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There's parts of your life where there's these big question marks that I'm hoping you can answer for me. Okay. But I want
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the full truth. Now I'm nervous. Scooter Braun is the man behind some of the biggest stars in the music industry. And
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he built one of the most disruptive entertainment empires on the planet. I've never really said this out loud
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until right now. At this age, I feel a lot of guilt because I worked with so many young artists and we were all kids moving so fast and we all wanted to succeed so bad. And it wasn't until I
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was 40 years old doing some intense therapy that I realized I was so driven by the fear that I wouldn't be enough.
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So, let's go back. As a kid growing up, I wanted to prove that I could be more than the privilege I was born with. And
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I created this character, Scooter, because I didn't think Scott could achieve these things. That mask made me
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absolutely relentless faking it till I make it. Like, I had no right convincing Justin and his mom to be on the first
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plane they had ever been on and meet me. So, what were they betting on? My ignorance. But it was also realizing
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that so much of insecurity drives us and makes us great. Like now that I'm here, I can't fail because then everyone will
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see that I shouldn't be here. So let's go for it. And then had such extreme success. The whole world thought I was
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crushing it. But I had built this mask so big. I didn't realize how far away I'd gotten from the sky. So here I am
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the top of my game. I wanted to kill myself. I went to a very dark place and I broke down crying because I spent so much time trying to impress people who
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didn't love me instead of realizing how many people already did. And I was so desperate to do the thing I had never done before. What was
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that? This has always blown my mind a little bit. 53% of you that listen to this show regularly haven't yet
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subscribed to the show. So, could I ask you for a favor before we start? If you like the show and you like what we do here and you want to support us, the
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power, me and my team, to make sure that this show is better for you every single week. We'll listen to your feedback.
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We'll find the guests that you want me to speak to, and we'll continue to do what we do. Thank you so much.
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Scooter, when I look at your life and I look at the things you've achieved, so much of it makes sense. But then there's this these other parts of your life where there's these big
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question marks that I'm hoping you can answer for me. And maybe the earliest question mark that remains in my head is
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what it is that drives you? Because from an exceedingly young age, there was this dog in you. there was something for me
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when I was going through the research. It looked like a chip on your shoulder or something to prove to someone. And so
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that's really where I wanted to start. I want to understand your earliest context so I can understand the cauldron that
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scooter was shaped in and the way that that made the boy turned to a man. Big question, but that's the um the starter right burning question in my head. You know, it's funny because you started by
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asking Scooter, "What drives you?" And it took me a long time to figure out as an adult that it was actually Scott, my real name, that was the real driver.
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And I I really created this guy scooter when I was an adult because I didn't think Scott could achieve these things. So I almost like created a mask. And it wasn't until I was 40 years old doing
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some intense therapy that I fell in love with my name again and realized the answer to your question,
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which is part of it was shame of why with my family's background am I getting all this privilege? My father's a refugee from
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Hungary. My mother, her dad died when she was 11, you know, and her mother struggled to to raise them with family
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help in the Catskill Mountains. My grandparents were Holocaust survivors. And here I am, first generation, born in
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America, and I wanted to prove that I could be more than the privilege I was born with. And I so I had that chip on my shoulder. I wanted to prove my value. I wanted to prove I was worthy of this.
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Who's told you you had to? No one. I think, you know, as a kid growing up, I read it that way because,
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you know, you're hearing the stories of the Holocaust and my dad every night before he put me and my brother to bed would say, "Hey, boys, you're different.
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You're special. I hold you to a higher standard." Every night before we went to bed and we started to really believe him
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of like, we need to hold ourselves to this higher standard. We need to do more. The idea of failing, the idea of
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looking at my parents and and not achieving it, that's what drove me. And and years ago, I was on a podcast,
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probably 10 years ago. I was doing a podcast with Complex with this guy, Noah. I watched it. Do you remember the
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baseball analogy? I literally wrote it down in my notes. Well, I will tell it again, but I will tell you on your
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podcast, the difference I hold today. Okay. They asked me what it takes to be successful. And I made up this analogy with baseball. And I said, "Imagine Sai
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Young award winner CC Svathia at the height of his career is in the middle of Yankee Stadium and they invite everyone
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to come hit a home run and they say you get as many at bats as you want and whoever hits the home run wins like the, you know, billion dollars, million dollars, whatever it is." And you can
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imagine everyone flies in from all around the world. People are fulfilling for New York City. The line is crazy.
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And I said, "The person who's successful is not only the person who finally gets up to the plate and swings and misses,
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but stays at the plate." And now people are saying, "Are you kidding me? There's lines of millions of people waiting for their turn and you're going to stay
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there? You're going to stay there and swing again and they swing again. And then everyone's booing and they swing
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again and they literally keep swinging as everyone is booing them and booing them and booing them for hours. They're
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the most selfish person in the world. You don't deserve to be here. Get off that plate. This is not." And then they finally hit that homer and everyone
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cheers cuz oh my god they did it. And I said that years ago and it wasn't until recently that I realized there's one
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difference in the story. I never understood who the crowd was. I always thought the crowd was being able to shut
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out the outside noise. I always thought the crowd was the naysayers and all the people in your life who will tell you
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you're never going to achieve anything. And that's part of it. But the crowd, all those people waiting in line is
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actually you. That's what I never realized till now. That that's the difference. I always thought when people
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asked me, "What drove you?" I thought it was all the outside noise. I thought it was the fear of failure, the fear of
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letting them down, all these different things. And it wasn't until recently when I hit some hardships as an adult
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and really had to look inward that I realized everyone's got the same crowd and everyone has their own issues and
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everyone has their own stuff. And what actually brings you to success and self-worth and happiness is actually
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understanding how to stand at that plate and shut out the noise that's here. Not
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the millions of people around. The millions of people are in your head screaming at you telling you you're not enough. The deep deep lie from the most
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confident people have it. So I'm glad I get to finally publicly say the difference because I've had it wrong all these years. And in that analogy, you talk about how
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most people come up to the plate, they swing once, they leave, they hear the boo, they leave, they go back to their
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sofa or wherever they're coming from, some or or they swing two, three times, everyone's telling they're selfish, and they get, you know, oh my god. And
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they're embarrassed and they leave. Mhm. It takes a lot for someone to stand there in the middle of the noise, shut
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out the noise, and understand the opportunity was given to me. I deserve this. I'm going to keep swinging. Going
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back to your early context, Scott. Yeah. your dad, Irvin. Yeah. He sounds like quite a tough guy. I was reading about some of the things he was saying to you when you were a kid and I was like, "Dad, Jesus." Like when he called you a
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liar. Yeah. That day and told you about living with integrity, etc. My dad grew up tough and it was almost like when you're being raised by two people who live through what they live through,
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they were raising him for a world that took everything away from them. They were so loving, but they still raised
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him that way. And then he was so loving, but he still raised us really tough. And I was the firstborn son, so I'm the
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oldest of all our kid, all the kids. So he was very tough on me. You're referencing this time when I was I was
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probably 14. And he uh he caught me in like a white lie. And usually he would punish me. And his punishments could be severe, but
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this time he just said, "Hey, come here. I want to talk to you." It's not going to be a punishment this time. I just want you to know you got the gift for
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Gab. You could talk your way out of anything. And in life, I used to tell you, if you lie, you're not going to be
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successful. I want to tell you the truth. You're so good at it. You might be successful, but you're going to be a
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liar. And I'll know you're a liar, and you'll know you're a liar. So, do that with what you want. And I was so beaten
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down and ashamed because it wasn't like raining down fists on me. It was just like the guy I admired so much called me
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a liar. And I walked away. I was messed up. And I went back to him and I said, "Dad, I want you to know I'm I'm not
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going to lie. I'm going to be a man of integrity. I'm Yeah, I could do that, but I understand this opportunity what
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you're saying." And he just looked at me. He said, "Okay, good." And he walked away. And it was one of the best lessons
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ever, you know, cuz he was right. Like you you can win certain ways, but you're going to know how do you how do you want to win? You want to do it the right way. And um and
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that that tough love, I'm appreciative of it. You go to college. I went to college. You went to college. Um you started a business at college doing events. Yeah. Well, I I started selling
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fake IDs. That's what I started first. Yeah. Yeah. I sold fake IDs cuz my friend sold fake IDs and I thought he had a bad business plan. So I was like,
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I'll market them, you make them. Um and and quickly uh he broke my golden rule of not keeping in touch with people we sold to. So, I stopped immediately because I didn't want to get caught. And
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um I walked by a nightclub and said, "How much would you give me if I brought people here the next week?" And that was
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the beginning of my Atlanta party promotion days. Why did that succeed? What is it about you as you look back in
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hindsight, your skill set, your ability that made your party promotion days so successful, which eventually sort of
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parlayed into music? But a combination of things. I think one, uh I wasn't a threat to the freshman girls. I had a high school sweetheart at the time. I was very committed to her. I was a
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decently cute kid and I could dance. Okay. So, I was a good person to go out with and have fun. So, uh that was one
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thing. Number two, I was playing sports. So, I had a lot of friends in different, you know, teams and different arenas. And three, I was in the right place at
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the right time. You know, I uh that first party I threw was successful. And at that first party, I was approached by
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a guy named Jason Weaver. He's an actor and he was in this old Michael Jackson movie I used to watch as a kid where he played young Michael. And he came in and
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he said, "This is crazy." Cuz Atlanta at that time was very segregated in the club scene. So it was like if you were
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black, you went to a party that, you know, a club that played hip-hop and if you were white, you went to a club they played techno. But I didn't grow up in
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the South and I wanted to listen to hip-hop and rock and roll. And we played that. And when Jason came in, he was so
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fascinated to see a mixed crowd listening to hip-hop that he was like, "You want to see how the other half
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lives?" And Jason brought me to a club called Velvet Room on Tuesday nights in Atlanta, Georgia. It was ran by a guy
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named Alex Giddawan. Alex was so fascinated to see me in the line. He said, "You know, let this kid in here."
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And Alex taught me how to promote. He taught me what the value of the door actually was, what I should be getting
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from the bar. And I would start moving my parties. And I would spend all my money that I made on Thursday nights at
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the college party on Alex's Tuesday night meeting people, meeting rappers, meeting singers, meeting different
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people, faking it till I make it and getting people to come back and forth between my parties. And that's how I
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started. That's how I met Germaine. That's how I met Luda. That's we all kind of came up together.
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Relationships. Why did he give you a foot up? So many people are early in their careers and they're having these chance encounters, but those those
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aren't converting into a relationship. And when I look at your life, there's people you meet along the way who end up
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being really, really pivotal. And it appears to me as an objective observer that you have an ability to form good
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relationships, loyal, lasting relationships with people. One, I think it's important to
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pay people respect. You know, I came from a household where you respect your elders. And when I was coming up, I was
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19. So, I was very respectful of the people that giving me an opportunity. And I never forgot who helped me along
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the way. I think the other thing that was a big part of my philosophy was let your work be the reason they want to meet you. I didn't want to be that kid who was going, "Hey, give me an
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opportunity." And by the way, sometimes that works. But I wanted them to see what I was doing and then say, "Come
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over here." I didn't approach Germaine Dri to work at So Deaf. Germaine heard about me in my parties and he met me and he said, "You have more potential than parties. Why don't you come work for me?" I didn't approach, you know,
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Ludicrous who was coming up as a rapper and say, "Let me do that." I didn't a lot of people in my life. I I never
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really approached them. And then even as my life changed and I got older, I made a lot of relationships and I have a lot
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of relationships now that I've never done business with. And people go, "Well, you have that. Why don't you?" And it was because I never wanted anyone
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to feel probably my insecurities. I never wanted anyone to feel like I needed them. I never wanted to feel like a user. It was like my own insecurities of how they might see me. Mhm. But I think
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on top of that, I just it was that same old thing of never wanting to be in a position where you're
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begging somebody for something. I called Jermaine and we spoke to him and I listened to the recording again just before you arrived. But what Jermaine said in that voice recording is also
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pretty similar to what your dad said, which is they both saw something in you. You're this young kid who doesn't have
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an extensive track record of decades of work, but they're all betting on you in some way. As you look back on your life,
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what were they betting on? Cuz they all seem pretty sure that you had something.
