← Takin' A Walk - Music History with Buzz Knight
Takin' A Walk - Music History with Buzz Knight
Classic Replay with Actor and Musician Jeff Daniels
00:30:52
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- [00:00]
Podcast Sponsor/Announcer
This is an iHeart podcast. This episode of Taking a Walk is brought to you by Chase Sapphire Reserve. Whether I'm booking my next vacation or going to a concert, Chase Sapphire Reserve is my gateway to the world's most captivating destinations. When I use my Chase Sapphire Reserve card, I get eight times points on all the purchases I make through Chase Travel and even access to one of a kind experiences like music festivals and and sports events. And that's not even mentioning how the card gets me into the Sapphire Lounge by the club at select airports nationwide. No matter where I'm walking, travel is more rewarding with Chase Sapphire Reserve. Discover more@chase.com Sapphire Reserve cards issued by JP Morgan Chase Bank NA member FDIC subject to credit approval terms apply. Every music lover has that moment you hear or read something that stops you in your tracks. A forgotten B side, an offhand comment in an interview. A connection. Nobody else noticed that. Curiosity. That's where Claude comes in. Claude is AI for people who don't stop at the surface. It helps you explore the real stories behind the music, not with quick answers, but by working through the discovery with you, matching your level of curiosity. Try Claude for free at Claude AI Buzz Lexus believes in the importance of standards One of my standards I never want to be late. I always want to show up on time. For Lexus, the standard is simple experience. Amazing. Their benchmarks aren't stats or specs, they're feelings. Exhilaration. Joy. That sense your car was designed just for you. Machines built to make you feel more human. Because a car that doesn't make you feel something is a car that stops short of amazing experience. Amazing at your Lexus dealer. This episode is brought to you by 20th Century Studios New film Springsteen Deliver Me From Nowhere don't miss the movie. Critics are raving as the real deal. An intelligent, deliberate paced journey into the soul of an artist. Scott Cooper, director of the Academy Award winning movie Crazy Hard, brings you the story of the most pivotal chapter in the life of an icon. Springsteen Deliver Me From Nowhere Only in theaters October 24th. Get your tickets now.
- [02:33]
Josh Clark
Hi there, this is Josh Clark from the Stuff youf Should Know podcast. If you've been thinking, man alive, I could go for some good true crime podcast episodes, then have we got good news for you. Stuff youf Should Know just released a playlist of 12 of our best true crime episodes of all time. There's a shootout in broad daylight, people using axes in really terrible ways. Disappearances, legendary heists, the whole nine yards. So check out the stuff youf should know true crime Playlist on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
- [03:03]
Buzz Knight
Taking a Walk.
- [03:04]
Jeff Daniels
It's cumulative. You know, an artist gets better with each project, with each year, with each decade. That's how it's supposed to work if you're learning from the people you're around. And I've been fortunate to be around some great people over the decades.
- [03:20]
Buzz Knight
Welcome to the Taking a Walk podcast, where Buzz Knight talks with musicians and insiders about their love of music. And from time to time, he's lucky enough to speak with great actors that are also great musicians. And today, that person is Jeff Daniels. Jeff's musical journey is impressive. He's a skilled guitarist and songwriter. He has released multiple albums that showcase his authentic Americana sound and his storytelling prowess. Let's join Buzz Knight with his guest, the legendary Jeff Daniels, now on Taking a Walk podcast.
- [03:58]
Interviewer (Buzz Knight)
Jeff Daniels, welcome to the Taking a Walk podcast. It's so nice to have you on.
- [04:03]
Jeff Daniels
Nice to be here, Buzz.
- [04:05]
Interviewer (Buzz Knight)
So since this is called Taking a Walk, I do want to ask you if you could take a walk with somebody, living or dead, who might that be? And where would you take a walk with him?
- [04:19]
Jeff Daniels
That's good. You know what? Robert Johnson and I know he wasn't the only one. Charlie Patton and Son House and Skip James, but Robert Johnson and I would love to just listen to him talk about the blues, where he got it, you know, the famous story of the crossroads, which sounds more like, you know, marketing. You know, let's make up a story about yourself that. That you made a deal with the devil and you came back. All of a sudden you're playing differently. Just to get inside his head would be great. And I, you know, I'd walk down Highway 61 with him and just listen.
