March 6, 2018 • 31 mins
Academy Award-winning screenwriter and 'Nashville' creator Callie Khouri visits KB's condo with a stack of cookbooks to talk about the peace she finds in the kitchen. Plus: Trade Ya, and Kristian's tribute to one of the greatest music producers of all time.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello, This is Christian Bush and welcome to Episode four,
A New Hope of Geeking Out my new podcast. Every
episode is a new person talking about what they're obsessed
with that has nothing to do with their job. The
only requirement is that they're totally geeking out on it
and they want to talk about it. From revolving restaurants
(00:23):
to green tea kit cats, from homestar runner to custom
airbrush license plates, from your favorite vacation location to collecting
old typewriters. Tell me about what you love, why you
love it, how you got into it, and what makes
it awesome. Every episode is presented in three chapters. Chapter one,
my guest and I talk about what they're obsessed with.
(00:44):
Chapter two is a game I call trade jo, where
my guest and I turn each other on to one
thing that we've discovered. And chapter three closes the show
with me talking about music that I'm currently geeking out
on and why I believe that curiosity is can tageous
and the life is better with the soundtrack. So let's
go Chapter one. Today's guest is Callie Curry, the Academy
(01:14):
Award winning screenwriter of Thelma and Louise who has also
directed movies like Divine Secrets of the Yaya Sisterhood and
Mad Money. Most recently, she created the hit formerly ABC
now CMT Hulu television drama Nashville Heaven. Nashville's wrapping up
(01:41):
its final season, and I'm so excited to have one
of its stars, Claire Bowen, who plays Scarlett, joining me
and sugar Land on the road this summer. Callie has
come over to my place in Nashville in the afternoon
and the two of us are sitting down at my
kitchen table. She's brought with her a stack of cookbooks
and you can hear us page and do them while
(02:01):
we're talking. All Right, I'm here with Cali Curry. Hi,
thank you for being here on my wonderful, gigantic podcast.
Thank you for asking me. There's nowhere else I'd rather be. Um. So,
the rules may have or may not have been explained
to you, but I'll explain them again. Um. What I'm
interested in is what you're geeking out on right now,
(02:23):
what you're totally into, what you're excited about that has
nothing to do with your job, right Yeah, So the
first thing you're gonna have to do is explain your job. Well,
My job is um as a producer and a writer
and a director for the television show Nashville on the
(02:44):
beautiful CMT network. It's a pretty uh all inclusive job. Yeah,
it keeps me very busy, and then I have other
projects on the side. So, and have you done this?
Most of your life? Is this? Most of this is
your thing? Most of my adult life, I wrote my
I didn't write my first script until I was in
my early thirties, but that was Stilman Louise, So I
(03:06):
kind of didn't have a there was no going back
from that. That was your first one, that was my
first one. That's super cool. Well, on the one hand,
on the other hand, it would have been nice to
build up to it a little bit because but once
I wrote that, you know, I want an Academy award
and a whole bunch of other stuff, which I can
tell you was the last thing in the universe that
(03:30):
I could have imagined happening when the first time I
sat down to write. And so I guess I just
looked at it as I had been kind of searching
for so long to figure out what my calling was
that that just seemed like, well, this must be the answer.
So what are you into right now? What I am
(03:50):
into and what I am doing when whenever somebody's not
looking at me or I'm not performing my job, as
I am either reading recipe these or creating recipes in
my head, or looking at pictures of food or planning
menu that maybe someday I'll actually have time to cook.
(04:10):
It's I think about food almost all the time. And
sometimes when I'm really freaking out at work, I go
in my office. I closed the door and I just
go to like my favorite cooking websites, and I just
go away and I watched videos of people making su
FLEs and making pastry dough and all kinds of other things.
(04:33):
And I just stay there. And then when I've calmed
down enough, I can go back out and pick it
up where I left off. And the thing I love
about Nashville is since I've moved here, I've been to
a couple of dinner parties and I leave with cookbooks
of people going here. You need to look at these,
they have the same thing. I'm not alone, you know,
(04:54):
just just take them home and just just read them,
just go through them. You can give it back whenever.
And so that's been happening, and I just thought, Wow,
I thought it was just me. I'll be over at
someone's house and I see cookbooks, and it's really hard
for me to remember that I'm supposed to be engaging
with somebody because I can just take the cookbook and
go sit down and just go all the way through it. Yeah,
(05:18):
And I love old cookbooks, Like I go to antique
stores and things like that and look for the old
like junior league or charity league or church cookbooks that
have been put together by everybody just giving recipes. And
they're hilarious, first of all because the stuff that you
would just go how did they think of that? And
(05:40):
who in their right mind would eat that? But like what,
it's just fun you can almost do. Like I saw something.
I opened this one randomly today and I just saw
something called chocolate mayonnaise, and I was like, yeah, no,
I won't. I won't any desire to try that at all.
That's the opposite of like a Reese's peanut butter, right,
(06:03):
and it's I would never want to put together exactly.
It's or like quick fake charcoal steak, Like I don't
even need to read that one because I know I'm
not gonna be having that, but just the fact that
somebody has done this whole thing of how to do it,
(06:23):
and and like this is the Nashville Seasons one, which
is I'm sure probably still it's a junior league, but
it's an old one. They're great. And the Southern ones,
for me, are the best. And I have friends that
know that I'm into this now, so I have them
from everywhere. I have Amish ones and you know, Puget
(06:44):
Sound ones and Tahitian ones and you know, just all
these how this cook hurt, you know, Remember I started
cooking when I was little, Like I really loved it.
My mom was a really the excellent cook. And I
remember we had these time Live cookbooks and they had
(07:05):
these beautiful pictures on the front of each one, and
they came in a series and I just couldn't take
my eyes off of them, and so I would go
through them. And then we had these really old cookbooks
which I still have. I can't remember where they're from.
It was Volumes one and two, and you know it.
