Brandi Carlile

Right, let's talk about winter. It's freezing, it's dark at about 4.12pm and you've got big goals, right? But somehow you're meant to be meal prepping quinoa at 9 o'clock at night? Absolutely not. That's where Factor comes in. Fully prepared meals designed by dieticians, crafted by chefs, so you can eat brilliantly without planning, chopping or pretending that you enjoy washing up. Now my personal favourite at the moment is the high protein creamy parmesan chicken. it's got lean juicy chicken loads of colourful veg proper whole food ingredients and healthy fats that actually keep you full there's no refined sugars no artificial sweeteners or refined seed oils just real food that fits the let's be sensible this winter mood it's perfect when I'm trying to stay on track manage my calories and still feel like I've had a proper comforting meal and there's so much variety there's over 100 rotating meals every week high protein calorie smart mediterranean glp1 support even ready to eat salads they've even launched muscle pro to support strength and recovery which is incredible it's like having a tiny little chef who genuinely cares about your goals now the best bit it's always fresh it's never frozen and it's ready in about two minutes. There's no prep, no stress and no excuses. Honestly, it really makes eating well ridiculously easy, even in the middle of winter. Head to factomeals.com slash lifeofmind50off to get 50% off and a free breakfast for a year. Eat like a pro this month with Factor. New subscribers only, varies by plan. One free breakfast per item per box for one year while subscription is active. Lemonada. Hello and welcome to This Life of Mine, the show where we talk about the places, people, possessions, music and memories that have made our incredible guests who they are. joining me today is a singer songwriter producer whose voice and musicianship has won her huge critical acclaim as well as 10 grammy awards it could have been such a different story aged four her heart stopped multiple times when she was in a coma after contracting meningitis when she finally left hospital her family knew that she was saved for a reason perhaps that's why she hasn't only used her voice for singing, choosing to speak up on multiple issues, using her platform to great effect and raising millions for her Looking Out Foundation, which is why Brandy and her wife are regularly named as Women Who Are Changing the World. I'm very, very excited for this show. Are you ready? I'm ready. Then take us away. I'm Brandy Carlisle. Welcome to this life of mine. Now, Brandy, I need to tell you something. We've done a few episodes of this now, and I've never, in the history of the time we've been doing this show, has anybody had such a profound effect on our team who make the show. So, Jeff, who works on the show, I have never seen a man so obsessed with a guest ever, even now as you walked in people are spraying cologne people are making sure that they is this a regular occurrence in your life is this the Carlisle effect no I sprayed cologne in the car too I was just as excited to meet everybody in here imagine if you said I was just as excited to meet Jeff and I've really got to say something all I've been thinking about is Jeff I get no sleep thanks so much for being here I'm really excited to talk to you about your life We've asked you for a person, a place, a possession, a piece of music and a movie. And first up, we're going to talk about a memory. It plays a significant part in your life and your story. Tell us the memory that you've chosen to talk about today. I chose to talk about an attempt that I made as a teenager to be baptized in the Baptist church that went terribly wrong. So what happened? I've always been pretty spiritual, even maybe religious person and quite Jesus-y. As you mentioned, I had a near-death experience as a child, so I had a lot of faith-based conversation and existential insinuation about my life. I was the first grandchild on both sides and I felt very self-important like as a kid and felt really close to the other side. I felt that the veil had been lifted and I had a chance to see beyond it really young. And as I got older and started to realize I was gay, it was really frightening to me because it was just antithetical to everything that I had learned was virtuous or sort of salvation friendly. Yeah. and I'd be lying if I said it didn't embarrass me and smack me in the face a few times and this is one of those times where I was a teenager I was going to this church I loved this church and my brother was in the church and we're like uh only about 11 months apart we're really really close and we sort of did everything together but we started to find a fork in the road around my sexuality and his faith at this time. And for whatever reason, I felt that some reconciliation to myself, some reconciliation to my brother, to my family, to my small town would be possible if I made this sort of declaration that would get me out of this feeling of isolation and outsider-ness. I