#293: Keith Jeffrey - A "Broc & Roll" Star from the Band, Atlas Genius
Keith Jeffrey, lead singer of Atlas Genius
Ready to travel down under for some plant-powered rock? Today, we introduce you to Keith Jeffrey and his band, Atlas Genius.
Not only do they create incredible music, but they also embrace a plant-based lifestyle while touring the world.
In this episode, we dive into:
The compelling intersection of music and plant-based living.
Keith discusses the societal perceptions of masculinity in Australia, particularly regarding the necessity of meat for strength and health.
How Atlas Genius has effectively navigated their vegan lifestyle while maintaining a rigorous touring schedule, showcasing their commitment to plant-based living.
Keith shares anecdotes about his family's history with plant-based diets, illustrating the deep-rooted values that influence his personal choices.
The conversation also touches upon the evolving vegan landscape in Australia, highlighting both progress and setbacks in public acceptance and restaurant offerings.
The world needs more broc and rock stars like Keith Jeffrey who aren't afraid to amplify their ethics and their music. It’s a conversation about passion, purpose, and making choices that align with who you are.
(Plus, stick around till the end—we’re playing one of my favorite Atlas Genius tracks!)
Photo and bio from plbsync.com
About Atlas Genius
Atlas Genius is an Australian alternative rock band formed in Adelaide, Australia in November 2009. In 2011, Atlas Genius saw immediate success with the breakthrough of their debut hit single “Trojans.”
Over the last ten years, the Australian-bred band of brothers has proven that their knack for creating catchy-yet-meaningful alt-pop was no fluke. They have amassed nearly 300 million streams to date, played on sold-out arena tour line-ups (with the likes of Imagine Dragons, Weezer, Silversun Pickups, Panic! At the Disco, and others), and have been invited to perform on national shows such as The Tonight Show, The Late Late Show and Jimmy Kimmel Live. But most notably, they’ve created a signature breezy-yet-complex sound that uniquely blends genres and engages an ever-growing and always committed fanbase. Learn more at atlasgenius.com.
Episode Resources
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Full Episode Transcription via Transcription Service
I'm Rip Esselstyn, and you're listening to the PLANTSTRONG Podcast.
[0:05] Today, you're going to travel down under with me to the land of Australia to meet a powerhouse of plant-based music. I can't wait to introduce you to Keith Jeffrey and the music of his band, Atlas Genius. I'll have that right after this message from Plant Strong.
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Meet Keith Jeffrey of Atlas Genius
[1:39] Today is going to be a fun episode, my PLANTSTRONG brothers and sisters. Let me give you the backstory here.
[1:47] Several months ago, I received an email from a gentleman named Steve Jeffrey from the Adelaide, Australia band Atlas Genius.
[1:58] Love that name. They're not only distinguished by their musical talent, but also by their commitment to a plant-based lifestyle. And they wanted to send me a big thank you for all the work that I'm doing and the messages that I'm spreading. So naturally, I wanted to ask them to be on the show and share their journey and their music with us. Today, I speak with Keith, the lead singer, songwriter and guitarist for the band. And he shares how this lifestyle choice intertwines with their artistic identity and their personal values. I wanted to know how they navigate their eating with such a vigorous touring schedule and how he feels about the societal perceptions of masculinity and diet, particularly in Australia, where the idea of needing meat to be strong persists like nobody's business. I sincerely appreciated his perspective on this one. At the end of the episode we even get a little funky as my producer carrie pops in to share one of my favorite songs called nobody loves like you which is off their latest record called end of the tunnel i know you're going to enjoy this one and if you feel like it be sure to get up and dance.
[3:25] Keith, Jeffrey, thank you for joining me from the down, the down. Thank you for joining me from the land down under. Yes, it's nice to be here with you from down under. Yeah, I appreciate you kind of waking up at the crack of dawn. Well, I'm a musician, Rip, so, you know, early mornings and I'm my friend. Got it, got it. So, well, so it doesn't come with the territory.
[3:51] I will say I'm more of a morning person now than I used to be. Right because yeah when i was younger we used to play gigs till three in the morning and so, so if you're playing a gig till three in the morning does that mean that you're getting up at 1 p.m or noon probably 11 11 ish back in the day which which i didn't like because you know you've missed half the day yeah that was the trade-off with being a musician right right Right. Well, just so everybody knows. So Keith Jeffrey is the lead singer and guitarist for Atlas Genius. You guys hail out of Adelaide, Australia. And you guys in doing my homework I've come to realize that you guys kind of really cracked the scene in 2011 with Trojans and all of a sudden you guys became a worldwide sensation reached number 4 on the billboard alternative song charts and like wow, I mean, and I'm sure from there that kind of, you know, changed your life.
