November 22, 2022 • 52 mins
The Book of Joe Podcast begins with Hosts Tom Verducci and World Series Champion Joe Maddon welcoming legendary musician Max Weinberg to the show. We've been talking about 'Glue Guys' and how important they are in keeping a team together. Max explores the importance of having chemistry in a band or team and the hurdles it can bring. Max was inducted into the NJ Hall of Fame and discusses some of the special moments of his ceremony. As in sports, being on stage is all about being nimble and adjusting to what's in front of you. No matter the obstacle, Max tells us what it takes to keep the music going. Max compares holding his drumsticks to an MLB player holding his bat and how he had to learn new grips to play more relaxed. Max takes us through his journey of trying out for Little League, auditioning for Bruce Springsteen, and being named as the leader of The Tonight Show Band. Max reveals that Bruce is a big baseball fan and gives us a scouting report on The Boss playing shortstop!
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
The Book of Joe Podcast is a production of My
Heart Radio. Welcome back to the latest episode of the
Book of Joe Podcast. Of course, it is based on
our book, The Book of Joe. This is Tom Verducci
joined by Joe Madden. Joe, how you doing. I'm doing well, brother,
(00:25):
Good morning, How you doing? I am doing well. It's
Thanksgiving week and man, we have a special guest today
and it's a special episode. We are going to be
joined by Max Weinberg, of course, longtime drummer with Bruce
Springsteen and the E Street Band, and Joe. I know
you're looking forward to this for many reasons, but especially
(00:46):
because it's not just about the band and drumming. Yeah,
we wanted to really try to highlight blue guys outside
of the baseball industry too. We talked about it the
other day and I thought Max would be the perfect fit.
Beyond it, You're gonna hear all about it very shortly.
But I've been as such as Springsteen and since the seventies,
I think you have also. But anyway, I have to
(01:08):
get an opportunity to speak with Max about the similarities
the relationships that you build within a rock and roll
band and what it feels like in a major league
clubhouse or dug out, the highly charged athletes, these highly
charged musicians, and how they cope with it, and uh,
getting into the glue component of it, how do when
when things go awry, how does how does it come
back together? And how do you interact in regarding the
(01:29):
egos subjectgating of eagles and moving it on to something
more important as a group or as a team. Looking
forward to all that with Max, because again, this has
been been my favorite band since the mid seventies. Ditto
for me as well. And of course if you've read
the book or will read the book and have been
listening to this podcast, you know one of our favorite
intersections is the intersection of baseball, rock and roll and leadership,
(01:54):
and mighty Max Weinberg is right at that intersection. This
is gonna be fascinating, folks. Stuff. I'm not gonna tell
you exactly what's coming up, but you're going to year
about Paul McCartney ringo star and a baseball scouting report
on the baseball skills of Bruce Springsteen. Yeah, you're gonna
stick around for this deep Back in a minute, Welcome
(02:25):
back to the Book of Joe podcast, and we are
thrilled to be joined by our special guest today, Mighty
Max Weinberg. Of course you know him as the drummer
in the East Street Band, but I know him as
a Jersey guy. So Max, welcome. It's always good to
have a Jersey guy on here. And people talk about
the cradle of civilization between the Tigris and Euphrates. I
think it's between the Hudson and Delaware. So thanks for
(02:48):
coming on. And by the way, congratulations being inducted into
the New Jersey Hall of Fame. That's big time. Well,
thank you, Tom. Good morning, Joe. Tom. Yeah, you know,
it was quite a moving experience to be inducted into
the New Jersey Hall of Fame. As they say, when
(03:10):
you leave Philadelphia or New York City, you know you're
in Jersey because you can see the air you're breathing.
It's an old Jersey joke, it's not quite true anymore.
But when you look at the inductees through the years,
I'm delighted to be in the company of these amazing individuals.
(03:31):
It was quite a moving ceremony. And Joe, our mutual
friend Mark Stein of Chicago, was able to my great
surprise to have Ringo star and then Paul McCartney show
up to say a few nice words, and that was,
you know, quite an unbelievable experience. My son Jay, who's
(03:55):
a very renowned drummer, uh, inducted me, so it was
kind of a family affair. And then to have Paul
McCartney play the drums. He was actually playing the drums,
I believe it was in his home studio in London.
Uh and then stopped and said a few words. If
(04:15):
that was something I would have never in my wildest
imagination dreamed possible. But I was very delighted to be
the recipient of those words. Congratulations on all that, Max.
And but also I thought that Hazelton, Pennsylvania might have
been the cradle of civilization Tom. I didn't realize that
(04:36):
happened between the Hudson and Delaware. But yeah, Max that
congratulations on all of that. It is really um, like
you said, as a kid, growing up, to to arrive
at that particular juncture again, New Jersey Pennsylvania were neighbors.
I kind of understanding, get that that whole process of
growing up and what it's like in almost these surrealistic
moments that occur as you professionally moved down the road.
(04:58):
So we'll congrats on that. I think it's outstanding. We
all do well. Thank you, Joe, Max. One of the
reasons we really were just thrilled to have you on here.
We've been talking about glue guys as it relates to baseball,
talking about guys on a baseball team that really are
kind of the mortar of this spirit, de core of
a team. You know, maybe it's not the best player,
(05:18):
but there's usually somebody and Joe knows this as a manager,
if you're lucky you have more than one the guys
you can bring the whole group together, diverse backgrounds and
be that one guy who can be the bridge to teammates.
And we thought about you when it came to a
glue guy in a band. Why don't you talk about
(05:39):
your role in the band and whether you thought of
yourself as a glue guy. Well, it's an interesting term
because that's exactly what it is, whether you're playing. For example,
I had a good friend in high school. It was
a great catcher, and you know, the catcher drops the ball,
chaos breaks out and hockey if the goalie let's just shot,
(06:04):
go by the same thing in drums in a band,
in a combo, whether it's a large orchestra or even
histor rock band, you are the last line of defense.
And the drummers that I admired and the drummers that
I believe have become successful, embraced that sort of philosophy
(06:25):
that um, you can't let anything get by you if
you you know, if you make a mistake, it can
sound like you're dropping the kitchen sink. Everybody makes mistakes,
but it's how quickly you recover and cover yourself, and
that comes with maturity. I've been playing drums. I'll be
seventy two and a couple of months. I've been playing
drums since I was five years old, so I've made
(06:48):
my mistakes, made many of my mistakes in public, and
to rebound and just keep moving, keep moving. That's the
most important thing. Uh. You also realize that you are
as you say, the glue and it's not just your
position as the drummer. Drummers tend to be the in
(07:10):
a lot of ways, the coalescing factor in bands. For
some reason, I'm not quite sure. I had a drum teacher,
very illustrious drummer named Bernard pretty Pretty who said the
best drummers are helping drummers helping that was the key word.
And I met him when I was nineteen. I studied
(07:31):
with him, and studying with Bernard Purdy, the famous soul,
rhythm and blues drummer was it wasn't so much out
of a book, It was going to sessions. It was
developing the right winning attitude. And I believe my longevity
as a musician has been because I embraced that sort
(07:57):
of approach. Uh. I can play a drum solo and needed,
but drummers never get hired to do a drum solo, unless,
of course, your buddy rich uh. And I'm not and
never purported to be. But you, uh, you want to
be a helping drummer. You want to help your bandmates.
(08:18):
You are as a drummer sort of the Someone once
referred to drummers as the molding that goes below and
above the sheet rock. You know, you smooth over the
rough edges. So we're using in sports and in music
lots of metaphors to kind of describe the indescribable. You
(08:41):
know it when you see it. You know it in
the locker room or the dressing room. I'm always the
guy that come in every day, and you know, the
first thing I say is here's one for you, and
I'll have heard a joke and I'll repeat it. So
it's creating an atmosphere of uh conviviality. UM. And I
(09:06):
take that role seriously because it extends to my drumming.
My job is to make the other guys look good,
and if I do that, then I look good. Awesome.
I just ask us the question regarding all that of
of any kind of alluded to it. There's gonna mistakes
are gonna occur, Like during a performance, things might go awry.
And when things may go awry, of course, there might
(09:28):
be a little bit of a flare up among the group.
For me, my glue guy, the leader in the clubhouse
normally with independent of myself, maybe go reach whomever there
may have been a dispute with among the group. Again,
I'm talking probably about the band members now I'm talking
about the players. Are the coaching staff regarding that when
you when you when you run into a situation like
(09:50):
that where things aren't smooth and and possibly because somebody's
just gone a little bit rogue on you, guys, UM,
is there is that Does that actually happen within a
group like you? Would that be your responsibility or somebody
else within the band to walk up to somebody else
I'm saying, independent of the manager, independent of Bruce, whatever
does that? Does that play as that's a logical within
(10:11):
your group? Well, of course, and it depends on the group.
For example, if you are the titular leader of the band.
For example, when I was on television leading my seven
piece group on the late night programs, the Maximum Brook seven,
so that responsibility would fall to me. Um if you're
(10:34):
working of course, we're working in smaller ensembles, and I
think the hope is that you don't let it get
out of hand. And uh, you know, there's a there's
a once you've been playing for a long time playing music,
(10:54):
whatever happens on stage, it's all, Uh, it's all a
part of the show. And what I mean by that
is if you if you let it collapse. I mean
we've had we've had things on stage with Bruce and
the Eastreet Band where we've literally had to stop and
(11:15):
start again. Not very often. Our percentage of of hits
it's pretty good. And I don't mean hit records but
you know, connecting it's pretty good. But you, uh, it's entertainment.
