. Um, second, did anyone ever answer your question?
1:20:04 Speaker 01 Um, nope.
1:20:06 Tucker Carlson? Nope.
1:20:07 Speaker 01 Um, I lost employees.
1:20:09 Tucker Carlson? Employees?
1:20:11 Speaker 01 Oh, yeah. People, people that, not direct employees in my like, in my knit circle.
1:20:18 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
1:20:18 Speaker 01 But external employees, people that worked for me in, in different areas that wouldn't, that, that wanted nothing to do with it anymore. It's, it's a, it's a funny story and you're part of it. The reason I said that is because I had literally just watched your show.
1:20:36 Tucker Carlson? Oh, gosh.
1:20:37 Speaker 01 And you were the one to say, hmm, maybe we should have, maybe we should listen to Putin and see what he has to say. And I was like, well, if Tucker has said it on Fox.
1:20:50 Tucker Carlson? How'd that work out for me?
1:20:52 Speaker 01 It worked out for both of us the same way.
1:20:54 Tucker Carlson? Amen, I agree.
1:20:55 Speaker 01 It worked out for both of us the same way. It, it, it took weeks for that one to go away.
1:21:01 Tucker Carlson? Really?
1:21:02 Speaker 01 Oh, yeah.
1:21:02 Tucker Carlson? But I just, I, I'm not an artist. I'm, I'm a guy who gives his opinions on YouTube, but I appreciate artists, which is to say, people whose whole job is to pursue the truth, you know, whether they get there or not. But I mean, that's their job. And every society carves out room for them to do that. And a healthy society isn't run by artists. Don't want them, they're not in charge of the power grid. Okay. But a healthy society does kind of listen sometimes to what they say because they're saying unconventional things, challenge you to think a little more deeply about things you assume are true. Are they actually true? You pay artists to say things like that.
1:21:41 Tucker Carlson? So it's just wild to live in a society where artists are leading the charge for conformity. They're like, no, no, obey. That does seem.
1:21:51 Speaker 01 When did that happen?
1:21:52 Tucker Carlson? I don't know, but it's very weird.
1:21:55 Speaker 01 It, it, it seems like what once was like on that edge is now so blunted and everybody is just a spokesperson, person for the machine.
1:22:11 Tucker Carlson? It does feel that way.
1:22:12 Speaker 01 Because they're all afraid of losing their position in the machine.
1:22:16 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
1:22:18 Speaker 01 When all of the higher ups think the opposite that you do, most of the time in this industry, those people don't have the wiggle room that I do.
1:22:32 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
1:22:33 Speaker 01 So they have to conform or they lose their spot.
1:22:39 Speaker 01 I was lucky enough to have built and created my spot before I chose to not conform.
1:22:47 Tucker Carlson? Right.
1:22:48 Speaker 01 So I didn't, I didn't necessarily lose my spot just because I didn't conform because I had already built it and they couldn't take that away from me at that point. Like, they've already tried to cancel me. They've already done everything that they can do to talk shit about me. So now they just ignore my existence. Now they don't even say bad things. They just don't say anything at all.
1:23:16 Tucker Carlson? It doesn't seem to have affected your sales.
1:23:21 Speaker 01 Doesn't seem to.
1:23:22 Tucker Carlson? You had one of the biggest songs in the country a couple of years ago. Everybody hated it. Everybody in charge hated it.
1:23:29 Speaker 01 Am I the only one?
1:23:30 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
1:23:30 Speaker 01 Yeah, there was a outward call within the industry for me to be canceled and to lose my record deal. And my record label president, who we don't see eye to eye on politics at all, stood up for my right to free speech and my right and my right to creativity and as an artist, my right to express myself however I want.
1:23:54 Tucker Carlson? What didn't they like about the song?
1:23:58 Speaker 01 That it was a patriotic, country-loving,
1:24:07 Speaker 01 point out the what the fuck is going on right now?
