Famous People

by Justin Kuritzkes

  I think a lot of it was like, I didn’t really get much of a chance to go to school, you know? Like, yeah, legally I was required to have tutors go on tour with me, but those people are as much teachers as, like, the doctor who gave me my weed prescription in L.A. back in the day is a doctor. It’s like: I’m sure he went to medical school, but at the end of the day, I don’t think I’d want him operating on me.

  So it was only really when I encountered Bob that I started to enter into anything like the intellectual world. I mean, I wasn’t gonna get to go to college. That wasn’t in the cards for me. But with Bob, like, I felt like I had someone who not only thought I was smart or who wanted to talk to me about real shit, but like, who sort of took it upon himself to create a program of study for me—a course of learning.

  And so that’s why when people jump to conclusions about Bob and what he stands for, it just makes me want to scream, because, like, how can you look at this man and look at his work and not see the total beauty of it? How can you just focus on one thing without even READING the book that contains it? How can you read some fucking ARTICLE and make up your mind about a complex human thinker?

  I think hands down, the thing that Bob said that people just can’t get behind is this comment he made about gay people. For most people, like, that’s where it begins and ends with Bob. And I mean, here’s what I know: Bob is not a bigot. I know in the core of my being that Bob loves and accepts all people. I don’t necessarily agree with everything he says—like, I’m not some fucking hype man for Bob Winstock—but the dude is not some fucking hateful person who judges anybody for who they love or what they do with their lives. And it’s really sad for me to see people take him out of context, because like, with the internet and everything, people just jump to conclusions when they’ve heard one little sound bite, and then it’s like, they think they can condemn a person’s entire life, their entire worldview, just from this one little thing. Like, they think that just because all these uber-right-wing, uber-intense dudes think of Bob as like, their intellectual guide or whatever, that must mean that Bob’s ONE of them. And it’s like: People have been interpreting philosophers and thinkers and doing whatever the fuck they want with them forever. This is nothing new. You can’t just nail Bob down to the worst things that people do with his work and then go: Boom! Gotcha!

  But okay, since we’re here and since we’re talking about Bob, like, let’s get into it. Let’s see how bad this thing really is.

  To the best of my understanding, Bob’s position on gay people is this: They’re not natural. Everybody says it’s natural to be gay, and Bob is like: No. They are a product of the modern world. They could only exist in a perverted society. Gay people are a response to a world that’s out of whack.

  I mean, is Bob saying we should kill all the gay people? No. And I definitely don’t think that. I love gay people. I love all kinds of people. I mean, what people do in the privacy of their own homes, like, what people do with their own lives—why should that affect me? It’s everyone’s responsibility to figure their own shit out for themselves, and like, make their own way through the world, and what the fuck do I care who fucks who or how they do it?

  But people are so hungry to like … throw each other into the fire, you know, so when they heard that Bob said that—which is like, crammed into chapter fifty-six of like, a five-hundred-page book he wrote SIXTEEN YEARS ago, but whatever, I mean, I guess he published it, so it’s all fair game—but when that shit surfaced, all of a sudden people are asking me in interviews, like: Do YOU think gay people are not natural? Have YOU spoken to Bob about this?

  And I’m like: That’s not what Bob and I talk about! LOL. Look at all the OTHER shit Bob said. Look at all the actually amazing, like actually mind-blowing shit that he’s written about, and actually READ his books, and then talk to me. I mean, seriously, it’s like, if people actually read Bob, they’d have a lot more interesting shit to be angry about. I mean, Bob’s said some shit that pokes at the very structure of our REALITY. But, meanwhile, they want me to focus on the gay shit? They want me to focus on THAT? They want me to spend my time on THAT just because that’s what THEY’RE concerned about?

  And again, it’s like, this is something I really firmly believe: I think one of the things that normal people just absolutely can’t understand about someone like me is that I just don’t have the same framework for the world that they do. Even intellectuals or whatever, like, even really smart people, I mean, they may be people of the world, you know, but they’re still essentially tied down to certain traditions—like, they’re all still speaking from a certain POSITION in society—and so there’s a real limit to how much they can understand. But for me, it’s like, I have fans all over the world, you know—I exist for EVERYONE—and so I can’t just be so quick to speak from a certain perspective. I go to places I’ve never even heard of, and they’re using me to sell baby shampoo. They’re playing my songs at protests. They’re dressing up as me for Halloween and putting ornaments of my face on the Christmas tree.

  There are certain countries in the world—countries where like, I have millions of fans—where it’s just straight up illegal to be gay. It’s just like, not allowed. And like, what? I’m gonna say that that entire country is wrong? I’m gonna be vibing with all these people from that country at a concert one night and like, chilling with their president the next morning, and then back in the U.S., back on home soil, I’m gonna be like: Yo, that government is fucked up and those people need to get their shit together. Who the fuck am I? How can I possibly judge people like that? When we’re all in the room together, I’m ONE OF THEM, you know? I’m a part of that society.

