Josh Groban: A Beard Is Contour for Men

24:35Rob Lowe:And everybody's watching. And everybody knows. Everybody's watching. Chanting. Can you mention being the Met? As we speak, the Mets have lost 11 straight. I know that's going to be, look, I'm not, you know, I'm Dodgers true and true, but I will be interested to see how the Mets, you know, how the team responds to this. And Soda comes back and they're able to, they're able to get through it. I mean, I, I'm fascinated by it. I love to learn about the game that way. I will never turn down a ticket to a game anywhere. Just, I love being in a ballpark. But, but it's, it's chaos out there. I mean, they call it the show for a reason.

25:15It's, you know, I did the anthem. You were there, I think, the last two opening days. And, you know, you can be calm about singing it in your shower and singing it. But all of a sudden, when you're down there and you're at home plate, a song that should be very simple becomes very complicated in your head because there is so much chaos around you. And I can't even imagine having to play the game in that chaos. It's an amazing thing to see. I mean, that's a zone that I think anybody can learn from.

25:47Rob Lowe:Yeah, you were so great. It was such a zoo. I think I barely was able to say hi. I know. It's such a freak show. You've got Sandy Koufax over here. You've got Magic Johnson. You've got Billie Jean King. You've got Jason Bateman. You've got Ice Cube. Me, you. It's really, really, it's not opening day in Toronto. So, yep, you know, it's like LA throws it down. Yes. Is it always as echoey when you're singing in a stadium as it is there? I always have your monitors in. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that's all you're hearing is yourself. I wind up, yeah, it would be masochistic as a singer to decide to go out there just au naturel because, you know, you have to, if I weren't to have them, I'd have to really focus on the sound in front of me and not the sound coming back at me two seconds later.

26:41and that's, you know, as a singer, you're so interested in like, you know, you monitor yourself. Am I on pitch? Am I, is it right? Am I sounding good? And so you're naturally inclined to listen a little bit to bounce back or, and if you don't have it, it really is like two seconds. It's very, very. It's insane. Insane, yeah. So yeah, I've got to mix.

27:04Rob Lowe:How come we only notice it? I mean, is it the same in everywhere? If you're like playing the Hollywood Bowl, do you have, is that a thing? that it always is two seconds? No, I think it's just, the stadium is so huge. And I think because the speakers are positioned in a certain place that really travel and then they hit the audience and then they bounce back. There's a lot of reverberation out there. Just naturally, the way stadiums are built, they're not meant for music. They're meant for the insanity in the game. And that's what makes the game sound so great. That echo, that crack of the bat, the way the announcer sounds when he met.

27:43I mean, that's all part of, that's the sound of the game. But if you have to do a concert in a place, I've never done a concert in a stadium, but if you're playing in an arena or someplace, the Hollywood Bowl, you gotta have a great engineer to kind of balance that out and make sure that it sounds good for the audience. For me with the ears, it's a revelation for me because no matter where I'm playing, I get a really crystal clear, fairly echo-free mix in my ears. And I can also talk, Like every moment until I was going out to home plate to sing, I was just chatting with Dieter, who was accompanying me on the organ.

28:16And we were just talking about the day. And I was kind of like, hey, can you give me that F again? Like, hey, can you just, you know, like literally right until he announced me, like, hey, give me that opening note again, would you mind? You know, how are you doing up there? What's the weather? Like, so, you know, you're in your own little world. And it kind of keeps you a bit sane that you're in that little bubble of sound when you have to go out there and everything else out there is chaos. But then you turn to your left and see Shohei and it's just, they don't sell over.

28:40Rob Lowe:it's it's it's a um okay what are the what are the do's and don'ts of the anthem do's and don'ts of the anthem uh don't fuck it up would be number one don't fuck it up is a big one it's it's it's a hard it's a hard task because oh yeah that's why i'm asking it's not because generally you know performers we all want to stand out but when you're doing the anthem you got two options you're either going to do it well and everybody's just ready for the game right they say okay great job anyway time for the game or you make the most minor of mistakes and you live in infamy so you know there is no such thing as just unless you're whitney of just it's just a glorious thing that they will everybody will remember for the end of time you have a very specific job to do is to honor our country to do the best job you can and then it's time for the thing everybody's there for.

