Joe Rogan Experience #1656 - Adam Duritz

1. 0:00 – 15:00

   (drumming) Joe Rogan podcast,…

   1. NANarrator0:00

      (drumming) Joe Rogan podcast, check it out. The Joe Rogan Experience.

   2. JRJoe Rogan0:06

      Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night, all day. (rock music plays) Hello, Adam.

   3. ADAdam Duritz0:16

      Hello, Joe.

   4. JRJoe Rogan0:17

      How you doing?

   5. ADAdam Duritz0:17

      I'm pretty good.

   6. JRJoe Rogan0:18

      It's good to see you. It's nice to meet you, man. It's nice to be, uh, I, I've been a fan of your work for a long fucking time, and it's always weird when you meet someone that you listen to their music or you've seen their stuff, and you're like, "Oh, you're just a normal human being. There you are."

   7. ADAdam Duritz0:32

      A, a little whacked out, but yeah.

   8. JRJoe Rogan0:34

      (laughs) But it's, uh, you know, like, I remember watching Mr. Jones on, uh, MTV and, uh, I, I, I wa- I loved that fucking video, man, and I loved that you dancing in that, was it like a living room or something like that?

   9. ADAdam Duritz0:47

      Yeah, yeah.

   10. JRJoe Rogan0:47

       I'm like, "I, I wanna be that free." Like, you seem so loose. You were so in the moment. I remember thinking that. I was, remember talking to a friend of mine that la- uh, that night after a, a show. I was at a bar. I was like, "You ever see that Mr. Jones video?" I go, "When that dude's dancing," I go, "I wanna, like, figure out how to get there."

   11. ADAdam Duritz1:06

       Shit, I wanna be that free.

   12. JRJoe Rogan1:08

       (laughs)

   13. ADAdam Duritz1:08

       And you know, it's a weird thing. I used to, I'm gonna take these off for now.

   14. JRJoe Rogan1:11

       Okay.

   15. ADAdam Duritz1:11

       I used to be, for me, you know, life is often very awkward and uncomfortable, but not on stage. You know, like, on stage I always felt like, well, this is the one place on, everything I do is fine.

   16. JRJoe Rogan1:24

       Right.

   17. ADAdam Duritz1:24

       And so when I started, you know, making videos, uh, at first it was just like, uh, this is apps, this is easy, 'cause all I gotta do is do the stuff I gonna, I'm gonna do, you know, and, and there's nothing wrong I can do. I can just be as free as I want. And that lasted about a year and a half, maybe two years. Something about, like, getting really famous outta nowhere and then, you know, all the kind of backlash that comes with it. I noticed a couple years later I was a lot more self-conscious. I'm still, on stage I never think about anything. When I'm playing, it, nothing bothers me, but in front of cameras, I got really self-conscious in front of cameras after sometime in the middle of our second record. I just noticed that I started to suck on, not suck on video, but definitely not like that Mr. Jones video. You know?

   18. JRJoe Rogan2:14

       You became aware that so many people were watching and criticizing you, or like, what was it?

   19. ADAdam Duritz2:19

       I think it was that, you know, 'cause at first I just, uh, well, didn't care, and I just thought that there's nowhere in the world I'm more comfortable than here, so I'm fine. And then I think on our second album when we got a lot of backlash and you get a little too big and everybody, you get, you annoy the shit out of people being-

   20. JRJoe Rogan2:34

       Yeah.

   21. ADAdam Duritz2:35

       ... being, you know, especially 'cause in a band because you get a really successful song, they're gonna play it on the radio every five minutes. After a while, it's like, God, who wouldn't get sick of it, you know?

   22. JRJoe Rogan2:43

       Yeah.

   23. ADAdam Duritz2:44

       And then you get some backlash after that, people say some terrible things.

   24. JRJoe Rogan2:47

       (laughs)

   25. ADAdam Duritz2:47

       And then, and then I started thinking about, like, "What do I look like on film?" Then I got really self-conscious.

   26. JRJoe Rogan2:52

       (laughs)

   27. ADAdam Duritz2:52

       You know (laughs) , w- what does this, pants, does this look my, does this song make my ass look big?

