One of Us (with Alan Light)

This is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed human. I'm Hester Prynne, DJ and licensed therapist. This is Music is Therapy. Your session starts now. What's the most useless piece of advice you can hear? Be yourself. Just be yourself. Cool. Right. What does that mean? Which self and how do I know if I'm being it? I think there was an entire My So-Called Life episode about this once. Well, I've heard this useless advice so many times, but now I'm the therapist and I'm the DJ. So I select the songs and the advice. And when people ask me now what this means or where do I start? I actually have an answer. I say, start with what you like. Like, for example, do you like the outdoors or do you like tacos? Well, how do you know you like them? It's a feeling, right? That feeling, that's you. For me, the thing that has always made me feel like myself has been music, records. I've loved this since I was a kid. I will love it until I die and I've never once had to talk myself into it. That's how I know it's real. And the thing about knowing what you really love is that it becomes a compass, a compass because you start to look around and it points directly to other people who love it too. So in my world, like I'll mention a lyric or a record or a reference, a throwaway reference and they know it. And suddenly we're both like, oh, we're one of us. That's a real thing I say. We're one of us. And it crosses everything, age, background, whatever. Music does that. It tells you who your people are before anyone has said anything about themselves. Like, you don't even need to say anything about yourself. You don't need a backstory. We love the same thing. We're one of us. That's what this month is about. Community, identity, how we find our people and how we know when we've found them. And it is getting harder. Today's guest is Alan Light, Emmy award winning music journalist, bestselling author, former editor-in-chief of Vive and Spin. He's interviewed basically every artist that you care about for The New York Times, Rolling Stone, The Wall Street Journal, Esquire, Not Too Shabby. And his new book about Fleetwood Mac is called Don't Stop, Why We Still Love Rumors. He co-hosts the music news podcast Sound Up. But most importantly, Alan is the person who made me realize that I was one of us. He was the first person who put me on live radio. He's a dear friend and really one of my absolute favorite humans on planet Earth. OK, two quick things before we go in. The April playlist is called Songs That Make Everyone On The Dance Floor Best Friends for three minutes. Just a short casual title, but it's linked in the show notes. And you may notice it's getting longer because you keep sending me songs and I love it. So keep sending them. Music is TherapyPod at gmail.com. And on April 18th, which is a Saturday, I'm hosting a second. It's my second time ever doing this, a second free online workshop where I'm going to teach you one piece of the music connection therapy method, just one piece. You're going to learn how to use the songs you already love to change your life. And we might actually make real connection with other people. Imagine it's going to be at 1 p.m. Eastern for about an hour. That link is also in the show notes. My conversation with Alan Light starts now. I am intimidated to interview you. It's ridiculous. How could it not be ridiculous? How many times have we gone on the radio live together? A million had to navigate whatever was thrown at us. Like, what are you still going to surprise? Can I walk down memory lane with you for several minutes? It's your show. I feel like people who are listening to the show who know our relationship will be excited to hear me walk down memory lane. I thought you were going to say if they know what they'll be bored by this part. No, we're going to edit that out. And people who don't know our relationship will be like, oh, this is something very serious. You and I met when I was in Northern State. We played at your bookstore, which is the housing works bookstore in Soho. Correct. Where I have seen all of the greats be interviewed often by you. In all of our time knowing each other, you failed to mention that you have worked with or interviewed Led Zeppelin, my favorite band. Must have come up at some point. It's never come up. Would you like to just open the show by telling me about that? I did. Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones sort of together handing the phone back and forth before the O2 show. Yes. In London, which I did go to. I know that. Yes. And then and I've also done multiple things with Page over the years and many things with Robert Plant, right? Over the years in different for print, for TV, for radio, for lots of things. So I've worked with all of them. It was really only when I did Page and John Paul Jones together that you would say that was a Led Zeppelin interview. OK, I got it. So since everyone who listens to the show knows that Led Zeppelin is my favorite band, what surprised you the most about Jimmy Page? I mean, sadly about Jimmy. I would usually do it the other way, which is that the surprise really cool thing about Robert Plant is that guy's just an old hippie. Like really is just it was in. I thought I'd go to Feds, you know, or I want to work with this country. But like he really just doesn't care and does whatever is sort of musically in his head and has been very true to that. And it's really cool because it's hard to come up with any of those guys who are so loose. Yes. About like not feeling competitive with his past, just feeling like this is a chance to go explore. Right. Where with Jimmy Page, you are so aware of how paralyzed he is. Yes. And how frozen by his legacy and that he can't get it out of his head. He can't get past it. And so he's endlessly remixing and doing deluxe versions of Zeppelin albums and doing books of the gear he played with that. Like it's it's so overpowering in his head. You can see he just can't it's visceral out of that. It's it's tangible. So the massive Jimmy Page fans like me believe and we'll get to the interview. But let's just get this out of the way. Massive Jimmy Page fans like me believe the the lore that he made a deal with the devil, which gave him 10 years to be to be should be matched with three of the greatest musicians who ever lived with no with no ego. No one in that room had an ego, but Jimmy Page and he could do it every one of ten years, but that was it. That was the deal. Do you think that there's any truth to that? I mean, I'm not going to I'm not going to sign off on the going to the crossroads and signing the deal necessarily. But functionally, it feels like that. It feels like he gave everything that he had to what that band was and what that band, you