- [05:07]
Interviewer (Buzz Knight)
Oh, that'd be awesome. Oh, my God. Well, folks could hear you play at 54 below in New York City on April 7th. And that sounds like it's going to be a pretty amazing place to be. Can you talk about the first moment that you remember you were deeply connected with music?
- [05:34]
Jeff Daniels
Well, it's. There were a couple things early on. I mean, I. I was in. I grew up in a small town in the Midwest, Chelsea. I still live there. And, you know, just public high school. And they do high school musicals. And so I was around it. I was in choir. I was one of the boys who could actually carry a tune which qualified you in that town. And same thing with the musical. But it wasn't until I got. I think I One of the early ones was when Arlo Guthrie's Alice's Restaurant album came out. And that song, Alice's Restaurant, which was so different from, you know, in the 60s, even before Woodstock, it was, you know, the Turtles. For me, it was the Turtles. A strawberry alarm clock, Dave Clark 5. Oh, the monkeys. Oh, the Monkeys. You know, it was. And then all of a sudden, it was Led Zeppelin and the who, Elton Johns. 11, 17, 70. And that was the rock side. Grand Funk Railroad, Jake Giles BAND but then I heard Alice's Restaurant, and it was just Arlo with that guitar that just stayed with me. And he was. The first concert I saw. I. I couldn't drive, so my parents had to drive me to the Masonic Temple in Detroit. And the marijuana smoke before Arlo even came out was like, you know, the fog of London. It was just everywhere. And for my parents to sit there and basically try not to breathe, because if they did, you know, they might get stoned. But I got to see Arlo, and that mattered. That stayed with me because when I moved to New York in 76, I bought an acoustic guitar and threw it in the back of the car and just took it with me. I knew three chords. That was it. But I just. Whatever it was he was doing, it was similar to seeing Dog Day Afternoon with Al Pacino. I saw it six times. I was in college. And I remember thinking, whatever it is Pacino's doing, I need to go and learn how to do that. And that meant New York. It's the same thing with Arlo. Whatever he's doing underneath Alice's Restaurant, I gotta figure out how to do that. And that led me to finger picking. That led me to, back in the late 70s, early 80s, the tablature books of people like Stefan Grossman and Doc Watson and James Taylor, you know. And then I discovered Robert Johnson and the blues. And that was. That was a turning point.
- [08:25]
Podcast Sponsor/Announcer
And you, when you were in New.
- [08:26]
Interviewer (Buzz Knight)
York City, got to see a bunch of shows at the Bottom Line. Doc Watson was. Was one of them. That really made an impact on you. Who were some of the others that you saw either at the Bottom Line or some of those other great clubs in the Village?
- [08:43]
Jeff Daniels
Well, I was. I was aimed at the acoustic guitar, so I. You know, I missed the whole Talking Heads thing, and I. I just wasn't. I wasn't into the jazz scene at all. It was the acoustic guitar and, you know, I saw Doc Watson at the Bottom Line with T. Michael Coleman on bass and Merle Watson, his son. He was so fast. Doc and Merle were so fast with the flat picking. And then he's blind, Doc Watson is blind. And you're just going, good God. And then I saw Stevie Goodman and that was a huge thing because there was no band. And Stevie Goodman was 5 foot 5 inches tall. Maybe he's 5, 6. Just this little guy. The big dreadnought guitar he had seemed bigger than he was, but God, could he hold an audience. And with his humor, you know, he was one of the guys that, that quietly gave me permission to be funny. You didn't have to try to be James Taylor or something. You know, I need to be serious and important. I need to move to Nashville and write important. Move. No, you can also be funny. Stevie Goodman taught me that. Arlo taught me that, Christine Lavin taught me that. Cheryl Wheeler. I wasn't into Loud and Wright and Wainwright, but, you know, he's certainly qualifies. John Prine, you know those guys that use their sense of humor in their writing to kind of pull the audience in. Yeah, those guys were a huge influence and I was able to see a few of them when they came through New York.
- [10:27]
Interviewer (Buzz Knight)
I love the song Road Signs. It is so beautiful. It is so colorful. Can you tell that story when you first perform that and were sort of urged on?
