August 28, 2025 • 29 mins
Talent alone doesn’t lead to success, not when that talent gets lost in an ocean of alcohol and lost opportunities. Michael Massey is an accomplished, award-winning musician, speaker, author, composer, and producer. He’s also a recovering alcoholic, whose book, “More: A Memoir,” chronicles his downward spiral into addiction and his climb out of it. Michael, his book, and all of his music can be reached at https://www.mikemasseymusic.com.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:12):
Welcome everybody.
This is Avoiding the Addiction Affliction,brought to you by Westwords Consulting,
the Kenosha County Substance Use DisorderCoalition, and by a grant from the State
of Wisconsin's Dose of Reality Real Talks.
I'm Mike McGowan.
Michael Massey is an award-winningand accomplished musician, speaker,
author, composer, producer.
(00:33):
He's also a recovering alcoholic,whose book MORE: A Memoir
chronicles his downward spiral intoaddiction and his climb out of it.
I gotta be honest, it is an honestand amazingly interesting story that
is almost impossible to put down.
Michael lives outside Madison, Wisconsinwith his wife Robin and joins us today.
(00:53):
Welcome Michael.
Hi, Mike.
Nice to meet you.
Well, I'm so glad you could do this.
I told you off the air.
I really loved your book.
It was great.
Like a lot of folks who go, whatyou went through especially those
of us in the midwest you startedearly with your drinking and your
memoir more is full of laughable tome, laughable, ironic coincidences.
(01:18):
Let's do the first one.
Your first drunk at age 15 was where?
Well, I wasn't quite 15.
It was on a church trip to Houston, Texas.
(laughs)
There we go.
And I was an incoming sophomore in thechoir, and we were doing a trip to Houston
for the world's largest gathering ofLutheran youth in the Astrodome that
(01:40):
then, like the ninth Wonder of theWorld or the eighth Wonder of the world.
Yeah.
And a senior had smuggled vodka in hisluggage and we were in a dormitory.
At a college we werestaying in on the way down.
And wow, talk about a revelation,you know, it's kinda like a, a
1-year-old with chocolate cake.
Yeah.
So what was the revelation?
(02:02):
Well, all of a sudden I was funnyand I was social and I was smart
and I was making people laugh,and I felt like a million dollars.
I've read in different places thatalcoholics on their first drunk
feel differently than normal people.
That it does affect them that way thateuphoria is pronounced in an alcoholic.
(02:27):
You know, Michael, I've worked withyoung people my entire life and
what you just said I've talked abouta lot and it encapsulates a lot.
One of the things that's terrifyingto me about a young person drinking is
what they discover in their personalitywhen they drink, especially the second
time they drink you can duplicate it.
That's very attractive to some kid,guy, especially 14, 15 years old.
(02:50):
Yep, yep.
Oh yeah.
Give you courage.
Give you courage to maybe approach thatyoung lady that you wanted to talk to.
Yeah, yeah.
Oh, I know.
Well, and you, but it didjust stop with one drunk.
You went head over heels with it.
You were lucky to come outtahigh school with a diploma.
I was you know, I credit my girlfriendfor getting me back into school, but I
(03:14):
ended up with a 2.5 grade point average.
I had 4.0 freshman and 4.0 senior, butin the middle there it was a wasteland.
You know, I was lucky to pass.
I was lucky to pass.
I read the World Book Encyclopediafrom cover to cover in 1969 and 1970.
My brother and I both did.
And so in a western civ exam as asophomore that I attended one day for the
(03:39):
semester, I aced the final exam because ofthat encyclopedia, and she had to pass me.
She had to pass me.
Oh my God.
For those of you who were younger,that would be like diving headlong
into Wikipedia for hours on end.
Right?
Right.
Yeah.
Yep.
Holy cow!
Michael are we that old?
(03:59):
Well I am.
I don't think you are.
But you know, music thoughwas your gift from early on.
I guess you could call it a gift.
It was my chosen profession almost.
It was a calling, put it that way.
I knew from a very young age thatthat's what I wanted to do with my life.
So therefore everything else became kindof inconsequential, you know, it and
(04:23):
everything was then to pursue that endas opposed to college was not important.
I wanted to be a rock star.
Let's face it.
It was in my blood.
But as far as a gift, yeah, I,I'm lucky that I'm able to do it.
But I do say I think one of my favoritedescriptors of myself is that on
(04:48):
a really good night, I come close,but never quite achieve greatness.
Mm, wow.
Why not you?
Others see it differently though, Michael.
I'm sure others see it differently.
They may, but when I think greatness,I think Paul McCartney, I think...
Yeah.
Well I think the Eagles, I think,you know, the songwriting and the
(05:09):
performance that I just watchedthe Billy Joel documentary and his
voice is just pristine even now.
Yeah.
You know, pushing 80 years old.
I don't have that.
I mean, I'm okay.
(laughs) I've made aliving, but I'm not great.
This is also for those of youwho are younger who don't quite
(05:30):
get what I'm about to say.
Back in the day, bands were reallypopular and they were everywhere.
High school dances, CYO andso I laughed again out loud.
You actually got hired to play churchfestivals with a band named what?
(05:51):
Lucifer.
(laughs)
Come on.
And we were all, I mean, I was theminority of being a Lutheran and
everybody else was Catholic in the band.
Yeah.
But not only that there was another bandon the east side of Madison named Satan.
Yes.
Yeah.
And we were friends,but still competitors.
Well, I wish I would've been in the gymto see you introduced by the monsignor.
(06:16):
(laughs)
Here's Lucifer.
Yeah, yeah.
Oh, dear.
And you continued to getbetter clearly, right?
And your band achieved bands'cause that wasn't your last one.
You achieved some success, but you seemto sabotage that success over and over.
There's a sense in your book of gettingto a point and then coming back down and
(06:38):
getting to a point and coming back down.
Yeah.
And it wasn't intentional sabotageby any way, shape, or form.