know, getting it from what was in his head to what was in those tracks and knowing you can't compete with it. You can't get, you know, unless you do what Plant does, which is just first essentially ignore it. Yeah, essentially keep moving, you know. And of course, it's always funny. Every time you interview Robert, they say, well, don't ask about Zeppelin. And like within five minutes, he's talking about Led Zeppelin. Like you don't have to ask him. They say, don't ask about Led Zeppelin. Oh, yeah, yeah. They're just asked about Alison. Yeah. I do love that record, too. And, you know, and he and he instantly talks about Led Zeppelin. Like it's not that he's I'm sure he doesn't want to get asked about a reunion again. Yes. But but the way that they each dealt with that. And I don't know if you've watched the new this new Paul McCartney, this Wings documentary that just went up last week. I haven't. You know, it's a story that's been told. But what those early days were for him and figuring out like I was in the Beatles and I'm not. And what do I do? Yeah, who am I? Who am I? How do I function? How do I make music? And, you know, and there's this real for him, he's both of those things, right? There's the tension and it's very obvious that there's the tension between. I just want to be a guy in a band and, you know, screw around and see what I can do. And I'm the greatest melody writer in the world. And of course, I'm going to tell everybody else what they should be doing. Right. And it's a big piece of the end of the Beatles and it's a big piece of everything in his solo career. And he sort of holds both of those things where Page and Plant really are on opposite sides of that. We're talking about community and I the Beatles. I'm part of this Led Zeppelin massive fan community. You know, what is it now? One, 10, 20, 30, 46 years since they've made any music. It's hard to imagine that, right? It's my whole life. And then I think about another band that we share a love for that you wrote a book about that I was inspired by who ended in a similar way, which is the Beast Boys. And I wonder what is it about some of these bands that an entire community, that an entire identity is built around them? It's it's hard to really understand, right? I mean, as you know, all too well, band dynamics are their own thing. Sure. And then what the legacy, what the, you know, ongoing and endless sort of connection to that music. You don't and you don't know and you don't necessarily know. I mean, I wrote to, you know, two other I wrote a book about the song, Hallelujah, right, which when Leonard Cohen wrote, literally, his record label turned it down. That's insane. Said, we don't want to put this record out. No reason for us to put this record out. And over the course of decades, this song becomes discovered, explored, covered, placed the snowball rolls downhill. And it eventually becomes, you know, one of the handful of most beloved songs in the world. There was really zero way to anticipate that coming. And it wasn't below the radar. It was nowhere near the radar. Is that is that true? I mean, like it was there no way. Hallelujah is a song that's changed your life. And for anyone listening, they know that the you wrote the book about the song. The book was turned into the movie. The movie was option for the Oscar. I mean, that was your life for two years. For yeah, for a rainy number of years. Sure. But more than that, it changed the lives of so many people who listened to it and loved it and embraced it. I mean, so why does one song or one band and not another? That's the book, right? So my most recent book, which is about Fleetwood Max Rumors, yes, called Don't Stop Why We Still Love Fleetwood Max Rumors, is trying to examine rumors is the one single classic rock album that young people still adore. And all the data tracks this out, right? In twenty twenty four, it was the, according to Billboard, the number one rock album of the year. New, old, most played, most streamed, most vinyl sold, most whatever metric you use. It's the only if you look at the top 100 hot one, whatever it is, top 200 album chart. It is parked in the top 30. It was up to number 14 a couple of weeks ago. Sometimes what else is there? What else is on the list? Then you drop down 20 spots and you start getting the greatest hits records. Right. Elton's greatest hits, Queen greatest hits. You know, but what's it 20 before? What's before that? What's couching? Bad Bunny, Taylor, you know, pop, new pop records. That's some real context. That is some real pop records. Last year they combined. So twenty twenty four biggest rock record of the year. Twenty twenty five. They combined the alternative and rock charts. Number one, Billie Eilish. OK. Number two, Noah Kahn. Number three, Flew and Max Rumors, an album that is about to be 50 years old. So what I really wanted to do with this book was talk to these young listeners. I talked to about 30 post millennial listeners about, yeah, why? Why is everything else? Oh, they don't care about born to run. They don't care about dark side of the moon. There's the fourth. There's always going to be 14 year old boys who smoke weed for the first time and listen to dark side of the moon or Jimi Hendrix. I bet these are not. You know, or they don't care about Hotel California, for God's sake. I mean, the song. I don't I don't know. Nothing else. Not the biggest Eagles man. Understood. But you know, if you're 18, that's got nothing to do with you. If you're 18, Rumors is in your life. That's what I wanted to look at is why? Why? Why and how? How do they even know that it's there? How did it become a tick tock juggernaut? Yes. When not, there's nothing else to compare it to. So I too am fascinated by the question that you ask. And I've spent lots of time on, you know, a number of my recent projects trying to dig into that and and determine what that is, because it changes. Context changes, you know, a huge thing with with Rumors. Yes. The just the gender composition of that band, which plays incredibly differently in 2026, of course, to in a world where Taylor, Billy, Sabrina, Olivia, but Beyonce, dominate the pop conversation, where in 1987, that was not the way that it was. Right. It's way easier for them to connect and relate to a band that looks like that than to five long hair white guys with guitars. Who are their parents? Right. Nobody nobody cares. No one cares. Maybe what Dunn Henley has to say, unless he's talking about Stevie. But here's the question we've asked the question. You're the guy. I mean, you're my one of my smartest friends. I don't want to say my smartest friend because I don't want to insult anybody, but but it might be you. Suffice to say. So what's the answer? What's one of your many hypotheses? Why? I mean, they're they