It's all entertainment, and if you don't obsess about that,
which can uh stop you in your tracks. I mean
(11:40):
at the age of seventy two, and when you've been
doing something as long as we have, not just collectively
but individually. I still play with several other groups of
my own when when I'm not working with Bruce in
the Eastreet Band, you do hope you gain a bit
of wisdom. It's more difficult when you're in your twenties
(12:02):
or early thirties. You haven't had experience, and I would
imagine that particularly if you've been an outstanding athlete in
your school days. Um that the uh, the maturity it
takes two take it all and stride um because everybody
(12:23):
makes mistakes, everybody forgets things, every there's broken plays, there's
strategies that aren't that aren't fulfilled, game plans that perhaps
may not be. You sort of have to shrug it off,
address it. Um. We have a fortunate uh uh say
organizational structure within the eas Street Band. Whereas Bruce has
(12:46):
said many times, and it's absolutely true, it's a benevolent dictatorship,
and that takes a lot of the guesswork out of
it been in democratic bands obviously. The the prime example
of a democratic band would be, say the Beatles, where
you had four distinct individual personalities and desires and abilities
(13:11):
and everyone had to say it takes a lot of
the guesswork out when you don't have any decision making
ability in that context, and you may be a leader
of a band in your own right. One of the
beautiful things about the eas Street Band is that everybody
in the Street Band is a leader in their own
(13:32):
right and does their own thing, and when we come together,
we take that experience in service of advancing Bruce's musical agenda.
And you know, the hardest thing to get in any
band is a great lead singer. The second hardest thing
is to have great songs if you're if you're playing
(13:54):
original music. In the Easteret Band, We're lucky we got
both and it's a phenomenal platform. When I do my
own thing and I'm the leader. As I've grown and
I've gotten more mature, you know, I've recognized that there
are ways to get performances out of your uh players
(14:19):
that don't involve an emotional reaction. You want to be
able to inspire. I believe now at my age, you
want to be able to inspire the best performances. And
having come up in an era where UM, there's always
(14:39):
a lot of chaos and democratic bands, someone's got to
take control and U these leaders naturally emerge or sometimes
they are there by design, as we are in the
Eastreet band and UM. But some say I've mellowed. I
certainly have not mellowed when I'm sitting behind the drums,
(15:02):
because when I'm sitting behind the drums, where where I
go to is I have the technical ability that I've
developed over the last sixty something years, and I have
the emotional stability to be able to handle any situation.
And that just takes longevity. And you know, there's a
(15:26):
reason why those of us who play music, or my
sports friends who who enjoy UH, there's there's there's that
window of opportunity where you're performing at peak experience. It's
playing music, it's playing baseball, it's playing football. So whenever
(15:48):
a few jobs are referred to as playing, you know
it's usually working. And while it is hard, and nobody
UH should diminish the difficulty it is to get into
an elite level at whatever endeavor you're with which you're involved,
(16:09):
it is playing at the end of the day. And
the idea is if you can stay relaxed, if you
can come at it from a hey, I'm enjoying this.
It's tough. This maybe the hundred and twenty game I've
played in a row, or the hundred concert I've done
in a year. You take each one individually, and I say,
(16:31):
I'm fortunate because I've gotten to the point where not
only take each show individually, I take each song. Some cases,
each section of the song. Time slows down, and we've
all had the experience, whether it's hitting a baseball, hitting
that sweet spot. And when I was in my early
(16:52):
days of my career, I lot I read a lot
of sports training books that addressed the sort of zen
of whatever you're doing. It was a great book called
The Zen of Motorcycle Maintenance, and obviously the the the
the intent was to to get you to to to
(17:12):
focus on making time almost stand still. Another book that
I found help was called The Inner Game of Tennis.
And when I was in my twenties, I was searching
for that sense of relaxation in a very highly charged
very very quick, and a situation where the stakes were high.
(17:37):
You know, people are paying a lot of money, good money,
to not just get admission to an event, but to
get the best out of that event. So it's incumbent
upon the participants in that event on the on the
active playing field, whether it's a stage, a diamond of
(17:59):
football grid, to give the customer more than their money's worth.
And that's something I learned from Bruce Springsteen. And you
don't leave it on the stage or the field every
single second. And uh, these are life lessons that you know.
(18:20):
I consider myself so fortunate because I've been able to
do something I started when I was five years old
and have continued for the next sixty seven years and
dig into it and get better. One of the things
I had to learn, In fact, I went to a
baseball coach, Joe, and I don't know if we've ever
about this, but in my early career with the street band,
(18:45):
I used to grip the sticks very tightly, afraid of
dropping them. And I spoke to a lot of people
about it. And I was a young drummer. Actually what
I was an experienced drummer, but I was experienced enough
to get in the street band. The question was could
I become good enough to stay in the street band.
(19:06):
This was in the seventies, and Uh, I had to
relearn a lot of my techniques. You I could liken
it to being in a batting slump. So I went
out and I got a drum coach, a drum teacher,
a coach of guru. And one of the problems was
the inner anxiety I was feeling of of the pressure
(19:30):
was translating down my arms into my hands and fingers
and grabbing the sticks really hard. So this teacher was
an amateur baseball player, and he and he and he
made the analogy. You know, when you when you're when
you're hitting a ball, when you're holding a golf club,
(19:52):
a racket, anything where you're transmitting the force. Uh. The idea,
and he was a very experienced, world renowned drummer. The
idea is the only time you're actually gripping lightly the drumstick,
the bat after all ideal in the same wood that
(20:15):
baseball players do. The only time you're really gripping lightly
was when you're addressing the drum or the ball. So
let's let's work on adjusting your grip, which is exactly
what we did. And at the age of I guess
I was about twenty nine, I had to completely relearn
(20:35):
how to hold the sticks, how to address the drum
from maximum speed and power without a lot of history onics,
and I would suppose uh not. You know, I remember
trying out for Little League I think four years in
a row and not making it, and finally my parents
(20:56):
went and said, give the kid a break, and you know,
put them on a team. I kept trying. Yeah, you know,
I always said I never got my letter in sports,
but I do have quite a few platinum and gold records,
so uh, you know, I sort of uh did the
sports thing in my own way. But in studying with
(21:18):
this teacher um and he had a friend who was
a base a college baseball coach, and we went to
him and he he said, well, here are the different
ways you can hold and swing a bat, and if
you're grit, if you have a life a death grip
on that, Matt, there's no way you're ever going to
be able to hit the balls far and as accurately
(21:38):
as you want. It made the analogy to the drumstick.
And there's a method that I was taught that was
developed in the nineteen twenties by a drummer, drum teacher,
drum instructor who was with the New York of uh
Symphony Orchestra, that Philharmonic, and he developed this technique and
I embraced it. It wasn't easy to learn, but ever
(22:00):
since the age of about thirty thirty one, I've been
able to incorporated into my drumming, which made me more accurate,
which made me more dynamic, and which enabled me to
have the longevity that I currently enjoy. A fascinating stuff, Max,
and it reminds me of Joe Torre saying at the plate,
be intense but without being tense. And you use the
(22:23):
phrase there that I want to explore it a minute here,
benevolent dictatorship. I love that phrase in the framework of
team chemistry. I want to explore that a little bit more.
Right after we take a quick break, be right back
with the mighty Max Weinberg. Welcome back to the Book
(22:47):
of Joe podcast. We're speaking with Max Weinberg. And Max
I brought up the idea of team chemistry, and obviously
in the Eastreet Band, it's the epitome of what a
baseball team would look for. It's held together all these years.
I want to go back to the origin story for you.
I heard a story about you interviewing for the drummer
position with the band. Um. Back in those days, guys
(23:09):
used to like to say they were from New York
City in the music business. It just sounded like it
had more cash. And you dropped a jersey on Bruce
kind of opened the door. I'm wondering about meeting Bruce
and and and being interviewed for that position, and when
you knew that chemistry was taking root, well, of course,
uh you the chemistry it was really quite amazing. Literally
(23:35):
happened within the first twenty seconds of of playing. And
that happened within the first three minutes of meeting Bruce.
And the East Free Band members who were there, which
were Clarence Clemens and Dan Federici are are late and
and and deeply loved associates and friends, and Gary Tallant
are bass player, um who's still with us. And there
(24:00):
were a couple of things I noticed, Um, the leadership,
it wasn't articulated. Of course, it was Bruce Springsteen and
the Easterly Band, So obviously there's Bruce standing in front
of me. But What was what was really amazing to
me at the age of twenty three when I auditioned
(24:20):
was not just the power of conviction and intensity and
energy coming from Bruce, but the way that the other
three guys who were there were so focused on where
that energy and direction was coming from. And it wasn't
a real obvious direction. You had to feel it. And
(24:42):
I had never experienced that kind of um concentration on
the point man and bands, you know, you'll always hear uh,
you know, the bass player locking in with the drummer, etcetera. Uh,
the Easter band isn't organized like that. We're like a
(25:02):
flying wedge if you can imagine trees in the forest
that are sort of spread out organically and it thought,
and then there are bands that are organized like that.
Ours is a flying wedge with Bruce is the point
and our musical agenda, and it went beyond musical agenda,
particularly in the early days, where you know, we are
(25:23):
where we're building the thing, and you never knew, you know,
really when when it could end, and not for anything
that we were doing, but just the forces of the
music business in the seventies and eighties, particularly in the seventies,
you sort of you you you, you kept we all
kept pushing in the same direction. And when you do
(25:44):
that and you, uh, you subsume your own personal ego,
which I must say, that's one of our strengths is that, um,
when we're we're on stage and even off stage, you
you subsume your your ego, your own personal agenda for
(26:07):
the good of the group. And that involves a lot
of different things as it does on sports teams. On stage, um,
you know you you, we do a lot of Bruce
does a lot of audibles. He'll change on any given
night to fifteen songs. In fact, if you ever looked
(26:28):
at the collection of set lists that Bruce's assistant, his
technical assistant, Kevin Bull, keeps, the original set list is
just you know, list of thirty songs. What he has
kept all of these The actually what we played looks
like a tellustrator. You've got arrows and lines and where
(26:52):
things were moved around. So you never know what's going
to happen. You cannot let your guard down for a
minute because that train will leave without you. I learned
that very early on. And when you make that kind
of mistake where you maybe your concentration lapses or your
(27:12):
you're you're you know, focused on what you do. Focusing.