29:31And so I think that for me, I chose to do it simply. I chose to do it with the organ. I chose to just do it that way because I found that for things that just are so very much not about me, I try not to overcomplicate it. I want to do the best I can. I want to sing the crap out of it and hopefully make that moment pleasing and what it's supposed to be. Oh, the one thing I do have to think about though out there is timing it to the jets. This is something that audiences sometimes don't know is happening.

30:02Rob Lowe:Yes. By the way, this is why we do this show, guys. People are always like, well, why do you have a podcast? This is why. Where else are you going to get? How do you time your national anthem to the Jets? How do we do it? So there's two things that happens. There's a flyover. It's very important. So that morning, I go up to the organ where Dieter Ruhl, who's one of the great organists in all of sports, and he's a total Dodgers and sports legend. He does the Kings as well. So we'll go up there. We'll pick a key. He'll play along. We'll do it once together to find our rhythm. And then they bring in somebody from the Air Force.

30:36He's all, he's in his full uniform, everything. He's got a notepad. Very intimidating. Nice to meet you, sir. Thank you for your service. Comes over and he goes, all right, ready. You know, and Dieter again. And all of a sudden, like my heart's racing because I'm doing it for -

30:51Rob Lowe:My heart's racing now. My heart's racing now. Now I'm doing it for, you know, one of our incredible servicemen. And so, but he's timing out, he's writing down timing markers for specific words in the song. Oh, say, can you see? Okay, that was 15 seconds to see. Okay, the dawn's early light. Okay, 28 seconds to light. And he's timing certain markers to relay to the people that are flying at a thousand miles an hour or whatever it is. And, you know, it's, it's, and so that's his job to kind of get a rough sense of what my timing of the song is to give to them. Then my job is watch while you're singing, watch the skies.

31:38And when you get to free of the free, where are they? Are they on the horizon? You know, am I going to do a long free or am I going to do a short free? because you want that and the home of the to be when they come over. So I know that once I get to that point in the song, I'm watching for airplanes.

31:59Rob Lowe:And you're watching free is the airplane. Free is the moment for me. I know they're doing their communication. Hopefully you've hit it the way we did it at rehearsal. Right. Yeah. But as the guy on the field for that, for them to basically say, you know, we think we have the timing, right? But when you're down there, just hold it out until they come over the stadium. And, you know, because you want, you want to hold it out and you want that home of the brave to be that roar of the joke. That's the money. Money. It's my favorite thing ever. It's my favorite. And I've, I, cause I've been lucky enough to be at so many opening days.

32:32Rob Lowe:Of course. And somebody, I have, I record everyone on my phone and I, and I have, I have it down to a science and it's, and you're right. It's, it's on you singing. Maybe, maybe a stadium pan, maybe. Maybe. But up to the sky on free. And then you've got to stick the pan where they fly right over and hold on the Dodger logo at the top of the stadium. That's totally, yep. And they fly over it. It's so fun. It's so fun. And if you're the one singing it, there's no greater feeling of relief and excitement than when you're finally at the end. You've done it. It's gone all right. And then you get to like, Then you get to just celebrate being at home plate while jets are over, you fireworks are going, and you got Shohei and Mookie standing to your left.

33:20You take that five-second moment of relief while you're still on the field and all that's going on. And those are the best moments of my life. Those are when I get to combine my fandom for the team and for the stadium I've been going to since I was five. And the job I get to do for a living. There's nothing like it.

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36:27Rob Lowe:do you have a record do the digers have a what's your win-loss record when you sing the anthem do you have one I have no losses so far so amazing no I've I've I've I've only done it twice now twice I've done the two opening games and we we won both games and we won the World Series both seasons. So, you know, I've got a two-for-two win and I've got a two-for-two championship singing opening day. I was in Dublin this year for opening day on my tour. So I wasn't able to make it for this opening day, but I've told the superstition gods that as long as I sing at some point during the season, I will be okay.

37:10Not to put it all on me, but... No, that's a real thing.

