Finneas Inside the Studio

So far, the interviews we’ve shared were recorded shortly after Finneas had released his solo debut, Optimist, in the fall of 2021. But it’s also interesting to hear from an artist in the midst of their creative process — to hear firsthand about their emotional state, in addition to the challenges and even doubts they face in the studio.
So with this in mind, we're sharing an interview with Finneas from fall of 2020 for another show, Inside the Studio. At the time, Finneas was busy working on his first full length, as well as testing the waters with an EP, Blood Harmony.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:09):
Hello everyone, and welcome The Song Stories, a new I
Heart radio podcast where we try to figure out how
do you make a hit? To answer this not so
simple question, we're sitting down with some of the biggest
names in music. They're going to take us through the
life cycle of a song, from studio to stage and
everything in between. My name's Jordan run Toad. Thank you
so much for joining us. By now you're no doubt

(00:30):
a where that we're talking to Phineas the singer, songwriter
and producer extraordinaire. So far, the interviews we've shared were
recorded shortly after he released his solo debut Optimist, in
the fall of The timing of the conversations gave him
perspective on the project, allowing him the opportunity to make
insights on themes and emotions that aren't always apparent when

(00:50):
you're heart at work. But on the other hand, it's
also interesting to hear from an artist in the midst
of their creative process, to hear firsthand about their emotional
state in addition to challenges and even doubts they face
in the studio. So with this in mind, I'd like
to share with you an iny of you I did
with Phineas in the fall for another show I host
called Inside the Studio. At the time, Phineas was busy

(01:12):
working on his first full length as well as testing
the waters with an EP Blood Harmony. But talk will
add a new dimension to the previous interviews you've heard
with Phineas on the show, and he's just as engaging,
fascinating and funny as ever. I hope you enjoy Phineas.
How are you. I'm good. It's it's been raining ash

(01:36):
in Los Angeles. I don't know where where you're calling
me from, but it's been just it looks like your
Blood Harmony cover. Really I wish it was that pretty.
It's it's just this kind of smoky gray, very depressing
and sort of alarming. But like we've been indoors, a
lot of people have been comparing the weather to like
Blade Runner, like all the orange skies and Blade Runner.

(01:58):
And my girlfriend was like, I don't think i've ever
seen later, Like, well, then let's watch Blade Runners. So
we watched we like on Friday, we had nothing to
do when we just marathon like both Blade Runner movies,
the first one and then the one that came out
in They're so good. They are so good. But it
definitely I can imagine like living in it right now,
probably like inhibitory ability to enjoy them to some extent.

(02:19):
You're like, it's too bad the future isn't that cool?
Like we have like we have like all the pollution
and like not any flying cars. Somebody dropped the ball
on that. I know, the first Blade Runner takes place
in and they're like flying around and uh, we're not
rocking that yet. So like Back to the Future to
also let us down when Back to the Future two

(02:41):
took place in or something or yeah, we blew it.
I know. Man, It's actually kind of sweet because it
just means that people were very optimistic. Yeah, that would
be like if we were like, um, what would the
example be if we were like, yeah, we will have
stopped climate change by two tho in twenty two, Like

(03:02):
I wish we were that proficiently. That's kind of where
I want to start with you. I mean, this year
must be so insane for you for so many reasons.
I mean you go from sweeping the Grammy's performing at
the Oscars to like six weeks later being confined to
your home. I mean, what was what was that adjustment?
Like it was it like, you know, whiplash. It was
super weird. I mean, you know, on one hand, I

(03:22):
think like, I feel very privileged to have had a
very enjoyable first two months of the year before everything
kind of like collapsed in on itself. The lucky thing
is that if I'm lucky enough to live this long
twenty years from now, I will be like looking back
at two thousand twenty and I'll be like, yeah, that
was a weird period. But obviously, like these these seminal
moments in my life also took place that year, and