It was alcohol that was doing it to me.
Yeah.
Always alcohol.
Always alcohol.
(06:59):
Thankfully other drugs weren'treally a problem for me.
I mean, they were present.
Because I was a rock singer, so drugsand alcohol were everywhere, but
other drugs didn't really interest me.
It was all alcohol.
Did you feel almost like you had to doit, there was a persona you had to...
Well, that was part of it.
It fueled that raucous wild frontman, Stephen Tyler, Freddie Mercury,
(07:26):
David Bowie, Mick Jagger-ishpersonality that I was coming across.
I don't think that there was a showfrom the time I went on the road in
1978 until I quit drinking that Ididn't have some amount of alcohol in
my system regardless of the time of day.
Wow.
Well, there's stories back in thosedays of people who had it on stage.
(07:48):
I think there was a story aboutJanice Joplin, I'm on a quart of
Jack on the stage while she sang.
Right.
Everybody did.
And, and you know, I've oftensaid, depending on their degree of
professionalism or addiction, it mayor may not have been colored water.
Huh.
Interesting.
Yeah.
I often wondered that same thing.
(08:10):
I was at a concert one time with StevieRay Vaughn, where Stevie Ray Vaughn
played, and he showed a clip on thebig screen of him playing intoxicated
and he was then in recovery and hethen played, said, if you think that it
enhances your performance, think again.
Here's how I play now.
That was very powerful.
(08:30):
Although when he said, here's what Iused to sound like drunk, people cheered!
Of course they did.
Wow.
Yeah.
Oh yeah.
It had to seem surreal though,for you to be playing at a bar
like the Stone Hearth in Madison.
That's for those of you who arefrom around here one day and then
a little while later, you're atRod Stewart's place in California.
(08:54):
Yeah, I'm blessed with an amazing memory.
I can remember details that people lookat me funny, like, how the heck can
you even possibly remember that stuff?
And I have no business because ofthe amount of alcohol I was drinking.
Yeah.
As well.
But to think about those those times.
I mean, our management elevated usvery quickly and he had connections
(09:18):
in the LA record industry.
But yeah, I mean, my good friend MikeRipp, the guitarist in the band and I
were at Rod Stewart's house not longafter playing locally in the Midwest.
And it was, of course, it was surreal.
And we were star struck andeverything else trying to make it
seem like it was normal becausewe didn't want to seem like, you
(09:40):
know, green kids from the Midwest.
But we were.
You can't really hide that.
And in retrospect, I wish we would'veembraced that more because people
would have seen my daughter's successand embracing her Midwestern roots.
People are loving that on both coasts.
She's also a musician.
Yes.
(10:01):
And very talented and achievingsuccess that is transcending my own.
Yeah, it's very good.
You have some on your websiteand you all know who listen, that
we have links to all of this.
Her music is really good.
Really good.
Yeah.
You certainly lived the lifestyle, right?
Was there a sense, though, youjust indicated where you needed
(10:23):
it to feel like you fit in?
That there was... whatwould the kids call poser?
Sorta like, I don't deservethis you know, what am I doing?
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
I think to a certain extent, I still feelthat, you know, the imposter syndrome.
We talked before on airabout writing a book.
I have no business writing a book.
I don't know what I cannot do.
(10:43):
I guess it comes down to.
In retrospect at that point in mylife, in the early rock and roll days,
that, and we were flirting with therecord labels and stardom in Hollywood.
I think becoming a rock starwas more important to me than
the music as I look back there.
It was a very superficial pursuit atthat time, even though we were coming
(11:07):
up with some pretty darn good music.
Mm-hmm.
It seemed secondary to the pursuit offame as opposed to after I got sober where
everything flipped and I concentrated onthe quality of the music I was creating.
Do you like the stuff youwrote and performed back then?
I do, and I do.
It, it's, there are some reallyamazing stuff, you know, I mean.
(11:31):
It wasn't always a life alteringand destroying thing, the
alcohol, until later in my life.
I wasn't drunk 24/7.
At that time it was very excitingand we were living that lifestyle
and every moment of every day.
Eating, sleeping, breathing it.
(11:52):
And so we were, the camaraderie wasamazing and the creativity was amazing.
So, yeah.
And we still, we have played recentlysome reunion shows with that band
and, and done quite well with it.
That's gotta be fun.
Yeah.
Almost 50 years later.
Dare I say it..
Well, because they weren't allterribly pleased with your drinking.
(12:16):
No.
No.
No, but you know.
Some of them weren't far behind me.
You're nice to them in the book then.
I am.
I blame myself for a lot ofthe negativity surrounding that
because I was the front man.
I was the first person that they sawand management, agents, and record
(12:39):
labels, if they can't see pastthe front guy who's representing
this and putting that vocal forth.
There's no sense in looking further.
Yeah.
Well, you guys thought you wereand you thought you were on
a straight line train, right?
Yeah.
And then all of a sudden it, it justgot derailed when one of the production
companies said, nah, we'll take a pass.
(13:00):
We'll go with another band.
It was Atlantic Records.
I mean, one of the biggestrecord labels in the world.
And they had spent $35,000 onus in 1981, which translates to
about 200 and some thousand nowby, if you adjusted for inflation.
So it was a major investment, butit was an investment for two bands
(13:22):
and they chose the other one.
Hmm.
Which you think about the amountof money that label has to throw
around and it's just, it's like, wow!
Yeah.
But they had the Stones, they had LedZeppelin, they had AC/DC, they had,
you know, Atlantic is a gigantic label.
Aretha Franklin, you can go on and on.
(13:43):
Foreigner, you know, that were,that were all selling millions and
millions of records, so, and theartists weren't making the money.
(laughs)
No, no.
That's what we've all learned.
Right.
You didn't make a lot from that at all.
Yeah.
The only way for them to make moneynow do you still own your catalog?
'cause that's what, that's what they'reall doing now is selling their catalogs.
(14:03):
We do.
Yeah.
