Back with a Sunday sampler. Matt Stell in New Orleans. That's what you're here from me. We were at the super Bowl and he played against Lebron James in high school and his mom recorded over the video and so we're gonna play that coming up in a second. But you're gonna hear clips of a bunch of podcasts here, and if you like any of the stories, go check
out that individual podcast. I would recommend Doctor Josie's podcast if you love animals and celebrities, and check out Morgan's new podcast as well, called Take This Personally.
But I want to start with this.
It's an episode from the Bobby Cast this week with country music superstar Matt Stell.
I moved to Nashville, finally got a publishing deal, and about six months into that publishing deal, I think, all right, prayed for You with a couple people in town and
my manager at the time, I'm and Alison Vell. Shout out Alison the songs about her husband, and I wrote pray for You, and I I thought we had written a good song that day, but I I had no idea it was like gonna be a life changing hit song, and no idea, and so my publishing company were putting out an EP and they're like, we should put these songs, and my publishers like, man, you should put Prayed for You on there too.
I was like, okay, well, let me stop you for a second, because if you wrote write Pray for You, you three were just together generally writing, and then your publisher were just gonna go and pitch the song. You aren't writing for anything specific. She didn't have anybody in mind.
So I think they were I mean, I think we were kind of writing for We were writing for me, because you know, the idea was like, we're gonna put an EP together. I get, you know, pitched to lay. We'll see we get some traction.
But I wanted to know, like what was the purpose of the right to me?
I was in there writing this song that is like, I'm proud to say it's a good song. I'm really proud of that song. It's not the kind of music that I thought I would be making, you know, from what we just talked about. But I wrote that song and I was, you know, cool, awesome, wrote.
A good song.
The day you finished.
Did you think it was good?
I thought it was good.
It was for you.
No, No, I didn't.
I didn't know, Like I had never written a hit song before, Like I wasn't one of these guys that just moved to town and like lighting it hits in a battle.
Like thematically when you finished it were like nothing says Stelle. I prayed for you, like I just wonder right, I know, because it doesn't sound based on the things that you heard that didn't resonate with you. And this is the irony of it, is that, especially the music you wanted to make, you finished the song and it's like man stamp of Stelle just right there exactly.
And you know, to be honest with you, Bobby, I have I've tried to put more and be more me in the music that I've made as an artist because I wasn't an artist at that, Like I wasn't a person on the radio with then like we put that song out in that EP out and John Marx was at Spotify at the time, and my other manager emailed him. They put that song on Spotify and it started. It was like a million streams a week on without much at all playlisting. And then it, I mean it organically did it blew?
It went viral. Before that, it was that social media was viraling songs to deals.
Yeah.
For yeah, it was it went viral. Yeah, basically like for me music, my socials have always followed my music. They have not like my George Birds, you know, one of my good friends, he's a little bit the other way, you know, social media. He's really good at it, and he's also very good at music, but his socials are the are the the bell cow you know, that gets all that great music to people. And me, I've always my soles have always lagged behind whatever music I had. And yeah, man, that happened.
And then we shot it a single, like was it in your mind? Because again, if you send it to Spotify and John used to be the guy Spotify, was it this? I guess singles a weird word if you're not.
Actually it was the single.
It was the song, It was the scene. It was the one song we sent.
Okay, so we were you trying to service it to radio as well? Well?
At that point we were, you know, I was going and playing some songs in some offices downtown, but I really, you know, hadn't nailed anything. You know, we had a little interest here and there, but I didn't have a record deal or anything.
Did you feel like the song where you were like, oh, man, it's a good song, but I don't really want this to be the single. Even though the song was good. Did part of you not want to be the single because it was love?
And in my you know, if I'm being honest, I wanted that song to be a multi week number one for Blake Shelton or for whoever. Like I thought that's what I was doing because I thought we'd written a good song that day. But man, you know, for me in this business and how hard it was and to get started and getting started late, you know, if you have an opportunity, I've never been one that was so confident in myself that I would be picking and choosy
about opportunities. And so when that song hit like it did, we started getting calls from some labels. Then we got a call and signed a deal and blah blah blah. You know that led to you know, whatever, did.