- [10:42]
Jeff Daniels
Yeah, again, I'm an actor, so I'm an actor who has a guitar in his apartment and that's where it needs to stay. You are told early on to stay in your lane. You want to be a musician, you want to be a singer, songwriter, then drop the acting and go do that. But there are plenty of us out there trying to do what you doing as a little hobby. So there was always kind of a, you know, stay in your lane thing. And, you know, I used to open my show with if William Shatner can, I can too, you know, just to kind of cut the critics off ahead of time. But I, I just did it for me. I, I, I, I, I would go to see people like Stevie Goodman and Doc Watson, Arlo, Stefan Grossman, Cab Mo Kelly, Joe Phelps. And I'll never be as good as them. Does that mean you quit? You know, John Prine wasn't that fancy on the guitar, but he could, he wrote imagery and so I would just sit in my apartment and try to do that. In the late 70s, I was doing a play called 5th of July off Broadway and Lanford Wilson was the playwright and Lanford was a mentor. I had never been around real play, living, breathing playwrights until I went to Circle Rap and they Every single one of them was rewriting a second act. It was thrilling. And Lanford would go on to win a Pulitzer Prize for playwriting play called Tally's Folly. And in 1978, I'm sitting there between shows if it's July, playing, you know, a song I wrote with bad lyrics because I'm, you know, 23 and I don't know anything. And I look up and he's in the doorway leaning against the door frame, and he goes, you write songs? I said, yeah. He goes, let me help. And he hands me a piece of paper. And on the, on the paper was a poem called Road Signs about a bus trip he had taken as a young man from Lebanon, Missouri, up to Chicago to become a graphic artist, which didn't work out. So he took another bus to New York and became a Pulitzer Prize winning playwright. But I think he had a collection of poems. And hearing my bad lyrics, he went back to his apartment and went through some and pulled this one out and handed it to me and said, see if you can do something with this. And it's more of a poem than a song. I repeat the chorus a couple times, but it's, it's unusual. But in it is the imagery that only Lanford Wilson could write. And that's what separates him as a playwright. It's what separates John Prine. They're just definitive. The only Prine would write hello in there that way. Lyle Lovett's another one. You know, Lyle's. I mean, his take on the world and his. Just the, just the, the rhymes, but also the construction, the structure of the songs, the how he says what he says. That's what Lanford had on that page called Road Signs. And so I, I threw some chords on it. And I'm kind of. Because I never think of myself being very good back in the late 70s, but I pretty much play it now the same way I played it for lanford back in 1978. He goes, yeah, that's pretty good. I like that. Well, nothing happens, man. 20 years goes by and now I got a theater company in Chelsea, Michigan, called the Purple Rose Theater Company. And we bring Lanford out to write a play, a new play for our company of actors. We'd been open about eight or nine years. We had developed a good group of people and I thought he could look at them and go, yeah, I can write for them, just like I used to write for Circle Rep. So we brought him out and after seeing a performance of a play so he could see the actors, we went out to a bar, and there was a guy in the corner playing covers. And nobody knew I played. I played on my back porch, staying in my lane, you know. And Lanford, the guy put his guitar down to take a break. And Lanford said, go play Road signs. I said, no, they're. No. Nobody knows I play. Lanford. I'm not. Get up there. And he's one of the few people that would fort can I. I. You know, I have to do it. So I got up and played, and people are going, are you kidding me? And I'm going, well, and that became, why don't we put you out between Christmas and New Year's and sell tickets and raise some money? But now I had to learn how to do that. And that's when I. I learned how difficult it is to do what Arlo does. And Stevie Goodman did. Kev Moe sitting there with just his guitar. Christine Lava and holding an audience for 90 minutes with her wit and musicianship. There ain't nobody to save you. You know, you don't look to the guitar player and say, take it. It's just you. So I had to. I had to get good real fast, and I've worked real hard on that end of it. So that, you know, after about three years of doing those holiday shows, I was able to kind of go out. And I had an agent named Jim Fleming, still do, who came and said, you know, you could do this if you wanted to. I said, well, my acting career at that time, like 2003, 2004, was slowing down. Maybe this is what I'm going to do. And so I started touring. I would go play clubs all over the country, opera houses, sometimes thousand seaters. But I love the clubs. I love the 200 seaters, the places like 54 below in New York, where they're just right there. I kind of love that. You know, I'm fortunate. I don't have to make my living, have something that's entertaining and can hold an audience using some of my skills as an actor on a stage who knows how to work an audience, skills as a playwright that I've become. Or I learned about how to structure a set so that it builds to something. I've learned how to do that and have spent the time and have played. I think I'm over 600 gigs now, which is pretty good for a guy with a day job. So I enjoy it, and I have 100% creative control. And I've got to show that not only entertains people, but pulls them in.