Actually it's not easy, but it when you focus, it
actually makes the job easier. Um. It takes that time
element out of it. You don't get distracted. And of
course when you're in the heat of of of a
fast paced rock show, it's one thing, um, But to
(27:36):
maintain your concentration, UH is absolutely the most important thing
and one of the hardest things to learn. UM. You know,
we've been fortunate in the Street band that we've had
fifth almost fifty years together to develop these protocols and
modalities of working. Most bands don't last that long. That's
(28:00):
why I say democratic bands don't work. Been volent dictatorships ah,
and they work, and sometimes the accent is on benevolent,
sometimes the act is on dictatorship. But you have to
have that vision and then you have to have your
(28:20):
so to speak, soldiers advancing your vision and UM, a
lot of trust, a lot of faith and uh, and
then you go out and you lay it all out there. Max,
let me ask you a question. Ask you a question, um,
in order to I mean, you're talking about a high
level of flexibility regarding what you guys do the fact
(28:41):
that calling audibles. I love that. Um, you know you
see that in football, but obviously even in a baseball situation,
you're always calling audibles within the dug out. A lot
of the decisions nobody will ever no decision that's really
been made within the dug out. Subtleties kind of a
subtle movements, uh, eye contact when you look at the
shortstop David Eckstein during the World Series in two thousand
(29:02):
and too. Subtlety subtleties. But got to really know your
stuff among the group. Everybody's got to be on the
same page, like you're suggesting, um, and and it's paramount
to be able to remain flexible and nimble and and
to be able to accept an audible when it's called.
And just curiously, I know what it takes on a
baseball level in spring trainings and during the season regarding work,
(29:25):
I'm just curious, I mean, because it's what you do
as a drummer. Man. It's like I can't even imagine
with your arms in your hands and fingers feel like
but the practice involvement with that before we let you
go on to tour, how much how much you guys
actually have to get together in practice and then even
on a daily basis, What does it take before a concert?
Is it? Is it more conversational, is it physical? How
(29:45):
do you guys get to this level? Well, that's a
great question, Joe, and it's very very similar as sports.
Um the most important thing, particularly as you age, is
to not stop doing it. And you know all of
your engagements are not in stadiums or arenas. I keep
myself going by having three or four different style of
(30:08):
music bands that I play with. It could be a
five piece be bop quintet. I also have a twenty
three piece society orchestra where I lead it and they
call me Ricky Ricardo because I'm up in front. I
also have, and I think you've seen my my jukebox
band where we play audience requests. So that's the most
(30:29):
warm thing is don't stop doing what you're doing. It's
it's very very difficult to get it back. Along with
that is um uh, you know the scale. I don't
play any different in a small rock club with my
jukebox as I do in well, to use that obvious
(30:52):
example Wrigley Field, exactly the same. The other thing is
to rehearse the way you're gonna play, no holding back
that I learned from Bruce. Our rehearsals are as intense
and as focused as our show because there's only one
way to do it. And maybe it sounds like a cliche,
(31:14):
there's only one way to do it. You do it
as if you're two things, as if your life dependent
on it. Certainly your livelihood depends on it, And you
do it as if it's the last show or game
you're gonna play. And I'll tell you what, when you
embrace that mental philosophy, it makes it easier. Not that
it's easy. You know, the way I played drums is
(31:36):
pretty simple, but it's not easy, and it's taken me
a lifetime to learn how to refine it. And um,
I would imagine that a sports career has to be
uh condensed into less years generally speaking. Um, So you've
got to learn those lessons earlier. And when you're in
your twenties or early thirties, it's you know, they say
(32:00):
your brain is still growing in your twenties. Um In, Mike, So,
I'm not so sure it was. You know, I had
a lot of learning to do. I was a talented
amateur that suddenly got thrust into a very high profile,
uh pressurized situation, and fortunately I did rise to the occasion.
(32:22):
But um, you know, you don't stop. I mean, I
have a friend I'm glappy to say, Doc Severnson, who
when I got the Tonight Show as a band leader,
the best moment of my ton Night Show career was
seeing my name in the same sentence as Doc Severanson,
who was of course a long time Johnny Carson Tonight
Show band leader, and Doc who's now in his mid nineties,
(32:46):
still plays every single day. I spoke to him. He
called me on my birth my last birthday, which was
last April, and we talked about that he said, he said, kid,
every day I still try to hit that high note.
And it's that sort of a metaphor for life, I think,
And you do. You try to hit the high note
(33:08):
every time. You owe it to yourself, you owe it
to the people who are coming to see you do
what you do. And uh, you know, it takes a
little while to embrace that. I guess it did in
my case. And but fortunately I've had the platform, both
television and particularly with Bruce and the Eastreet Band, to
(33:28):
be able to develop You're just here you're hitting a
bunch of different chapters in her book. You're talking about
naming high, doing simple, better, embracing the target. You're talking
about all the different things that we cover in the
book of Joe. I love all that stuff. To hear that,
Doc Sefferson, I was a big ben as a kid grown.
I actually had a couple of albums by Doc Sefferson
back in the day. But all everything you're talking about
(33:51):
so closely relates to what we do and how we
do it. And that was the whole point to try
to get somebody of your statue on her outside of
the baseball industry, to relate to the baseball industry and
just try to validate what we do here compared to
what you do there. Uh. And again, the practice component
of this thing and how you go over your stuff constantly,
(34:11):
the adjustments you have to make. Again, you could you
could be talking about you could be in our clubhouse
during the spring training meeting and talking about the exactly
the same ideas and thoughts. I think it's outstanding and
it's great to hear that, And Joe I got just
a piggyback on that. I loved hearing Max talk about
setting the tone of the day. Have you heard the
one about? And it brought me back to you with
(34:33):
the Tampa Bay Rays starting in spring training with the
joke of the day, right, gathering the guys together and
just lightening the move. Yeah, I have a I have
a guy by name of Tim Bust that we utilize.
I was with the Angels and with the Cubs Bussies
like he's he's another glue guy. This is a glue
guy that nobody knows or um probably most have never
heard about. But this guy, to me, if I get
(34:53):
another job as a manager, someday, he'd be one of
my first hires. I would. This is this is something
that's unique, has a skill skill set is unique in
regards to bringing people to together. Uh, just everything you've
just been talking about Max, And that's what he does.
He brings people together. I does it with comedy. Um,
he does it with the emotion and empathy. I mean,
(35:14):
everybody's just wants to be around Bussy And again that's
such a big part of it. And with the Rays,
the joke of the day, the word of the day
in spring trainings, all that anything small. I was always
trying to educate, make guys think make them try to
reach another level internally mentally, and and when you have
(35:34):
a glue guy to be able to spearhead that it
really actually it makes your job somewhat easier. Well, that's
the key is that you know you're there, whatever position
you're playing, at the end of the day, you're there
to inspire the people with whom you're doing it. And um,
(35:56):
it's not always necessarily the the you know, the stars
or the guys up front. It's to be the you know,
the guy that the fans don't even know that much.
But you need that kind of thing because you know,
it's a stressful when you're at that level of you
(36:17):
know I called stadiums. If you're playing in a baseball stadium,
a football stadium, a soccer stadium, a rock and roll arena, stadium,
it's you're at you're at the top of your game.
I see it in my son, who's the same thing.
You know, who spent ten years playing goalie in hockey,
very very talented goalie who embraced the sport and his
(36:41):
thing was as a kid, one of his motivations was
he loved being the last line of defense and that
that he was able to withstand the pressure. So when
he made the transition. When he was a he was
recruited by a high school and he was a great
hockey player. My son and lived it absolutely lived at
(37:05):
my Son Jay. When he was fifteen, he decided he
wanted to become a musician, and he was recruited by
a local high school as a goalie, and he told
the team in his second year that he was going
to leave the world of hockey for the world of music.
And he taught himself how to play the drums. I
had nothing to do with it other than once he
(37:25):
got into it, telling him not to grip the sticks
tightly and make the same kind of mistakes with tendonitis
and uh carpal trum tunnel syndrome that I had. I mean,
I've had so many performance related surgeries. I've lost count
whether it's my back, I had my shoulder rebuilt, you know,
Uh it's uh. I've got the scars to prove the
(37:47):
sixty years I've been playing. But he became an elite drummer.
He's considered now the my Son Jay with his band
slipknot Um, the band that he's in, Slip not He's
considered the top of his field, and I see the
work that went into it constant, you know, coming home
from school in the afternoon, doing his homework and then
(38:08):
playing until ten o'clock at night by himself, teaching himself
how to play the drums, by playing to records very
organically because he loved it. So anything we start, whether
it's baseball, football's any sport, music, the things that turn
us on as a kid, you know, when you're in
(38:28):
Little league, you know, if you're in pop Warner, that feeling.
If you can maintain that as you age in this endeavor,
you can't go wrong because no matter what else goes
on during the day with me, even when I'm playing
a Bruce in the EA Street Band show and it's
(38:49):
serious business up there. We take our fund very very seriously. Yeah,
you hit on another one of our great things, which
is Joe likes to say, see it with first time eyes,
no matter how long you've been doing it, right, that
joy that you only get when you first really discover something.