[5:10] Yeah, it was kind of out of the blue because as musicians, you work a lot on songs that nobody ever hears or nobody wants to hear.
[5:25] And I was 31, I think, or 30 when we finished Trojans. So I'd kind of given up on the idea of it being a career. I mean, a career that I was happy with.
[5:38] So I went back to school. I was studying architecture when Trojans did its thing. So that was the universe interjecting and saying, let's keep going with this music that you've been doing. Yeah. yeah and so i mean so since so when did you start the your kind of music career and would you say that you've been doing it kind of full you've been a full-time musician up until that i mean up until now or not uh yeah i so i have been a full-time musician since i was 19 so i had it i had a couple of jobs when i was a kid so my first job which i think is partly the reason why we're in indirectly while we're sitting here right now you and I talking is that my first job was at KFC when I was 15. Wow. And then I worked in a supermarket so that was a couple of years at KFC and then a couple of years at a supermarket and then then music took over and I was able to play gigs and pay the bills without having to work for the man so to speak.
Journey to Veganism
[6:40] Wow well and so what happened is it was probably a couple weeks ago I got a letter from I think it's your brother steven yeah right my middle brother yep yeah and so he sent me in a really nice email telling me about you know you guys and how the the whole band is is vegan yeah and uh and how you guys have.
[7:05] Kind of successfully navigated i think being vegan and being musicians over the years And so I would love to kind of jump into, well, for starters, so it sounds like you had a very interesting KFC experience, but, but is there anything like what drove maybe you in particular to the vegan lifestyle?
[7:32] So Uh, growing up, I didn't like meat. I just, it was something I just didn't, um, even as a little kid, um, I was just, it was something I, if it was ever cooked, which was rare in our family, but if it was, if it was me, I didn't like it. Um, and my parents actually followed the Pritikin diet when we were growing up. So Nathan Pritikin, right? So my dad went deep on that because he lost his dad at 51 of a heart attack when so my dad was 18 and all of a sudden his dad passed uh he's 51 he was on holidays in perth apparently and he was went for a run his doctor had given him the all clear the week before this was in like 1969 or something like that and um and then he dropped dead of a heart attack my dad was just like well obviously grief stricken but then after that once the grief had kind of subsided a little bit it was like anger of like why was my dad taken at a pretty young age and seemingly like he looked healthy from photos that I've seen and from what my dad said. So that set him off on a path. And then in the 70s, I guess, you know, a few years after losing his dad, he was listening to a radio program and this guy, Nathan Pritikin, was being interviewed on an Australian radio station talking about this diet where you cut out the majority of animal fats.
[8:58] I think pretty prescribed small amounts of meat. I think it was like 200 grams a week or something like that. But then cutting out dairy, cutting out oils, it was very strict. I mean, really strict, probably too strict. But that kind of – so growing up, we were kind of living that lifestyle with the odd bit of meat occasionally, but I hated it.
[9:21] And then you go into your teens and then you've got some disposable income because you've got your first job working at KFC. And so you'd buy burgers and whatever. So I was definitely not. Um vegan during that period right and so and so it was only until my about my 30th year, when i actually we watched forks over knives which is kind of the funny things that'd be sitting here now talking to you yeah yeah yeah how many how many brothers sisters do you have in your family so there's just three of us three brothers in total three brothers you're one of those brothers so three in total yeah so i'm the eldest steven who emailed you is the middle and And Michael, our drummer, is the youngest. So none of them eat meat. My parents don't.
[10:10] My grandparents didn't. I've got one grandmother left. She's vegan as well. She's 96. And my uncle and auntie and cousins are also vegan as a result of watching Forks Over Knives about, I don't know, 13 years ago, 14 years ago. Well, yeah. No, you're exactly right. It came out in 2011.
Masculinity and Diet in Australia
[10:32] Um and and growing up in australia i mean australia i think is very similar to the united states as far as the the i think the prevailing attitude amongst most people that you need meat in order to be manly and to be strong and i've heard that australians next to the americans have some of the highest rates of heart disease, cancer, type 2 diabetes, elevated blood pressure, all those things. Is that what you see from where you sit in Adelaide? Yeah, it is. There is this really strong idea. I mean, it's been around forever that to be a man is to have steak and protein.