(03:45):
aren't I lucky. I don't think I'll remember only the
terrible things, which obviously there are so many terrible things
to remember. So yeah, I feel very lucky. And uh,
and you know what, like, on another very selfish level,
like at least we had been touring the world for
you know, three years straight when everything came to a halt.
I think if we were only just starting it would

(04:05):
be very devastating. At least we know what it's like
and we know what we have to look forward to
in you know, a year or so time, when you know,
maybe it's safe to go play Arenas again. But yeah,
I mean it's it sucks. I mean, we you know,
we love touring. We love traveling. It's it's one of
our favorite things in the world. So it's pretty torturous

(04:26):
to not get to do that. But most of the
people have in the show, I ask, you know what
you're in lockdown, How's how's working from home been like
deffected your creative process? It must be so different, But
I imagine for you it's probably not the biggest change
in the world. No, it's been. I mean, like, to
be totally honest, it's been like in terms of like
making Billy's second album, making my first album, it's been awesome,

(04:48):
you know, Like I know that's kind of crazy to say,
but like there's no way we'd be writing and recording
as much this year otherwise. So I'm trying to look
at it like I'm kind of trying to look at
it like we have this thing that no artists ever get.
It's basically, here's the deal. Every artist makes the first
album and then if it's successful, they tour it into oblivion,
and then there's somehow expected to like have made album

(05:11):
two in that time, which is just kind of crazy.
I mean, our version of that was that we made
the James Bond song on tour. But it's like we
have this crazy luxury of like having this amount of
time off after the first album that I think almost
no artist gets anymore. So I'm kind of like I'm
playing like mind games with myself where I'm like, as

(05:31):
soon as there is a vaccine and everything can start
up again, like you're you're never going to get a
break ever again, because everyone's gonna be trying to make
up for two years within the span of like six months.
So I'm kind of like pretending this is like some
short term forced hiatus or something where we're just like,
we have to make this next record, and I'm really
enjoying making it. I'm loving all the songs we're writing,

(05:53):
and it's really fun. So you're feeling productive. That's good.
And I feel like I know people on both sides
of that. They're they're like I'm just really on or
it's like I can barely get out of bed. Please
don't make me do an entirely. It's it's it's day
by day. I should remind you that. Earlier in this call,
I admitted to watching both Blade in the Movies on
Friday and I also that same day, I watched like

(06:14):
an hour and a half behind the scenes of the
Social Network, and also I watched an episode of The Boys,
So it was like, you know, there there are days
where I am super prolific, and then there are days
where I watched like three movies You Got, You Gotta,
you know, Prime, the Pump, I Guess, EBB, and Flow. Yeah, Well,
tell me about your new song. What they'll say about us?
It seems you know, I got a lot of hope

(06:34):
in that song, which is not something we we get
a lot of this year. You know. Um, that's definitely
what I was aiming for. I think, I think, I mean,
there are other songs that may never see the light
of day that I wrote during this that are just dirges.
They're just like bleak, this sucks, you know, that's kind
of the m O. And I think the reason I
felt so proud of this song was I I wrote

(06:55):
it during the Black Lives Matter protests in June, and
I was like going to them, and it was like
it was like the only thing that I could justify
going out and doing, Like I still haven't been out
to like eat at a restaurant or anything. It just
seems too too irresponsible. I see my family, my parents
are in their sixties whatever. But I was like, you
know what, I have to go to these protests and
and if if that jeopardizes my health, I'll, you know,

(07:16):
I'll quarantine for two weeks whatever. I'll take the hit
because these protests are important. And whenever I go to protests,
I feel really hopeful. Gone to marches my whole life.
In l A. We've marched against the Iraq War, and
we went to the Women's March in the March for
our Lives in Boston, and it marches make me feel
really good because you're like marching down the street with
all these people who agree with you. And I think

(07:37):
the Internet at its best is like this empathy machine
where we see people, you know, suffering and we feel
bad for them even though we don't know them. And
it's worse, it's this like divisive division where we're like
just seeing everybody that disagrees us about everything, and it's
You're just like, oh my god, how do I disagree
so fundamentally with this person that otherwise isn't that different