knew I couldn't change that I was gay. I was out of the closet in school. My hair was about an inch and a half long. I was a total little baby dyke. And I stood off in the middle of church on Sunday and said, yeah, I'd like to be baptized. And then what happened? You know, you started going to the pizza lunch once a week and you study the scripture and you hang out with the pastor who knew I was gay the whole time. And I learned all the rituals, all the right things to say and the right things to wear under my clothes on that day and planned this day with the pastor for like a week, invited all my family and friends. Nobody was real comfortable with me being a lesbian, but they accepted me and we just didn't talk about it much. So I think the baptism was a welcome reconciliation for all of them, you know? And they kind of came to the church on the day. I was going to be baptized alongside this other kid. And the pastor takes us back into the room and he was like breathing quickly. Like you could tell that he was really nervous about what was about to happen. I remember thinking, I wonder what's wrong with this guy, you know? And he says, I just have to ask you one question. Do you practice witchcraft or homosexuality? And I laughed. I thought witchcraft was about the weirdest thing that anybody had ever asked me if I practiced before as a 16-year-old. And homosexuality just seemed like such a sterile description of who I was. And me and my girlfriend were friends with this pastor and in this community, and he knew everything there was to know. And I said, well, you know I'm gay. And he said, if you can't denounce witchcraft and homosexuality today, I can't baptize you. it feels so cruel to me it was pretty gnarly to wait until the day the moment the moment regardless of what happened i do remember in the aftermath not to skip to the final chapter but i do remember in the aftermath god was so there in that experience i think god was more there at my botched baptism than like any baptism you know of anybody that i know talk to me about that how do you know that i was so embarrassed i was completely humiliated you know so i had to run out of this church like a fucking movie in front of all these people you know my aunties and uncles and neighbors and and nobody had ever like looked at me and said we accept this about you you're one of us until that day it was like that happening to me gave everyone a villain and it wasn't my sexuality anymore yes it was my humiliation they denounced the treatment of me they denounced the humiliation my dad became protective and macho and you know my mom the same and the town got angry with the church and suddenly instead of feeling outside i was shown acceptance and it was isn't that funny groundbreaking for me. Isn't that amazing that something so humiliating can actually become, perhaps there would have been people there who maybe never would have accepted you after that. Yeah, so I just never felt more like I had a community. I want to talk about your book, your memoir, which is a really fantastic read. And one thing I wanted to talk about on the show is your memoir is dedicated to the family of fellow misfits on the island of misfit toys. Anyone who's been rejected by this realm and its interpretation of your faith, but never by your creator. To the repulsed, rejected, reformed, reaffirmed, and the redeemed, your immeasurable worth precedes you. It's a wonderful thing to write. It's an even more fulfilling thing to read. Do you see yourself as a misfit? And has your success changed your perception of yourself in that way? I see myself as a misfit, but not in a bitter way. Yeah. Just like in a beautiful way, you know. And actually, since having this job and getting to know so many other musicians, you know very few cool musicians. Like only in this kind of latter day moment do they ever get called cool for one point in their life. We all just come from very interesting circumstances. And so, yeah, you get all these popular people with this interesting career that all feel somewhat dejected and rejected. which is why I think that we're able to speak to whatever masses we have access to. I just so happen to have access to a kind of people who are navigating cultural issues that, even if we deny it, they stain us, the human stain of being queer in this culture and coming up in this way. one thing I feel particularly called to talk about though is the burden of hell trauma and faith on LGBTQIA people. It's so... I used to think I was the only one or at least like maybe a small handful. But then I wrote that damn book you're talking about and it was like it has been nonstop flow of people coming up to me and saying yes yes yes I feel the exact same way I have the same dreams I have the same fears I have the same moments And the same things pull me out of them. And I feel really passionate about that conversation, really good about how we talk about it now. Let's move on to your person. and in your teenage years is where you first encountered the person that you're going to tell us about yeah tell us the person you've picked as significant in your life i chose elton john right yeah i was 11 years old i was in fifth grade and i was allowed to pick a book from the library to do my own book report on and i chose a book about a little boy called ryan white who had died of AIDS in the early 90s. You remember Ryan White? Yeah, yeah. I remember this. He was a hemophiliac, right? Exactly. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I remember this. Yeah, yeah. And he got HIV through a blood transfusion. Yeah. And he was amazing. He was in school. And back then, obviously, HIV was a death sentence. Nobody knew anything about it. So he was expelled from school. Nobody would, like, touch him or be around him. And yeah, he was really, really heavily politicized and sort of sought after. by the religious right to kind of vilify gay men and create this narrative of HIV and AIDS being a byproduct of their being evil in the world. Even being from rural Indiana, even being a young kid, they totally denounced that as an option for them, fought to get him back in school. And I read this amazing story about this incredible family. And then toward the end of the story, this guy comes into this little boy's life and like pays off their house and befriends them and this english chap called elton john and he was a musician and i didn't know his music or anything like that i only listened to country music but i remember thinking wow this guy's amazing there was like a picture of him in the book with his little glasses and i liked him i liked the way he looked and when ryan white died he sang a song at his funeral called skyline pigeon and i was reading the lyrics and I just couldn't believe what I was reading. Turn me loose from your hands. Let me fly to distant lands. Over green fields, trees and mountains. Flowers and forest fountains. And I'm just thinking like this is the most beautiful thing i've ever seen in my life like that was my first experience of poetry from bernie tompin yeah and so i went to the king county library and they had a cd with a song on it and they let me borrow it and that was when i heard elton john for the first time and i devolved into this fantasy world of just worshiping this elton john character every square inch of my walls was covered in elton john posters i had i wrote i love elton john on my notebooks at school i had e and j on my shoes and this was not in the 70s okay this wasn't getting any friends this is like 1993 right so i was transformed my worldview was transformed the way I talked to and interacted with my father was transformed. My music was born and he became my great, great hero. And you now have a friendship with Elton John, right? Yeah. Like a proper friendship, not really a showbiz friendship, like a genuine deep friendship. Yeah. Like talk every single day. You talk every day? Every day, at least once, sometimes three or four times without fail without fail this is insane i just like went on from that point i just like went on throughout my life obviously i learned to play piano and sing and dress up like elton john for halloween and you just like it was way more special to me than it should have been i feel a little bit like it was almost not like premonitiony but that it did feel mystically connected to my future in some weird way because through elton john and like biographies i would read and stuff i didn't divorce country music but i developed a new appendage which was that i just really embraced rock and roll and pop music british pop music mostly i learned about queen george michael and the beatles and david bowie and it became a new identity that was like wrapped up in like a whole new me that led me to start writing songs but not just writing songs i was always had one step in activism i had an awareness of politics an awareness of charity and philanthropy even though those are words that didn't really apply to later on because i didn't discover elton john on the radio i found his heart first you know and then i found his music which is a weird way That is a weird way. It's odd that that would be your first encounter with Elton John. Yeah, and I canonized him as saint a bit, and I tell you, that's not accurate either. He's so wonderfully flawed, you know. That's why I love Elton John. Yeah, me too. I love Elton John because he somehow has been able to show us all of him and say, well, here I am. Yeah. How? And we go, I'm so happy that you're here. I mean, there are so many people that have stories like this of him touching their lives in an extraordinary way. Oh, my God. I've sat with entire bands that he got sober. Yeah. And it's never, you know, I'm sure when Elton John was young, he would just buy people cars and shit. It's never like that now. Now it's phone calls and flights to visit and real human connection stuff. You know, Elton asks you questions and then listens to the answer. You meet a lot of celebrities. When does that happen? Sorry, I switched off. What were you saying? No, I