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My ignorance. Ignorance. I think I think uh I No one told me I shouldn't be there. And he offered you a job for working at his company which meant you had to drop
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out of college. I didn't have to drop out of college. I did because um I went to work for Germaine and now I'm traveling all the time. I'm still throwing parties, you know, we're gearing up for Usher's album. We're
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doing this, we're doing that. I'm working with the Young Bloodoods, Anthony Hamilton. Like it's and I'm 19, 20 years old. And my grade point average
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went from a 3 point something to a 1 point something. And they brought me in on academic probation. And they said,
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um, you know, what's going on with you? Is there a drug problem? Are you being abused? And I said, "No, no, no, no. I'm
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an entrepreneur. I'm building this. I want to build a record label. I'm working for Jermaine Dupria." You know, and this guy's looking at me like I'm
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insane. And he's, this dean looks at me at Emery and he says, "Uh, do you know the story of Robert Woodruff?" And I
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said, "You know Robert Woodruff?" He goes, "Yeah, the founder of Coca-Cola, the Woodruff Center, the largest endowment in Emery." and he tells me
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this amazing story of this entrepreneur who created Coca-Cola who is the largest
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endowment at our university. And I'm so hyped. I'm like, "This guy gets me. He gets me. He's going to help me. I'm
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going to be at the school." And just when my hopes are really high, he looks at me, he goes, "You know what we're going to do, right? Cuz we're going to
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stop all the nonsense. You're going to focus on school. You're going to get a degree because the chance of you being like Robert Woodruff without an Emory
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degree is like one in a billion." And the moment he said it, that's when I dropped out of school. What did your
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father say? Before you ask me about my father, I want to ask you a question. Okay. You made a face and you paused.
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Yeah. Because you have your own story of something happening like this. I just have a a bias. I just have a real hate for dream busters. Yet, every great story we have of success, people tell of
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that pivotal moment, whether it be this dean or Michael Jordan being cut by his coach, the varsity coach when he was
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younger. Yeah. We all talk about the dream buster as a catalyst to our success. And you know, in life, I've I
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kind of feel like everything even, you know, it's like I have this tattoo amor fati, you know, from Marcus Aurelius.
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It's the a concept love of one's fate in Latin. And it's this concept that you have to love the sorrow as much as you
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love the joy. You have to love the pain as much as you love the success. You know, it's if it wasn't for that, Dean,
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I wouldn't have had that chip on my shoulder in that moment. I would just push you on the fact that like you hate these dream busters, but I am so
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grateful for them. I'm I'm grateful for the dream busters. However, and this is actually something I was talking to my
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friends about in our group chat this morning. Is it okay in your view to be driven by haters?
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It's so funny because if you're only driven by haters, no. But I think that everything plays its role at the time.
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Like um Robert Green Mhm. he talks about this idea of embracing your dark side. And I think that there's truth in that. Like you know, if if you continue to fight something that's naturally inside
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of you, you're going to really struggle with it. If you can accept that's part of you can use it as fuel and you can move right through it. So yes, there are
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things that drive me. My curiosity is a big driver for for where I go. My children now are a big driver for where
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I go and how I live my life. The people I love, the joy that I find, the introspective voice that now I can go to
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when I'm meditating or, you know, working you on myself, but doubt from someone who
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dislikes me or doubt from a hater. I can pretend like I'm zen as much as I want.
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But if I'm being really honest with myself sometimes that's the fuel that I need. So I think if it's if it's solely
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one thing it's not healthy. But I think if you can admit you get fuel and different influences from different places and don't try and be ashamed of the one that doesn't fit in your
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narrative of how evolved you are. Yeah. You know then it's okay. You established SB Projects I believe
00:18:24
after leaving Germaine when you were 24 25 years old. 24. And I read that you'd kind of have had this plan to sign three different types of acts. Yeah. First one Asher Roth who's a very famous rapper.
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Yeah. I wanted to sign three types of acts and Asher fit the mold for one, Justin for the other, and the other one I never found. So Asher, for people that
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don't know, is a very successful rapper. Um, what was the mold you were trying to fit? Eminem was a very big rappers, one
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of the biggest rappers of all time. And I was in college and I'm watching all like these at the time these frat guys,
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but they loved hip-hop. And I don't think they had anyone who spoke to their life. So I wanted a kid who could speak
00:19:06
to college life who had the skills to be credible within the world of hip-hop. Why did you think you could find talent?
00:19:14
What did you believe? Ignorance. Ignorance. Okay. I'm telling you, every aspect of my life, if we talked about
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every little thing that I've been in, you said earlier, I've been in all these different things and probably your listeners have no idea what the hell I am. So, they're like, what is he talking
00:19:25
about? But every time I put myself in that next arena, it's this why not me. I had no
00:19:33
right contacting Asher on MySpace. I mean, at that point, I could say, okay, I came from so deaf. I was the youngest
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vice president music because of Germaine when I was at SOFE. I was 20 years old. So, I had the right, you know, some
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credibility other people didn't have. I definitely could do that. But to tell him to drop out of college and move down
00:19:50
to Atlanta, Georgia for be the first artist on my record label to, you know, find Justin in Canada and convince his
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mom and him to be on the first plane they had ever been on to come down to Atlanta and meet me. I mean, it it was I
00:20:03
was 25 years old, 24 years old. Like, these are I was insane. Like, you know, so interesting. When we talk about belief, we we ask if you know Scooter, did you have belief? But in your case,
00:20:15
you had the lack of limiting beliefs, which shows up the same as having there was just like nothing. It wasn't even
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because I was so driven by also the fear that I wouldn't be enough. That back then I would have lied. I would have
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said, "Oh, I had such a deep belief in my in my conviction that I could do it." It was partially that, but it was
00:20:35
also why not me? and no one told me I can't be here. And also now that I'm here, I can't fail because then everyone will see that I shouldn't be here. And so it was this this fear, excitement,
00:20:48
fear, excitement, conviction. That's why I always tell people when I meet them as young people, I'm like, "You don't have
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kids. You can starve a little bit. Your parents want you to go the easiest route because they don't want to see you
00:20:59
suffer, but now is the time when you should be suffering. If you want to go for it, now's the time when you don't
00:21:06
have anyone to support where you can really really go for it because later on in life, you got to think about other
00:21:12
people. And back then, 19 years old to 24, I'm Let's go for it. And the second artist that you signed,
00:21:25
it's called Justin Bieber. Who's Justin Bieber? Justin Bieber. You were 26 years
00:21:32
old when you came across Justin. 25. 25. And he was 12. 13. 13. Damn. You discovered Justin by watching a a Soick video by Yeah. Well, I saw a bunch
00:21:44
of videos from his church his mom had posted and the one that moved me the most was So Sick by
00:21:51
[Music] [Music] Neil and I sense you walked out the door. It's the only way I hear your voice anymore. You must have been asked this a gazillion
00:22:15
times, but the the actions you then took based on seeing a kid on on a video are
00:22:21
bizarre. Yeah, they are bizarre. Yeah, I like Googled uh the background of of the church to look up the businesses and
00:22:33
then called the regions of Canada school boards to figure out where he was cuz his mom had a different name than him cuz her name was Mlette, his was Bieber. So, I went a little crazy to find him
00:22:44
within 24 hours. Once I saw him, I kind of knew in person or No, I knew when I saw online, I was like, "This is the kid
00:22:50
I've been looking for." And I I felt the same way about Asher. I mean, I relentlessly kind of pursued both of
00:22:56
them. I had a clear vision to like what I could do and what he was capable of. And it was funny cuz no one believed me. I mean, even after we met and we did the deal and we started working together,
00:23:07
literally no one believed me. And YouTube was not a big thing back then. So when I took him from 60,000 views and
00:23:13
we took him to like 60 million, now he's like one of the biggest YouTubers in the world and everyone's like, "Yeah, youtubers don't turn into musicians,
00:23:19
though." What were the first principles that you saw in him? Like what were the Cuz I when I think about having those
00:23:25
moments where my intuition just says yes to something. Tone. Okay. Charisma. Um it was
00:23:32
like he had incredible tone and he had soul and he had charisma. He was doing like there was one where there was an
00:23:38
instrumental and he was like jumping around and I just believed in him instantly and then when I met him he had
00:23:44
even more charisma. He was funny and I was like all right this kid let's go. And he was an athlete so he was
00:23:50
competitive. He was a very special special talent and very unique individual and uh those were special
00:23:58
times. And you flew in to meet him and his mother? No, they flew to me. Oh, okay. I talked to her for like an hour
00:24:05
and a half that night and uh first plane ride they ever went on and I remember he was so excited that there was a fridge
00:24:11
inside his hotel room. His mother said, "Speaking of you, Scooter really believed in Justin from day one. He put everything on the line for
00:24:23
us." And and they put it on the line for me, too. You know, they believed in a 25year-old kid. and uh we were able to achieve some amazing things and I'm very
00:24:37
proud of what we achieved and always rooting for him. How's your relationship with Justin now? Um not the same that it was. I think you
00:24:48
know these things go eb and flows. I think there comes a point where I understand he probably wants to go on
00:24:55
and and show that he can do it. I mean, we we worked together for so long and we had such extreme
00:25:02
success and I think you get to a point as a as a man where you want to show the world you can do it on your own and uh I completely respect that and I think at
00:25:13
this point that's what he's doing and myself and and everyone from the old team is rooting for him. But I stopped managing two and a half years ago and now I'm I'm a cheerleader from the side
00:25:26
and you know I I want everyone that I worked with to do well. I think sometimes when you walk away from
00:25:31
management I've heard managers which I never understood they'd be like deep down when behind closed doors they don't
00:25:36
want to see them do as well without them is almost like you know them succeeding is is tarnishing your legacy. Mhm.
00:25:46
Every artist that I worked with, I believed in them because they were great. And if they continue to be
00:25:53
great, I think that's the best testimony to that belief. So to see Justin move forward and succeed, to see Ariana, you know, with what's happened with Wicked in this past year, um to see Tori Kelly,
00:26:09
you know, to see everybody that I've ever had a chance to work with, to see them go on and do great things on their
00:26:16
own, it's awesome. Is there anything that these individuals have in common at all? These people that
00:26:23
pain. Pain. Yeah, I think it's pain. Personally, I think um to be able to convey emotions on the level that it touches people around the
00:26:34
world, you have to understand emotions. And I think um I think great artists, great performers are able to draw from different places. And
00:26:46
sometimes it's joy and sometimes it's pain. Um and sometimes it's just a natural god-given gift.
00:26:53
How important is hard work? Oh, it's very important. I think especially in the beginning. In the beginning, you're
00:27:01
stepping into a pool where everyone talented wants to be seen and you have to work incredibly hard to break out of the noise. So, and
00:27:13
by the way, I don't think that's particular to artists or music or film or TV or anything I've done with entertainment. I think that's every
00:27:20
business I've ever been a part of. The first three to five years of any business I've ever built in any arena or
00:27:28
worked with anyone who's ever achieved anything great, those first three to five years are the most important.
00:27:33
Sounds like something I said to my girlfriend. [Music] Um, it sounds like, you know, same thing
00:27:40
with relationship. Maybe put in the foundation those first three to five years and really be there together. I I really believe that. I
00:27:46
think you put in that time in the beginning and you can break through the noise and set a foundation for
00:27:51
everything else. When I think about Justin's career, he he had a a wobble um where he was
00:27:58
involved in lots of sort of uh you know, it looked like he was going through a bit of difficulty. And I
00:28:05
reflect on one of my friends, Liam Payne, and who was on this podcast and who's sadly passed away now, but he also
00:28:13
around the same age was thrown into the public eye at a very young age. He joined One Direction, went on the crazy
00:28:19
crazy wild roller coaster ride that is One Direction. And he admitted on the podcast that he struggled, he struggled
00:28:24
with addiction. He struggled with lots of pain that he was dealing with. And his story has is a an inspiring one
00:28:30
ultimately, but also a tragic one in many respects. Why does this happen to so many young artists, childhood stars?
00:28:46
You know, when you ask me this question, at this age, I feel a lot of guilt. Um, I feel a lot of guilt because I worked with so many young artists and
00:28:57
like I told you, I hadn't taken the time to look at myself or um do the therapy myself until I was older. So I didn't understand at 25 years old,
00:29:10
at 27 years old, at 30 years old that they each were coming from very unique backgrounds of their own stuff with their own families and their own childhoods and growing up this way and
00:29:25
being seen by the whole world and being judged by the whole world at a very young age. And I think it's two things.