1:24:11 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
1:24:13 Speaker 01 Point of view. And they didn't like that. They, they, they didn't like that I was pointing out the obvious in a time where
1:24:28 Speaker 01 every single one of us was sitting there scratching our heads going, what in the fuck is going on in this country? I'm, I'm 49 or 50 at the time or whatever it was. And I've never seen anything even remotely close to what's going on right now in this country. Like, where did our sense of free people go where all of a sudden we're just conforming to these rules that just don't make any sense? It seems like they're just taking handfuls of shit and throwing it against the wall and seeing what sticks.
1:25:06 Speaker 01 And I was like, what the fuck? Am I the only one who's seeing this? Who's, who's recognizing how completely?
1:25:22 Speaker 01 How completely absurd the whole concept was of shutting everything down? How?
1:25:33 Speaker 01 How do we survive that as a, as an economy, as a, as a, as a,
1:25:41 Speaker 01 the wheels that need to keep moving at all times just screeched to a freaking halt?
1:25:50 Speaker 01 And, you know, me and Jeff Steele and Ira Dean got together and
1:25:59 Speaker 01 everybody was wearing masks at the time. Everybody was, was, was distancing themselves from everybody. That moment in time was one of the most destructive moments in time that we've ever experienced.
1:26:15 Speaker 01 It, it destroyed our, our close knitness. It destroyed.
1:26:24 Speaker 01 Human beings are, are, are, are social people. They, they want to be in groups. They want to be together. We, we, we want to, we're, we're, you know, we, we, we want to come together instinctively.
1:26:41 Speaker 01 And to do that, like, there's a, there's a whole lot of people that, that are responsible for that, that, that should be held accountable for what they did.
1:26:54 Tucker Carlson? I couldn't agree more.
1:26:57 Speaker 01 I'm, I'm still blown away by it. I still,
1:27:03 Speaker 01 I still feel like the words to that song are, are just as relevant to this moment that we are sitting in right now as it was five years ago when we were locked up and told that we had to wear masks and that we couldn't.
1:27:24 Speaker 01 I had a mask in my car
1:27:29 Speaker 01 just to put on
1:27:32 Speaker 01 if I went into Dunkin Donuts or if I, and that didn't even last for very long. A month into it, I was like, this is fucking bullshit. I'm not, I got thrown out of Dunkin Donuts one day for walking in without my mask on.
1:27:48 Tucker Carlson? You're thrown out of Dunkin Donuts?
1:27:50 Speaker 01 And like, like rudely.
1:27:54 Tucker Carlson? Really?
1:27:55 Speaker 01 Like you are putting everybody in this, in this place's life in danger and, and you should be ashamed of yourself.
1:28:03 Tucker Carlson? Wait, Dunkin Donuts is the place where homeless junkies shoot up in the back?
1:28:05 Speaker 01 Right, yeah, yeah, same place, yeah.
1:28:07 Tucker Carlson? Yeah, okay. Um, but what you were doing was unclean.
1:28:10 Speaker 01 Right.
1:28:12 Tucker Carlson? So, I, yeah, I never knew that people were that easy to, to train. I never knew they were that obedient. I never knew there were that many people with no self-respect at all.
1:28:23 Speaker 01 At the time, I was living in a, a very, very
1:28:29 Speaker 01 left town.
1:28:31 Tucker Carlson? Which town?
1:28:32 Speaker 01 Massachusetts, North Hampton, Massachusetts.
1:28:34 Tucker Carlson? Lesbian capital of the world.
1:28:36 Speaker 01 Mm-hmm. It's where Smith College is.
1:28:38 Tucker Carlson? Yep.
1:28:39 Speaker 01 It's a, it is a festering cesspool of, of anti-American everything.
1:28:45 Tucker Carlson? What's the happiness level, would you say, in North Hampton, man?
1:28:48 Speaker 01 Misery. I don't see, I don't see anybody smiling, ever, ever. They are all, all these people that feel the need to virtue signal every time they turn around are some of the most miserable people you've ever met in your life.