[11:20] And if you're going to go to the gym, or then you need to be eating a bunch of whey protein and a bunch of meat and the best food. I've got friends who are – I go to the local gym. I've got friends who go there a lot. They're big bodybuilders and they're all about just chicken and beef and that's what it is to be a man. And so it is disappointing because I feel like around 2011, 2012, there seemed to be this like growing movement of people going, we don't really need to be killing these poor animals. There's the ethics of that then there's also your own personal health um and it seemed like people were kind of waking up but i feel like unfortunately i've had friends that were sort of going down that path too they might have been pescatarian or they might have been vegetarian or whatever and they've a lot of them have sort of stepped back and gone back they've gone backwards into just eating meat again um yeah and australia was like america because i've spent a lot of time in America a long time period obviously and that's that prevailing attitude. Well and unfortunately.
[12:24] There's so much confusion out there for the layperson and so much distractions with, you know, high protein, low carb, you know, the newest iterations of Atkins, which are now, you know, the paleo and then the carnivore and now the lion and the caveman diet. And so um people don't think yeah don't you think that it's it's a deliberate muddying of the waters so that you just you don't even there's so many options and they all have like a compelling story and then you're like oh i guess i'll just do what i'm what i've always been doing or i'll, rather than making it it's like the clear like michael grieger is great but no not enough of my friends know about michael grieger and and you know talking about these like if you look at these studies this is all bullshit you know like but there's this deliberate muddying of the waters like just you know what just people just give up well it's funny i don't know if it's a deliberate um muddying of the waters or if it's just people that are trying to carve a niche in a space and yeah make a make make a living make you know tons of money off of it um because everybody everybody wants to eat right or everybody needs to eat yeah and um.
[13:42] And when you tell somebody that you can eat foods that you love, you can have your steak and you can have your butter and you can have your, your eggs. You know, I think people, unfortunately, they want to hear that message. Yeah. Yeah. So you're right. It's a very easy sell to do what you're doing and we'll call it this.
Atlas Genius and Their Music
[14:02] Just take one, one thing out and then keep doing everything else. Yeah. Yeah. So, Hey, I want to, I want to come back to your, your veganism because that's going to be the thread that comes through this this talk with you but i want to go back to your music for a second so trojans was released uh or i should say uh came out in 2011 you just came out with a a new album called end of the tunnel, that came out in September 6th of this year, you had a nine-year hiatus. Any particular reason why nine years or is it just that's just how it happened? It definitely was not a planned nine-year hiatus. And it wasn't a hiatus in the sense that we took time off music because we were making music the whole time. And we were touring up until the pandemic. We were still touring. We were living in Los Angeles. We lived there for about eight years. Wow.
[15:00] So we put out the second record in 2015 which is a shockingly long time ago and which I actually felt bad about when we put it out because it had been two years or a year and a half since the first record and I was like oh that's so long a year and a half and not knowing what would happen of course and so the plan was to put out another record in 2017-18 we had, We toured a lot on the second record, and then we got dropped by Warner Brothers after a year because we didn't have a number one single on the second record. The ruthlessness of the industry is, well, you did have a song that got to number 10, top 10 on the second record, but that's not enough. We wanted a number one. So see you later. So we were kind of in the wilderness for a little bit there looking for a new label. We found a new label, then we changed managers, then we changed labels, we changed managers, and we toured a lot. And then um the pandemic came along i mean it was a combination of just it was like spinal tap i think in some ways yeah um like you you see i mean spinal tap is the most accurate documentary i feel like uh even though it is a mockumentary it seems sometimes like you know blueprint for what happens and so it was just a combination of bad management bad label bad you know bad moves on our part.
[16:26] Um and then we were about we finished a new record at the beginning of the pandemic in 2020, we were about to hopefully go and put that out and then tour in 2020 and then of course we all went into lockdown yeah well i want to say i have not listened to the new album yet but what i have done is i've listened to a couple songs and i literally i'm not kidding you um keith when i say i have listened to nobody loves like you probably 50 times in the last two days i cannot tell you how much that just it feels just so right in in every cell of my body i love that song i'm glad to hear it i feel yeah thank you that's um that song is probably probably my favorite on the record It's so good. It's so good. Tell me, Atlas Genius, what's with the name? I'm sure you've told this story a jillion times, but I've never heard it. Oh, I've told many stories about the band name, many different stories. In truth, I had a list of names for... I guess just for a project that would come along, right, because we were making music under different band names growing up.