I mean it had recipes for fudge and I used
to make like this Annus candy when I was a
(07:27):
kid that was this red hard candy that I just
was like, you know, I just did it in my
spare time. I don't know. Why do you feel more calm? Yes?
I do. It's like I feel completely engaged when I'm cooking,
like everything's fine, I'm happy, and I just have a
(07:48):
real sense of well being when I'm doing it. I
love it. Did It's also natural for you you know.
I often think that if I didn't end up doing
what I'm doing now, that it would have been great
had I figured out that this whole thing was going
to happen with everybody being chefs and knowing, you know,
with our society being as as food obsessed as it is,
(08:11):
that I probably would have gone into that, you know.
But at the time, I just didn't think of it.
But the other day, like Julia Child came on and
you know, it had been on PBS, and and then
this old Julia Child show came on with Baking with
Julia and they were making gingerbreads and I just was
(08:35):
gone for like, I don't even remember. I just was
sucked in. I could watch a million of them. I mean,
I don't watch the cooking shows very much anymore because
they're all competitive and I don't really enjoy that. I
don't really want to kind of experience other people's anxieties,
and I find those incredibly anxiety provoking. So the old
(09:00):
cooking shows, though, where they just show you how to
make stuff, I just I can watch them all day long.
So somebody's listening right now and they're interested in getting
into this, how would you start them? You know? There's
some really good Mark Bittman has great cookbooks for people
(09:22):
who are just beginning, and they have hundreds of recipes
in it, but they're very basic. And I've given that
cookbook to a lot of people who want to cook
but say they don't know anything about it because he's
works for the New York Times. But he he's just
(09:42):
another one of those people that just makes everything look
so simple and it's all very fresh and easy, and
there's no like monumental challenges in it, and it's great,
you know, and it's everything. I mean, it's like every
kind of food you've ever heard of, there's there's some
(10:02):
recipe for it, and so I usually start people there.
But the other thing I do is just like when
you eat something that you really like, figure out what's
in it, you know, like really try to figure out
if you could duplicate it. I do that all the time.
I just try to taste everything in it as much
(10:22):
as I can, and then next time I'm cooking trying
to figure out how they did it. So do you
feel like the great recipes are like great magic tricks,
like the magicians keep them hidden well, or you know
it's sharing. I think it's a culture of sharing. I mean,
I think for as many cookbooks as there are, aside
(10:43):
from it being a money making an enterprise, I think,
you know, there's a generosity about giving people food, making
it for them and feeding them. That is that's, at
the end of the day, the part of it that's
so beautiful. I mean I I use it as you know,
a sanctuary and of relief. But when I'm cooking for people,
(11:05):
the whole time, I'm thinking this is going to go
in their bodies and it's going to become part of
them for you know what I mean. And so I
always had this joke whenever cook a big thing, you know,
I go do me a favor, eat it really slowly
and just see if you can taste the love, you know,
because it is a way for me to show people
(11:26):
that I love them, you know, and so I mean
I put a lot into it. Have you Have you
gotten to the point where you take a day off
just to cook, Well, I'll take a whole day if
I'm gonna if I'm going to have people over, I
will start two days before just thinking about it and
trying to figure out what they would like and kind
(11:47):
of try to imagine the experience of us all being
together eating it. The thing that's kind of strange is
when I when I do that, by the time I
sit down, I can't taste anything anymore. So I don't
even care if it's you know what I mean, you
judge yourself on the outcome. Well, I I kind of
watched them like I I want to see them enjoying
it more than I care if I enjoy it myself.
(12:09):
Tell me a couple of the strangest things you've made,
or at least like the furthest out there things like
if you looked at it and you're like, this has
a incredible level of difficulty. I'm gonna try to stick
the landing. I try not to think of anything that's
too difficult, Like I try not to think that there's
anything that I just can't make even no matter how
(12:30):
many times I've been proven wrong. Um, when I was
a kid, I don't know where I saw it, but
I saw it baked alaska, and I was like, I'm
making a baked alaska. And I made one for my
mom was having a dinner party. My parents were having
a dinner party. And I made this baked alaska that
(12:51):
had was in the shape of a mountain and it
had like a little eggshell on the top with kersh
poured in it, you know, and so you would pour
it in and then light it on fire. So I
cook breakfast. That's the only thing I cooked. Do you
have a breakfast food that you would recommend like that?
I learned how to cook. Well, yes, I mean, you
(13:14):
know any of the fritatas. I like fritatas that have
like sausage and stuff like that, and you know what
I mean. And they're really easy. I mean you can
actually just put anything in it you want and just
bake it. It's so it's simple. But the other thing
I like making is like German apple pancakes and things
like that, or like this baked pear pancake. So you
(13:39):
basically just make a batter and while you're making it,
you you cut up your pears and you just put
it in the oven and it just kind of puffs
up and one side of its brown from the pan
and the other side is kind of brown from the top.
And then you just kind of flip it out of
the pan when it's done and put powder sugar on it,
(14:00):
and it's so good. It's just ridiculous. Oh my gosh. Yeah,
when are you going to make a cookbook? You know,
I don't know. I mean I write down stuff all
the time, but I mean at this point, I just
feel like me doing a cookbook is almost derivative. There's
so many I take from so many sources. I'd have
(14:21):
to really sit down and think about how to narrow
it down because it would be all over the place.
Like my grandmother was Lebanese and she used to make
this thing that when I was a kid, I loved
so much. And it was cusa. It was stuffed squashed
with rice and lamb, and I loved it. I absolutely.
(14:43):
I mean it was like, I don't know, some kind
of magic potion to me. Like when I ate it,
I would just have these like, oh that's so good,
And I hadn't had it in years. Because she died
many years ago, and I just I don't know why
I never thought to make it, and then I thought
to make it, and I did, and it was so good.