   28. JRJoe Rogan2:57

       (laughs)

   29. ADAdam Duritz2:57

       You know (laughs) , and, uh, I noticed that I got kind of crappy in, just in front of cameras, not the rest of the time. And, and not, like, cameras when I'm on stage at a concert. Like, you play a big festival, there's lots of cameras, it doesn't bother me there. It's just kinda sometimes on TV and in, in filming. I got kinda self-conscious.

   30. JRJoe Rogan3:15

       Mm-hmm.
2. 15:00 – 30:00

   I know Sarah very…

   1. ADAdam Duritz15:00

      a- after the r- when they first opened it, after the, when that, Desert Storm and the war... Not Desert Storm, I guess it was the second Iraq War. Um, and he, he brought a little camera with him and he filmed all this stuff, the, the comedy stuff, but also, like, what it was like. I mean, it's before they closed anything, so they were, they were playing, like, you know, holes dug in the dirt, really. He got to see all over the country, that part, and he made a really cool film about, you know, being in a comedy tour over there with all the troops right then. Um, so he showed it to me and we just kinda became friends and started doing stuff together. We did a trip with the USO, me and him and, uh, Sarah Tiana, Colin Kane.

   2. JRJoe Rogan15:37

      I know Sarah very well.

   3. ADAdam Duritz15:38

      Oh, yeah. Stewie Stone.

   4. JRJoe Rogan15:39

      (clears throat)

   5. ADAdam Duritz15:39

      And, uh, like, Robert Klein, and we did a... And me.

   6. JRJoe Rogan15:41

      Oh, wow.

   7. ADAdam Duritz15:41

      So, like, five comedians and me playing the only songs I can play on piano, which are the mopiest shit we have. So it's like...

   8. JRJoe Rogan15:49

      Ah.

   9. ADAdam Duritz15:49

      I was right in the middle of the show. We went around Germany together to the bases and, uh, played Schifffbude-

   10. JRJoe Rogan15:54

       Why did you decide to go solo? Why'd you decide to go without a band or...

   11. ADAdam Duritz15:57

       It was just like, 'cause it's just the kind of comedy that they're doing it really bare bones.

   12. JRJoe Rogan16:00

       Mm-hmm.

   13. ADAdam Duritz16:00

       So Jeff's like, "Hey, you wanna do this thing?" I was like, "Yeah, let's go."

   14. JRJoe Rogan16:03

       Wow.

   15. ADAdam Duritz16:04

       You know? So, it was, it was weird, though (laughs) because I, I mean, I can... I'm not a very good piano player. I can only really play a few things and they're mopey, you know, as shit.

   16. JRJoe Rogan16:12

       Right, right.

   17. ADAdam Duritz16:12

       So it'd be, it'd be like, uh, S- uh, Colin would play, then Sarah, and Stewie was hosting all of it. And, uh, and then it'd be me and then Jeff and then Robert Klein and, uh... So it's like, it's a pretty stark change in the middle there to, like, mope, the mopefest.

   18. JRJoe Rogan16:28

       (laughs)

   19. ADAdam Duritz16:28

       I had to start telling jokes and just, like, just ripping with Jeff.

   20. JRJoe Rogan16:31

       (laughs) Mopefest. (laughs)

   21. ADAdam Duritz16:33

       Because it was so, such a bizarre contrast. It was fun, though. It was l- it was, like, really fun to be... It was like being at camp with all the funny people.

   22. JRJoe Rogan16:40

       Your music is, uh, oftentimes so emotional. There's so much, so much feeling and pa-... Did you ever feel, like, almost like you, this is what you have to do because this is, like, the, your initial success was in this kind of music? Or has your music always sort of had that kind of emotional flavor to it?

   23. ADAdam Duritz17:02

       I think that was always the thing. I mean, you kinda wanna find something that you can bare to people. You know? Like, I mean b-a-r-e.

   24. JRJoe Rogan17:11

       Right.

   25. ADAdam Duritz17:11

       Like, really open. You know, the more you can open something up and let people in... And that's kinda the whole thing, I think, when we're trying to make a record, is you just kinda wanna make a world that people can climb into for a while and, like, feel something. You know, go from here to there with you, and...

   26. JRJoe Rogan17:27

       Yeah.