If you're able to maintain that, and it sounds like
(39:11):
all these years you have Max, it's a gift. Well,
it's when you sit on the drum. Whatever else went
out during the day when you sit on the drum,
when I sit on the drums, A, it's a privilege. B.
I'm thankful every day that at my advanced stage, I'm
able to rock and get people up out of their seats.
That's important for me to lay down that beat. I'm
(39:33):
not the most uh, you know, flashy drummer, but I'm
meeting potatoes and at the end of the day, that's
what worked for me. But when I'm sitting at the drums,
I'm fourteen years old again, and I'm playing at the
eighth grade dance. And it could be you know, a stadium,
it could be Madison Square Garden, it could be any place.
(39:53):
I'm fourteen years old. There's a saying that musicians get
paid for the twenty two hours a day that they're
not on stage, and they do the show for free.
That is awesome. I love that. I do love I
love that. I wanted to bring this back a little
bit to the intersection of baseball and rock and roll. Um.
I think you made it clear you did not win
(40:15):
a varsity letter in baseball, but it seems like there's
a connection with the band in the sport. I think about,
of course, Glory Days lyrics in the video going back then.
I'm pretty sure Bruce was at the World Series in
Philadelphia this year. He was so is that it's baseball
part of his slash bands fabric. Well, Bruce is one
of the most devoted baseball fans I've ever met. And uh,
(40:40):
it's his by far, his favorite sport. He's very involved
in it. He was a very very good baseball player
in nine seventies seven when he was going through his
tumultuous legal wrangling and we were only able to play
sort of third level markets. We had a lot of
time off. So he and Steve van Zand started a
(41:02):
baseball team and they all did the East Street Kings
and we got satin jackets, we had uniforms, and we
played other bands on days off. And Bruce was a shortstop,
had a fantastic arm, still does, I'm sure, but and
he was a great batter. Um. He still loves baseball.
(41:24):
One of his I can tell you, and I don't
think he'd mind me saying. One of his prize possessions
is a uh personalized autograph from Mickey Mantle. And you know,
growing up in New Jersey, Uh, you know, the Yankees
legend loomed large in our background. And uh my father
was also a great baseball fan. Was an All State
(41:45):
pitcher in the thirties for Central High School in Philadelphia.
He went on to play for the University of Pennsylvania.
One of my prize possessions is a picture of him
as an eighteen year old pitching, and he was a
hell of a pitcher. Um, you know, apparently, um. I
can tell you one short story about I once asked
(42:07):
my father when I was a kid, Gee, Dad, I
remember seeing the Luke Garret Story the movie and I said, Jeverosy,
Luke Garret or Bruth play And he said to me, son,
Luke Garrett, babe Ruth. I saw Ty Cobb. He was
of that you know generation when he was a kid.
(42:27):
So that was pretty impressive. Is there anywhere of those?
Is there any more of those satin jackets left around?
I left that one of those satin jackets. I mean,
there's any lying around and whatever it costs, man, I
would love to to wear that around. That would be
my I say everything mine is on tour with the
Grammy Museum. My you know, had Mighty Max on the
(42:48):
breast front and the E Street kings on the back.
But you know, we used to practice. One thing I
noticed about Bruce is playing baseball as a shortstop, was
when when he caught a ground there, for example, before
he threw it to first base, give you an example,
(43:09):
there was a moment and this is a perfect metaphor
for what he does on stage. It's always thinking ahead.
There was a perfect just a split second pause before
he released the ball and then he had a rocket
of a throw and uh, this was before he balked
up and was working out and but but he didn't
(43:32):
catch the ball and then throw it. There was always
this set up where he got his arm into position
and it was only a millisecond, but he was so
accurate that, uh, you know something I noticed, and um,
I've got a great picture of him, you know, hitting
a home run to still that I took at the
(43:53):
moment of impact. But we were very serious about it.
And you know, he tells stories about his his his
coming up in little league and uh, you know, he's
had lots of friends who were in sports, particularly baseball.
And I was, you know, I remember doing I was
doing one of my one man show performances near where
(44:15):
we lived at the time. In Jersey invited him down.
He was gonna come. Turned out its been Game five
of this particular year's World Series and just couldn't drag
himself away from the TV to to not watch the
World Series. So you know, baseball has loomed, you know,
like the song Glory Days. And he took pitching lessons. Uh,
so he would do it. He wasn't a picture. He
(44:37):
took it, so he would do it somewhat corrected, corrected
correctly in that in that video. Beautiful. Yeah, that's great stuff. Max.
We can't thank you enough for this. This has been
such a thrill for us to listen to your stories
and especially your insight because, as Joe mentioned, I think
a lot of the themes you hit on here in
(44:57):
terms of leadership, connectivity with other human beings, joyfulness, and
what you do, it's a part of our book, the
Book of Joe. So I can't thank you enough. Your
time is I'm sure precious, and again congratulations on induction
and Shrineman into the New Jersey Hall of Fame. Well,
thank you guys. Listen. Uh, it's always a pleasure to
(45:19):
talk to Joe and time yourself. What can I say?
I mean, I love talking about these issues because if
there's a way that I can in part any knowledge
to a younger performer. And I use that in the
broadest sense of an athlete, because I I love watching
(45:40):
athletes and when you watch, you know the people who,
in my view performed like their musicians. So it's a
wondrous thing if I can impart any uh, sort of
tips that make it It's never gonna be easy, but
it can enable you to perhaps avoid some of the pitfalls.
You know, the greatest lessons I've ever learned have been
(46:02):
from the absolute loot worst mistakes I've ever made, and
on the drums and in and in life. Um, and
you know, you hope to pass that knowledge along. And
I do meet younger people, particularly musicians, who you know,
any any tips you know, Uh, it's basically keep your
(46:24):
head down, look sharp, act sharp, and keep your ears open,
because that will give you the sort of tips to
enable you to you know, the distance between and I'm
sure it's like this in sports, particularly at the professional level,
the distance between success and not being successful. And I
don't mean failure, um, you know, striking out for example,
(46:49):
is it can't even be quantified. You know, I have
a friend of mine who became a very well known
professional football player, and he once told me years ago,
it had to be thirty years ago. The the the
differ prints between high elite you know, Big ten college
football and the speed of professional football. That was the
(47:13):
biggest adjustment. And it was similar to that, and I
related to that because it was sort of the same
thing that went on with Bruce Knee Street band. Uh.
You know, in some cases you're just you're just reacting,
and it's everything you did for however many years, and
experience in games, innings, at bats, it's everything you bring
(47:35):
to that moment. And if you're lucky enough to have
any longevity in a career and not flame out, whether
it's music or sports or any other endeavor, you're gonna
learn from everything you did and you're gonna bring it
to that at bat. You're gonna bring it to kicking. Uh,
you know, the after I always look at these after points, situations,
(47:56):
after goal, you know, the point after situations, and the
immense pressure that's on these guys, and it's what they do.
You know, I've had I have a friend who's, uh,
one of the retired is one of the most senior
NASA astronauts on the Space Shuttle, and he also plays drums,
and we always talk about the similarities and the differences,
(48:19):
and um, you know, and there are significant differences. But
his big question to me is how can you How
can you go in front of fifty people and play
the drums? And I said, well, I have two people
to please, the guy in front of me and then me,
(48:42):
And I said, how can you sit on top of
seven and a half million pounds of explosive and your
heart rate doesn't move a bit? He goes, well, that
I can do, but I could never play the drums
in front of a thousand people. So, you know, different
strokes for different folks. I guess it is you're speaking
(49:04):
to our language. Man. That's right on the money. I
really appreciate hearing all of that. Oh Joe, It's always
a pleasure to talk to you, to see you. I
hope to see you on our upcoming uh Bruce and
Eastreet band tour. We're gonna be everywhere. We're gonna have
a blasts, gonna be a rock show. And I'll tell
you what I know. He and I speaking for myself,
I can't wait we start rehearsals in three weeks. And
(49:28):
you know, with the Eastreet Band, it's like slipping into
a well worn baseball glove. We've been doing this for
almost fifty years. So when the first count off of one, two, three,
four happens, it's right there, beautiful brothers, well done man,
Thank you Max. That's that's like I said, that's that's
(49:48):
really dovetails it. It validates so much that we've been
talking about. You just said in this last segment here
really reflects a lot of my own personal baseball philosophies.
So again, for the for our podcast, recomminated the Book
of Joe. I think the folks that are listening to
this will really Gardner gathered the the relationship between what
you do as a professional musician and what we do
(50:11):
as professional athletes or baseball players. Thank you well, my pleasure, Joe, Tom,
thank you very much for having me on. Well, Joe,
that was fascinating. I could listen to Max Weinberg all
day and all night when he's not behind a drum set.
That's how good that was. Yeah, And again, just from
our perspective here, we wanted to glue guys and on
(50:32):
these shows and here is a glue guy. And the
really interesting kind of neat part about the whole thing
is the validation what he talked about. He covered so
many topics in the Book of Joe Uh there towards
the end of different chapters, aiming high do simple better.
He said it in other words, and he talked about
embracing the target in other words. But nevertheless it was
all there and of course just a brilliant way of
(50:53):
putty things together. He's very he's very good with words.
He's very good about his explanations, and his descriptions are outstanding.