You have to have like an internal conversation of this is not exactly what I thought it would be, but this is awesome, so we're gonna commit and just.
Go Yeah, Well I knew I just wanted to make music that mattered to people. And I did struggle with this a little bit earlier. Yeah, to answer your question, but like I had, I always want to make music that mattered to people. But I never thought I was gonna be as someone who wrote like one of the bigger wedding songs. I wasn't married. I mean, if it like, I wasn't even engaged at that time, I don't think maybe you know, I can't remember.
Maybe I was.
Those those timelines seem like they're parallel, but they're different tracks of mine.
But uh, yeah, I had no idea.
And now you know, now that I am married and found somebody that I that I think those things about that song makes even makes more sense to me now. Number one, But number two, it is really really humbling and special that people want to include that song, get it tattooed on them, somebody has those lyrics on a headstone like that. I that there's no amount of like, oh wow, I wish this. I wish my famous song was about whiskey. You know, Like dude, I'm just glad
to have made any music that matters to people. And but yeah, I mean there was that the questions you're asking were questions I asked myself, And these are the answers to those questions.
Cast up little food for your song.
Life. It's pretty, it's pretty beautiful.
That for a little moth would it's exciting?
A course said he you're kicking it with full thing with Amy Brown.
All right, let's talk about why we put things off that we really want to do. Like I want you to think about something that you really wanted to do but you put it off, or that you currently really want to do, but you are putting it off at this exact moment, even though you know it's something that you're going to totally enjoy and you want to do it. I have done this many times now, about a year and a half ago, I think it was maybe even two years at this point. Time has been weird lately.
I took an improv class and I absolutely loved it. I left it feeling energized, and I told myself that I would sign up for another session soon. So they're eight week courses. But guess what, I totally put it off and put it off and put it off. I originally signed up for after I had that teeny tiny role in the Christmas movie Holiday harmony. My scene was in the bathroom. Not sure if y'all saw it. My
kids thought that my bathroom scene was hilarious. My debut in a movie and I had my lines in a bathroom, but I loved the entire experience. So after that, I decided to take improv lessons and acting lessons to you know, hone in on my skills. I obviously should have done that stuff before I filmed the movie, but I was playing myself and it was sort of a last minute thing that I got invited to do, and I was like, I don't have time to take any lessons. I'm just
gonna go for it. And I had no idea how much I was gonna love the whole thing. So then I decided I would like to pursue more of these opportunities, So I'm gonna do the acting lessons, I'm gonna do the improv And I did all that and then just stopped, stopped going, didn't pursue anything. And I really think it boiled down to that. I the rejection, and I don't know why we do this to ourselves, because I know
better than that I have heard from others. I've even shared on this podcast I know that we have to just go for things. We can't fear the failure because even from the failure, obstacle is the way we will learn from it. We will grow from it. We have the question that Donald Miller gave us, what does this make possible? So I know all the things? So why was I putting it off? Like why did I quit? And then why did I just ignore it even though I've had it on my list for sure the last
six to eight months. Sign up for another improv class, sign up for another improv class. Like when we know we want something and then fear creeps in. Uh, it's the worst when the fear wins. And that's what happened to me. I feel like we easily convince ourselves that we don't really want it because that's easier than failing. And it's sort of what I started to tell myself. I'm like, well, I guess it's not so something that I really wanted, because if I wanted it, I would
be signing up for it. Or we tell ourselves that we're going to wait for the perfect time, then the perfect time never comes, and we think about doing it so much that we exhaust ourselves before we even get started, and that's exactly what happened to me. However, I had a turning point today. I finally signed back up for the improv classes. Like before I hit record, I made myself go to the website. I signed up. I'm gonna be taking classes starting in March. It'll be for eight
weeks every Tuesday night, six thirty to nine thirty. I'm sure I'll run into some issues there, but I'm gonna have to navigate around that. This is something that's important to me. So for the next eight weeks, that's where I'm going to be on Tuesday nights. You can't miss more than two or you have to start over. And I did level one a while back, and I got to do level one again because so much time past, I would feel ridiculous going into level two. So I'm
gonna start level one. I'm going to see how it goes, and then if I still love it, I'm gonna roll in to level two. But I'm proud of myself for finally signing up for the class, and I hope that that will encourage any of you right now, if there's something you've been putting off, maybe even pause this right now and go look up what it is you need to do. Go to the website. Can you sign up for it? Do you need to look at your calendar?