And I'm having a little bit of successplacing stuff in TV and film, but
I'm also in a new band and writingreally exciting new music that is
some of the best stuff of my life.
That's really good.
Yeah.
Well, another ironic coincidence, Ithink you go and you meet people and
(14:23):
there's a great part in the book withAndy Warhol, which is just... (laughs)
well, it defines surreal, doesn't it?
Oh, it really does.
It really does.
And then for those of you who are, again,too young, there's a show you were on
Star Search, which is the current, youknow, the current version of The Voice.
Hosted by Ed McMahon, JohnnyCarson and Star Search Fame.
(14:45):
Not that I compare AndyWarhol and Ed McMahon.
(laughs)
But and all of these people all around.
And then where do you meet your wife?
In a mall.
(laughs)
In Madison.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So you're around allthe glam and then what?
Okay, so you gotta talk about that.
Well, yeah, and it's a great story.
(15:05):
You know, we talked about thosefirst flirtations with alcohol,
giving you courage to talk to women.
I had been afraid to talk towomen my entire life, but when
I became a rock singer, I didn'thave to be the one to initiate it.
It was initiated to me.
So all of those years I didn'tever had to be that social animal.
(15:25):
After getting fired by my dad fromselling cars at his used car lot,
I went to work in a music store ina mall that sold pianos and organs.
And this young lady used to comeout and sit taking her breaks out
in the mall and listen to me play.
And I was enamored with her.
She was gorgeous.
I thought, wow, I gotta meet that woman.
(15:47):
And through a coworker who rode thebus with her, we got introduced and
I gave her a ride home from work.
We stopped and had a beer on the way home.
And after I dropped her off, Iwent to my parents' house and told
my brothers that I had just metthe woman I was going to marry.
She was everything, every good qualityof every woman I had ever dated.
(16:08):
Wrapped up into one package and Ididn't need to look any further.
There's a saying today when you know,you know, so you must have gotten
something from just that first meeting.
Yep.
Yep.
And now 38 years later,we're still together.
I credit her with helpingme to achieve sobriety.
There's no doubt.
(16:28):
What would she say to that?
She would say that I wasthe person that did it.
Yeah.
But to have her support waiting forme on the other side was priceless.
I don't think that I could have doneit without her, without her support.
Well, I don't think it'sjust support either Michael.
'cause for me, there's an importantpart in your book where she basically
(16:52):
says, I'm out unless you do X.
Right.
And so what she drove you to detox.
Well, she said, I'm out unless you quit.
And then I moved in with abuddy in a bad part of town.
And then after some just realizinghow I was ruining my life,
asked her if I could come home.
And I quit drinking on October 13th, 1993.
(17:15):
And came home three days later,two days later, and four days
after I quit, I finally wentinto hallucinatory withdrawal.
That's when she took me to detox andfive days in the hospital in intermediate
care and 15 days in treatment.
Let's go backwards for just a second.
(17:36):
'cause when you get the DT's, when yougo through that, alcohol can kill you.
For those of you listening who don't know,this alcohol withdrawal can kill you.
It's the only drug that can.
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
And so how much were you up to,how much were you drinking then?
Because it had to be daily.
It had to be a 24/7 thing almost.
Oh it was definitely a 24/7.
(17:57):
I had a fifth of brandy underneathmy bed, and I had pints in the
car and pints hidden everywhere.
It was 24/7.
When I would wake up, I wouldhit the bottle and 50% of the
time I would throw it back up.
Yeah.
But even doing that, kept enoughin my system to stop the shakes.
(18:18):
So that I could, I could drink more.
Yeah.
The movie Leaving Las Vegas withNicholas Cage just shocked the hell
outta me when I watched it becauseit was so realistic in its portrayal.
I could not believe how realisticit was and that was me basically.
At that point in alcohol addiction,you really don't care about anything.
(18:42):
You just, all you really care aboutis getting that next hit of liquor.
What was detox like?
Well, I don't remember a lot of it.
Yeah, I figured that.
(laughs)
Yeah.
I remember getting to the emergencyroom and then my memory leaves me and
I'm told that I was singing Hey Jude,at the top of my lungs in the ER.
(19:07):
I was violently thrashing on thetable and the ER doc told Robin that
he wished it was being videoed sothat he could show young people the
horrors of actual alcohol addiction.
And I woke up in a hospital room withmy wrists and ankles lashed to the bed.
(19:27):
Oh man, that's gotta justbe like, what the heck?
Yeah.
Yeah.
But, you know, in the grandscheme of things, Mike.
I'm glad that it happened.
Because in my mind, being that fardown, being, I mean I was as low
as you can be on this side of thegrass and it was almost beneficial
(19:52):
to my recovery to be that far downand have nowhere to go but up.
And that's why I wannatell my story to people.
'cause the people that thinkthat it's hopeless, it is not.
It is not.
I am living proof.
It can be done
And a lot of people have to do this.
3, 4, 5, 10, 12 times.
(20:14):
This stuck, and I hope you don'tmind me saying this, surprisingly
to me, reading the book, it stuck.
I had tried to stop on my own, butnever seriously, and I did go to one
outpatient treatment a year before that.
I lasted a week before I was drinking andlying to 'em, and I, I went for a month.
(20:36):
So, yeah, I mean, I had my failures aswell, but, but like I say, to be that
far down, it almost became easier.
Because there's nowhere else to go.
Nowhere else to go besides dying.
This is theoretical, but you cananswer it however you want to.
(20:57):
How many bottoms does somebody haveto hit before they hit their bottom?
Hold that question.
I didn't answer your other question.
How much was I up to drinking?
I was doing at least afifth of brandy a day.
At least that and a 12 pack of beer.
Most times probably more than that.
Were you eating.
(21:19):
Very little.
Yeah.
Very little.
I would literally go days withoutanything, without needing anything.
I was getting all mycalories from alcohol.
Wow.
How many bottoms?
And that kind of goes along with thefailures to achieve sobriety, you know?