1:29:05 Tucker Carlson? Oh, I've noticed.
1:29:06 Speaker 01 Oh, yeah.
1:29:07 Tucker Carlson? What are they mad about?
1:29:11 Speaker 01 Their own failures? I, I don't, I don't know. I don't know why it's such an incessant need these days to, to do it. Like, just live a good life. All this virtue signaling, all this, all this fake outrage.
1:29:32 Speaker 01 Just live a good life.
1:29:33 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
1:29:35 Speaker 01 Treat people good. You'll get treated good in return.
1:29:38 Tucker Carlson? How'd they, how'd they treat you in Northampton?
1:29:42 Speaker 01 If they knew who I was, probably not very good.
1:29:45 Tucker Carlson? Country music's not that big in Northampton?
1:29:47 Speaker 01 I'm not, I'm a, I'm not the artist, celebrity. I hate, I don't even like using that word. It makes me feel weird. I'm not, I'm not the artist that wants to get noticed. I, I try my best to, to stay under the radar. A successful day for me of going out and about is not getting noticed.
1:30:16 Speaker 01 So.
1:30:19 Speaker 01 I, it, uh.
1:30:22 Speaker 01 It doesn't.
1:30:25 Speaker 01 I don't even remember where I was. Sometimes I get on a roll and I, I lose track.
1:30:31 Tucker Carlson? Well, you just picked the right town for anonymity. I mean, if you were, say, the Indigo Girls.
1:30:37 Tucker Carlson? Or the Dixie Chicks.
1:30:37 Speaker 01 Wouldn't be able to walk down the street.
1:30:39 Tucker Carlson? No. But, um, you really, did you choose Northampton because you know, not a single person there has ever heard of your music?
1:30:47 Speaker 01 At the time, it was out of convenience.
1:30:54 Speaker 01 But.
1:30:57 Speaker 01 I certainly would not choose. Nor do I, now that I don't live in downtown Northampton. I, I don't, I don't choose to go there. I will go into Northampton for pretty much one reason and one reason only. And his name is Sam and he is the sushi chef at Moshi Moshi.
1:31:21 Tucker Carlson? Oh.
1:31:22 Speaker 01 And I will go and I will sit down at the sushi bar with Sam, drink sake with him and eat sushi.
1:31:30 Tucker Carlson? So you'll make the sushi pilgrimage, but you would, but no more residential time there?
1:31:34 Speaker 01 No.
1:31:36 Tucker Carlson? What's your, let me ask you a couple of questions about what you like.
1:31:42 Speaker 01 I want to try that flavor.
1:31:43 Tucker Carlson? Oh, it's the best. This is sweet nectar. We just came out with it and I got like a case of it. So I've been, I've been on it and I really like it.
1:31:50 Speaker 01 What are the other two new flavor, the other couple of flavors? I know that I heard you.
1:31:53 Tucker Carlson? We have a bunch. We've got fruit and mint and wintergreen and all that, but this is, um, and we've got a bunch of other flavors we're working on, but that, uh, the government makes it hard to introduce new flavors. It's crazy.
1:32:06 Speaker 01 Well, cause you're, you're, you're, you're trying to get the kids. That's what it is.
1:32:11 Tucker Carlson? Yeah, I can't, I'm not even allowed to talk about that topic. Nicotine for the children is totally verboten. Um, I started really young. I'll just say that. And I'm glad I did. But anyway, uh, I know everyone disagrees with me, but that's how I actually feel. So I'm just going to say it.
1:32:26 Speaker 01 I had my first cigarette at eight.
1:32:33 Tucker Carlson? That's pretty young.
1:32:34 Speaker 01 And I've actually been smoking, like have a pack of cigarettes. I've been smoking since I was like 13.
1:32:43 Tucker Carlson? Yeah, me too.
1:32:45 Tucker Carlson? But I quit at 45. And what brand do you smoke?
1:32:48 Speaker 01 American Spirits.