00:29:31
I think one, human beings are not made to be worshiped. I think we're made to serve. And I think that when we worship
00:29:39
human beings, it changes something within us. It it messes us up a little bit because that's not what we're built
00:29:45
for. And I think that can be very confusing. And I think being able to transcend the childhood of, you know,
00:29:52
people cheering your name and and everything else at that level and get to the place where the artists I've worked
00:29:58
with are where they are in healthy relationships and and with their families and and still working through
00:30:04
stuff, but like having a human experience, I think it's a testament to their strength. So, I think that's part
00:30:09
of it. I just think the nature of of being on that stage, you know, that young and people chanting your name and
00:30:15
I didn't realize that till, you know, I got older. The other side of it is I never understood even without me. I
00:30:22
didn't have that childhood yet. I broke. And what I think also is important is um I don't think we can push everything. I think adversity
00:30:33
is important. We can't just talk about mental health and say adversity shouldn't exist. But I do think I
00:30:39
understand the importance now of of really putting in the time to make sure mental health is addressed and that we have an outlet to speak to someone outside of the crew. Um, and there's a
00:30:53
lot of things that I learned within myself that I wish I knew back then. I met those One Direction kids
00:30:59
when they started. They came to LA and actually the whole group cuz Nyall reached out to me. They came to my house
00:31:05
to hang out in the backyard when they were first starting before they really blew up, like their first US visit to LA. And I met Liam back
00:31:13
then. And I met the excited young kid with the with the voice. Yet each one of them has had a
00:31:20
different experience. Each one of them has had a different story of perseverance and
00:31:27
tragedy. Um, and that's the thing. It's like with kids like you just never know what the cocktail is going to make of life. Um, and I
00:31:38
think I think you know that idea of we're not made to be woripped. That can play funny things on the mind. The brain isn't even developed until you're 25, they tell me. So I don't even
00:31:51
know if mine's developed at 43. But I've sat here with so many neuroscientists that have said that to me and it and
00:31:57
also addiction scientists that say the brain is still learning and building it sort of like dopamine receptors and
00:32:02
stuff. So Liam was telling me that he he was up on stage in front of 100 odd thousand people in Dubai. Huge adrenaline rush, huge surge
00:32:09
of dopamine. Then they drive him back to his hotel and he was like they lock the door and it's just me in there with the mini bar and then the the next day it's
00:32:16
the exact same thing. Stage, car, hotel and without the stage you were looking for that dopamine hit. Yeah. No, it's
00:32:23
it's uh like I said, it's I'm very proud of the job that we did and how much we cared and how much the team cared for all the years that we did
00:32:37
it. But it doesn't mean I don't look back and wish that I knew what I know now. How would you have been different?
00:32:46
I think I would have had a therapist on the road for all of us. like you know I think that's the biggest
00:32:53
difference. I think I would have slowed down all of us. I think I made would have made every single one of us stop
00:32:58
and do that hour, you know, because we were all kids and we were all moving so fast and we all wanted to succeed so bad and we all wanted the excitement and we wanted to
00:33:11
make kids dreams come true and bring them down from the upper decks to put them in the front row and, you know, to
00:33:17
help Justin get that number one and, you know, to help Ariana do this and we all wanted it and we we're excited and we
00:33:24
were doing something that was so unique and everyone in the world was so excited for us, you know, oh my gosh, you guys
00:33:29
are a part of this. This is so cool. I didn't know I didn't know to go inward for the dopamine
00:33:41
hit. And I wish I would have known that and been able to share it back then. when Justin ultimately said that he wanted to kind of go it alone and do it himself. Does that hurt? No, not at that
00:33:56
point I think I was also at that point, you know, at at that point it had been a
00:34:02
couple years where I knew I wanted to do something else and I I wanted to find out who I was. I wanted to experiment
00:34:09
with, you know, a different career and we were both communicating enough with each other. Everyone the writing was on the wall. How many clients Oh god, that
00:34:17
we would know a lot. Cuz when I was doing my research, I was like, "No, surely not." Karly Ray Jeepson and then
00:34:23
um Martin Garrick's Kanye. Yeah. Can you give me the top 10 off the top of your head that you worked? I would never say a top 10. A good manager knows how to do that, but I got I got to work with a lot of incredible artists a
00:34:37
long time. I mean, from Zack Brown band to Black IPs to Justin to Ariana to, you
00:34:44
know, Martin Garrick's we signed um while he was at Club Med with his parents. We contacted him because he had
00:34:49
the song Animals and we heard it. Um to Dan and Sheay to I mean just to so many over the years. It was pretty incredible to be a part and so close to so many
00:35:01
incredible stories, you know, and to see, you know, going to a coffee shop to see Tory Kelly sing to seeing her walk
00:35:08
on a Grammy stage. It just I got to see really incredible moments in people's lives to you know Demi telling me I want to sing the national anthem at the Super
00:35:19
Bowl you know and showing me a tweet that she wrote this years ago to seeing her actually perform you know you know
00:35:26
uh at the Super Bowl you know so it's it's just been a really cool experience but I got to see it in so many different arenas and and you're only there for a flash right you have this little tiny small moment here a
00:35:38
little tiny small moment But to get to witness so many different rides, it's a really cool thing. And I
00:35:45
remember as a kid, I heard this great saying, don't just read stories, try to be a part of them. Try to be a story.
00:35:51
And I think I've always tried to take that into my life. Crazy. Crazy. Why? I was I was there was a second ago when
00:35:57
you were talking and I was just I stepped into your body for a second and I ran the highlight reel of your life
00:36:03
just as Justin's um sort of manager and I was thinking God like the places you must have been and the things you must have seen just as his manager let alone working with all of these other great
00:36:16
artists. It's not just a lifetime of experience. It's multiple lifetimes of fortune to get to even see
00:36:23
those things. I met a guy years ago and um I'll name drop here. So I I got invited to meet Charlie Munger. Oh yeah. The investor. Yeah. And everyone was asking him questions about business and
00:36:37
I asked him a question about life. And afterwards his guy contacted me. He goes, "Charlie liked your question. He
00:36:42
wants you to meet this other guy that he really likes who's a brilliant businessman. And I meet this other gentleman and he tells me he's a
00:36:49
statistician by trade. And the reason he's excited to meet me is cuz people in my world who are part of so many
00:36:55
different stories live in dog ears because they get to be a part of kind of so many other people's things.
00:37:01
Yeah. Um but it's uh it's a unique thing. But I told you it the biggest lesson I learned from all
00:37:09
of it is that at one point in my life I received so much praise and then the next moment without me expecting it I received so much
00:37:23
hate. And on the other side of all these experiences I've come to learn that both
00:37:29
were not deserved. The people who were praising me did not know me and the people who hated me did
00:37:36
not know me. And it's like one of my favorite uh I saw Tom Hanks say this on like an actor's table one time. He goes,
00:37:42
"This too shall pass." You remember that? Yeah. Yeah. It's so great. He's like, "You think you're killing it? This too shall pass." He's like, "You think
00:37:48
it's going to be hard? This too shall pass." Like it's true. So what do you anchor in then if so much is transient
00:37:56
at this point in life generally? What what does one anchor in? If everything is transient, if you know this two, you
00:38:01
don't have kids yet. I have a major anchor and three kids. Major anchor. What if you don't have kids? If you
00:38:08
don't have kids, that's when you should definitely do the selfwork cuz your anchor's you. And and the truth is I've
00:38:13
really gotten to a beautiful place of I fully expect to be misunderstood in the future. I expect tomorrow something can happen where especially because my life has been somewhat in the public eye. You
00:38:25
get misunderstood all the time. People make up stories. They twist things. Someone's hurt. It comes out this way,
00:38:31
that way. I could get pulled into this stuff. It's happened to me already. And so, I've come to terms with that. What I've realized is being on the other side
00:38:37
of it already happening to me. All it does is end up making room for something else. So, for me, what anchors me
00:38:45
is I no longer think I'm in control, but I think I'm participating in one hell of a game. I can't control the outcome. I'm
00:38:52
Steph Curry and LeBron could be at the height of their game, but even they can't control the game. they can influence it. And so that for me it was
00:39:00
like the first half of my life was I'm manifesting. I'm manifesting. I'm doing this that youthful energy. And then you
00:39:07
turn 40 and this stuff happens and you start the other half of your life. You're like, you know, Michael Singer, I need to surrender. You know, you had
00:39:13
their surrender experiment, you know, like everything surrender. And then I realized there's a balance. There's this
00:39:18
balance of I'm participating in an incredible game and I can bring what I bring to the
00:39:25
table and I'm not going to be able to control this game, but maybe I should start enjoying the game a little bit.
00:39:30
I'm out here. I'm participating. That's pretty freaking cool. And I think that is what anchors me at this
00:39:38
point that I have no idea what the next 5 to 10 years of my life are going to look like. I used to think I did. Now I
00:39:45
know it can change like that. And I think I'm excited for love in the future. I'm excited for adventure. I'm not looking forward to the pain, but I know if it comes, there's a reason for
00:39:57
it. So, tell me about a an artist that you believed in. You don't have to name them, of course, but an artist you believed in you were wrong about something you really just your first principles were off. And in hindsight, I
00:40:10
had an artist who was honestly maybe the most talented artist I ever signed. His name was Spencer Lee. And Spencer Lee got brought to me by a
00:40:24
buddy of mine named Freddy. Uh, and we did a deal for Spencer and Dave Appleton, who I told you about, my buddy was trying to handle in management. And Dave started calling me saying, "Hey, there's some real addiction issues here
00:40:36
and we're really struggling." And we put him into rehab. And then he wrote one of
00:40:41
the most incredible songs, River Water. River Water. Send away my worries, please.
00:40:59
[Music] River, take me down. Show me the dreams that I never [Music] found about addiction. And when he got out, we thought, okay, he's going to be
00:41:27
clean and everything great. We made this video and we started getting going. We made the Spencer Lee Band and we started
00:41:32
putting him out there like paying for everything to kind of get it going and he started doing festivals and we
00:41:37
started getting phone calls of like, hey, people are coming to see this insane talent with this voice
00:41:44
and he went uh back to drugs and um he overdosed last year and uh he's no longer with us. And we got the news cuz his grandmother, who's the sweetest, she called to say thank you for trying and
00:42:00
everything else. And that was the love of her life and she lost him. And um that one I got wrong because I thought, you know, maybe if we
00:42:13
get the records right, if we get the music, if he gets on the road, you know, he gets out of rehab, like, you know, this would be enough. It's one of the
00:42:20
biggest tragedies cuz I I can't tell you how good he was. I mean, he just a special special talent. You listen to this guy's records. Sometimes I always say I want to like reach out to his family and be like, let's just release
00:42:32
the records like the ones that I have that the world's never heard and I, you know, I all the money
00:42:40
should go to, you know, a cause, you know, to help people in a similar situation. I wish we could do that. I'd
00:42:45
love to get permission to do that. Um cuz he was one of the most special talents I ever came across. They don't
00:42:51
want to release the records. It's complicated. Last week I was in New York interviewing one of the world's leading addiction experts. And if for anyone that hasn't
00:43:04
been through addiction, it's a very confusing thing to observe. Because as an onlooker, you just go just stop that.
00:43:10
You're self-destructing. But if you've had friends that have dealt with addiction, you realize that it's not an attempt to self-destruct. It's like an
00:43:16
attempt to Yeah. Yeah, it's like it's maybe the last attempt to do the opposite to
00:43:22
survive to survive from something. When I was dealing with addiction with someone I managed, um someone I really
00:43:29
respect told me about Alenon, uh Alanon is for a support. It's like AA but for the families and they recommend I go and I went to two Alanon meetings and it was very helpful at the time and one of the
00:43:41
things I learned there was one this concept of it is not your fault. you this is not about you that you have to love them where they're at. You can you know but the biggest thing I really learned was be a rock you know like this
00:43:54
person said to me home doesn't move around home is a constant place that someone can come
00:44:00
back to. If someone beats addiction it is because of them. You know they've made that choice and they deserve the credit. But if you want to be helpful this person said just try to be a
00:44:10
constant place. They know that no matter what at the end they can come back and they and you'll be waiting.