I had so many bottoms thatshould have been a bottom.
Mm-hmm.
In my performing career.
(21:40):
My partner.
You know, telling me if you come towork drunk one more time, I'm done.
I'm not gonna play with you anymore.
That wasn't my bottom is telling.
I mean, how far down do you have to go?
Mine was literally onthe precipice of death.
Mm-hmm.
Had I not gone, had Robin not takenme to the hospital that night, I
(22:01):
would have died from withdrawal.
I would've died.
They filled me full of Valium and Haldol.
Yeah.
To bring me back.
I had Dion DiMucci on a coupleof years ago on the podcast
from Dion and the Belmonts.
Legend.
Yeah.
And he's in recovery.
And he told a story about beingnew into recovery and being in
(22:25):
a limo with a bunch of folks.
He mentioned them and I don't recallthem at the time, but very famous
and somebody offered him a drug.
And I said, what would you say?
He said, well, I just said I'm good.
And then he proceeded to say, everyonein that limo is dead and then he
said, and I'm still making music.
That's you.
(22:46):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yep.
You, you alluded to 27people I went to rehab with.
90 days later, two of uswere sober and one was dead.
Two of us were sober, and it was and olderwoman that was the other sober person, and
I ran into her about 10 years after rehab.
(23:07):
Awesome.
In a store and we just, we embraced andit was such a happy reunion because we
were both still sober 10 years later.
And it was amazing.
But all, you know, the 25 others.
24 others, the other one was, it surehits home and that, you know, that
(23:28):
might even be a better percentageof success than the actual average.
Yeah.
Well, you know, you never know.
When I used to do this, Michael,sometimes you would say, well I think
this person will, or that person will,or this per... you don't know, even
the pros that, you know, we don't know.
You know, you watchthese show Intervention.
Oh boy.
(23:48):
Yeah.
And people who seem to haveeverything going for him.
And then the little last littletagline, they relapsed in nine
days and then some dude living in arefrigerator box down by the river.
He's been sober for nine months.
You know, you, you don't know.
Right?
My counselor gave me the least chanceof success out of the 29 people.
(24:09):
Wow.
So October, 1993.
So what is that?
You're now on 30 years.
32. It'll be 32 in October.
Wow.
My math is used to be better.
Mine too.
That's outstanding.
Congratulations.
Well, there can't be abetter sober birthday present
than the birth of a child.
Who was born on your sober birthday?
(24:30):
Emily, my musician daughter who's gotover a hundred million streams on Spotify.
Unbelievable.
Yeah.
The day to the day, two years to theday that I quit drinking, she was born.
And it just solidifiedthat decision, you know?
I mean, the, the universe was smiling.
It was very powerful.
What did it do?
I mean, I know you said solidifiedit, but how did then being a dad,
(24:55):
and of course Robin is of coursestill incredibly supportive, right?
Mm-hmm.
How did being a dad change yourview of sobriety and recovery?
It just made life thatmuch deeper and sweeter.
And to be able to experience knowingthat when you're as far down the
alcoholic wormhole as I was, you know,you wouldn't be able to enjoy that.
(25:19):
We tried early in our marriageto have children and I would've
been a horrible father.
So it's a really good thingthat we weren't successful.
Being a father, just, itchanges everything for everyone.
You know, I tell my friends nowthat after they have the birth of
their first child, your life willnever, ever again be the same.
(25:40):
It just won't.
Yeah, yeah.
You know so to
love every moment, toexperience everything fully.
You know, is the gift of sobriety.
Oh, that's great.
You know, I'll let you end it with this.
(26:02):
You, you and I both livein Wisconsin, right?
And you're a Packer fan.
You have to be.
If you're not, then move.
Alright.
(Laughs)
So you tell a story where youhad an aha moment during the
Green Bay Packers Victory Parade.
For those of you living inMinnesota, that's what you get
when you win the Super Bowl.
(laughs) Oh, careful there.
(26:23):
Sorry.
Yeah, right.
I just lost a state.
And after they won the SuperBowl in New Orleans in the mid
nineties, you had like an aha.
You defined winning as...
Well, you and I both know.
That the seventies and eightieswere the pinnacle of mediocrity.
Oh god, that's what makesthe jokes fun, right?
(26:45):
Yeah.
Eight and eight season was a success.
Yeah.
You know?
Wow!
We're, and, and almost makingthe playoffs in 1989 was amazing.
Anyway to live through all of that.
Every week in the fall, as we alldid, as Wisconsinites, and to see
that success after 20 plus years.
(27:07):
I became a fan the year after theywon Super Bowl II, so I knew nothing
but mediocrity, nothing exceptmediocrity for my entire fandom.
I thought the Packers are winningand, and I looked at my 16 month
old daughter next to me, and,and I'm blubbering like an idiot.
(27:28):
I've got snot coming outta my noseand just crying, watching Packers in
their open air buses going throughstreets of snowy streets of Green Bay.
And my daughter says,daddy, why are you crying?
I said, they're happy tears, Emily.
Because, you know, it was at thatmoment that I thought, you know,
this reaction, which was so visceraland so almost violently crying
(27:52):
was not just for a football team.
It was also for me.
It was also maybe, maybe I'm winning,maybe, maybe I do deserve this happiness
in this modest little home and in mybeautiful family that I've got now.
And looking at a musical careeras a means to a living as opposed
to trying to be a rock star.
(28:13):
It was an epiphany.
It was an eyeopening moment,and I carry it with me.
I carried that awakening with me.
And after that, the Packerswere just a football team
and not an obsession as well.
Wow.
That's incredible.
That's just such a greatdefinition of winning too.
(28:33):
For those of you listening andwatching please go to the links
provided and listen to some ofMichael's old music and new music.
And his daughter's music that you'refeatured on in several of them, right?
Yeah.
It's just, it's just wonderful.
Michael, thanks so much.
It's an inspiring story.
Your work.
Pick up the book.