(07:59):
than I am. We grew up in the same place,
you know. It's kind of crazy. So anyway, protests made
me feel really good, and I had come home and
I sort of started this thing, this this kind of
hopeful piece. But at the same time I was following
Amanda Klutz, who's the wife of Nick Cordero, who at
the time was dying of COVID in the hospital or
dying of you know whatever, they call it, complications due

(08:20):
to COVID, where his lungs had been obliterated by the virus.
And so I was like singing kind of in the
vein of like maybe maybe he's gonna be okay, and
like wouldn't that be great? And if you were the
loved one of a person who was lying in a
hospital bed and you were kind of explaining all the
protests and everything, you know what you might say, And
so that was kind of the nut of that song,

(08:41):
and then everything beyond that was was just sort of
like trying to be as self aware of it as possible.
I find I find some songs that are like optimistic,
sort of hard to take. So there's like a line
in the second verse that's like if I say a
cliche because I mean it, and I think that's like
the whole kind of nature of a song like that
is like you are saying this thing that might seem

(09:02):
a little bit foolhardy or a little bit like blind,
but it's like I think. I think to be optimistic
is to be aware of negative things that are happening
and to be like, you know what, I'm still gonna
be hopeful and I'm still gonna like root for us.
I have not yet resorted to nihilism, which is the
next the next state. Everyone treats like it's this bad year.

(09:23):
I'm is the nihilist year. That's like the year where
we're all just like, never mind, it's never gonna go away.
And you performed the d n C in August, I
mean that must be an incredible thing to to lend
your voice to, you know. It was. We saw it
as a good opportunity to throw weight. You know, I
think this is a really important election, and I think
anybody who doesn't think this is an important election is

(09:44):
is privileged to not paying much attention. And we were
just like, we'd love to make whatever small amount of
difference we can try to make would be useful. I
think we were just like the option of like looking
back at this period and having done nothing is like
very grim to me. So how do you balance with
all this going and being so aware what's going on
in the world. How do you how do you find
a good work life balance in the midst of all that.

(10:05):
I know that sounds like a very that sort of
trite question, but I think it's something a lot of
people are dealing with. It's super hard. I've like put
those like app limits on my phone of like the Instagram, Twitter,
social media like screen time limits where your phone just
kind of like shuts you out. And I that's a struggle,
you know, I think I think it's really challenging. The
thing that I try to remind myself is that, in
my specific case, my work is the thing that brings

(10:27):
me fulfillment, right writing songs, producing them that makes me
feel really good looking at the news cycle. Although I
think it is important, it doesn't make me feel good
at all. My joke, and I haven't even tweeted this,
but like, you know, how on Twitter there's like the
categories in the app of like COVID related sports entertainment, right,
so I don't know if you've checked, maybe yours is different,
but the fun tab on Twitter, there's like a fun section.

(10:50):
It has one thing right now, and it's like and
it's not even that fun. The thing is like, let
me pull it up, it's like bizarre. You're just like,
this isn't even fun here. I opening it really quick. Okay,
So the fun tab it's like three three things, and
one of them is just imagine explaining these things from
two people living in nineteen and I'm like, that's not fun.

(11:12):
That's not fun. It's still dark anyway. So I just
try to get off the apps as much as I can,
because the stuff that brings me joy is like going
on walks with my friends and hanging out with my
girlfriend and the stuff I can do safely that feels
very like connected social media, even though it's important, like,
does not make me feel very good. I don't think
I know anyone who makes them feel really good. I know.