mean, he is. Do you know, honestly, I'm kind of proud of my 11-year-old wisdom that that's who I chose, you know? What's funny is if he knew right now that we were talking in this way about him, I'm almost certain he'd go, oh, fuck off. Stop. Stop. Oh, fuck off. Jabbing on about me. Oh, fuck it off. Oh, yeah, fucking podcast. Oh, well done. Yeah. Right, let's talk about winter. It's freezing. it's dark at about 4 12 p.m and you've got big goals right but somehow you're meant to be meal prepping quinoa at nine o'clock at night absolutely not that's where factor comes in fully prepared meals designed by dieticians crafted by chefs so you can eat brilliantly without planning chopping or pretending that you enjoy washing up now my personal favorite at the moment is the high protein creamy parmesan chicken it's got lean juicy chicken loads of colorful veg proper whole food ingredients and healthy fats that actually keep you full there's no refined sugars no artificial sweeteners or refined seed oils just real food that fits the let's be sensible this winter mood it's perfect when i'm trying to stay on track manage my calories and still feel like I've had a proper comforting meal. And there's so much variety. There's over 100 rotating meals every week. High protein, calorie smart, Mediterranean, GLP One support, even ready to eat salads. They've even launched Muscle Pro to support strength and recovery, which is incredible. It's like having a tiny little chef who genuinely cares about your goals. Now, the best bit, it's always fresh. It's never frozen. and it's ready in about two minutes. There's no prep, no stress and no excuses. Honestly, it really makes eating well ridiculously easy, even in the middle of winter. Head to factomeals.com slash lifeofmind50off to get 50% off and a free breakfast for a year. Eat like a pro this month with Factor. New subscribers only, varies by plan. One free breakfast per item per box for one year while subscription is active. I mean you didn't discover Elton John until you were 11 Yeah But you had started singing at this point in your life Yeah You actually started singing when you were very, very young Your mum was a singer, right? Yeah So what sort of songs would you be singing? Well the very first song I ever sang on stage was called Tennessee Flat Top Box By the little dark haired boy that played the Tennessee Flat Top Box Which is a song Johnny Cash wrote And then it was like Tanya Tucker just tanya tucker was like the ballsiest bitch i'd ever seen just like to be honest here i don't know who tanya tucker is oh man well what sort of stuff you'll know her by her camel toe okay and feathered mullet and very wide stance right she's like the toughest cowboy chick in country music so how old were you when you were singing these songs eight right nine ten did you know you were good i have always believed that i was very very good right when i even when i wasn't at all and i liked her because she was so just like kind of dykey right and honestly i didn't know why but I really liked that. Right. Okay. Yeah. I mean, don't tell her I said she was dykey. I mean, you can tell her. I understand what you mean. But she's like... And perhaps, am I right in sensing different to a lot of other country music stars in that sense? I think so. Right. I asked her one time who her favorite female artists were, because I was like perplexed. And she just said Elvis. That's a great answer. I can't see you any indication. That's a great answer. so i was singing a lot at tucker so i was singing these songs i would bring my songs in on a wednesday night teach them to the quote-unquote opry band and then i'd do shows on fridays and saturdays and school didn't stand a chance right i was never going to finish school well this really wonderfully brings us to your music selection and i should tell anybody who's listening to this that really what the guests do when they're on the show is they give us their selections their picks a couple of weeks before and it gives us a chance to curate the show and which order will it go in and when you spoke to Jeff who's obsessed with you you said I don't know my music selection you said I need to go and discuss this with Catherine and I'll get back to you and as I sit here right now it says memory being refused baptism as a teenager person Sir Elton John music TBC You still at this moment haven been able to choose a song As it stands right now there is no song being chosen This makes this very exciting for me because I very excited to know which song you going to give us Firstly, tell me why this has been so hard. Because songs are the pivotal moments, the turning points in my life. I remember that the song that goes with my refusal at the baptism is Hallelujah, Jeff Buckley's version, you know, and the song that goes with my love for Elton was Skyline Pigeon. So every song means a big thing in my life. So to find that song as a standalone thing, there's so many and they are so important that it was really hard for me to kind of like narrow down a defining