It's just a great read.
(28:55):
We hope that those of you listening, findlove, courage, support wherever you are.
Thanks for listening.
Be safe and I'm gonna borrowa line from Michael to end it.
Life is so sweet, sober.
Welcome everybody.
This is Avoiding the Addiction Affliction,brought to you by Westwords Consulting,
the Kenosha County Substance Use DisorderCoalition, and by a grant from the State
of Wisconsin's Dose of Reality Real Talks.
I'm Mike McGowan.
Michael Massey is an award-winningand accomplished musician, speaker,
author, composer, producer.
(00:33):
He's also a recovering alcoholic,whose book MORE: A Memoir
chronicles his downward spiral intoaddiction and his climb out of it.
I gotta be honest, it is an honestand amazingly interesting story that
is almost impossible to put down.
Michael lives outside Madison, Wisconsinwith his wife Robin and joins us today.
(00:53):
Welcome Michael.
Hi, Mike.
Nice to meet you.
Well, I'm so glad you could do this.
I told you off the air.
I really loved your book.
It was great.
Like a lot of folks who go, whatyou went through especially those
of us in the midwest you startedearly with your drinking and your
memoir more is full of laughable tome, laughable, ironic coincidences.
(01:18):
Let's do the first one.
Your first drunk at age 15 was where?
Well, I wasn't quite 15.
It was on a church trip to Houston, Texas.
(laughs)
There we go.
And I was an incoming sophomore in thechoir, and we were doing a trip to Houston
for the world's largest gathering ofLutheran youth in the Astrodome that
(01:40):
then, like the ninth Wonder of theWorld or the eighth Wonder of the world.
Yeah.
And a senior had smuggled vodka in hisluggage and we were in a dormitory.
At a college we werestaying in on the way down.
And wow, talk about a revelation,you know, it's kinda like a, a
1-year-old with chocolate cake.
Yeah.
So what was the revelation?
(02:02):
Well, all of a sudden I was funnyand I was social and I was smart
and I was making people laugh,and I felt like a million dollars.
I've read in different places thatalcoholics on their first drunk
feel differently than normal people.
That it does affect them that way thateuphoria is pronounced in an alcoholic.
(02:27):
You know, Michael, I've worked withyoung people my entire life and
what you just said I've talked abouta lot and it encapsulates a lot.
One of the things that's terrifyingto me about a young person drinking is
what they discover in their personalitywhen they drink, especially the second
time they drink you can duplicate it.
That's very attractive to some kid,guy, especially 14, 15 years old.
(02:50):
Yep, yep.
Oh yeah.
Give you courage.
Give you courage to maybe approach thatyoung lady that you wanted to talk to.
Yeah, yeah.
Oh, I know.
Well, and you, but it didjust stop with one drunk.
You went head over heels with it.
You were lucky to come outtahigh school with a diploma.
I was you know, I credit my girlfriendfor getting me back into school, but I
(03:14):
ended up with a 2.5 grade point average.
I had 4.0 freshman and 4.0 senior, butin the middle there it was a wasteland.
You know, I was lucky to pass.
I was lucky to pass.
I read the World Book Encyclopediafrom cover to cover in 1969 and 1970.
My brother and I both did.
And so in a western civ exam as asophomore that I attended one day for the
(03:39):
semester, I aced the final exam because ofthat encyclopedia, and she had to pass me.
She had to pass me.
Oh my God.
For those of you who were younger,that would be like diving headlong
into Wikipedia for hours on end.
Right?
Right.
Yeah.
Yep.
Holy cow!
Michael are we that old?
(03:59):
Well I am.
I don't think you are.
But you know, music thoughwas your gift from early on.
I guess you could call it a gift.
It was my chosen profession almost.
It was a calling, put it that way.
I knew from a very young age thatthat's what I wanted to do with my life.
So therefore everything else became kindof inconsequential, you know, it and
(04:23):
everything was then to pursue that endas opposed to college was not important.
I wanted to be a rock star.
Let's face it.
It was in my blood.
But as far as a gift, yeah, I,I'm lucky that I'm able to do it.
But I do say I think one of my favoritedescriptors of myself is that on
(04:48):
a really good night, I come close,but never quite achieve greatness.
Mm, wow.
Why not you?
Others see it differently though, Michael.
I'm sure others see it differently.
They may, but when I think greatness,I think Paul McCartney, I think...
Yeah.
Well I think the Eagles, I think,you know, the songwriting and the
(05:09):
performance that I just watchedthe Billy Joel documentary and his
voice is just pristine even now.
Yeah.
You know, pushing 80 years old.
I don't have that.
I mean, I'm okay.
(laughs) I've made aliving, but I'm not great.
This is also for those of youwho are younger who don't quite
(05:30):
get what I'm about to say.
Back in the day, bands were reallypopular and they were everywhere.
High school dances, CYO andso I laughed again out loud.
You actually got hired to play churchfestivals with a band named what?
(05:51):
Lucifer.
(laughs)
Come on.
And we were all, I mean, I was theminority of being a Lutheran and
everybody else was Catholic in the band.
Yeah.
But not only that there was another bandon the east side of Madison named Satan.
Yes.
Yeah.
And we were friends,but still competitors.
Well, I wish I would've been in the gymto see you introduced by the monsignor.
(06:16):
(laughs)
Here's Lucifer.
Yeah, yeah.
Oh, dear.
And you continued to getbetter clearly, right?
And your band achieved bands'cause that wasn't your last one.
You achieved some success, but you seemto sabotage that success over and over.
There's a sense in your book of gettingto a point and then coming back down and
(06:38):
getting to a point and coming back down.
Yeah.
And it wasn't intentional sabotageby any way, shape, or form.
It was alcohol that was doing it to me.
Yeah.
Always alcohol.
Always alcohol.
(06:59):
Thankfully other drugs weren'treally a problem for me.
I mean, they were present.