So I promised the folks, Uh, that was really a
unique experience for me, and again being that that I'm
tied so far back musically and how I grew up
and what it means to listen to the music that
him and a group have created, it's pretty special. Yeah,
(51:14):
special for me too. Again, I grew up with the
soundtrack of my youth being the band, the Easter Eat Band,
and actually went to high school just a few miles
away from where Max went to high school. So a
lot of connections and I can't wait for the upcoming tour,
same with me, brother. Could I could conclude with one
thought right here, Please do because I think it kind
(51:35):
of like dovetails into this whole thing, and that's Jack
Wilson is a guy that I really dig a lot
of different closities had but and it kind of again
devetails into what Max we just talked about. Control your
own destiny or someone else will take charge. Love it,
peace out, Thank you brother. The Book of Joe podcast
(51:59):
is a production of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts
for my heart Radio at the i heart Radio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
The Book of Joe Podcast is a production of My
Heart Radio. Welcome back to the latest episode of the
Book of Joe Podcast. Of course, it is based on
our book, The Book of Joe. This is Tom Verducci
joined by Joe Madden. Joe, how you doing. I'm doing well, brother,
(00:25):
Good morning, How you doing? I am doing well. It's
Thanksgiving week and man, we have a special guest today
and it's a special episode. We are going to be
joined by Max Weinberg, of course, longtime drummer with Bruce
Springsteen and the E Street Band, and Joe. I know
you're looking forward to this for many reasons, but especially
(00:46):
because it's not just about the band and drumming. Yeah,
we wanted to really try to highlight blue guys outside
of the baseball industry too. We talked about it the
other day and I thought Max would be the perfect fit.
Beyond it, You're gonna hear all about it very shortly.
But I've been as such as Springsteen and since the seventies,
I think you have also. But anyway, I have to
(01:08):
get an opportunity to speak with Max about the similarities
the relationships that you build within a rock and roll
band and what it feels like in a major league
clubhouse or dug out, the highly charged athletes, these highly
charged musicians, and how they cope with it, and uh,
getting into the glue component of it, how do when
when things go awry, how does how does it come
back together? And how do you interact in regarding the
(01:29):
egos subjectgating of eagles and moving it on to something
more important as a group or as a team. Looking
forward to all that with Max, because again, this has
been been my favorite band since the mid seventies. Ditto
for me as well. And of course if you've read
the book or will read the book and have been
listening to this podcast, you know one of our favorite
intersections is the intersection of baseball, rock and roll and leadership,
(01:54):
and mighty Max Weinberg is right at that intersection. This
is gonna be fascinating, folks. Stuff. I'm not gonna tell
you exactly what's coming up, but you're going to year
about Paul McCartney ringo star and a baseball scouting report
on the baseball skills of Bruce Springsteen. Yeah, you're gonna
stick around for this deep Back in a minute, Welcome
(02:25):
back to the Book of Joe podcast, and we are
thrilled to be joined by our special guest today, Mighty
Max Weinberg. Of course you know him as the drummer
in the East Street Band, but I know him as
a Jersey guy. So Max, welcome. It's always good to
have a Jersey guy on here. And people talk about
the cradle of civilization between the Tigris and Euphrates. I
think it's between the Hudson and Delaware. So thanks for
(02:48):
coming on. And by the way, congratulations being inducted into
the New Jersey Hall of Fame. That's big time. Well,
thank you, Tom. Good morning, Joe. Tom. Yeah, you know,
it was quite a moving experience to be inducted into
the New Jersey Hall of Fame. As they say, when
(03:10):
you leave Philadelphia or New York City, you know you're
in Jersey because you can see the air you're breathing.
It's an old Jersey joke, it's not quite true anymore.
But when you look at the inductees through the years,
I'm delighted to be in the company of these amazing individuals.
(03:31):
It was quite a moving ceremony. And Joe, our mutual
friend Mark Stein of Chicago, was able to my great
surprise to have Ringo star and then Paul McCartney show
up to say a few nice words, and that was,
you know, quite an unbelievable experience. My son Jay, who's
(03:55):
a very renowned drummer, uh, inducted me, so it was
kind of a family affair. And then to have Paul
McCartney play the drums. He was actually playing the drums,
I believe it was in his home studio in London.
Uh and then stopped and said a few words. If
(04:15):
that was something I would have never in my wildest
imagination dreamed possible. But I was very delighted to be
the recipient of those words. Congratulations on all that, Max.
And but also I thought that Hazelton, Pennsylvania might have
been the cradle of civilization Tom. I didn't realize that
(04:36):
happened between the Hudson and Delaware. But yeah, Max that
congratulations on all of that. It is really um, like
you said, as a kid, growing up, to to arrive
at that particular juncture again, New Jersey Pennsylvania were neighbors.
I kind of understanding, get that that whole process of
growing up and what it's like in almost these surrealistic
moments that occur as you professionally moved down the road.
(04:58):
So we'll congrats on that. I think it's outstanding. We
all do well. Thank you, Joe, Max. One of the
reasons we really were just thrilled to have you on here.
We've been talking about glue guys as it relates to baseball,
talking about guys on a baseball team that really are
kind of the mortar of this spirit, de core of
a team. You know, maybe it's not the best player,
(05:18):
but there's usually somebody and Joe knows this as a manager,
if you're lucky you have more than one the guys
you can bring the whole group together, diverse backgrounds and
be that one guy who can be the bridge to teammates.
And we thought about you when it came to a
glue guy in a band. Why don't you talk about
(05:39):
your role in the band and whether you thought of
yourself as a glue guy. Well, it's an interesting term
because that's exactly what it is, whether you're playing. For example,
I had a good friend in high school. It was
a great catcher, and you know, the catcher drops the ball,
chaos breaks out and hockey if the goalie let's just shot,
(06:04):
go by the same thing in drums in a band,
in a combo, whether it's a large orchestra or even
histor rock band, you are the last line of defense.
And the drummers that I admired and the drummers that
I believe have become successful, embraced that sort of philosophy
(06:25):
that um, you can't let anything get by you if
you you know, if you make a mistake, it can
sound like you're dropping the kitchen sink. Everybody makes mistakes,
but it's how quickly you recover and cover yourself, and
that comes with maturity. I've been playing drums. I'll be
seventy two and a couple of months. I've been playing
drums since I was five years old, so I've made
(06:48):
my mistakes, made many of my mistakes in public, and
to rebound and just keep moving, keep moving. That's the
most important thing. Uh. You also realize that you are
as you say, the glue and it's not just your
position as the drummer. Drummers tend to be the in
(07:10):
a lot of ways, the coalescing factor in bands. For
some reason, I'm not quite sure. I had a drum teacher,
very illustrious drummer named Bernard pretty Pretty who said the
best drummers are helping drummers helping that was the key word.
And I met him when I was nineteen. I studied
(07:31):
with him, and studying with Bernard Purdy, the famous soul,
rhythm and blues drummer was it wasn't so much out
of a book, It was going to sessions. It was
developing the right winning attitude. And I believe my longevity
as a musician has been because I embraced that sort
(07:57):
of approach. Uh. I can play a drum solo and needed,
but drummers never get hired to do a drum solo, unless,
of course, your buddy rich uh. And I'm not and
never purported to be. But you, uh, you want to
be a helping drummer. You want to help your bandmates.
(08:18):
You are as a drummer sort of the Someone once
referred to drummers as the molding that goes below and
above the sheet rock. You know, you smooth over the
rough edges. So we're using in sports and in music
lots of metaphors to kind of describe the indescribable. You
(08:41):
know it when you see it. You know it in
the locker room or the dressing room. I'm always the
guy that come in every day, and you know, the
first thing I say is here's one for you, and
I'll have heard a joke and I'll repeat it. So
it's creating an atmosphere of uh conviviality. UM. And I
(09:06):
take that role seriously because it extends to my drumming.
My job is to make the other guys look good,
and if I do that, then I look good. Awesome.
I just ask us the question regarding all that of
of any kind of alluded to it. There's gonna mistakes
are gonna occur, Like during a performance, things might go awry.
And when things may go awry, of course, there might
(09:28):
be a little bit of a flare up among the group.
For me, my glue guy, the leader in the clubhouse
normally with independent of myself, maybe go reach whomever there
may have been a dispute with among the group. Again,
I'm talking probably about the band members now I'm talking
about the players. Are the coaching staff regarding that when
you when you when you run into a situation like
(09:50):
that where things aren't smooth and and possibly because somebody's
just gone a little bit rogue on you, guys, UM,
is there is that Does that actually happen within a
group like you? Would that be your responsibility or somebody
else within the band to walk up to somebody else
I'm saying, independent of the manager, independent of Bruce, whatever
does that? Does that play as that's a logical within
(10:11):
your group? Well, of course, and it depends on the group.
For example, if you are the titular leader of the band.
For example, when I was on television leading my seven
piece group on the late night programs, the Maximum Brook seven,
so that responsibility would fall to me. Um if you're
(10:34):
working of course, we're working in smaller ensembles, and I
think the hope is that you don't let it get
out of hand. And uh, you know, there's a there's
a once you've been playing for a long time playing music,
(10:54):
whatever happens on stage, it's all, Uh, it's all a
part of the show. And what I mean by that
is if you if you let it collapse. I mean
we've had we've had things on stage with Bruce and
the Eastreet Band where we've literally had to stop and
(11:15):
start again. Not very often. Our percentage of of hits
it's pretty good. And I don't mean hit records but
you know, connecting it's pretty good. But you, uh, it's entertainment.