moment. And I didn't want to choose one of my own songs, but I think I did. So go on, tell us. I think I'm choosing my song, which is called The Mother. But I think it might almost be equally understood by a father, because it's born of being put in a different role than the traditional understanding of a mother. Welcome to the end of being alone inside your mind. You're tethered to another and you're worried all the time. You always knew the melody, but you never heard it right. But I am the mother of Evangeline I wrote it because my wife and I, when we got married, she came over from the UK. And she left every single thing she knows to come over here and do this crazy thing with me. And I had always thought I was going to be pregnant and give birth to a child. And it became clear to me as we talked through what this would look like that it wasn't going to be me this time. It was going to be my wife. And so we decided to go this really long route where Evangeline would be my egg and that Catherine would carry. And then the plan was that next time I would carry and it would be Cass' egg. Didn't happen. Right. Thank God. But at the time, there was like a grief that I was dealing with because my wife was carrying my child and it wasn't me. And I couldn't figure out why that felt so weird. I've not been really ever super tied to kind of feminine things or pageantry around weddings or childbirth or any of that kind of stuff. but it's so set up for a certain way for heterosexual people that it's really strange when you're dealing with feeling a little jealous and sad that you're not carrying you know in my mind my own child but that the whole system is kind of like built around upholding the birth mother and this kind of almost tongue-in-cheek like laughing at dad's vibe right do you know talking about yeah i do like i would go to the birthing classes or whatever and the things and they'd get me up in front of the room with all the quote-unquote dumb dads and and laugh at us while we put diapers on the babies backwards and the didn't know how to wear the baby bjorns and i just felt so grief stricken and humiliated so it was really difficult for me because i was like squeezed into this like heterosexual paradigm i'm not carrying my own child and then the baby's born and there's this awkwardness of like, yeah, I'm in the room and do I cut the cord? And who am I, you know, in this situation? Because I'm really feeling like a mother, but really getting treated like a father. I just felt awful. And I remember that toward the end of Kath's pregnancy, when I was finally sort of honest with her about how I was feeling, because first of all, she was pregnant, man. Couldn't even touch her toes. she couldn't she was like eating tic tacs and just like feeling terrible and i couldn't be like i'm really sad because somebody laughed at the fact that i couldn't put on a baby bjorn she's like are you sad yeah i'm growing eyelashes inside my stomach so you're like no you're right but yeah so what you're saying like just your exact reaction to that is a cultural reaction that we're all set up to accept you set yourself aside for the birth mother well i think the thing is that you don't necessarily really have a role so right i wish i'd known you earlier because somebody told me this and i did this with all three of my children and i've told countless people this and this is my little tip whenever a couple or a person falls pregnant they can't move for people trying to give them advice i don't really have any other than this is my one thing which i did with all of our children i've told everyone i know lay it on me i might have another one you never know well that last month before a child's born i think is a really it's an interesting time as the parent who isn't carrying the child yeah so i did this thing where about a month before each of our kids are born i got and i buy this blanket from a nice shop and every night when i'd get into bed i would wrap it around my body and you wake up in the morning it's down on the floor at the bottom of bed whatever yeah and then when you go to the hospital put this little blanket in the back and then when you go in and the birth and all these things the most important thing in the world is when that baby's pulled out that it's laid on the person that's been carrying that but it's laid on their skin yeah the first thing they feel is that skin yeah and it's amazing and you're all crying and it's covered in cook and stuff and you're crying and it's all amazing and then a little while later when they clean them up and they take them over and they start to weigh them and all these things i'd go over and i'd get this blanket and i'd say can you wrap them in this so the first thing that they ever touched was Julie and my wife and then the first feeling your baby ever has of being warm and safe in the world smells like you it's like this is my little thing that I'm going to do between me and them and it always was of great comfort to me and I've told everybody and I've told you