[17:43] And I just had a list of maybe 15 band names on my phone, and we finished Trojans, and it was the first song of this new Batchip songs we were doing. And we thought we should put this out. We need a band name. What are we going to call it? And it was just I went to this list, and Atlas Genius stood out to me as there was just something that sounded big and classic.
[18:08] And I don't remember writing it down. I don't know what I was thinking when I wrote Atlas Genius down. So I've bullshitted many times and told all these stories about what it means. But it was in a list of names I'd written down, and I don't know what I was doing. It could have been driving, it could have been running, I'm not sure, and I'd written it down. And Atlas Genius felt right for that song. And so there wasn't a whole lot of, like, you know, and I think that's, people don't realise, But to be honest, when people choose band names, it's a random thing. You're kind of like what feels right or what sounds cool or whatever. And it just felt like it fit what we were doing. And so we chose it. And then all of a sudden, it became a bigger thing than we anticipated. Yeah. Well, I think it's incredible. Uh i was just on a phone call right before we were talking and uh we're trying to get our we're trying to find a new sales management team and i was talking to my uh vp of sales and i said i got to jump off this call i'm actually gonna be talking to the lead singer guitars for atlas genius he's like you gotta be kidding me atlas genius oh my god i love those guys and i'm like Like, I can't say that I love them, but I love Nobody Loves Like You. I've heard that thing a jillion times.
[19:32] And he's like, oh, my God, you're going to love these guys. And then I told him that you guys were vegan, and he had no idea that you guys were vegan as well.
[19:42] Just on that topic, actually, I remember when we first came out in 2013 or 12, 13, and Trojans was getting bigger and bigger, and that album did really well for us. In interviews i would talk about it and i remember we did a few few podcasts and an interview with peter i think at one point whatever and but you'd start to piss off people because if you know if you don't eat meat then you're oh great but if you do eat meat there's like shut the fuck up dude yeah yeah yeah um.
[20:17] Well, OK, so let me ask you a question based upon that comment you just made. So how how vocal are you with your audience that you guys, the band Atlas Genius is we're vegan, we're plant based. We, you know, we don't engage in not this nonviolent. We engage in nonviolent, a nonviolent way of eating. And we're very proud of it. Do you guys make that known? Well, yeah, we did. I mean, that was in the early years we did. But just like with fans, friends as well, I noticed quickly, well, probably not quickly enough, but if you would talk about it all the time, then people would just, oh, come on, man, just can we drop this? And I'd share a lot of things about, you know, like the cruelty to cows and the cruelty to pigs and all this sort of stuff on my social media.
[21:14] Um and then i realized the friends that kind of came over to the dark side i stopped eating meat they would they're the ones that would just hang around and see that we were we were healthy we were um it actually looked pretty good the food was was you know good and they then they kind of piqued their interest a bit and they're like oh actually i think i might try it for a bit and that was the successful kind of conversion was just having just being around people and doing that rather than beating them over the head with the message. And so, so now I don't take that approach. Either with friends or with fans of the path. It's kind of more of a just do your thing. If people ask you, of course, I'll happily talk about it. I'll chew someone's ear off if they want to talk about it. But I kind of became less militant because it seemed like it was a more effective approach to just do what you do. I think that's really smart. You know, I think that the preaching kind of gets old and tends to backfire more than it helps. And I – because exactly, because if I stop and think about what I was like when I had – I remember there was a couple of girls in high school who were vegetarian, and that was – that tended to be the first. Because as a guy, you know what we're talking about, you've got to eat your meat.
[22:33] And I remember kind of thinking, oh, they're a bit weird. And if they'd talk about it, I was like, oh, yeah, I don't want to go there. Even though deep down, I didn't feel good about being implicit in the violence of farming. Yeah. I didn't want to hear the message.
[22:49] Does any of your – so do you refer to yourself as vegetarian, vegan? I guess plant-based now. Okay. Because I think also the problem with terms like vegan is it's become so politicized. And so people will just attribute a whole list of other things to you based on the fact that you're using the term vegan. And I think that's a huge problem in the plant-based vegan movement is that it shouldn't be politicized. It's got nothing to do with left, right. But it seems like people feel like it is now, like you're a soy boy.
[23:31] Hey, I want to be a soy boy. That sounds kind of sexy. uh, what, Uh, does any veganism or, or plant-based ism run through any of your songs?