  I play in places where they just chop off women’s heads with swords. Seriously! That’s what happens! I play in places where you can’t use Google or whatever. And like, yeah, that sounds crazy to me, but like, what? I’m gonna be so arrogant that I’m gonna come out and be like: I’m taking a stand. This shit is wrong.

  What the fuck? Who AM I?

  I remember I was gonna play this concert in Tel Aviv, you know, in Israel, and like, all these activist groups were passing around this petition like: Yo, you can’t play there, yo, you gotta show your support for the Palestinians by not playing a concert there. And I was just like: Do you people even understand how this WORKS?

  When you ask me to do that shit, like, what you’re asking me to do is to basically nail myself down to a certain number of principles that you’ve decided RIGHT NOW, in the context of YOUR WORLD, are the most important principles that a person can have. And I get it. Like, I get that for most people, their context is really important. They’ve gotta use that shit to guide their decisions. But for me, like, and I’m not trying to sound self-important or something, but for me, I’m just operating on a different plane. I’m flying here and there and there and there, and I’m living for tomorrow. I’m trying to see the whole picture. That’s honestly the biggest thing I’m working on all the time, like: How can I expand my perspective? How can I see MORE?

  And so that’s why it upsets me so much when people gang up on Bob because of this thing he said or that thing he said, because the idea that Bob has hatred for a certain type of people is just so fucking offensive. If Bob is saying something about gay people, he’s not trying to put them down or to talk shit about them—he’s just saying what he thinks. He’s talking about what he’s observed, the conclusions he’s come to, and just because he’s not saying the generally ACCEPTED thing where YOU come from doesn’t make him some kind of monster or some kind of super-villain. Maybe you just need to step out of your frame of reference, take off the specific glasses that you’ve been wearing, and try to hear where he’s coming from. Maybe then you’ll understand him.

  I just wish people would greet things with curiosity and openness instead of always with judgment, you know? Because it would be dope if people would admit sometimes that they don’t know anything about anything. It feels so fucking amazing to admit that you�
�re a total fucking idiot, because, like, we can’t even understand what’s going on in our own hearts, you know? We can’t even understand how our own minds work. And now you’ve got something to say about global politics? Now you’ve got something to say about the structure of the universe? Sit down, bro. No one’s asking you.

  That was always the main problem with my dad, you know? He just couldn’t admit the limits of his own understanding. Having even a little bit of success at all was the worst thing that could’ve ever happened to him, because, like, he didn’t have it in him to be flexible. He didn’t have it in him to assess the new situation and change. And that’s what’s required if you want to stay in the game. That’s what you’ve gotta do if you wanna stick around. I mean, sure, yeah, it’s great to have a plan, and like, it’s great to think things through really far before you get going, but once you’re out in the world, like, once the train is moving, it’s just not yours anymore, you know? You can write an amazing TV show, and like, you can have all these plans for the whole series, but if everyone’s like: Oh my god, we love this character, oh my god, we’re gonna make all these memes about him, and you were planning on killing him off at the end of season one, that’s just not an option anymore. You’re not allowed to kill him. And you’ve gotta get to a place in your mind where, like, that’s dope, you know what I’m saying? You’ve gotta fully embrace the influence and be happy about it and realize that your life doesn’t just belong to you anymore: You’re collaborating on it with the world.

  But for some people, that kind of attitude just isn’t possible, and I think, unfortunately, my dad was one of those people.

  * * *

  After that blowup at my parents’ house, I didn’t talk to him for a while. I would go and visit my mom, but whenever I’d show up over there, my dad would be gone, like, nowhere to be found, and I’d ask my mom, like: Yo, what’s up? Where is he? And she’d just be like: He needs some time. He’s in a very rough place right now.

  We were both still really mad at each other. My mom was trying to repair things between us—like, she kept trying to get us in the same room or like, organize a family meeting or whatever—but I was really busy, and my dad was really mad, and so we would always find excuses to avoid each other.

  My mom started this email thread with the three of us called “Family,” and she sent us this long email being like: Guys, come on, you’re father and son, you love each other, you built this beautiful thing together: Why can’t you just make up? But whenever my dad would write on the thread, it was really short and kind of rude. He’d say he was interested in us all getting together, and he’d propose a time that worked for him, and then I’d be like: Sorry, I gotta do an interview at that time. Can we do this day instead? And then he just wouldn’t respond.

  And I had a new manager at that point. She’s still my manager today: Shari. Part of me thought that it was just gonna be a temporary thing until my dad and I were ready to heal the wound, but this other part of me kind of knew that it was for good. At that point, like, my shit was blowing up even bigger than it did with the first album. I started steadily releasing all the tracks I had been recording with Trick and Deez and Bunny, and people were getting really excited about them, and I started to realize that, like, I pretty much already had the second album and now all that was left to do was put it all together and release it.