1:32:49 Tucker Carlson? It's a good cigarette.
1:32:50 Speaker 01 It is, as far as a cigarette goes.
1:32:53 Tucker Carlson? It's still, it's delicious.
1:32:54 Speaker 01 It's delicious. It doesn't have all the extra 1600 chemicals that they put in there to make it more addictive, to make it burn faster, to make it burn slower.
1:33:04 Tucker Carlson? Right.
1:33:04 Speaker 01 They even put chemicals in there that are contradictory to themselves.
1:33:07 Tucker Carlson? Yeah, for fire, fireproofing their cigarettes. I mean, it's all, yeah.
1:33:13 Speaker 01 And then an American spirit will go out on its own.
1:33:17 Tucker Carlson? No, I know. If you, I smoked American Spirit Blues, um, the light blue and I always took the filters off. And I thought, wow, that's like, that's the strongest cigarette in America. If you do that. It's incredible cigarette. I don't smoke anymore. Anyway, sorry. So I'm not promoting smoking, though it is delicious, very delicious.
1:33:38 Tucker Carlson? More delicious than anything I've ever done before or since. I'm just, that's why people do it. By the way, the piety around smoking, obviously smoking is not good for you. I don't want my children to smoke.
1:33:47 Speaker 01 Not good for you. It smells, it looks gross, all of those things.
1:33:52 Tucker Carlson? I disagree.
1:33:53 Speaker 01 And it's. Such a satisfying five minutes removed off your life.
1:34:03 Tucker Carlson? When you think about people who kind of openly, brazenly, publicly send young men off to die in pointless wars on behalf of some other country, like that's just, that's just par in the US Congress. They all can't wait to do that and they face no moral sanction whatsoever. But if you were to light a cigarette and someone saw you, you'd be like a monster. Look, I'm not arguing for smoking. I'm just saying it's good to have a sensible moral hierarchy in mind when you assess other people's behavior. Like, some things are bad, but some things are worse than that.
1:34:39 Speaker 01 Right.
1:34:40 Tucker Carlson? Right?
1:34:40 Speaker 01 And make your choices accordingly.
1:34:43 Tucker Carlson? Well, kind of, and make your judgments accordingly. I mean, I do think violence is bad.
1:34:50 Speaker 01 Sure.
1:34:50 Tucker Carlson? And sending off other people's kids to die is one of the worst things I can imagine. And yet, that's celebrated.
1:34:59 Speaker 01 You would think that that would be like, a really hard decision.
1:35:03 Tucker Carlson? It's not. It's not.
1:35:05 Speaker 01 No, it's like the easiest decision for them to make.
1:35:07 Tucker Carlson? Lindsey Graham literally can't wait. And I do think all of them should be forced to go to the front lines in Ukraine and worry about getting droned.
1:35:15 Speaker 01 How about this?
1:35:16 Tucker Carlson? Not because I wish them harm, but because there should be some skin in the game.
1:35:20 Speaker 01 I just want some fucking truth.
1:35:23 Tucker Carlson? Yeah, I agree.
1:35:24 Speaker 01 I want to know why Lindsey Graham is such a, a, a Ukraine, like, what, what were you doing over there, Lindsey, in 2014?
1:35:40 Tucker Carlson? I think that's fair to ask.
1:35:42 Speaker 01 What were you doing? Why are you so vested in, in Ukraine? Why, why, why would you put Ukraine?
1:35:51 Speaker 01 Over everything else. Like, what is going on? I mean, as, as you know, as so many people are fully aware, the Ukraine is one of the dirtiest and most corrupt places in the world, aside from the United States.
1:36:08 Tucker Carlson? Run by a Stalinist, by the way, who canceled elections, closed the biggest Christian denomination in the country, put the priests and nuns in prison, like murdering his political enemies. I can't go to Ukraine. I'd get killed if I went to Ukraine, a country that my tax dollars support.
1:36:24 Speaker 01 Right.