It's all entertainment, and if you don't obsess about that,
which can uh stop you in your tracks. I mean
(11:40):
at the age of seventy two, and when you've been
doing something as long as we have, not just collectively
but individually. I still play with several other groups of
my own when when I'm not working with Bruce in
the Eastreet Band, you do hope you gain a bit
of wisdom. It's more difficult when you're in your twenties
(12:02):
or early thirties. You haven't had experience, and I would
imagine that particularly if you've been an outstanding athlete in
your school days. Um that the uh, the maturity it
takes two take it all and stride um because everybody
(12:23):
makes mistakes, everybody forgets things, every there's broken plays, there's
strategies that aren't that aren't fulfilled, game plans that perhaps
may not be. You sort of have to shrug it off,
address it. Um. We have a fortunate uh uh say
organizational structure within the eas Street Band. Whereas Bruce has
(12:46):
said many times, and it's absolutely true, it's a benevolent dictatorship,
and that takes a lot of the guesswork out of
it been in democratic bands obviously. The the prime example
of a democratic band would be, say the Beatles, where
you had four distinct individual personalities and desires and abilities
(13:11):
and everyone had to say it takes a lot of
the guesswork out when you don't have any decision making
ability in that context, and you may be a leader
of a band in your own right. One of the
beautiful things about the eas Street Band is that everybody
in the Street Band is a leader in their own
(13:32):
right and does their own thing, and when we come together,
we take that experience in service of advancing Bruce's musical agenda.
And you know, the hardest thing to get in any
band is a great lead singer. The second hardest thing
is to have great songs if you're if you're playing
(13:54):
original music. In the Easteret Band, We're lucky we got
both and it's a phenomenal platform. When I do my
own thing and I'm the leader. As I've grown and
I've gotten more mature, you know, I've recognized that there
are ways to get performances out of your uh players
(14:19):
that don't involve an emotional reaction. You want to be
able to inspire. I believe now at my age, you
want to be able to inspire the best performances. And
having come up in an era where UM, there's always
(14:39):
a lot of chaos and democratic bands, someone's got to
take control and U these leaders naturally emerge or sometimes
they are there by design, as we are in the
Eastreet band and UM. But some say I've mellowed. I
certainly have not mellowed when I'm sitting behind the drums,
(15:02):
because when I'm sitting behind the drums, where where I
go to is I have the technical ability that I've
developed over the last sixty something years, and I have
the emotional stability to be able to handle any situation.
And that just takes longevity. And you know, there's a
(15:26):
reason why those of us who play music, or my
sports friends who who enjoy UH, there's there's there's that
window of opportunity where you're performing at peak experience. It's
playing music, it's playing baseball, it's playing football. So whenever
(15:48):
a few jobs are referred to as playing, you know
it's usually working. And while it is hard, and nobody
UH should diminish the difficulty it is to get into
an elite level at whatever endeavor you're with which you're involved,
(16:09):
it is playing at the end of the day. And
the idea is if you can stay relaxed, if you
can come at it from a hey, I'm enjoying this.
It's tough. This maybe the hundred and twenty game I've
played in a row, or the hundred concert I've done
in a year. You take each one individually, and I say,
(16:31):
I'm fortunate because I've gotten to the point where not
only take each show individually, I take each song. Some cases,
each section of the song. Time slows down, and we've
all had the experience, whether it's hitting a baseball, hitting
that sweet spot. And when I was in my early
(16:52):
days of my career, I lot I read a lot
of sports training books that addressed the sort of zen
of whatever you're doing. It was a great book called
The Zen of Motorcycle Maintenance, and obviously the the the
the intent was to to get you to to to
(17:12):
focus on making time almost stand still. Another book that
I found help was called The Inner Game of Tennis.
And when I was in my twenties, I was searching
for that sense of relaxation in a very highly charged
very very quick, and a situation where the stakes were high.
(17:37):
You know, people are paying a lot of money, good money,
to not just get admission to an event, but to
get the best out of that event. So it's incumbent
upon the participants in that event on the on the
active playing field, whether it's a stage, a diamond of
(17:59):
football grid, to give the customer more than their money's worth.
And that's something I learned from Bruce Springsteen. And you
don't leave it on the stage or the field every
single second. And uh, these are life lessons that you know.
(18:20):
I consider myself so fortunate because I've been able to
do something I started when I was five years old
and have continued for the next sixty seven years and
dig into it and get better. One of the things
I had to learn, In fact, I went to a
baseball coach, Joe, and I don't know if we've ever
about this, but in my early career with the street band,
(18:45):
I used to grip the sticks very tightly, afraid of
dropping them. And I spoke to a lot of people
about it. And I was a young drummer. Actually what
I was an experienced drummer, but I was experienced enough
to get in the street band. The question was could
I become good enough to stay in the street band.
(19:06):
This was in the seventies, and Uh, I had to
relearn a lot of my techniques. You I could liken
it to being in a batting slump. So I went
out and I got a drum coach, a drum teacher,
a coach of guru. And one of the problems was
the inner anxiety I was feeling of of the pressure
(19:30):
was translating down my arms into my hands and fingers
and grabbing the sticks really hard. So this teacher was
an amateur baseball player, and he and he and he
made the analogy. You know, when you when you're when
you're hitting a ball, when you're holding a golf club,
(19:52):
a racket, anything where you're transmitting the force. Uh. The idea,
and he was a very experienced, world renowned drummer. The
idea is the only time you're actually gripping lightly the drumstick,
the bat after all ideal in the same wood that
(20:15):
baseball players do. The only time you're really gripping lightly
was when you're addressing the drum or the ball. So
let's let's work on adjusting your grip, which is exactly
what we did. And at the age of I guess
I was about twenty nine, I had to completely relearn
(20:35):
how to hold the sticks, how to address the drum
from maximum speed and power without a lot of history onics,
and I would suppose uh not. You know, I remember
trying out for Little League I think four years in
a row and not making it, and finally my parents
(20:56):
went and said, give the kid a break, and you know,
put them on a team. I kept trying. Yeah, you know,
I always said I never got my letter in sports,
but I do have quite a few platinum and gold records,
so uh, you know, I sort of uh did the
sports thing in my own way. But in studying with
(21:18):
this teacher um and he had a friend who was
a base a college baseball coach, and we went to
him and he he said, well, here are the different
ways you can hold and swing a bat, and if
you're grit, if you have a life a death grip
on that, Matt, there's no way you're ever going to
be able to hit the balls far and as accurately
(21:38):
as you want. It made the analogy to the drumstick.
And there's a method that I was taught that was
developed in the nineteen twenties by a drummer, drum teacher,
drum instructor who was with the New York of uh
Symphony Orchestra, that Philharmonic, and he developed this technique and
I embraced it. It wasn't easy to learn, but ever
(22:00):
since the age of about thirty thirty one, I've been
able to incorporated into my drumming, which made me more accurate,
which made me more dynamic, and which enabled me to
have the longevity that I currently enjoy. A fascinating stuff, Max,
and it reminds me of Joe Torre saying at the plate,
be intense but without being tense. And you use the
(22:23):
phrase there that I want to explore it a minute here,
benevolent dictatorship. I love that phrase in the framework of
team chemistry. I want to explore that a little bit more.
Right after we take a quick break, be right back
with the mighty Max Weinberg. Welcome back to the Book
(22:47):
of Joe podcast. We're speaking with Max Weinberg. And Max
I brought up the idea of team chemistry, and obviously
in the Eastreet Band, it's the epitome of what a
baseball team would look for. It's held together all these years.
I want to go back to the origin story for you.
I heard a story about you interviewing for the drummer
position with the band. Um. Back in those days, guys
(23:09):
used to like to say they were from New York
City in the music business. It just sounded like it
had more cash. And you dropped a jersey on Bruce
kind of opened the door. I'm wondering about meeting Bruce
and and and being interviewed for that position, and when
you knew that chemistry was taking root, well, of course,
uh you the chemistry it was really quite amazing. Literally
(23:35):
happened within the first twenty seconds of of playing. And
that happened within the first three minutes of meeting Bruce.
And the East Free Band members who were there, which
were Clarence Clemens and Dan Federici are are late and
and and deeply loved associates and friends, and Gary Tallant
are bass player, um who's still with us. And there
(24:00):
were a couple of things I noticed, Um, the leadership,
it wasn't articulated. Of course, it was Bruce Springsteen and
the Easterly Band, So obviously there's Bruce standing in front
of me. But What was what was really amazing to
me at the age of twenty three when I auditioned
(24:20):
was not just the power of conviction and intensity and
energy coming from Bruce, but the way that the other
three guys who were there were so focused on where
that energy and direction was coming from. And it wasn't
a real obvious direction. You had to feel it. And
(24:42):
I had never experienced that kind of um concentration on
the point man and bands, you know, you'll always hear uh,
you know, the bass player locking in with the drummer, etcetera. Uh,
the Easter band isn't organized like that. We're like a
(25:02):
flying wedge if you can imagine trees in the forest
that are sort of spread out organically and it thought,
and then there are bands that are organized like that.
Ours is a flying wedge with Bruce is the point
and our musical agenda, and it went beyond musical agenda,
particularly in the early days, where you know, we are
(25:23):
where we're building the thing, and you never knew, you know,
really when when it could end, and not for anything
that we were doing, but just the forces of the
music business in the seventies and eighties, particularly in the seventies,
you sort of you you you, you kept we all
kept pushing in the same direction. And when you do
(25:44):
that and you, uh, you subsume your own personal ego,
which I must say, that's one of our strengths is that, um,
when we're we're on stage and even off stage, you
you subsume your your ego, your own personal agenda for
(26:07):
the good of the group. And that involves a lot
of different things as it does on sports teams. On stage, um,
you know you you, we do a lot of Bruce
does a lot of audibles. He'll change on any given
night to fifteen songs. In fact, if you ever looked
(26:28):
at the collection of set lists that Bruce's assistant, his
technical assistant, Kevin Bull, keeps, the original set list is
just you know, list of thirty songs. What he has
kept all of these The actually what we played looks
like a tellustrator. You've got arrows and lines and where
(26:52):
things were moved around. So you never know what's going
to happen. You cannot let your guard down for a
minute because that train will leave without you. I learned
that very early on. And when you make that kind
of mistake where you maybe your concentration lapses or your
(27:12):
you're you're you know, focused on what you do. Focusing.
