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The end of the year, I'm thinking about the next Next year is the year I finally make my Spanish better than my 9 year old's. Rosetta Stone is the most trusted language learning program available on desktop or as an app and it truly immerses you in the language that you want to learn. I can't wait to use Rosetta Stone and finally speak better than my 9 year old who's been learning Spanish in his own way. Rosetta Stone is the trusted expert for 30 years with millions of users and 25 languages offered. Spanish, French, Italian, German, Korean. I could go on fast language acquisition. Rosetta Stone immerses you in many ways. There are no English translations so you can really learn to speak, listen and think in that language. Start the new year off with a resolution you can reach today. The Moth listeners can take advantage of this Rosetta Stones lifetime membership for 50% off visit rosettastone.com moth that's 50% off. Unlimited access to 25 language courses for the rest of your Life. Redeem your 50% off at Rosetta Stone.com.
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Moth today welcome to the Moth Podcast. I'm Dan Kennedy. This episode is brought to you by squarespace.com the fast, easy way to create and manage a high quality website or blog. Create a website that's uniquely you in the design and colors of your choice. Display your photos from Flickr. Start that blog you've been thinking about. Say it easily and with style with Squarespace and the iPhone app makes it easy to update your site on the go. Try it out today for free. Visit squarespace.com and sign up for their free trial. Then choose a design template to get started. No credit card is needed, just get it a Try and build your website and then if you decide to purchase, enter the code moth and receive 10% off for six months. That's squarespace.com offer code moth. Today's podcast is also brought to you by Carbonite Online Backup, easy, automatic and unlimited backup for your computer files. Try it free for 15 days@carbonite.com and if you use the offer code themoth, you'll get two bonus months if you decide to buy. The story you're about to hear is by Darrell DMC McDaniels, who was part of the legendary rap group Run DMC. Here's DMC live on the Moth national Story tour when it pulled into Washington College in Chestertown, Maryland, in 2000.
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Hi. Everything happens for a reason. Everything happens for a reason. I'm going to tell you all about what happened to me when I asked myself, why am I here? I do that every day. Now I ask myself, why am I here today in front of y'all? But I'm here today in front of y'all to tell you what happened when I asked myself, why am I here? Several years ago. Several years ago, I was on tour with my band, Run dmc. We was over in Europe. Now we was in Europe. We was out there doing shows. We was getting 40, $50,000 a night. But for some reason, something in me wasn't right. Had no idea what it was. So on this particular evening after the show, I got back to my room and I asked myself, am I here? Just this be dmc? And I laid there that night and I thought about everything that happened to me. Okay, I'm Darrell McDaniels. I grew up in Hollis, Queens, New York, Pipford and Banners. My mother and father, my brother is Alfred. My mother and father worked every day to send me to every school that I went to. And every school that I went to was a Catholic school that they worked every day to pay for me to go to. And I treated them right by coming home with straight A's every day. I was an athletic kid. For me as a kid, I. Every day. Not materially, but every day as a kid, it was Christmas for me. Life couldn't be no better. And then growing up in Hollis, Queens, I met Joe and Jay. And we did the things that young guys do. And then we call ourselves starting a rap group, and we put a record out and then the record goes number one. And we, you know, damn near created hip hop. And we was the first to go gold, first to go platinum, all this good stuff. Rolling Stone, MTV. And now here I am playing in Europe, getting 40, $50,000 tonight. But why am I so unhappy? I was laying there and I summed up everything that was mean. I was unhappy to the point where I was so depressed. And out of that, I became very suicidal. Now I had suicidal thoughts. So I don't think I really, really killed myself, because I did go to the ledge and look. And I looked and said, I ain't jumping. It's gonna hurt. Put the poison in the glass. And I thought about drinking the poison. And I looked at it and I said, I ain't drinking that. Thought about the gun, the whole nine. But I knew something was wrong with me, even though life was good, because I had suicidal thoughts. So I was saying, okay, I gotta figure out how to kill myself. No, I'm not. Whatever, whatever, whatever. But then I came to the conclusion, I can't kill myself on the road while we're touring because Running Jay is gonna be mad at me. So I'm going to just wait till I get home. So we finished, we did what we had to do on a tour in Europe, and I came home very depressed. Didn't know what this void was in me because I summed up everything about me. I'm supposed to be happy. I get in a car and the limo driver goes, you want to hear some music? And I'm like, yeah, just turn the radio on. You have a preference? No, just turn it on. So he turns the radio on. And this was in 1997. And on the radio was a record called angel