(15:05):
I couldn't believe it. And I was so happy that
I was able to just kind of like remember what
she did to recreate it, you know. But the hard
thing that I couldn't recreate. She made what she called
Syrian bread. When my mom passed away, we were going
through everything. I found this recipe box and I started
(15:25):
going through the recipe box and the recipe was in there,
and so I have it just like set aside too
when I can like, really, really do it, really do
it because I am I as much as I liked
not anticipate failure, she had been doing it since she
was a child, and so she made it look so easy.
(15:47):
But I think there might be open the I need
some margin for error there. And I almost feel like
incantations or something making these recipes or a little bit
like spells. Yeah, well, it really reconnects you to the person, yeah,
whoever it was that made it for you. And the
(16:07):
first time my mom used to make this, this proven
salt beef stew that is I don't know. It's again.
It's one of those things that my family has it
all the time, and and I served it to several
friends because it's something you can just put in the oven.
It's braises for hours and it comes out and you know,
(16:28):
you just have it with French bread and salad, and
everybody thinks you're a genius. It's so good. And I
used to have friends call up and ask me when
I was going to make that again, or if I
was thinking of making that trying to direction tonight, and
I came over, yeah, and so I do you know
I do that? And then other people would ask me
when I was making fried chicken again, because that's something
(16:50):
that I you know, when I was living out in
l A, I could really I could really charm them
with that, because you know, good fried chicken isn't laying
around all over the place out there like it is here.
I have one recipe that was my mom's for a
strawberry chiffon pie, and it's just like when the strawberries
are good, you make this pie and it is the
(17:14):
essence of strawberry. It's so light and it's just like
getting hit in the face with strawberries. It's so good.
And whenever I give somebody the recipe at the end,
I always put serves one because I've eaten the whole
pie myself many times, a little bit at a time,
but I know nobody's touched it but me, and it's gone.
(17:37):
So your ser Chapter two. In every episode of Geeking Out,
I see if I can trade one thing I've discovered
with one thing that my guest has discovered, a friendly exchange.
(18:00):
I call it trade you. This is part of the
podcast that I call trade You. I will trade you
one turn you onto one thing that I'm into kind
of this week in exchange for one thing that you're
into this week, all right, and I will go first.
That will give you enough time to think this through.
Because I've just put you on the spot. I feel terrible.
(18:22):
My dear friend UM in Atlanta and my assistant UM.
She has been exercising a lot recently, and for her,
her story is that her the exercise is very boring,
so she has taken to mowing her lawn as her
(18:42):
form of exercise with a push mower old Tommy push
mower and to the point where she's now learned how
to tune up the mower and and you know, had
the guys come over and like fix your blades and everything.
And what she loves about it is that she gets
to push this mower around kind of in a Georgia
heat and she sweats and it she gets a whole
(19:04):
lot of aerobic exercise, and I think it satisfies her.
Um Uh. I'm sure she's not diagnosed, but her like
casual O c D right of trying to keep the
lines straight, you know what I mean? Um, And now
she ran out of just mowing her own lawn over
and over again, started mowing the neighbor's lawn and then
just anybody's lawn, like not for money, but like the
(19:24):
Angel law and rowing moment. And so she has been
really sore in her shoulders. So the other day she
showed up um at my house and she had this massager.
And you know, you see these things like on and
in the airports at Brookstone or whatever. You know, you
sit in a chair and it makes you feel awesome,
but you think to yourself, I never have enough money
(19:45):
for that. Well, she brought one over and it kind
of goes on your neck and you put your hands.
If you can imagine this, you put your hands through
the the that put tension on the edges that pull
the thing into your neck and it heats up. And
I brought one here good to show you today because um,
when I put this on like four days ago, I
(20:06):
had just about lost my mind. Here it is. Here's
the box, all right, and I wish you know. I'm
not sponsored by these people, so we're just saying natural
Eco and a t U R A L A c
O three D neck and shoulder massager. All right. I'm
getting that you need this in your life. I definitely did.
(20:28):
Had had I bought two, I would just give you
one of these here, or you would have found one missing.
The other cool thing that I can't wait is um
because we're in Nashville right now, I'm gonna be driving
back to Atlanta, and it has an adapter for the car.
Oh god, that's so nice. Natural Eco in a t
(20:49):
U R A L I c O. This thing is
for real three D neck and shoulder massage. I don't
know why the three D needs to be in there.
I don't either, but if you can imagine um. Anyway,
whenever we put this podcast out, I'll put this up
on the web side. So you can see what it is.
I'm ordering one. In fact, I might do it right
now here. It is. I got it. I got mine
(21:11):
on Amazon. That's what I was just gonna do. Alright,
I don't know. I mean, I can't It could be anything,
could be like all right, I'll tell you, like a
show I should watch, or a can't be a food
I can eat. That's cheating. That's what you do already, right,
all right. Well, there's one thing that I think is
the most brilliant invention so far this year for me.
(21:36):
The bandalier. Why the bandalier. It's called a bandalier, and
it's for your phone, and it's on this string is
around your neck. Yeah, you kind of wear it across
your chest if you want, or over your shoulder or
in any case. It's got a strap on it that
it's with you at all times. It's got this little
(21:57):
card holder for your credit card and money and stuff
like that purse. It's like a phone purse. And and
every time I'm out with it on and I forget
like I have it has to go with every outfit
because I'm never without it. And every time I'm out,
some woman comes over to me and goes, oh my god,
(22:19):
where did you get that? And I feel like at
this point I should like have stock in the company
because where did you get? So? I got it online.
The company is called Bandalier. I've never seen them in stores,
so you have to go to bandalier dot com and
order it. And they're might shape. Yeah, they're not inexpensive,
but they are so much less expensive than replacing your
(22:42):
phone after it drops into the toilet two days in
a row, which is what happened to cause me to
have this problem that needed to be solved immediately. And
a friend showed up with one. She's like, this is
the greatest thing. You gotta have it here, take this,
and I did, and it's like I can't live without it.
(23:02):
Oh my gosh. Okay, I accept all right. I don't
know if they make one for men, but I can out.