Because I was a rock singer, so drugsand alcohol were everywhere, but
other drugs didn't really interest me.
It was all alcohol.
Did you feel almost like you had to doit, there was a persona you had to...
Well, that was part of it.
It fueled that raucous wild frontman, Stephen Tyler, Freddie Mercury,
(07:26):
David Bowie, Mick Jagger-ishpersonality that I was coming across.
I don't think that there was a showfrom the time I went on the road in
1978 until I quit drinking that Ididn't have some amount of alcohol in
my system regardless of the time of day.
Wow.
Well, there's stories back in thosedays of people who had it on stage.
(07:48):
I think there was a story aboutJanice Joplin, I'm on a quart of
Jack on the stage while she sang.
Right.
Everybody did.
And, and you know, I've oftensaid, depending on their degree of
professionalism or addiction, it mayor may not have been colored water.
Huh.
Interesting.
Yeah.
I often wondered that same thing.
(08:10):
I was at a concert one time with StevieRay Vaughn, where Stevie Ray Vaughn
played, and he showed a clip on thebig screen of him playing intoxicated
and he was then in recovery and hethen played, said, if you think that it
enhances your performance, think again.
Here's how I play now.
That was very powerful.
(08:30):
Although when he said, here's what Iused to sound like drunk, people cheered!
Of course they did.
Wow.
Yeah.
Oh yeah.
It had to seem surreal though,for you to be playing at a bar
like the Stone Hearth in Madison.
That's for those of you who arefrom around here one day and then
a little while later, you're atRod Stewart's place in California.
(08:54):
Yeah, I'm blessed with an amazing memory.
I can remember details that people lookat me funny, like, how the heck can
you even possibly remember that stuff?
And I have no business because ofthe amount of alcohol I was drinking.
Yeah.
As well.
But to think about those those times.
I mean, our management elevated usvery quickly and he had connections
(09:18):
in the LA record industry.
But yeah, I mean, my good friend MikeRipp, the guitarist in the band and I
were at Rod Stewart's house not longafter playing locally in the Midwest.
And it was, of course, it was surreal.
And we were star struck andeverything else trying to make it
seem like it was normal becausewe didn't want to seem like, you
(09:40):
know, green kids from the Midwest.
But we were.
You can't really hide that.
And in retrospect, I wish we would'veembraced that more because people
would have seen my daughter's successand embracing her Midwestern roots.
People are loving that on both coasts.
She's also a musician.
Yes.
(10:01):
And very talented and achievingsuccess that is transcending my own.
Yeah, it's very good.
You have some on your websiteand you all know who listen, that
we have links to all of this.
Her music is really good.
Really good.
Yeah.
You certainly lived the lifestyle, right?
Was there a sense, though, youjust indicated where you needed
(10:23):
it to feel like you fit in?
That there was... whatwould the kids call poser?
Sorta like, I don't deservethis you know, what am I doing?
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
I think to a certain extent, I still feelthat, you know, the imposter syndrome.
We talked before on airabout writing a book.
I have no business writing a book.
I don't know what I cannot do.
(10:43):
I guess it comes down to.
In retrospect at that point in mylife, in the early rock and roll days,
that, and we were flirting with therecord labels and stardom in Hollywood.
I think becoming a rock starwas more important to me than
the music as I look back there.
It was a very superficial pursuit atthat time, even though we were coming
(11:07):
up with some pretty darn good music.
Mm-hmm.
It seemed secondary to the pursuit offame as opposed to after I got sober where
everything flipped and I concentrated onthe quality of the music I was creating.
Do you like the stuff youwrote and performed back then?
I do, and I do.
It, it's, there are some reallyamazing stuff, you know, I mean.
(11:31):
It wasn't always a life alteringand destroying thing, the
alcohol, until later in my life.
I wasn't drunk 24/7.
At that time it was very excitingand we were living that lifestyle
and every moment of every day.
Eating, sleeping, breathing it.
(11:52):
And so we were, the camaraderie wasamazing and the creativity was amazing.
So, yeah.
And we still, we have played recentlysome reunion shows with that band
and, and done quite well with it.
That's gotta be fun.
Yeah.
Almost 50 years later.
Dare I say it..
Well, because they weren't allterribly pleased with your drinking.
(12:16):
No.
No.
No, but you know.
Some of them weren't far behind me.
You're nice to them in the book then.
I am.
I blame myself for a lot ofthe negativity surrounding that
because I was the front man.
I was the first person that they sawand management, agents, and record
(12:39):
labels, if they can't see pastthe front guy who's representing
this and putting that vocal forth.
There's no sense in looking further.
Yeah.
Well, you guys thought you wereand you thought you were on
a straight line train, right?
Yeah.
And then all of a sudden it, it justgot derailed when one of the production
companies said, nah, we'll take a pass.
(13:00):
We'll go with another band.
It was Atlantic Records.
I mean, one of the biggestrecord labels in the world.
And they had spent $35,000 onus in 1981, which translates to
about 200 and some thousand nowby, if you adjusted for inflation.
So it was a major investment, butit was an investment for two bands
(13:22):
and they chose the other one.
Hmm.
Which you think about the amountof money that label has to throw
around and it's just, it's like, wow!
Yeah.
But they had the Stones, they had LedZeppelin, they had AC/DC, they had,
you know, Atlantic is a gigantic label.
Aretha Franklin, you can go on and on.
(13:43):
Foreigner, you know, that were,that were all selling millions and
millions of records, so, and theartists weren't making the money.
(laughs)
No, no.
That's what we've all learned.
Right.
You didn't make a lot from that at all.
Yeah.
The only way for them to make moneynow do you still own your catalog?
'cause that's what, that's what they'reall doing now is selling their catalogs.
(14:03):
We do.
Yeah.
And I'm having a little bit of successplacing stuff in TV and film, but
I'm also in a new band and writingreally exciting new music that is
some of the best stuff of my life.
That's really good.
Yeah.