00:44:15
Understanding your story, you stuck around with Justin when he went through his his difficult times and people were calling for you to drop him and
00:44:22
to maybe move on. Yeah, I think it was an interesting time. But like I said, if someone beats that, they deserve the
00:44:28
credit. So I don't I don't deserve any credit in that. He does. You ended up posting that post on your Instagram
00:44:34
which sent a ton of headlines around the world saying that you were quitting music management. 23 years after 23
00:44:42
years. There was a little bit of a question mark though because I think you referenced in something you'd posted
00:44:47
that part of your inspiration or a catalyst was a particular artist had decided that they wanted to
00:44:54
go their own way. Yeah. Who was that? I prefer not to say like there's a bunch of legal stuff around that everything
00:45:00
else but uh she uh she informed me and I respected the hell out of it that she was she felt that way and uh but I had had that conversation with others too and and
00:45:13
um I wrote I mean I wrote it all in 23 years. The reason I posted that at the time was I had already made the decision
00:45:19
a year prior but I'd never talked about it. And you know, when you're running a big company, there's all these, you
00:45:25
know, legal things. And we had to wait till everything was in order and then I could say it. And um and they were like,
00:45:31
"Well, you've already been out of it for a year. Why say it now?" And I just felt I need to say it for me, but I also need
00:45:37
to say it so I hold myself accountable not to ever go back. Okay. And I, you know, it was way too long. It was like
00:45:43
10 slides on Instagram. No, it was incredible. But it was uh I appreciate you saying that, but it was from the
00:45:49
heart. And I remember waking up, posting it, and then just like falling down because I was like, "Oh my god, like this thing I've been doing since I was 19 is now over." And what I wrote in
00:46:02
there is the truth. My entire adult life, that's all I had known. So not being in that situation, I didn't know
00:46:10
what a normal adult life was like. I didn't know you could have a weekend. Like I didn't know, you know, like
00:46:17
that's what it was. I was on call all the time for 23 years. And it wasn't one, it was a lot. And um finding out
00:46:24
what a normal adult life was like was pretty wild to me and also really interesting. But I don't I had some of
00:46:30
the most incredible memories and I'm very grateful. But if you remember, do you remember the Barry Gordy quote at
00:46:35
the end? No, I don't. Barry Gordy is the founder of Mottown Records. Barry Gordy
00:46:41
is a kid from Detroit. Michael Jackson's theater play. Barry Gordy. Correct. Yes.
00:46:46
So before Barry Gordy, black musicians would make incredible music and a white person could come along and just cover
00:46:52
it and make it theirs. And Barry Gordy took that back and gave us Mottown Records and changed the entire music industry. And I was at a dinner and Barry Gordy was placed next
00:47:05
to me and I was just like freaking out. Barry Gordy sit next to me and we start talking and this is years before he said, "I'm going to tell you a story and you're going to need it one
00:47:17
day." And boy was he right. And he said, "You know, do you know what the Mottown 25 was?" And I said, "Absolutely. It was the first time Michael Jackson did the Moonwalk, Diana Ross." And he's like, "Oh, you really
00:47:29
are a Mottown fan." I was like, "Yeah." And he said, "Well, do you know I didn't want to go?" I said, "What?" He goes, "Yeah, I didn't want to go." At the
00:47:35
time, Michael had left for CBS records. Diana had left for CBS records and everyone was saying that I took their
00:47:40
publishing and I was like the bad guy for all these people that I had supported and lifted and like I was so
00:47:47
angry and I didn't want to go. I said, "What changed?" He goes, "My family made me go." And I said, "Yeah, cuz I
00:47:52
remember you were in the balcony and I kept cutting to you." And he goes, "You know, the first I get there and Diana Ross is hosting. Michael's going to
00:47:58
perform. He's the biggest thing in the world. I'm I'm mad." But as the night went on, I suddenly realized little
00:48:05
Barry from Detroit would have lost his mind knowing this was coming. He said, "Young man, it will never end the way
00:48:12
you want it to, but it doesn't mean it didn't happen." And I didn't know how much I
00:48:17
needed that in the years to come. You can plan it. You can try and control it as much as you want, but Barry God was
00:48:24
right. It will never end the way you wanted unless you're Derek Jeter on the Yankees, but or you know, you're messy.
00:48:31
But um but most of us it's not going to end the way we wanted. However, it happened and how cool is that? Like how
00:48:40
cool is that that like we get to do this and get to have this life and I thought that's the way I wanted to end 23 years
00:48:47
because the me stopping managing and ending managing and it didn't end the way I necessarily wanted. I would have wanted a giant concert where all the artists come out, we celebrate everything we did together. and ended
00:49:00
pretty abruptly of like, "Oh, this is it." And some want to leave and some want to stay and yeah, I'm done. I don't
00:49:06
want to do this anymore. And some people understood it and other people didn't. But it happened
00:49:13
and no one could ever take that away. Did you ever feel betrayed? Oh, of course. But I'm sure that goes both
00:49:20
ways. Like as much as I felt betrayed, like music business can be heartbreaking. Management can be
00:49:26
heartbreaking. If you watch David Geffin's documentary, he says uh management is like move the mountain
00:49:32
over here and they say it was supposed to be there, you know, but like but at the same time it must be heartbreaking
00:49:38
the other way. It's such an interdependent relationship and it's such I don't I you know the people
00:49:46
always say stay on your side of the street. I try to do that. It's easier for me to move on with my life and be happy by staying on my side of the
00:49:52
street. So yeah, I've definitely felt betrayed a hundred times. I've definitely felt misunderstood so many
00:49:58
times, but I also try to give empathy of if someone is doing this to me, they must be hurting for some reason. And maybe I did play a role in it, even if I don't know I did, you know.
00:50:11
So, do you feel betrayed? Yes. Especially in a job of service. Yeah. But yeah, you're right. We all do have a preconception of how how the run will end. Man, we're all the protagonists in
00:50:23
our own story. Now that there's been some space between that decision. Yeah. 2 and a half years. 2 and 1/2 years since that decision.
00:50:35
Wow. 2 and 1/2 years. Wow. It feels like it was 6 months ago. Well, it was 2 and 1/2 years for me. Okay. It's been
00:50:41
probably a year and a half since I probably posted that. Okay. You've had some space since that decision. Correct decision? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Even high
00:50:48
conviction now that it was the right thing. Yeah. And like I said, it happened. In hindsight, it was what it was supposed to be at the time it was
00:50:54
supposed to be. I think the reason why I wrote 23 years and why I quit I wouldn't say I quit when I retired and stopped
00:51:00
doing that when I moved on. How about that? When I moved on to something else was because what exactly what I wrote it
00:51:07
was I was too afraid to find out who I was without it for so long that I probably should have left earlier. But I
00:51:14
finally got to a point where I realized either you do it now or something you're
00:51:19
going to have to learn the hard way again, you know? So, it was time and it was time for some of the most
00:51:26
amazing artists that I worked with to also spread their wings and do their own thing. I think B2B marketeers keep
00:51:32
making this mistake. They're chasing volume instead of quality. And when you try to be seen by more people instead of
00:51:39
the right people, all you're doing is making noise. But that noise rarely shifts the needle. And it's often quite
00:51:44
expensive. And I know as there was a time in my career where I kept making this mistake that many of you will be
00:51:50
making it too. Eventually I started posting ads on our show sponsors platform LinkedIn. And that's when
00:51:55
things started to change. I put that change down to a few critical things. One of them being that LinkedIn was then
00:52:01
and still is today the platform where decision makers go to not only to think and learn but also to buy. And when you
00:52:07
market your business there, you're putting it right in front of people who actually have the power to say yes. and
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to get you started. If you visit linkedin.com/dary, you can claim that right now. That's
00:52:33
linkedin.com/diary. You sold your company for $1.1 billion. That's what I read. You can't confirm or deny, but that's
00:52:40
publicly traded, so I can confirm, but I don't like talking about it. Okay. You sold your company for $1.1 billion, which I don't think people realize. It's
00:52:46
a [ __ ] lot of money. Um, at 39 years old, roughly, I was about to turn 40. You talk about laying on the beach. Yeah. With your belly out.
00:52:57
Yeah. I mean with a significant amount of money in your bank account without the
00:53:03
same job that's sort of demanding your time seven days a week. A lot of people are scared of
00:53:09
that. Lot not not the money but the gap, the uncertainty, the space. Honestly, the timing of when it happened for
00:53:22
me, I was in such a place, like I said, of surrender that I really wasn't looking at it as like achievement or
00:53:30
money or something like that. I more looked at it as what are you going to do now? Are you going to try and control?
00:53:36
Are you going to participate? Like I told you earlier and I started to just be curious for the first time instead of
00:53:41
I love this idea of a competitive mind versus cur a curious and creative mind. Mhm. A competitive mind is what I had
00:53:48
and it is where I was of there's always something finite when you're competitive. You know, it's going to
00:53:53
finish. There's going to be an outcome and then what? But when you're operating from a curious and creative mind,
00:54:00
there's no end. You can just continue to create. You continue to build. And I want I want
00:54:05
to be in that place in my life now of what how big can I think? I saw this Jeff Bezos interview the other day and
00:54:12
he just said one of the biggest curses of an entrepreneur is not thinking big enough, you know, and I think, you know,
00:54:19
think big. You know, you only get one ride around this thing. Think big, have fun, love your friends, love your family, dance, laugh, cry, you know, do
00:54:32
all the things and get to know yourself more and more every single day. Just before that time, we have this whole Taylor Swift incident. What happened?
00:54:45
Is this the moment you're talking about where you received Bad Press? Oh, Bad Press. Yeah. Yeah. That was That's the
00:54:50
When I bought Big Machine, I thought I was going to work with all the artists on Big Machine. I thought it was going to be like an exciting thing. I knew that Taylor, she and I had only met
00:55:03
three times, I think, in my life, three or four times. And one of the times it was years earlier. It was really a great
00:55:10
engagement. She invited me to private party and we we we respected each other. We had a great engagement. In between
00:55:15
that time since I'd seen her last, I started managing Kanye West. I managed Justin Bieber. I knew she didn't get along with them. I had a feeling, this
00:55:23
is where my arrogance came in. I had a feeling she probably didn't like me because I managed them, but I thought that once this announcement happened,
00:55:30
she would talk to me, see who I am, and we would work together. and the announcement came out and I'm
00:55:36
calling Scott Borchetta and saying, "Hey, send me her number. I'm I just talked to Thomas Rhett and he's excited
00:55:41
and I just talked to, you know, uh, this, you know, this person and they're excited and I'm calling, you know,
00:55:47
Florida Georgia line next and oh, and then this Tumblr comes out and it says all this stuff and I was just like
00:55:53
shocked." Um, and it's it's been five, six years. I don't need to go back into it, but what I can tell you is everything in life is a gift. Having that experience allows me
00:56:09
to have empathy for the people I worked with who I would always say, "Yeah, I understand." But I never knew what it was like to be on the global stage like
00:56:15
that. I never knew what criticism like that felt like. And like I told you, the biggest gift that I got from that was
00:56:22
understanding that all the praise I had received up until that moment was not deserved. And all the
00:56:29
hate I got after that moment was not deserved because none of these people knew me. Yeah. She didn't know me. This
00:56:37
person didn't know me. This person who met me three times, they didn't know me. I can show respect for all of them cuz I
00:56:43
don't know them. So, I can love them where they're at. But the gift of pain was awareness. And the other part I was going through
00:56:58
very something very personal shortly after I was going through the divorce, my marriage and all these different things. And it just felt like one after
00:57:05
another. But I look back at those didn't things didn't happen. I I really think they're all gifts cuz when when something's fair, you don't respect it.