1:36:25 Tucker Carlson? And Lindsey Graham was like, no, that's great. I don't know. I mean, let's just wake up a second. This is bonkers. It's degrading us. It's beyond immoral. It's like self-harm at scale. It's crushing the United States.
1:36:38 Speaker 01 It just makes me wonder how many of these politicians that make these decisions that were like, what the fuck are you even thinking? Did you get caught in a honeypot? Did, did, did you do something and they caught you doing it? And now they have you under their thumb?
1:36:55 Tucker Carlson? Oh, I know.
1:36:56 Speaker 01 Like Madison Cawthorn got ran out because he started mentioning stuff like that. Started talking about the parties that happened and start, they got rid of him as fast as they could. He's a good dude.
1:37:11 Tucker Carlson? Well, Matt Gaetz, same thing.
1:37:12 Speaker 01 Matt Gaetz, same thing.
1:37:13 Tucker Carlson? They're like, oh, you had sex with-
1:37:15 Speaker 01 I don't know how Marjorie Taylor Greene has, has somehow made it this far, aside from
1:37:23 Speaker 01 being a woman and-
1:37:24 Tucker Carlson? I don't think they have anything on her. I think she's like a decent person.
1:37:27 Speaker 01 Yeah, I think she's incredible.
1:37:29 Tucker Carlson? But it was so funny with Gates. They're like, he starts making, you know, unauthorized noises about this or that. And all of a sudden they're like, well, you had sex with children. Okay. Where's the evidence? And by the way, where's the indictment? They never indicted him for it.
1:37:43 Speaker 01 Oh, I know.
1:37:43 Tucker Carlson? So how can you accuse somebody of a crime and then not, the government is accusing him of a crime and then not indicting him for it? Why is that not a crime in itself? If Matt Gaetz had sex with children- Indict him, arrest him, put him on trial and prove it.
1:37:58 Speaker 01 Or you're in trouble yourself for, for, um, for destroying his character.
1:38:06 Tucker Carlson? Using my tax dollars to commit slander against your political opponents? Yeah, that's a crime.
1:38:09 Speaker 01 Right.
1:38:10 Tucker Carlson? But no one's ever prosecuted for it. And, and, but that's, what that does is it puts the fear of God into all the other freaks in Congress, all of whom have some, not all, but many of whom have something to hide, including people we've just mentioned. And they're like, whoa, you know, I better stay way away from the boundaries because I could get hurt.
1:38:27 Speaker 01 Sure.
1:38:27 Tucker Carlson? It just casts a pall over everybody of fear.
1:38:30 Speaker 01 Mm-hmm.
1:38:32 Tucker Carlson? Um, you obviously don't feel that.
1:38:35 Speaker 01 No.
1:38:39 Tucker Carlson? How, how long can you do 180 shows a year?
1:38:44 Speaker 01 If I'm doing the country thing?
1:38:46 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
1:38:47 Speaker 01 Forever.
1:38:49 Tucker Carlson? Really? Well, Willie Nelson does it. He's 90.
1:38:52 Speaker 01 Yeah, I could, I can, if I live that long, I could, I could still be, the country thing, I could still be doing that. The Stained thing, that's a, that's a little bit more taxing.
1:39:05 Tucker Carlson? Yeah, I believe that.
1:39:06 Speaker 01 To my voice. It's a lot of yelling. It's a lot of screaming. It's, it's, it's, it's a lot more taxing to where if I'm being completely honest, there's probably more of a shelf life to my country thing than there is to the Stained thing.
1:39:25 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
1:39:26 Speaker 01 There's probably gonna come a point where I'm gonna have to be like, you know what?
1:39:32 Speaker 01 It's, it's too taxing on me and it takes too long for me to recover from being on tour with Stained for a month.
1:39:41 Speaker 01 And there's probably gonna come a point where I'm gonna be like,
1:39:46 Speaker 01 for longevity's purposes, I, I, I need to either do less shows or not so many in a row, or the country thing, man, I could do three shows a day, every single day and never blow myself out.