Well, another ironic coincidence, Ithink you go and you meet people and
(14:23):
there's a great part in the book withAndy Warhol, which is just... (laughs)
well, it defines surreal, doesn't it?
Oh, it really does.
It really does.
And then for those of you who are, again,too young, there's a show you were on
Star Search, which is the current, youknow, the current version of The Voice.
Hosted by Ed McMahon, JohnnyCarson and Star Search Fame.
(14:45):
Not that I compare AndyWarhol and Ed McMahon.
(laughs)
But and all of these people all around.
And then where do you meet your wife?
In a mall.
(laughs)
In Madison.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So you're around allthe glam and then what?
Okay, so you gotta talk about that.
Well, yeah, and it's a great story.
(15:05):
You know, we talked about thosefirst flirtations with alcohol,
giving you courage to talk to women.
I had been afraid to talk towomen my entire life, but when
I became a rock singer, I didn'thave to be the one to initiate it.
It was initiated to me.
So all of those years I didn'tever had to be that social animal.
(15:25):
After getting fired by my dad fromselling cars at his used car lot,
I went to work in a music store ina mall that sold pianos and organs.
And this young lady used to comeout and sit taking her breaks out
in the mall and listen to me play.
And I was enamored with her.
She was gorgeous.
I thought, wow, I gotta meet that woman.
(15:47):
And through a coworker who rode thebus with her, we got introduced and
I gave her a ride home from work.
We stopped and had a beer on the way home.
And after I dropped her off, Iwent to my parents' house and told
my brothers that I had just metthe woman I was going to marry.
She was everything, every good qualityof every woman I had ever dated.
(16:08):
Wrapped up into one package and Ididn't need to look any further.
There's a saying today when you know,you know, so you must have gotten
something from just that first meeting.
Yep.
Yep.
And now 38 years later,we're still together.
I credit her with helpingme to achieve sobriety.
There's no doubt.
(16:28):
What would she say to that?
She would say that I wasthe person that did it.
Yeah.
But to have her support waiting forme on the other side was priceless.
I don't think that I could have doneit without her, without her support.
Well, I don't think it'sjust support either Michael.
'cause for me, there's an importantpart in your book where she basically
(16:52):
says, I'm out unless you do X.
Right.
And so what she drove you to detox.
Well, she said, I'm out unless you quit.
And then I moved in with abuddy in a bad part of town.
And then after some just realizinghow I was ruining my life,
asked her if I could come home.
And I quit drinking on October 13th, 1993.
(17:15):
And came home three days later,two days later, and four days
after I quit, I finally wentinto hallucinatory withdrawal.
That's when she took me to detox andfive days in the hospital in intermediate
care and 15 days in treatment.
Let's go backwards for just a second.
(17:36):
'cause when you get the DT's, when yougo through that, alcohol can kill you.
For those of you listening who don't know,this alcohol withdrawal can kill you.
It's the only drug that can.
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
And so how much were you up to,how much were you drinking then?
Because it had to be daily.
It had to be a 24/7 thing almost.
Oh it was definitely a 24/7.
(17:57):
I had a fifth of brandy underneathmy bed, and I had pints in the
car and pints hidden everywhere.
It was 24/7.
When I would wake up, I wouldhit the bottle and 50% of the
time I would throw it back up.
Yeah.
But even doing that, kept enoughin my system to stop the shakes.
(18:18):
So that I could, I could drink more.
Yeah.
The movie Leaving Las Vegas withNicholas Cage just shocked the hell
outta me when I watched it becauseit was so realistic in its portrayal.
I could not believe how realisticit was and that was me basically.
At that point in alcohol addiction,you really don't care about anything.
(18:42):
You just, all you really care aboutis getting that next hit of liquor.
What was detox like?
Well, I don't remember a lot of it.
Yeah, I figured that.
(laughs)
Yeah.
I remember getting to the emergencyroom and then my memory leaves me and
I'm told that I was singing Hey Jude,at the top of my lungs in the ER.
(19:07):
I was violently thrashing on thetable and the ER doc told Robin that
he wished it was being videoed sothat he could show young people the
horrors of actual alcohol addiction.
And I woke up in a hospital room withmy wrists and ankles lashed to the bed.
(19:27):
Oh man, that's gotta justbe like, what the heck?
Yeah.
Yeah.
But, you know, in the grandscheme of things, Mike.
I'm glad that it happened.
Because in my mind, being that fardown, being, I mean I was as low
as you can be on this side of thegrass and it was almost beneficial
(19:52):
to my recovery to be that far downand have nowhere to go but up.
And that's why I wannatell my story to people.
'cause the people that thinkthat it's hopeless, it is not.
It is not.
I am living proof.
It can be done
And a lot of people have to do this.
3, 4, 5, 10, 12 times.
(20:14):
This stuck, and I hope you don'tmind me saying this, surprisingly
to me, reading the book, it stuck.
I had tried to stop on my own, butnever seriously, and I did go to one
outpatient treatment a year before that.
I lasted a week before I was drinking andlying to 'em, and I, I went for a month.
(20:36):
So, yeah, I mean, I had my failures aswell, but, but like I say, to be that
far down, it almost became easier.
Because there's nowhere else to go.
Nowhere else to go besides dying.
This is theoretical, but you cananswer it however you want to.
(20:57):
How many bottoms does somebody haveto hit before they hit their bottom?
Hold that question.
I didn't answer your other question.
How much was I up to drinking?
I was doing at least afifth of brandy a day.
At least that and a 12 pack of beer.
Most times probably more than that.
Were you eating.
(21:19):
Very little.
Yeah.
Very little.
I would literally go days withoutanything, without needing anything.
I was getting all mycalories from alcohol.
Wow.
How many bottoms?
And that kind of goes along with thefailures to achieve sobriety, you know?
I had so many bottoms thatshould have been a bottom.
Mm-hmm.
In my performing career.
(21:40):
My partner.
You know, telling me if you come towork drunk one more time, I'm done.