00:57:14
When something happens to you that you feel is fair, you're just like, "Oh, I I I deserve that." And you move on. You
00:57:20
feel justified because you saw it coming. When something happens to you that feels deeply unfair and you can't
00:57:27
fix it, then you really got to look at everything and realize the role you played in this or maybe this or that or who do you want to be or how so I'm grateful. But how does one
00:57:41
contend with an unfair world? And I use the word unfair as well because, you know, we've got investigative re
00:57:47
researchers here who looked through everything relating to that particular deal. And then we also looked at what's
00:57:53
written on the internet. And there's this great disparity between what actually happened and what people say happened. Yeah. And there's actually I
00:57:59
think there's a documentary out there which goes into it in great detail which Andrew Schultz was talking talking about on a podcast which I saw. So I looked at
00:58:05
that documentary as well. I mean look, I'm grateful for a couple things. One, my kids were really young when it happened, so they didn't feel it as
00:58:11
much. Yeah. It was very hard at the time. It was hard on the marriage. It was hard on our family. You also
00:58:17
threats. Yeah. But I also don't know what was being said on the other side, you know, cuz I never got to have the
00:58:22
conversation, you know. So, I think when people aren't communicating and refusing to communicate, a lot of things can get
00:58:28
misconstrued and you, you know, I don't want to hold any hatred or like I we everyone moves on, you know. So, yes, I
00:58:35
appreciate you saying that. I appreciate you actually doing the research, but for
00:58:41
me, I choose to see it as a gift. I choose to see it as being able to have a perspective that very few people in the world have knowing what that's like, of
00:58:54
feeling that on a global level. Pain. Yeah. And also just what does that mean in reality when you It just felt unfair. It felt like and but so much but of course of course it happened to me right
00:59:07
of course because here I was thinking my value was from all this praise you know
00:59:13
and I and everything was me making sure that I was living up to it and then this
00:59:19
happens and it's unfair and I can't control it and of course the universe was like screaming at me like God's screaming at me like hey wake up you're
00:59:25
not in control you can't navigate all of this you don't get to decide what your legacy is and you you just get to decide who you are on a daily basis and who you
00:59:36
choose to see in yourself and how you treat the people that love you and the people you can actually interact with.
00:59:42
Surrender, but surrender and participate, you know, that's the big thing for me. It's more
00:59:48
than just surrender. It's surrender and participate and just enjoy the ride. That's why I got the tattoo. You know,
00:59:54
it was I can't worry about everyone's niece being mad at me, you know, like, you know, it it's what I got to do is is show up for my
01:00:09
niece, you know, and I got to show up for my friends and my family. And I wish everyone involved across the board,
01:00:16
whether I know them or not, nothing but good wishes. When I say specifically that pain, people don't like think about
01:00:22
how many people on earth have experienced such a thing. And if you if I could be a fly on the wall that is
01:00:28
actually just has CCTV for eyes and I was watching you at that moment in time just for seven days I got to watch Scooter, what would I have seen? Like I said, at that point I hadn't
01:00:39
really done the work. Okay. Um, so resistance, resistance, trying to navigate it, trying to understand it,
01:00:46
trying to um figure out how to fix it. And then I couldn't, but then I did financially like I couldn't fix the relationship that I didn't have, but then I was able to figure out, okay, you
01:00:59
know what, we will sell it. You know, in a in a world of streaming, re-records will only help the old catalog as much as they help the new catalog. both will get
01:01:11
a bump. I presented that I showed you know how everyone can be a winner here and I was able to sell the catalog and I
01:01:19
don't want to go into too much detail but I but I offered it. It's now come out very factually that I did offer it.
01:01:24
There's evidence of that multiple times in that process. They said no. I sold to
01:01:30
someone else and I washed my hands of it and moved on. And I actually sometimes look back to that and I go the universe was trying
01:01:36
to teach me something and I navigated out of it. I found a way out. So then the universe went, "Oh man,
01:01:44
we tried to tried to give you a warning sign. We tried to like you're you're sailing by in the Titanic and we're
01:01:50
waving like iceberg." And then the universe said, "Okay, you really didn't pay attention and you
01:01:55
still aren't doing the work. Marriage." Cuz that one got me. That one got me to pay attention. Losing my kids 50% of the time, that one changed
01:02:08
everything. and the world that still couldn't move me. I was still able to figure out the chessboard, but my kids and my
01:02:22
marriage, that one rocked me and woke me up. What's really crazy is when I told you I did this Hoffman process, I won't tell you the process because you're not supposed to, but I can tell you at the end of the week, can
01:02:35
you give it context for anyone that doesn't know the the Hoffman process is is one week, no phone, no email,
01:02:41
um, intense work on your early childhood to understand why you are the way you are and give you tools to go out in the
01:02:48
world and understand yourself. The reason I went October of 2020, my marriage was
01:02:55
falling apart. The whole world thought I was crushing it. Ariana's crushing it. This Justin's cr all these people like
01:03:01
we're on fire. And I had a suicidal thought for 20 minutes where I was like, if my marriage is going to fall apart, I'm not going to be with my kids all the time. I can't
01:03:13
control this. I'm not going to be this perfect image that I've presented to the world. And if I can't be this perfect
01:03:20
image, I don't want to be here. And it went to a very dark place. And after 20 minutes, I said, "What the hell was
01:03:25
that? That's not me. I would never leave my kids. I don't want to like leave anybody. Like, what was that? And the
01:03:30
next morning, I was on the set of a video shoot. And a friend of mine called and he said, you know, what's going on with you? And I told him I told him about that night before. He called me
01:03:42
back with another friend and they said, you need to go to Hoffman. We did it. It changed our life. They told me that they
01:03:48
could get me in in two weeks cuz there was a cancellation October 24th and that was the release of Ariana Grande's
01:03:54
Dangerous Woman album. It was the busiest week of the year for me at work. And I started laughing in the parking
01:04:00
lot of this video shoot. And she goes, "Do you want us to pick another week?" I said, "No." I said, "I've spent my whole
01:04:06
life pursuing these things, doing this, choosing this, choosing scooter, choosing that life, choosing the
01:04:12
clients, and I'm the top of my game. Yet, I wanted to kill myself last night. Something's got to change." And I chose to go to that place instead.
01:04:24
And the hard stuff actually came after I got out of Hoffman. You know, I ended up going through a divorce. I ended up
01:04:30
going through all this different stuff. But I never was depressed again. And the
01:04:35
most interesting thing that happened on the other side of it is six years ago, I
01:04:41
was biggest manager and the perfect marriage and you know, everything I touch turned to gold and there was no
01:04:47
negative press about me ever. Six years later, I'm divorced. I don't manage anymore. I've had negative press and I
01:04:55
couldn't be happier. It doesn't mean it doesn't eb and flow, but I get to be the dad I've
01:05:02
always wanted to be and the friend I've always wanted to be. And it doesn't mean that things aren't going to go, you know, be hard and I'm going to say
01:05:08
suffer more things and go through them, but I'm in a place that I understand a morati. It's like everything is a gift
01:05:15
and I'm being super long- winded, but that's the story. that phone call the day after that to your friends. Yeah. Did you tell him the truth on the phone?
01:05:26
The full truth? Yeah, I did. And what was that full truth that I had the night before thought about, you know, just
01:05:34
shutting it all off. It wasn't even an idea that I wanted to die. I just wanted the noise in my head to go away. I
01:05:39
wanted the failure, the disappointment, the fear. I was going to fail in my mind. I couldn't control it. I'd always
01:05:46
been able to navigate out of failure and head towards success. A pit stop. But I
01:05:52
had left what I found at Hoffman. I told you is my name, the inner child, the Scott. I had built this mask so big. I
01:06:00
wanted to feel like me again. And I didn't realize how far away I'd gotten from that. Building up this armor,
01:06:06
building up the mask. You know, I I want to tell you something funny. I usually don't say names in these things, but I
01:06:12
want to give him credit cuz I think it's hilarious. Michael Rapino is the CEO of Live Nation. He's an amazing guy. I
01:06:18
think he's one of the most impressive people in the entire entertainment industry because he wields so much
01:06:24
power, but he also empowers other people so well. And after the divorce, after, you
01:06:33
know, the big machine and and stuff that happened with that, all these different things. And you know what Michael told me? He goes, "I like you a lot more now
01:06:39
cuz you seem human." you know, and he told me, he was like, "Before," he's like, "Nobody goes on
01:06:46
like it's like this." He's like, you know, I just didn't, he goes, he goes, "I didn't think you were real. I thought you were full of shit." And he was
01:06:53
right. I mean, it I didn't know myself cuz I had no reason to do so. And it wasn't until I had some real hardships
01:06:59
and real pain and real scares and real rock bottom moments that I started looking at myself and started figuring out who I was. And then everyone got to
01:07:10
know me. my best friends since I was 11 years old. They're the people I hang out with the most. Um, two of them live out
01:07:17
here, Mike and V. And I hang out with them all the time. And people who know me, they know these guys because they've
01:07:23
been my friends since we were 12 years old, 11 years old. And Mike and Vuke told me at 40 years old when I was doing this work, "We've known you since you were 11 and this is the most we've ever
01:07:36
known you." And I'm not surprised or insulted because they say you haven't changed but
01:07:42
we didn't know you because I was always even to them presenting what I thought they needed me to be perfect and then I broke and then I said
01:07:54
this happened and this happened when I was a kid. This was going on and this was and they were like we love you and I
01:08:02
really became one of the boys for the first time in my life. I became one of the boys because the boys became
01:08:08
vulnerable. I thought it was the opposite my whole life. I thought you had to be cool. You had to be tough to be one of the boys. And it was funny
01:08:14
because they didn't all the achievements. Not only did they not give a [ __ ] about I probably lost touch with
01:08:20
them more so. And when everything fell apart, they were the ones that were there, the ones who knew Scott, the ones
01:08:27
who didn't care about any of it. And I've never really even said that out loud to this extent until right now. And
01:08:34
I'm actually glad I get to say on here both their names because they damn they picked me up and in a really
01:08:48
really tough time and a time where I couldn't even look at my own brothers cuz I was too ashamed and
01:08:55
um and I never felt like one of the guys. Like I felt like I had those friends, but I just couldn't let them
01:09:00
all the way in because I felt, well, maybe I'm smarter, maybe I'm this, maybe I need to be perfect. And it wasn't
01:09:08
until I really hit rock bottom that I realized that they always had my back and I'd made all these stupid ideas in
01:09:15
my head and they were they were there and they weren't there for Scooter, you know, they were there for Scott. And I see you getting a little emotional too because you
01:09:28
probably have the same type of friends. So I'll I did it so you can do it too. What are their names? Well,
01:09:34
Michael, Ash, Dom, Anthony, and Oliver. But they are they're the constant. They're the they're there through everything. The up, the down, the up, the down, the up,
01:09:47
the down again. And they don't give a crap about any of this [ __ ] about anything. In fact, if your friends are like mine, they're brutal about this
01:09:53
stuff. My friends rip me. Like if people saw the text messages between us, they would think we hate each other. Um, but we
01:10:04
love each other deeply. And and the best part about the messages is the random, "Hey guys, I love you." You know? I It
01:10:11
happens all the time. I'll get a phone call, I'll pick up, I'll just see Paul. Hey brother, I love you. Just want to call and tell you. I'm really grateful.
01:10:18
Like I have so many different people I can name. And what was really interesting
01:10:23
is before all this happened, I don't know if you can relate to this, but I spent so much
01:10:31
time trying to impress people who didn't want to love me instead of realizing how many people already did.
01:10:43
I was just thinking what a great shame it is that the amount of units of energy we exert on as you said like the external like the audience whereas when
01:10:51
you ask me who would be there for me irrespective of what was going on in my life I can name them and then I ask
01:10:56
myself how much energy and effort am I putting into these relationships and I'm embarrassed about how much energy and effort I'm putting into these
01:11:02
relationships I'm like embarrassed by it and they'll still be there. Yeah. They don't care. Yeah. Yeah. And and that's the best part because when you do start putting your energy it becomes even more fun.
01:11:17
It's really it's really um it's really difficult for me to understand and this is my naivity. The part that's difficult
01:11:22
for me to understand is you family meant so much to you. Didn't don't you have a tattoo that says family?
01:11:29
First one I was 18. You got a tattoo at 18 about your future family. Correct. So
01:11:34
family has been this like dream and ambition of yours. Mhm. So, it's surprising to me as someone who was naive in this context that some it had to be
01:11:45
threatened for you to care enough to No, I cared. I just uh childhood trauma is a
01:11:51
hell of a thing, man. Yeah. It's um and we all have it. That was the thing. The reason I didn't think I had it is
01:11:57
because I had friends who, you know, had parents who were alcoholics. I had friends who had parents who this. So, I
01:12:02
always thought, you know, both my parents are here. They love me. Like, the stuff I dealt with, that's not real.
01:12:08
you know, I come from an immigrant family. Like, we can deal with this. Like, we're strong. You know, that's not
01:12:14
real. And what I realized is everyone has trauma. That's the human experience. And the faster we value our
01:12:21
own trauma and stop trying to downplay it because we don't think it equals someone else's, the more we can work on
01:12:28
ourselves. Because all you get to do is work on yourself. You don't get to work on the other person. Yeah. Like, you can
01:12:33
really only work on yourself. You can help the other person, but the work that's only here.