they it depends case to case. Obviously, it depends case to case. Right. I think, you know, with Rumors, there were I've heard really interesting things from these kids, you know, as one girl who is like, of course, we still listen to Rumors. We still read Jane Austen. Like things about relationships that are as emotional and profound as these songs are is a universal that is still going to connect where, you know, what I think is so interesting is if you sat down December 31st, 1979 and said, here are the biggest albums of the decade. Yeah. Hotel California, Dark Side, Born to Run, Rumors, whatever, 50 years from now, who's what's still going to matter. Not one person would have said Rumors. They would have said those others are statements. Of course, they're, you know, commentary, they're big, important records. Rumors is great, but it's a pop record. Right. It's fun. It doesn't rock. It doesn't rock quite as hard as Born to Run. And that turns out to be way more timeless than these things that are really rooted in the context they were created in. OK, but this is. Rumors is not the only, you know, Jane Austen, yes, it connects to these feelings. Rumors is not the only record that's been written in 50 years that connects to this. I understand this from a female perspective, and that's, you know, women are driving this in a way, but like, what else? I mean, I can do you the 280 pages of the book. And it's not like what do you want from me? We're going to link your book in the show notes. Just anyone wants to read the book, we're going to link it in the show notes. But like, what is your other thing? I mean, I think that there I think that the I think it's real, you know, the fact that there are three different singers and songwriters and perspectives and points of view that are represented. All kind of at different places in that relationship. Lifetime. Yes. It plays more like a playlist than an album. That's true. It represents a range of emotions and experiences. It's not one guy singing at you for 45 minutes about, you know, it's not blood on the tracks. It's not Dylan talking about his marriage breaking up for 45 minutes. Yeah. I think that's really important. I think they're able to hear those different facets, those different elements and hear them from different actual different voices and actual different points of view. I think that makes for a very different experience. Yeah. Sonically, there is nothing in the world that sounds like rumors sounds. Now, you can say that for other things as well. Is that true? Is that true? I think that's what you're saying that that's interesting to me. Let's bring this let's bring this back for a minute. You're essentially describing a reality show. Rumors is like a reality show. And so it's a story. I mean, Stereophonic on Broadway won all the Tony Awards, won the best play and absolutely is an exact retelling of the sessions for rumors. The playwright is very kind of like Daisy Jones in the sixth. It's also there's like a love triangle. He goes to her hotel room and I mean, a lot happens, but it's not really based on it's an existing like. She does write in the last page. There is like and she's like, I was listening to rumors. I was like, no kidding. So, you know, that's still going to resonate. It's always going to resonate. It's the craziest thing you ever heard. That's right. So this is like, essentially the timelessness of songs of heartbreak in real time. It's watching a band and two relationship, two marriages, right? Fall to pieces from four different perspectives. It's a lot. It's a lot to still be working over 50. It's pretty good, pretty good stuff. OK, let's bring it back to us. We you and me, you and me. I'd say the next time we really connected in the deep way was at the Bonnaroo Music Festival. It's true. Circa 2000 and seven, eight, not somewhere in there. So something somewhere in there. It was the hottest year on earth. It's it's actually in the Farmers' Almanac that you and I were the two most overheated people alive. What's what in my mind, what stands out to me is that you were interviewing all of the artists. Jack White was the star of Bonnaroo that year and Tool played a Bonnaroo that year. Right. Is that the same year? I don't know. Same year. And I remember you told me that someone said the two living rock stars. Who said this word? Jack White and Maynard. Did you say that? I don't know who said it or if I said it, but it's it's pretty good for that time. You may have said I definitely didn't say it. You said it to me. But I remember watching you interview the White Stripes and no one was allowed to watch you interview them because Jack had all of those rules around him. I wonder if he still does. Does he? Lots of rules. Lots of rules. And you asked him. Do you remember what you asked him? I don't remember. You said, what's the most misunderstood thing about the White Stripes? You being very taken by that question. I didn't know who was from that. Well, I was taken by that question because you surprised him and you disarmed him with one question. How did you learn how to do this? A lot of. Magazine writing, print writing, whatever is about it's not necessarily about silence, but it's about waiting. Your greatest asset when you are doing that kind of interview is you let them finish and you just don't say anything for a minute and they'll often just be nervous enough that they just keep talking. Most fall for that. It's interesting ones who do not fall for that. Some do not sting. God love him. He will answer your question and he'll answer the question and then he stops. Right. He's done and you can't. If you leave the gap, he'll. You lost the time. You lost the time. You're just losing the time. Yeah. But that can be a tremendous asset when you're doing those kinds of interviews. You know, it's so interesting as that as a therapist, which I am. Yeah. It's very it's the same thing. Is there somebody or some interview that comes to mind where you did that and something revealed itself? So I did do a lot of work with Prince and I did an interview for Vibe magazine when I was editing Vibe magazine that was the first interview that he had done in about five years, five or six years. I will not tell the lengthy story of what went into putting that together, which was like nothing else I've ever been through. We finally did do the interview in Monte Carlo. Wow. Because he had the World Music Awards and had to be there for three days of rehearsal and like nothing else. And they're like, he's going to be here. Let's do it. Okay. Here's the thing, though. Interviewing Prince meant couldn't record him. Couldn't take notes. Um, okay. So it's amazing exercise to go through. To actually talk to somebody and just stay right with them for an hour and then try to go in a