I'm not gonna play with you anymore.
That wasn't my bottom is telling.
I mean, how far down do you have to go?
Mine was literally onthe precipice of death.
Mm-hmm.
Had I not gone, had Robin not takenme to the hospital that night, I
(22:01):
would have died from withdrawal.
I would've died.
They filled me full of Valium and Haldol.
Yeah.
To bring me back.
I had Dion DiMucci on a coupleof years ago on the podcast
from Dion and the Belmonts.
Legend.
Yeah.
And he's in recovery.
And he told a story about beingnew into recovery and being in
(22:25):
a limo with a bunch of folks.
He mentioned them and I don't recallthem at the time, but very famous
and somebody offered him a drug.
And I said, what would you say?
He said, well, I just said I'm good.
And then he proceeded to say, everyonein that limo is dead and then he
said, and I'm still making music.
That's you.
(22:46):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yep.
You, you alluded to 27people I went to rehab with.
90 days later, two of uswere sober and one was dead.
Two of us were sober, and it was and olderwoman that was the other sober person, and
I ran into her about 10 years after rehab.
(23:07):
Awesome.
In a store and we just, we embraced andit was such a happy reunion because we
were both still sober 10 years later.
And it was amazing.
But all, you know, the 25 others.
24 others, the other one was, it surehits home and that, you know, that
(23:28):
might even be a better percentageof success than the actual average.
Yeah.
Well, you know, you never know.
When I used to do this, Michael,sometimes you would say, well I think
this person will, or that person will,or this per... you don't know, even
the pros that, you know, we don't know.
You know, you watchthese show Intervention.
Oh boy.
(23:48):
Yeah.
And people who seem to haveeverything going for him.
And then the little last littletagline, they relapsed in nine
days and then some dude living in arefrigerator box down by the river.
He's been sober for nine months.
You know, you, you don't know.
Right?
My counselor gave me the least chanceof success out of the 29 people.
(24:09):
Wow.
So October, 1993.
So what is that?
You're now on 30 years.
32. It'll be 32 in October.
Wow.
My math is used to be better.
Mine too.
That's outstanding.
Congratulations.
Well, there can't be abetter sober birthday present
than the birth of a child.
Who was born on your sober birthday?
(24:30):
Emily, my musician daughter who's gotover a hundred million streams on Spotify.
Unbelievable.
Yeah.
The day to the day, two years to theday that I quit drinking, she was born.
And it just solidifiedthat decision, you know?
I mean, the, the universe was smiling.
It was very powerful.
What did it do?
I mean, I know you said solidifiedit, but how did then being a dad,
(24:55):
and of course Robin is of coursestill incredibly supportive, right?
Mm-hmm.
How did being a dad change yourview of sobriety and recovery?
It just made life thatmuch deeper and sweeter.
And to be able to experience knowingthat when you're as far down the
alcoholic wormhole as I was, you know,you wouldn't be able to enjoy that.
(25:19):
We tried early in our marriageto have children and I would've
been a horrible father.
So it's a really good thingthat we weren't successful.
Being a father, just, itchanges everything for everyone.
You know, I tell my friends nowthat after they have the birth of
their first child, your life willnever, ever again be the same.
(25:40):
It just won't.
Yeah, yeah.
You know so to
love every moment, toexperience everything fully.
You know, is the gift of sobriety.
Oh, that's great.
You know, I'll let you end it with this.
(26:02):
You, you and I both livein Wisconsin, right?
And you're a Packer fan.
You have to be.
If you're not, then move.
Alright.
(Laughs)
So you tell a story where youhad an aha moment during the
Green Bay Packers Victory Parade.
For those of you living inMinnesota, that's what you get
when you win the Super Bowl.
(laughs) Oh, careful there.
(26:23):
Sorry.
Yeah, right.
I just lost a state.
And after they won the SuperBowl in New Orleans in the mid
nineties, you had like an aha.
You defined winning as...
Well, you and I both know.
That the seventies and eightieswere the pinnacle of mediocrity.
Oh god, that's what makesthe jokes fun, right?
(26:45):
Yeah.
Eight and eight season was a success.
Yeah.
You know?
Wow!
We're, and, and almost makingthe playoffs in 1989 was amazing.
Anyway to live through all of that.
Every week in the fall, as we alldid, as Wisconsinites, and to see
that success after 20 plus years.
(27:07):
I became a fan the year after theywon Super Bowl II, so I knew nothing
but mediocrity, nothing exceptmediocrity for my entire fandom.
I thought the Packers are winningand, and I looked at my 16 month
old daughter next to me, and,and I'm blubbering like an idiot.
(27:28):
I've got snot coming outta my noseand just crying, watching Packers in
their open air buses going throughstreets of snowy streets of Green Bay.
And my daughter says,daddy, why are you crying?
I said, they're happy tears, Emily.
Because, you know, it was at thatmoment that I thought, you know,
this reaction, which was so visceraland so almost violently crying
(27:52):
was not just for a football team.
It was also for me.
It was also maybe, maybe I'm winning,maybe, maybe I do deserve this happiness
in this modest little home and in mybeautiful family that I've got now.
And looking at a musical careeras a means to a living as opposed
to trying to be a rock star.
(28:13):
It was an epiphany.
It was an eyeopening moment,and I carry it with me.
I carried that awakening with me.
And after that, the Packerswere just a football team
and not an obsession as well.
Wow.
That's incredible.
That's just such a greatdefinition of winning too.
(28:33):
For those of you listening andwatching please go to the links
provided and listen to some ofMichael's old music and new music.
And his daughter's music that you'refeatured on in several of them, right?
Yeah.
It's just, it's just wonderful.
Michael, thanks so much.
It's an inspiring story.
Your work.
Pick up the book.
It's just a great read.
(28:55):
We hope that those of you listening, findlove, courage, support wherever you are.
Thanks for listening.
Be safe and I'm gonna borrowa line from Michael to end it.
Life is so sweet, sober.
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