by Sarah McLachlan. Now, look, fame, friends, fortune, and even my family, my wife and kids didn't mean nothing to me because I was suicidal. I was depressed. I was an emotional wreck. But for some reason, when I heard that record, Angel Pa McLoughlin, something in me said, life is beautiful. It's good to be alive. So for one whole year, all I did was listen to Sarah McLachlan's record, Angel. For one whole year. Not only that, I went out and brought every record she ever made. And the only thing that I was living for was Sarah McLachlan. Over and over and over, everywhere I went. I was driving my management crazy because I would be like, come on, D, we gotta go on the road or you gotta put this in. They would go, no. I said, then I ain't going. And they would be like, okay, we'll put it in for you. And they're like, there's something. Matt, Ricky, what's up with this? He listen to Sarah McLaughlin, whatever. Whatever. So for one year, I'm listening to Sarah McLaughlin. At the end of the year, my manager goes, yo, D, I got tickets to Clive Davis Grammy party. You don't know who Clive Davis is, right? If you win American Idol, you get a deal with Clive Davis. He discovered Janis Joplin and all these people. But I'm like, I have no time for Clive Davis in Hollywood because I have my Sarah McLachlan. That's all I care about. So he's like, yo, D, man, I went through a hard time to get these tickets to Blah, blah, blah. I'm looking at okay. I say, okay, I'll go to the party. But I'm only staying one hour. So I go to the party. Cloud Davis Grammy party in LA. Oh, man. I'm counting the seconds. 59, 58. I'm looking around and Stevie wonders, why Alicia Keith. Who cares about Alicia? Kid paparazzi and Pam Anderson and all this stuff, right? I'm in there hating on everything. So I'm sitting there at a party that I did not want to go to because all I want to do is listen to my Sarah McLaughlin music. But guess who walks in. That lady. She was that lady to me. She was that lady to me then. That lady that made that record that changed my life. I'm losing it because nobody in the whole facility knows I'm. I'm an in the closet Sarah McLachlan fan. But I'm losing it. I'm like, oh, my. That's la. So I get myself together. I say, okay, I gotta go over there. If I do die, kill myself, whatever. I gotta go over there and let her know what her record did for me. So I walk over to Sarah McLachlan, and I'm in the whole run, DMC garb, the hat, the black, all the way down. She sees me coming, she goes, dmc. It's tricky to rock a rhyme, rock around my Adidas and walk this way. I'm like, wow. But in my head, this is where I was at. In my head, I'm like, that's a good reason to stay alive, because Sarah McLachlan likes my music. That's where I was at, y'all. I go over to her and I say, hey, Ms. McLaughlin, I just want to tell you, your record angel, your record angel saved my life. I was depressed. I was suicidal. But every day I listen to that record, I don't leave the house without listening to that record. It's a crutch I stand on. It's like everything I Do with rolling around that record. And listen, the record is called Angel. You sing like an angel. People say you are angel, but you're not an angel to me. You're God. And I go on and on and on and on. But she's looking at me like, okay, where is this coming from? I just wanted to say hi to his ass. So I finished my little ramp. She looks at me and she goes. She ain't know what to say. Thank you for telling me that, Darrell. Cause that's what music is supposed to do. Three whole years go by she takes my hand, walks away. Three whole years go by I'm trying to figure out what this void in me, this and that. Why don't I want to kill myself? But I ain't going to kill myself because I got my Samuel Clocklin music. I'm listening to Samuel Clocklin, figuring out why. Am I crazy? This. I'm going through a lot of emotions. Did I realize something? People know my musical legacy. What Run DMC did. First to go gold, first to go platinum, first on mtv. First with a record deal. First all at first. But nobody knows the legacy. Nobody knows about the little boy, Darryl, who became dmc. So I said, if I die, my friends and my fans and people that I grew up with, my generation, they just know dmc, what DMC did. They don't know about Daryl, and especially the younger generation. So I said, I gotta write a book. So I'm gonna write a book and it's gonna be, yo, what's up? My name is DMC. You know me, Daryl McTan is to run DMC. First I go. Go first. I go platinum, first on MTV versus roller. So all the. First I got to the point where I. I got to. I wanted to write. Yeah, I was born May 31, 1964. When I got to that point, I realized that's all I know about the day I was born. So I said, I gotta figure out, you know, the details of my birth. So I called my mother. Hey, Mom. Hey, Dara. How you do? Love you. Love you, too. Did you eat? Yeah, Mom. I mean, you're losing too much weight. No, Mom. Working out. It's a difference. But whatever, whatever. I just need to know three things because I'm writing this book. How much did I weigh? What time was I born in? What hospital? She told me those three things. Love you. Love you too. Hung up the phone. Boof. About an hour later, the phone rings. It's my mother and my father. Hey. Hey, son. How you doing? What's up? Dad. Yo, what's up? We have something else to tell you. Blasi blah this, blasey blah blah blah blah. You was a month old. We think you're Dominican and you're adopted. You're adopted. You're