   27. ADAdam Duritz17:28

       Um, so I, no, I always just kinda thought that was, um... You know, but sometimes, you- you know, there's, there's hope and joy in there too. But yeah, it's about feeling stuff, mostly. Uh, I think that was always kinda what it seemed like it was about, because I think I always had trouble, uh, feeling things with other people, you know, just in normal life. You know?

   28. JRJoe Rogan17:49

       Right.

   29. ADAdam Duritz17:50

       But, uh, and I always liked music. I... And when I would listen to it, I, I, I think that's one of the things I loved about it, was that you could get lost in it and you could feel all the stuff, and they seemed to be able to communicate stuff to me when I was listening to a record. Um, you know, and I was a... I just couldn't figure out what to do with music when I was a kid 'cause, you know, I didn't... I just could sing, so I don't know what that means to high school musicals or something, but, uh, where's that going?

   30. JRJoe Rogan18:12

       When did you start? When did you start singing?
3. 30:00 – 45:00

   (laughs) …

   1. ADAdam Duritz30:00

      stage is in the corner over here. Uh, and there's no, like, back... The backstage is, is up near the front door, and you gotta, like... They just kept, like, a border around the club of people, so you could walk, and you have to walk around everybody to get up to the stage. And so we get up there to open the show, and the, the monitors are busted. Like, the tweeter's blown out on the monitors, so it's just like (imitates distorted music) the whole time, you know? And it's like, just, you can't hear anything, and I'm trying to sing. It's before we had in-ears, you know, and, uh, my voice is already wrecked from the first year of touring 'cause I had never sung that much, you know. I'm really tired, and so we, we played, and I'm, I'm...... we were terrible. Like, I mean, terrible.

   2. JRJoe Rogan30:35

      (laughs)

   3. ADAdam Duritz30:35

      And, uh, and... (laughs) 'Cause it was just so bad. I mean, later on that night, Cracker got on stage and, uh, they were pretty good, but they hated it so much that, like, he stuck his guitar through that monitor after a while. 'Cause you couldn't hear anything. It was just like, "What, what... You're a club, man. Fix the goddamn monitor."

   4. JRJoe Rogan30:49

      Right, right.

   5. ADAdam Duritz30:50

      You know? "Like, the horns are all busted." So anyways, we get done, this particularly terrible set. I mean... And we do a lot of improvisation on stage, too. We're making whole shit up, which doesn't get any better, by the way, when you, you can't hear anything and you're-

   6. JRJoe Rogan31:03

      Right.

   7. ADAdam Duritz31:03

      ... when you're sucking. We're still trying it, and it's still just like... Oh, just, you know. Anything would've been better than what we did. So, man, w- the set ends, and, and it's just silence, man. There's no booing or anything, but... Nobody's clapping. Like, nobody's clapping.

   8. JRJoe Rogan31:17

      (laughs)

   9. ADAdam Duritz31:17

      There's just nothing. There was just fucking nothing happening in there. It's just like, like, like nothing had happened.

   10. JRJoe Rogan31:23

       Yeah.

   11. ADAdam Duritz31:23

       Like it... Like, they were just... Everyone's just kind of looking at us like maybe we're going to play another song, I don't know. They don't really want us to, but they're not trying to encourage us, and so we just like... I remember some of the other guys had to grab their stuff, I kind of walked down off the stage and, you know, around, down the whole side of the crowd, across the back to the little dressing room. Silence, just people looking at me.

   12. JRJoe Rogan31:44

       (laughs)

   13. ADAdam Duritz31:46

       Just like, "Fuck."

   14. JRJoe Rogan31:47

       (laughs)

   15. ADAdam Duritz31:47

       It was just so fucking humiliating, just the worst. I, I've never forgotten it, except I, I guess I have forgotten where it was, but... I think it was Lexington. But I don't know. But it was just the worst fucking show, and just, just the utter silence, though. The, the... Like, they were confused as to what we were doing.