quiet room and reconstruct as much of that conversation as you can is a really fascinating thing to do. Just to see it'll come to you in waves. Yes. And then you'll do the thing. It'll just start scribbling. And of course I'm running. I'm going to the bathroom. I'm writing on napkins. You're writing on your sleeve. You're just whatever you can do to, you know, grab anything, but then go back and try to actually reconstruct that. People say it's that was stupid. You could so easily misquote him. You could make it up. There's no record. There's no evidence. Why would he do that? But what I think he really understood, maybe I give him too much credit, but what I think he understood is that meant that what he emphasized is what stayed with you. He actually has much more control over what you walk away with. If I'm recording you and you make some aside to the waiter, that could be my lead of my story, right? Something that was a trivial in the moment, but then ends up being a thing that you can use and plug in. If I'm not recording and I don't have that record, the things that he's really landing on and pushing out is what you're going to walk away remembering the best and centering the most when you're trying to, you know, recall what happened. And so in certain ways, once you get past that, maybe you didn't get it word for word, but you got more of his message than you maybe would have otherwise gotten. That's the flip that I think he is doing there. That is so fascinating. It's very like Don Boris, Get to the Chorus. It's very just the hits. Right. Right. Right. What's interesting about it is that my initial thought and maybe some other people who are listening to the story have this thought like, wow, that he trusted you, that he would trust another person to make meaning, but because he trusted himself. Yes. He trusted himself to have the impact. And it's why he wouldn't just sit with anybody. We spent 18 months and a lot of meetings and a lot of hanging out before he would agree to it. Your Alan light. You're not, we get it. Fine, fine. Still, still it was a process. That's incredible. We were dating for quite a while before we got to that. So on this show, did we just reveal you and Prince were at one point dating? I'm kidding. I'm kidding. That's the headline. But we did see a lot of each other. What do you mean by that? Just kidding. That's a great story. Let's keep moving in the timeline. Keep moving in the time you want to go up. You want to go back. We're going to go back to you and I. So we're using this as I have. That's the spine of this interview as it turns out. As it turns out. The next time you and I really connected in a deep way was when you called me to come on Serious XM. Right? Yes, I think. I think so. And then I was on a panel of women, of ladies for like women's music day. Some stupid. Some stupid thing. Yes. And it was me and you and Mark Goodman and Roger. My co-host and our producer and Carrie. Producer. Show producer. Show producer. And I can't remember what we talked about, but we it was the best day of my life. I loved being on the radio, loved with a deep capital L. And then you took me out to lunch the next day and you said, you're one of us. What do you want to do here? Right? Something something like that. Yeah, I was some stupid panel for some women's thing. Yeah. And I think, I don't know, somehow it was like, should we get somebody from like Dance World or DJ World? I don't think I think that was the thing. I was like, I know somebody who could do that and thought to ask you and you were, of course, amazing and a delight. And we, you know, so we started thinking about like, OK, we want to around. Let's try to figure out is there a segment? Is there a thing? Is there something we can do that we can build? We tried to figure out a segment that was like DJ specific. And that was my favorite job ever. But the reason I bring this up is not so we can rehash my story of how you gave me a career on the radio and thank you is because this idea of you're one of us. Music is like the only thing I can think of where it's really you're one of us. You're in the fold. You're part of this community. How see, this is if I was on the air with you, you would say, what's your question? When you I might say that I'm you're still in it. We're not done yet. More music is therapy coming up right after this. I DJed a party once in Westchester somewhere for a big celebrity. And it was a great night. And I played all these records like I played dancehall records and pop records and weird B-size. And it was great and everybody danced. And I remember I was so elated and I went back to my hotel and I sat down on the bed and I had this like almost like a premonition from the beyond. And I thought to myself, I'm not even religious. And I was like, thank you, God. Thank you, God, for giving me this gift of loving music in this lifetime. Thank you for striking me with this. I can't believe of all the things I got, you know, green eyes and red hair and this. And so. What's the question around that? What is the what would you ask about that? I don't. I mean, I went to my first, you know, real rock show was my 10th birthday to see Elton John on the Philadelphia Freedom Tour. Cincinnati Riverfront Coliseum in 1976. And there's the case that I can make that I've spent the rest of my life trying to get the feeling that I got in that moment. And I would, you know, we'll never forget. We'll never what that what what the that experience was, right? Biggest rock star in the world, my favorite doing anything at that moment when I'm 10 years old and to go and to see it and to feel what that is, what the power of that room is, of that gathering is. It's super tribal, obviously that part of it is. My mother was a former dancer. Yes. Who had become a dance writer. She was the critic for the Cincinnati Enquirer for the newspaper in Cincinnati, where I grew up. She taught dance history at the College Conservatory of Music and wrote for the journals and all this stuff. Um, so first of all, I grew up with that experience of. That that was a thing that I could see and witness and be, you know, around on the on the edges of watching my mom do that. What was really just from a writing and a criticism standpoint, the thing that most stays with me out of all of that, people act like, you know, music critic, we have all this power and you can make or break bands and you can like you can mostly you can help a little band get attention. Yes. If you're at a bad review of a Mariah Carey record, nobody cares. It has no impact on anything. Right. If you're the dance writer in a regional American city and the Cincinnati ballet performs and you put in the newspaper, man, these guys sucked. Nobody goes and the company closes down like you can turn the lights