What is it you need to do?
Like, if you've been putting off something, ask yourself why you're putting it off. Is it fear? Is it perfectionism, is it lack of time, whatever it is, Acknowledge why you're putting it off, and figure out a way to make it work. When we do that, it will help get us out of the what if cycle, which is what I need to get out of. I will just know, and I owe it to myself to give it a try, and so do you.
We're gonna do it. Live Oh the one, two, three, sore losers?
What up, everybody? I am lunchbox. I know the most about sports, so I'll give you the sports facts, my sports opinions, because I'm pretty much a sports genius, y'all. It's Sison.
I'm from the North. I'm an alpha male. I live on the north side of Nashville with Bayser, my wife.
We do have a farm.
It's beautiful, a lot of acreage, no animals, a lot of crops, hopefully soon corn pumpkins. Rye I believe maybe a little fescue to be determined over to you, coach.
And here's a clip from this week's episode of The Sore Losers Jasmine with Nashville sc Hi. I'm just letting you know I'm your new ticket rep.
How's it going, Jazzy?
And I'm like okay, And she's like, I just wanted to call and see as a season ticket member. If every if you're happy with everything that's going on and every the process and everything. I said, well, I do have a few questions here we go, Do I have any comments? And she goes, are you just are you looking forward to this upcoming season? I was like, well, last season ended on a little bit of a rough note. You know, we were really pissed poor towards the end of the year. What do you like on the in
the midfield? Like? What what did we do to address the situation? She's like, excuse me, I'm like, like, how are we going to score more goals? It seems like it takes a lot of effort for us to score just one goal. When we go to the games, we don't really score a lot of goals and we get beat two to nothing, three to nothing, and if we score one goal, it's a it's a miracle. How what
have we done to improve that need? Somebody better than muck tar And she's like, oh, sir, I'm just calling about your season tickets.
That wasn't in her training class.
And I'm like, yeah, I know you're calling about my season tickets. But you said if I have any questions, and I said, and I saw that we let our backup goalie go. Do you know was there a reason behind that?
Oh?
Contract issues?
And she's like, I didn't make that decision. I'm just your ticket rep. Like I'm just handling anything on your season ticket sales, Like if you need any help with.
That, dude. She's just trying to draw check in the box by your name.
Bro.
She has a list of people that she is supposed to call now that she has this job, to introduce herself and like get the ball rolling, like just so you know who she is. And she can say, yep, I did that, yep I did that. She reports or a boss. I talked to all thirty people on my list and they are all happy. And I just start pestering her with questions. I said, you know, last year was the first year we didn't make the playoffs. Like, what's the you know mood around the office.
Well, at the office, we always like to network on Fridays.
She says, Well, we're really looking forward to this season, and you know, we're really glad that you're a season ticket member. Is there anything else I can do for you? And I'm like, well, like, how are we going to handle the firepower of Messi and his boys when they come up from Miami.
She's like, I went to a couple of games with the girls and drink.
She goes, if you do need me at a game, I will be there if you you know, if you tell me beforehand, I can come down to your seats. And I'm like, well, how is that gonna help us stop Messi? And she's like, I don't I don't know that, sir, sir.
I'm just trying to get you to renew at your rock bottom price of forty dollars for the season pass.
I mean, I hit her with like ten questions, cut her on the phone for at least fifteen minutes.
It's got to improve her life and how you view your job. If she does enjoy ted Lasso.
I should ask her. I said, Hey, did ted Lasso inspire you to apply for this.
I should have had that one because that does make it cooler that she's working at a stadium and then also can just go outside and watch the games. I wonder if her offices are at the stadium. They have to be.
Oh, that's a great question.
Then that makes me jealous that they had the ted Lasso life because that was pretty cool. How the one lady whoever the owner of the Yeah, how she'd always go into her office. Sum, Yeah, it was so great. That's a pretty dope office.
That was that.
