Joe Rogan Experience #2232 - Josh Brolin

Narrator 0:01 (drumming music) Joe Rogan podcast, check it out.

0:04 The Joe Rogan Experience.

Joe Rogan 0:06 Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night, all day. (rock music) Hey, oh.

Josh Brolin 0:14 Little Bo Peep, she needed the money.

Joe Rogan 0:16 Oh.

Josh Brolin 0:17 Oh. How, remember how great that was, man?

Joe Rogan 0:20 Oh, yeah. When I first met him, it was like one of those weird things where, you know, you know, I mean, you've met a lot of famous people. Some of them you meet them and you're like, "Uh, fucking really you?"

Josh Brolin 0:29 Bummer.

Joe Rogan 0:30 It's weird.

Josh Brolin 0:30 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 0:30 Oh, there's bummer too, yeah.

Josh Brolin 0:32 Right, right, right.

Joe Rogan 0:32 The bummer one's are... That sucks.

Josh Brolin 0:33 That, that sucks.

Joe Rogan 0:33 When you meet someone and they suck, and you're like, "Oh, no, you suck."

Josh Brolin 0:36 Yeah. Yeah, exactly.

Joe Rogan 0:37 Some people just should just not talk. They should only do what they do, act and sing.

Josh Brolin 0:42 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 0:42 Just stop talking.

Josh Brolin 0:42 But then you get to know them. Like, I don't know, like, I'm pretty good at this now, where you don't, where you see people that you, like, looked up to, like Eddie Vedder, I had a pretty close relationship with Eddie Vedder.

Joe Rogan 0:52 Oh, really?

Josh Brolin 0:54 Yeah. But I was drinking and then I would grab his balls and do shit like that.

Joe Rogan 0:57 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 0:57 And then it was like, "I don't want him around."

Joe Rogan 1:00 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 1:01 "I don't want Josh around."

Joe Rogan 1:03 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 1:03 "I don't like that anymore. I don't want my..." You know. And I think Sean Penn appreciated shit like that, like, "Wow, somebody has the balls."

Joe Rogan 1:12 A little chaos?

Josh Brolin 1:12 It's not even a little chaos, it's like somebody has the balls to, like, call me on my shit. Like not everybody is afraid of me.

Joe Rogan 1:19 Oh, right. Yeah, he's probably used to people constantly being afraid of him.

Josh Brolin 1:22 Yeah, like, "Oh, we can't fuck with him."

Joe Rogan 1:23 Right. Well, he does wild shit, like when he went down to fucking Mexico and met with El Chapo. Like Jesus Christ, dude.

Josh Brolin 1:30 That's, that's-

Joe Rogan 1:31 That's a fucking wild and reckless thing to do.

Josh Brolin 1:31 But that, you know, and I do think that that's organic, but I think that that's also you just have that thing where you just go, "You know what? Shit's getting boring."

Joe Rogan 1:40 Right.

Josh Brolin 1:40 "Like the weather is just too fucking nice here."

Joe Rogan 1:42 "Weather's too nice, I'm too famous, let's go be a mobster." (laughs)

Josh Brolin 1:45 Something. Yeah. Let's go fuck some shit up. Let's do something, let's do something big...

Joe Rogan 1:50 Let's do something really reckless.

Josh Brolin 1:51 ... let's do something that's gonna resonate for at least a year.

Joe Rogan 1:53 Yeah. That whole El Chapo thing was so crazy though, because that kind of is one of the things that got him caught.

Josh Brolin 1:58 It, it was, right?

Joe Rogan 2:00 Yeah, yeah. Because they, you know, they track your cell phone data.

Josh Brolin 2:03 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 2:03 And they know where you go. And if you're bringing your fucking cell phone, you're basically bringing a tracking device to-

Josh Brolin 2:08 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 2:08 ... to go find one of the most notorious gangsters alive today.

Josh Brolin 2:13 The most noto- I mean, who, who, who was the guy with the football team back in the day? Like the-

Joe Rogan 2:18 Pablo Escobar? Yeah.

Josh Brolin 2:19 Think about it. It's our day's, this time it's Pablo Escobar.

Joe Rogan 2:23 Yeah, yeah.

Josh Brolin 2:24 And Sean Penn-

Joe Rogan 2:26 Goes and hangs out with him.

Josh Brolin 2:27 ... who was suppo- Spicoli-

Joe Rogan 2:29 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 2:30 ... goes, "You know what, man?"

Joe Rogan 2:31 Spicoli. (laughs)

Josh Brolin 2:32 "Hey, who wants to come with me and find this motherfucker?"

Joe Rogan 2:35 Did he go solo?

Josh Brolin 2:36 I don't, I think so.

Joe Rogan 2:37 I, I think he went solo.

Josh Brolin 2:38 I think he went solo.

Joe Rogan 2:38 Well, he knew that lady who was like a reporter, you know, there was like this really hot Mexican reporter.

Josh Brolin 2:42 Oh yeah, the, the Mexican girl. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 2:44 Yeah, he knew her and he-

Josh Brolin 2:46 Was he dating her?

Joe Rogan 2:47 I don't know, but, uh, I think she had a thing with El Chapo.

Josh Brolin 2:51 After that?

Joe Rogan 2:52 No, like previously.

Josh Brolin 2:52 Did Sean introduce them properly? (laughs)

Joe Rogan 2:54 I don't know. I think he knew her and she knew him.

Josh Brolin 2:57 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 2:58 She knew El Chapo.

Josh Brolin 2:59 Oh right, that's how he got...

Joe Rogan 3:00 And so it was one of those... Yeah.

Josh Brolin 3:00 That was the connect.

Joe Rogan 3:01 And El Chapo was like, "I'd like to meet Spicoli."

Josh Brolin 3:03 Right. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 3:04 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 3:04 (laughs) "I like your meat."

Joe Rogan 3:06 "I love you." (laughs) "You know, I really enjoyed you in Colors." (laughs) And then the next thing you know...

Josh Brolin 3:13 What's the most dangerous thing that you do now? What do you think would, would-

Joe Rogan 3:16 Dangerous thing?

Josh Brolin 3:17 Yeah. Like we're talking about Sean going out on a limb. Do you find it necessary to go out and do things that, like, challenge you in a way?

Joe Rogan 3:25 Yes.

Josh Brolin 3:25 Challenge your psyche?

Joe Rogan 3:27 Yes.

Josh Brolin 3:27 In what way?

Joe Rogan 3:28 Uh, elk hunting is probably the most exciting.

Josh Brolin 3:32 What is?

Joe Rogan 3:33 Elk hunting.

Josh Brolin 3:33 Elk hunting.

Joe Rogan 3:33 Elk hunting.

Josh Brolin 3:34 Why? Because it puts you in danger?

Joe Rogan 3:36 Well, no, it's just really difficult, you know. You're bowhunting in the mountains.

Josh Brolin 3:41 Right.

Joe Rogan 3:41 And it's just you and the mountains and there's fucking mountain lions and bears and shit.

Josh Brolin 3:43 Do you stay up there for days and days and days?

Joe Rogan 3:45 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 3:45 And do you quarter your, your kill?

Joe Rogan 3:47 Oh yeah, we pack it out, yeah.

Josh Brolin 3:49 See, that's a different thing.

Joe Rogan 3:50 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 3:50 You know, people say, "I don't, I don't like hunt..." Personally I, like I grew up in a very red part of California. Everybody hunts that I grew up with. And I would shoot and I would hunt with my dad and I would like fucking think about it and dream about it for three weeks.

Joe Rogan 4:04 Oh yeah, I love it.

Josh Brolin 4:05 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 4:05 I love it. I love eating it, I love hunting.

Josh Brolin 4:06 No, no, no. I'm saying that I would like, I would spiral.

Joe Rogan 4:08 Oh, in a bad way? Oh, you would get negative with it.

Josh Brolin 4:11 Not even... It was negative... Yeah, I guess it would be negative, but it would like, made me think of like the kids that were going like, "Mom, mom, are you there?"

Joe Rogan 4:20 Oh, because you killed your mother.

Josh Brolin 4:20 And I just killed the mother. It's like the Bambi kind of thing.

Joe Rogan 4:23 Right.

Josh Brolin 4:23 But, I eat meat.

Joe Rogan 4:25 Mm-hmm.

Josh Brolin 4:26 So that hypocritical thing of like, "I don't want to kill anything, but I want you to kill it for me so I can eat it, because I really like the way it tastes."

Joe Rogan 4:34 Well, that's the anpr- anthropomorphization of animals-

Josh Brolin 4:37 Ooh, nice.

Joe Rogan 4:37 ... that Disney has kind of done, uh, a number on people with, you know, like Bambi and Yogi Bear...

Josh Brolin 4:44 Right.

Joe Rogan 4:44 And all that kind of shit, cartoons and teddy bears. And we have a very... You know, living in, uh, when you live in urban areas and cities and people, you know, streets and concrete...

Josh Brolin 4:55 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 4:55 And people just get a very distorted idea of nature and our relationship with nature. And when you're a kid and you're just, these are sweet, cute things and then all of a sudden you're supposed to go murder one...

Josh Brolin 5:06 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 5:06 Like it's all fucked up.

Josh Brolin 5:08 It's... Right.

Joe Rogan 5:08 But it's, what's fucked up is the cartoons. I mean, they're cute and everything, but-

Josh Brolin 5:13 Because they depict it in a way how?

Joe Rogan 5:15 Well, it's just completely distorted. You have these animals that are talking to each other and the hunters are always assholes and they'll like...

Josh Brolin 5:22 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 5:22 If it wasn't for hunters, there would be no humans. We'd have never made it this far.

Josh Brolin 5:26 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 5:26 If we were all just eating fucking tubers and grapes and shit, we would have never made it.

Josh Brolin 5:31 Do you like garbanzo beans?

Joe Rogan 5:32 They're not bad. I don't prefer them.

Josh Brolin 5:34 (laughs) Have you ever hunted one?

Joe Rogan 5:35 No.

Josh Brolin 5:36 It's fucking wild, man.

Joe Rogan 5:37 How do you do that?

Josh Brolin 5:37 (laughs) You get, you take a bunch of acid.

Joe Rogan 5:39 You got to go to an Italian restaurant?

Josh Brolin 5:40 You take a bunch of acid. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 5:42 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 5:43 It's possible.

Joe Rogan 5:45 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 5:45 Yeah. What, what about the sexual connotations of Disney? Like, you know, did you ever hear that thing that Disney, Walt Disney had like the biggest porn collection of all time?

Joe Rogan 5:54 Really?

Josh Brolin 5:55 That's what I heard. I don't know how much of it is true. You know there's-

Joe Rogan 5:57 Have you ever seen how, um...

Josh Brolin 5:58 There's like the Rod Stewart thing and there's the... You know what I mean?

Joe Rogan 6:01 Oh right, right, the Richard Gere thing.

Josh Brolin 6:01 I don't know if it's what...

Joe Rogan 6:03 Right.

Josh Brolin 6:03 I don't know how much it is.

Joe Rogan 6:04 Go, google it, Jamie. Did Walt Disney have a gigantic porn collection?... I wouldn't be surprised. A lot of people that are, like, really into kids stuff-

Josh Brolin 6:11 Mm.

Joe Rogan 6:11 ... and, like, sweet, wholesome stuff, they, they need-

Josh Brolin 6:14 Have that other-

Joe Rogan 6:15 ... they need to flip.

Josh Brolin 6:15 ... kind of slant?

Joe Rogan 6:16 Yeah. They need something-

Josh Brolin 6:17 Or eventually flip?

Joe Rogan 6:18 ... that... Maybe. Maybe it's a cover or maybe it's, like, they're so cutesy with the fucking completely wholesome stuff that they have to balance it out with some bondage shit.

Josh Brolin 6:30 Some fucked up shit.

Joe Rogan 6:31 Some guys getting kicked in the nuts and ball gags.

Josh Brolin 6:32 Why is it that people feel that people in Hollywood, and Texans are like that. Like, I know people that have moved to Texas, and they, and they've called me. There was one guy that I used to work out with in Venice, and he started, he moved here, and he called me and he'd be like, "Hey, man, you know the list is coming out." And I'd go, "What list?"

Joe Rogan 6:50 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 6:50 And he goes, "You know, the list."

Joe Rogan 6:52 The list.

Josh Brolin 6:53 And I go, "Am I on the list?"

Joe Rogan 6:54 Oh, no.

Josh Brolin 6:55 And he goes, "No, you're clean. You're good."

Joe Rogan 6:59 Phew.

Josh Brolin 6:59 "But I know you know who's on the list."

Joe Rogan 7:01 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 7:01 It's you. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 7:02 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 7:02 I'm glad I know I didn't do anything wrong, even though I didn't do anything wrong. And I said, "But why are you..." For two, like, a twofold thing. "Why are you under the impression that everybody in Hollywood lives under the same roof?" Like, we all live in the same apartment-

Joe Rogan 7:15 Right.

Josh Brolin 7:15 ... complex.

Joe Rogan 7:15 It's they.

Josh Brolin 7:16 It's they.

Joe Rogan 7:17 Yeah. They.

Josh Brolin 7:18 It's they.

Joe Rogan 7:19 They are out there fucking-

Josh Brolin 7:20 They are out there doing-

Joe Rogan 7:21 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 7:21 ... that thing.

Joe Rogan 7:22 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 7:22 And then what would... Why... How could you possibly think that, that a guy who's a trainer at Gold's in Venice would have the list?

Joe Rogan 7:32 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 7:33 Why was he chosen?

Joe Rogan 7:34 Well, he goes on Reddit.

Josh Brolin 7:35 He goes on Reddit. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 7:35 And that's how you get the list.

Josh Brolin 7:36 That's how you get the list.

Joe Rogan 7:37 That's how you get the list.

Josh Brolin 7:38 I still am waiting for the list.

Joe Rogan 7:39 Yeah. Well-

Josh Brolin 7:40 I think I'm gonna see him when I'm, when I'm here. We started communicating again.

Joe Rogan 7:43 Well, we have things-

Josh Brolin 7:44 Now.

Joe Rogan 7:44 ... like the Epstein client list that doesn't get released, then it fuels these kind of conspiracy theories about there being a list.

Josh Brolin 7:51 So, why is that list not released?