1:40:05 Tucker Carlson? And enjoy it.
1:40:12 Speaker 01 You have to be pretty damn blessed in life.
1:40:19 Speaker 01 To be able to continue.
1:40:23 Speaker 01 Enjoying a job.
1:40:26 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
1:40:26 Speaker 01 It is a job at the end of the day. At the I'm blessed that I was able to. Create my job around something that I love and that I'm driven to do.
1:40:42 Speaker 01 But as a job. There's parts of that that kind of ruin the the experience of it all. There's it's the music business. The music part I love.
1:40:57 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
1:40:58 Speaker 01 The business part.
1:41:02 Speaker 01 It. It can ruin the part that I love so much.
1:41:06 Tucker Carlson? Of course. That's why no one enjoys porn. Sorry, I shouldn't have said that. No, but it's true. I mean, like any, any time you. You know, take a good thing and and make it a business. It it diminishes it, of course.
1:41:16 Speaker 01 Oh, God. Our poor kids these days, they're they're sex addicts and porn addicts before they even had sex.
1:41:23 Tucker Carlson? I know. It's depressing.
1:41:24 Speaker 01 They're learning about sex through porn.
1:41:28 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
1:41:29 Speaker 01 And yeah, that's a that's a healthy sex life.
1:41:34 Tucker Carlson? It's, yeah. Yeah. Speaking of like creating a moral hierarchy, the people who make and profit from porn. I mean, I don't know why they're not in prison, but um.
1:41:46 Speaker 01 I talk about exploitation.
1:41:48 Tucker Carlson? Oh, yeah. Right. But it's it's the cigarette smokers and the people who doubt Zelensky who really should lose their jobs. Okay, let me end on a on a happy note. So you've said a lot of um. Tough things about the music business and the people who profit from it. You described them as leeches. I don't know that to be true because I've never been in your business, but we all know, we all know that they're all.
1:42:10 Speaker 01 It it calling them a leech. It's a that's a pretty negative connotation, but.
1:42:15 Tucker Carlson? Just a blood sucking parasite.
1:42:16 Speaker 01 In general, what a leech does is it parasites off of a living organism. And. That. That leech.
1:42:29 Speaker 01 Isn't the one that's responsible for the life that it's leeching off of.
1:42:33 Tucker Carlson? Exactly.
1:42:35 Speaker 01 And so it's an analogy. I don't want to be that
1:42:41 Speaker 01 negative or like hateful about it. I'm, I'm very grateful to,
1:42:50 Speaker 01 to my president, the record label president for standing up for me and for, but you know, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a business in a, in a situation that you stop paying attention for a half a second and you're ate up and spit out already and you're gone.
1:43:09 Tucker Carlson? Yeah, I believe that.
1:43:11 Speaker 01 It, uh,
1:43:12 Tucker Carlson? So who are, so here's the, the question I want to end on, cause it is, it is a positive question.
1:43:18 Tucker Carlson? Having been in it for 30 years, who are the good guys? Who are the artists who you know personally, who are actually in the green room, good guys?
1:43:31 Tucker Carlson? Ooh, long sigh there.
1:43:34 Speaker 01 Um,
1:43:36 Speaker 01 I, I keep my circle pretty small.
1:43:45 Speaker 01 You know,
1:43:48 Speaker 01 Bob's, Bob's my friend.
1:43:51 Tucker Carlson? That'd be Kid Rock.
1:43:51 Speaker 01 Mm-hmm.
1:43:55 Speaker 01 You know, I,
1:43:59 Speaker 01 I don't interact very much with the rest of the industry, really. I mean, I don't, I don't find myself in Nashville very often. I don't go to the gatherings and the parties and the, and the, I'm, I live out in the corn and soybeans and the tobacco and, and, and, you know, there's miles in every direction around my house of just agriculture.