I'll make it. I can rock it. Yeah. I don't
have a problem with many exactly. You know, if you're
man enough, you can wear anything. Anything is better than
a Fannie pack for me, Callie, thank you for being here,
Thank you so much for having me. Chapter three me
(23:31):
geeking out on music this week. The answer to an
age old question, what is a music producer? What do
they do? Is this actually a real job or did
someone make it up? Is that different than a movie producer?
Is this a job for someone to wear suits or
does budgets or conducts in orchestra. Callie Curry is actually
(23:54):
married to one of the most influential American music producers,
Tibo and Burnett. The job description of a music producer
is completely unwritten. I would simply describe the music producer
as the collaborator who helps the recording artist record their
(24:17):
knowledge and skills combined with the knowledge and the skills
of the artist in a unique way, and that combination
becomes the essence of the fingerprint or the recording. Many times,
as a producer myself, my responsibilities have included picking the musicians,
picking or writing the songs, arranging or rearranging a song,
(24:40):
helping the artists focus on telling their story, guiding what
songs sound like, what instruments should be played, what an
album should be titled, putting the songs in the right order,
keeping the artist on track, keeping the record label on track,
creating an atmosphere that everyone feels inspired to create an
record in. But overall, for me, it's the delicate balance
(25:04):
between pushing everyone to reach for creative spaces they haven't
been in before, while making sure the recording is as
solid as it can be. As a teenager and and
through my early twenties, UM I circled around the sounds
that were really inspiring me, and I listened to and
consumed an incredible amount of music. And while I listened,
(25:25):
I read the liner notes, and I asked myself many times, well,
how are these things connected that I like? And one
of the things I noticed was the name of the producer.
Here's how T Bone Burnett changed my life. The first
thing I really heard of T Bones that I knew
was actually T Bones was this album by Elvis Costello
(25:50):
called King of America. When I heard this, I immediately
went and started buying Elvis Costello records, and as I
hug none of the other albums sounded like this, So
I started to read the liner notes and found out
that T Bone Burnett was a name on there. In
the same year, I had heard a song by Robbie
(26:12):
Robertson and it had might have been out earlier that
had a voice in it, a guest voice that I
didn't know. And as I chased down the voice, I
found out that the voice belonged to a member of
a band called the Bodins. When I bought the Boating's album,
at the bottom of the liner notes, I noticed it
was produced by T Bone Burnett. Suddenly I thought to myself,
(26:37):
I really have an idea of what I like, and
I liked a lot of things, but really what I
liked about these albums is their combination of acoustic instruments
and power rock. I loved the idea that a song
could exist with really strong rhythm and along with acoustic instruments.
I'm from the mountains of East Tennessee. I grew up
(26:58):
on acoustic instruments, but I was young and I loved
the power of rhythm. So fast forward to where all
of that information I had processed into starting a band.
Mini bands, but this particular one was with Andrew Hira,
my friend, and it was called Billy Pilgrim, and we
(27:21):
had made an album that was very strongly rooted in
rhythm and very strongly rooted in acoustic instruments, much like
I learned from T Bone. During the year that we
had recorded it, we had gotten a record deal with
Atlantic Records, and they had very, very wisely asked us
to go and and remix and remake the record. But
(27:43):
during that year this came out. Suddenly I had heard
sounds that we were also making. So I sat on
the floor of my apartment in Atlanta, and I almost
half cried over the fact that they had beat us
to the punch, and then also in other half of
(28:05):
joy of how much I loved this record. So I
dug there in through the liner notes and noticed the
producer was T Bone Burnett. As soon as that happened,
I realized that I had moved from being a person
who's casually noticing his name to a person who was
absolutely a fan of what he was doing. Not long after,
(28:28):
Andrew and I made our next record for Atlantic, immediately
this came out again. I sat in my living room
with another c D opened up and the liner notes
strung across the sofa, and I noticed again T Bone Burnett.
(28:48):
So I thought to myself, that guy is awesome. I'm
going to follow him and his career, no matter what
kind of where it goes. A number of years later,
as Billy Pogram slowed down, I heard this and constant
sorrow through his day and a constant sorrow I've seen drum.
(29:26):
So then I decided maybe country music was the way
to go and started a country band. I would say this,
uh t Bone sits as an example for me as
a creator, as an artist, as a producer, and as
a songwriter, and on top of that, also a musician.
He played guitar on many, many of these records. I've
(29:47):
absorbed t bones attitude and treatment of acoustic instruments, his
guitar sounds that I heard on records that he made,
where drums matter, where they don't, how important the singer is,
how important the song is. But mostly I hear in
his work the care, in the space I feel he
gives to the emotion of a song. Angry songs have
(30:09):
angry recordings, and driving songs sound like they have rolling
wheels underneath them. Songs about healing, in fact, actually kind
of put a save on my hurt. When I hear him,
it's a joy to listen to the way that he
hears the world around him. I barely know him, but
I feel like I've heard his thoughts for a long
long time. So what is a music producer? Maybe their guides,
(30:33):
maybe their storytellers, babysitters magicians, but they are essential to
the art of making recorded music. So next time you
hear something you love, dig around a little see who
produced it. You may find a rabbit hole that you
can jump down and discover more music that you love.
(30:57):
I hope you enjoyed this episode of Geeking Out and
we are already hard at work on the next one.
Are you obsessed with something amazing? I want to tell
us about it. Right to us at geeking Out with
KB at gmail dot com and you might be a
guest on an upcoming episode. Come find out more about
me and this podcast at Christian Bush dot com, Christian
(31:18):
with a K people follow me at Christian Bush on Twitter,
Christian Bush on Instagram, Christian Bush on Facebook, and Christian M.
Bush on Snapchat. Thanks to Bobby Bones for the opportunity
to make this podcast, Briandon Bush for making the soundtrack
and assembling the pieces, Tom Tapley for audio wizardry, and
Whitney Pastrick for being a great producer and making this
(31:38):
whole thing possible. This is Christian Bush Geeking Out. Thank
you for listening.