Joe Rogan 7:53 That's a very good question.

Josh Brolin 7:54 Who-

Joe Rogan 7:54 Powerful people.

Josh Brolin 7:56 Who has that list?

Joe Rogan 7:56 Well, for sure someone has the list.

Josh Brolin 7:58 Okay.

Joe Rogan 7:58 Ghislaine Maxwell's in jail, right? So she must have talked. Like, there must have been conversations.

Josh Brolin 8:03 Right.

Joe Rogan 8:03 And there must be a bunch of very powerful people that are on that list and, you know, protecting them.

Josh Brolin 8:07 Are all the powerful people in cahoots?

Joe Rogan 8:10 Now-

Josh Brolin 8:10 Well, something that I learned-

Joe Rogan 8:11 Now, they compete with each other.

Josh Brolin 8:11 ... like when I played, when I played W, I played a senator.

Joe Rogan 8:16 Mm-hmm. Who was that like?

Josh Brolin 8:16 I played W.

Joe Rogan 8:17 Was it... Did that... What is it like playing a guy who's still alive? Did you meet with him-

Josh Brolin 8:20 Scary.

Joe Rogan 8:20 ... or hang out with him at all?

Josh Brolin 8:21 Scary. I mean, it, it... No. I wanted to.

Joe Rogan 8:24 Did you ever meet him?

Josh Brolin 8:26 No.

Joe Rogan 8:27 God, that's weird, right-

Josh Brolin 8:28 (inhales deeply)

Joe Rogan 8:28 ... playing a guy-

Josh Brolin 8:28 I had the opportunity to meet him afterwards and, and there was something about him that was more... Remember when he was, like, giving candy to Michelle Obama and all that?

Joe Rogan 8:38 Yeah. Yeah.

Josh Brolin 8:39 And it was, like, a really friendly kind of a mischievous thing.

Joe Rogan 8:41 Right.

Josh Brolin 8:41 And I was like, "I would like to meet him." And then I saw his paintings of his dogs and I said, "I don't wanna meet him."

Joe Rogan 8:47 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 8:49 I just don't... Like, (laughs) it was something attractive for a moment-

Joe Rogan 8:52 (laughs) What's it about the-

Josh Brolin 8:52 ... and then I was like-

Joe Rogan 8:53 ... paintings that got you?

Josh Brolin 8:54 I don't know. And I love paintings. I don't know what it was, but-

Joe Rogan 8:57 He didn't like the paintings?

Josh Brolin 8:58 I... No, it's not that I didn't like the paintings.

Joe Rogan 9:00 There's something in the paintings.

Josh Brolin 9:01 There was... I don't know what it was, man.

Joe Rogan 9:02 You know what was in the paintings? Something in the paintings is I killed a million people with fake weapons of mass destruction. You know, there was... We had a fake story and I used that story to justify an invasion of a country, and now a million people are dead and-

Josh Brolin 9:14 So, that's the question.

Joe Rogan 9:15 ... and I'm haunted every night-

Josh Brolin 9:16 Totally.

Joe Rogan 9:17 ... by these paint dogs.

Josh Brolin 9:18 That are staring like that.

Joe Rogan 9:20 Yeah. This episode is brought to you by ZipRecruiter. It takes a lot of hard work to put this show together, which is why I'm grateful for the small circle of people that work behind the scenes. A team effort is what makes this show successful, just like it takes a solid team to make any business successful. If you're hiring and you wanna know how do you find the best person for your team, I think the answer is ZipRecruiter. And right now, you can try it for free at ziprecruiter.com/rogan. ZipRecruiter is the hiring site that employers prefer the most based on G2. You'll immediately get your job posting in front of qualified candidates, and then you can invite top candidates to apply. See why so many business owners and hiring managers are thankful for ZipRecruiter. Four out of five employers who post on ZipRecruiter get a quality candidate within the first day. Go to this exclusive web address right now to try ZipRecruiter for free, ziprecruiter.com/rogan. Again, that's ziprecruiter.com/rogan. ZipRecruiter, the smartest way to hire. This episode is brought to you by The Farmer's Dog. Dogs are amazing. They're loyal. They're lovable. Like, just having Marshall around can make my day 10 times better. And I'm sure you love your dog just as much, and you want to do your best to help them live longer, healthier, happier lives. And a healthy life for your dog starts with healthy food, just like it does for us. There's a reason having a balanced diet is so important. So, how do you know if your dog's food is as healthy and as safe as it can be? Well, Farmer's Dog gives you that peace of mind by making fresh, real food developed by board certified nutritionists to provide all the nutrients your dog needs. And their food is human grade, which means it's made to the same quality and safety standards as human food. Very few pet foods are made to this strict standard. And let's be clear, human grade food doesn't mean the food is fancy. Just means it's safe and healthy. It's simple, real food from people who care about what goes into your dog's body. The Farmer's Dog makes it easy to help your dog live a long, healthy life by sending you fresh food that's pre-portioned just for your dog's needs because every dog is different. And I'm not just talking about breeds. From their size to their personality to their health, every dog is unique. Plus, precise portions can help keep your dog at an ideal weight, which is one of the proven predictors of a long life. Look, no one, dog or human, should be eating highly processed foods for every meal. It doesn't matter how old your dog is. It's always a great time to start investing in their health and happiness. So, try The Farmer's Dog today. You can get 50% off your first box of fresh, healthy food at thefarmersdog.com/rogan. Plus you get free shipping. Just go to thefarmersdog.com/rogan. Tap the banner or visit this episode's page to learn more. Offer applicable for new customers only.

Josh Brolin 12:27 Like your-

Joe Rogan 12:27 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 12:27 ... face right now is exactly how every eye is in his dog's paintings. It's so funny that you-

Joe Rogan 12:33 That guy must be medicated. They must put him on something so he could sleep.

Josh Brolin 12:36 Is that that look?

Joe Rogan 12:37 I think... I don't-

Josh Brolin 12:38 And does, does he put into his dog's eyes the look that he has always or at least that he feels that he has?

Joe Rogan 12:43 Right, like there's a haunted-

Josh Brolin 12:44 His lens.

Joe Rogan 12:45 ... his real look behind his eyes.

Josh Brolin 12:47 It's his lens.

Joe Rogan 12:47 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 12:48 How he sees the world, how he's experiencing the world.

Joe Rogan 12:49 What is it, what is it like running around knowing that you did that? Not just that you did that, but that there's no culpability.

Josh Brolin 12:56 Hmm.

Joe Rogan 12:56 Like no one went to jail for that. No one even got brought up on charges for that.

Josh Brolin 13:01 Well, that's what I was bringing up because when I would meet these people, I would... You know, I went to the Senate floor and I met a lot of these people and then I met a lot of rich people, which is when I met Trump actually at 21 Club back when I knew a lot about him. I was fascinated by the whole-

Joe Rogan 13:15 What's the 21 Club?

Josh Brolin 13:16 21 Club is a place that he used to go a lot and it was like, you know, yeah, you have a chance to meet this billionaire, this billionaire-

Joe Rogan 13:22 Oh, one of them places.

Josh Brolin 13:23 ... and then Trump, yeah, and then Trump, you-

Joe Rogan 13:24 Eyes Wide Shut type shit.

Josh Brolin 13:25 Yeah. So he, uh... What was I gonna say? Is he... Oh, meeting these people, especially getting them drunk, you know, where people get super honest.

Joe Rogan 13:35 Right.

Josh Brolin 13:35 You know, where they go, "You, you know what, man? I trust you."

Joe Rogan 13:39 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 13:40 "I trust you." And you're like-

Joe Rogan 13:41 Oh, no. (laughs)

Josh Brolin 13:42 ... "Here it comes, here it comes."

Joe Rogan 13:44 Here it comes. (laughs)

Josh Brolin 13:44 Whereas before that they were like, "You know, I'm not sure and I just," or "What I think is," you know, and then they finally go, "I just fucked her, I fucked her."

Joe Rogan 13:51 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 13:51 "I didn't... I couldn't..."

Joe Rogan 13:52 Mm-hmm.

Josh Brolin 13:52 You know, and you're like, "Oh." Or they tell you what's going on. But the thing that I learned, and I'm really curious about, like what we were talking about Hollywood and the perception of them all being in it together, is don't you think the rivalries and all that, not entirely, but that all politicians are basically under the same roof? They all know what each other's doing and that there's more of an agenda of power to keep the public thinking a certain way?

Joe Rogan 14:20 Well, there's, there's-

Josh Brolin 14:21 Not brainwashed.

Joe Rogan 14:21 There's certainly a benefit to that.

Josh Brolin 14:23 Of course there is.

Joe Rogan 14:23 Yeah, there's a benefit to that, and then there's also the- the- the underlying factor is money, of course. Like there's so much money and influence. There's so many special interest groups. There's so many lobbyists. There's-

Josh Brolin 14:34 Tha- that's what I mean, it's all based-

Joe Rogan 14:35 So many massive corporations-

Josh Brolin 14:36 Mostly based on money.

Joe Rogan 14:36 ... that are donating to campaigns.

Josh Brolin 14:38 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 14:39 Yeah, so there's- there's always going to be this desire to sort of color things with a certain light.

Josh Brolin 14:46 Satiate. Pacify.

Joe Rogan 14:46 Yeah. Yeah, for sure, and then treat you like you're a baby so they can continue-

Josh Brolin 14:50 That's exactly right.

Joe Rogan 14:50 ... making insane amounts of money.

Josh Brolin 14:52 That's exactly right.

Joe Rogan 14:52 Like if you're someone like Nancy Pelosi and you're worth hundreds of millions of dollars and you make $170,000 a year and there's no fucking explanation.

Josh Brolin 14:59 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 15:00 Like just that alone.

Josh Brolin 15:01 Just that alone.

Joe Rogan 15:01 Like you have to kind of keep people in the dark. You have to kind of like keep dancing and-

Josh Brolin 15:06 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 15:06 ... otherwise you're going to jail. (laughs)

Josh Brolin 15:08 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 15:08 Like some- someone's gonna start investigating and they're gonna go, "Hey, what you did is not legal."

Josh Brolin 15:13 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 15:13 And you're gonna be in real trouble.

Josh Brolin 15:15 How'd you... What's your relationship like with money?

Joe Rogan 15:18 In what way?

Josh Brolin 15:19 Just in what... You- you've made a certain amount of money for a long time.

Joe Rogan 15:22 I don't think about it.

Josh Brolin 15:23 You don't think about it?

Joe Rogan 15:24 I like... No, no, what I like about money is to not think about it. That's what I like.

Josh Brolin 15:27 Do you like spending it?

Joe Rogan 15:28 I like buying stuff.

Josh Brolin 15:29 Me too.

Joe Rogan 15:29 I have a nice car. Drove here.

Josh Brolin 15:31 Do-

Joe Rogan 15:31 I drove a '69, uh, Camaro once.

Josh Brolin 15:33 See, but that's different.

Joe Rogan 15:34 I like that. Yeah, I like that.

Josh Brolin 15:35 That's fucking different.

Joe Rogan 15:36 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 15:36 That's character.

Joe Rogan 15:37 I like fun stuff, but-

Josh Brolin 15:39 Fun stuff.

Joe Rogan 15:39 ... for the most part, I'm not interested in it like as a goal. You know, I just... I l- uh, what I like about money is not having to think about it.

Josh Brolin 15:46 Mm.

Joe Rogan 15:47 My friend, Bryan Callen, said this to me once. He said, he goes, "Real freedom is when you can go to a restaurant and not worry about what anything costs." He's like, "Everything else is bullshit."

Josh Brolin 15:54 It is.

Joe Rogan 15:55 And it really is.

Josh Brolin 15:56 It really is.

Joe Rogan 15:56 Everything else is bullshit. When you can just go to a restaurant, get a nice steak, you know, order a bottle of wine, and have a good time and not think about the bill. That's-

Josh Brolin 16:04 What I think happens is, is... And be grateful for it.

Joe Rogan 16:08 Mm-hmm.

Josh Brolin 16:08 And to remind yourself-

Joe Rogan 16:09 Mm-hmm.

Josh Brolin 16:09 ... to be... That that, that exist to be grateful for-

Joe Rogan 16:12 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 16:13 ... and not be taken advantage of, and I think that's one of the hardest things about money/power is you start treating things as if they're underneath you.

Joe Rogan 16:21 Ooh.

Josh Brolin 16:21 You know?

Joe Rogan 16:22 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 16:22 Where you go, "God, I'm so glad I, I can go anywhere in the world right now and get a meal and I don't have to think about how am I gonna pay for this."

Joe Rogan 16:29 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 16:30 "Am I gonna be in debt on my credit card?" But when you start saying, "Excuse me."

Joe Rogan 16:34 Oh, yeah.

Josh Brolin 16:34 "I said, I said 204 degrees, not 190."

Joe Rogan 16:40 Right. Uh, uh... (laughs)

Josh Brolin 16:41 "Read my lip..." You know?

Joe Rogan 16:42 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 16:42 And you're like, "Oh, man, that's..."

Joe Rogan 16:43 That's just gross. That's just-

Josh Brolin 16:44 It is gross, but it happens.

Joe Rogan 16:46 Taking, that's just taking advantage of this relationship that everyone knows where service people have to be nicer than they really would be normally, like a regular person. So people that-

Josh Brolin 16:56 Hoping for a tip.

Joe Rogan 16:57 ... t- yeah.

Josh Brolin 16:57 Hoping for one of your many hundreds or thousands-

Joe Rogan 17:01 Yeah, it's gross.

Josh Brolin 17:01 ... or hundreds of millions of dollars.

Joe Rogan 17:02 Yeah. It's disgusting. It's a gross way to treat people, but some people want to get rich so they, they can do that to people. Maybe someone did it to them when they were younger and they're like, "I can't wait to do this to other people."

Josh Brolin 17:13 I mean, when you said nice car and you went-

Joe Rogan 17:14 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 17:14 ... like I thought you were gonna say, I was like, "Oh, please no. Like Lamborghini or..." But I wanna-

Joe Rogan 17:19 No, I don't have any of those.

Josh Brolin 17:20 And then-

Joe Rogan 17:21 No, I like muscle cars. I like old muscle cars.

