Joe Rogan Experience #1256 - David Lee Roth

David Lee Roth is the lead singer of multi-platnium hard rock band from Southern California, Van Halen. https://inktheoriginal.com/

Joe RoganhostDavid Lee Rothguest

Mar 1, 20192h 55mWatch on YouTube ↗

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150 min read · 30,083 words

0:00 – 15:00
Four, three, two, one.…
1. JRJoe Rogan
  Four, three, two, one. (clapperboard snaps) And we're live, Mr. Roth.
2. DRDavid Lee Roth
  As live as live will ever-
3. JRJoe Rogan
  (laughs)
4. DRDavid Lee Roth
  ... possibly get on the inter-grid international.
5. JRJoe Rogan
  Good to see you, man. You really do look great. You look healthy, you look vibrant.
6. DRDavid Lee Roth
  You look surprised.
7. JRJoe Rogan
  No. (laughs)
8. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Don't, don't look so surprised. You know, I've, I haven't been to sleep since the late '80s.
9. JRJoe Rogan
  (laughs)
10. DRDavid Lee Roth
  I didn't miss a thing, but, uh, I'm a little groggy, but I'm good to go. In my job, you expect dis- dissipation and illness, right? You know, kind of goes-
11. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
12. DRDavid Lee Roth
  ... along with... Y- you expect a disintegration-
13. JRJoe Rogan
  Right.
14. DRDavid Lee Roth
  ... in my kind of job. And, uh-
15. JRJoe Rogan
  Like Lemmy from Motorhead style.
16. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Mm... Do you know the term wabi-sabi? Do you know what that is?
17. JRJoe Rogan
  No.
18. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Wabi-sabi is a Japanese term that, succinctly put, means that which is perfect 'cause it's a little fucked up.
19. JRJoe Rogan
  Oh, right, like-
20. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Your favorite jeans, very wabi-sabi.
21. JRJoe Rogan
  Yes, like a patina on an old car.
22. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Mm... The guitar player in the Rolling Stones, very wabi-sabi. (laughs)
23. JRJoe Rogan
  Yes, yes. He's very wabi-sabi. (laughs)
24. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Yeah. And the, and New York City, for example, the old that starts to fall apart right next-
25. JRJoe Rogan
  Mm.
26. DRDavid Lee Roth
  ... to the new, that's part of the beauty there. Your favorite-
27. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
28. DRDavid Lee Roth
  ... leather jacket-
29. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
30. DRDavid Lee Roth
  ... is that, and you expect that to increase. But, uh, I don't know. I'm not really an athlete. I don't really train. I'm kind of a singer who always traded his celebrity to, you know, "Hey, show me how you do that," and, "How many times should I lift this?" And, uh, "What happens if I fall off of this going this fast?" (laughs)
15:00 – 30:00
Yeah, I would imagine.…
1. DRDavid Lee Roth
  it, it was a trial.
2. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah, I would imagine.
3. DRDavid Lee Roth
  And, uh-
4. JRJoe Rogan
  Is it much more painful to do it that ta-tapped way?
5. DRDavid Lee Roth
  No.
6. JRJoe Rogan
  No?
7. DRDavid Lee Roth
  It's, uh, overall, I think what happens is tattoo, when you get something that stings, you can take it for a while. It's the distance-
8. JRJoe Rogan
  Hmm.
9. DRDavid Lee Roth
  ... that counts. You can take the cold for 30 seconds.
10. JRJoe Rogan
  Right.
11. DRDavid Lee Roth
  You can take measurable cold. Are you doing the cryo dunk or anything?
12. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah, I do that stuff.
13. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Okay, boom.
14. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
15. DRDavid Lee Roth
  You can take anything for 30 seconds.
16. JRJoe Rogan
  Right.
17. DRDavid Lee Roth
  You're in Showbiz. (laughs)
18. JRJoe Rogan
  (laughs)
19. DRDavid Lee Roth
  But man, (laughs) try holding that out in front of you for 15 seconds kind of a thing.
20. JRJoe Rogan
  That, that's your suit?
21. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Yeah.
22. JRJoe Rogan
  Wow, look at that. So you, there's some photos of it up... Yeah, because you never really do, uh, show your tattoos anywhere. It's not like-
23. DRDavid Lee Roth
  No, it's not part of-
24. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
25. DRDavid Lee Roth
  ... the show. It's not part of, but behind the scenes, my mom, who was an art teacher, was the, the, the healing happy side of my family came from my dad. I learned to box from mom.
26. JRJoe Rogan
  Really?
27. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Oh, yeah.
28. JRJoe Rogan
  (laughs)
29. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Bad Dave, like my sisters call it.
30. JRJoe Rogan
  Mm-hmm.
30:00 – 45:00
(laughs) …
1. DRDavid Lee Roth
  "Somebody clean the fucking truck up." (laughs)
2. JRJoe Rogan
  (laughs)
3. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Until I put on that uniform, Joe, after training for how many months, it's almost a year for me, like this, I wasn't someone, "Someone clean up the truck." (laughs)
4. JRJoe Rogan
  (laughs)
5. DRDavid Lee Roth
  And that was my job.
6. JRJoe Rogan
  Wow.
7. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Starting right off. But, uh-I was also the somebody who dragged the oxygen box on 13 floors up in the E- Eden Wald projects, and artist to artist, how many times have you driven past something, whether it's a huge building or a teepee? I wonder what's in there.
8. JRJoe Rogan
  Mm-hmm.
9. DRDavid Lee Roth
  And then you go in there, and, "I wonder what's in the refrigerator? I wonder what they listen to in there. And I wonder who the they are." I have a fascination for that.
10. JRJoe Rogan
  Mm-hmm.
11. DRDavid Lee Roth
  My pop had a big sprawling, I think, is it sympathy? Empathy for people. You know, when the fellas started getting AIDS in the early '80s, he started treating them. He's a eye surgeon. And, uh, everybody, my sisters and stuff started saying, "But this is a time when you think you can catch that shit from breathing it, Pop, and whatever." And he turned to me, I'll never forget, he said, "I don't get to choose my patients." Well, I don't get to choose my audience.
12. JRJoe Rogan
  So what was the motivation-
13. DRDavid Lee Roth
  "Let's go see 'em."
14. JRJoe Rogan
  ... to start doing that, though? Like what-
15. DRDavid Lee Roth
  "Let's go see what's in their refrigerator, Joe. And you'll walk in first 'cause you're way stronger than me, in case there's trouble. And you'll go, 'Ambulance.' And in case somebody comes at us, you handle it." (laughs)
16. JRJoe Rogan
  (laughs)
17. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Oh, I had a, I had a mentor named Keisha who had to pile her dreadlocks up so high that it was as long as from her shoulders to the top of her head, her haircut. It was like she had 10... She'd put her hat up on top, and Keisha walked in that door first, homie. (laughs)
18. JRJoe Rogan
  (laughs)
19. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Domestic disputes?
20. JRJoe Rogan
  Oh.
21. DRDavid Lee Roth
  She dealt with the guys.
22. JRJoe Rogan
  You had to be there for domestic disputes?
23. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Oh, yeah.
24. JRJoe Rogan
  Oh, those are the scariest, right?
25. DRDavid Lee Roth
  She dealt sh- uh, very. And you get an eye on your audience, stops being audience.
26. JRJoe Rogan
  Mm-hmm.
27. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Starts being the neighborhood.
28. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
29. DRDavid Lee Roth
  And pretty soon you live in the neighborhood. I was under the train once in the Fulton Street Station talking to a homeless fella. Quick briefing, act like nothing's wrong. See if you can get him to come out. "Hey, you hungry?" (laughs) Train breathes, okay? Subway train breathes. It doesn't just sit there silently. It does this. (laughs)
30. JRJoe Rogan
  (laughs)