out in a weekend. But also you're not doing anybody any favors if like they were really boring and you kind of don't say that and then people go and we're like, that was really boring. And then they don't go back like what, you know, so the things that I really took away from watching my mom do this work was this sense of like, what's the role of why are you doing this? Yeah. Like, who is it for? What is it about? What are you trying to communicate to people? And that's the thing that has tried to, you know, that stayed with me through all these different projects and ventures. When I just shut down, I so after I edited some magazines, I went the last magazine I did as a magazine called Tracks that with my publisher from Spin and Vibe, we left. We went to start our own magazine. It was right when like Nora Jones was happening and a brother, where art that was happening and we're like, there's an audience that nobody is making a making media for. And so we launched this magazine called Tracks. It was an amazing experience from we raised every dime like having to do all that stuff was great. In the end, we had to shut it down after a couple of years. Our primary investor didn't want to re up and walked away. And when you, you know, what I found was really valuable for me at that moment. Was to say, OK, why do you why do you like this? Yeah. Why do you like this? Why do you want to do? You can't do that. OK, that's done. Maybe you can't make magazines anymore. You've done that the last 15 years. That's what you really learn to do. But this is just as I really do think at those moments of sort of crossroads crisis, right, figure making decisions, but kind of anyway, to say why? Yeah. What is it? What is it? And there's things you're never going to know, right? I'm from my mom, it was dance for me from a very early age. It was music for you. Like we found this thing. Why there's not a rational answer for. It just is. It just there's something that you react to, you respond to and who who these people are and what it makes you feel and how the pieces fit together. How do you how do you? Something you said in there is really exciting to me because I'm doing this work trying to get people to connect their feelings to the song. Now, that feels like something that is hard to verbalize. Maybe it's easy for people to get if they love music, but your career, I guess, that it's most like seed level is about translating the feeling you get at the Elton John show, the feeling you get listening to the fluid macro, the feeling from Tupac or Bob Dylan or any of these people that you worked with, right? The feeling and put it into words, English words that the that everyone can understand. How do you do that? I'm going to say it wrong, but there's a line that that I love and that I whenever I teach a writing class, a criticism class, this is what I write on the board the first day of class. And there's a writer named Albert Murray. He said, the primary objective of criticism is to render an aesthetic experience more accessible for an audience. That line is really important. It's not to judge it, right? You're a critic. People think you're there to criticize or you're there to, you know, it's thumbs up or thumbs down. It's how many stars? It's what grade do you give it? You could do all those things and you want to give a sense of like, do you think it succeeded or not? That's your I'm flattering you, which are so brilliant. And that's why you're that's why your writing is different. Real talk. But the good but the real writers, the good writers, I really do think that's what holds for them is they're not just saying and I was giving you an opinion. Yeah, they're not just giving you a history and context and all of that. When you read that piece, you may or may not agree. You may like the record. They may hate it. You may have been it. People like, I can't believe he was at the same show. I was at. I thought it was great. And he said it was terrible. That may be true. But if there's something that's in there that you're like, oh, yeah, I wouldn't have thought of it that way or that makes me look at this thing. Then that person has done their job. I was going to ask you the question is, does the context change how you hear the album? But I know now that it does. The last time I called into let's go back to serious XM. The show was called. Show was called debatable. The debate was called volume. The channel was called volume. And we had a very devout fan base. I'm sure some folks are listening today called the volumeaniacs, who are wonderful people who self identify as what? Very deep. They're not just music fans. They're people who have very passionate, very passionate. I remember one time we were talking, you and Mark were hosting and Lady Gaga had just put out Chromatica. So this is early 2020, right before the pandemic. And the song rain on May with Ariana Grande came out and you guys called me or I called you or somebody. I was like the bat phone for pop, right? I will be seeing Lady Gaga in two weeks. Hopefully we're going the same night. That's my yes. We got to let me know. You got to let me know. So I said, oh, my God, you know, I don't I don't like this song. I just heard it for two seconds. I made a rash judgment, never forgive myself. And I said, here's the refrain. I'd rather be dry, but at least I'm alive. That's weird. That doesn't even rhyme. I hate it. Now, two weeks later, we're in lockdown. I'm DJing on Instagram. I do my indoor recess show. I become a licensed therapist. My whole life changes. The song, the song that same song, same song, nothing changed. That song inspired the entire change of my life. It inspired the second act of my life. It's one of the most important songs. I did a playlist a couple months ago, 10 songs that shaped me. You know, I pretended I was on that Desert Island show. I just did it myself. I was like, I'm on my own show. I'm doing myself. That song is the first song on a playlist. Sometimes I think back to telling you live on the radio that I didn't like that song. And I say, first of all, I'm mortified. I hope Stephanie never finds out. We're at the end of the show. But second of all, the context of my life changed. And suddenly this lyric hit me. I'd rather be dry, but at least I'm alive. That's me. It's me. She wrote it about me, me, me in this moment. And I'm sure millions of other people felt the same way. I'm going to hear the song. I cry. So I agree. Let me ask you this. What are songs like that for you? I know you love Dylan. I know you love the Beatles. I know you know all the things. What is like the lyric that was written for you? God, I just want to back that up slightly to say, you know, a place where I really learned about the ways that history in context changes like that is, you know, that