[23:49] Um, yeah, there's a, there was a song called City We Grow on the second record that initially we were, we were touring the first record. And I remember being on the tour bus and our manager at the time said, Coca-Cola, I want you to write a jingle or a song, not a jingle, but a song for this new environmentally friendly plant-based, you know, the bottle was made out of, I don't know how they did that. But anyway, we write the song, they liked it, but then they scrapped the campaign. So the song never got used, but in my mind, it was kind of writing about, you know, plant-based and, you know, not. Yeah it'd be a positive new um way to to live that's probably the only song i there might be something else but right where i've sat down to try and write about that kind of topic how many members are there in your band oh it's like revolving door so um so um it's always been my myself and my brother mike um stephen um has come and has been in the band now he was in the band years ago and then he's back in the band he's been back since 2016 so there's three core members now or others uh and then we've had a few other um members that have been in for a period and then you know right move on and and when that revolving door opens up in order to get.
[25:16] Through that revolving door do you have to be uh plant-based i again was very strict early on um i remember having band members and like there was no meat allowed on the rider because you know generally you get to a venue there'd be a platter and there'd be like you know some fruit cheese and then a bunch of shaved meats and i absolutely hate that right and so the ad rider would always say you know no meat no cheese uh and sometimes you'd get there they hadn't read it so it was just a typical right and i'm really pissed off about that and uh and i and we didn't have any meat on the bus um actually well we still wouldn't allow that but um but then you realize like it's just, you just do what you want to do um just i'm not i don't want to sit there with you and, smell the freshly cooked steak ideally but you've got to live in this world and you can't be that um yeah yeah uh end of the tunnel hmm.
[26:15] I have a couple questions about that album number one i love the name and i love what the name stands for tell the the the audience what does end of the tunnel mean uh a couple of things i guess they're all obviously closely linked so the end of the tunnel for us well for me and i'm sure for my brothers was this period of trying to get the record out not being able to because contraction Actually, we were sort of, I guess, trapped in a record deal where we couldn't see eye to eye on how we wanted to put it out. Therefore, it gets shelved. I mean, it happens more often than it should in the industry where you've got a body of work, but the recording is owned by the record label. So there was that. There was also just everything we went through pre-pandemic, like some personal relationship issues that just got really out of hand and then obviously going through the pandemic as musicians where you couldn't do what you did. I mean, our industry was probably the first to shut down and then the last to open up.
[27:27] And we're a relatively small group compared to a lot of other industries, so we didn't really have anyone championing the plight of the musician. So the whole thing, it was just a long period of time, personal struggle and also i guess um and also the global struggle that we all went through but also i think it also there's an element of of hopefulness right the end of the tunnel the light at the end of the tunnel and it's going to be okay yeah well that was exactly there was the idea that okay you get through it and uh what doesn't kill you makes you stronger hopefully and, And you become more resilient. I mean, and also I guess, you know, the passing of time, hopefully some maturity and a way of looking at it and going, well, look, this is tough, but there's more to life than just one. We have all these other aspects to our lives that you can, and I've been guilty of this, of just focusing on, well, if I can't get the record out, this is the end of the world. This is, you know, and it can, a huge mental toll when you focus on something so much like that. When your job is also your passion, that's sort of the double-edged sword. Like being a musician, like I would do this if I didn't make money from it because I did for a long time.
[28:49] But when you do have some success with it and it affords you the freedom to do it full-time, then if that situation is threatened, that's a really confronting thing to go through. Yeah.
[29:07] You uh as part of your tour for the end of the tunnel and you guys came to texas, what cities were you in in texas uh we did it was austin houston and then dallas and i'm not just saying this because you're in houston i'm in austin um but, Probably my three favorite shows, as well as Nashville. We did Nashville, then Austin, Houston, Dallas. And those four shows were just fantastic. Crowds were just off the chart. Yeah. Well, I wish I would have known you then. I would have come to the concert. Yeah, I know.
[29:47] So how do you navigate being on the road, being on tour, and eating this way? How do you guys make it work?
[29:56] Well it's oh firstly i'll say it's a lot easier now than it was 2012 a lot more options i mean pretty much every restaurant will have one or two vegan options now um if not you're eating the chips but um it's i think that it's you find those fast food chains that will accommodate you like you know no sponsors here but like you know you'd you'd regularly go to chipotle and get the sofritas bowl that would get you through totally yeah um or what else would we do uh uh sweet greens i think it was sweet green yeah we do the shroom army sweet green salad um you just find and whole foods of course if you were feeling flush with cash you go to whole foods and spend 25 on a salad um so you know you find your routines and and then there's like you know whole foods had that there's a a range of uh vegan smoothie like um uh like like a protein smoothie there's like a whole bunch of flavors so you'd get that um yeah i forget the name yeah okay well i'm gonna come back and ask you some some more specific questions about food here in a sec what um what's the the the vegan slash plant-based scene like in australia.