and I've told anyone listening to this oh my god I love that because I'm with you Like I try not to give advice around childbirth and pregnancy and yeah, but that's really good for me. It was like my voice. I was like toward the end of Catherine's pregnancy. I told Catherine I fessed up. She brings in this woman that comes in to our house and starts doing some of those birthing classes with us together. And she like did these things like where she made these ice buckets and she made us both plunge our arms into these ice buckets and hold them for 90 seconds. And she's like, that's the time of a contraction. And she like got me involved. Right. And that felt so good. And she said, you have to think of a mantra. If you get to feel like you don't have a role, if you get to feel like you don't know who you are, if you get to feel like the world doesn't have a space for two women to both be mothers, you need to come up with a mantra. Right. And mine was, I'm the mother of Evangeline. I'm the mother of Evangeline. And I just started saying it. And I thought, well, what if I say it at the end of every verse? And I just write real feelings. and that I am the real feelings because I am a mother of Evangeline. And so that's when I wrote The Mother and it's stayed my mantra. I still sing it every single night. But I am the mother of Evangeline Let's move on to your next selection. section uh and we asked you for a possession what is the possession that you've chosen for us to talk about on the show the possession i've chosen to talk to you about is my log cabin i've lived in the same log cabin for 22 years and where is this log cabin it's in the cascade mountain foothills about an hour outside of seattle so when did you buy this log cabin right away when i was 21 and i've never moved and i never will move most of my time that i've lived there you know it started out really rustic and has turned it since into a very, very nice log cabin, but it's still the same log cabin. And it was my first taste of no one can make me leave. I used to pick houses on the school bus. I'd sit on the school bus and I'd go, if I could just live in that house, I want to live in that house. I want to live in that house. They're basic houses, little cottages, you know, with a pond in the yard, or there'd be some idyllic thing. And I had this like snow globe fantasy of a little square log cabin with a creek going through the yard like a Kincade painting. When I saw that cabin, I knew that was it. That was my house. And it's been my house ever since and always will be my house. And for the first 15 years I lived there, I only heated it with a wood stove. My wife finally made me get rid of that wood stove two years ago. And it's been a ritual. My house is like a ritual to me. It's my one thing that I fault myself for being materialistic and possessive about. You've built quite a lot of the house yourself, right? Yeah. We ripped a hole in the wall and we built an addition because we actually, it's a small cabin, so we actually needed a nursery. And I learned how to do finished carpentry. And, you know, I just have poured a lot of my artistry into it, which is interesting, actually if you've ever been to Joni Mitchell's house it's a have not had the invite Brandy carry on please you need to come to a jam well I lived in Los Angeles for eight and a half years a lot of people used to say oh going up to Joni's I think well fucking hell what am I gonna do to get an invite up there no carry on hit up your girl Well, the inside of her house is hand painted the beams and the cabinets and her doors. And it's like, it's not a house anymore after that. And that's why I did that work on the inside of my house. It's not perfect. It's laughable. Anytime anybody comes over and like understands construction, I die. I don't want them to see it. but it's a thing I have and I feel like that's a unique thing about someone whose career has done what mine's done and I've had the privilege to enjoy this success especially this recent success you know but sort of stubbornly staying in this lifestyle or zone but this makes complete sense to me knowing the circumstances of your upbringing yeah it seems pretty obvious to me that I'm not going to go to school I'm not going to do these things oh my god music oh I can do this writing songs and then 21 first bit of money I will buy a house and I will tell everybody everybody that I will never leave this house yeah it's like on some level you must have been searching for some kind of foundation to put roots somewhere and go well I know who I am yeah you've always known who you are really yeah and this is what I'm gonna do I'm gonna lay down these roots and this is where I'll be and I will never leave. We're having a child? Fine. I'll build a shoddy extension to this with my own, you know, nails and hair. It makes complete sense to me. Yeah. Yeah. That's what happened. Let's move on to your next selection. We asked you to pick a movie. I will say there was a lot of talk amongst us here at This Life of Mine