I was for a long time on the nominating committee for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. And it would be really interesting to see year over year who would feel more or less important or over the course of years who would feel more or less important, sometimes really obvious ways. I'd been pushing for NWA. Didn't get anywhere. Think we got them about. Didn't get in. Then the NWA biopic comes out. They're in the next year. Right. So things of the world is changing. As we said with Fleetwood Mac, the context of rumors is changing as the gender dynamic is changing. So that was, you know, working on something like that that's really about trying to, you know, condense the history of this music down to this, you know, this list that tells that story. Like a list in black and white. List, yeah. Who like who mattered who mattered. And if somebody who a couple of years ago, you might say, like, I don't see any impact or legacy from them. And then a couple of years later, you might see, oh, everything sounds like that now. That that it does happen. So first of all, you can be mortified, but yes, sometimes it, you know, oftentimes it does change. Yes. And, you know, the their reviews, I look back that I wrote, you know, in Rolling Stone, I'm like, I just didn't get that. What? Well, you know, it will haunt. I stand by some of it. OK, I gave a really pretty bad review to Ice Cubes. America's most wanted. OK. Why? Because it really was so next level, violent and misogynistic at that. That's the, you know, I could have kicked that bitch in the tummy album. Like that's the ugly stuff on that. Right. This is this is DJ Hester Prince music is there, but you don't have to explain misogyny in this show. Understood. But I'm saying that was like I wasn't braced for. Where he had sort of escalated on some of that. And it just like that freaked me out. And I, you know, I said something like he's turning into the Andrews Ice Clay of hip hop or something like that. That said, kind of classic record with some unbelievably great things on it. You're talking about Ice Cube, the children's movie. I'm talking about the. Yes, are we there yet? Got it. OK. Just making sure we're alive. Go on. So, you know, I could there are things that I can point in. Some things I want you to do that I oversold. You get you get caught up. You get excited, especially like, you're a big star. Like Northern State, for example. Never wrote about Robert Crisco oversold my band. So this is the the sort of. Pinnacle question that I wanted to ask you, the pinnacle, as they say, I'm Bridgerton is, you know, for those of us who are over 40, let's say, which I think is probably most of the listeners of the show, maybe not most, but many, it's certainly me, it's you. Like the refrain I heard a lot on when I was on Sirius that I fought was people would say music doesn't mean what it did. Music is not as good. The barrier to entry, because I don't know. I mean, I said that the barrier to entry when I went to buy vitality and I held the vinyl and I touched it and I waited. I don't do that anymore. Fine. For people my age and older, where can you get this community if you're not just going to go see a legacy act? And for me, I have found it, right? I found it because I became like a 40 plus year old raver now, which I think is so funny. And I say it that way because I think it's fun to say. But, you know, Fred again, did these shows that changed, truly changed my life. And Randy, my husband shoots all these shows with the FPV drone. And so we go to all these EDM shows and the community around these at these EDM shows, which is really a dance community. It has its own rules. It has its own structure. There's a lot of drugs, which people I think are scared of, but I don't think it has to be that way. I think there's probably a lot of people who are sober there. And there's sort of like I feel older than a lot of these people. And so I don't feel like it's my community. I feel like I'm sort of a guest or like an anthropologist. But I love it and I love the records. And when I listen to the records at home, when I work out to Dom Dalla or whatever, I remember and my body feels connected to those people in quite the same way. So that's where I've found it, but not everybody loves EDM. Where do you find it? Do you miss it? Where can people get it? Yeah, it's a hard. I mean, first of all, I feel so not in some ways not qualified to answer that because, you know, when this is what you've done for a career for many decades, like. Everybody sends me music. So like it's not a typical experience and I don't have to find it through the ways that a person was a regular person with a job and and has their life has to find this. I long ago accepted A being the oldest person in the room and knowing you're invisible, which is good. And you know, you're not an average person. And another thing that I made peace with, you know, I both of us grew up a lot in the world of hip hop. You and me. You and me. I was the editor of Vibe magazine for a number of years. I was part of the founding team at Vibe. And, you know, there's there comes a day when you sort of realize, you know what, a lot of the stuff is not for me and is not about me. And I can appreciate it or listen to it or see, you know, I think as hip hop became bigger and bigger and bigger and then eventually became much more of a sort of producers medium. I started to have that response of like, I think a lot of these records are kind of like amusement park rides. Like they're a fun trip to go on, but they don't really mean a lot to me. I thought we'd and that's and that's OK. I thought you're going to say that actually now this is very interesting to me is I thought you were going to say the hip hop records aren't for us in a certain in a different type of way. Like I feel like I love that I use the word interloper because I think it's really true and I feel like a chameleon in a lot of places and ways. And when I was in the hip hop group and we were on the tour at the roots and, you know, Cypress Hill and all these things, I was that wasn't that music is not targeted for me. I mean, I took my daughter to see Beyonce and I love Beyonce and I worship her, but that's not really for me either. And I can still go and appreciate and enjoy in all of these things. And the EDM feels the closest thing for me because it's for the it's for the body. Do you know what I mean? We'll be back with more music as therapy right after this. So what was again back to I'll do it for you to go back to some of this notion of community in a way. Thank you. In the earth when I started out in the 80s writing about hip hop, the 1980s, that is another century. It was so small. It was such a sort of cottage industry. There were a couple of labels. There were