   16. JRJoe Rogan32:04

       (laughs)

   17. ADAdam Duritz32:05

       Like, like... As if, like... It would've been confusing to them if we'd kept playing, it was weird that we stopped. Uh, whatever we were doing, they didn't really get it. I didn't... I mean, I don't under-... Understandably. It was just fucking... O- one time, like, w-... I came off a tour and I had, I had messed up my knee. I'd scraped up my knee early in the tour and it kept getting infected, and I ended up having, like, a staph infection inside my knee. It was really bad. So I got off stage at the last gig and I had to go in the... for surgery the next day. And, uh, they, you know, opened my knee up and cleaned it out, and then, uh, they released me later that day. And it was the day that Jeff was releasing, uh... He h- he wrote a book, like... I can't remember what it's called. Ro-... You Only Roast the Ones you Love, maybe?

   18. JRJoe Rogan32:44

       Yeah.

   19. ADAdam Duritz32:45

       And he, he had, uh, he was having, like, a, a... I don't know what you'd call it. A book release party, I guess, at the Friars Club, 'cause he was real excited and he'd wanted me to come, and I was like... I'd just gotten out of the hospital, um, that, like... late that morning, and I was... But I felt okay, you know? Um, and it was all sewn up, so, uh, I... You know, I was a little high from the drugs, but I, I was okay. So I, I put on, like, a tux, tails, but I, I couldn't wear the pants 'cause I had this huge bandage on my knee, so I just put some shorts on and nice shoes, too, and I, I got a cane, and I, and I went to the Friars Club to this thing, to... I wanted to be there to support Jeff, you know? And so he comes... He's up on the, like, the dais up there. N- it's, like, in one of the rooms there, not, not a stage, but he's up on there talking, thanking some people, and he comes down. Uh, he, they... He got me a chair. It's just a room full of comics and he got me a chair so I could sit down near the front. Um, everyone else is standing just 'cause I, you know, I had surgery. And he comes down, uh, and

   20. NANarrator33:43

       (laughs)

   21. ADAdam Duritz33:43

       I wanna really thank my friend Adam, who came with me, and, you know, we went on this trip a little while ago, and he's just a... He's a good friend. And he hands me the mic and for some reason instead of just saying, you know, "Congratulations, Jeff," or whatever, I took the mic out of his hand and I walked up on the stage to, like, the podium, put it in the mic thing, and I... 'Cause I don't know, some part of me thought, "I'm at the Friars Club and I should make a speech for Jeff's thing."

   22. JRJoe Rogan34:08

       (laughs)

   23. ADAdam Duritz34:08

       (laughs) But by the time I got up there and put the mic in, I realized, "What am I doing here?"

   24. JRJoe Rogan34:14

       Oh, no. (laughs)

   25. ADAdam Duritz34:14

       Like, I, I'm like, "I don't know what the fuck to do." I'm, I'm just... I, I, I just-

   26. JRJoe Rogan34:19

       Ugh.

   27. ADAdam Duritz34:19

       ... like, sort of looked at them and I said, "So I peed on my girlfriend earlier today."

   28. JRJoe Rogan34:25

       (laughs)

   29. ADAdam Duritz34:25

       (laughs) 'Cause I... It, it had happened, you know, like, when they finished the surgery, they, you know, they gave me this epidural and they numb your whole lower half of your body, so I didn't know what was going on, and, uh, it... They... I'd come out of it and they were... my, you know, girlfriend was like, "How are you?" I'm like, "I don't know, I feel weird. I feel pretty good. Uh, uh, am I, am I bleeding down here? Am I wet?" And, and, and she reaches, like, under the skirt to check me out, and she's like, "Uh, I, I just, I think you're, you're peeing, that's all. You're just... You're peeing yourself right now." I'm like, "W- well, how do you know?" And she goes, "C- you're... 'Cause you're peeing on me right now. It's just..."

   30. JRJoe Rogan34:57

       (laughs)
4. 45:00 – 1:00:00

   Oh, yeah. Yeah, it…

   1. JRJoe Rogan45:01

      That's not a good one. That's a hard one to tell. See if you can see it again, though. Watch. Yeah, do, it does... Th- watch this. See that?

   2. ADAdam Duritz45:09

      Oh, yeah. Yeah, it whips around.

   3. JRJoe Rogan45:10

      Come on, that's crazy. It's, you-

   4. ADAdam Duritz45:11

      It looks like it's coming up under his arm.

   5. JRJoe Rogan45:12

      Yeah. See-

   6. ADAdam Duritz45:12

      And then it whips over.