(11:34):
I think the issue is that it is a little
bit like a nicotine addiction, where it gives you some dopamine.
Like you go on, you see some likes, you see
some nice comments, and so you're like wow, like I'm
I am loved and valued, and then it's like you
just spiral off into like looking at terrible articles. But
the whole West Coast burning down. So it's it's a
tricky balance, right. You don't want to turn a blind
die of problems, but you also don't want to ruin

(11:55):
your own life by observing it's not actually constructive to
look at something negative happening in the world on your
Twitter unless you're then going to like do something about it, right,
I try to look at it that way. It's like,
all right, I can. I can indulge in this weird
habit of like looking at terrible news as long as
I then plan on instilling some form of change. Well,

(12:29):
you're working on so many things right now. Does what
they'll say about us mean that there's a full length
LP on the way coming from you soon? There's definitely
it's on the way. I mean it's I'm I'm working
on it all the time. It was sort of like, um,
if I had to answer, I would imagine that that
song will play a role in the album. I don't
think the album is far enough away that it would
not fit on the album. I think it will be there.

(12:50):
But I didn't want to announce a record or release
date with that song because I felt like I wanted
to just let that song exist because I really believe
in that song. And I think like sometimes in you
announce a single with a record, it's like people are
just like, oh my god, like there's a record coming.
And also I'm not actually done with a record. I'm
like working on the songs all the time, but I
have lots of work to do. I always been so

(13:11):
fascinated by the unusual sounds in your records, you know,
like a lit matches, a snare, dentist drill, or like
an Australian crosswalk beef and bad Guy. What is your
process for incorporating those? Do you have like an arsenal
of cool sounds and tape loops that you draw from,
or do you hear a sound in your head that
you know you want and you just start experimenting with
what's around you. Totally both. It just depends on the situation.

(13:33):
I'm always looking for inspiration, right, I think one of
the issues with you know, the more music you make
is the more things you think you've covered, And anything
that reinspires me is really exciting. You know. It's like
this is a weird example, but like so so watched
the sound of like the song of the match Sticks,
like that song is like a C chord and an

(13:55):
F chord and a minor chord and an F chord,
and like, those are chords that like, I have written
so many songs with those chords that they are they
do not carry inspiration for me anymore. And you chuck
some match sticks in there, and it's very cool and
inspiring to me, and I think that's like, that's what
I'm always going for. It's just like something to reinspire.
Have you ever heard of Pink Floyd's Household Objects project? Yeah,

(14:18):
I thought that was a really cool project. I haven't
done it, but I thought it was like really smart. Yeah,
it's like because I think that was what followed Dark
Side of the Moon too, So it's almost a similar
position where Okay, we we did what we set out
to do a thousand times over, beyond the wildest dreams
and then finding inspiration in the in the every day.
It's I was joking with my dad because I'm I'm
really proud of the second album that we're working on

(14:40):
with Billy Um, and I was talking to my dad
and I was like, but I'm like, we're supposed to
do this every time, Like you're always supposed to make
like a really good album, like over and over, Like
it's so hard. But you know, I think that's it's
about reinspiring yourself and it's about growing as a person.
Like it's a funny thing that people level this criticism
of like my favorite are have changed, because it's like,

(15:02):
what the what on earth could they expect you to
do as an artist other than change? That's I mean,
that's it's such a funny criticism that people. Yeah, I
don't really understand that. I mean, listen to every Beatles
album post nineteen sixty four and it sounds completely different
than the one before it. Yeah, I know they're so different.
I do understand that if you are a fan of
the record, that doesn't mean that you're going to be

(15:23):
a fan of someone else's record if it's a very
different record. But it's like that's how music is supposed
to work, Like you kind of have to make music
for yourself and then whoever likes it will like it. God,
if I were always trying to cater to like one listener, like,
I wouldn't have made like half the songs I'm proud
of because I would have just been like second guessing them,
been like oh my god, they're not gonna like this.
So I think it's a it's a double edged sword

(15:45):
because obviously we're all as artists like very indebted to
whoever listens to our music, and that's why we have
a career. But it's also like I think of this
in terms of like food in a certain way. If
I only ever ate stuff I already like, I'd never
try anything new that it's great, and it's like I
feel like that's that's the best. And you go to
a new restaurant and you try something, You're like, I
have no idea how that's going to be, and you