a couple of managers. There was like one real publicity firm. There were a couple of us writing about it. And you would literally go out to one club one night to another club another night and you would just see the same people going, you know, from what they'd be to grill on Tuesdays, it'd be as on Mondays, you know, whatever it was. And it just felt like this little thing that we're all a part of. Look, I was a cognizant and I think appropriately cognizant of being a white guy writing about hip hop, even then you need to think about that. But what I found from those from the artists at that time was the only time they would be covered was as scandal, was as controversy. This music is violent. This music causes, you know, and so once you could go in the room and actually show I listen to this stuff, I care about this stuff, I know this stuff. I always did feel welcomed into that room. Now, I was going to write about them for Rolling Stone. It's to their interests to welcome me and, you know, play nice and all of that. But, you know, it that felt like there was this sort of community that was there of most everybody doesn't care about this or hates the idea of it. And so those of us who. Yeah, we got it. Actually loved it and knew this was the most exciting thing happening that you were you were on board. It grew so big so fast that that all changed very rapidly. Right. But flash, but flash forward. Well, one thing flash forward is when I started writing more later in my life about country music. That was a place where I found still some of that feeling, right? Where most of the regular media didn't care about it, didn't get it, didn't get how big it was. You could I could go to Nashville and do a story with somebody where I could. I mean, both these when I wrote the I.C.T. cover for Rolling Stone, when Cop Killer was, you know, being debated on the floor of the Senate. God help us. I spent three days with I.C.T. I mean, I knew I.C.T. Well, I did allow them. We went shopping for screen doors. You know, we took his car into the shop. We hung out with the mechanic like you could spend time and feel like I'm actually writing something that can give you a sense of this person. Yes. When it gets so in there weren't 75 people lined up at the door wanting to do them in the for that they did, but that was a different thing. Once it became you'll get your 45 minutes in the conference room at the label with JZ. Yeah. It's, you know, it's a lot less fun. When I started doing stuff in Nashville, I found that opportunity where I could go motorcycle riding with why I know no judge. You know, we could go to her house that she was having renovated or whatever it was. We could, you know, you could spend time with these people because they weren't under such incredible demand and everybody kind of knew that story. That one on a judge story was first was the first sort of big feature I did. And once I heard her first solo and I loved it after the judge you know, starting to break up and she made this record. It was really like a Bonnie Ray record. I mean, really sort of a pop blues record and it's a great, great record. And I went to the music editor rolling. So I was like, I want to write about this one. I'm going to link to all of every reference you've made in the show. So I'll put that. I went down to Nashville. I did this story. I hung out with why no no. We went that night to the guy who was her producer and who ran MCA Nashville as Guy Tony Brown, who is a legend. Just went in the rock and the country music hall of fame year or two ago, produced everybody did everything. Also was Elvis's piano player at the end for the last couple of years. So we go to his house to hang out. And we're in his basement and it's Winona and Ashley Judd, Trisha Gearwood, Tony Brown and a couple of guys from that band, the Mavericks. They're literally were playing pool. They're passing a guitar around and singing Everly Brothers songs. Tony is telling Elvis stories and showing us the T.C.B. ring that Elvis gave him and all this stuff. And I'm like, you guys are putting on a show because I'm down here. And they're like, this is where if you were not here, this is exactly what we would be doing. Wow. So that again gave us some of that sense of there is this community around this music that isn't so recognized by the world. And there's the chance to tell a different kind of a story as a result of that. Yes. So, you know, you try to be open to that in terms of how people find that. I mean, I think, you know, for these are easy things to say, you know, to find live music that's not the big arena shows, you know, that's the thing that kills me. And it's I never get mad at success. Like I never get mad at Harry Styles. No, anybody just in general, the concert industry. Like, what am I supposed to say? Neil Young played in Cincinnati when I was in 10th or 11th grade and 35 of us or something went to this show together. We lined up at the Ticketron counter, five of us. We each bought six tickets or whatever it was. We had a party at Susan Abramson's house before and then went to see the Neil Young show. Can you imagine 30, 17 year olds going to any show now? Like, it's that's a that's like the the economy of of a small city. They're going they're going. Hold on. But are we running out of time? Yes. OK, we have to wrap this up. They're they're they're going, but they're not going to see. They're going to see one of them. No, oh, they're going to see. See the same people over and over. So the fact that going to shows has become a special event. Yes. You go once or twice a year on a special. Well, if you're buying a ticket for that kind of a show, OK, yeah. But finding where can I find? You know, other kind of stuff. I was with my college roommate. He came, he was in town the other week. I haven't seen him for a while. He lives in Sonoma, California. He's like Monday nights. There's this like honky tonk band that plays in this bar. Sometimes they have guests. Sometimes, you know, name people who play with other bands or whatever. I've been going every Monday night. My wife doesn't. She's like, get out of the house. It's fine. And he's like all these older people, they can all two step. They can all like do the dances. And I feel like an idiot because I can't. I don't know that stuff. I got to learn how to do it, but I at least kind of have a place where I can go and hang out and do this thing. And I've missed it. So, you know, finding the opportunities that aren't going to the Gaga show and the Beyonce show are really important. The Gaga show is not. I mean, I live for Gaga. I love her. I've seen her, you know, but it's not a community in the same way. I will connect to the people for one minute in that moment. And that's it. And to give her her full credit, you know, the