I wonder, my friend Jinny works for Austin FC, and I'll ask her if her office is at the stadium, because that would be so. I would have asked questions like that. Instead you're being a dick and you're like, hey, so Hanni. Muktar and Zimmerman they weren't very social when they would lose a game and then you guys would have your meet and greets you, why don't you do something constructive where you said, hey, it was really hard. The one cool time was when my kids played basketball
with Muktar. There's been other times though, where they get one hot dog and you guys run out, why didn't you address that? I should have addressed Meet the Team Day. I'm like, hey, so two years so fit with meet the Team Day. Two years ago we went to Meet the Team day and you, if you were a season ticket member, you got to go and you got to
do all this stuff. But my kids didn't get to do anything because everything we did was, oh, you have to have a risk band for that, you have to have a risk band for this, you have to have this collar risk And there were no damn wristbands. But no one said that on the copy, like how have we.
Worked to improve that? That would have been a good question.
That would have been a great question.
She would listen.
She would have been like, I didn't even know we have fan Meet the Fan day. This is only my second day on the job.
Sir, You're gonna hang up and listen. You're hanging up.
Uh So, I thought, I'm sitting there laughing to myself. And I get off the phone and my wife was like, who was that. I said, Oh, that was our new season season ticket rep with Nashville. Escia's Jasmine. She goes, well, what the hell were you asking her all those questions for? And I said, oh, I thought I was being funny. She goes, that is so awkward. I'm like, I cracked myself up. She goes, She's not going to know the answer to that. That poor girl is just trying to
do her job. She has so many more people to call, and you just took up fifteen minutes of her time. And I'm like, I laughed to myself, And my question is is that Jasmine girl When she gets off the phone with me, was she laughing or was she was like? What the hell did I get myself into? What you did was funny.
The nation will think what you did was funny her that was part of her job, so that you were probably a nuisance. But I will say I love that you had fun with people on the phone. I do it a little too much to the now, the point baser makes me go in the other room even if I'm ordering pizza, because I'll be like, hey, how's it going, what do you What are you guys doing there at the old pizza joint?
Yeah?
Yeah, we're just gonna do two pizzas, gonna try and eat them up and sop up that beer. You know what I'm saying. She gets so secondhand cringe that she'll make me go in the other room and do it. My wife said, I was suffering from second hand embarrassment. She goes, that makes me so uncomfortable. You just gotta do in the other room.
Guys have been there.
You do it.
You on the patio, you have a little fun with the local pizza joint, whether it's a kid that smoked a little too much or a guy that's a dead end job. You can't just make these phone calls cut and dried.
My last question to her was, uh, coach Callahan, Like what has he been doing around Nashville in the offseason? Is he getting it because we hired him midway through the season, Like has he put down roots here? And what's his attitude like? And she was like, I haven't met the coach. That's surprising. Well, she's only been there for like a week.
Oh she really only had Yeah.
Yeah.
I was like, I'm your new ticket rep. I just started with National sc I'm just reaching out to let you know the h here's the list that this one man asked me. I need to know all of this stuff. Apparently I'm supposed to call him back by Wednesday. Dude, I didn't know they're going to give you personalized calls. I might need to become a season ticket member, dude. They were pretty hands on. No, No, they only call you when they first start the job to introduce themselves
and if you need anything. Do you have any questions? She said, do you have any questions? And so I had questions, how are we going to score more goals? What did we do to improve our midfield? Why do we let our backup goalie go that blocks all the pks? And I want to know what the coach has been up to.
If a place did call you after you went to an event, a restaurant or anything, would it annoy you or would it seem like the the fact she's calling you seems like she cares what you're saying. It only happens once a year and.
Once a year and it's like I get a new ticket rep every four months. They don't stay around very long. Is she trying to upsell you? I don't get hout is How is it a base pay? No, it's it's see.
If I was her, i'd try to upsell you. Why is she not trying to get you in a better seat? I'd have turned it on you. Well, I don't know. You want to be right next to coach and ask those questions. We can get you in our premium seating right on the first base line, which is also that's I use baseball terminology. I'm not familiar with soccer, but that's right along your visitors dugout zone the net pitch. So dude, I'm gonna try and hit you like that.
Yeah, I don't think. Like I said, they had the chance for upgrades a couple months ago, like you could change your seats, you know what I mean, Like they already went through that. She missed that part.