01:12:39
And I think that I saw my life as perfect. So why change anything? And that's why you're smiling. Stop calling me out. Yeah, you're smiling. So true because you see your
01:12:53
life as perfect and screaming at you. She's screaming at you and trying to and you can't see it. She's not screaming
01:12:59
just yet. She is in her own way increasingly expressing to me and Yeah. in her own way that there is an issue. And I I'm going to be
01:13:09
completely honest because this is why I started this podcast was the diary of a CEO. So this is what would be written in my diary. The alarm is getting louder and
01:13:18
I'm still in a a state where I think I've got a a lot of time before the alarm is so loud that I can't fix it. I got you. I see you, buddy. Trust me. I see. And here's the funny thing. I don't
01:13:29
want to go into detail cuz I have a lot of respect. We're family forever. It goes both ways. It's not like there
01:13:35
was one thing happen. It both people have to play a role in where we got to. You know, things happen on, you know, both ways. However, Chris Rock says something
01:13:46
really special. He goes, "Relationships are actually quite easy. You know, you ever try to pick up a couch with two
01:13:53
people? No problem. Pick up a couch by yourself." And that was the thing. We we both went to pick up the couch at different times. And we were made to be amazing
01:14:04
co-parents. We were made to come into each other's lives to help each other be better in different ways through the heartbreak of our relationship ending.
01:14:11
And we were we were brought together to make three incredible souls. And now whoever gets me next is in for a
01:14:21
treat cuz I'm a better version than I was before. And in hindsight, what are those warning
01:14:27
signs for someone like me who might be the choices that you make that you justify? Oh, I got to do this because, you know, if I don't do this one, it could all fall apart. No, it isn't. Oh,
01:14:39
God. You know, I if I don't if I don't stop everything I'm doing and choose this, it could all fall apart. Or, yeah, okay, you're saying this to me, but you don't really mean it because you don't
01:14:51
understand what I'm going through because I'm in this grind. And I'm in this hunt that you no one can understand cuz only I can achieve this. You're
01:14:58
smiling cuz you live it. Can I ask you some questions? Sure. How long have you guys been together? Uh 6 years now. And why are you smiling so big? Cuz how
01:15:11
many times have you made those choices? I know. I just justified [ __ ] And there's always going to I know logically there's always going to be something
01:15:16
else. There's always there's never going to be a perfect time. So, I know logically that I have to pick imperfect
01:15:22
moments. And do you guys want kids? Yes. Do you use that as an excuse? Well, the
01:15:27
kids aren't here yet, so I need to grind now. I've I've I've certainly thought it as a way to justify to myself to self-rationalize. I don't think I've
01:15:39
ever said that to her, but I have said to her I've said internally. Yeah, I've said it to myself internally. I've said to myself like this season of life up
01:15:46
until I'm 35, I'm going to go for it. And then if I'm good. And then you know she's looking at you thinking, I want to be able to trust you to have children. Yeah. Yeah.
01:15:57
Listen, a long time ago, someone really smart ran this little exercise with me and I wish I would have paid better attention to it other than just thinking it was a cool saying to like use in the
01:16:09
office. He said, "If I told you someone you loved was sick and you had a billion dollars, how much of it would you spend to save them?"
01:16:21
A billion dollars. Yeah. Correct. And he says, "Is your loved one, is she healthy? Does she love you? Is she here with you right now? Everything you're
01:16:32
working to achieve with that perspective, you already have it." Yeah. And they said it to me, and it sounds great, and I'm
01:16:38
seeing it on your face. You're a smart guy. It's logical. You're like, "Yeah, I get it." And then you're going to go repeat the same stuff because that's
01:16:44
what we do. And what I realized when I went and did this work was it's not going to change between you and her or
01:16:51
me and my ex. You know, that wasn't what it was about. It was actually something deeper deeper underlying that had
01:16:58
nothing to do with the current relationship. It had to do with that lie that I'm not enough. That this person
01:17:04
actually doesn't really love me unless I do this. Were you happy before the marriage fell apart? I think so. But I also didn't know who I was. I think I was happy because everyone in the world
01:17:17
told me I was doing great and I thought that that was enough. And I I feel like looking back now, I feel like I was asleep at the wheel. I feel like I didn't know myself at the time and but I
01:17:29
had so much success at such a young age. So everyone was telling me I was doing great. So I just chose to believe them.
01:17:34
And it wasn't until I, you know, the foundation broke and there was nothing underneath it that I was like, "Oh [ __ ]
01:17:40
I'm actually not happy." And I never knew. And it's like, I wouldn't go back to that before all the crap in a million years. I want to stay here cuz now I'm
01:17:51
like, I'm I'm awake. What is the um the practical advice you would give me? Because you can identify where I'm at in
01:17:57
your own story. So, what is the practical advice you'd give me now to avoid myself getting into a situation
01:18:04
where one day I have regret because I didn't listen to the alarm? Couple things. Okay. Number one, turn the
01:18:10
cameras off and go do some selfwork. Stop being nudged. Just go do it. Stop being, with all due respect, a [ __ ]
01:18:17
Okay. I appreciate it. And um and my group chat. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it it's just there's no good time in the future. There's no when I get to 35, when I get to 36, when I get to 40, there's when I
01:18:29
achieve this. Go do it. One to two weeks out of the year will not kill you. It will only
01:18:35
make you stronger because what you're dealing with with what you're telling me has nothing to do with the two of you.
01:18:40
It has more to do with your stuff. And she has to go do her stuff. You have to see if she wants to go do the same thing
01:18:46
and and work on herself in the same way cuz it's a constant thing. The second thing is go on vacations together and
01:18:52
when the kids come, go on vacate. That's something I think we we forgot to do. We did the vacations with the kids. We did
01:18:58
the vacations with friends, but we didn't do vacations together because we were so we had three kids in 5 years. Yeah. And I think um you know that's
01:19:05
something I think about. But then also just trust that like if it's supposed to be, it's supposed to be. My journey was
01:19:11
supposed to be exactly the way it was. Even the when I found out things and she found out
01:19:17
like about ourselves, it was exactly when we were supposed to find out. So, I just I'm a firm believer, you know, you're here to learn exactly what you're supposed to learn. Have you read Many
01:19:28
Lives, Many Masters? No. By Brian Weiss. No. Easy, quick read on a weekend, you'll
01:19:33
enjoy the hell of it. Um Brian Weiss was the head of psychology at University of Miami and he was recommended a nurse
01:19:41
from the hospital. Would he see her? And he saw her and she had deep trauma and couldn't figure it out. So, he goes, "We're going to do hypnotic
01:19:48
regression." She does hypnotic regression. She goes into something from like age 0 to six that she couldn't remember. Very traumatizing. He's like,
01:19:54
"Oh, this will make a difference." She comes back the next week. It's even worse. That makes no sense to him. He does hypnotic regression again and she
01:20:00
goes into a past life. He calls [ __ ] He does another hypnotic regression. She goes into another past
01:20:06
life and he realizes her educational background could not know the things that she's saying that he's looking up.
01:20:12
So, what happens is he just writes a book about this patient and how she changed his entire practice. And what
01:20:19
was really interesting about it is it made me look at death differently and life differently. We're here to
01:20:25
learn and then if we don't figure it out, we leave and we come back again. And if we learn that one, we come back
01:20:31
and it's transitions and but it's never it's not ending. It's all about coming here to learn. But I feel like I have so much to learn and at least I know that and I'm such a mess and I'm figuring it
01:20:42
out every single day that if Brian Weiss's book is right, I'm not going anywhere for a while.
01:20:48
But it's a really amazing way to look. And what was interesting is when I told my mom had read it, when I told my dad,
01:20:54
he actually goes, "Well, you know, we're Jews. We don't believe in reincarnation." And when I started studying Cabala, I realized that
01:21:01
actually Cabala teaches reincarnation almost the exact same way this woman was describing it, which means
01:21:07
Judeo-Christians actually believe in reincarnation, but many of us don't know it. Um, and it was just a really
01:21:13
interesting way of looking at life. Do you believe in reincarnation? I do. You do? Yeah, I do. Especially reading this
01:21:19
book and then studying Cabala. And I started studying Cabala about a year ago. Um, I like some of the principles
01:21:26
I've learned from Cabala about this idea of being a custodian, that nothing is actually
01:21:35
ours, but we're custodians. You know, that um, God, Hashem is what they say in Cabala. But um this idea that we're supposed to give 10% to charity but no more than 20, you know, because the
01:21:48
belief if God is giving you this, he's asking you to hold on to it because he has a purpose for you. But if he chooses
01:21:53
to take it away, you should be just as joyful because it was never yours in the first place. You are a custodian. And I
01:21:59
think that's a really great way of looking at materials, looking at life, and understanding, like I said, participating. And I'm getting to play
01:22:06
in this game. But you have your moments, right? Yeah. Still today because you're someone
01:22:12
that's done so much work. So it's it's interesting speaking to you because you're someone that I would seek advice
01:22:18
on in everything in my life, but you still have work left to do. You said there I still have things left to learn.
01:22:25
Well, I think I have a lot of things left to learn. I find myself sometimes needing to defend
01:22:30
myself, sometimes not defending myself when I should. I feel like sometimes I feel misunderstood or not loved. And you I I've you know had that moment and then even on the other side there's times
01:22:42
where you feel like oh you're doing all this work and people see you as someone who's done the work and then you don't want to be seen as someone who's failing
01:22:48
at that work and the truth is that's all part of the process. It's like a constant surrender to your your human
01:22:55
experience. The work for me is life is going to throw the things you need at you. So, like I said, tomorrow something could happen that, you know, I'm being ridiculed again and I'm having
01:23:06
to learn again, you know, or a praise could come and I'm having to learn how to handle that. Like, I don't know what tomorrow is going to bring. It's always
01:23:12
a new experiment. But it's almost as if like when you're doing this work, people call it, it's as you're swimming in the
01:23:19
waves and now you have the skills to get through the wave. The waves still come,
01:23:24
but you're just going through them differently. Do you wish they wouldn't come? Hell no. That's life. You know, I
01:23:31
I asked you said I'd accompany Ithaca. Do you know where it comes from? No. So, some people think they're like, "Oh, Ithaca, New York." No. It comes from a
01:23:43
poem by Kafi. Um, I asked David Geffen uh years ago with his extraordinary life and career. When did he feel like it was
01:23:55
like enough? I was 30 years old when I met him. And I asked him that question. the
01:24:00
first meal we ever had. And he looked at me and he said, "That's not how life works. It goes up and down this." He goes, "I want you to read a poem." And he gives me Ithaca by
01:24:11
Kafi. And I named my holding company. I had SB projects, but then when I did the
01:24:16
holding company and started doing other things, too. I named it after this poem because I was so moved by it. And the
01:24:21
concept of the poem of Ithaca is you're on the way to the island of Ithaca in the Greek islands. And along the way,
01:24:27
you're going to see so many different things and you're going to meet scholars and you're going to, you know, learn
01:24:32
wisdom and all these different things. And when you find Ithaca, finally, if you find her poor, she did not fool you
01:24:38
because it was never about the destination. Always about the journey. And I think right now, if there if I get to this end game with you, like that's
01:24:49
no fun. Then it's over. So like, keep the waves coming. Bad skin. I've had it and I'm sure many of you listening have
01:24:56
had it too or maybe you have it right now. I know how draining it can be, especially if you're in a job where you're presenting often like I am. So, let me tell you about something that's helped both my partner and me and my
01:25:08
sister, which is red light therapy. I only got into this a couple of years ago, but I wish I'd known a little bit
01:25:13
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yourself, head over to boncharge.com/diary and use code diary for 25% off any product sitewide. Just
01:25:50
make sure you order through this link, bondcharge.com/diary with code diary. I made the biggest investment I've ever made in a company because of my girlfriend. I came home one night and my
01:26:02
lovely girlfriend was up at 1:00 a.m. in the morning pulling her hair out as she tried to piece together her own online
01:26:09
store for her business. And in that moment, I remembered an email I'd had from a guy called John, the founder of
01:26:16
Stanto, our new sponsor and a company I've invested incredibly heavily in. And Stanto helps creators to sell digital
01:26:22
products, courses, coaching, and memberships all through a simple customizable link in bio system. And it
01:26:28
handles everything, payments, bookings, emails, community engagement, and even links with Shopify. And I believe in it
01:26:34
so much that I'm going to launch a Stan challenge. And as part of this challenge, I'm going to give away $100,000 to one of you. If you want to take part in this challenge, if you want
01:26:45
to monetize the knowledge that you have, visit steven bartlet.stan.store to sign up, and
01:26:51
you'll also get an extended 30-day free trial of Stanto if you use that link. Your next move could quite frankly
01:26:58
change everything. I I told Daniel E that I was interviewing you a couple of months ago and he sat me down in his LA office and was like, I've got to tell you a story about that Scooter Bron guy.