Josh Brolin 17:23 I know.

Joe Rogan 17:23 That's my favorite.

Josh Brolin 17:24 That's like me at 37 knucklehead.

Joe Rogan 17:26 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 17:26 And people say, "Oh, is that an affectation? I know you're friends with Momo or whatever." I go, "No, man. I've been riding motorcycles since I was three and a half years old."

Joe Rogan 17:33 They're fun.

Josh Brolin 17:34 They're not only fun. There's something on a s- if you read Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance-

Joe Rogan 17:39 Mm-hmm. I did read it.

Josh Brolin 17:39 ... which is the only book that's ever been written that's kind of, gets close to the kind of spiritual place. If you're a true motorcyclist, whether you're riding with your son or whether you're riding with a grid of guys or whatever, that beautiful thunderous hum when you're in a, when you're in a group of guys who really know what they're doing and you're in absolute fucking sync.

Joe Rogan 18:02 Yes.

Josh Brolin 18:02 And yes, your arms are up here and your arms are pretty numb at that point, but you're fucking soaring. You're an eagle on a fucking jet stream.

Joe Rogan 18:09 You ever heard Hunter S. Thompson in... Y- you know that documentary they did, Gonzo?

Josh Brolin 18:14 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 18:14 The li- that, that-

Josh Brolin 18:15 Of course.

Joe Rogan 18:15 In the documentary, the very beginning, he talks about riding a motorcycle on the Pacific Coast Highway.

Josh Brolin 18:21 Oh, I don't remember that. I don't remember that.

Joe Rogan 18:22 Yeah. Oh, it's fucking great. See if you can find that. It, he talks about riding a motorcycle, how about like that the, the, the lines begin to blur.

Josh Brolin 18:30 Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's it.

Joe Rogan 18:30 Those, and you just, you're just on the edge and how alive you are. It's a fucking fantastic speech.

Josh Brolin 18:35 We don't have to get into this book right away, but there was... I wrote, they came to me. It's the only story that I wrote that somebody asked me to write for the book. And they were like, "Well, you're really into motorcycles, why don't you write a story about motorcycles?"... and I tried and it was just bad and bad. And everything I wrote was, like, so forced and bullshit. And finally I said, "I can't do it, I'm not gonna write it." And the minute I said, "I'm not gonna do this," I started writing. It just kinda started-

Joe Rogan 18:59 Ah.

Josh Brolin 18:59 ... to come out, and it's good.

Joe Rogan 19:00 Do you write by hand?

Josh Brolin 19:02 I do.

Joe Rogan 19:02 Yeah?

Josh Brolin 19:03 Mostly.

Joe Rogan 19:03 Do you feel more of a connection when you write by hand?

Josh Brolin 19:05 No, that's not why I do it.

Joe Rogan 19:06 You don't like to type?

Josh Brolin 19:06 'Cause I'll write any which way, whether it's on the phone, whether...

Joe Rogan 19:09 Mm-hmm.

Josh Brolin 19:10 You know, I remember people saying, like, "I, I write, you know, by hand, I hand write because it's, it's the way it used to be." And I was like, "Yeah, it also used to be under candlelight, which fucked your eyes up."

Joe Rogan 19:20 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 19:20 You know what I mean?

Joe Rogan 19:20 Also be, used to be, people had slaves.

Josh Brolin 19:22 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 19:22 Polished

Narrator 19:23 ... and also you could-

Joe Rogan 19:23 You could only get around by horse. (laughs)

Josh Brolin 19:24 ... paint on caves and shit. "Why don't you go paint on a cave? Tell me a story. Try to get it published."

Joe Rogan 19:28 Yeah. "Get a witch doctor to take care of your broken leg."

Josh Brolin 19:31 I don't care how it comes out. I think real writing is anywhere, anytime, however you can get it out.

Joe Rogan 19:36 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 19:36 I don't think there's a muse that's needed. I think it's work, man.

Joe Rogan 19:40 It is work.

Josh Brolin 19:40 It's labor.

Joe Rogan 19:40 I think the muse is, like, it, it's, it's a concept, right? Have you ever read Pressfield's The War of Art?

Josh Brolin 19:47 Yeah, of course.

Joe Rogan 19:48 Great book.

Josh Brolin 19:49 Great book.

Joe Rogan 19:49 I think he's right, though, when he says you summon the muse when you sit down to work. But that's also just, like, an intention thing. Like, you have so much time and effort put on a thing, and when you do that, your mind gets more in sync with creativity.

Josh Brolin 20:02 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 20:02 But if you treat it like it's a muse, it actually does work.

Josh Brolin 20:06 Hm.

Joe Rogan 20:06 Like, if you show up every day and, like, say-

Josh Brolin 20:09 Click into that thing.

Joe Rogan 20:10 Yeah, yeah, and, and pay respect to the muse, "I'm sitting here and I'm ready to write, and I'm a professional and I'm ready to go."

Josh Brolin 20:16 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 20:17 And treat it like you're summoning the mu- the muse.

Josh Brolin 20:19 Yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 20:19 It actually works.

Josh Brolin 20:20 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 20:21 It ac- there actually is a, an effect that happens. I don't know if there's an actual muse, but (clears throat) you can understand why someone would think that there's a muse, because that-

Josh Brolin 20:29 Yeah, but why do people chant? Why do people meditate?

Joe Rogan 20:31 Right.

Josh Brolin 20:31 Why do people that? That's the muse. Whatever the muse is-

Joe Rogan 20:34 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 20:34 ... it's like talking about God. What's God? I don't know, it depends on who you're talking to.

Joe Rogan 20:37 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 20:38 God is a feeling.

Joe Rogan 20:39 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 20:39 God is something that, that fucking thing that keeps you inspired, that keeps the gasoline at a high octane.

Joe Rogan 20:46 Well, it's something that get-

Josh Brolin 20:46 That's how I see it.

Joe Rogan 20:47 It's something that gets you away from your ego, like with writing, something that gets you away from your ego and into your mind, into your consciousness, into, like, your, your perceptions of things.

Josh Brolin 20:57 Mm.

Joe Rogan 20:57 Your ability to express it. And it's a, just a f- it's a focus thing. And the more you focus on it, the more that muscle grows, the more you get adapted to it.

Josh Brolin 21:05 Because your ego is worried about how people are gonna perceive you.

Joe Rogan 21:09 Right.

Josh Brolin 21:09 And that's not right.

Joe Rogan 21:10 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 21:10 You're writing for somebody else.

Joe Rogan 21:11 And how, yeah, you wanna look cool.

Josh Brolin 21:12 You wanna look cool. People are like, "Fuck."

Joe Rogan 21:14 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Josh Brolin 21:14 "I read that book-"

Joe Rogan 21:15 Mm-hmm.

Josh Brolin 21:15 "... that you wrote, man. Holy shit."

Joe Rogan 21:17 Mm-hmm.

Josh Brolin 21:18 "I had no idea, you're amazing."

Joe Rogan 21:20 (laughs) That's the grossest conversation ever.

Josh Brolin 21:22 (laughs) Yeah, it's the grossest.

Joe Rogan 21:22 Cocktail party in Hollywood, some guy comes up to you and tells you, "You're amazing."

Josh Brolin 21:26 Dude.

Joe Rogan 21:26 "You are a genius."

Josh Brolin 21:27 I ha- And it's always with those eyes.

Joe Rogan 21:29 You're s- You're so incredible.

Josh Brolin 21:29 "I had no idea, dude."

Joe Rogan 21:30 Meanwhile, that guy's trying to sell you on some multi-level marketing scheme or something.

Josh Brolin 21:34 As, absolutely.

Joe Rogan 21:34 There's something he's trying to tap into you, it... (laughs)

Josh Brolin 21:36 "I wanna buy that book. I want a option in your book. I wanna"-

Joe Rogan 21:39 Oh, here it comes.

Josh Brolin 21:39 "... turn it into a fucking movie."

Joe Rogan 21:40 Here it comes. "I also have a script I'd love you to see."

Josh Brolin 21:42 "Yeah."

Joe Rogan 21:43 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 21:44 "What's the new, is it a Disney?"

Joe Rogan 21:46 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 21:46 "Is it, is it about-"

Joe Rogan 21:47 Hmm, that's the one thing-

Josh Brolin 21:48 "... is it about animals talking?"

Joe Rogan 21:48 ... I really love about living in Texas.

Josh Brolin 21:50 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 21:50 Is there's no Hollywood. There's no show business. I don't have to deal with any of these people with, like, alternative agendas. And the worst-

Josh Brolin 21:57 We just moved to S- we just... I wanna go back to that, but we just moved to Santa Barbara.

Joe Rogan 22:01 Santa Barbara's-

Josh Brolin 22:02 Santa Bar- ... awesome. Santa Bar- It's funny.

Joe Rogan 22:04 I love it out there.

Josh Brolin 22:04 Like, why does everybody fucking think that? It is awesome.

Joe Rogan 22:06 Montecito, I love it out there.

Josh Brolin 22:07 Why?

Joe Rogan 22:08 So pretty. 'Cause it's beautiful.

Josh Brolin 22:09 'Cause it's beautiful. What about the people?

Joe Rogan 22:11 Uh...

Josh Brolin 22:13 I'm not, I'm not-

Joe Rogan 22:13 They're a little elitist. There's a lot of elitist people-

Josh Brolin 22:16 Okay, so this-

Joe Rogan 22:17 ... out there.

Josh Brolin 22:17 ... is a perfect place for me.

Joe Rogan 22:18 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 22:18 So I grew up in Santa Barbara.

Joe Rogan 22:20 Mm-hmm.

Josh Brolin 22:21 I was in Paso Robles, which is ranch country, about two hours above Santa Barbara. And then we moved to Santa Barbara when I was 11, and it was Montecito, but it was a very different Montecito. Like, yes, there were a couple rich people. Yes, my dad was doing okay by then. He had done Marcus Welby. He did, uh, at that time, he did Amityville Horror, so he had a little bit of money.

Joe Rogan 22:40 (laughs) I remember that.

Josh Brolin 22:40 But we bought, you know, what would now be a $35 million home in Montecito-

Joe Rogan 22:45 Right.

Josh Brolin 22:45 ... he bought for $600,000.

Joe Rogan 22:48 Oh.

Josh Brolin 22:48 Same fucking house.

Joe Rogan 22:49 Right, right, right. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Josh Brolin 22:49 Do you know what I mean? So it was a different Montecito, and then whatever, you know, group I, I grew up with. But I went to... The point is, I went to jail there a lot.

Joe Rogan 22:57 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 22:58 I just did. I just liked it.

Joe Rogan 23:00 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 23:00 Instead, instead of the museum, I went to jail. I was like, "No, Mom, I'm gonna go to jail today." Um, and then ... So in LA, Venice Beach. I love Venice Beach, but Venice Beach has even changed. You know, you used to know everybody and-

Joe Rogan 23:15 Oh, yeah.

Josh Brolin 23:15 ... everybody kind of coexisted beautifully, and, and then Venice Beach changed. It got totally randomly violent.

Joe Rogan 23:22 Became very dangerous.

Josh Brolin 23:22 Had little kids. Very dangerous.

Joe Rogan 23:24 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 23:24 Little kids. Okay, so we moved to Malibu. We're close to Laird. I know Laird and Gabby and all that thing, but it never landed. So we were always talking about moving, even though we were kinda building a house and we were finalizing everything. We were always talking. I mean, we talked about Texas. My mom's from Texas. We were talking about East Coast, we were talking about Europe, all these places, but never Santa Barbara. I would never move back to Santa Barbara.

Joe Rogan 23:48 Really?

Josh Brolin 23:48 'Cause, by the way, honey, if we move to Santa Barbara, which you love so much and you think is so beautiful, our little girls will eventually, for sure, go to prison. That was in my mind.

Joe Rogan 24:00 Why?

Josh Brolin 24:00 Because in my mind-

Joe Rogan 24:01 Because in your childhood?

Josh Brolin 24:02 ... I had built... Totally.

Joe Rogan 24:03 Huh.

Josh Brolin 24:04 Most of my friends that grew up in Montecito are dead.

Joe Rogan 24:07 Really?

Josh Brolin 24:07 Like, 36 out of 50.

Joe Rogan 24:08 Really?

Josh Brolin 24:09 Oh, yeah. Yeah, they all died.

Joe Rogan 24:10 From what?

Josh Brolin 24:11 Heroin epidemic, punk rock.

Joe Rogan 24:13 Oh, God.

Josh Brolin 24:14 Driving accidents, everything.

Joe Rogan 24:15 36 out of 50?

Josh Brolin 24:16 Out of 50.

Joe Rogan 24:17 Wow.

Josh Brolin 24:18 Best friend, Jason Sears, who was the lead singer of Rich Kids on LSD, RKL, which was a big punk band that influenced a bunch of people. Nirvana, you know, Pearl Jam, all these people.

Joe Rogan 24:28 Rich Kids on LSD is a great name for a band.

Josh Brolin 24:30 You should look it up. Can you look it up?

Joe Rogan 24:32 (coughs)

Josh Brolin 24:32 Jason Sears, Rich Kids on LSD. We got a tattoo at the same time. I got a tattoo from Freddy Negretti that's gone now 'cause I got removed it. But it was a big Jesus with blood coming out of the hands, and Jason-

Joe Rogan 24:43 Oh, Jesus. (laughs)

Josh Brolin 24:43 ... that same night, got, the same night, got "Eat Shit" on his ass. See if you can find Jason's ass that says, "Eat Shit," on it.... (laughs) you're gonna put that in? Jason Sears, eat shit. Yeah. Where is it? Oh, you gotta just keep looking. Yeah, it'll be there.

Joe Rogan 25:03 (clears throat)

Josh Brolin 25:04 So, why was... Oh, so eventually, when we finally said, "Look, we're not moving, we should be grateful," we're not grateful enough, that's the problem. We're not grateful enough, but Malibu just didn't kind of sit. And then one day, I'm lying on the bed-

Joe Rogan 25:17 What didn't you like about Malibu?

Josh Brolin 25:19 I love Malibu, it's just remote. You know?

Joe Rogan 25:21 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 25:21 Like, we already are remote in Paso Robles.

Joe Rogan 25:23 Mm-hmm.