Here's how I would have hit you. I would have hit you with, sir, when you go to our games? Are you getting the party pack? Uh? No, I just get a hot dog and lemonade? Okay, Well are you the cheap skate of your What if you got some better seats? Is that can help with clients, your family, your wife, your kids, getting a better view of the players. Let's try and get you locked in today. See, I'm gonna upsell your ass.
It's not bad. Yep, Damn, I need to look into that. Do you want to see the coach come on and off the field where you can hear those questions. You need to move to the other side of the stadium where you're at. The coach will never even know you're in the stadium.
Well, my seats are pretty high.
Oh oh yeah, I mean I do see him down there when I pull out my binoculars and I.
Look and I can see him. And I got a problem with our seats. They're in the sun. Sir, if you do this upgrade today, I'm personally I'm going to deliver a pair of ray Bans to your office on Monday, and you can wear those every time you come to the game. Coach, I need to be in sales. I'm at I'm in the wrong industry.
Oh man, So that that was my I thought I was funny, but I don't know if Jasmine enjoyed my jokes. My wife didn't. And so then I was like, man, does everybody go through this where they they're in their own head like this is so damn funny, Jasmine, what are you wearing? No, I didn't ask that. I didn't ask that. I didn't ask that you were in the national sc uniform. Do you have that new jersey? By chance? Can you send one over my way? Because you know.
I'm a season ticket member and I never got one. They used to send them to the station.
Nothing, Jasm been here at work. They don't let us wear sweatpants or hoodies anymore. What are you wearing?
What's the dress coat over there at NSC?
Oh?
Just the high heels and slacks and then sometimes skirts.
Sometimes I wear some soccer shorts, you know what I mean? And I put a jersey on.
Do you like that?
Wonder how old Candae is doing over there?
Oh, she don't work there anymore.
I think you told me that, Erica, thank you so much for joining me.
How are you?
Thank you? I'm good. I've been really excited to talk to you.
What's super frustrating on dating apps? Because you get on there with great intentions.
When the constant pimpelling happens, you get very frustrated. Why do you think it is that people find themselves in this kind of rotating pin pal type situation.
I think most people are generally clueless. They don't know how to how or when to transition from that conversation to the date. And so if I can do anything to help people speed that up, I certainly will. I don't think people have I don't think I'm in general, I don't think people have some nefarious intentions to just waste your time on this.
Some people do.
Sure, some people are doing it for that validation. Oh look at me, I'm still desirable. But I never want to meet these people. Oh I'm just out of a relationship. I don't actually want to date. I just want to make sure people still like me. Yeah, of course there are some people out there like that. But on the whole, I think people generally do want to meet, and they really just don't like no one taught this.
Skill in school.
It's a new skill, and so people really just don't know. So I would say, give the benefit of it out.
That's why you're going to use your language to try to get it closer to a date, or just ask yourself and then you know from their answer, because they could either just not answer you, in which case there's clearly no date. They could ignore your suggestion of meeting, in which case they either didn't understand or have no interest in meeting, or they could grab.
It and run with it.
You win either way because you know exactly what your next step is.
It's the basic skill of communicating, which.
It is, but but again, maybe it's not basic, Maybe it's not common. Maybe it's not basic.
Yeah, you also have this step which I love and I've incorporated into my dating and it's been super helpful to find who really is a good communicator.
Is the ask two questions and then make a statement.
Oh my god? Yes, So tell everyone about it in case they don't help.
Well, I want you to tell them you're the expert.
You came up with it.
I mean you, you nailed it.
So okay, So let's have a mock conversation. So we are on a dating app, we match and send me a message. What would you ask me?
And what I've whatever? Anything?
I don't care.
Hi, Erica, what are your favorite genres of food?
I love Italian and tie?
Oh that's really exciting. What's your favorite place in town to go to?
Uh?
There's this place called Regent Tie.
I really like.
Oh that's really good.
We did it.
We did it.
That was the exercise, So exactly what we did here.