Hello, This is Christian Bush and welcome to Episode four,
A New Hope of Geeking Out my new podcast. Every
episode is a new person talking about what they're obsessed
with that has nothing to do with their job. The
only requirement is that they're totally geeking out on it
and they want to talk about it. From revolving restaurants
(00:23):
to green tea kit cats, from homestar runner to custom
airbrush license plates, from your favorite vacation location to collecting
old typewriters. Tell me about what you love, why you
love it, how you got into it, and what makes
it awesome. Every episode is presented in three chapters. Chapter one,
my guest and I talk about what they're obsessed with.
(00:44):
Chapter two is a game I call trade jo, where
my guest and I turn each other on to one
thing that we've discovered. And chapter three closes the show
with me talking about music that I'm currently geeking out
on and why I believe that curiosity is can tageous
and the life is better with the soundtrack. So let's
go Chapter one. Today's guest is Callie Curry, the Academy
(01:14):
Award winning screenwriter of Thelma and Louise who has also
directed movies like Divine Secrets of the Yaya Sisterhood and
Mad Money. Most recently, she created the hit formerly ABC
now CMT Hulu television drama Nashville Heaven. Nashville's wrapping up
(01:41):
its final season, and I'm so excited to have one
of its stars, Claire Bowen, who plays Scarlett, joining me
and sugar Land on the road this summer. Callie has
come over to my place in Nashville in the afternoon
and the two of us are sitting down at my
kitchen table. She's brought with her a stack of cookbooks
and you can hear us page and do them while
(02:01):
we're talking. All Right, I'm here with Cali Curry. Hi,
thank you for being here on my wonderful, gigantic podcast.
Thank you for asking me. There's nowhere else I'd rather be. Um. So,
the rules may have or may not have been explained
to you, but I'll explain them again. Um. What I'm
interested in is what you're geeking out on right now,
(02:23):
what you're totally into, what you're excited about that has
nothing to do with your job, right Yeah, So the
first thing you're gonna have to do is explain your job. Well,
My job is um as a producer and a writer
and a director for the television show Nashville on the
(02:44):
beautiful CMT network. It's a pretty uh all inclusive job. Yeah,
it keeps me very busy, and then I have other
projects on the side. So, and have you done this?
Most of your life? Is this? Most of this is
your thing? Most of my adult life, I wrote my
I didn't write my first script until I was in
my early thirties, but that was Stilman Louise, So I
(03:06):
kind of didn't have a there was no going back
from that. That was your first one, that was my
first one. That's super cool. Well, on the one hand,
on the other hand, it would have been nice to
build up to it a little bit because but once
I wrote that, you know, I want an Academy award
and a whole bunch of other stuff, which I can
tell you was the last thing in the universe that
(03:30):
I could have imagined happening when the first time I
sat down to write. And so I guess I just
looked at it as I had been kind of searching
for so long to figure out what my calling was
that that just seemed like, well, this must be the answer.
So what are you into right now? What I am
(03:50):
into and what I am doing when whenever somebody's not
looking at me or I'm not performing my job, as
I am either reading recipe these or creating recipes in
my head, or looking at pictures of food or planning
menu that maybe someday I'll actually have time to cook.
(04:10):
It's I think about food almost all the time. And
sometimes when I'm really freaking out at work, I go
in my office. I closed the door and I just
go to like my favorite cooking websites, and I just
go away and I watched videos of people making su
FLEs and making pastry dough and all kinds of other things.
(04:33):
And I just stay there. And then when I've calmed
down enough, I can go back out and pick it
up where I left off. And the thing I love
about Nashville is since I've moved here, I've been to
a couple of dinner parties and I leave with cookbooks
of people going here. You need to look at these,
they have the same thing. I'm not alone, you know,
(04:54):
just just take them home and just just read them,
just go through them. You can give it back whenever.
And so that's been happening, and I just thought, Wow,
I thought it was just me. I'll be over at
someone's house and I see cookbooks, and it's really hard
for me to remember that I'm supposed to be engaging
with somebody because I can just take the cookbook and
go sit down and just go all the way through it. Yeah,
(05:18):
And I love old cookbooks, Like I go to antique
stores and things like that and look for the old
like junior league or charity league or church cookbooks that
have been put together by everybody just giving recipes. And
they're hilarious, first of all because the stuff that you
would just go how did they think of that? And
(05:40):
who in their right mind would eat that? But like what,
it's just fun you can almost do. Like I saw something.
I opened this one randomly today and I just saw
something called chocolate mayonnaise, and I was like, yeah, no,
I won't. I won't any desire to try that at all.
That's the opposite of like a Reese's peanut butter, right,
(06:03):
and it's I would never want to put together exactly.
It's or like quick fake charcoal steak, Like I don't
even need to read that one because I know I'm
not gonna be having that, but just the fact that
somebody has done this whole thing of how to do it,
(06:23):
and and like this is the Nashville Seasons one, which
is I'm sure probably still it's a junior league, but
it's an old one. They're great. And the Southern ones,
for me, are the best. And I have friends that
know that I'm into this now, so I have them
from everywhere. I have Amish ones and you know, Puget
(06:44):
Sound ones and Tahitian ones and you know, just all
these how this cook hurt, you know, Remember I started
cooking when I was little, Like I really loved it.
My mom was a really the excellent cook. And I
remember we had these time Live cookbooks and they had
(07:05):
these beautiful pictures on the front of each one, and
they came in a series and I just couldn't take
my eyes off of them, and so I would go
through them. And then we had these really old cookbooks
which I still have. I can't remember where they're from.
It was Volumes one and two, and you know it.
I mean it had recipes for fudge and I used
to make like this Annus candy when I was a
(07:27):
kid that was this red hard candy that I just
was like, you know, I just did it in my
spare time. I don't know. Why do you feel more calm? Yes?