(16:06):
try to like, oh my god, it's amazing, and and
I think that's like what I always aimed to do
as a musician, is like give someone something they didn't
even know they wanted. And I assume being in your
position now, having one, you know, all the Grammys, you
have all sorts of resources open to you that you
might not have before. I mean, you could have a
wall of melotrons or a string section, or you know,
whatever you want. Do you have any desire to vastly

(16:27):
expand your sonic paletin anyway or did you feel like
you have everything you need with your laptop and you know,
logic pro tools or whatever. So I spent a considerable
amount of money this year on like instruments and microphones
that I couldn't afford before. And I think, you know
what I would say to like any young listener who's
like I, I record my own vocals on a microphone

(16:47):
called a Chandler Red now, which I really like. And
my my buddy yesterday was like, I gotta get a
new microphone. I was like, you should get a Chandler
Red and he was like, I was thinking, get in
the TLM one oh three. And I was like, well,
that's that makes fine. And he was like, didn't you
record all of Billy's album on that mike? And I
was like yeah. I was like it's a great mike.
I was like, I'm just telling you that other one
is even better. And he was like, right, but it
doesn't matter. And I was like, no, it absolutely doesn't matter.

(17:10):
It's just it's a very selfish purchase, right, It's like
I enjoy it. But yes, In the last several months,
I've I've acquired really sort of more, mostly before COVID,
but I've acquired like some really nice mikes and some
cool vintage sins and stuff and like, to be honest,
I don't know how to feel about this, but I
still like largely am using like built in software on

(17:33):
my computer because it's fast and I'm usually looking for speed.
But it is really fun and again it's like it's
the inspiration that I'm looking for. I'm not like a
super like analog verse digital like convert. I think digital
sounds pretty great. I have a couple since I had
this thing called an ace tone. You know, I play
that and it inspires me a lot, and you know,

(17:54):
in making a second album and then making my first album,
like I'm I love being re inspired by things um
and approaching things in a different way. So that's kind
of like that would be my encouragement to people in
terms of like what they invest money on and with gears,
you know, like wait until you're uninspired by something and
then and then get something new to reinspire you and

(18:15):
re excite you. That would be my advice. You're superstitious
at all? Do you go back to the bedroom at
your parents house to do the vocals just to get
the sound of that room? I am I am not
at all superstitious or sentimental, I will like throw away
or give away anything. I don't know. Man, people let
like sentimentality like rule like their whole lives, and I

(18:37):
get it, but like I've never felt that way. The
only devices I keep, and I keep them largely because
I just know how quickly they're going to seem crazy.
Is I keep all of my computers like I have,
like my my first computer and my second computer whatever,
because they don't take out that much space. And also
I just know that, like in thirty years, it's gonna
look nuts, like we're just gonna be like, what is this,

(18:59):
like that Morris phone? Yeah exactly, So I'm not. I'm
not superstitious. People are so funny about the bedroom men,
like they're all just like I gotta go back there
and recording happen. I'm like, you know, my my mom
sleeps in there now, like it's not my I have
a different house. But the only thing that's in that
bedroom that I would maybe record is my granddad's old
beat up piano. His upright is in there. So I'm

(19:21):
might someday maybe I'll be like I gotta have that
cloudy upright sound again. But it's kind of it. It's
kind of a an asinine hypothetical question. If you were
growing up in the sixties and a purely analog era
where people went to like gold Star or Abbey Road
or whatever to cut records, do you think you'd still
be involved with production? Like, how do you think your
career would be different if you didn't have tools that

(19:42):
you have a new laptop right now? Such a good question, man, Um,
you know, I think I think I am so a
product of the period of time where I was born
and what was accessible to me. You know, if I
were born with the same brain and the same appetites
and the same interests, I'm sure I would be involved
in music it in some capacity. But the level of