Josh Brolin 25:23 We have a place in Paso Robles, a place where I grew up, not the ranch I grew up, it's about three miles down the road, but that's remote, and a remote that I love. I love remote, but I love extremes. I don't wanna be sort of next to Santa Monica.

Joe Rogan 25:37 Mm-hmm.

Josh Brolin 25:37 And it's 20 miles away and it takes two and a half hours to get there.

Joe Rogan 25:40 Right.

Josh Brolin 25:40 You and I were talking about that. I don't wanna sit in traffic for half my life.

Joe Rogan 25:44 Right.

Josh Brolin 25:44 I just don't want to.

Joe Rogan 25:45 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 25:45 You know, if I'm gonna be somewhere, I wanna be somewhere. So Santa Barbara represented a place where you kind of had your own piece of property, but everything was 10 minutes away. You got dance class for the girls, you got soccer, you got this.

Joe Rogan 25:58 Right.

Josh Brolin 25:58 You know? You know what I mean?

Joe Rogan 25:59 Yeah, yeah.

Josh Brolin 26:00 So that was the thing. But s-

Joe Rogan 26:02 (clears throat)

Josh Brolin 26:02 But never, I would, never was I gonna go back to Santa Barbara. I finally put on Zillow Santa Barbara, one house came up and that's the house that we bought.

Joe Rogan 26:09 Really?

Josh Brolin 26:09 And it was Joe Walsh's old house.

Joe Rogan 26:10 Oh, wow.

Josh Brolin 26:11 Which is amazing.

Joe Rogan 26:12 That's incredible.

Josh Brolin 26:13 Incredible.

Joe Rogan 26:13 That's incredible.

Josh Brolin 26:14 Which I was stoked. And I asked him... Anyway, I have to finish the story-

Joe Rogan 26:19 Okay.

Josh Brolin 26:19 ... is that I was so freaked out about moving up to Santa Barbara, I still hadn't made the kind of transition, that I contracted a mild case to, of Bell's palsy.

Joe Rogan 26:29 Really?

Josh Brolin 26:30 Yeah. Like, literally was stressing out my wife with, like, "You gotta..." And I'm not a stress guy. And she was like, "You gotta mellow the fuck out." I'm like, "Yeah, but you don't know what's gonna happen when we move up here." It's like, it's gonna be-

Joe Rogan 26:39 So your face started, like, sagging?

Josh Brolin 26:40 So literally, I'm washing my face and I'm doing this, and it just started going br-...

Joe Rogan 26:47 Wait, when was this?

Josh Brolin 26:49 Four months ago.

Joe Rogan 26:50 Okay.

Josh Brolin 26:51 Four and a half months ago.

Joe Rogan 26:51 That's a side effect of the vaccine too. That's one of the side effects of COVID-19 vaccines.

Josh Brolin 26:55 I've heard that.

Joe Rogan 26:56 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 26:56 And I've also heard that speech impediments have als-... I've heard a lot of things. Kids taking vaccines-

Joe Rogan 27:00 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 27:01 ... and things happening.

Joe Rogan 27:03 (clears throat) Yeah.

Josh Brolin 27:03 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 27:04 That vaccine in particular.

Josh Brolin 27:05 That one.

Joe Rogan 27:06 The MRNA one.

Josh Brolin 27:07 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 27:07 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 27:07 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 27:09 Yeah, I know quite a few people that developed Bell's palsy from them. Well, whatever you wanna call it.

Josh Brolin 27:12 Are you serious?

Joe Rogan 27:12 Yeah. Facial paralysis. Yeah. I know two people specifically-

Josh Brolin 27:16 I wonder if that's-

Joe Rogan 27:17 ... developed fac- facial, like droopy face.

Josh Brolin 27:20 Because when my older kids-

Joe Rogan 27:21 It went away. (clears throat)

Josh Brolin 27:22 When my older kids were young, there were, what, 17 vaccinations?

Joe Rogan 27:25 Mm-hmm.

Josh Brolin 27:26 And now that my younger kids are young, there's 56.

Joe Rogan 27:29 72.

Josh Brolin 27:30 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 27:32 Yeah, it's a, a series of them, but it's ultimately 72 shots.

Josh Brolin 27:35 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 27:35 Yeah. And-

Josh Brolin 27:36 It's a scary prospect, man.

Joe Rogan 27:38 Well, the, the fucked up thing is if you talk about it, you're an anti-vaxxer and you're a conspiracy theorist.

Josh Brolin 27:42 You could talk about anything.

Joe Rogan 27:44 But that's a big one, 'cause they've done a really good job of demonizing anyone who questions-

Josh Brolin 27:49 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 27:49 ... a medicine that might be correlated with a bunch of fucking serious diseases.

Josh Brolin 27:53 Yeah, exactly.

Joe Rogan 27:54 And for whatever reason-

Josh Brolin 27:55 Profit.

Joe Rogan 27:56 ... they've, yeah, they've just done a great job of gaslighting people.

Josh Brolin 27:59 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 27:59 And scaring the shit out of people by labeling anybody who d-... Like, look what they did to Jenny McCarthy. Do you remember when Jenny McCarthy-

Josh Brolin 28:06 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 28:06 ... had a kid and her kid had autism-

Josh Brolin 28:08 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 28:08 ... and she thought that autism had possibly come from vaccines? And they basically ran her out of Hollywood.

Josh Brolin 28:13 But why would they do that? What's the reason?

Joe Rogan 28:15 Money.

Josh Brolin 28:15 What do they benefit? Money. That's what I said before, money.

Joe Rogan 28:16 Well, well, the thing is, during the, uh, Reagan administration-

Josh Brolin 28:21 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 28:21 ... they, uh, the vaccine companies, pharmaceutical drug companies that are making vaccines, they said, "We are unable to make these vaccines if we're liable. Because if we're liable, there's too many lawsuits that are gonna come our way."

Josh Brolin 28:38 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 28:38 'Cause vaccines cannot be completely safe and effective, just by virtue of the mechanism in which they work.

Josh Brolin 28:45 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 28:45 You know, you have, uh, an irritant, you have this, uh, this, this virus, this dead virus. Your body sees the aluminum or whatever it is, it, it reacts to that in a negative way and it finds the dead virus, it develops antibodies. Just by the way they work.

Josh Brolin 29:00 Right.

Joe Rogan 29:00 When you vaccinate a o- enormous amount of people, you're gonna have a certain amount of people that have a negative reaction. If we have lawsuits for every person that has a negative reaction-

Josh Brolin 29:08 You're broke.

Joe Rogan 29:08 ... we're gonna go out of business.

Josh Brolin 29:09 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 29:10 So, they made them immune. They made them immune. And you know what happened? Immediately, they're like, "Well, you need a vaccine for this and you need to get a vaccine for that." And they gave babies-

Josh Brolin 29:16 Knowing that there was no drawback.

Joe Rogan 29:18 ... Hepatitis B vaccines.

Josh Brolin 29:20 Right.

Joe Rogan 29:20 Babies. Which-

Josh Brolin 29:21 Right when you're born.

Joe Rogan 29:22 Right when you're born. Which-

Josh Brolin 29:22 Right when you're born.

Joe Rogan 29:23 You know, there's also doctors that say it doesn't even really work for babies, but what you're doing is you're cons- you're conditioning the parents to accept the fact that your child's gonna get regularly vaccinated.

Josh Brolin 29:34 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 29:34 I mean, my doctor fu- fortunately, our pediatrician wanted to put the kids on a, uh, a, a different schedule, a slower schedule.

Josh Brolin 29:42 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 29:42 And he didn't want them to have any vaccines-

Josh Brolin 29:44 Hmm.

Joe Rogan 29:44 ... until they were two.

Josh Brolin 29:45 Your doctor in California?

Joe Rogan 29:46 Yes.

Josh Brolin 29:47 Hmm.

Joe Rogan 29:47 And he, but he wa- it was not like a quack, he was like, "I think y- the way to do it," I mean, you ha- there's a, a schedule of vaccines your kids have to get unless you're, have religious exemption if you didn't go to school-

Josh Brolin 29:57 But let's not assault your children-

Joe Rogan 30:01 Right.

Josh Brolin 30:01 ... with a potential poison-

Joe Rogan 30:03 Right.

Josh Brolin 30:03 ... because everybody is different. If I take-

Joe Rogan 30:05 Yes.

Josh Brolin 30:05 ... a bong hit, I might end up under the table.

Joe Rogan 30:08 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 30:09 If you take a bong hit, you actually may feel smarter and clearer. I remember Dean Potter, who was a climber, and he was like, "I stopped smoking pot for four months, but when I started smoking pot, I could feel the hold."

Joe Rogan 30:19 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 30:19 "At 2,000 feet."

Joe Rogan 30:21 Oh, yeah.

Josh Brolin 30:21 "Sheer cliff, nothing underneath, no ropes, but I felt more confident." And for me, I go, "If I took a bong hit up there, I could be four feet up and be freaking out."

Joe Rogan 30:32 Right. It's different for everybody.

Josh Brolin 30:34 It's... 'Cause everybody has different brains, it's like psycho-pharmaceuticals.

Joe Rogan 30:37 Mm-hmm.

Josh Brolin 30:38 Let's just give them all lithium, or let's give them all that. You have to experiment and the, the, the idea-

Joe Rogan 30:43 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 30:43 ... of experimenting with that shit is super scary.

Joe Rogan 30:45 It is. It is super scary. And it's also super scary when you're not liable for any of the repercussions and you're just pushing it on people because you're a corporation.

Josh Brolin 30:55 (clears throat)

Joe Rogan 30:55 And corporations just wanna make money. Their, their thing is just, is just unlimited growth. They just have a, they have an obligation to their shareholders every...... quarter, they wanna make more money, and they just keep ramping it up.

Josh Brolin 31:07 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 31:07 Like, we're doing really well this year.

Josh Brolin 31:07 I remember Seinfeld, Seinfeld talking about that. He was like, "I remember back in the '70s and comedy, you know, green rooms and all that, and we'd all be fucking with each other. And it had, never had anything to do with money because nobody was really making money, like money, money, like, tons of money."

Joe Rogan 31:22 Right.

Josh Brolin 31:22 It was just about, "What set are you gonna do?"

Joe Rogan 31:26 Right.

Josh Brolin 31:26 "What are you trying out?"

Joe Rogan 31:27 Right.

Josh Brolin 31:28 "Are you gonna fail, or are you not gonna fail? You know?"

Joe Rogan 31:30 Right.

Josh Brolin 31:30 But it was this community-

Joe Rogan 31:31 (clears throat)

Josh Brolin 31:32 ... again. And I think that things have grown into... Not that I wanted to talk about this or that I even thought about it before, but the money thing is a very interesting thing to me, you know? And if you wanna take it back to the book, which we can talk about later-

Joe Rogan 31:43 No, I mean, money is a-

Josh Brolin 31:44 ... it's like the anti-celebrity. It's like how do you stay grounded?

Joe Rogan 31:47 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 31:48 How do you stay accountable? And why would you stay accountable? Because I actually give a fuck about people instead of just being in it for myself.

Joe Rogan 31:56 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 31:57 And I think that's the difference.

Joe Rogan 31:58 Well, I think one of the things-

Josh Brolin 31:59 (sniffs)

Joe Rogan 31:59 ... that happens to people with money is you didn't have money when you were young. Now, all of a sudden you have money, and you get really scared about losing that money.

Josh Brolin 32:06 That somebody else is gonna take it away. Yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 32:07 Yeah. You get scared it's gonna go away because now you realize-

Josh Brolin 32:10 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 32:10 ... "Oh, my God. It's so much better to not have to worry about your bills."

Josh Brolin 32:12 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 32:12 "And it's so much better to have some money to buy things."

Josh Brolin 32:14 Yeah, totally.

Joe Rogan 32:14 And then you start thinking only about money.

Josh Brolin 32:17 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 32:17 And start making decisions only for money.

Josh Brolin 32:19 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 32:20 And then you go down the weird road.

Josh Brolin 32:22 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 32:22 And it r- r- you know, really distorts artists. It, it, it fucks a lot of people up.

Josh Brolin 32:27 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 32:27 You know, you see it in a lot of bands. They start making, like, poppy songs when they used to be, like, raw and gritty when they were younger. They used to be, they used to be, like, authentic, and then all of a sudden they're making, like, theme songs for films that it's, like, weird fucking romance songs.

Josh Brolin 32:41 Theme songs (laughs) for rom-coms.

Joe Rogan 32:42 Like Aerosmith went through-

Josh Brolin 32:43 Totally.

Joe Rogan 32:43 ... a bunch of that shit.

Josh Brolin 32:44 Totally.

Joe Rogan 32:45 Where, to me, as an Aerosmith, you know, lover as a kid-

Josh Brolin 32:48 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 32:48 ... to see them d- you know, go from, like, Dream On to, like, the shit they were-

Josh Brolin 32:52 Now, and I wonder with, like-

Joe Rogan 32:54 ... from Walk This Way

Josh Brolin 32:54 ... drug addiction and all that, I wonder if that's, like, if the parallel is I went back to heroin at that point 'cause I just couldn't fucking deal.

Joe Rogan 33:02 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 33:02 Do you know what I mean?

Joe Rogan 33:03 I think it's when they get off heroin-

Josh Brolin 33:04 It-

Joe Rogan 33:04 ... and they start wanting to make money.

Josh Brolin 33:05 (laughs) Maybe. I don't know.

Joe Rogan 33:06 It's like, "How can I make m- I need to make some money. I spent all my fucking money."

Josh Brolin 33:09 But look at... I wonder if there's any connection, like, with-

Joe Rogan 33:12 (clears throat)

Josh Brolin 33:12 Remember Philip Seymour Hoffman, like, one of the greatest actors-

Joe Rogan 33:14 Oh, yeah.

Josh Brolin 33:14 ... that ever lived? And I've known his mother since I was doing theater in Rochester, New York. I was, like, a 20-year-old, 21-year-old, and she would come up to me, and she said, "I think you're a fine actor." And I'd go, "Oh, thank you very much." And she, and she goes, "You know, my son just moved to New York. He," like, "he's, he wants to be an actor." And I said, "Oh, yeah, what's his name?" "Phil. Phil is his name." "Oh, well, tell Phil good luck. Good luck to Phil." And that, you know, it's like every- anybody who wants to be an actor just-

Joe Rogan 33:40 Right.