I do. It's like I feel completely engaged when I'm cooking,
like everything's fine, I'm happy, and I just have a
(07:48):
real sense of well being when I'm doing it. I
love it. Did It's also natural for you you know.
I often think that if I didn't end up doing
what I'm doing now, that it would have been great
had I figured out that this whole thing was going
to happen with everybody being chefs and knowing, you know,
with our society being as as food obsessed as it is,
(08:11):
that I probably would have gone into that, you know.
But at the time, I just didn't think of it.
But the other day, like Julia Child came on and
you know, it had been on PBS, and and then
this old Julia Child show came on with Baking with
Julia and they were making gingerbreads and I just was
(08:35):
gone for like, I don't even remember. I just was
sucked in. I could watch a million of them. I mean,
I don't watch the cooking shows very much anymore because
they're all competitive and I don't really enjoy that. I
don't really want to kind of experience other people's anxieties,
and I find those incredibly anxiety provoking. So the old
(09:00):
cooking shows, though, where they just show you how to
make stuff, I just I can watch them all day long.
So somebody's listening right now and they're interested in getting
into this, how would you start them? You know? There's
some really good Mark Bittman has great cookbooks for people
(09:22):
who are just beginning, and they have hundreds of recipes
in it, but they're very basic. And I've given that
cookbook to a lot of people who want to cook
but say they don't know anything about it because he's
works for the New York Times. But he he's just
(09:42):
another one of those people that just makes everything look
so simple and it's all very fresh and easy, and
there's no like monumental challenges in it, and it's great,
you know, and it's everything. I mean, it's like every
kind of food you've ever heard of, there's there's some
(10:02):
recipe for it, and so I usually start people there.
But the other thing I do is just like when
you eat something that you really like, figure out what's
in it, you know, like really try to figure out
if you could duplicate it. I do that all the time.
I just try to taste everything in it as much
(10:22):
as I can, and then next time I'm cooking trying
to figure out how they did it. So do you
feel like the great recipes are like great magic tricks,
like the magicians keep them hidden well, or you know
it's sharing. I think it's a culture of sharing. I mean,
I think for as many cookbooks as there are, aside
(10:43):
from it being a money making an enterprise, I think,
you know, there's a generosity about giving people food, making
it for them and feeding them. That is that's, at
the end of the day, the part of it that's
so beautiful. I mean I I use it as you know,
a sanctuary and of relief. But when I'm cooking for people,
(11:05):
the whole time, I'm thinking this is going to go
in their bodies and it's going to become part of
them for you know what I mean. And so I
always had this joke whenever cook a big thing, you know,
I go do me a favor, eat it really slowly
and just see if you can taste the love, you know,
because it is a way for me to show people
(11:26):
that I love them, you know, and so I mean
I put a lot into it. Have you Have you
gotten to the point where you take a day off
just to cook, Well, I'll take a whole day if
I'm gonna if I'm going to have people over, I
will start two days before just thinking about it and
trying to figure out what they would like and kind
(11:47):
of try to imagine the experience of us all being
together eating it. The thing that's kind of strange is
when I when I do that, by the time I
sit down, I can't taste anything anymore. So I don't
even care if it's you know what I mean, you
judge yourself on the outcome. Well, I I kind of
watched them like I I want to see them enjoying
it more than I care if I enjoy it myself.
(12:09):
Tell me a couple of the strangest things you've made,
or at least like the furthest out there things like
if you looked at it and you're like, this has
a incredible level of difficulty. I'm gonna try to stick
the landing. I try not to think of anything that's
too difficult, Like I try not to think that there's
anything that I just can't make even no matter how
(12:30):
many times I've been proven wrong. Um, when I was
a kid, I don't know where I saw it, but
I saw it baked alaska, and I was like, I'm
making a baked alaska. And I made one for my
mom was having a dinner party. My parents were having
a dinner party. And I made this baked alaska that
(12:51):
had was in the shape of a mountain and it
had like a little eggshell on the top with kersh
poured in it, you know, and so you would pour
it in and then light it on fire. So I
cook breakfast. That's the only thing I cooked. Do you
have a breakfast food that you would recommend like that?
I learned how to cook. Well, yes, I mean, you
(13:14):
know any of the fritatas. I like fritatas that have
like sausage and stuff like that, and you know what
I mean. And they're really easy. I mean you can
actually just put anything in it you want and just
bake it. It's so it's simple. But the other thing
I like making is like German apple pancakes and things
like that, or like this baked pear pancake. So you
(13:39):
basically just make a batter and while you're making it,
you you cut up your pears and you just put
it in the oven and it just kind of puffs
up and one side of its brown from the pan
and the other side is kind of brown from the top.
And then you just kind of flip it out of
the pan when it's done and put powder sugar on it,
(14:00):
and it's so good. It's just ridiculous. Oh my gosh. Yeah,
when are you going to make a cookbook? You know,
I don't know. I mean I write down stuff all
the time, but I mean at this point, I just
feel like me doing a cookbook is almost derivative. There's
so many I take from so many sources. I'd have
(14:21):
to really sit down and think about how to narrow
it down because it would be all over the place.
Like my grandmother was Lebanese and she used to make
this thing that when I was a kid, I loved
so much. And it was cusa. It was stuffed squashed
with rice and lamb, and I loved it. I absolutely.
(14:43):
I mean it was like, I don't know, some kind
of magic potion to me. Like when I ate it,
I would just have these like, oh that's so good,
And I hadn't had it in years. Because she died
many years ago, and I just I don't know why
I never thought to make it, and then I thought
to make it, and I did, and it was so good.
(15:05):
I couldn't believe it. And I was so happy that
I was able to just kind of like remember what
she did to recreate it, you know. But the hard
thing that I couldn't recreate. She made what she called
Syrian bread. When my mom passed away, we were going
through everything. I found this recipe box and I started
(15:25):
going through the recipe box and the recipe was in there,
and so I have it just like set aside too
when I can like, really, really do it, really do
it because I am I as much as I liked
not anticipate failure, she had been doing it since she
was a child, and so she made it look so easy.