[31:24] Uh it's it's decent but again i feel like it's stalled it felt like there was this wave of change happening and there were these restaurants popping up everywhere um and then some of those, didn't last um it's like it's good it's decent like there's one of my favorite places, in the city is called K-Pub. It's Korean, like a Korean barbecue, right? But they do the traditional meat, but they also have the other side, which is a completely vegan menu. And so you get, you know, the chicken and all that kind of, the barbecue that is vegan. It's kind of the equivalent of the other side of the menu. So there are places like that, which is encouraging. Mm-hmm.
[32:13] But I do, yeah, I haven't seen any new spots recently, which for a while I felt like every month there was a new spot popping up. Yeah. And I'm not just talking about, you know, the restaurant scene. I'm just talking about people, people that, you know, in your, maybe in your circles that just are, you know, starting to eat this way. I know in my circles between Forks Over Knives that came out in 2011, which had an amazing impact and moved the needle as far as people talking about it and trying it probably for a good six, seven years. And then on the heels of that kind of ending up, you had the Game Changers documentary in 2019. And then you had a whole new wave of people. Well, and now you've got, you know, Dan Buettner's Living to 100 on Netflix and you've got a bunch of other documentaries that typically, I think, do a much better job of moving the needle than books do.
[33:12] Yeah, that's right because, I mean, you can shape it not just with the words, but if you get the right footage with the right inspiring music, et cetera, it does move. And that Forks Over Knives was huge for us. And then obviously Game Changers. There's been a few others. Yeah. Yeah, but I would love to say that more of my friends are embracing it at the moment, but I feel that there needs to be this new, another wave of, because game changes sort of made sense. Like, you don't need to eat meat. In fact, you're probably getting better quality protein. That's right. But at my gymnasium, I don't see anyone.
[34:01] So in Australia, you know, you
Navigating Veganism on Tour
[34:03] got a couple of blokes down there that are friends of mine that I like. I'm wondering if you know them or have heard of them. You ever heard of Paul DeGelder? I have not. Okay. Well, you should look up Paul DeGelder. He was in the equivalent of the Navy SEALs there, and they were doing some training in the harbor there where the Sydney Opera House is and got one of his legs taken off and half of one of his arms by a bull shark. And he is now the most incredible advocate for sharks and he appears on um.
[34:48] Now that you mention it it sounds really yeah yeah but he's he he is he's a badass he is he is plant-based and uh and he's he's a he's a great human being and then the other is simon hill who's got a podcast called the proof and he does amazing work and has written a bunch of books as well so anyway two two people you should you should look up i'll hit them up next time i'm in town yeah there you go there you go um all right i want to do right now is i want to go through i'm going to ask you this or that and uh i'm looking for kind of a an answer okay, okay or or or neither drugs or alcohol alcohol okay do you do you still imbibe do you drink.
[35:49] Uh a little i'm not a big drinker i don't have the gene where i can drink a bunch and wake up feeling fine like some of my friends so i've always been a bit of a light drinker yeah but i i i do enjoy a good wine yeah i would i would hate to get to that point i don't want to just cut it out completely although i i have dab i have i have thought about cutting it out um yeah i changed no i decided not to yeah i cut it out about seven years ago and um you know i've got three three three kids 10 15 and 17 now so they've never seen me have a drop of alcohol and um i just want to be a great role model for them like that. And I do agree that...
[36:36] It's something that clearly a lot of people abuse. And it's also a societal norm that we accept. We don't accept people smoking meth in a family environment, but we do for some reason accept beer and wine. So, yeah, I'm torn because I feel like I'm teetering on the idea of cutting it out, but I haven't. Did you did uh so being in the music and i'm going to come back to my little either or so because we're taking a tangent now but so did you ever have a period where you as a musician were doing a lot of drugs no good for you and how do you feel that you kind of escaped going down that path uh i was talking to someone recently about this when in high school they used to do the uh they'd get i think it was a police officer or matt would come around they'd do the presentation and they'd and he'd like he'd be jimmy jimmy was 15 years old and jimmy only took ecstasy once and then and he died you know or whoever it was and that fear that it instilled re that really um, that stuck with me because i know and my mum was and still she was always good with that i just don't make sure you don't do drugs because you know you could die straight away so there was there was that fear kind of that stuck with me.