(20:02):
innovation I've been able to be a part of, I
have no idea if that would be available to me
or be achievable to me. I mean, it's like it's
kind of everybody right, Like Bill Gates had access to
that computer mainframe at his college and whatever. You know,
he's a very smart dude, but like he had access.
You know, if you if you take away his access,
no matter how smart he was, he wouldn't have been

(20:23):
able to learn it the way that he learned it.
So I think there would have been amazing things about
growing up in the sixties. There were so many amazing
musicians back then, and holy sh it, it it would have
been so cool to maybe produce like the Beatles or something.
But um, who knows. People love like the time machine
stuff and like as cursed as this period of time
may seem to be, I want to be right now,

(20:44):
Like I don't even know if I want to be
in the future, Like I think I just want to
be like right now. Well that's the best way to be. Ever,
every Buddhist in the world right now is like, yes,
I've been listen to this right not being in the moment.

(21:09):
You made a Bond theme on a tour bus. I
think you said, I mean that that is unbelievable. I mean,
I gotta I'm a huge Bond nerd. What was the
process like for that? That is it's just so cool.
It was a really cool process. I am also a
Bond nerd, and I have I have always looked at
doing a Bond theme as like the the pinnacle of
film music collaborations. So it was always on my fantasy

(21:32):
bucket list of like, wouldn't that be unbelievable to do.
And you know, they were making this, this Bond movie,
and we kind of got wind of that, not in
a secret way. I think it was just like the
way that anyone would know that they're making a movie.
We're like, are they making a new Bond movie this summer?
Isn't Daniel Craig doing another one? And uh, we were
just like to our team, We're like, we we'll meet
with anyone that will let us meet with them to

(21:53):
try to convince them that we're right to do this.
You know. So we met with Barbara Broccoli and we
met with MGM and what we were given and I
think I'm a had to say this. We were given
like a scene of the script that was kind of
it like the cold open. Yeah, and um, so we
had that and and that was obviously huge because um,
it's so important to know what angle you're writing from.

(22:14):
And then on a personal note, because I'm kind of
obsessed with Bond themes, I was like, has to be
the movie title, Like all of my favorite Bond themes
are the movie title, like Live and Let Die, Skyfall,
gold Finger, like it has to be that was like
caveat number one. And then two was I'm pretty loosey
goosey in terms of like what what I'm trying to

(22:35):
achieve with goals as a songwriter. But with a Bond song,
to me, the melody has to be completely bulletproof, like
it has to be like a melody because it's going
to be interpolated through the whole movie, like every Bond
theme is played by like strings and orchestra in the
rest of the movie. So I was like, the melody
has to be like amazing and very Bond. So I
wrote all of the melodies first, and then Billy and

(22:58):
I set up out sort of perfecting like what line
would go on each melody, which is very atypical. Usually
I write melodies and lyrics at the same time because
it's much harder to write a lyric, I think when
you don't have the melody already or sorry, it's hard
to write the lyric when you have a melody because
you have to just like it's a little bit like Sudoku,
like you have to like just fill in the blanks
in this way. So that was it was this really

(23:20):
challenging thing, but it actually from sort of start to
finish of that specific song only a couple of days,
although there were there were months of like super stress,
what are we gonna do? And and Tony Siler, who
was our champion at Billy's label, Interscope, who I adore.
I think Tony is the greatest. He was the one
kind of like up to bat for us, you know,

(23:42):
and he would check in with us. Yeah, it was.
It was a stressful experience, but mainly it was only
stressful because I just really wanted to write a great song,
like I love those Bombs songs so much, so I'm
really proud of the song. That's gotta be so hard.
I mean to write something that fits the aesthetic but
also isn't a total cliche to like that's gotta be

(24:02):
that isn't done before, like that it hasn't already been done. Like,
it was a really satisfying experience. It was also a
really phenomenal excuse to work with Hans Zimmer and Johnny Marr.
Well they kind of our package deal. Johnny was working
with Hans on the whole film, and then Stephen Lipson
like helped produce the song with us. But it was
so cool, you know, because Billy and are so insular