(15:47):
But I think there might be open the I need
some margin for error there. And I almost feel like
incantations or something making these recipes or a little bit
like spells. Yeah, well, it really reconnects you to the person, yeah,
whoever it was that made it for you. And the
(16:07):
first time my mom used to make this, this proven
salt beef stew that is I don't know. It's again.
It's one of those things that my family has it
all the time, and and I served it to several
friends because it's something you can just put in the oven.
It's braises for hours and it comes out and you know,
(16:28):
you just have it with French bread and salad, and
everybody thinks you're a genius. It's so good. And I
used to have friends call up and ask me when
I was going to make that again, or if I
was thinking of making that trying to direction tonight, and
I came over, yeah, and so I do you know
I do that? And then other people would ask me
when I was making fried chicken again, because that's something
(16:50):
that I you know, when I was living out in
l A, I could really I could really charm them
with that, because you know, good fried chicken isn't laying
around all over the place out there like it is here.
I have one recipe that was my mom's for a
strawberry chiffon pie, and it's just like when the strawberries
are good, you make this pie and it is the
(17:14):
essence of strawberry. It's so light and it's just like
getting hit in the face with strawberries. It's so good.
And whenever I give somebody the recipe at the end,
I always put serves one because I've eaten the whole
pie myself many times, a little bit at a time,
but I know nobody's touched it but me, and it's gone.
(17:37):
So your ser Chapter two. In every episode of Geeking Out,
I see if I can trade one thing I've discovered
with one thing that my guest has discovered, a friendly exchange.
(18:00):
I call it trade you. This is part of the
podcast that I call trade You. I will trade you
one turn you onto one thing that I'm into kind
of this week in exchange for one thing that you're
into this week, all right, and I will go first.
That will give you enough time to think this through.
Because I've just put you on the spot. I feel terrible.
(18:22):
My dear friend UM in Atlanta and my assistant UM.
She has been exercising a lot recently, and for her,
her story is that her the exercise is very boring,
so she has taken to mowing her lawn as her
(18:42):
form of exercise with a push mower old Tommy push
mower and to the point where she's now learned how
to tune up the mower and and you know, had
the guys come over and like fix your blades and everything.
And what she loves about it is that she gets
to push this mower around kind of in a Georgia
heat and she sweats and it she gets a whole
(19:04):
lot of aerobic exercise, and I think it satisfies her.
Um Uh. I'm sure she's not diagnosed, but her like
casual O c D right of trying to keep the
lines straight, you know what I mean? Um, And now
she ran out of just mowing her own lawn over
and over again, started mowing the neighbor's lawn and then
just anybody's lawn, like not for money, but like the
(19:24):
Angel law and rowing moment. And so she has been
really sore in her shoulders. So the other day she
showed up um at my house and she had this massager.
And you know, you see these things like on and
in the airports at Brookstone or whatever. You know, you
sit in a chair and it makes you feel awesome,
but you think to yourself, I never have enough money
(19:45):
for that. Well, she brought one over and it kind
of goes on your neck and you put your hands.
If you can imagine this, you put your hands through
the the that put tension on the edges that pull
the thing into your neck and it heats up. And
I brought one here good to show you today because um,
when I put this on like four days ago, I
(20:06):
had just about lost my mind. Here it is. Here's
the box, all right, and I wish you know. I'm
not sponsored by these people, so we're just saying natural
Eco and a t U R A L A c
O three D neck and shoulder massager. All right. I'm
getting that you need this in your life. I definitely did.
(20:28):
Had had I bought two, I would just give you
one of these here, or you would have found one missing.
The other cool thing that I can't wait is um
because we're in Nashville right now, I'm gonna be driving
back to Atlanta, and it has an adapter for the car.
Oh god, that's so nice. Natural Eco in a t
(20:49):
U R A L I c O. This thing is
for real three D neck and shoulder massage. I don't
know why the three D needs to be in there.
I don't either, but if you can imagine um. Anyway,
whenever we put this podcast out, I'll put this up
on the web side. So you can see what it is.
I'm ordering one. In fact, I might do it right
now here. It is. I got it. I got mine
(21:11):
on Amazon. That's what I was just gonna do. Alright,
I don't know. I mean, I can't It could be anything,
could be like all right, I'll tell you, like a
show I should watch, or a can't be a food
I can eat. That's cheating. That's what you do already, right,
all right. Well, there's one thing that I think is
the most brilliant invention so far this year for me.
(21:36):
The bandalier. Why the bandalier. It's called a bandalier, and
it's for your phone, and it's on this string is
around your neck. Yeah, you kind of wear it across
your chest if you want, or over your shoulder or
in any case. It's got a strap on it that
it's with you at all times. It's got this little
(21:57):
card holder for your credit card and money and stuff
like that purse. It's like a phone purse. And and
every time I'm out with it on and I forget
like I have it has to go with every outfit
because I'm never without it. And every time I'm out,
some woman comes over to me and goes, oh my god,
(22:19):
where did you get that? And I feel like at
this point I should like have stock in the company
because where did you get? So? I got it online.
The company is called Bandalier. I've never seen them in stores,
so you have to go to bandalier dot com and
order it. And they're might shape. Yeah, they're not inexpensive,
but they are so much less expensive than replacing your
(22:42):
phone after it drops into the toilet two days in
a row, which is what happened to cause me to
have this problem that needed to be solved immediately. And
a friend showed up with one. She's like, this is
the greatest thing. You gotta have it here, take this,
and I did, and it's like I can't live without it.
(23:02):
Oh my gosh. Okay, I accept all right. I don't
know if they make one for men, but I can out.