1:44:29 Speaker 01 I so I don't really interact with the business very much. I'm I'm very particular about my inner circle and and who I consider a friend and I don't. I don't have a lot of those. So I don't I don't have a lot.
1:44:52 Tucker Carlson? Picture here, Aaron Lewis. I gave you a so I was like, all right, who are the good guys? And you're like, uh.
1:45:00 Speaker 01 Well, you know, this this business is is tough.
1:45:06 Tucker Carlson? Would you want your kids to go into it?
1:45:07 Speaker 01 No. And and they've had my my my oldest daughter Zoe is on one of my records singing. Uh, singing Traveling Soldier by the Dixie Chicks, actually. And I don't know. So many people approached me like, I'll give her a record deal. Let's let's she doesn't want nothing to do with it. My kids have. My kids have been on the receiving end of all the shit that comes with this industry.
1:45:46 Speaker 01 And all the sacrifice and all the all the the the disappointment and the, you know, I'm a I'm a slave to the grind, you know, the grind has taken precedent over important things in my life that I can never get back. You know, monumental things, my kid's first steps, my kid's first words, my kid's first days of school, my kid's last days of school, my kid's graduations. I haven't been able to be there for a lot of them.
1:46:24 Speaker 01 The sacrifice is real.
1:46:28 Tucker Carlson? Yeah.
1:46:30 Speaker 01 But it's created a situation where I just don't let very many people in. So to, in a big roundabout circle to answer your question. I have a lot of acquaintances in the industry. Like, there's people that I have huge love and respect for. I, I'm like pen pals, like me and you text all the time. Me and Marilyn Manson text all the time.
1:47:02 Tucker Carlson? Yeah. I haven't seen.
1:47:05 Speaker 01 He'd actually surprise you.
1:47:07 Tucker Carlson? I interviewed him in the 90s, Brian, and I thought he was smart. In maybe 1999 at the Chateau Marmont in LA.
1:47:16 Speaker 01 Brian is one of the most intelligent, profound conversations I have ever had with somebody. I like, he's a, and I use the word evil lightly, but he's like an evil genius. He is fully aware of every single button he is purposely pushing. Like, all, it's all been, he's genius. Like, it's all been calculated. It's all, like, he knows exactly what he's doing. He knows exactly what buttons he's pushing, and he's pushing them on purpose.
1:47:57 Tucker Carlson? Interesting.
1:48:00 Speaker 01 He's amazing. Jonathan Davis from Korn, one of my favorite people.
1:48:11 Tucker Carlson? I can't believe you text with Marilyn Manson.
1:48:13 Speaker 01 He's like my modern day pen pal. We never actually talk on the phone, we just text.
1:48:20 Tucker Carlson? Give him my best.
1:48:21 Speaker 01 I will.
1:48:22 Tucker Carlson? Aaron Lewis, thank you.
1:48:24 Speaker 01 Thank you.
1:48:24 Tucker Carlson? I'm gonna go bird shooting with you.
1:48:26 Speaker 01 I look forward to it.
1:48:27 Tucker Carlson? I can't wait.
1:48:28 Speaker 01 I can't wait to watch you, uh, watch you use your, your new hammer gun.
1:48:34 Tucker Carlson? I don't know if I'll be able to use it correctly, but we'll find out. Thank you.
1:48:37 Speaker 01 My pleasure.
1:48:42 Tucker Carlson? We want to thank you for watching us on Spotify, a company that we use every day. We know the people who run it, good people. While you're here, do us a favor, hit follow and tap the bell so you never miss an episode. We have real conversations, news, things that actually matter, telling the truth always. You will not miss it if you follow us on Spotify and hit the bell. We appreciate it. Thanks for watching.
Previous Dave Collum: Financial Crisis, Diddy, Energy Weapons, QAnon, and the Deep State’s Digital Evolution Next Cliffe Knechtle Answers Tough Questions About the Bible, Demons, Israel, Judas, Free Will, and Death Page updated November 1, 2026 · transcript and summary are machine-generated