- [17:18]
Interviewer (Buzz Knight)
So. Al Kaline is such a beautiful tribute to someone. Obviously, that was a big part of your life. When I listened to that song, I was only on the porch in the stadium in Detroit one time to see a game, but it made me feel like I was watching him play as I was there on that porch at Tiger Stadium. Talk about the creation of that beautiful song and what Mr. Kaline meant to you.
- [17:56]
Jeff Daniels
Well, he was a baseball player for the Detroit Tigers in the. Mainly the 60s, and he was part of the World series champions in 1968. And I was nine years old in 1964 when I kind of discovered the Tigers. And he was my hero. He was my childhood hero. And it was all things Al Kaline. Friends of mine had Norm Cash, Willie Horton, Bill Freehand. But I had Kine. And you want to be him. You know, you're playing sandlot baseball, you want to be Kine. He passed away a month into Covid. Not from COVID but he was. He was in his 80s, and he passed away. And it hit me because that's, you know, it's when your childhood hero dies, you know, a little bit of you does, too. And so I just wrote the song for me, and I sent it to a friend of mine who also plays a guy named Devin Scillian, who. Who used to be one of the anchors at the local, you know, NBC affiliate. I said, look, here's the. I know Kine died. You know him better. Knew him better than I did. You know, if you like it, you know, play it, put it in your set. But I think you could kill this song. And blah, blah, blah. It was just give him the song. And he came back and he said, you know, I. We're going to put together a visual tribute on Sunday morning for Kine, and can we put this song underneath it? I said, sure. And it was, you know, was four minutes long, the video tribute and the song. And there were grown men crying all over the state of Michigan that morning. And then a few days later, Devin texts me, and he says, I got a call from Cooperstown, New York. They heard about the song, and they, you know, it gave me a name of somebody to contact. And basically it was, can we have the handwritten lyrics to your song Alkaline to include in his display in Cooperstown, proving once and for all there's more than one way to get into the Baseball hall of Fame. Which is the joke at the end of the patter at the intro, and then I go into it. But it's, you know, it's for anybody who's been lucky enough to pick the right person for a childhood hero. Sometimes they don't end up so well, they end up in prison or they disappoint us or they fail us or something. Kaline didn't. And I got to meet him after I started doing movies. I was able to kind of celebrity my way backstage back in the stadium, and suddenly I'm meeting Al Kaline, and he couldn't have been nicer. And, you know, his ability to handle his fame, even after he was done playing with grace and appreciation of how people felt about him, you know, because it's not always easy, especially in the days of, you know, guys jumping. Hey, can I get a selfie? Yeah. It didn't take long. Hey, come on, come on. He's gonna do a self. You know, that guy, he didn't have to deal with that, but. But it's. It's a great lesson. It was. He was a great lesson in how to handle it because it is thrust upon you. When he passed away, he was revered. And that's kind of how you want to end up is like alkaline, the way he handled it. So I picked a good one.
- [21:34]
Interviewer (Buzz Knight)
It's beautiful. And as I was listening to it again before talking to you, I. I couldn't help but think in an era where the true gentleman don't exist as much, he certainly seemed like a real gentleman with high ethics. Actually got to do a little work around my radio Nielsen Arbitron measurement days with his son Mark, who, you may know, who's a pretty influential marketing guy there up in your neck of the woods. And he couldn't have been any nicer as well. So he. He raised. He raised a good son also, you know.
- [22:26]
Jeff Daniels
Yeah, he was. He was a class act. He really was. I mean, we're. Look social media and, you know, the video games, it's all about the celebration, the entertainment factor. You go into the end zone, you got to do a dance. You hit a home run, you've to, you know, do, you know, strike somebody out. But Kaline was just doing his job. This is what I'm supposed to do. They're paying me to do this. And he. He doesn't celebrate himself the way that. That, that players do now. It's, you know, it's a different time. People are. They want different things out of their athletes. I get that. But, you know, Barry Sanders, you know, Kaline was Barry Sanders before Barry Sanders was Barry Sanders. Barry Sanders was a Detroit Lions running back, and he would run into the end zone, turn around and hand the ball to the ref. I think it was Barry who said, act like you've been here before, not like it's the first time you've ever scored a touchdown or knocked down a pass that was intended for a receiver that you were being paid to cover. You know, And Kaline was of that era where they just kind of did their job, and if they did it with excellence, it was even more wonderful, at least for me to see him make that incredible catch that saved the inning, laying over the fence, catching the ball and then running in without the beating of the chest and all that, you know. But you know, you get old. You miss things that aren't here anymore.