37:14Rob Lowe:It's important. It is important. Yeah. The Lakers in the Showtime era had Jeffrey Osborne. Oh, Jeffrey Osborne's a legend. Of course, he's their guy. Absolutely. I mean, if Jeffrey Osborne came out, we were winning. And of course, what's the famous one for the Philadelphia Flyers? Is there somebody for that too? Well, and Paisley, our friend Brad Paisley. Yes. Who's got this, I mean, this stuff, by the way, the universe doesn't mess around. Kate Smith, thank you. Yeah, thank you. Yes. Yeah, for them. Yeah, there is a mysticism to baseball that always permeates around all the stuff that's happening on Earth.

37:57There is superstition, there is lore. And these things, that's why when people say you can't not love baseball, because there's a romanticism to the stories that develop. I mean, everything from like the two Max Muncie's that are playing at the moment, that we're both, I think, have the same birthday and we're both signed to the A's different years. I mean, like, very strange shit. Paisley singing the anthem and every time he sings, they go way extra innings. Yes. Is a crazy thing. And that's not just happened once or twice. That's happened like four times. So, you know, it's a... It's real.

38:35Rob Lowe:We bow to the baseball gods and hope they're kind. I think the players, when they see Paisley, they're like, oh my God, I am not going, I'm not meeting anybody for dinner tonight. I went to the game. Just as a fan, I went to the game after the one he sang. I forgot which game of the series it was. And it was the game after. And we just, I turned to my friends and we were just like, this is going to be a tired game. This is the post-Paisley game. Post-Paisley game. Yeah, yeah. PPG. Post-Paisley game. Tell me about the new album, Cinematic. Coming out May 8th. New album, look out. Yeah, it's been such a joy to record this album.

39:12I was in a real interpretive headspace after doing Broadway. And I realized that my connection to film music and film songs actually ran all the way back to my first days with David Foster and singing songs for films or reinterpreting, finding lyrics for melodies that we loved from films. We always recorded things from film music because those songs are so emotional and so dramatic. And my voice felt like it had that gravitas. And so it was a natural fit. I just had never done an album fully honoring that genre of music and fully honoring those songs. So I got with my friend Greg Wells, who is just a brilliant producer, who's got classical chops and just finished doing the Wicked, all the music for the Wicked movie.

39:53So he was in that world. And I said, I've got this idea. There's some songs I think I might want to sing. I may want to do a film music album. And he went, this is an album I've wanted to make forever. And he gave his favorites. I gave my favorites. And we talked about arrangers. And, you know, you can pull your hair out about what to do next for a very long time. This is probably the same with acting. Yeah, it is. When a chapter closes of something that was very special to you, there's a time period of, what the fuck now? You know, like, how do I keep growing? How do I stay scared? How do I, you know, trying to make things right on paper that maybe aren't right in your soul?

40:28So when an idea starts to happen very quickly and organically, like that wave starts to develop where people go, yes, and. over and over and over again, you got to write it. And all the yes ands for me were about this project. And I got asked by Francis Ford Coppola to sing the Godfather theme for his AFI tribute. That was the first nucleus of singing that theme made me say, oh, maybe there's more of this I should be doing. I did a residency in Vegas at the Coliseum and Adele had just been there. So we wanted to do a tip of our hat to honor her. And so I ended the night with Skyfall, her song from James Bond.

41:06Again, I didn't know I was doing this album. And just went, oh, that felt really good. So we had two. And then we just started getting arrangements that just felt so incredible. We went to London with a full symphony and recorded these in the room. And they're some of my favorite songs that I've ever recorded. I can't wait to sing them forever and I hope people enjoy it.

41:25Rob Lowe:What is, what's your favorite Bond song? Skyfall, by the way, I think it's up there. I think it's up there. I think it's... Skyfall? Yeah, I think it's one of the top ones. I mean, we had our pick of the litter, and that's the one we chose. I mean, I think that that's really damn near up at the very top. I know. I agree. I love Diamonds Are Forever. That is a... The snare drum that was used for Diamonds Are Forever was used on Skyfall. That's the old snare that we got from that. But Goldfinger is incredible. Yeah, there's so many incredible ones. Some of the new ones have been great. Skyfall's great.