01:27:10
I've got to tell you something. He said that when he made the Forbes under 30 list when he was a young man in I think
01:27:16
Stockholm, Sweden, he said he randomly got a phone call out of the blue from you and you had decided to call
01:27:23
everybody on the Forbes 30 under 30 billboard. Oh, the billboard. It was Billboard 30 under 30. I thought it was foot Forbes and you decided to call all
01:27:30
every single person on the list just to introduce yourself. Yeah. I when I heard that I thought [ __ ] wow.
01:27:38
You don't want to know why? Why? Cuz every single time I met someone very accomplished and
01:27:44
successful and they wanted to help me, they'd say, "Well, who are you trying to reach?" And they'd say, "Oh my gosh,
01:27:50
I've known them for 20 years, 30 years." And they would pick up the phone call. And their power was in relationship that
01:27:58
was expansive and and long and they knew each other from the beginning, not that
01:28:04
they had met some powerful club at the end. And what I realized was the real power is in community and I wanted to know my peers.
01:28:16
I wanted to grow with them that we didn't need to go and find someone who already had it. We needed to support
01:28:22
each other. How old were you when you did that? 27. So you were 27 and you called everybody on that list. Yeah.
01:28:30
Such a cool thing to do. So many people are now going to go do that, but it's such a cool thing to do. By the way, I
01:28:37
am an early investor in Spotify because of that phone call. He was just I'm sure
01:28:42
he told you this. He was just a company in Sweden. He didn't tell me this part. Oh, yeah. He was just When I called him,
01:28:47
he was, you know, they were talking about this new thing, Spotify, but it was in Sweden. And we met and I tried to
01:28:55
get in right away after we met cuz I was like what is this and he didn't let me in at first and then you know I went and
01:29:00
met Shaq you know. Oh Shaq good friend of mine. I met Shaq in London. We walked around and then Da Wallik was like
01:29:06
advising them and um I ended up getting to be a significant you know investor at that point in my life in this you know
01:29:14
new young company Spotify and I have not sold a share in probably 18 years. You haven't sold a [ __ ] No, I'm a firm believer in that company and I'm a firm believer in Daniel. And I
01:29:26
and I think listen, I hear all the time where people are like, "Oh, look, you know, this is so unfair." Daniel Ek with
01:29:34
his bravery and his foresight saved the music industry. He gave value to our industry again. He
01:29:41
found a way to make us go from going in one direction to the most successful we've ever been. And I don't think
01:29:49
people realize that and give him enough credit for what he did. People don't understand the machine. They just think,
01:29:54
well, record sales went away and now we've got this streaming fee and it's lower. So, what is the context we're
01:30:00
missing there? What did he what did that company do? It gave value to our business. It gave, you know, uh,
01:30:07
multiples on publishing and masters that we had never seen before because now everyone's music can be heard and heard
01:30:13
for a long time. You know, at the time Daniel came along, all I would hear going in the music business is, "Man,
01:30:18
you missed the 80s and 90s. Sorry, kid. You know, this business is going down." You know, and Daniel with streaming made it so that, you know, these these major
01:30:29
labels and these independent companies and, you know, these artists are able to do things they've never been able to do
01:30:35
before. One on bringing that amount of revenue to our business, but two, also bringing our global community together. And uh and that was Daniel's foresight and his vision and his uh I mean he
01:30:50
didn't have any relationships. He didn't know the major labels. Crazy, isn't it? You know, he he he saved the music
01:30:56
industry. And I think now that you know he's the biggest thing in the music industry. It's easy to point at him as
01:31:02
like the big bad. Oh, and yes, he's always trying to innovate and change, but he has brought more money back into
01:31:08
our industry than we ever thought would be there. and um and I'm grateful to him
01:31:13
and I think he he saved a lot of careers. I also would like to add a couple of words to that just to say what an unbelievably humble, smart, kind
01:31:25
human being he is. It's an impossible story for it for to do what he did out of Stockholm as well, not Silicon
01:31:30
Valley, and for it to be the dominant platform and still to be the best platform even as a podcast. It's my favorite platform by far. and they've
01:31:37
just decided in the last 2 to 3 months, which is actually why I was over at Spotify's office to meet him, that
01:31:43
they're going to start paying podcasters revenue that we've never been paid before. They're going to cut us in on the Spotify membership fee, which means
01:31:49
that again, it's going to fuel this whole industry. Apple aren't paying us anything, but Spotify have decided to pay podcasters who upload on video,
01:31:56
which is going to mean that people can quit their jobs and and focus. Daniel's a very innovative guy
01:32:02
and I remember him as the kid I called on that list and who when he came to the United States a couple weeks later played me in ping pong eight times, you know, and that's how we became friends.
01:32:14
And um he's incredibly humble, incredibly smart, incredibly hardworking, and he has changed a lot of
01:32:23
people's lives. What's next for you, Scooter? Should I call you Scott or Scooter? Either one.
01:32:29
And I'm proud of both now. Okay. I'm going to call you Scott. Okay. What's what is next in if we sit here in 10
01:32:36
years time? Do you have any idea what that chapter looked like or do you have any idea what would have had to have
01:32:42
happened for you to consider it a success? The only thing I want to make sure is
01:32:47
that you know I stay I want to be the father to my children, right? That I that I want to be that I continue that
01:32:53
that's the thing like that's the one consistent thing. I want to make sure that I put them first, that they are my priority because I get them until
01:32:59
they're 18 and then, you know, they're going to be like, "Dad, we're out." Yeah. Um, and I'm still going to obviously look forward to the next
01:33:05
chapter. But, um, I got 10 years of that. I think something I'm excited about the next chapter is like, what
01:33:11
does love look like? What does relationship look like? Um, and then I'm excited to be a rookie again and try new
01:33:18
things and get into industries cuz I I said to you before we started taping, you know, you asked me about AI
01:33:25
and I said, I feel like we're in the beginning of an industrial revolution and a cold war at the same time, but
01:33:31
there's just so much opportunity because things are shifting and things are moving and we're becoming a more productive society because like you,
01:33:39
I've gotten to see some of the things that are coming on the technology side and it's mind-blowing what's coming and
01:33:45
it's mind-blowing what's already happening that people a lot of people don't even realize and the innovation is
01:33:51
going to get faster and faster and faster and I think the one thing that will never go away is humans want for taste for human error for
01:34:02
experiences you know if anything during co we saw national parks explode people had time for experiences I think AI is going to make us more productive we're going to have more time for experiences
01:34:13
and I'm excited for And I'm excited for what that world looks like. And I think there will always be growing pains when there's change. But on the other side,
01:34:20
societies have always been measured by productivity, not by wealth. How productive is that society? We're about
01:34:26
to be the most productive society we've ever been. It's quite it is quite scary, but it's also extremely exciting. And I
01:34:32
think I think both responses are quite natural. I think excitement is often present where fear is. And um I the
01:34:38
choice that I'm personally just making is to lean in and to mess around and to learn. When we spoke earlier, you were
01:34:44
telling me that you'll stay up all night long like learning how to code with AI and you're trying to understand all the
01:34:50
AI tools that are in front of us so you can kind of be first because you feel like, you know, you weren't at the right place in the.com boom and you want to
01:34:57
make sure that you're in there. Can I ask you what you consider success? Is it you don't want to miss out? Like what what is the success? Why do you feel like you want to not miss out? What
01:35:10
do you want to be first to? If you if you achieve something on the other side because you actually master AI and you
01:35:15
are one of the first, what are you hoping happens? So, I think I'm trying I'm running from a fear and the fear
01:35:23
is I'm 32 now and I've I've been playing at the frontier my whole life. So like my first business was in social media. I rode that wave into sure. It changed my
01:35:34
life. I was relevant. It made me feel great. I built on on that frontier as the wave came into shore. Then the blockchain came around. started a
01:35:40
company called Third Webb, valued $160 million. Amazing. I was on the frontier. Then this AI thing comes along and it
01:35:45
feels like the wave is coming in and I'm I've got a surfboard and I've got to decide whether I want to take this wave
01:35:51
or not. And if I I feel like if I miss the wave, if I'm not involved, if I'm not building there,
01:35:57
then it's quite existential. It's like then I don't know what can happen. And I don't like that. I don't like the unknown. And it goes back to many things we talked about, but I Do you ever swim
01:36:10
in the ocean? Yes. I'm not the best swimmer in the world. I'm saying But you'll go in the
01:36:16
ocean. Yeah. Not just in the beach. Will you go out in the ocean and get in the water? If I have my floating vest on cuz
01:36:22
I can't I can't swim. Which is interesting though. You'll get in though. Yeah. Yeah. 100%. I have a a top I wear to go in.
01:36:28
No, I understand that. But I I find that interesting only because the ocean is a place where you have absolutely no control. Mhm. You know, it's the ocean
01:36:36
can do what we want. You don't know what's in there. You know, a lot of people like I see when they want control. I realized there were years
01:36:42
that I kind of just didn't swim in the ocean. I swim on the beach, but I didn't really want to go into the ocean because
01:36:47
I didn't have control out there, you know? I didn't know what was in there. I didn't know what could get me. I didn't like I couldn't see it coming. I
01:36:54
couldn't control the outcome. And you talk a lot about this like the need for control that makes you feel
01:36:59
uncomfortable. But you are also a very big risk taker. I mean, you're 32 years old. You've achieved all this. You're pushing yourself to find out more. You're defying all the odds. You got the
01:37:10
kid from home who's still talking crap because, you know, look at everything you're doing. And and I I guess I'm I'm
01:37:16
intrigued because one, you don't give yourself the credit of how much you go into the
01:37:21
unknown. It's almost like you do it out of fear and necessity, but I'm really pushing you on like what does success look like for you? Because you're on the
01:37:32
surfboard. You keep surfing. I'm trying to figure out like where where is what is success to you? Is
01:37:37
it you're you're 90 years old and you're looking back at your life. What are the
01:37:43
things that you could not live without? You'd be disappointed if they weren't there.
01:37:48
I imagine it's going to be my kids. I imagine it's going to be my relationship with my partner. I think that's the
01:37:54
going back to this sounds like a crazy thing to say, but if there was a button on the table and I had to press it to kill myself or my partner, I'd press it
01:38:00
to kill myself. And that was a really clarifying thought for me because I was like, I would literally take my I'd give my life to save this person, this other
01:38:06
human being, my nieces, my brother, um my fam, my f my my family. I'm confused because you haven't named all the achievements of AI. Hello. Hello. You haven't named, you know, all
01:38:23
the things that you think you need to do. You know, the um Ithaca. Yeah. Part of what I think makes the journey exciting is being like slightly terrified and having something that consumes you and that challenges you and
01:38:35
that scares you a little bit and and building and experimenting and leaning in. Like when I was a kid in my bedroom,
01:38:41
I'd turn my bunk bed into a business. It'd be a salon one week and then the next week I'd be dismantling my
01:38:48
brother's radio and trying to sell the parts and like so I've always been extremely curious, extremely
01:38:54
experimental. I've always tried to build things. So I think that's my fun, but I
01:38:59
also I these days the more I've done this podcast, the more I've learned to like question myself, question what I'm
01:39:05
saying. Listen, I think you're an incredibly intriguing guy. That's why I wanted to meet you. And and I love how
01:39:11
much you push yourself and you question things. But I find it very interesting that when I asked you about your 90s and
01:39:16
when you look back, you name things that are very attainable to you cuz you found
01:39:22
someone that loves you and you love them. Yeah. And then when we're talking throughout this entire
01:39:29
conversation, it seems that when you actually open about your personal life, you spend a lot of your time avoiding
01:39:36
that thing. and focusing on all these others that make you feel worthy to experience that
01:39:42
thing. And I I guess like what I'm just trying to say to you, for as smart a guy
01:39:47
as you are, this is coming from someone who literally suffered from the same thing.