- [23:58]
Buzz Knight
So we'll be right back with more of the Taking a Walk podcast.
- [24:04]
Podcast Sponsor/Announcer
This episode of Taking a Walk is brought to you by Chase Sapphire Reserve. Whether I'm booking my next vacation or going to a concert, Chase Sapphire Reserve is my gateway to the world's most captivating destinations. Travel is one of the most precious things in my life, and the memories of each of the experiences live on forever. Chase Sapphire Reserve allows me to travel with ease with a $300 travel credit and access to a curated collection of hotels through the edit. So no matter where I'm walking, travel is more rewarding with Chase Sapphire Reserve. Discover more with Chase Sapphire Reserve@chase.com SapphireReserve cards issued by JP Morgan Chase Bank NA member FDIC subject to credit approval terms apply Every music story has layers most people never discover the session musician who created that signature lick, the studio accident that became a classic sound, the cultural moment that made a song possible. That's when you need Claude AI Built for minds that can't stop at the first answer. Comb through interviews, biographies, recording session notes. Claude analyzes up to 200 pages instantly and can reveal connections across decades of music history. Need to verify claims about music legends? Claude searches the web and cross references sources with citations you can check. But here's what's different. Claude doesn't just give you quick facts. It works through the problem with you, step by step. It's built for people who know that understanding music means understanding the culture, technology, and universal human stories behind the sounds. Whether you're researching your favorite artist, exploring genre evolution, or discovering untold music history, Claude matches your curiosity about what really happened. See why the world's best problem solvers choose Claude as their thinking partner and try for free at Claude AI Buzz Lexus believes in the importance of standards One of my standards I never want to be late. I always want to show up on time. For Lexus, the standard is simple experience. Amazing. Their benchmarks aren't stats or specs. They're feelings. Exhilaration, joy that sens your car was designed just for you. Machines built to make you feel more human. Because a car that doesn't make you feel something is a car that stops short of amazing experience. Amazing at your Lexus dealer. This episode is brought to you by 20th Century Studios New film Springsteen Deliver Me From Nowhere. Don't miss the movie critics are raving is the real deal. An intelligent, deliberate paced journey into the soul of an artist. Scott Cooper, director of the Academy Award winning movie Crazy Heart, brings you the story of the most pivotal chapter in the life of an icon. Springsteen Deliver Me From Nowhere Only in theaters October 24th. Get your tickets now.
- [27:16]
Josh Clark
Hi there, this is Josh Clark from the Stuff you Should Know podcast. If you've been thinking, man alive, I could go for some good true crime podcast episodes, then have we got good news for you. Stuff youf Should Know just released a playlist of 12 of our best true crime episodes of all time. There's a shootout in broad daylight, people using axes in really terrible ways. Disappearances, legendary heists, the whole nine yards. So check out the Stuff youf Should Know True crime Playlist on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
- [27:49]
Buzz Knight
Welcome back to the Taking a Walk podcast.
- [27:52]
Interviewer (Buzz Knight)
I was privileged to get to see you at the amazing performance of To Kill a Mockingbird was just absolutely unbelievable. Can you take our audience back to the moment where you, I guess for the crew members and, and, and your fellow actors came out and did the amazing All Rise?