You're engaging me in conversation, and I am shutting it down at every turn by not asking you a question back even an and you and you would be anything would be so easy, and so my recommendation. I call it two qs, two questions in a statement. So you ask question one what type of food? I gave a statement Italian and tie? Question two, oh, do you have any favorite places? I gave a statement Regent tie. And then you're not going to keep asking me questions. You're
not my interviewer here. And but the reason I do have you answer that last message in a statement is because I never ever want anyone.
To accuse you of ghosting them. We're not answering, and.
So we're simply closing out the conversation with a statement. Sounds great, sounds delicious, Yum yum, I love pad Thai, I don't care. So ninety percent of the time the conversation was done anyway, and you're just sort of shutting the door.
They already shut the door. You're just like putting the deadlock on it.
Ten percent of the time the other person will come back and ask you a question because they go back to the conversation, realize there's nothing to talk about, realize, oh, I didn't ask a question.
Half of that ten percent.
Will be how's it going or how's your day, which is a non starter.
Hey, and this week a movie Mike's Movie Podcast, I broke down what I believe to be the five most important superhero movies of all time, all throughout history. These are the ones that were most important to the success of the genre. I also gave my spoiler free review of Captain America Brave New World that a lot of people disagreed with, but I had to say it. So here's just a little bit of my top five list.
Be sure to go check out the full episode to hear my full review, but right now, here's just a little bit of movie Mike's Movie Podcast. At number one is Batman nineteen eighty nine. Why I believe this is the first most important superhero film is it created a new public perception of Batman, and it legitimized the genre and took Batman from being a comedic character to a greedy character even by nineteen eighty standards. And this was a big deal, more so than Superman that came.
The decade before it.
This is the one that I feel, without its success would not have led to any other super We hear a movie being made before this. Batman hadn't been a gritty character. And even if you look at nineteen eighty nine, now it's not as gritty as what we know to be now as a gritty Batman, But at the time it was revolutionary because everybody associated Batman with Adam West's depiction of him, which was great at the time, but that show was a comedy. It made him really zany.
It made the fight seems overly cheesy with the bam zap Powell. It made Robin a very just one dimensional character. And for the longest time this movie was trying to be made in this way. Michael Uson, who is somebody who was fighting for this. He had the rights to Batman for a decade, maybe even longer than a decade, and he was fighting for the depiction of the character
that he knew was out there. He was a fan of Batman from when he was a kid, and he was the person whenever that TV show debuted he was like, Oh no, this is wrong, this is bad, this is not the Batman I love. So he bought the rights for such a little amount and kept trying to find producers, kept trying to get a movie like this green lit. And it wasn't until nineteen eighty nine's Batman that his love of Batman, his complete nerd Hm actually came to
life and he was able to do it. So he was this driving force trying to bring this darker, more serious version of the character to life. And then you combine that with Tim Burton and we finally got it, and it changed the public perspective of not only what Batman could be, but what superhero movies could be as a whole. Now, even in nineteen eighty nine, these movies were still being geared towards kids, with the idea being you put out a movie and then you sell a
bunch of merchandise, which has always been the model. Star Wars was the one who really made that a thing, like, oh, you put out the movie, then you sell a buttload of toys. That was the model. So we weren't there quite yet, but it did show that you can make something for kids because it is a superhero movie, but also that would appeal to the older audience. If you look at this one at times, it doesn't feel like
a kid's movie. This movie moved on to Batman Returns, and that one you had a public outcry from parents saying, this is not a kid's movie. Whatsoever. You have penguin biting at people's noses causing them to be all bloody, and there was a big problem with that. But the reason I believe that this movie was so important is because it was the first movie to really usher in this new era of superhero film and say, a movie like this can be made and you can change what
everybody believes these characters to be. And you're gonna see this theme throughout my list because whenever you set a standard, everybody starts following that and then it almost takes somebody else to break that mold yet again to re revolutionize the genre. But this movie did that. It gave us not only the gritty hero, but also the gritty villain. Jack Nicholson's set the standard for creating a villain like this made everybody who played the Joker after him have
some really big shoes to fill. So at number one, I have Batman nineteen eighty nine. At number two, it would come almost ten years after this in nineteen ninety eight. My next most important superhero film of all time is Blade from nineteen ninety eight. Why this movie is so important one I feel it's underappreciated, it's underrated, and how revolutionary this movie was and how important it was for Marvel's success. It proved that you could make a superhero
movie a comic book character for adults. Because this movie is R rated, it's bloody, it's violent, and it's cool. And at the time, Blade wasn't even a popular character in the comic books. Even after this movie came out, his comic still struggled and they readapted them to fit the movie character. More so, it wasn't even a top
tier character, not even the second stream character. Even now, the character of Blade isn't as popular as all these other Marvel characters, and you look at their model now, and this is what later Marvel would bank on because there had been attempts to make other character movies before this be successful. You had pretty much made for TV movie with Captain America Spider Man, and those just never quite worked out. This was the first successful Marvel movie ever.