[38:05] And also I don't – I think like the depression of drinking, like if you have a few beers, the blues the next day, and I can't imagine how bad that would be if I was to –.
[38:25] Be a start becoming a regular you know user of some substance um yeah yeah i'm a regular user of substance called exercise same yeah it's a daily thing yeah what what what do you uh what's your preferred you know movement of choice uh so every basically every day i'll walk uh my two labradors to the beach and that's about a six kilometer walk so you know a kilometer to the beach and then a couple of k's along the beach so that's about an hour and then i'll go to the gym, normally in the afternoon for an hour so i kind of get about two hours in a day which i feel pretty lucky to be able to do right so your your golden lab is rosy and your black lab is henry correct what about old floof marcus yeah gorgeous boy he we lost him a couple of years ago he was, nearly 16 he had a good run and he was he was plant-based actually all the dogs are plant-based Wow, that's great. I mean, there might be people out there who will think that that is animal abuse, to not feed your dog's meat, but they're fine. Yeah, yeah.
[39:38] So what's interesting is, you know, we throw these six-day retreats twice a year, and we typically have 70 to 90 people that show up, and we don't allow any alcohol on the campus. No smoking, no Twinkies, no animal products. Right. And it's amazing. We have more fun and we laugh harder and we play harder and we dance harder. And people at the end, they're like, I can't believe that I was able to laugh, dance, sing, have fun without alcohol. I've never tried that before in my life i mean isn't that just crazy yeah yeah i'm not surprised though i don't i don't i um i think a lot of people feel like they need it as their social lubricant.
[40:35] I i i know that i don't need it like i can go out and not drink and have a great night i don't and i don't find that alcohol gives me that buzz that i think i've got some of my friends do i see that in them and i think there's that tendency then to keep going because i do get that but i don't i don't feel that so i guess that's probably partly why yeah i have to become a full-blown alcoholic uh yeah i mean because australians are known for their yeah well i i'm i don't fit that yeah i i i was gonna say i wish i did but no i don't my my dad and mom will get hangovers from one glass of wine like they're lightweights and we're lightweights as well so what would you say is the biggest difference because i've never been to australia or new zealand what's the biggest difference between New Zealanders and Australians.
[41:24] Uh i really like new zealanders um i've known a few i dated a new zealand girl uh years ago and i've had got some friends who are from there there's always been the rivalry right because their accent is extreme they do have a strong accent um at least to australian ears it is and they do this thing called vowel swapping where like it seems like every vowel is in the wrong spot.
[41:49] Like six becomes sucks i don't know how that how that happens but i i i really like new zealanders and i'd say on average percentage wise i've liked more new zealanders than i have australians so i i dare i say that um wow um but i haven't been there so i haven't sort of immersed myself in their culture well and you dated a new zealander did she just was she in australia no that was in los angeles oh los angeles of course yes yes hmm uh all right so let's do our our my my little game with you okay yes yes continue okay here we go here we go about about 12 of these guys mac or pc mac all the way i know i know i know i i saw you singing uh if so on the side of a cliff it was so incredible with that in front of you oh my gosh keith that was like incredible thank you that was during the pandemic yeah that footage that footage was killer thanks yeah elvis or elton john oh that's a tough i'm gonna go elvis because i mean the originator the i mean the first rock star really yeah yeah good oatmeal or avocado toast.
Quickfire This or That
[43:16] Avocado toast because i grew up eating oatmeal every morning.
[43:24] Pancakes or waffles uh waffles because the we didn't grow up with them they were not a big thing here and so yeah probably waffles all right going to the movie theater or staying home and having uh and watching netflix uh i don't do it often but going to the movie theater okay baseball cap or hoodie, baseball cap there you go you're wearing it right now camping or a luxury hotel, luxury hotel i should i should say, that's funny all right new york city or the windy city chicago oh i like them both i do we started our tour in chicago we had a week there i do love chicago but i'm going to say new york because from the moment i first got there in 2012 it blew me away nice um i think i know the answer to this one because we kind of talked about earlier but alcohol or wim hof breathing.