- [28:21]
Jeff Daniels
Yeah, that, that was a gift to the cast. We had, we had been in it, the original cast had been in it for a year. We had to sign for a year, eight shows a week. And, and there were three of us that didn't miss a show. So we were very proud of ourselves. But we were coming down to the last matinee, the Sunday matinee, and then the, the next cast would take over the following Tuesday. And it's, it's a long haul and, and I didn't know what to do for the cast and so I wrote this song called All Rise, which is something that, that, that Scout says in particular in the play. And, and it really was just a remembrance of the year we had spent together, knowing that in decades to come, that November till November would be inside this song. And I just tried to capture some of the feelings of what it was like for me Anyway, and for others to kind of have done this, you know, there's a line in there and I, I always felt this during the Atticus's closing argument when I would turn to the audience, 1400 of the most sophisticated theater goers in the Shubert Theater. And I would turn to them and I would make the audience feel like they were the 12 white jurors that were about to put Tom Robinson away. And, you know, and I had people night after night come back and just go, I couldn't move. I mean, it was the proverbial pin drop moment. And to get that and to have that night after night after night on Broadway is something I'll never forget. And there's a line, couple lines in the song, you know, I'll forever feel the stillness and the silence in their eyes. And that's what it felt like for me, looking at them, talking to them, trying to get them to let Tom Robinson go. And that song kind of just reflects all of that. And it's a good, it's a good, it was a good closing day gift.
- [30:40]
Interviewer (Buzz Knight)
It's a gift that still, that still lives with us though. So I, I really thank you for that. So can you talk about what you're working on besides the show for, you know, 54 below on, on April 7th? You've got the, the audible work that you're continuing, is that right?
- [30:59]
Jeff Daniels
Yeah, we're looking to get a season three. We'll see how season two does. I enjoy doing it alive and well enough on audible.com. it's kind of a memoir, but more of a kind of a one man audio adventure. I tell stories. It's similar to what I do with the Unplugged show, but I tell stories, behind the scenes stuff. I talk a lot about what I've learned from some people who are pretty great in all kinds of fields, whether it's writing or acting or music. And I'm just kind of trying to entertain people along the way. There's a lot of music in it, so that's kind of teed up. I just shot a movie, an independent movie that, that might be pretty good. They're just finishing cutting it now. It's called Reykjavik. And it was a movie about the meeting between Reagan and Gorbachev in reykjavik, Iceland, in 1986. And it's a famous meeting where they went there for a weekend and sat in a house and tried to figure out a way for the two superpowers not to blow each other up with nuclear weapons. It was such a precarious Dangerous time that Reagan felt it was important that they get together and Gorbachev agreed. And the movie is about that weekend. And Jared Harris plays Gorbachev and J.K. simmons plays George Schultz, and I played Reagan, and we shot it in the same house, in the same room, sitting in the same chairs. The writer, director Michael Gunn, had access to George Shultz and the transcripts of their negotiations and their meetings. So a lot of what we're saying is what they said with where we are now with Trump and Putin. It's an interesting contrast, to say the least. For sure.
- [33:03]
Interviewer (Buzz Knight)
Can't wait to see it.
- [33:04]
Jeff Daniels
Our hope is to get into some film festivals the end of the summer, early fall, and hopefully have it out by the end of the year. But I, you know, it's. It could be good.
- [33:15]
Interviewer (Buzz Knight)
Jeff, in closing, who instilled the ability to take risks that you were so amazing at?
- [33:23]
Jeff Daniels
The biggest risk? There were a couple of them. One is to leave a little town where, as the eldest son, you were supposed to run the family business, the lumber company. There's that risk of going, I'm going to go be an actor now. I could have failed after two or three years and come back, and I would have landed on my feet there. I wasn't built for that. That wasn't what I was supposed to do. So the risk of just going off to try to be an actor with the odds that are stacked against you in 1970s New York City, which is a whole different deal, that's a risk. And I guess Dumb and Dumber, I know Dumb and Dumber was a risk. Walking out with a guitar is a risk. But, you know, my dad told me a long time ago, he, you know, and it's not first time I've heard it or people have said it, but it was invest in yourself. And so that's what I've done. Whatever talent I have, I've tried to live a very creative life, whether it's acting, music, playwriting. I feel like I'm. I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing. It may not always make financial sense. It's certainly not what you do. If you go to business school, become an artist, you don't do that. It's a gamble to do some of the things I've done, but I'm still gambling on whatever talent I have that I have continued to grow and learn and add to. It's cumulative. You know, an artist gets better with each project, with each year, with each decade. That's how it's supposed to work. If you're learning from the people you're around. And I've been fortunate to be around some great people over the decades. And so it doesn't really feel like a risk to me. I mean, occasionally, you know, like if Dumb and Dumber had failed or the Reagan movie fails or Newsroom had failed, you go away into oblivion. But they didn't. They didn't. And so the risk isn't that big of a risk if I know I can pull it off if I work as hard as I have to work. I learned that from people like Meryl Streep. There's a, there's a big difference between good and great. And the difference is that good is a close cousin to good enough. And the people who are great in whatever field outwork those who are satisfied with just being good. And I remember Meryl, how hard she worked, how prepared she was, coming in every morning. You know, the people that I've worked with like that, you know, Doc Watson doesn't sit on that stage and just do that. There are countless hours getting that good so that he can, if you put in the time and you know, a lot more than you did than you used to, yeah, it might be a risk to some, but to you it's. No, it's not as big. It doesn't seem as big as a. Of a risk. I, I guess I just challenge those who want to pigeonhole or label. I'm constantly challenging that because I know I can bust that.