Josh Brolin 33:40 ... the, the odds-

Joe Rogan 33:41 Good luck. Right.

Josh Brolin 33:42 ... of it happening, it's just not gonna happen. And then Phil became this guy, 22 years of sobriety, who had an inkling in the beginning and said, "You know what? I don't want this to control, like, my thing, so I'm not gonna do it. I'm gonna give everything I am to acting, and I'm gonna try to make the best career, theater career, movie career, whatever." And then, you know, and I, again, I have it in the book, where I see him on the street, and I'm crazy, and I've gotten into a fight with my wife. And I'm walking down Columbus Avenue, and I have cords on. I have no shoes, I have no shirt. On my way, I'm out of my fucking head.

Joe Rogan 34:18 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 34:18 And I look to my left, and I see Nick Nolte at a café.

Joe Rogan 34:22 Oh.

Josh Brolin 34:22 And we lock eyes, and I've never met Nick Nolte. I've never seen him. And it will happen that I actually will have a relationship with him later on. But, uh, we lock eyes, and the moment is he's seeing in me what he used to be or seeing in me what I'm to become. Like, I'm seeing in him-

Joe Rogan 34:38 Oh.

Josh Brolin 34:38 ... what I'm to become later, right?

Joe Rogan 34:40 Right.

Josh Brolin 34:40 Then I see Philip Seymour Hoffman, who's standing there talk-... I go, "Hey, Phil, it's Josh."

Joe Rogan 34:48 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 34:48 "What's up?"

Joe Rogan 34:50 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 34:50 "You're doing so well, man. Fuck. Good for you, dude."

Joe Rogan 34:53 No shirt.

Josh Brolin 34:54 No, no shirt, no shoes.

Joe Rogan 34:56 No shoes.

Josh Brolin 34:56 And he's standing there with one foot pointed toward me and another foot pointed in the direction that he wants to go.

Joe Rogan 35:02 (sighs)

Josh Brolin 35:02 You know how people stand there? And they're like-

Joe Rogan 35:03 Like, "Get ready to get the fuck outta here."

Josh Brolin 35:03 ... "Good to see you, man. Yeah, good. Good."

Joe Rogan 35:07 Oh, no.

Josh Brolin 35:08 Now, how is that the guy that died of a heroin overdose?

Joe Rogan 35:13 Did he get injured?

Josh Brolin 35:16 No.

Joe Rogan 35:16 No?

Josh Brolin 35:17 I-

Joe Rogan 35:17 He just got back on it? 'Cause sometimes it, what happens is, uh, people get injured. Yeah.

Josh Brolin 35:22 I know, and they have surgery, and then they have back-

Joe Rogan 35:24 Uh-huh. Yeah.

Josh Brolin 35:24 ... and then they get on-

Joe Rogan 35:25 I know quite a few people that-

Josh Brolin 35:26 ... you know, OxyContin. Me too.

Joe Rogan 35:26 Yeah, yeah.

Josh Brolin 35:27 I know a lot of people that, that, that's kind of been the trajectory.

Joe Rogan 35:29 No back pain, nothing?

Josh Brolin 35:30 No. To me, there's another parallel, and the parallel is, "I just wanna make money finally. I'm sick of doing independents. I'm sick of doing this and not making any money." And then you start doing, you know, whatever he was, Hunger Games or-

Joe Rogan 35:42 And then you feel hollow, and then you wanna fill yourself-

Josh Brolin 35:45 What we were talking about before.

Joe Rogan 35:46 Right. You wanna numb yourself up because you feel like a whore.

Josh Brolin 35:48 You feel like a whore.

Joe Rogan 35:49 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 35:50 It's, like, there's one thing about, like, actually finding solace in saying, "Hey, man, I'm older. I'm gonna do this movie. I get it. I would like, you know, I got college coming up for my kids."

Joe Rogan 36:00 Mm-hmm.

Josh Brolin 36:00 And you justify it in a way that's okay. And then there's one thing about you've identified yourself so much as an artist that to release yourself from that identity in other people's minds, again going back to the ego, that you just, it just fucks you up.

Joe Rogan 36:14 Right.

Josh Brolin 36:14 You just can't deal.

Joe Rogan 36:15 And then you wanna escape from your reality.

Josh Brolin 36:17 Exactly.

Joe Rogan 36:17 Yeah, you wanna numb yourself.

Josh Brolin 36:19 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 36:19 Yeah. Well, that is a real fucking thing, man. And if you've ever done a project where it's, like, really a-... I did a really bad sitcom once, and, uh, I remember-

Josh Brolin 36:29 Did you act in it?

Joe Rogan 36:30 Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. It was terrible.

Josh Brolin 36:31 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 36:31 And I remember while I was doing it, I was just imagining, like, "What if this is my life? What if this stupid piece-of-shit sitcom goes for, like, 10 years?"

Josh Brolin 36:38 10 years, yeah.

Joe Rogan 36:39 "And I have to kee-"... 'Cause there's sitcoms that inexplicably are very successful, or were in the '90s-

Josh Brolin 36:44 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 36:44 ... and very successful, and they were terrible.

Josh Brolin 36:47 Yeah, terrible.

Joe Rogan 36:47 They were terrible.

Josh Brolin 36:48 But people loved them.

Joe Rogan 36:49 Well, people wanna be numb.

Josh Brolin 36:50 It's like eating ice cream.

Joe Rogan 36:51 They just wanna slack jaw-

Josh Brolin 36:52 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 36:52 ... sit in front of the com- computer-

Josh Brolin 36:54 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 36:54 ... or whatever, the TV, and eat SpaghettiOs, just fucking numb themselves to some mundane bullshit.

Josh Brolin 36:59 Fuck yeah.

Joe Rogan 36:59 And if you're doing that kind of a thing, you live in hell.

Josh Brolin 37:02 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 37:03 And a lot of those people that do those things, they wind up doing drugs 'cause they just feel very lost.

Josh Brolin 37:08 (laughs) If you do that and you're doing... "You live in hell."

Joe Rogan 37:11 Yeah, you live in hell.

Josh Brolin 37:11 Which it is.

Joe Rogan 37:12 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 37:12 To me, to you.

Joe Rogan 37:13 It sounds crazy to a person listening. "Oh, you're making $50,000 a week. How you living?" "You're living in hell." Like, "What are you talking about?"

Josh Brolin 37:20 No, no, no. That's not the point.

Joe Rogan 37:21 They're mostly people would be like, "That's great. That would be amazing." But if you wanna do a thing, if, like, you wanna be a great comic or you wanna be a great actor and you're doing something-

Josh Brolin 37:28 You have to have incentive.

Joe Rogan 37:29 Right. You have to have... You wanna, you have to wanna create something really good.

Josh Brolin 37:33 Right.

Joe Rogan 37:33 And when you can't create something really good-

Josh Brolin 37:35 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 37:35 ... and you're just doing it for money, you feel trapped and you feel like shit. And then you have to reward yourself for this stupid fucking thing you do.

Josh Brolin 37:41 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 37:41 So what do you do? You go out and buy a nice Mercedes. You get a fucking house in Malibu. Now you have a large monthly nut that you have to cover. But when you take people over your house, like, "Look how I'm living."

Josh Brolin 37:50 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 37:51 "Look at this ocean view."

Josh Brolin 37:52 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 37:52 "Come on."

Josh Brolin 37:53 "Yeah."

Joe Rogan 37:53 "Not bad."

Josh Brolin 37:53 "How much of this house do you use? Nothing."

Joe Rogan 37:55 Yeah, almost nothing.

Josh Brolin 37:56 But-

Joe Rogan 37:56 I always say to my friends, my, my young comic friends that are coming up, "Your house is just your house." I l- I remember when I first got a nice apartment when I moved to North Hollywood in 1994. I got a loft apartment, and it had a pool table in it, and a nice stereo. And I was like, "This is incredible."

Josh Brolin 38:11 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 38:11 "I have a nice apartment."

Josh Brolin 38:12 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 38:12 "This is amazing." And then after a while, it just became my house.

Josh Brolin 38:16 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 38:16 Becomes where I live.

Josh Brolin 38:17 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 38:17 And I realized at that moment, I'm like, "Oh, this just... Oh, it's all the same feeling." Like, all you need in a house is it to be comfortable.

Josh Brolin 38:25 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 38:26 You need a TV and a kitchen and a couch and a bed.

Josh Brolin 38:27 It's not supposed to... It's supposed to... It's, it's the place that you sleep.

Joe Rogan 38:31 Yeah, it's a place where you relax.

Josh Brolin 38:32 It's not the place where you live your, the entirety of your life.

Joe Rogan 38:34 You can relax almost anywhere that's comfortable and safe. That's all you need.

Josh Brolin 38:38 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 38:38 And then w- everything else is kind of bullshit.

Josh Brolin 38:40 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 38:41 It's kind of... The things that you get for your money, it's like there's a lot of things that people spend a lot of money on, and they're not really worth it.

Josh Brolin 38:48 Hmm.

Joe Rogan 38:48 You don't really get anything out of it. You get things-

Josh Brolin 38:50 That's why it was interesting walking in here and, you know, man cave. I hate that fucking term, man cave. Man cave.

Joe Rogan 38:57 Mm-hmm.

Josh Brolin 38:58 You know? It's like gay cave, you know? It's like there's a-

Joe Rogan 39:00 Well, it's a man cave because no woman would ever let me decorate this place-

Josh Brolin 39:04 Do this.

Joe Rogan 39:04 ... this way. (laughs)

Josh Brolin 39:04 But it's not that no woman wouldn't like it. I think there's, there's some, there's-

Joe Rogan 39:08 Well, my wife likes it when she comes here.

Josh Brolin 39:09 That, that, that's what I'm saying.

Joe Rogan 39:09 She just doesn't want to live in it.

Josh Brolin 39:10 She doesn't wanna live... Do you wanna live in it?

Joe Rogan 39:12 Yeah. No, I wouldn't want to live here.

Josh Brolin 39:13 Well, there you go.

Joe Rogan 39:13 But I might if I was, like, a single guy. I might decorate my house like this.

Josh Brolin 39:17 But it's things... The point is, is that there's things when I walked in here, it made me smile because I started seeing things that inspire. And you like to surround yourself, like, if somebody comes in and does an interior design of your office...

Joe Rogan 39:30 Ugh.

Josh Brolin 39:31 ... ugh.

Joe Rogan 39:31 Yeah, ugh.

Josh Brolin 39:32 And they go, "We, we brought in this amazing fabric from Paris."

Joe Rogan 39:35 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 39:36 And you go, "But I don't like it." And I remember when we were doing our house, we were like, I said, "Look, man, you can get things from Target. I don't want to feel that people have to take the... I don't want anybody to feel that pe- that they have to take their shoes off."

Joe Rogan 39:49 Right.

Josh Brolin 39:49 That's what I don't... I want them to feel that they can scuff up the floor-

Joe Rogan 39:52 Right.

Josh Brolin 39:53 ... because that's the mark that they made when they walked in my house.

Joe Rogan 39:56 Yes.

Josh Brolin 39:56 And maybe I don't even like the scuff. I don't like that they walked so heavy.

Joe Rogan 40:00 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 40:00 But it's their mark.

Joe Rogan 40:02 Right.

Josh Brolin 40:02 We are leaving our mark.

Joe Rogan 40:03 Right.

Josh Brolin 40:03 So I said if you g-

Joe Rogan 40:04 That's how I feel about this table. That's why this table has all these stains on it.

Josh Brolin 40:07 Seriously, it's good.

Joe Rogan 40:08 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 40:08 It has character.

Joe Rogan 40:09 Yeah, yeah, it's alive.

Josh Brolin 40:10 And that's the thing, is like-

Joe Rogan 40:11 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 40:11 ... when we built our, our, the ranch, I said... There were shelves. I said, "I want linoleum," or what is it? Formica. Linoleum on the shelves. And we have 150-year-old barn wood, but along with linoleum, because r- th- l- linoleum reminds me of, like, trailer parks and shit.

Joe Rogan 40:26 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 40:26 And it just makes me fucking smile. So I saw this thing when I walked in, because I have one, and that is Ralph Steadman's print that you have.

Joe Rogan 40:35 Oh, okay.

Josh Brolin 40:36 And here's the story.

Joe Rogan 40:37 The Hunter S. Thompson print.

Josh Brolin 40:37 So, so Ralph Steadman... Johnny Depp gave me Ralph Steadman's number, because he was close with Hunter. And my son was graduating. My son's an artist and he was obsessed with Steadman, right? And, and I, I called Ralph Steadman. He goes, "Hello?" And I said, "Hey." I said, "Listen, uh, you don't know me. I'm a friend of Johnny's and this." I said, "You know, my son's graduating, and like the greatest gift I could ever get him..." And this is not just to throw Steadman under the bus, because it comes full circle. But he says... I said, "My son's graduating. Can you do like a little th- I'll pay you for it. Can you do... just draw a little thing for him for his graduation?" There was a long, long pause and he goes, "Why the fuck would I do that?"

Joe Rogan 41:19 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 41:19 And so that conversation went nowhere.

Joe Rogan 41:22 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 41:22 I was like, "What the fuck? What an asshole." And then 20 years went past and my book is designed by one of his proteges.

Joe Rogan 41:32 Oh, wow.

Josh Brolin 41:33 And then, so Joey Feldman, he called me one day and he said, he said, "Ralph wants to send you a print." And I said, "No way. Does he know? Or that we have, like, a history?" And he said, "No, I don't think so."

Joe Rogan 41:47 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 41:47 So I sent him a voice memo of the history and I said, "I never held it against you. I totally understand it, especially for somebody..." So he sent me one for my son and one for me.

Joe Rogan 41:55 Oh, that's cool.

Josh Brolin 41:56 And I have it hanging up in my house.

Joe Rogan 41:57 That's cool.

Josh Brolin 41:58 I love having that thing, man.

Joe Rogan 41:59 He was an interesting artist.

Josh Brolin 42:01 He is an interesting artist.

Joe Rogan 42:02 Very, yeah, I should say. He is.