01:39:54
The thing that you want the most at 90, you got true. The building in your room and the building with AI should be just fun. H
01:40:06
it shouldn't be terrifying anymore. It should be fun because the terrifying thing is turning 90 and not having the
01:40:11
thing you really want. That's when I woke up. And so what does that mean for me? And what what for anyone that can resonate with that? What does that mean that they
01:40:24
should do? I know you said like turn off the cameras and but can you do both? I don't know. I think everyone's journey
01:40:30
is different. I think everyone experiences things in a different way. Some people are able to, like you talked about with addiction, some people are
01:40:35
able to say just stop and other people can't. And other people have to go through a different process to get
01:40:41
there. So I'm trying to understand the balance though. Like how do I know if I've got the balance right in that? I hate that word because uh someone I
01:40:47
really admired said to me, harmonize, you know. Um so how do I know if Jeff Bezos was the one who said it? He was
01:40:53
like, don't balance things, harmonize. Why why weigh things that you love against each other? You love building in
01:40:59
your room. You love learning things and building things. You love that. You love
01:41:05
your partner and you want to build a family with her one day. It's not about balance. It's about putting them
01:41:12
together. Bring her into every aspect of it. Bring her into the fears that you have with this. Bring her into, you
01:41:18
know, that's what I I you know, I didn't know that. You know, it's it's bring every aspect of your life together and
01:41:24
share and let them be with the up and downs and you do do the up and downs and kind of go across the board. And then
01:41:30
also, like I said, do the work to find out why you ask all these questions, but still with all the nudging that's
01:41:36
happened, do the work to find out why you're so afraid to actually turn off the camera and just do it. So, are you
01:41:42
saying then to get out of like competition and get into that curiosity that you described? You said about these
01:41:47
two states that you can invest in. Look, I I think being competitive is always a beautiful thing if used in the right
01:41:54
way. I love that. But I will say to you, when you talk to me about where the AI staying up at night, we're building your company came from, it was a kid building in his room. Mhm. That kid wasn't
01:42:06
competing with anyone. He was having fun in his room. He was building. That's when you're at your best. It's when you're actually just building for the joy of building. And I
01:42:19
think along the way, based on our fears, based on the I'm not enough, based on all these different things, we start to take that thing that brought us joy and
01:42:26
we start to think if I don't crush it now that people are watching me do it, I'm not good at it.
01:42:33
And you're asking me for like this question is almost if it's like advice. I'm trying to figure it out the same time you are. Yeah. You know, so I guess
01:42:44
I'll pose it back to you. You've done research. Do you know a little bit about my life? What would you say to me? What
01:42:51
should I be doing next? What do you think I should be nudged to do? I think what you're what you've done today is some of the most valuable work
01:43:06
that you can do. And what I say today, I mean, is as you've sat here and the vulnerability that you've expressed, the honesty, the nuance to certain points, I
01:43:16
think it's one of the most important things you can do because many of us don't get to climb up to the top of the mountain top and see what's up there.
01:43:23
And you're choosing to go up there and then shout back down about your marriage, about business, about your
01:43:29
mental health, and everything in between about mistakes you've made, injustices, all these kinds of things. probably one of the most powerful things you can do
01:43:35
because as you you've identified there'll be a couple of kids, maybe me being one, who will not have to be
01:43:41
burnt, not have to hit the rock bottom to learn the lesson. And there's actually very few people I do this for a
01:43:46
living. There's very few people that have both that experience and the ability to articulate it in a way that
01:43:52
is resonant in terms of this next season of your life. I mean, you're doing so much well.
01:43:59
Like it was so nice actually hearing you on the phone to your kids yesterday when they came over and it was like dad I want a pencil or whatever he was saying
01:44:06
and you were like Stephen you said to me I've got a you hung up the phone and you you addressed your kid you called me back in 10 seconds and I thought there
01:44:11
was something really special and telling that you were willing to end a phone call with someone and put the phone away
01:44:17
and immediately be present with your child to have a conversation with him to have a conversation then call me back straight away most people don't do that
01:44:23
so I thought okay he's really this really means a lot to him in this season you know when when you just said me what
01:44:30
I did here today. Yeah, I smiled cuz I was being really honest with myself and I really appreciated you
01:44:36
saying that. But I also smiled cuz I was being honest with myself of how funny it is that when I leave
01:44:43
here, all I've been doing lately when I'm away from my kids is thinking of what do I build
01:44:50
next so I can show my value. I'm going back to that old habit because I'm excited to build something else. But
01:44:55
when I'm being really deep honest with myself, really going deep, it comes from this place of well, if I can do it
01:45:02
again, then I'll show them. This time will be the one that I'm happy about. This time, like it's that same old thing that comes every single time. And I still want to build something
01:45:13
because I get joy out of that. But same while I'm giving you this advice, when you said that to me, I went, "Oh
01:45:19
man, he's right. This is the most valuable thing I could probably do." But the reason I don't do it is because deep down I feel not worthy of it. I feel
01:45:31
like who am I to tell anybody anything? You know, all of us, we feel like a fraud when we're giving any kind of advice. And that creeps up in me. And I I get to this very if I'm being very
01:45:43
vulnerable, it gets to this place of I don't even want to say, "Oh, thank you for saying that." at first because I'm
01:45:50
like, "Well, if someone's watching, they'll be like this arrogant guy or you get all the voices coming back in your
01:45:55
head." But the truth is, I want to go and build something next. I want to fall in love again. I want to be present for my children.
01:46:09
And I want to be someone who can give advice from a place of wisdom and be proud that I give it but also receive it
01:46:16
because I've learned just as much talking to you. And what I will tell you is you are way ahead of the game at 32
01:46:23
compared to where I was. Thank you. And I had a lot of success at 32, but I wasn't asking these questions and I
01:46:30
wasn't pushing myself the way you did. And I think it is an incredibly cool thing that this is what you get to do as
01:46:36
a career cuz I think you get to help a lot of people. Um, and don't ever lose sight of the
01:46:43
fact that the kid who was building in his room is now building in a lot of other people's rooms and it's really
01:46:50
impressive. Thank you. That means an awful lot coming from you. I've been extremely excited by this
01:46:55
conversation and I've been telling everybody in our team because of the conversations we have on the phone and I
01:47:01
knew that if those conversations are any reflection of the conversation we'd have on my show it would be really pivotal
01:47:07
for me and it has been. It's been the nicest punch in the face. [Laughter] Me too. Right. You know, people have probably wonder
01:47:18
why I say all this stuff in public, but um what an unbelievable opportunity it is to meet someone like you and get to get to learn from you genuinely to get to
01:47:29
learn from you. Like what an unbelievablely crazy thing from this kid from Botswana to get to meet someone
01:47:34
like you and learn from you to the point that my life has a chance of being better than I've spoken to you. and then
01:47:41
to get to share that with people who I know are struggling with the same [ __ ] who are contending with the same battles. So that is why I I make the
01:47:47
decision to have these conversations in the way that I do. And um by the way, I just want just cuz I struggle with
01:47:53
giving myself credit. I wanted to say this to you, the kid from Basana is teaching me
01:48:00
as well. The kid from Cascap, you know, it's uh as much as like that's an incredible
01:48:09
thing, I wanted to come on here because I've listened to your podcast before and I've been one of those listeners who
01:48:15
grew and learned from it. So, thank you honestly and continue to give yourself the credit you deserve and continue to ask the questions. I do want to blow a little bit of smoke up your ass for
01:48:26
something else that you've done because I don't think people have the all of this information, but when I looked at
01:48:32
the breadth of philanthropic work that you've done, whether it's the support you gave to Manchester, which is the
01:48:37
city that I consider my my hometown after the um Ariana attack. Ah, oh my god, you got a B on your arm. But all these other foundations, the list of
01:48:48
philanthropic work that you've done is so long that I that I would have to we'd have to do another podcast just to go
01:48:54
through all of these things. And you don't talk about it publicly. I don't see you posting about it all the time. So for me, that's always indicated that
01:48:59
you're doing it for the right reasons, but it's incredible. So thank you for doing that as well. And you deserve credit that you never you never get for
01:49:06
doing all of these things. And this inspired me as well because sometimes I think as entrepreneurs we can fall into
01:49:12
the trap of thinking we we cut down the forest then donate to the bees. You know, my mom is the reason um she as I
01:49:20
started building in college, she said, "Just promise me, you know, you'll do Sedaka, which is charity within our our
01:49:26
culture to give back." And I basically said, "Every aspect of my business will have a give back component." And Shauna Neep, who runs our family foundation, like our job is to make the money, her job is to help me give it away. And um
01:49:39
and sometimes it's with money, sometimes it's with effort. But I've met so many incredible heroes, unsung heroes in all
01:49:45
this work. Um, people who really dedicate full-time their lives to this. And I really always I always say um my
01:49:52
grandfather before he passed, he said, "If your glass is filling with water and you're one of the lucky people in this
01:49:57
world that God continues to pour water into your glass, well, you better start pouring it into other people's glasses.
01:50:04
Otherwise, it's just going to spill and make a mess." And I never forgot that. But even when you sold Hib, there was
01:50:10
this tremendous amount of money that you turned around and gave to all the employees, which a lot of people don't know about. And you also gave money to
01:50:18
several of your artists. And from what I've researched, tens of millions were given to your artists as well. And you could have kept all that money to
01:50:23
yourself. So when I hear that someone's gone around and given that much money to 264 of their employees and artists that
01:50:28
have worked with them, you kind of get a picture of who the guy is. We have a closing tradition on this podcast where the last guest leaves a question for the
01:50:35
next guest, not knowing who they're going to be leaving it for. And the question that has been left for you is
01:50:43
now I'm nervous. Why do people always get nervous? It's like a lot of questions all day. The question left for
01:50:50
you is if you could do one thing that fear of failure has kept you from doing, what would it be and why has it kept you from doing it? Man, if I could do one
01:51:02
thing, that's a really great question. [Music] Um, you know, at first I was thinking it would be like, oh, say sorry to somebody or this that, but I feel like I've
01:51:17
gotten to do that with people in my life for the last couple years for things that like I wanted to kind of talk
01:51:22
about. And some things you realize like it's just not the season for that. You know, it takes two. And I felt myself, it was almost
01:51:30
the fear of saying this out loud. Um, write write a book. Oh, thank God. Yeah. I I've always uh I think it's it's my brother wrote a book, a really great one
01:51:42
called The Promise of a Pencil, and it was a New York Times bestseller, and I was always like, "That's Adam's thing."
01:51:48
And I've always wanted to write, but I always feel like my mind and, you know, the things I'm working on in myself, all
01:51:53
these things, they change like every week. And I've always felt like deep down like, "Oh, yeah, you should write a
01:51:58
book, but like you're really not going to write a great book if you do." And I think it's always held me back from
01:52:03
actually just sitting down and doing it. I got goosebumps then because as in that silence for some bizarre reason I swear
01:52:09
on my mother's I I was thinking I hope he says he's going to write a book. I swear to you that's what went through my
01:52:15
mind. I went I hope he says he's going to write a book. That's why I went thank God. Well I didn't say I was going to write it. I said fear's been holding me
01:52:21
back. But maybe maybe you'll turn off the camera and go in your nudge and this will be the nudge for me. Okay. Well, we
01:52:26
hope you do, Scooter, because um I've been so shocked and blown away by your wisdom and your ability to articulate things and the stage of life that you've you've arrived at is for me as an
01:52:37
objective observer just the perfect moment. I appreciate that and uh we'll keep doing the work together and this is
01:52:44
the beginning of a great friendship and I'm really honored to be here and really happy for all your success. Thank you.
01:52:50
The feeling is mutual. Thank you, brother. Thank you so much. Thank you. Make sure you keep what I'm about to say
01:52:56
to yourself. I'm inviting 10,000 of you to come even deeper into the diary of a CEO. Welcome to my inner circle. This is
01:53:04
a brand new private community that I'm launching to the world. We have so many incredible things that happen that you
01:53:10
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released. and so much more. In the circle, you'll have direct access to me. You can tell us what you want this show to be, who you want us to interview, and the types of conversations you would love us to have. But remember, for now,
01:53:33
we're only inviting the first 10,000 people that join before it closes. So, if you want to join our private close
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community, head to the link in the description below or go to daccircle.com. I will speak to you
01:53:47
then. Heat. Heat. N. [Music] [Music]