42:10Rob Lowe:Yeah, I mean, it's so funny when you go, wait, Carol Bayer Sager wrote a James Bond theme? You're like, yeah. I know. There's nothing she can't do, I'll tell you. Nothing, right? My favorite song on the album, though, is I got to do a duet with my 80-year-old dad playing trumpet. That was the highlight for me. We had Moon River. Oh, Moon River's great. He hadn't played in 50 years. And I said to my mom, do you think he could warm up and play? We had a spot in the song for a trumpet solo. And I said, if he really works on the lip and works every day, do you think he could pull this off? And he rehearsed and rehearsed.

42:44And we got Sunset Sound, which was Louis Armstrong's favorite studio here in Los Angeles. I'm sure you've been. We got Louis' stool that he used to sit on. And I said, Dad, here's the room and here's the mic. And boy, he played so beautifully. So that's probably not only my favorite collaboration on the album, but favorite probably collaboration, one of one forever.

43:05Rob Lowe:Oh, that is a... And to have it. It wasn't just like a live thing. Exactly. It's there, it's recorded, it's forever. Exactly. No, it was very, very special. Moon River is great. I wasn't quite expecting with this album. I knew I was going to do a bunch of songs people knew, and I was going to try and sing them to the best of my ability with great arrangements. But it was surprising to me just how personal the album became. And so it's been fun. I love that. It's got me thinking about... I love making lists of like, like I was thinking of last night as I was going to bed, like, you know, everybody does it, but like greatest bands ever.

43:42Rob Lowe:And then like two or three or anybody, everybody knows. And then, but then after that, it gets tricky. And it's like, well, is it about sales? Is it about catalog? Is it about how great they were live? Because, you know, you didn't want to go, you know what I mean? Is it so. And then it becomes very personal, you know, it becomes, It goes from being objective to subjective and listing out songs you may want to sing in a category of music that everybody has a different favorite can be actually really paralyzing. You know, it's actually it's super hard to get a project like this going because there are so many opinions and there are so many eras and the choice is unlimited.

44:20And we were talking about the structure of Broadway. Having an unlimited choice of songs sometimes can be enough to make you say, maybe not. Maybe not. There's too many. I don't want to piss too many people off. I don't want to pick the wrong music. But the right stories start to come to the top. You get a long list, then you get a short list. And then the way you feel when you sing it becomes the shortest list. And at the end of the day, you can't fake how it feels coming out of your mouth. There are songs that on paper were such a sure thing. And then interpretively, it was karaoke and not from the heart.

44:59You know, and so you realize sometimes just because you can sing something really great doesn't mean there's, you know, an honesty there or a why. There isn't a reason for it. And I think audiences sometimes even if they don't know, you know, on paper the difference, they can feel the difference of if there wasn't a good reason for the why or not.

45:20Rob Lowe:Well, that's my, not to be the old man yelling at the clouds, but that's my issue with like hits today. Like I don't feel any connection and it's not because I'm my age and I grew up with this, that, and the other. It might be, Rob. I'll tell you. Is it? I feel the same way and I'm yelling at the clouds too. And I'm saying, it's not my age, damn it. It's just the way. And then I see the audience at Coachella and I watched that stream and I go, they are in it. They are so connected and they are going to carry this moment in front of Sabrina or Bieber, whoever's out there. They're going to carry that into their 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s.

46:09And that's going to be, and whatever comes out then, they're going to go, yeah, but back when, back when I was there at Bieber and he brought Eilish up on stage. That was my child. I think that there's a certain part that is absolutely correct. The technology and the ease with which we can fool people has made songs, I think, less heartfelt, a little more cynical or a lot more cynical. The formula has gotten more formulaic because we can. Back in the day, I listened to old Motown. To me, if I want to recharge my soul, I'll listen to Otis Redding and I'll listen to all that stuff. And I'll listen to when they had to just go into one room and they had, if somebody messed up the take, they had to do the whole thing over.