I'll make it. I can rock it. Yeah. I don't
have a problem with many exactly. You know, if you're
man enough, you can wear anything. Anything is better than
a Fannie pack for me, Callie, thank you for being here,
Thank you so much for having me. Chapter three me
(23:31):
geeking out on music this week. The answer to an
age old question, what is a music producer? What do
they do? Is this actually a real job or did
someone make it up? Is that different than a movie producer?
Is this a job for someone to wear suits or
does budgets or conducts in orchestra. Callie Curry is actually
(23:54):
married to one of the most influential American music producers,
Tibo and Burnett. The job description of a music producer
is completely unwritten. I would simply describe the music producer
as the collaborator who helps the recording artist record their
(24:17):
knowledge and skills combined with the knowledge and the skills
of the artist in a unique way, and that combination
becomes the essence of the fingerprint or the recording. Many times,
as a producer myself, my responsibilities have included picking the musicians,
picking or writing the songs, arranging or rearranging a song,
(24:40):
helping the artists focus on telling their story, guiding what
songs sound like, what instruments should be played, what an
album should be titled, putting the songs in the right order,
keeping the artist on track, keeping the record label on track,
creating an atmosphere that everyone feels inspired to create an
record in. But overall, for me, it's the delicate balance
(25:04):
between pushing everyone to reach for creative spaces they haven't
been in before, while making sure the recording is as
solid as it can be. As a teenager and and
through my early twenties, UM I circled around the sounds
that were really inspiring me, and I listened to and
consumed an incredible amount of music. And while I listened,
(25:25):
I read the liner notes, and I asked myself many times, well,
how are these things connected that I like? And one
of the things I noticed was the name of the producer.
Here's how T Bone Burnett changed my life. The first
thing I really heard of T Bones that I knew
was actually T Bones was this album by Elvis Costello
(25:50):
called King of America. When I heard this, I immediately
went and started buying Elvis Costello records, and as I
hug none of the other albums sounded like this, So
I started to read the liner notes and found out
that T Bone Burnett was a name on there. In
the same year, I had heard a song by Robbie
(26:12):
Robertson and it had might have been out earlier that
had a voice in it, a guest voice that I
didn't know. And as I chased down the voice, I
found out that the voice belonged to a member of
a band called the Bodins. When I bought the Boating's album,
at the bottom of the liner notes, I noticed it
was produced by T Bone Burnett. Suddenly I thought to myself,
(26:37):
I really have an idea of what I like, and
I liked a lot of things, but really what I
liked about these albums is their combination of acoustic instruments
and power rock. I loved the idea that a song
could exist with really strong rhythm and along with acoustic instruments.
I'm from the mountains of East Tennessee. I grew up
(26:58):
on acoustic instruments, but I was young and I loved
the power of rhythm. So fast forward to where all
of that information I had processed into starting a band.
Mini bands, but this particular one was with Andrew Hira,
my friend, and it was called Billy Pilgrim, and we
(27:21):
had made an album that was very strongly rooted in
rhythm and very strongly rooted in acoustic instruments, much like
I learned from T Bone. During the year that we
had recorded it, we had gotten a record deal with
Atlantic Records, and they had very, very wisely asked us
to go and and remix and remake the record. But
(27:43):
during that year this came out. Suddenly I had heard
sounds that we were also making. So I sat on
the floor of my apartment in Atlanta, and I almost
half cried over the fact that they had beat us
to the punch, and then also in other half of
(28:05):
joy of how much I loved this record. So I
dug there in through the liner notes and noticed the
producer was T Bone Burnett. As soon as that happened,
I realized that I had moved from being a person
who's casually noticing his name to a person who was
absolutely a fan of what he was doing. Not long after,
(28:28):
Andrew and I made our next record for Atlantic, immediately
this came out again. I sat in my living room
with another c D opened up and the liner notes
strung across the sofa, and I noticed again T Bone Burnett.
(28:48):
So I thought to myself, that guy is awesome. I'm
going to follow him and his career, no matter what
kind of where it goes. A number of years later,
as Billy Pogram slowed down, I heard this and constant
sorrow through his day and a constant sorrow I've seen drum.
(29:26):
So then I decided maybe country music was the way
to go and started a country band. I would say this,
uh t Bone sits as an example for me as
a creator, as an artist, as a producer, and as
a songwriter, and on top of that, also a musician.
He played guitar on many, many of these records. I've
(29:47):
absorbed t bones attitude and treatment of acoustic instruments, his
guitar sounds that I heard on records that he made,
where drums matter, where they don't, how important the singer is,
how important the song is. But mostly I hear in
his work the care, in the space I feel he
gives to the emotion of a song. Angry songs have
(30:09):
angry recordings, and driving songs sound like they have rolling
wheels underneath them. Songs about healing, in fact, actually kind
of put a save on my hurt. When I hear him,
it's a joy to listen to the way that he
hears the world around him. I barely know him, but
I feel like I've heard his thoughts for a long
long time. So what is a music producer? Maybe their guides,
(30:33):
maybe their storytellers, babysitters magicians, but they are essential to
the art of making recorded music. So next time you
hear something you love, dig around a little see who
produced it. You may find a rabbit hole that you
can jump down and discover more music that you love.
(30:57):
I hope you enjoyed this episode of Geeking Out and
we are already hard at work on the next one.
Are you obsessed with something amazing? I want to tell
us about it. Right to us at geeking Out with
KB at gmail dot com and you might be a
guest on an upcoming episode. Come find out more about
me and this podcast at Christian Bush dot com, Christian
(31:18):
with a K people follow me at Christian Bush on Twitter,
Christian Bush on Instagram, Christian Bush on Facebook, and Christian M.
Bush on Snapchat. Thanks to Bobby Bones for the opportunity
to make this podcast, Briandon Bush for making the soundtrack
and assembling the pieces, Tom Tapley for audio wizardry, and
Whitney Pastrick for being a great producer and making this
(31:38):
whole thing possible. This is Christian Bush Geeking Out. Thank
you for listening.
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I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com