45:00 – 1:00:00
Ah, oh boy. …
1. DRDavid Lee Roth
  (laughs)
2. JRJoe Rogan
  Ah, oh boy.
3. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Yeah, he was unforgiving. And, uh, you learned quick of, about timing in between, transitions, segue. You were allowed to do three songs. And if he felt your song was too long or your, your riff in between, as he, oh, he called you on it. If he didn't like your shoes, he talked about it. You never saw him. You heard it over the PA.
4. JRJoe Rogan
  Oh, wow.
5. DRDavid Lee Roth
  He was in the back. It was quite a ritual. And I learned a tremendous amount about how you communicate with a, with a crowd. How do you talk to people as one? How do you make eye contact? What, in fact, are the wrong shoes? (laughs)
6. JRJoe Rogan
  Hmm. What are the wrong shoes?
7. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Platforms. (laughs)
8. JRJoe Rogan
  Oh yeah, back in the day they wore platforms.
9. DRDavid Lee Roth
  (laughs) Yeah.
10. JRJoe Rogan
  That's right.
11. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Whatever, okay.
12. JRJoe Rogan
  How did that ever happen?
13. DRDavid Lee Roth
  David Lee Bowie will be singing-
14. JRJoe Rogan
  (laughs)
15. DRDavid Lee Roth
  ... us hopefully a shorter song than the last one he sang last Sunday. Are you the same David Lee Bowie? You would hear this. (laughs)
16. JRJoe Rogan
  Right.
17. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Over the, uh, over the PA system.
18. JRJoe Rogan
  When KISS performs today, do they still wear platforms?
19. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Uh, I think it's in the contract, Joe.
20. JRJoe Rogan
  It's part of the b- the outfit.
21. DRDavid Lee Roth
  McEnroe has to yell at, uh, "You gotta be fucking kidding."
22. JRJoe Rogan
  (laughs)
23. DRDavid Lee Roth
  (laughs)
24. JRJoe Rogan
  But for KISS, I'd never thought of that. Like, they might be the last band that's wearing platforms.
25. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Until, uh, wow, everybody likes to make fun of platforms, bell bottoms, sideburns-
26. JRJoe Rogan
  Till they come back around.
27. DRDavid Lee Roth
  ... yeah, oh, there's, there was something there, Sarge. (laughs)
28. JRJoe Rogan
  (laughs)
29. DRDavid Lee Roth
  I don't know about platforms on guys, but on the right girl-
30. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
1:00:00 – 1:15:00
Wow. …
1. DRDavid Lee Roth
  in 1973. Y- you would, if I didn't tell you, you know, would, you would think it was three years ago.
2. JRJoe Rogan
  Wow.
3. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Kind of a sound. There was virtually no development.
4. JRJoe Rogan
  How'd that happen? How did it work that way?
5. DRDavid Lee Roth
  We had classical training.
6. JRJoe Rogan
  Ah.
7. DRDavid Lee Roth
  All right? And this kinda speaks to what we were discussing-
8. JRJoe Rogan
  Cross-training.
9. DRDavid Lee Roth
  ... earlier in that a lot of my colleagues are having a great time making music, and they celebrate, and it's, uh, the word fun.... comes into it. And we grew up in classical music backgrounds where you had to challenge for first chair saxophone.
10. JRJoe Rogan
  Mm.
11. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Every six to eight months, you gotta go to the conductor and say, "I want first chair."
12. JRJoe Rogan
  Mm.
13. DRDavid Lee Roth
  And if you're first chair, and he thinks I have a shot, he's gonna come over. Joe, he says, "Roth's talking about you."
14. JRJoe Rogan
  Ooh.
15. DRDavid Lee Roth
  "You both, you both get to play this piece in front of the orchestra next Wednesday. You best practice."
16. JRJoe Rogan
  Ah.
17. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Okay? And we'll both get up-
18. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
19. DRDavid Lee Roth
  ... and we'll both play 18 bars of the same piece, you dig?
20. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
21. DRDavid Lee Roth