It was the second one because before this, back in nineteen eighty six, they made a Howard the Duck movie. I don't know why they decided to go with Howard the Duck first, but that movie was awful, terrible, and it was a long time until Marvel had success. So this movie was important, not only for Marvel because without its success, it was right there at the brink of bankruptcy. It had been fighting bankruptcy for so long because they
just didn't have a successful movie. This was their first big hit, their first big taste the success, and it also inspired and was the stepping stone for a lot of R rated movies to come. If there wasn't Blade, we would have never got Deadpool, we would have never got Logan, we would have never got other comic book movies outside of Marvel, like Watchmen and kick Ass or
even Suicide Squad. All of those movies' success had to come from proving that you could make an R rated superhero movie, even more so that you could do it without a popular character. Now, at the time, Wesley Snipes was a very popular actor, so that brought in some fans. Vampires in the nineties were all so hot as well,
so that helped. And I believe this is what Marvel started to do whenever they sold all the rights to their main characters to Sony and to Fox, and later when they're trying to build things, they decided, okay, well we can't use our most popular characters. Let's build a team of all of our second string and third stringers and see if we can make something out of this,
and that proved to be successful. So it's working with what you have and also ahead of its time because you had a black lead in this movie in a superhero film. He was the first successful black superhero in mainstream cinema. Paved the way for Black Panther. And I know X Men was already in development that would come out in the year two thousand, but if it wasn't for the success of Blade, that wouldn't have set up
the X Men. And it made one hundred and thirty one million dollars worldwide on a forty five million dollar budget, and Wesley Snipe said it best in Dead Pull and Wolverine. There will only be one Blade, so hopefully they still bring this character back to life at number two from nineteen ninety eight. I have Blade at.
Carylone. She's a queen talking.
He was so.
Not afraid to feel episode, so just let it flow. No one can do it quiet carey line, its sounding care line.
One thing I really do love to take is constructive criticism and encouragement from people that have went through things that I've went through.
That's why I really feel like it's very.
Important for artists in general to be behind one another, creative people in general, specifically women. And yeah, I like to get together with my female compadres in this industry, and I think those are the safest places other than true therapy, to talk about all these things that may feel like first world problems and entitled problems to have.
But when you have the load that you have on yourself as an artist and as a creative, it's nice to be able to go to others and go I'm tired of getting glammed every day and I've had four hours of sleep and I am living the dream.
But it's much harder than I think this was gonna be.
And just you know, it's I think it's really nice to get those little stressors off your chest.
By talking about it in safe spaces. I am a big component of safe spaces.
Mmmmmm, So do you feel.
Like you have a safe space in life?
Like?
What do you feel like? How did you This is a cool thing I love to ask people. How did you build your village? Like your people that you go to for anything in life? But that community?
Well, okay, that's a great question. I started off, thank you for turning the tables on me. Oh sorry, Now I love podcasts because it's really this is coming back to you too. I'll do mind briefly, but then we're going we really want to hear about your village.
Okay.
I'm from Waco, Texas, and I grew up in a great family. Like my parents are great. They had great friends. So I started off with friends of my parents' friends, like the kids who are still my best friends to this day. So I feel like I have like deep friendships. And then when I came to Nashville, it took me a long time to find a village. I was absolutely terrified when I came here. I moved here when I was nineteen, and I was just like super nervous, didn't
know anyone. I was moved from my hometown of Waco, Texas to hear and like was overwhelmed. I was also chasing the music industry and all of that, and just like super intimidated, and I didn't have a lot of self worth back then. It's take me a long time to get my self worth. I've had to really develop, but I've still like pursued all my dreams despite the fact I did not feel worthy but I knew that they were my dreams and I was supposed to do it.