- [37:00]
Interviewer (Buzz Knight)
So, Jeff, thank you so much. 54 below April 7th in New York City. Check it out. And I'm so grateful for all the gifts that you continue to give us. Jeff Daniels thank you.
- [37:16]
Jeff Daniels
Thanks Buzz. Appreciate it.
- [37:19]
Buzz Knight
Thanks for listening to this episode of the Taking a Walk podcast. Share this and other episodes with your friends and follow us so you never miss an episode. Taking a Walk is available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts and wherever you get your podcast.
- [37:37]
Podcast Sponsor/Announcer
This episode of Taking a Walk is brought to you by Chase Sapphire Reserve. Whether I'm booking my next vacation or going to a concert, Chase Sapphire Reserve is my gateway to the world's most captivating destinations. When I use my Chase Sapphire Reserve card, I get eight times points on all the purchases I make through Chase Travel and even access to one of a kind experiences and like music festivals and sports events. And that's not even mentioning how the card gets me into the Sapphire Lounge by the club at select airports nationwide. No matter where I'm walking, travel is more rewarding with Chase Sapphire Reserve, discover more@chase.com Sapphire Reserve cards issued by JP Morgan Chase Bank NA member FDIC subject to credit approval terms apply. Music history is full of hidden connections, just like everything else worth understanding if you're someone who can't help but dig deeper, who sees problems as puzzles worth solving, Claude is for you. It's built for people that don't settle for surface level answers. Claude works with you on whatever you're curious about, helping you explore ideas and connect dots in ways that might surprise you. Not by thinking for you, but with you. See why the world's best problem solvers choose Claude as their thinking partner and try Claude for free at Claude AI Buzz Lexis believes in the importance of standards One of my standards I never want to be late. I always want to show up on time. For Lexus, the standard is simple Experience. Amazing. Their benchmarks aren't stats or specs, they're feelings and exhilaration. Joy. That sense your car was designed just for you. Machines built to make you feel more human. Because a car that doesn't make you feel something is a car that stops short of amazing. Experience. Amazing at your Lexus dealer.
- [39:41]
Josh Clark
Hi there, this is Josh Clark from the Stuff you Should Know podcast. If you've been thinking, man alive, I could go for some good true crime podcast episodes, then have we got good news for you. Subscribe Stuff youf Should Know just released a playlist of 12 of our best true crime episodes of all time. There's a shootout in broad daylight, people using axes in really terrible ways. Disappearances, legendary heists, the whole nine yards. So check out the Stuff youf Should Know True Crime Playlist on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
- [40:11]
Jeff Daniels
People called them murderers.
- [40:13]
Interviewer (Buzz Knight)
Ten years later, they were gods.
- [40:16]
Jeff Daniels
Today, no one knows their names.
- [40:18]
Podcast Sponsor/Announcer
A group of maverick surgeons who took on the medical establishment who risked everything.
- [40:23]
Jeff Daniels
To invent open heart surgery. Welcome to the Wild west of American Medicine.
- [40:27]
Podcast Sponsor/Announcer
I'm Chris Pine and this is Cardiac Cowboys.
- [40:31]
Buzz Knight
If you like medical dramas, if you.
- [40:33]
Jeff Daniels
Like heart pounding thrillers, you will love Cardiac Cowboys.
- [40:36]
Podcast Sponsor/Announcer
Listen on the iHeartRadio app or wherever.
- [40:39]
Jeff Daniels
You listen to podcasts sponsored by by.
- [40:41]
Interviewer (Buzz Knight)
Jasper AI built for marketers.
- [40:44]
Podcast Sponsor/Announcer
This is an iHeart podcast.