46:56And it wasn't perfect, but it was great. And you could hear the nuance in it. And now everything is programmed within an inch of its life. And so I agree that to me, it's not the same. But then also, I didn't grow up with a phone in my hand. There's a whole group of people that don't know anything different than what they were raised with and what they had. And that's every generation. And so I'm with you. By the way, I'm not disagreeing. I'm totally with you. I think it's all, it's not the same. It's not the same. But, you know, I watch the tears in the eyes of those hundred thousand kids and I go, okay, well, to them it is, you know.

47:35Rob Lowe:Which raises the question, how much of it is actually the music and how much of it is the experience? Well, live performance, I think, is one of the things I love about seeing, even if I'm not a huge fan of the artist, but when I see people of all ages congregating in one place and feeling that connectivity, and when I feel it, when I'm on stage and I look out at thousands of people congregating in one place, you know, I'm reminded, and especially, I mean, this is a period of time where I think that it is the most potent and the most important. Because we're coming out of a pandemic where we were all forced to just be isolated for a long time.

48:18And we've gone through kind of one microtrauma after another. We had a pandemic into a nation more divided than it has ever been in my lifetime or my parents' lifetime. into global conflict constantly. The doom scroll of seeing things no human being should have to endure seeing day after day after day. We're exhausted. Our souls are completely depleted. And you can AI hit song. You can Photoshop a picture. You can't duplicate the feeling of sharing art with other people. And literally and figuratively all singing the same song together at a time when everything is yelling at us to be as far apart as possible.

49:07Is the medicine, is the medicine, whether it's Coachella or whether it's Disney Hall, it couldn't be more important than right now. And so, you know, I agree. That sharing reminds us of our humanity when we need it the most.

49:23Rob Lowe:Josh, that's a mic drop. One of the things I've learned about mic drops is it can't be a mic drop if you keep picking the microphone back up. So there you go. You dropped the mic and I'm not picking it up. Yes. There you go. It's an eardrop. Eardrop. Eardrop. The new album's out May 8th, Cinematic. I will be seeing you at the next Dodger Homestand. Yes, sir. For sure. And we're going to do, we should attach our Take Me Out to the Ballgame to this. I was going to say, one thing we didn't mention on the pod is that we actually have a great, we have a great take me out of the ball game that went fairly viral.

50:02And it was so fun to sing that with you.

50:03Rob Lowe:I think that was kind of fun. I was surprised that we, I mean, I was not surprised that you were great, but like I had kind of - You sounded great, Rob. You sounded really good. Did I hold my own with you? I think I did. You held your own. You've got a beautiful vibrato. You've got the voice of an angel and you actually also kind of picked a harmony. Like that's musicality that you can't teach. Like you really nailed it, I gotta say. It was so fun. We need to, let's recreate it. Oh, I'll leave you with this. Here I am. I'm breaking my own rule. I'm picking the mic back up. So for some reason, Dieter didn't do this, Dieter Rule, at the first 18-inning game I went to, the one that ended in the home run.

50:42Rob Lowe:I guess that was against the Boston Red Sox. So the next one, we did take me out to the ball game in the 14th inning. So it's seven innings and 70. We sang it twice. I've never heard of it before. Me neither. I've never, I didn't know it was a thing. They feel like they need a second stretch. I mean, I don't blame them. But isn't that sick? That's awesome. I love that. I love that tradition. Because it's not going to happen a lot. No. No. They were like, please rise. In honor of, for a second, take me out to the level we did it again. It was insane. Lord knows by the 14th inning, our blood sugar desperately needs more peanuts and Cracker Jacks.

51:23So, you know, we, I think it's important that we have that. So Dieter, if you're listening, let's keep that going. All right. See you at the stadium, brother. Rob, it's been a pleasure. Really honored to talk to you. Thank you so much for having me on. Thanks, man.

51:41Rob Lowe:Josh Groban. He said I had a nice vibrato. Okay, that made my day. All right. That's all we got today. We'll be back next week right here on Literally. As always, I appreciate you taking time out of your day wherever you are to listen, and let's keep it up.

52:20Rob Lowe:and Jeff Ross for Team Coco. Booking by Catherine Cook. Music by Devin Bryant. Special thanks to Hidden City Studios. Thanks for listening. We'll see you next time on Literally.

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