about what movie you might pick. And I will say a couple of people made this guess. They got it right. What I know It Jeff It was Jeff It Jeff Yeah Tell us the film I chosen the film The NeverEnding Story I think it like 1984 My grandma showed it to me when I was probably a little too young to see it that horse drown in the swamp But don't let that turn you off. It's an amazing 80s movie right up there with Goonies and Labyrinth and all the best things ever. I have loved its mysticism and cheese and darkness since I was such a little girl. it's informed so much of my aesthetic in the way that i think that it's just it'll always be my favorite movie i actually in fact have the r and tattooed on both of my shoulders you have the character the r and is like let me show you just the see it oh there you go yes i see okay yeah the r and is like a snake symbol that the character atreyu wears because okay so there's a boy called Bastion. And he is despairing, and he goes into a bookshop, and the man that owns the bookshop discourages him from buying this book, but the discouragement is meant for him to actually take it. The man wants him to take this book. Have you ever been Captain Nemo trapped inside your submarine while the giant squid is attacking you? Yes. Weren't you afraid you couldn't escape? But it's only a story. That's what I'm talking about. The ones you read are safe. And that one isn't? Don't worry about it. But you just said it was... Forget about it. This book is not for you. So the boy waits till the man's not looking and he steals the book and he runs to his school and he goes upstairs in the attic. And he starts reading this book only to discover that he's in it, that the book is speaking to him and is for him and that he is some sort of protagonist in the story. In the story, there's a thing called the nothing, which is sweeping across the land and the land is called Fantasia. And I think it represents like the imagination, the sanctity of the human mind's ability to create its own reality. And the nothing is what's infringing upon that, all the things that could infringe upon it. We have our own set of things now, you know, mostly the computer we carry around in our pocket. And there's a hero in the story, this boy Atreyu, and he hunts the purple buffalo. And he gets this charm put around his neck called the Auron that when the nothing comes near, it lights up and it protects him. He inevitably saves Fantasia and the nothing doesn't take over. And the boy's imagination is preserved and the horse that dies in the swamp comes back to life in the end. But the thing about The NeverEnding Story that's so great to me is, first of all, the music is amazing because Georgi Amarota did it. My writing thing is... That's right, isn't it? The NeverEnding Story. Yes, all right. Yeah. I got the orange tattooed on my shoulders because I love the idea of this kind of symmetrical protection of my imagination from the nothing. It does also bring up what I consider to be the most hilarious movie title of all time, which is The NeverEnding Story Part 2. If we don't talk about that one or three. It's amazing. No, no, it's a never-ending story. Part two. It's so, it'll never not be funny to me. But it's not just you who's really, really into the never-ending story. Your bandmates, Tim and Phil, they also have the tattoo. Yeah, yeah. Lots of bands, when you hear them speak about each other, they say, oh, we're like a family. But I feel in your case, it really, really is the case. We're siblings. We've been together for 20-something years. They moved me into that cabin. They both lived with me at different times. I was the first person to live on five acres out there all those years ago, and slowly they've bought the adjacent land, and they live there now. and we live with more family more band members and stuff like that about 112 acres out there in the in the foothills and we do everything together we do our holidays together and when we are with each other in the rehab facilities when one of us hits the skids we are in the hospital together we are in the shit together you know i don't think there's any other band in the world like us were very weird very dysfunctional and very in love with each other or unconditionally forever so beautiful to hear and weird correct me if i'm wrong but i feel like the last i want to say the last five six years of your career have been pretty extraordinary have you felt a change has it felt different we weren't famous before we really didn't have enough money to write home about we were doing great i mean you hear about bands like ours you know on social media or sometimes we get a little print press or we'll screen time and it looks good it looks like great you know this band's doing really good look at them but like until the grammys and that song of ours the joke we were just a struggling band talk to me about that performance when you walked out it really was quite extraordinary i knew the minute the song ended like and i watch it now and then too because it was