(24:22):
with our own records doesn't really make sense to collaborate
with anybody because we're just in a room throwing stuff
into a fire and seeing what explodes. And I feel
like with a bond thing. They're like, I'm so glad,
Like if if they told me to do a string arrangement,
I would have been like, let me try to rip
off Hans Zimmer. And if they told me to play guitar,
I've been like, let me try to rip off Johnny Marr.
So the fact that I got to just have them

(24:42):
beyond the record was so sick. Who was that great
line that Hans Zimmer had? It was like whenever whenever
I get into the studio produced I want, I find
myself wondering can I do it again? There's something like
we're seeing on his like masterclass thing that he's like,
I'm I vinced I don't know how to do your movie. Dude,
He's the yeah. Every time every time I'm every time

(25:03):
I'm in the middle of producing a song, I'm like,
maybe this is the one where I don't know how
to do it. Like me, maybe the last song was
the last one I'll ever make. That's good, Like I
don't know, man, it's so weird. Your brain is your
brain is dumb. Like the fact that your brain puts
up such a fight against like new stuff is just
it's crazy. So he's a He's a legend and rightfully so,

(25:26):
and so nice and so collaborative and so like. There
was this one point we were doing like versions of production.
We're like, you know, version one of production, version two
of production, version three of production, version for a productive
and there was this version that Billy and I were like,
this is bad. And I was like, wow, I'm gonna
have to call on Zimmer and be like this is bad.

(25:47):
And we called him and he was like it's bad, right,
and I was like yeah, and he was like I know.
And it was like so it was so easy to
I wish to have that little ego when I have
as many oscars as he has one, like I feel
like that's like unbelievable, Like if you win an Oscar,
I feel like your ego must just explode. And he's

(26:08):
just this like mellow, nice guy, Like I just adore him,
so I would do I would do like anything for him.
I feel like I've pledged my allegiance to Hans. I
gotta ask aside from Daniel Craig, who's your favorite Bond? Oh?
You know what, I really like. I have seen a
film or two of the other of Conner and of Brasen,
and I think they're great, But like Bond is like Batman.

(26:30):
It's like whatever you grew up with. So like, I
just think of Craig as Bond. He's just my guy,
I think. And again, like not that the other Bonds
weren't great. I think they were, but that's just who
plays the role in my opinion. You know, I think
that's like the Christian Bale Michael Keaton, Val Kilmer thing.
It's like, you know, the Christian is my Batman until

(26:51):
Robert Pattinson is like unbelievable next year. Oh my god,
I know I can't wait to see that. Okay, well,
I gotta ask you. I've been asking. This has been
my last question for every buddy. If you could snap
your fingers and have everything go back to the way
it was in no COVID, no virus, no lockdown, no quarantine,
what is the first thing that you would do so
like like like fantasy wake up one day and everything

(27:13):
is just sort of like status quo again. Yeah, Freaky
Friday style yeah, um, really good question. I mean the
things that have struck me are like the things that
we take for granted. So I think I would I'd
have to say, like play a show. I think just
the idea. Like we played so many shows in twenty

(27:34):
nineteen that like we enjoyed them, but it was like
we were constantly playing shows. And I remember being on
stage in North Carolina, like the day before the lockdown started,
where we're like about to go home and stop our tour,
and I remember being like, wow, this this might be
the last time I'm on stage for a long time.
And uh yeah, that's the sort of you know, going
out to eat, seeing friends and stuff. That's all wonderful minutia,

(27:58):
but there is it's kind of nothing in the world
like being on a stage playing the show. That was
a solid answer. PHAs thank you so much for your time,
your music. It's been a pleasure. It's great talking to you.
Thank you, man, it was really good talking to you.
Song Stories is a production of I Heart Radio. The

(28:21):
show was hosted and executive produced by Noel Brown and
Jordan run Talk, with supervising producer Mike John's. If you
like what you heard, please subscribe and leave us a review.
For more from my heart Radio, please visit the I
heart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to
your favorite shows.