   7. JRJoe Rogan45:13

      And look at that, he does that kyokushin, like the fucking kiai at the end. But look how it comes low and then-

   8. ADAdam Duritz45:19

      All right.

   9. JRJoe Rogan45:19

      I mean, the way he would do it was like s- sensational hip flexibility. Isn't that wild?

   10. ADAdam Duritz45:25

       That rotation at the last minute.

   11. JRJoe Rogan45:26

       Yeah, look at this. It's wild, man. Nobody did it better than Glaube. I mean, he's just the, famous for it. A lot of guys are good at it. Maybe, uh, Stylebender does it really good too, but...

   12. ADAdam Duritz45:38

       It's wild watching, you know, mixed martial arts like that. Interesting which disciplines tend to be effective. I, I mean, it seemed to me early on when it first came around, there was a lot of grapplers, uh, some guys that had beginning wrestling and then the... I mean, I don't, I haven't watched a ton of it, but jujitsu seemed to be really effective for a while. Like, what's his name? Uh-

   13. JRJoe Rogan46:00

       Royce Gracie.

   14. ADAdam Duritz46:01

       Silva, I was thinking of, like, he-

   15. JRJoe Rogan46:03

       Anderson Silva?

   16. ADAdam Duritz46:04

       Yeah.

   17. JRJoe Rogan46:04

       Well, Anderson Silva was a Muay Thai guy. He had Brazilian jujitsu. He was very, he's a black belt in jujitsu, but his whole thing was striking. He was a Muay Thai guy. His whole thing was kicking the shit outta you. Yeah.

   18. ADAdam Duritz46:17

       Which would hurt.

   19. JRJoe Rogan46:18

       Oh, yeah. From him, yeah. Uh, he's, to this day, still one of the greatest of all time. But jujitsu, what, we were talking about-

   20. ADAdam Duritz46:25

       He choked guys out. He did those chokes.

   21. JRJoe Rogan46:26

       He definitely did.

   22. ADAdam Duritz46:27

       Yeah.

   23. JRJoe Rogan46:27

       He cho- choked out Chael Sonnen in the fifth round of like a fight where he was losing.

   24. ADAdam Duritz46:31

       He was getting the shit kicked out of him in that fight.

   25. JRJoe Rogan46:32

       Yeah. Well, he went into that fight, apparently, legend has it, with a broken rib. He had a, a fucked up rib going into that fight, so he couldn't really move properly, couldn't defend against takedowns, but still figured out a way to win.

   26. ADAdam Duritz46:46

       Boy, Chael Sonnen was just pounding him and-

   27. JRJoe Rogan46:48

       Oh, yeah.

   28. ADAdam Duritz46:48

       ... he finally, it looked like he was done. He had him on the ground, he was on top of him, and all of a sudden, his just legs just went fff.

   29. JRJoe Rogan46:53

       Caught him in a triangle. Yeah. Yeah, well, yeah, Chael was a beast, but Anderson figured it out. He just, I mean, that's, that's a guy like him who could do everything. He can strike, he can submit you. And because he has all these skills, like even when he's losing, he still could pull it out of his ass outta nowhere. That's what he did, you know.

   30. ADAdam Duritz47:13

       Are any of the guys who, like... I mean, I just love martial arts movies. Are any of the guys that were like, you know, the... Have any of them been really good fighters as well? I mean, I wouldn't know how to tell.
5. 1:00:00 – 1:05:11

   He's, uh- …

   1. ADAdam Duritz1:00:00

      Uh, somehow he just makes it work without causing a huge uproar. There's n- you know, even the bull- some- it's not even a bullshit uproar about, like... He, I don't know why, he's m- he's managed to pull it off in a, in a way that's good-hearted enough that, you know, I'm not sure how he's-

   2. JRJoe Rogan1:00:13

      He's, uh-

   3. ADAdam Duritz1:00:13

      ... managed it.

   4. JRJoe Rogan1:00:13

      ... b- because that's actually who he is.

   5. ADAdam Duritz1:00:16

      M- yeah, probably.