Actually it's not easy, but it when you focus, it
actually makes the job easier. Um. It takes that time
element out of it. You don't get distracted. And of
course when you're in the heat of of of a
fast paced rock show, it's one thing, um, But to
(27:36):
maintain your concentration, UH is absolutely the most important thing
and one of the hardest things to learn. UM. You know,
we've been fortunate in the Street band that we've had
fifth almost fifty years together to develop these protocols and
modalities of working. Most bands don't last that long. That's
(28:00):
why I say democratic bands don't work. Been volent dictatorships ah,
and they work, and sometimes the accent is on benevolent,
sometimes the act is on dictatorship. But you have to
have that vision and then you have to have your
(28:20):
so to speak, soldiers advancing your vision and UM, a
lot of trust, a lot of faith and uh, and
then you go out and you lay it all out there. Max,
let me ask you a question. Ask you a question, um,
in order to I mean, you're talking about a high
level of flexibility regarding what you guys do the fact
(28:41):
that calling audibles. I love that. Um, you know you
see that in football, but obviously even in a baseball situation,
you're always calling audibles within the dug out. A lot
of the decisions nobody will ever no decision that's really
been made within the dug out. Subtleties kind of a
subtle movements, uh, eye contact when you look at the
shortstop David Eckstein during the World Series in two thousand
(29:02):
and too. Subtlety subtleties. But got to really know your
stuff among the group. Everybody's got to be on the
same page, like you're suggesting, um, and and it's paramount
to be able to remain flexible and nimble and and
to be able to accept an audible when it's called.
And just curiously, I know what it takes on a
baseball level in spring trainings and during the season regarding work,
(29:25):
I'm just curious, I mean, because it's what you do
as a drummer. Man. It's like I can't even imagine
with your arms in your hands and fingers feel like
but the practice involvement with that before we let you
go on to tour, how much how much you guys
actually have to get together in practice and then even
on a daily basis, What does it take before a concert?
Is it? Is it more conversational, is it physical? How
(29:45):
do you guys get to this level? Well, that's a
great question, Joe, and it's very very similar as sports.
Um the most important thing, particularly as you age, is
to not stop doing it. And you know all of
your engagements are not in stadiums or arenas. I keep
myself going by having three or four different style of
(30:08):
music bands that I play with. It could be a
five piece be bop quintet. I also have a twenty
three piece society orchestra where I lead it and they
call me Ricky Ricardo because I'm up in front. I
also have, and I think you've seen my my jukebox
band where we play audience requests. So that's the most
(30:29):
warm thing is don't stop doing what you're doing. It's
it's very very difficult to get it back. Along with
that is um uh, you know the scale. I don't
play any different in a small rock club with my
jukebox as I do in well, to use that obvious
(30:52):
example Wrigley Field, exactly the same. The other thing is
to rehearse the way you're gonna play, no holding back
that I learned from Bruce. Our rehearsals are as intense
and as focused as our show because there's only one
way to do it. And maybe it sounds like a cliche,
(31:14):
there's only one way to do it. You do it
as if you're two things, as if your life dependent
on it. Certainly your livelihood depends on it, And you
do it as if it's the last show or game
you're gonna play. And I'll tell you what, when you
embrace that mental philosophy, it makes it easier. Not that
it's easy. You know, the way I played drums is
(31:36):
pretty simple, but it's not easy, and it's taken me
a lifetime to learn how to refine it. And um,
I would imagine that a sports career has to be
uh condensed into less years generally speaking. Um, So you've
got to learn those lessons earlier. And when you're in
your twenties or early thirties, it's you know, they say
(32:00):
your brain is still growing in your twenties. Um In, Mike, So,
I'm not so sure it was. You know, I had
a lot of learning to do. I was a talented
amateur that suddenly got thrust into a very high profile,
uh pressurized situation, and fortunately I did rise to the occasion.
(32:22):
But um, you know, you don't stop. I mean, I
have a friend I'm glappy to say, Doc Severnson, who
when I got the Tonight Show as a band leader,
the best moment of my ton Night Show career was
seeing my name in the same sentence as Doc Severanson,
who was of course a long time Johnny Carson Tonight
Show band leader, and Doc who's now in his mid nineties,
(32:46):
still plays every single day. I spoke to him. He
called me on my birth my last birthday, which was
last April, and we talked about that he said, he said, kid,
every day I still try to hit that high note.
And it's that sort of a metaphor for life, I think,
And you do. You try to hit the high note
(33:08):
every time. You owe it to yourself, you owe it
to the people who are coming to see you do
what you do. And uh, you know, it takes a
little while to embrace that. I guess it did in
my case. And but fortunately I've had the platform, both
television and particularly with Bruce and the Eastreet Band, to
(33:28):
be able to develop You're just here you're hitting a
bunch of different chapters in her book. You're talking about
naming high, doing simple, better, embracing the target. You're talking
about all the different things that we cover in the
book of Joe. I love all that stuff. To hear that,
Doc Sefferson, I was a big ben as a kid grown.
I actually had a couple of albums by Doc Sefferson
back in the day. But all everything you're talking about
(33:51):
so closely relates to what we do and how we
do it. And that was the whole point to try
to get somebody of your statue on her outside of
the baseball industry, to relate to the baseball industry and
just try to validate what we do here compared to
what you do there. Uh. And again, the practice component
of this thing and how you go over your stuff constantly,
(34:11):
the adjustments you have to make. Again, you could you
could be talking about you could be in our clubhouse
during the spring training meeting and talking about the exactly
the same ideas and thoughts. I think it's outstanding and
it's great to hear that, And Joe I got just
a piggyback on that. I loved hearing Max talk about
setting the tone of the day. Have you heard the
one about? And it brought me back to you with
(34:33):
the Tampa Bay Rays starting in spring training with the
joke of the day, right, gathering the guys together and
just lightening the move. Yeah, I have a I have
a guy by name of Tim Bust that we utilize.
I was with the Angels and with the Cubs Bussies
like he's he's another glue guy. This is a glue
guy that nobody knows or um probably most have never
heard about. But this guy, to me, if I get
(34:53):
another job as a manager, someday, he'd be one of
my first hires. I would. This is this is something
that's unique, has a skill skill set is unique in
regards to bringing people to together. Uh, just everything you've
just been talking about Max, And that's what he does.
He brings people together. I does it with comedy. Um,
he does it with the emotion and empathy. I mean,
(35:14):
everybody's just wants to be around Bussy And again that's
such a big part of it. And with the Rays,
the joke of the day, the word of the day
in spring trainings, all that anything small. I was always
trying to educate, make guys think make them try to
reach another level internally mentally, and and when you have
(35:34):
a glue guy to be able to spearhead that it
really actually it makes your job somewhat easier. Well, that's
the key is that you know you're there, whatever position
you're playing, at the end of the day, you're there
to inspire the people with whom you're doing it. And um,
(35:56):
it's not always necessarily the the you know, the stars
or the guys up front. It's to be the you know,
the guy that the fans don't even know that much.
But you need that kind of thing because you know,
it's a stressful when you're at that level of you
(36:17):
know I called stadiums. If you're playing in a baseball stadium,
a football stadium, a soccer stadium, a rock and roll arena, stadium,
it's you're at you're at the top of your game.
I see it in my son, who's the same thing.
You know, who spent ten years playing goalie in hockey,
very very talented goalie who embraced the sport and his
(36:41):
thing was as a kid, one of his motivations was
he loved being the last line of defense and that
that he was able to withstand the pressure. So when
he made the transition. When he was a he was
recruited by a high school and he was a great
hockey player. My son and lived it absolutely lived at
(37:05):
my Son Jay. When he was fifteen, he decided he
wanted to become a musician, and he was recruited by
a local high school as a goalie, and he told
the team in his second year that he was going
to leave the world of hockey for the world of music.
And he taught himself how to play the drums. I
had nothing to do with it other than once he
(37:25):
got into it, telling him not to grip the sticks
tightly and make the same kind of mistakes with tendonitis
and uh carpal trum tunnel syndrome that I had. I mean,
I've had so many performance related surgeries. I've lost count
whether it's my back, I had my shoulder rebuilt, you know,
Uh it's uh. I've got the scars to prove the
(37:47):
sixty years I've been playing. But he became an elite drummer.
He's considered now the my Son Jay with his band
slipknot Um, the band that he's in, Slip not He's
considered the top of his field, and I see the
work that went into it constant, you know, coming home
from school in the afternoon, doing his homework and then
(38:08):
playing until ten o'clock at night by himself, teaching himself
how to play the drums, by playing to records very
organically because he loved it. So anything we start, whether
it's baseball, football's any sport, music, the things that turn
us on as a kid, you know, when you're in
(38:28):
Little league, you know, if you're in pop Warner, that feeling.
If you can maintain that as you age in this endeavor,
you can't go wrong because no matter what else goes
on during the day with me, even when I'm playing
a Bruce in the EA Street Band show and it's
(38:49):
serious business up there. We take our fund very very seriously. Yeah,
you hit on another one of our great things, which
is Joe likes to say, see it with first time eyes,
no matter how long you've been doing it, right, that
joy that you only get when you first really discover something.
If you're able to maintain that, and it sounds like
(39:11):
all these years you have Max, it's a gift. Well,
it's when you sit on the drum. Whatever else went
out during the day when you sit on the drum,
when I sit on the drums, A, it's a privilege. B.
I'm thankful every day that at my advanced stage, I'm
able to rock and get people up out of their seats.