[44:37] Uh no wim hof breathing okay great wonderful tofu or chicken well i mean it's got to be tofu gotta be tofu exactly all right and this is the last one for you my man if so or nobody loves like you nobody loves like you it should be a bigger song than it is if so it was a big song for us but nobody loves should have been a bigger song wow wow so um carrie who's the producer of the podcast and she's listening right now tell me if is there a way that we could insert nobody loves like you into this podcast, because it's also will play on YouTube and actually embed it so everybody can listen to it. I, you know, I need to double, there's a lot of laws with music licensing. I mean, I know we've got the band leader right here. So I think, well, I think you should be okay. You should be okay because we own our own publishing and the.
[45:43] The record deal we have um we are we control those so you should be fine okay okay yeah yeah i always feel like if if the artist gives permission and you have that then i don't want to write a million dollar check to bmi or as you should be fine um i mean of course there's always the risk that there's some automated pull down thing which frustrates the hell out of us but no i think you should be fine well well well and this just so you know air this don't cut all this all right absolutely yes no this is this is all this is all very part of the the interview here um because i want people to see it and to hear it and feel what what i have felt and play that thing 50 times in two days do you know what i i very rarely have liked our music videos we've done it's good it's good but the video for nobody loves if people want to go check that out i really was chuffed with that because um it was i am barely in it which is great i love when i'm not.
[46:53] And secondly uh it just it reminds me of so my my parents got my dad got me into music because and he was a huge is a huge beatles fan along with his his mates uh and so it just reminds you of that era with those those kids dancing from the 50s yeah well in the voice in the beginning of that video too it sounds like david letterman so that is david letterman so when we so we did letterman in 2000 and i want to say 13 and he retired shortly after i think he retired that year and then didn't you do jimmy falcon fallon as well we we did the whole set we did fallon um kimmel twice uh cordon conan twice yeah we even we even did uh arsenio hall because he came back for one season he did we did that and we did uh and jay leno jay leno i will say yeah He was the nicest guy. Yeah. They all were nice, but he was above and beyond nice. Wow. And the day we played, right, we found out that morning before we got to the studio that they'd just announced that he was going to be let go, that they were ending. And we're like, oh, God, what's the vibe going to be like? Because, you know, the dude's just had his show cancelled.
[48:08] And he was great. Wow. Wow. He didn't faze him. It probably believed. On every one of those shows, did you play Trojans? It was like, was that the hit at the time? No, we did Trojans on the first few. And then we'd move on to the next singles, if so. So I think on Letterman, we did if so. On Kimmel, I think. Fallon, I think we did, if so. And then we did the songs from the next record a few times. So we did probably four or five tracks. So you mentioned Coca-Cola approached you about doing a little jingle for something that they had. Have you been fortunate enough, I would imagine, to have any of your songs be in commercials or in movies or things like that? We have. We've had songs in, like, there was actually a Chipotle commercial a couple of years ago. Yeah, things here and there.
[49:10] I remember, though, we got approached early on to do this big campaign for Uggs because we're Australian and they're Australian. And they're like, oh, this makes sense, you know, two Aussie brands.
Closing Remarks and Care Packages
[49:22] Yeah. We're like, yeah, but that's like, that's sheepskin. or you know that's what now we're not doing that so we we turned down a check for that one because i just i don't and also i wasn't a fan of bugs yeah yeah well you know what i i appreciate your ethics you know that's good yeah i i just uh it just didn't feel right yeah um well hey you know keith jeffrey this has been an absolute pleasure meeting you getting to understand a little bit more about atlas genius um great for me because i mean like i said without being too gushing we were huge fans of of you and your dad with the with the documentary and we used to go to whole foods all the time and get the um the engine to like the crackers and cereal yeah yeah yeah yeah well we got a whole bunch of new stuff now and you know if you weren't in australia are you in australia right now you are to say if you weren't there i'd send you a lovely care package but the shipping would be exorbitant yeah but the next time you come to the states in all seriousness please let me know oh i'd love to i mean yeah yeah we we try to always get to texas because it's a good market for us we love the crowd there so i'll let you know but it doesn't have to even be texas just the next time you come to the states for a period of time let me know and i'll send you you and your brothers a care package that'd be great thanks right because.
[50:49] You know it because you are a PLANTSTRONG brother.
[50:54] Will you give me a virtual fist bump on the way out? Kerry, get in there. All right. Hey, Keith, have a great day. All right. You too. Thanks very much for this. Absolutely. Our next guests are a young rock and roll band from Adelaide, Australia. Please welcome to the program Atlas Genius.
[51:20] Music.