adopted. You're adopted. You're adopted, you're adopted. Right then and there, whole world stopped. Thought about all of run DMC stuff. St. John's University High School when I was a little kid. And I thought about all this stuff that I was laying in a bed three years, I mean a couple of years earlier, saying in my hair chesterbee DMC summed up everything about me. That was the one void, the piece of the missing link that had me going out of my mind, suicidal because that was the one thing I didn't know about myself. Now if you think there's really a time to commit suicide, finding out you're adopted at age 35 and people say Dee, they told you over the phone. But right then and there, something happened. I remembered when I asked myself in my head to DMC and summed it up, that was the missing void. So the void was filled. I really wanted to kill myself. But then I remembered something. Sarah McLaughlin said that's what music is supposed to do. So I said, okay, before I get suicidal, depressed and do something real crazy, she said, that's what music is supposed to do. I said I need to write a record that's going to help that little orphan or that little kid in foster care who thinks they threw me away. I'm worthless. I mean nothing. My mother and father love you because I may be dmc, but what I really represent is purpose and destiny. So I need to make a record that's going to inspire somebody the way Sarah McLachlan inspired me. Then I got a bigger idea. I'm going to call that lady back up, have that lady make the record with me. So get Sarah McLachlan on the phone. And I'm thinking, if she thought I was crazy three years ago, she gonna really think I'm crazy now. Hey, Ms. McLaughlin. It's Daryl. Remember me? How can I forget you, Darryl? You called me. God. What do you want? Okay, here we go. Remember when I met you three years ago and I told you what your record did for me? Yeah. And you looked at me and you told me that's what you're supposed to do. Yeah, well, I. I found out why I was going depressed and suicidal, blah, blah, blah. Mother, father told me I'm adopted, I need to make a record. This one inspire Me the way inspire people, the way you inspire me. Blah, blah, blah. Will you help me do this record? She goes, yes, real quick. I was like, wow, that was easy. I'm losing it now. I'm like. She said, yes, this and that. I'll fly you to New York, put you in the Four Seasons studio. She says, no, Daryl, you could come to my house and make the record. Now, I'm a fan. After four years of listening to this lady, I'm a fan now, right? To make a long story short, when she said, come to my house, I fainted. I woke up, I was in Vancouver, Canada. It's beautiful there at Sarah McLachlan's house. The lady whose record saved my life, right? Now, listen, we went there, I said, Ms. McLaughlin, I want to make a remake of Harry Chapin's Cats in the Cradle. And I'm going to put my adoption story there, and I'm going to give it a happy ending. Okay, cool. Took us two days to make the record. Now, listen, it all started in the car with her record coming on the radio, right? A year goes by. I go to a party that I did not want to go to. Who walks in? Then I found out that I was adopted. I called her up to do the record with me. So we did the record, right? All happy. I was on my way out the door, and she says, darryl, before you go, I gotta tell you something. Now, I love her to death. Her music, everything, what she did for me, I'm in heaven. I'm on cloud nine. Whatever it is you want, Ms. McLaughlin, she says, before you go, I need to tell you something, Darryl. And I said, what? She says, I was adopted, too, and I did not know that. Everything happens for a reason.
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Darryl. DMC McDaniels is 1/3 of the trailblazing rap group Run DMC. In 2006, DMC released a solo album titled Checks, Thugs and Rock and Roll and was presented with the Congressional Angels in Adoption Award. For his work with children in foster care and promotion of adoption, he was inducted into the Rock and Roll hall of fame in 2009. For more information, visit medmc.com that's me-dmc.com this episode of the Moth is brought to you by Carbonite Online Backup. Carbonite automatically backs up files on PCs and Macs before hard drive crashes, viruses, theft or other computer problems occur. In the event of a computer disaster, Carbonite helps restore photos, music, financial records and other important files. Carbonite comes with anytime, anywhere. Access to your files from any computer or via a free smartphone app. Unlimited backup for your PC or Mac is only $55 a year and that is just 15 cents a day. Try it for free for 15 days at carbonite.com use the offer code themoth and get two bonus months if you decide to buy. That's carbonite.com code carnage the moth this episode of the Moth is also brought to you by squarespace.com the fast and easy way to publish a high quality website or blog. For a free trial and 10% off your new account, go to squarespace.com and use the code Moth.
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Our podcast host, Dan Kennedy is the author of the book Rock on An Office Power Ballad. Learn more@rockonthebook.com thanks to all of you.
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For listening and we hope you have a story worthy week. Podcast audio production by Paul Ruest at the Argo Studios in New York Podcast hosting by PRX Public Radio Exchange helping make public radio more public@prx.org.