  Deez had sort of become the main producer, and basically every day I was going over to his place and laying down new tracks and tweaking old ones and just working out the sound, you know, refining the thing. The album didn’t have a concept, but it definitely had a sound, and it was a little more edgy than the first one. I mean, I don’t think it was like, HARD or something—like, it wasn’t some Scaggs shit—but I was definitely being honest about what my life was like, and like, the sound of the music reflected that. The album my dad and I did together had this very bright, like, very enthusiastic sound, and this new sound was more like, swagger, you know? That’s the best way I can describe it.

  So I was in the middle of finishing that up and doing press and playing the new songs at radio stations and going on late-night shows, and I didn’t really realize that my mom and my dad were drifting apart too. I could kind of feel it whenever I’d go hang out with my mom. When my dad would come up, my mom would always sort of make this face like she was trying to smile and come off as though this was just a hard thing we were going through as a family and of course it would pass, but I guess what was really going on was like, our fight had sort of unleashed a lot of the worst parts of my father that had been put to bed by all of our success, and now that guy was coming back—that guy that my mom could never really stand—and unless he was going to do something about it, the strain was gonna be too much to take.

  And then one day I went over to my parents’ place, and my mom and I were like, sitting in the backyard by the pool having some barbeque that this Polynesian chef had prepared for us, and I just flat-out asked her, like: What’s the deal? How come Dad is never here when I come to visit? And she just looked at me with these sad eyes, and she started crying.

  And when she told me they were done, I felt this wave of relief pass over me. At the time, my attitude was like: Fuck this guy, you know? He’s being a whiny little bitch and he’s acting like a total fucking loser, and my mom doesn’t need that shit right now. My mom is such a loving, caring, amazing person, and she doesn’t need all this negativity weighing her down. And so I was glad that she was gonna get a chance to see what it was like without him.

  But this is my dad we’re talking about, you know? He wasn’t gonna go quietly.

  He was like, intent to have some success outside of me, and so he took all the money that was his share of our whole thing together—which, like, you gotta remember, was a couple million bucks at that point—and he started developing other acts. He was just basically going around the country, like, going to college vocal programs, watching singing competitions on TV and all of that shit, and just finding people, flying them out to L.A. and like, basically training them to be pop stars, making these little bets on them and hoping they would pay off. He was essentially, I mean, he was essentially trying to find another me, but like, one that he could control. And I would hear about what he was doing because, you know, at that point, the tabloids had obviously picked up on my parents’ divorce, and my dad had become this kind of joke. Like, all these memes were being made about him like, making fun of his desperate quest to prove that he could do something without me, and like, every bet he made just lost. Every person he tried to groom into his perfect little Frankenstein performer just never panned out.

  And then finally, like, a year or so after I released the second album—which fucking killed by the way—in the middle of probably the greatest time in my career so far up to that point, I read online that my dad had just gone totally bankrupt—he lost his entire share of our fortune. And at that point like, obviously, MY fortune had increased tenfold, but my dad had totally drained his piece of the original pie. And what I read online was that he was actually looking for work again—like, he was actually going around to radio stations and trying to be a sound engineer again—but nobody was hiring him because they had changed a lot of the equipment and it didn’t work the same way anymore. Plus, like, everyone sort of knew who he was, and they didn’t want to be associated with that kind of embarrassment.

  And so I just thought, like: Okay. I’ve gotta reach out to him. Like, I’ve gotta look out for my dad. I’m not gonna let him STARVE over some beef between us about some songs I made with fucking Deez Soundzz. And so I called his cell phone—he hadn’t changed his number—and he picked up, and I was like: Hey, Dad, what’s up? Where are you now? And he was like: Hey, kiddo, I’m in New Mexico. And I was like: Oh, cool. What are you doing there? And he was like: I don’t know. I don’t know. And I was like: Okay, well, why don’t you come back to L.A.? Let me put you up for a bit? And he was like: Yeah. Okay. I’d like that. And I was like: Dope.
Perfect. I’m buying you a plane ticket right now. And he was like: Okay. I love you, kiddo. And I was like: Great, yeah, I love you too. And he was like: How’s your mother doing? Is she okay? And I was like: Yeah, yeah, she’s doing great. And he was like: Is she seeing anybody? Is she dating? And I was like, in my head, like: Shit, okay, I guess I have to tell him. And he was like: Hmm? How’s she doing? And I was like: Yeah, Dad, she’s, um … She’s actually getting married again. And he was like: What? What are you talking about? And I was like: Yeah, she’s getting married. It’s not public yet, but it’s happening. And he was like: Whoa. Shit. Who’s she marrying? And I was like: Let’s talk about it when you get here. I’m psyched to see you. And he was like: Come on, man, who? And I was just like: Fuck, man, I really don’t wanna get into this right now. And he was just like: WHO? Who? And I was just like: Bob. Bob Winstock. She’s marrying Bob Winstock. And then he hung up the phone.

  * * *

  LOL.

  Believe me, I was just as shocked as anybody when it first started happening. When I introduced the two of them, I wasn’t thinking about that at all. I didn’t even consider it a possibility. I was just like: Here’s two people who are super-important in my life—why don’t they meet and become friends? And even though we were all vibing at that first dinner we had together, I had no idea that like, that was gonna happen.