That's important for me to lay down that beat. I'm
(39:33):
not the most uh, you know, flashy drummer, but I'm
meeting potatoes and at the end of the day, that's
what worked for me. But when I'm sitting at the drums,
I'm fourteen years old again, and I'm playing at the
eighth grade dance. And it could be you know, a stadium,
it could be Madison Square Garden, it could be any place.
(39:53):
I'm fourteen years old. There's a saying that musicians get
paid for the twenty two hours a day that they're
not on stage, and they do the show for free.
That is awesome. I love that. I do love I
love that. I wanted to bring this back a little
bit to the intersection of baseball and rock and roll. Um.
I think you made it clear you did not win
(40:15):
a varsity letter in baseball, but it seems like there's
a connection with the band in the sport. I think about,
of course, Glory Days lyrics in the video going back then.
I'm pretty sure Bruce was at the World Series in
Philadelphia this year. He was so is that it's baseball
part of his slash bands fabric. Well, Bruce is one
of the most devoted baseball fans I've ever met. And uh,
(40:40):
it's his by far, his favorite sport. He's very involved
in it. He was a very very good baseball player
in nine seventies seven when he was going through his
tumultuous legal wrangling and we were only able to play
sort of third level markets. We had a lot of
time off. So he and Steve van Zand started a
(41:02):
baseball team and they all did the East Street Kings
and we got satin jackets, we had uniforms, and we
played other bands on days off. And Bruce was a shortstop,
had a fantastic arm, still does, I'm sure, but and
he was a great batter. Um. He still loves baseball.
(41:24):
One of his I can tell you, and I don't
think he'd mind me saying. One of his prize possessions
is a uh personalized autograph from Mickey Mantle. And you know,
growing up in New Jersey, Uh, you know, the Yankees
legend loomed large in our background. And uh my father
was also a great baseball fan. Was an All State
(41:45):
pitcher in the thirties for Central High School in Philadelphia.
He went on to play for the University of Pennsylvania.
One of my prize possessions is a picture of him
as an eighteen year old pitching, and he was a
hell of a pitcher. Um, you know, apparently, um. I
can tell you one short story about I once asked
(42:07):
my father when I was a kid, Gee, Dad, I
remember seeing the Luke Garret Story the movie and I said, Jeverosy,
Luke Garret or Bruth play And he said to me, son,
Luke Garrett, babe Ruth. I saw Ty Cobb. He was
of that you know generation when he was a kid.
(42:27):
So that was pretty impressive. Is there anywhere of those?
Is there any more of those satin jackets left around?
I left that one of those satin jackets. I mean,
there's any lying around and whatever it costs, man, I
would love to to wear that around. That would be
my I say everything mine is on tour with the
Grammy Museum. My you know, had Mighty Max on the
(42:48):
breast front and the E Street kings on the back.
But you know, we used to practice. One thing I
noticed about Bruce is playing baseball as a shortstop, was
when when he caught a ground there, for example, before
he threw it to first base, give you an example,
(43:09):
there was a moment and this is a perfect metaphor
for what he does on stage. It's always thinking ahead.
There was a perfect just a split second pause before
he released the ball and then he had a rocket
of a throw and uh, this was before he balked
up and was working out and but but he didn't
(43:32):
catch the ball and then throw it. There was always
this set up where he got his arm into position
and it was only a millisecond, but he was so
accurate that, uh, you know something I noticed, and um,
I've got a great picture of him, you know, hitting
a home run to still that I took at the
(43:53):
moment of impact. But we were very serious about it.
And you know, he tells stories about his his his
coming up in little league and uh, you know, he's
had lots of friends who were in sports, particularly baseball.
And I was, you know, I remember doing I was
doing one of my one man show performances near where
(44:15):
we lived at the time. In Jersey invited him down.
He was gonna come. Turned out its been Game five
of this particular year's World Series and just couldn't drag
himself away from the TV to to not watch the
World Series. So you know, baseball has loomed, you know,
like the song Glory Days. And he took pitching lessons. Uh,
so he would do it. He wasn't a picture. He
(44:37):
took it, so he would do it somewhat corrected, corrected
correctly in that in that video. Beautiful. Yeah, that's great stuff. Max.
We can't thank you enough for this. This has been
such a thrill for us to listen to your stories
and especially your insight because, as Joe mentioned, I think
a lot of the themes you hit on here in
(44:57):
terms of leadership, connectivity with other human beings, joyfulness, and
what you do, it's a part of our book, the
Book of Joe. So I can't thank you enough. Your
time is I'm sure precious, and again congratulations on induction
and Shrineman into the New Jersey Hall of Fame. Well,
thank you guys. Listen. Uh, it's always a pleasure to
(45:19):
talk to Joe and time yourself. What can I say?
I mean, I love talking about these issues because if
there's a way that I can in part any knowledge
to a younger performer. And I use that in the
broadest sense of an athlete, because I I love watching
(45:40):
athletes and when you watch, you know the people who,
in my view performed like their musicians. So it's a
wondrous thing if I can impart any uh, sort of
tips that make it It's never gonna be easy, but
it can enable you to perhaps avoid some of the pitfalls.
You know, the greatest lessons I've ever learned have been
(46:02):
from the absolute loot worst mistakes I've ever made, and
on the drums and in and in life. Um, and
you know, you hope to pass that knowledge along. And
I do meet younger people, particularly musicians, who you know,
any any tips you know, Uh, it's basically keep your
(46:24):
head down, look sharp, act sharp, and keep your ears open,
because that will give you the sort of tips to
enable you to you know, the distance between and I'm
sure it's like this in sports, particularly at the professional level,
the distance between success and not being successful. And I
don't mean failure, um, you know, striking out for example,
(46:49):
is it can't even be quantified. You know, I have
a friend of mine who became a very well known
professional football player, and he once told me years ago,
it had to be thirty years ago. The the the
differ prints between high elite you know, Big ten college
football and the speed of professional football. That was the
(47:13):
biggest adjustment. And it was similar to that, and I
related to that because it was sort of the same
thing that went on with Bruce Knee Street band. Uh.
You know, in some cases you're just you're just reacting,
and it's everything you did for however many years, and
experience in games, innings, at bats, it's everything you bring
(47:35):
to that moment. And if you're lucky enough to have
any longevity in a career and not flame out, whether
it's music or sports or any other endeavor, you're gonna
learn from everything you did and you're gonna bring it
to that at bat. You're gonna bring it to kicking. Uh,
you know, the after I always look at these after points, situations,
(47:56):
after goal, you know, the point after situations, and the
immense pressure that's on these guys, and it's what they do.
You know, I've had I have a friend who's, uh,
one of the retired is one of the most senior
NASA astronauts on the Space Shuttle, and he also plays drums,
and we always talk about the similarities and the differences,
(48:19):
and um, you know, and there are significant differences. But
his big question to me is how can you How
can you go in front of fifty people and play
the drums? And I said, well, I have two people
to please, the guy in front of me and then me,
(48:42):
And I said, how can you sit on top of
seven and a half million pounds of explosive and your
heart rate doesn't move a bit? He goes, well, that
I can do, but I could never play the drums
in front of a thousand people. So, you know, different
strokes for different folks. I guess it is you're speaking
(49:04):
to our language. Man. That's right on the money. I
really appreciate hearing all of that. Oh Joe, It's always
a pleasure to talk to you, to see you. I
hope to see you on our upcoming uh Bruce and
Eastreet band tour. We're gonna be everywhere. We're gonna have
a blasts, gonna be a rock show. And I'll tell
you what I know. He and I speaking for myself,
I can't wait we start rehearsals in three weeks. And
(49:28):
you know, with the Eastreet Band, it's like slipping into
a well worn baseball glove. We've been doing this for
almost fifty years. So when the first count off of one, two, three,
four happens, it's right there, beautiful brothers, well done man,
Thank you Max. That's that's like I said, that's that's
(49:48):
really dovetails it. It validates so much that we've been
talking about. You just said in this last segment here
really reflects a lot of my own personal baseball philosophies.
So again, for the for our podcast, recomminated the Book
of Joe. I think the folks that are listening to
this will really Gardner gathered the the relationship between what
you do as a professional musician and what we do
(50:11):
as professional athletes or baseball players. Thank you well, my pleasure, Joe, Tom,
thank you very much for having me on. Well, Joe,
that was fascinating. I could listen to Max Weinberg all
day and all night when he's not behind a drum set.
That's how good that was. Yeah, And again, just from
our perspective here, we wanted to glue guys and on
(50:32):
these shows and here is a glue guy. And the
really interesting kind of neat part about the whole thing
is the validation what he talked about. He covered so
many topics in the Book of Joe Uh there towards
the end of different chapters, aiming high do simple better.
He said it in other words, and he talked about
embracing the target in other words. But nevertheless it was
all there and of course just a brilliant way of
(50:53):
putty things together. He's very he's very good with words.
He's very good about his explanations, and his descriptions are outstanding.
So I promised the folks, Uh, that was really a
unique experience for me, and again being that that I'm
tied so far back musically and how I grew up
and what it means to listen to the music that
him and a group have created, it's pretty special. Yeah,
(51:14):
special for me too. Again, I grew up with the
soundtrack of my youth being the band, the Easter Eat Band,
and actually went to high school just a few miles
away from where Max went to high school. So a
lot of connections and I can't wait for the upcoming tour,
same with me, brother. Could I could conclude with one
thought right here, Please do because I think it kind
(51:35):
of like dovetails into this whole thing, and that's Jack
Wilson is a guy that I really dig a lot
of different closities had but and it kind of again
devetails into what Max we just talked about. Control your
own destiny or someone else will take charge. Love it,
peace out, Thank you brother. The Book of Joe podcast
(51:59):
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