such a turning point in my life like when i watch myself and at the end of the song and i didn't even know i did this in real time but and i start jumping up and down and i'm like oh it's like i glimpsed the next six years of my life or something right in that second because it really did change my life and our lives like you know i'm not putting it all on that moment but it was about being ready yeah you know i just was like put me in coach this is my chance we've got one more selection to go to and i think this really ties up your story in a really perfect way tell us the place that you've chosen to talk about on the show today i've chosen to talk about a place called nia bay where is nia bay nia bay is the northernmost tip of the united states on the west coast it's on the straits of wandafuca right across from vancouver island why is it so important to you it's the macaw indian reservation and i've been going there since i was six or seven with my dad and brother to go fishing i'm really we haven't talked enough about fishing today. Fishing is like a huge part of my life. It's probably my favorite thing to do. And it's my meditative state. So we've been going here every year since I was a little kid. And I'm actually going day after tomorrow. Right. You go with a big group down there, right? Traditionally once a year. Is that right? Yeah. I think this year we might be looking at 30 or 40 people. Wow. It's always been this place where it's like this place is like the great equalizer of our family, no matter what we believe or who we are, where we come from, whether we have a little bit of money, whether we don't have a little bit of money. When we're on the Macaw Reservation, we're all the same. It doesn't really matter that I come back to work and it means that I'm going to fly to L.A. and hang out with James Corden on a podcast or whether or not I'm going to go roll underneath a bus like my Uncle Eric can be a mechanic. it's the place where we all go to just check in with our sort of carlisle-ness one time and then go back out into the world and be who we are you know for better or worse have you ever invited elton right now i'm just loving the idea so elton john head to toe in gucci talking to your uncle is it ernie did you say uncle eric yeah trying to catch a fish yeah i'm fucking done with this, Jonas. Fuck off! Fuck off! I will tell you, Elton, he is butch. He is more butch than my father, which is something I didn't know when I was 11 years old. He's more masculine, more rugged, more blokey, David calls him, than most people. Oh yeah, he loves his football. So he could handle Neobay, I think, on some level. Throughout this whole show I think my main feeling has been like oh my god this person this artist whose work means so much to me and so many the grounded nature in you is incredibly inspiring this fishing trip in Nia Bay is a great example of that the need and the want to constantly check in with who you are that's what it is outside of all of it yeah because it only makes you enjoy it more if you can see how far you've come or what the distance is between wanting a dream and having a dream then you can always relive achieving it but if you just stay here if you stay at the dream you don't really get to enjoy it that is a wonderful way to end this show Brandi Carlile your memory was being refused baptism as a teenager. Your person is Sir Elton John. Your music is mother and everything that it means to you, by you. Brandy Carlile, your possession is your house in Washington State. Your movie, The NeverEnding Story and your place is near bay on the Macau Reservation. Thank you so much for sharing this life of yours. Thanks for having me, man. Up next is this. I'm Yuval Noah Harari, and welcome to This Life of Mine. Save a Prayer by Duran Duran. I saw the video on Israeli television, and when I tried to look back, when was the first time in my life I saw an image of the Buddha or of Buddhist monks? Oh, it was in Duran Duran's Save a Prayer. We are basically carbon animals in a silicon world. And now more and more of the systems in the world, They are run by these inorganic silicone entities, and they increasingly expect us to adapt to them. When I wake up, the first thing I do, I meditate for one hour, and then I'll go and take out my morning porridge pot and make porridge. And it's been with me for, I think, at least 10 years. And it's such an insignificant possession. This is a pot you take on the road with the almost you travel. No, no, no, no. No, no, no, no. I don't go too extreme. This would be bizarre. If you haven't subscribed to Lemonada Premium yet, now is the perfect time. You can listen to this life of mine completely ad-free. Plus, you'll unlock exclusive quickfire rounds of questions with all of my guests. They're all in two minutes or less. Just tap that subscribe button on Apple Podcasts or head to LemonadaPremium.com to subscribe on any other app. Or you can listen ad-free on Amazon Music with your Prime membership. That's LemonadaPremium.com. Don't miss out.