kind of Taylor Swift fan that I listen to all too well. All too well. And this is the magic of what she has done that she can create this community and maintain it at such massive scale. At that scale. How is she doing it? And we have to we have to wrap this up. How she's doing it. She's incredibly brilliant and so finally attuned from the beginning. I met Taylor when she was 18. I met Taylor when the second album came out, when Fearless came out and had that sense of like, whoa, I don't know what this is, but this is a real thing. Like nobody's pulling these strings. Nobody's telling her what to do. What to feel like this is all her and the intensity and the direct connection. The tuning fork thing that she has for this is what my audience is looking to me for. And where they're going to go. I know where they're going to go. They don't know where they're going to go. I know where they're going to go. She grew up, I guess, and is is reliving her life with the kids. And you can't, you know, you can't study that. You can't learn that. It's an incredible thing. And it is why you'll go. There will be 80,000 people, all of whom feel she's here for me, all of whom spend the hours before trading their their friendship bracelets and telling their Taylor stories and bonding. And she has captured that in incredible way and as as as gifted as she is and as great as the music that she makes is, which I think it is, the real magic of what she's done is managed to create that sense of genuine connection, genuine community at an unprecedented scale. It's amazing to watch. Beautiful. So coming up with a line that feels like that's one of many. It doesn't have to be your line for your whole life. But like, I want to I want to ask you about a reason I'm asking you is because we all connect to music. I talk about songs. I connect to other guests do that. But you are the headiest music person who's going to come on the show all year. So what's it like for you? I mean, I think this is not an answer. This is not a personal answer to that. It's a more of a historical answer to that in a way. But I'm asking you an emotional question. Don't give me a prefrontal cortex answer. This is like when I ask my patients, I'll be like, and what does that feel like? And they'll be like, well, it's kind of like if a person was whatever. I'm like, don't give me a narrative. Tell me what it feels like. But that's why like, can I off the dome give you an answer to that? I don't know that I can give you. What were you listening to on the way here? I'll come back. It's you really don't need to answer that. Yes, I do. Because I was listening to a podcast with Mark Lewis and who's writing the definitive Beatles three part biography talking about where he is in writing the second volume. So be more Alan. Like, see what happens. You don't want that for an answer. Alan, it's music therapy and I need you to I need you to give me one song that you're emotionally connected to. Well, I'm emotionally connected to. Hang on. I want to go. I want to just talk about a volume thing for a minute, though. Oh, I'll tell you what it was. I was listening last night to Lou Reed's New York album, which I love and which is very attached for me to when I first came out very soon after I first moved to New York after I graduated college. And there are songs on here that are more emotional. There's like Halloween Parade, which is about it mid AIDS song and about going to parade and people who aren't there and like there's stuff like but the song. I think it was a song bustle to face, which is not which is sort of like you can't depend on your family. You can't depend on your friends. You need to bustle out of faith to get by. And it's kind of a angry. It's kind of a bitter song. And I was crying on the subway listening to that song. I don't know if it's this moment in history. I don't know if it. I don't know what that was. But that that's that's the answer to that within the last 24 hours. Alan, I love you, your dear friend, a great supporter, so smart. Maybe you'll come to Passover at my house again this year. I got to I got to get that together. If you can figure it out, get us back out there. But I love you, DJ has to print. I am so proud to see you keeping all this going and growing and expanding. Because as you've said, I've known you in different steps along the way that got you there when I was a baby. What's like a question we can leave the audience? The volume maniacs, we want them to maybe email us with a question. What's the question? What's the question of the day? Well, clearly, I mean, I don't know what the out of that where that conversation just ended. If you haven't done it, is where do you. Find. New music or music experiences in your life today. Yeah, and not even new music. Where do where are you? Where are you having music experiences where you connect with other people? Is it karaoke? Is it the two step bar? Is it the one gigantic show a year? Is it the EDM show every weekend? Is it online? Where is it happening? That's the question that we're living. All right, now everyone can find. I'm going to link all of Alan's links in the show notes to Alan's book about rumors. Don't stop. Why we still love Fleetwood Max rumors. The podcast that I co-host with Mark Goodman every week is sound up. Acclamation point can be found wherever you just wherever you find your podcast. I will also say that I saw Mark Ronson interview Alan about his book, and it was very cool. OK, dude. See you later. Bye. If this episode hit for you, there are a few ways to keep going. The April playlist, songs that make everyone on the dance floor, best friends for three minutes, is linked in the show notes. Go put it on. You'll feel it immediately and keep sending me songs. Music is therapy pod at gmail.com. You can also send me your feedback. I read and answer every single email. And on April 18th, I'm hosting that free live workshop at 1 p.m. Eastern. I'll teach you one piece of the music connection therapy method. How to use the songs you already love to shift your state, change your patterns and actually connect with other people. The link is in the show notes. You should come. That'll be fun. And if you liked this episode, send it to one person. Just the one who would get it. Someone who's one of us. That's how this grows. And if you have a second rate the show, leave a review, drop a comment. It really makes a difference. Thank you so much for listening and I will see you next week. DJ Hester Prynne's Music is Therapy is a production of I Heart podcasts. I'm your host, DJ Hester Prynne. Our executive producers are Marissa Bramwell and Jonathan Strickland. Our associate producer is Jonathan Klopp. Our marketing lead is Allison Cancer Graveller. That's it. This is an I Heart podcast. Guaranteed human.