  And there just may be a switch in front of 120 people.
22. JRJoe Rogan
  Mm.
23. DRDavid Lee Roth
  All of them colleagues, all right? We learned from in music school, you know, the racy stuff was big band, all right? If you're, uh, in terms of, you know, uh, we played rock and roll in parallel. But big band, it's got a square vibe to it because it wound up in elevators and restaurants and whatever. But they had cutting contests, and there was nothing more cutting than Benny Goodman versus Chick Webb Big Band at Roseland Ballroom. That shit is on. People would bet on it. They would play the same four songs. You play your version of it, and we'll play ours.
24. JRJoe Rogan
  Wow. (laughs)
25. DRDavid Lee Roth
  (laughs) Yeah. All right?
26. JRJoe Rogan
  Wow.
27. DRDavid Lee Roth
  (laughs)
28. JRJoe Rogan
  Wow, a throwdown, a big band throwdown.
29. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Yeah. Oh, yeah. And it was furious shit too, you know? It wasn't like friendly. (laughs)
30. JRJoe Rogan
  Right, right, right. They were serious.
1:15:00 – 1:25:17
Well, he's such a…
1. DRDavid Lee Roth
  you know. Uh, they're almost peripheral to his, uh, narration and his descriptions and his poetry.
2. JRJoe Rogan
  Well, he's such a deep guy. Like, you have to hear the in-between stuff. You wanna hear him brood, you wanna hear him talk, you wanna hear him think about things.
3. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Yes. And where do you learn that?
4. JRJoe Rogan
  Where do you learn that?
5. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Hmm.
6. JRJoe Rogan
  The road.
7. DRDavid Lee Roth
  That-
8. JRJoe Rogan
  Thousands of shows.
9. DRDavid Lee Roth
  Get ready. I'm, I'm gonna count to 30,000, Joe. (laughs)
10. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah. Hours and hours and hours.
11. DRDavid Lee Roth
  And when we're done, (laughs) you'll be able to ... "You know, Joe ..." That's not a good Springsteen imita-
12. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
13. DRDavid Lee Roth
  "You're a good man, Joe." (laughs) .
14. JRJoe Rogan
  We, we ... What I was trying to get at was that, does it ever freak you out? Like, when you're ever alone and you think about what you guys did and what you've done in your career, does it ever freak you out? The impact that you've had, the ... If you looked at the amount of human beings that have the kind of impact that you've had, it's a, the, the tiniest, tiniest fraction of a percent, like the amount of human beings that can relate to your personal life experiences.
15. DRDavid Lee Roth
  I'll paraphrase the James Brown movie. There's two of them. Both of them were helpfully, helpfully produced by Jagger. Okay? And, uh, as he does an interview, he goes, "There's a little bit of me in every record you hear."
16. JRJoe Rogan
  Mm.
17. DRDavid Lee Roth
  (laughs)
18. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
19. DRDavid Lee Roth
  He's in the DNA.
20. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
21. DRDavid Lee Roth
  And then there's a little bit of David Lee Roth in there.
22. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
23. DRDavid Lee Roth
  You dig? There's a little bit, whenever you see videos today, doesn't matter if it's hip hop, doesn't matter if it's rock and roll, doesn't matter if it's classic or pit bull, you dig? There's a l- you can trace it back, you follow?
24. JRJoe Rogan
  Right.
25. DRDavid Lee Roth
  And it's not, uh, I don't think of it as impact. That's a result.
26. JRJoe Rogan
  Hmm.
27. DRDavid Lee Roth
  What's the verb? Contribution.
28. JRJoe Rogan
  Yeah.
29. DRDavid Lee Roth
  At family reunions, whatever, we go around. Everybody picks a word. And, uh, my favorite word ever was contribution. Did you try?
30. JRJoe Rogan
  Hmm.

Episode duration: 2:55:36

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Four, three, two, one.…

Yeah, I would imagine.…

(laughs) …

Ah, oh boy. …

Wow. …

Well, he's such a…

Get more out of YouTube videos.