Josh Brolin 42:03 Yeah, mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 42:04 But I mean, the, the stuff that he did, uh, it's like... That's also in that Gonzo documentary where it talks about how Hunter gave him acid and mushrooms and he just started fucking writing-

Josh Brolin 42:12 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 42:12 ... and drawing-

Josh Brolin 42:13 Drawing all this-

Joe Rogan 42:13 ... like, really crazy shit.

Josh Brolin 42:14 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 42:15 And, like, um, the thing for... Do you remember the thing he did for, um, the, the Kentucky Derby as decadent and depraved?

Josh Brolin 42:23 Yeah, that was like the first thing, wasn't it?

Joe Rogan 42:25 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 42:25 I think that was how they got together.

Joe Rogan 42:26 See if you can find that. The Kentucky Derby as decadent and depraved.

Josh Brolin 42:30 Yeah. It's a really good article, actually. Whoa, that was fast, dude.

Joe Rogan 42:34 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 42:35 Um, but look at that.

Joe Rogan 42:36 That, that article is fucking amazing.

Josh Brolin 42:38 It's amazing article.

Joe Rogan 42:39 It's one of my favorite Hunter pieces.

Josh Brolin 42:40 And I don't think that they spent a lot of time together, but I think-

Joe Rogan 42:43 Hunter and him?

Josh Brolin 42:44 No, I don't.

Joe Rogan 42:45 There's a lot of it in the documentary where they're hanging out together.

Josh Brolin 42:47 Really?

Joe Rogan 42:48 Yeah, he picks him up at the airport in his VW Bug.

Josh Brolin 42:50 No, I know it exists, but I don't think that they spent the amount of time that you would think, given that they collaborated so much.

Joe Rogan 42:57 Oh.

Josh Brolin 42:58 I think Ralph was back in Britain and Hunter was-

Joe Rogan 43:02 Look at this.

Josh Brolin 43:02 I know. Look at that. Look at that. (laughs) See, that's the kind of shit... Do you miss that? Like, as part of driving your car and all that?

Joe Rogan 43:10 That's it. That's the thing from the... L- put your headphones on for a second.

Josh Brolin 43:13 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Narrator 43:16 Take the thing out for an honest run down the coast. I would start in Golden Gate Park, thinking only to run a few long curves to clear my head.

Josh Brolin 43:28 Oh, it's so good. (rock music)

Narrator 43:31 Wavering alcoholic off the wagon, but in a matter of minutes, I'd be out at the beach with the sound of the engine in my ears, surf booming up on the seawall, and a fine empty road stretching all the way down to Santa Cruz. There was no helmet on those nights, no speed limit, and no cooling it down around the curves.

Josh Brolin 43:49 Hmm. I love seeing the sand and the road.

Joe Rogan 43:55 Yeah.

Narrator 43:57 ... then into second gear, forgetting the cars and letting the beast wind out, 35, 45. Then into third, not worried about green or red signals. They're only some other werewolf learning. Now there's no sound except the wind. The needle leans down on 100. The wind-burned eyeballs strain to see down the center line. No room at all for mistakes.

Josh Brolin 44:24 Hm.

Narrator 44:24 And that's when the strange music starts.

44:28 In my head.

Josh Brolin 44:29 (laughs) That's great.

Narrator 44:31 Oh, we're apart. There's a place I go when I fall apart.

44:35 The edge, there is no honest way to explain it because the only people who really know where it is are the ones who have gone over. The others, the living, are those who pushed their control as far as they felt they could handle it and then pulled back or slowed down. But the edge is still out there.

Joe Rogan 45:04 That guy was fucking amazing.

Josh Brolin 45:05 It's great. It's great. It's fucking amazing. What do you love about his writing, and what type ... Like fear and loathing?

Joe Rogan 45:12 Well, I was just reading, uh, Hell's Angels recently actually. Re- reading it.

Josh Brolin 45:16 That's the book that I go back to most.

Joe Rogan 45:18 Yeah. Well, that's really him when he was starting, right? That was the beginning of this sort of Gonzo journalism stuff, because he was kind of mixing in fiction with, uh, reality. That's one of the things that pissed off the Hell's Angels-

Josh Brolin 45:30 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 45:30 ... is that he took a lot of liberties with the truth to try to, like, paint a picture.

Josh Brolin 45:35 Right, which was his deal-

Joe Rogan 45:37 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 45:37 ... which was his style later on, is like-

Joe Rogan 45:40 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 45:40 ... exaggerating and kind of romancing his own life.

Joe Rogan 45:44 Well, he was out of his fucking mind. I mean-

Josh Brolin 45:45 Out of his mind, but he was also one of the most brilliant technical writers that ever was.

Joe Rogan 45:50 Mm-hmm.

Josh Brolin 45:50 And that's what, that's what's forgotten. Like, even people talk about Kerouac. And Kerouac was like, you know, he wrote On The Road, and he was on the road, and it was the Hunter S. Thompson type of thing. And you're like, "You know he edited On The Road for seven years?"

Joe Rogan 46:05 Oh, wow.

Josh Brolin 46:06 And nobody knows that because Kerouac kind of like, uh, you know ... He put forth this thing of, like, first thought, best thought, don't edit-

Joe Rogan 46:14 Hmm.

Josh Brolin 46:14 Don't ... It was, again, a whole-

Joe Rogan 46:16 That's bullshit.

Josh Brolin 46:16 Like, it's total horse shit.

Joe Rogan 46:17 Oh, wow.

Josh Brolin 46:18 That's why I say it goes back to writers. It's a labor.

Joe Rogan 46:21 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 46:21 You sit down and you write all the fucking time.

Joe Rogan 46:25 My friend Ari-

Josh Brolin 46:26 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 46:26 ... on his, uh, laptop, he's got a little piece of paper above the keyboard that says, "The first draft of everything is shit."

Josh Brolin 46:31 That's ... And it's true.

Joe Rogan 46:33 It's Hemingway.

Josh Brolin 46:34 It's Hemingway.

Joe Rogan 46:34 Yeah, Hemingway wrote that. Yeah.

Josh Brolin 46:35 You know his first book, Hemingway's first book was lost by his wife.

Joe Rogan 46:39 What?

Josh Brolin 46:40 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 46:40 She lost it?

Josh Brolin 46:41 Yeah. She-

Joe Rogan 46:42 Oh, my God.

Josh Brolin 46:42 She had grabbed it for him and was on a train, and then she went to the bathroom-

Joe Rogan 46:45 (gasps)

Josh Brolin 46:45 ... and actually left the satchel on the seat. When she came out of the bathroom, it was gone.

Joe Rogan 46:50 Oh, my God.

Josh Brolin 46:51 Never to be found again.

Joe Rogan 46:52 Oh, my God.

Josh Brolin 46:53 Yeah, I know. Can you imagine?

Joe Rogan 46:55 Oh, my God.

Josh Brolin 46:55 All that work.

Joe Rogan 46:56 Did that marriage work out?

Josh Brolin 46:57 I don't think so.

Joe Rogan 46:58 I bet she did it on purpose, that bitch.

Josh Brolin 46:59 May- (laughs)

Joe Rogan 47:00 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 47:04 I bet she did it on purpose, that bitch. Yeah, man.

Joe Rogan 47:08 I just ... I love writing. I love when someone's a really good writer, because you just get these, like, moments where you're like, "Yes. Oh, yeah. Oh, that's it."

Josh Brolin 47:18 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 47:18 You know, these mom- ... And Hunter had a lot of those moments where you're like, "Goddammit, that's good."

Josh Brolin 47:23 You have so many people who were great young, and I know that there's a danger and a chaos within, like, the vortex within which they lived, but it couldn't survive. Do you know what I mean?

Joe Rogan 47:33 Most of them.

Josh Brolin 47:34 When Hunter got ... He was just too fucking alcoholic.

Joe Rogan 47:37 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 47:38 And, and Dylan Thomas became too fucking alcoholic.

Joe Rogan 47:41 Mm-hmm.

Josh Brolin 47:42 And it's one of those things that you go-

Joe Rogan 47:44 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 47:44 ... you were literally writing things that aren't possible. You were putting together, like, word-smithing things that are l- ... That-

Joe Rogan 47:53 Magic.

Josh Brolin 47:53 ... magic.

Joe Rogan 47:54 Yeah. Magic.

Josh Brolin 47:55 How he was describing-

Joe Rogan 47:57 Yes.

Josh Brolin 47:57 ... it's that thing. Whatever it is you're doing, how do you get to that place which most people can't touch?

Joe Rogan 48:03 Well, you can't neglect your physical health. That's the problem, is that in this chase for the muse and this dance you do with the drugs and the alcohol and the wild writing and ... You know, I'm sure you've seen, uh, Hunter S. Thompson's, uh ... There's a thing that a reporter, he hung out with Hunter S. Thompson and detailed what, what a day in the life of Hunter S. Thompson is.

Josh Brolin 48:26 What, w- ... Who was it?

Joe Rogan 48:26 Well, th- ... There's a c- ... There's a band called Beardyman and Beardyman took me and Gregg Fitzsimmons reading off Hunter S. Thompson's routine-

Josh Brolin 48:36 (laughs) That's great.

Joe Rogan 48:36 ... his daily routine before he writes-

Josh Brolin 48:38 Correct.

Joe Rogan 48:38 ... and made a song out of it. It's fucking incredible.

Josh Brolin 48:41 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 48:41 See if you can find that, because the, the routine was so insane, and this was, like, really what he would do. He'd wake up, like-

Josh Brolin 48:48 Like a discipline?

Joe Rogan 48:49 ... 2:00 in the afternoon. No!

Josh Brolin 48:50 No.

Joe Rogan 48:51 Chaos.

Josh Brolin 48:51 Okay, great.

Joe Rogan 48:52 Full-on chaos. Here, let's-

Josh Brolin 48:53 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 48:53 Let's put this, put the headphones back on.

Josh Brolin 48:54 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 48:55 Start it from the beginning.

Josh Brolin 48:59 Beardyman.

Narrator 49:02 In that 6:00 AM. In that 6:00 AM. 3:00 PM, rise. Chivas Regal with morning papers.

Josh Brolin 49:08 Is that you?

Joe Rogan 49:08 Yeah.

Narrator 49:08 3:45, cocaine, another glass of Chivas, another Dunhill. 4:05 PM, by the way, first cup of coffee and a Dunhill. 4:15, cocaine and another Dunhill.

Josh Brolin 49:20 (laughs)

Narrator 49:21 4:30, cocaine. Cocaine. Cocaine. Coffee, Dunhill.

Josh Brolin 49:27 Uh ...

Narrator 49:27 Cocaine, 5:45. 6:00, smoking grass to take the edge off the day. 7:00 PM- The day, three hours into it. Three hours in, lit.

Josh Brolin 49:38 (laughs)

Narrator 49:39 7:00 PM, lunch. Margaritas.

Josh Brolin 49:42 Luge.

Narrator 49:42 Taco salad, onion rings, carrot cakes, egg bean fritter, and cocaine.

Josh Brolin 49:48 (laughs)

Narrator 49:52 Okay, 9:00 PM, starts snorting cocaine seriously.

Josh Brolin 49:56 (laughs)

Narrator 49:58 10:00 PM, drops acid. 11:00 PM-

Joe Rogan 50:00 ... 11:00 PM, (farting sound effect) I don't know what that is, cocaine and grass. Cocaine, et cetera, et cetera. 12:00, midnight, Hunter S. Thompson is ready to ride.

Josh Brolin 50:12 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 50:14 6:00 AM-

Josh Brolin 50:15 Oh, wow.

Joe Rogan 50:15 ... in the hot tub with champagne. 6:00 AM, in the hot tub with champagne. 6:00 AM, in the hot tub with champagne.

Josh Brolin 50:25 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 50:25 So, this is like a electronic dance music song-

Josh Brolin 50:28 This is genius.

Joe Rogan 50:28 ... that plays in clubs sometimes.

Josh Brolin 50:30 Um, super funny. When'd you do that?

Joe Rogan 50:33 Oh, it was a long time ago. Many years ago. I- I-

Josh Brolin 50:35 Did you ever live like that?

Joe Rogan 50:36 No, no. I've never even done coke.

Josh Brolin 50:39 Wow.

Joe Rogan 50:39 Yeah, I've never fucked around with coke. I like psychedelics, I like weed. Uh, I like a little alcohol every now and then.

Josh Brolin 50:45 Hm.

Joe Rogan 50:45 But I don't fuck around with anything that's gonna kill me. Not interested.

Josh Brolin 50:49 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 50:50 And I'm not interested in anything that helps my ego, that boosts it up, makes me, uh, fearless.

Josh Brolin 50:55 That bloats it?

Joe Rogan 50:55 I'm not interested in any of that.

Josh Brolin 50:56 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 50:57 I, I like things that make me scared.

Josh Brolin 50:59 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 50:59 I like things that make me nervous. Like, the things that make you-

Josh Brolin 51:01 That's what I was talking about early on.

Joe Rogan 51:02 ... feel vulnerable.

Josh Brolin 51:02 What do you-

Joe Rogan 51:03 I like to feel vulnerable. I like it. It feels good.

Josh Brolin 51:05 You like to challenge yourself.

Joe Rogan 51:07 Yeah. I think if you don't-

Josh Brolin 51:08 And your perception and how you perceive certain things.

Joe Rogan 51:11 I think, uh, I like voluntary adversity.

Josh Brolin 51:14 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 51:14 Uh, physical voluntary adversity, but also I think mental voluntary adversity. And I think that's what I like about, like, psychedelics. I think you, there's like a, you have to go on, like, a journey.

Josh Brolin 51:25 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 51:25 And you can't control it. It's you, it takes you somewhere.

Josh Brolin 51:28 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 51:28 And then when you're back, you realize, like, you ain't shit. Just, uh, get all that ego stuff outta your system, relax, and just be appreciative and enjoy life and try to spread as much positivity as you can.

Josh Brolin 51:39 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 51:40 That's what you're here for. Do your best at everything you do. That's what you're here for.

Josh Brolin 51:43 And how do you find yourself doing that once you're not on it?

Joe Rogan 51:48 I just-

Josh Brolin 51:48 The incorporation of it into your life.