But I always felt like, oh my gosh, if people find out then I'm really a fraud and I'm really not worthy, then it's all going to be uncovered.
Or if they discover that you actually think you're good at something. I was always if someone said something nice about you.
I have to put myself down. Oh I have to put myself down.
But see, here's the thing with you that's different. You were born with this voice. So like a lot of people, like myself, I'll use myself as an example. I have a lot of things I'm good at, but like you and your voice are in a whole other stratosphere. Like you are just like that kind of singer, Like you're like in the celeandons of the world.
Like you have like the voice that is like hand motion, but it can't be.
Replicated, you know, although I do hear a little Dolly Parton in your voice.
Do you hear that people love Dolly?
It's just from being raised old her.
But like you have a voice though that like you can't you can't learn to sing like you like, Yes, I'm sure you can take lessons and you can learn things and like whatever, but like your tone, your texture, the way it all comes out like that is like a god given gift that you have. And so were people hard on you about that growing up? Like? Were people do they get jealous of that?
No?
I do remember one girl in high school when I won the pageant, the school pageant, she I didn't know, you know, I didn't own a BlackBerry. But I went to school the next day and they said, did you see what she wrote? And I guess BlackBerry had kind of like it's on Facebook coordever, you could put statuses and anyways you can tell I was a flip phone girl. But the raiser, Yeah, so many of those.
Like this.
But the thing is I remember her saying, like, you know, I didn't realize it was a talent show. I thought it was a pageant, And no, there's really I don't know as if life was hard on me because of my voice, I think I was harder on myself than I ever really allowed life to be.
Okay, I.
Think a lot of the turmoil that I have went through emotionally that has impacted me just as much as true tragedies in my life is because I was too hard on myself.
Really so very much.
So what are some of the things that you feel like you were too hard on yourself that caused you turmoil.
Well, once people started to acknowledge my voice, you know, I kind of went from the odd kid out to all of a sudden people liked me, you know, and I had something that was interesting.
And I just remember for so long.
As a young girl trying to be whatever I thought people would like so that I could fit in and I could have friends and I could feel that connection that I always felt slightly like I was out on the outside and I couldn't understand it. And the minute that I started singing, I started to get accepted. And I know that sounds so bad, but then I started putting a pressure on myself that this is my personality. If this is what it is that gets people to like me and to listen to me and to hear me,
I have to be the best. Then there's no alternative. And then there's also that pressure of I can't mess this up. What if I messed my voice up? And then the one thing that all these people have invested in me and believed in me for I've lost it. I've ruined it.
Oh my god, So you were stressed out about your voice?
Oh very much so so.
Also, I have deafness that runs in my in my dad's side of the family, so I was always scared I would lose my hearing.
I just was always panicked about it.
Once I realized that I had new gift, I realized how sacred of a gift it was, and I was terrified to somehow mess it up. But I think a lot of my life I have been terrified to mess up, And at thirty years old, I can finally look back and realize that I made things so much harder than they ever.
Actually had to be. It gets to be easy.
And I didn't realize that when I was younger. I didn't realize that I could forgive myself. I didn't realize that I could mess up and forgive myself. I didn't realize that all the mistakes you make they're great stories. When you get older, it's the stuff you laugh about with your friends, you know, it's the stuff you write songs about and people connect to and you can reach
people that are going through those odd moments too. As a kid, I remember the first biography we ever had written up and there was something in it that I had said in an interview, and it definitely didn't come across the way I wanted, But I had said something about I had always wanted a life that someone would write.
A book about because I loved books. I was just obsessed with.
Books from a young age, and so I wanted something that was exciting and riveting and would make you want to turn the page. And I don't think I really realized what I was signing up for by trying to manifest that and praying to God every night, give me an interesting life. Really gave me something fun? Give me was that never let me get bored?
Yes, hey, thanks for listening to this week's Sunday Sampler, The Bobby Cast Four Things with Amy Brown, sore Losers. I mean you heard all the shows. We'd love for you to go and check out an episode, subscribe to the feed if you like, or maybe just listen to the Sunday Sampler every week and get a little piece whatever it is.
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