   6. JRJoe Rogan1:00:17

      So, what he expresses on stage is how he is. And also, it's kind of how comics talk to each other anyway. We always talk shit to each other, but it's with love. It's funny. Like, if someone shits on your clothes or shits on your face or shits on your, your head or shits on... Whatever it is, it's like we're all laughing along with it. It's like it's an honor to get roasted by Jeff Ross, or, you know-

   7. ADAdam Duritz1:00:40

      Yeah.

   8. JRJoe Rogan1:00:41

      ... any really good roaster. It's just, and Jeff is-... because of his love of, like, old comedy culture, like the Friars Club-

   9. NANarrator1:00:50

      Yeah.

   10. JRJoe Rogan1:00:50

       ... and that kind of stuff. He ha- he always loved that. Like, when we were in our 20s, he'd be like, "I'm gonna go to the Friars Club." I'm like, "What the fuck are you doing? You're in your 20s." Like, we're not old dead men. Like, in my mind, I'm like, "Why are you going to the Friars Club?"

   11. ADAdam Duritz1:01:03

       He wanted to go hookup.

   12. JRJoe Rogan1:01:04

       Like, what is-

   13. ADAdam Duritz1:01:04

       He wanted to hang out with Don Rickles.

   14. JRJoe Rogan1:01:06

       Yeah.

   15. ADAdam Duritz1:01:06

       He wanted to pick his brain and like, you know, 'cause he's got that Rickles issue, you know?

   16. JRJoe Rogan1:01:09

       I get it now. I get it now. But back then, I was, uh, brazen and-

   17. ADAdam Duritz1:01:14

       Yeah, I get that.

   18. JRJoe Rogan1:01:15

       ... uh, you know, I didn't... Yeah. When I was in my 20s, I was a different human being. I didn't understand traditions and all that stuff. I was like, "Get the fuck outta here with these old dead men hanging out, cracking jokes-

   19. ADAdam Duritz1:01:25

       (laughs)

   20. JRJoe Rogan1:01:25

       ... with each other in wheelchairs." I just, I just thought of the Friars Club as being this thing, but I didn't know what it was. It was totally out of ignorance. I'd never been there before. And then I realized as I got older, oh, it's like a camaraderie thing, like these comics would get together and they had a place where they could hang out. And then, uh, Greg Fitzsimmons had gone there, and he told me you would go there and play pool and hang out with these guys. He's like, "It was just a fun hang with a bunch of guys who were just cracking on each other all the time." I was like, "Oh, okay, I get it now."

   21. ADAdam Duritz1:01:52

       Yeah, I mean, there's nothing like that for us, for music. You know, like, I- he took me there-

   22. JRJoe Rogan1:01:58

       Is there a place where you guys hang?

   23. ADAdam Duritz1:02:00

       Not really. I mean, there was at one point. You know, I, I bartended at the Viper Room for years, like, when I first moved there.

   24. JRJoe Rogan1:02:04

       Oh, did you really?

   25. ADAdam Duritz1:02:05

       Yeah. When, when... That's how I ended up moving to LA. I was, uh, I was home. It was getting really miserable in Berkeley. I'd been home for about a week from the end of touring. Uh, everywhere I went, it was an issue. Not... You know, mostly positive, but still, it's like you feel like everybody's looking at you. There are kids camped out on my lawn. A couple days, a bunch of days in a row, at least one, like 100 people come up to me a day, but one of them was like, "Hey, are you that guy from County Cars?" "Yeah." "You're Adam Duritz?" "Yeah." "You guys are so lucky." "Oh, thank you." "I mean, 'cause you suck and there's so many-

   26. JRJoe Rogan1:02:38

       Whoa.

   27. ADAdam Duritz1:02:38

       ... good bands in the Bay Area. It's wild that a band as shitty as you would be so successful."

   28. JRJoe Rogan1:02:43

       To your face?

   29. ADAdam Duritz1:02:44

       Yeah. I was just like... It happened like four or five days in a row. I mean, it was dwarfed by the amount of people that were coming up just loving the band, but still it was like, it started to feel like if there's gonna be one of these every day, is one of them gonna have a gun? You know, is, is like, is this Mark David Chapman? Is this like... I, it seems such, such a weird obsession to walk up to a total stranger in the line for a bank, you know, and just say-

   30. JRJoe Rogan1:03:06

       Shit on you.

Episode duration: 2:57:22