Joe Rogan 51:50 I just remember. You know, I just, I've, it's, so there's profound moments where I think that, you know, will change you forever.

Josh Brolin 51:57 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 51:57 And those, if you can hold onto them, some people don't hold on to them, but it's a matter of intention, right?

Josh Brolin 52:02 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 52:02 It's a matter of, like, what are you trying to do? Are you trying to be better at life? Well, if you're trying to be better at life, you can hold onto it.

Josh Brolin 52:07 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 52:07 If you're not, if you're just trying to, like, be the man or, you know-

Josh Brolin 52:10 Mm-hmm, exactly.

Joe Rogan 52:11 ... you know, and get all the accolades or, you know, win a fucking Grammy or whatever you're trying to do, like if that's your real goal, like, you're gonna get lost 'cause it's a shitty goal.

Josh Brolin 52:20 How old were you when you took a, a hallucinogen for the first time?

Joe Rogan 52:22 30.

Josh Brolin 52:23 I was 13.

Joe Rogan 52:24 Whoa, so that's a little too early. (laughs) I wouldn't recommend that.

Josh Brolin 52:28 W- I wouldn't recommend it either.

Joe Rogan 52:29 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 52:29 But it, it changed my life.

Joe Rogan 52:31 It can-

Josh Brolin 52:32 And I had, by the way, I took it twice in a 24-hour period.

Joe Rogan 52:35 Whoa.

Josh Brolin 52:35 So I took it 13, had the greatest trip ever, like still affected by it.

Joe Rogan 52:40 Wow.

Josh Brolin 52:41 And then I took it again that night and went to hell.

Joe Rogan 52:44 Oh, no. Yeah.

Josh Brolin 52:45 I don't know. I don't know.

Joe Rogan 52:45 You got cocky.

Josh Brolin 52:47 No.

Joe Rogan 52:47 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 52:49 No.

Joe Rogan 52:49 The psychedelics wanted to bring you down a notch. You were a little too happy.

Josh Brolin 52:51 It just did what it did.

Joe Rogan 52:53 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 52:53 It did, it did, and I truly believe that psychedelics, I don't do psychedelics anymore, but I think I did, but I do breath work, I do shit like that. And you go, "Can you get there?" And I go, "Yeah, I've had some"-

Joe Rogan 53:03 Oh, you can get there.

Josh Brolin 53:03 "... of the most amazing hallucinations I've ever had, most profound hallucinations I've ever had." Holotropic breathing-

Joe Rogan 53:09 Mm-hmm.

Josh Brolin 53:10 ... breath work with Laird going off, and if you do it long enough, you just reach a place where if you're in a sauna at 240 degrees for an hour doing breath work-

Joe Rogan 53:17 Oh, yeah.

Josh Brolin 53:18 ... you're gonna go places.

Joe Rogan 53:19 Yeah. No doubt. Um, sensory deprivation tank, you don't need anything.

Josh Brolin 53:23 Don't need anything.

Joe Rogan 53:23 And you, you trip balls. If they could give you in a pill form what, the experience you get from a psycho- from a sensory deprivation tank, it would be a very popular drug.

Josh Brolin 53:31 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 53:31 And it's completely safe.

Josh Brolin 53:33 And a productive drug.

Joe Rogan 53:34 Yes, very productive.

Josh Brolin 53:35 So, there's sensory, you say the sensory dep- deprivation tank.

Joe Rogan 53:38 (clears throat)

Josh Brolin 53:38 But I just saw, you can see it online or whatever, where people literally put a thing, they go into a room and there's silence. It's not like a, um, you know, where they don't talk, a meditation retreat or whatever. But they literally go into a room by themselves, they don't see anybody else. They put a thick mask on and they're in for four days, five days.

Joe Rogan 53:57 Oh, geez.

Josh Brolin 53:57 Have you seen that?

Joe Rogan 53:58 I have heard of people doing stuff like that, yeah.

Josh Brolin 54:00 Yeah? What about that?

Joe Rogan 54:01 Well, I think being alone with your thoughts is uncomfortable for people, and I think a lot of people avoid that.

Josh Brolin 54:06 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 54:06 They av- avoid really thinking. And you're forced to really think-

Josh Brolin 54:09 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 54:10 ... you know, when you're in those sort of situations.

Josh Brolin 54:12 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 54:12 You're, you're forced to be alone with your thoughts, you know?

Josh Brolin 54:15 Scary.

Joe Rogan 54:16 But we're always distracted. You know, we're distracted by-

Josh Brolin 54:18 Well, especially now.

Joe Rogan 54:18 ... people and devices and input and news and social media.

Josh Brolin 54:23 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 54:23 And there's, like, constantly stuff coming in.

Josh Brolin 54:26 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 54:26 And sometimes you don't, like, how do I feel about everything? Like what, do I even know?

Josh Brolin 54:30 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 54:30 Do, have I ever really considered things? Like, you need time alone.

Josh Brolin 54:34 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 54:34 You need time to think, you know? That's what I really like about, that's why I work out by myself. That's why I like to-

Josh Brolin 54:40 You work out by yourself?

Joe Rogan 54:41 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 54:42 Hmm.

Joe Rogan 54:42 Yeah. Unless I'm doing-

Josh Brolin 54:43 You don't like having a trainer?

Joe Rogan 54:45 I mean, I've had a lot of trainers. I, I appreciate them for tactical advice-

Josh Brolin 54:49 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 54:49 ... and stuff like that. But this is a meditative aspect of working out by myself-

Josh Brolin 54:53 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 54:53 ... that I think is very important. It's also discipline. Like, I don't, it's easy to go somewhere and the guy tells you, "Okay, 10 reps."

Josh Brolin 55:00 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 55:00 But I write my own workouts out and then I-

Josh Brolin 55:02 Based on that day and how you feel.

Joe Rogan 55:03 Yeah, well, I know what I wanna do. I, you know, I'm pretty good at it, so I just, you know-

Josh Brolin 55:07 It's funny, I haven't heard many people say that. But I, I, I, I feel, and it's not just some bullshit, like, affectation rebellious thing. When I'm with, and I appreciate trainers too and I've had, I've worked with some great trainers, but they make me wanna do less.

Joe Rogan 55:23 Why?

Josh Brolin 55:23 You know, they go, "Do 10." And I go, "But why?" (laughs)

Joe Rogan 55:26 (laughs) Oh no, you're one of those guys.

Josh Brolin 55:27 I'm one of those assholes. (clapping)

Joe Rogan 55:29 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 55:29 (laughs) I'm one of those assholes.

Joe Rogan 55:30 Why? Oh.

Josh Brolin 55:31 But I will actually push myself if say, 12, just for a random word, a random number, 12 is my limit. I'm good at pushing myself to 15.

Joe Rogan 55:41 Mm-hmm.

Josh Brolin 55:41 Or Jeff Cavaliere, do you know who that is?

Joe Rogan 55:43 No.

Josh Brolin 55:43 Athlean-X.

Joe Rogan 55:45 Oh yeah, yeah, I've heard of that guy, yeah.

Josh Brolin 55:46 Super smart guy.

Joe Rogan 55:47 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 55:47 And we would go back and forth and I'd be like, "Look, if I'm in, if I'm, you know, if I'm at my last three reps, why do we have to rest for two minutes? Like, who said that? Who made that up? Is it really a recovery thing, two minutes before you can go back in to 12 more reps? What if we just rest 30 seconds and then you're right back into that thing almost immediately of wha- and those are things that are tearing the tissues and growing the muscle-"

Joe Rogan 56:10 Mm-hmm.

Josh Brolin 56:11 "... and all that kinda stuff?" So just experimenting with it all.

Joe Rogan 56:14 There's a lot of schools of thought-

Josh Brolin 56:14 Again, this all goes back down to what we watched-

Joe Rogan 56:16 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 56:17 ... of like, what are we doing to just live a little more vividly?

Joe Rogan 56:20 Mm-hmm.

Josh Brolin 56:21 ... how are we pushing ourselves? How are we changing our perception? How are we pushing our perception?

Joe Rogan 56:25 Well, it depends on what you're trying to do, right? If you're just trying to get, like, conditioned, yeah, give yourself the minimal amount of rest and do it for as long as possible, and then-

Josh Brolin 56:33 Right.

Joe Rogan 56:33 ... take time off to f- afterwards for your body to heal and then get back after it.

Josh Brolin 56:37 As a base. As just a base.

Joe Rogan 56:37 But it depends on what you're trying to do.

Josh Brolin 56:38 Yeah, that's true. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 56:38 If you're trying to get strong, I always recommend taking out, like, long st- long periods of time in between sets. I take like five minutes, maybe even more, in between sets.

Josh Brolin 56:48 To come back in at your strongest.

Joe Rogan 56:50 Yeah, but I have long workouts.

Josh Brolin 56:51 To tell your body...

Joe Rogan 56:52 My workout's like two hours sometimes, two and a half hours-

Josh Brolin 56:55 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 56:55 ... because I have these long breaks in between.

Josh Brolin 56:57 Oh, no.

Joe Rogan 56:57 But because of that it's... You know who Pavel Totsilini is?

Josh Brolin 57:00 No.

Joe Rogan 57:00 He's, uh, one of the godfathers of kettlebells. He's one of the first people that introduced kettlebells to America from Russia.

Josh Brolin 57:06 Right. Yeah. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 57:07 And, uh, their, their philosophy, his philos- strong first philosophy is that strength is a skill.

Josh Brolin 57:13 Hmm.

Joe Rogan 57:13 And you don't work on a skill when you're tired.

Josh Brolin 57:15 Hmm.

Joe Rogan 57:15 So, it's all about how many repetitions you do, and that's what builds strength.

Josh Brolin 57:19 Right.

Joe Rogan 57:19 So, it doesn't mean you have to do ten in a row. Like, say if ten is your max, say if you pick up a weight and you can do ten cleans and presses, and on the tenth one you're like, (groans)

Josh Brolin 57:30 Hmm.

Joe Rogan 57:30 His philosophy is do five.

Josh Brolin 57:32 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 57:32 Do five, wait a long time, do another five.

Josh Brolin 57:35 Hmm.

Joe Rogan 57:36 So you've got the ten in, but you've got the ten in with perfect form.

Josh Brolin 57:39 Right.

Joe Rogan 57:39 And then you're still getting the same amount of repetitions, but you're not breaking yourself down to the point where you might get hurt or where you're doing it incorrectly or poor form.

Josh Brolin 57:48 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 57:48 So that's how I work out.

Josh Brolin 57:49 I talked, I talked, me too. I talk to my wife a lot about that. My wife would say, because I, I go, I'm all about form.

Joe Rogan 57:55 Yes.

Josh Brolin 57:56 Because otherwise you just get hurt-

Joe Rogan 57:57 You get hurt.

Josh Brolin 57:57 ... and what's the fucking point?

Joe Rogan 57:58 Yeah. I rarely get hurt from lifting weights, and that-

Josh Brolin 58:01 Have you ever gotten hurt in jujitsu?

Joe Rogan 58:02 Oh, yeah.

Josh Brolin 58:03 A lot?

Joe Rogan 58:03 Oh.

Josh Brolin 58:03 Everybody tears and pops and meniscus and...

Joe Rogan 58:05 Yeah, yeah. I've had surgeries and fucking-

Josh Brolin 58:09 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 58:09 ... bulging discs and torn this and torn that. Yeah. You have to. It's a sport-

Josh Brolin 58:14 I had sciatica.

Joe Rogan 58:14 ... where you're trying to kill each other. (laughs)

Josh Brolin 58:19 (laughs) It's true.

Joe Rogan 58:20 You try to get really good-

Josh Brolin 58:20 It's just the nature of the sport.

Joe Rogan 58:21 ... at killing people with your body.

Josh Brolin 58:22 I had-

Joe Rogan 58:23 So other people are doing that to you.

Josh Brolin 58:24 I had sciatica for a year and a half.

Joe Rogan 58:27 Oy.

Josh Brolin 58:28 Bad sciatica. A nine millimeter slip between S5, no, uh, L5 and S1.

Joe Rogan 58:33 How'd you get rid of it?

Josh Brolin 58:35 And they wanted to do surgery, and I'd had surgery when I was really young because I had a slipped disc between C5 and C6, and they took out part of my hip and they went in through my neck. They moved everything over and they replaced my, my disc with part of my hip back when they used to do that.

Joe Rogan 58:50 They used to play, replaced your disc with part of your hip?

Josh Brolin 58:52 Yeah, they would chisel out a part of your hip.

Joe Rogan 58:54 Like a bone?

Josh Brolin 58:55 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 58:56 And that's what your disc was now? A piece of bone?

Josh Brolin 58:59 Is now.

Joe Rogan 59:00 That doesn't even make sense. Your disc is supposed-

Josh Brolin 59:02 Yeah, because they-

Joe Rogan 59:02 ... to be spongy.

Josh Brolin 59:03 I know. I don't understand why.

Joe Rogan 59:04 They put a piece of bone in there?

Josh Brolin 59:06 Yeah, and it worked.

Joe Rogan 59:06 Really?

Josh Brolin 59:07 It actually worked. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 59:08 Wow.

Josh Brolin 59:08 Doctor Delamarter. I'll never forget his name.

Joe Rogan 59:11 Jesus.

Josh Brolin 59:12 Mm.

Joe Rogan 59:13 Now they, they have articulate-

Josh Brolin 59:13 So yeah, and then they used cadaver bone for a while, and now they use what?

Joe Rogan 59:17 Well, it depends. There's, uh, artificial discs. I know, uh, a couple people that have artificial discs.

Josh Brolin 59:23 And it worked?

Joe Rogan 59:23 Yeah, my friend Eddie got it done in his lower back. He, he, he's basically bone on bone, constant inflammation.

Josh Brolin 59:29 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 59:29 So he got a titanium articulating disc-

Josh Brolin 59:31 Yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 59:31 ... that's in his back. What is this? Surgery might take a small piece of bone from the hip called an autograft used in a neck surgery called anterior cervical discectomy and fusion. The bone is placed between the space between the vertebrae to stimulate bone healing and promote fusion. Oh, so you got your neck fused.

Josh Brolin 59:46 Yeah, they call it a Brolin graft.

Joe Rogan 59:48 Oh, really?

Josh Brolin 59:49 No.

Joe Rogan 59:49 Ah.

Josh Brolin 59:50 Hey.

Joe Rogan 59:51 Hey.

Josh Brolin 59:51 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 59:52 Wow. So that's-

Josh Brolin 59:53 Yes.

Joe Rogan 59:53 That's different.

Josh Brolin 59:54 There was-

Joe Rogan 59:54 That's you got your hip, your neck fused.

Josh Brolin 59:56 Fused.

Joe Rogan 59:57 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 59:57 Which they probably don't even do fusion any-

Joe Rogan 59:59 They do. They still do fusions.

Josh Brolin 1:00:00 Well, I mean, if it's a, if it's a massive break or something like that, maybe.

Joe Rogan 1:00:03 Yeah, I don't recommend it. There's other ways you can heal bulging discs, and one of them's there's uh, a process called Regenakene. And Regenakene is, uh, I had that done in LA.

Josh Brolin 1:00:15 Mm.

Joe Rogan 1:00:15 In Santa Monica. They used to do it in Germany. You used to have to go to Germany to do it, and like Kobe Bryant went over there and Peyton Manning went over there.

Josh Brolin 1:00:22 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:00:22 And what they do is they take your blood out, and it's like platelet rich plasma.

Josh Brolin 1:00:26 Yeah, which-

Joe Rogan 1:00:26 But it's a more advanced-

Josh Brolin 1:00:27 PRP? Right. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:00:27 It's a more advanced version of it.

Josh Brolin 1:00:29 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:00:30 And they spin your blood in this centrifuge and they add some stuff to it and it turns it into like one of the most potent anti-inflammatories. And then what they do is you lie down there and they inject it in your back.

Josh Brolin 1:00:40 Hm.

Joe Rogan 1:00:40 They have like these little needles. I think there's an Instagram post of me getting it done on my lower back. And so-

Josh Brolin 1:00:45 Did you have a slipped disc in your lower back?

Joe Rogan 1:00:47 Bulging.

Josh Brolin 1:00:48 Bulging.

Joe Rogan 1:00:48 You know, it's, it's essentially a bulging disc, but it can go back.

Josh Brolin 1:00:52 What did-

Joe Rogan 1:00:52 Bulging discs can go back.

Josh Brolin 1:00:53 Well, that was my experience.

Joe Rogan 1:00:54 And you al- you also have to have, uh, traction, like, uh, decompression.

Josh Brolin 1:00:58 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:00:59 So there's a bunch... There it is. So that's my back.

Josh Brolin 1:01:01 I had that done.

Joe Rogan 1:01:02 So they take that and they stick all that shit, but all that-

Josh Brolin 1:01:05 And they drill that, don't they?

Joe Rogan 1:01:06 They just put holes-

Josh Brolin 1:01:06 That's a dril-

Joe Rogan 1:01:07 No, it's just, it's just needles.

Josh Brolin 1:01:08 No, but this... It's ni- I know it's needles, but it's not like acupuncture. They actually drill that, then they put the needle in, don't they?

Joe Rogan 1:01:15 No. No, they just shove that needle in place.

Josh Brolin 1:01:17 Oh, okay. I see.

Joe Rogan 1:01:18 It's just like a syringe-

Josh Brolin 1:01:19 On each side of your spinal column, right?

Joe Rogan 1:01:20 Yeah. It's like a syringe...

Josh Brolin 1:01:22 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:01:22 And then inside the syringe they pump in the Regenakene stuff.

Josh Brolin 1:01:25 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:01:26 And then it, uh, it fills your, those, those areas up with this platelet rich plasma that's been enhanced and it just heals everything.

Josh Brolin 1:01:34 And did you feel like it helped?

Joe Rogan 1:01:35 And just like a hot- Oh, yeah. Absolutely.

Josh Brolin 1:01:37 You felt-

Joe Rogan 1:01:37 It f- it helped my neck so mu- my neck was so fucked.

Josh Brolin 1:01:41 Jacked.

Joe Rogan 1:01:41 My neck was so fucked I was getting numb fingers and pain in my elbow because-

Josh Brolin 1:01:45 I have that now.

Joe Rogan 1:01:46 Do you really?

Josh Brolin 1:01:46 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:01:47 You should go, go to that place.

Josh Brolin 1:01:49 Yeah, and when, when I ride motorcycles also-

Joe Rogan 1:01:51 Yeah?

Josh Brolin 1:01:51 ... I have my hands up like... I mean, I have shoulder issues. But I have a, a s- that slipped disc was a nine millimeter slip.

Joe Rogan 1:01:57 Why do you like to do this?

Josh Brolin 1:01:58 Huh?

Joe Rogan 1:01:58 Why not, why not do this? Why this?

Josh Brolin 1:02:00 Because that looks cooler.

Joe Rogan 1:02:01 Hmm. Does it? Not to me.

Josh Brolin 1:02:03 It looks super cool when you're doing-

Joe Rogan 1:02:05 This looks retarded.

Josh Brolin 1:02:06 ... it right now (laughs) .

Joe Rogan 1:02:06 This looks retarded. This looks retarded. This looks good. This looks like you can avoid things.

Josh Brolin 1:02:09 Put it up super high.

Joe Rogan 1:02:10 You can move around.

Josh Brolin 1:02:10 Put it up super high.

Joe Rogan 1:02:11 This is like...

Josh Brolin 1:02:12 That looks retarded.

Joe Rogan 1:02:13 When you have to turn?

Josh Brolin 1:02:14 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:02:14 Like how are you gonna turn like that? You're not gonna do a good job.

Josh Brolin 1:02:16 You look like a gorilla.

Joe Rogan 1:02:17 This is better.

Josh Brolin 1:02:18 (laughs) That's better.

Joe Rogan 1:02:19 This is better.

Josh Brolin 1:02:19 What about that?

Joe Rogan 1:02:20 This is better.

Josh Brolin 1:02:20 What about this?

Joe Rogan 1:02:21 Well, with Ducatis. I mean, that's like you're down like this, right?

Josh Brolin 1:02:23 That's when I, that's when I finally crashed, was a Ducati.

Joe Rogan 1:02:26 Oh, really? You went crazy?

Josh Brolin 1:02:27 No, I didn't go crazy. I didn't do anything differently. With Parleys you go slower.

Joe Rogan 1:02:32 Right. Right.

Josh Brolin 1:02:32 You ride. It's about the communal...

Joe Rogan 1:02:34 And it's loud so people know you're there.

Josh Brolin 1:02:36 ... thank you.

Joe Rogan 1:02:37 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 1:02:37 People go-

Joe Rogan 1:02:37 That's a big one.

Josh Brolin 1:02:38 It's- it's huge.

Joe Rogan 1:02:38 They have electric bikes now. I'm like, "Do you want to die?"

Josh Brolin 1:02:40 They're fast.

Joe Rogan 1:02:41 They're so fast.

Josh Brolin 1:02:42 They're super fast.

Joe Rogan 1:02:42 But do you want to die? They- they make no sound.

Josh Brolin 1:02:45 Nobody can hear you.

Joe Rogan 1:02:45 Nobody can hear you.

Josh Brolin 1:02:46 If I'm riding in a grid of 16 guys-

Joe Rogan 1:02:48 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 1:02:48 ... every... Because everybody thinks Hells Angels. I go, there's nothing about it that's trying to emulate Hells Angels, Mongols, any of that, you know, one percenter thing. But when you hear that rumble coming down the road-

Joe Rogan 1:02:59 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 1:03:00 ... you can't wait to get the fuck out of the way.

Joe Rogan 1:03:02 Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah.

Josh Brolin 1:03:04 And that helps us.

Joe Rogan 1:03:04 That's true. That definitely helps you stay alive.

Josh Brolin 1:03:06 Yeah, man.

Joe Rogan 1:03:07 Yeah. Yeah.

Josh Brolin 1:03:07 You want to live that-

Joe Rogan 1:03:07 Loud pipes save lives. I've heard that many times.

Josh Brolin 1:03:09 So to finish that thought, I... What I did was, is I went to... I started... Instead of resting, which is what doctors normally say. They say, "Do surgery, do surgery, rest, sleep, see if that helps. If it doesn't help, do surgery." And I did the opposite, which later, you know, Laird was like... Anytime you get hurt, Laird will be like, "Movement, movement, movement, movement."

Joe Rogan 1:03:32 Mm-hmm.

Josh Brolin 1:03:32 But this was before all that. But I started working out, and it got worse, and it got worse, and it got worse.

Joe Rogan 1:03:38 Mm-hmm.

Josh Brolin 1:03:38 But I continued to work out, and I started running, and I started doing pistol squats and all this kind of shit.

Joe Rogan 1:03:43 Ooh.

Josh Brolin 1:03:43 And then one day, it was gone and it never came back.

Joe Rogan 1:03:47 Really?

Josh Brolin 1:03:47 Never came back.

Joe Rogan 1:03:48 So he just beat it out of you?

Josh Brolin 1:03:49 I beat it out of me.

Joe Rogan 1:03:50 Wow.

Josh Brolin 1:03:51 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:03:52 Yeah. Movement is everything.

Josh Brolin 1:03:53 It's everything.

Joe Rogan 1:03:53 You need circulation and when-

Josh Brolin 1:03:54 You need blood in there, which is why they do PRP, which is why-

Joe Rogan 1:03:57 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 1:03:57 ... they do stem cell work or whatever.

Joe Rogan 1:03:59 Yeah. And if you're just sitting there, the problem is you're also gonna... You're body's gonna atrophy.

Josh Brolin 1:04:05 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:04:05 You're- you're gonna lose strength.

Josh Brolin 1:04:06 Exactly.

Joe Rogan 1:04:06 And then it's gonna make whatever ex- injured that area in the first place, it's probably a lack of strength.

Josh Brolin 1:04:10 But that was always promoted by doctors. Why would that always be promoted by doctors? Again, whether it's politicians, or whether it's doctors, or whether it's... They're telling you, "This is... You gotta eat from the four food groups, man."

Joe Rogan 1:04:21 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 1:04:21 "You're gonna die otherwise." (laughs) And you're like-

Joe Rogan 1:04:23 Well, you know, that...

Josh Brolin 1:04:24 And that changed after-

Joe Rogan 1:04:24 There's a lot to that stuff. But the- the- the, you know, the ford group- four food group shit is a lot of it's just people not knowing what the fuck they're talking about.

Josh Brolin 1:04:30 That's what I mean.

Joe Rogan 1:04:31 And also-

Josh Brolin 1:04:32 But pretending like they do.

Joe Rogan 1:04:33 ... there's a different perception back then of, like, what was healthy versus now. But it's also a lot of these doctors, they're not athletes, and they don't really understand, like, what's possible with the body. They just know how to fix things when they break.

Josh Brolin 1:04:46 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:04:46 And then for the average person, they say, "Just rest," because the average person's not gonna fucking do what you're doing anyway. So it's like-

Josh Brolin 1:04:52 No.

Joe Rogan 1:04:52 ... why, why tell 'em? Like, what you really need to do is movement, constant movement, and just beat that injury into submission.

Josh Brolin 1:04:58 That's right.

Joe Rogan 1:04:59 And no one's gonna tell you that 'cause-

Josh Brolin 1:05:00 How do I feel better? Lose some weight.

Joe Rogan 1:05:02 Yeah. Yeah.

Josh Brolin 1:05:02 Like, go- go do that uncomfortable thing. Start walking.

Joe Rogan 1:05:06 Mm-hmm.

Josh Brolin 1:05:06 Start slow. Maybe jog a little bit.

Joe Rogan 1:05:08 Yep.

Josh Brolin 1:05:08 Maybe lift a little something. That's why when you see those videos of these guys that just, for whatever's in their personality, they've had fucking enough. They're 400 pounds and they go, "That's it."

Joe Rogan 1:05:18 Uh-huh.

Josh Brolin 1:05:18 "The buck stops here."

Joe Rogan 1:05:19 Yep.

Josh Brolin 1:05:19 "I'm gonna start doing my shit."

Joe Rogan 1:05:21 Yeah, they hit rock bottom.

Josh Brolin 1:05:22 They hit rock bottom.

Joe Rogan 1:05:23 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 1:05:24 And then you see this again, what we were talking about before, incentive, where they just go, "I don't give a shit."

Joe Rogan 1:05:28 Well, isn't that the same with everything? Like, isn't that how you quit drinking? You just hit rock bottom?

Josh Brolin 1:05:32 I was just about to say that.

Joe Rogan 1:05:33 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 1:05:33 But- yeah, but you don't... I don't... I hit rock bottom when I was 15, you know? I was shooting coke at 15.

Joe Rogan 1:05:38 Geez.

Josh Brolin 1:05:39 So yeah, that thing that you didn't want to try, I did want to try.

Joe Rogan 1:05:43 Geez.

Josh Brolin 1:05:43 But that was that group. That's why so many of those guys died.

Joe Rogan 1:05:45 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 1:05:46 You know what I mean? So when I look at Hunter S. Thompson, who I love as a writer, when I look at Dylan Thomas, who I love as a writer, and all these guys that had this kind of amazing life, and I feel it too. Parallel. I had an amazing life, except nobody cared about mine. People really cared about theirs. I was just Josh that you wanted to stay the fuck away from.

Joe Rogan 1:06:06 (laughs)

Josh Brolin 1:06:06 You're like, "That motherfucker's great to spend like an hour with, and then once it hits 10 o'clock-"

Joe Rogan 1:06:11 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 1:06:11 "... and the moon comes out and the clouds part, you don't want to be-"

Joe Rogan 1:06:14 Right.

Josh Brolin 1:06:14 "... anywhere around." Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:06:16 Yeah.

Josh Brolin 1:06:16 But then you get to that point where you go, "When did Hunter S. Thompson, when did these guys just become, like, some kind of clown mask of themselves?"

Joe Rogan 1:06:27 Right.

Josh Brolin 1:06:28 Do you know what I mean?

Joe Rogan 1:06:28 Well, in the end, Hunter was definitely that. You- did you ever see when Hunter was on Conan O'Brien's show?

Josh Brolin 1:06:33 No.

Joe Rogan 1:06:34 It was horrible. He could barely talk. You barely could understand him.

Josh Brolin 1:06:38 Just