Celebrity Supermensch with Shep Gordon - I Love Marketing Episode #301

Today on I Love Marketing, you'll meet celebrity supermensch and super agent Shep Gordon. Hear the connection between self worth and celebrity, how Shep created and built the celebrity chef genre, the role belief plays in achieving your wildest dreams, and more. Shep E. Gordon is the famous talent manager, Hollywood film agent and producer featured in the recent documentary the Legend of Shep Gordon. Some of his clients include Alice Cooper, Anne Murray, Blondie, Teddy Pendergrass, Luther Vandross, Ben Vereen, Groucho Marx, and Raquel Welch. If you would like access to the full interview, the show notes and the special resources for this episode, please visit ilovemarketing.com 301 that's ilovemarketing.com 301.

I'm Dean Jackson. He's Joe Polish. And this is the I Love Marketing podc. Everybody. It's Dean Jackson and Joe Polish.

And we've got a very awesome special guest today.

I'm very excited because this is one of those times where we have a wonderful conversation ahead of us. And I want to kind of set the stage here of who our guest is. We have, if you've been paying attention in the last couple of years, you've heard a lot about this gentleman. We have Shep Gordon with us who's the subject of the Mike Myers documentary the Legend of Shep Gordon, supermensch and very exciting today. So you may have heard of some of the accomplishments of Shep Gordon or some of the things that he's been responsible for. And starting out with the serendipity of moving to Los Angeles in 1969 and just serendipitously rolling into the landmark Hollywood, the Hollywood landmark hotel, where it was just action central for all of the music scene that was going on there. And so his career for as a manager has really taken him to some incredible places. He's managed people starting out with Alice Cooper, been Alice Cooper's only manager for his entire career. So we'll talk a lot about that. But over that career, he's managed incredible people like Groucho, Groucho Marx, Raquel Welch, at one point having the trifecta of Luther Vandross, Rick James and Teddy Pendergrass, which I want to talk a lot about some of this, the marketing things that Shep was able to do with those, the seemingly opposite polar opposites of Ann Murray and Blondie and created the concept. And almost all of the celebrity chefs, any of the chefs that you can name are because Chef Gordon had created the idea of this celebrity chef. And we're going to have a lot of great stories to talk about that. But Emeril and Nobu and Wolfgang Puck and Mark Tarbell and Daniel Boulud, who in Toronto, where I live, is the executive chef at the flagship Four Seasons in Toronto. So he's had an incredible career. He's had incredible life of amazing experiences. And it's been a journey. And I really the pleasure of being a guest at Shep's home in Maui just about a month ago for a small dinner. And it was just an amazing experience. So I'm excited to get the chance to spend some time today talking about all of the experiences that Shep has had. So, Shep, welcome. We're very excited to have you with us.

Nice to be on the phone with you. Nice to still be in Maui. Yeah, I appreciate that.

And Chef, when I was at. Yeah, I'll just. When I was at Shep's house, I was in the beginnings of this terrible cold with the cough and all of that. And Shep has been suffering with that right now. So I'm hoping that it wasn't my fault.

But, I mean, I think we should blame it on you anyway because it just sounds more. It sounds more amusing. So, Shep, now, this is my first introduction. Introduction to you. I mean, I've known of you since I watched the movie. And there's so many great lessons in the movie that Mike Myers put together. And I've actually bought copies for all my genius network members when it first came out in 2013. And it's just a, you know, that's what people know you of. But like after. And you wrote, you know, a great book, which we're going to recommend that people listen to this episode and our conversation we have, and then go and watch the movie Supermensch if you've not seen it. And read Shep's book, which both Dean and I have read cover to cover. It's called they Call Me Supermensch. And it's a backstage pass to the amazing world of film, food, and rock and roll. And then come back and listen to this again. Cause I think it'll give you a whole nother perspective. And here you are, a person who was really kind of the backstage person for so many of these people. And now you've been thrust into your own world of fame. And what I wanted to kind of ask you from the beginning, even in the trailer of Supermensch, there's a line where you say, there's nothing about fam that I've ever seen that's healthy. The Ones that rose to the top got hurt the worst. And here you are now, you know, having become, I guess, famous. I mean, what are your perspectives and.

Thoughts about even that line?

Yeah, you know, because that always struck.

Me, I think, you know, the kind of fame that I was really referring to there, you know, in a movie you get part of a conversation. The fame that I was talking about is a fame that coincides with thousands and thousands and thousands of people telling you how great you are and what you're doing. This is the greatest thing you are, the greatest. Whether it's 30,000 people in a stadium, whether it's 500 people in a club, that kind of fame is very hard to achieve. And it's usually achieved by personality traits of people who need to get that acclaim. After that moment is rejection. Hundreds and thousands of times being rejected till you get to that place of adoration and for the most part to fight through to get to that place. Most of the artists that I've met who get to that place have the same self worth issues that everybody else has, except that they seem to think that that kind of adoration will cure the self worth issues and they don't. And that's why you see so many drug overdoses and Hendrix and all them died at 26. Jim Morrison. You get what you want and you're still empty.

And then you realize you're trapped by it. Probably they can't unring that bell.

During my era, when I was actually doing it, There's a book there. When I was doing it, there was no safety net. There wasn't a Betty Ford Clinic. Nobody really knew about that stuff. Nobody knew that anything had consequences. So whereas nowadays you see artists getting help really fast. You know, we all read about it in the press. You see someone go off the wires and the next thing you know they're in rehab or they do. It was self medication and the holes were so deep. So that was really what I was referring to through my own eyes, seeing it. My fame is very, very, very, very limited. But even in my small little touch of it, you can see the kind of things that I didn't really think about before can really affect people in a negative way very seriously. You have to really have your shit together. An example of that is my film played the festival circuit. And I've lived my whole life in anonymity. So my life has a certain rhythm to it. Part of that rhythm is that I love walking and thinking. That's one of my joys in life. I love walking and I Love while I'm walking to think about things. Sometimes they're big, sometimes they're small. Sometimes it's what I'm going to have for dinner. Sometimes it's but something and I'm not really interrupted. That's sort of been my life for 70 years. That two years ago I had the movie playing at the Tribeca Film Festival and Michael Douglas was interviewing me and I didn't want to be late. And I was walking down the street, I was maybe still 12 blocks away and I was walking and thinking in my head about what the next day and what am I going to talk about tonight? But, you know, thankful that Mikey's doing. Just a lot of thoughts were going through my head and that's my rhythm. And I could hear like in the distance. Mr. Gordon. Mr. Gordon. And I sort of stopped. I turned around, there was a middle aged woman there who said that she worked at cnn. They had screened my movie the day before. Could I give her some advice? She had a childhood that she felt rough for her to overcome and she wanted to be a producer and I had to stop her. My natural inclination is how great someone came to me for help. I can actually help someone. But I couldn't talk to her. I had to get to this event. So I said, I'm really sorry, here's my card, I'm going to be on the road, blah, blah, blah, the rest of the 12 blocks. I started thinking about Michael's life or Alice's life, and realizing I had spent my entire career either hiring someone to put an arm between that person and me, or in this case, let's say a Michael Douglas, or I was the one with the arm up, whisking him through a crowd. And so when I got on stage, I said to Michael, you know, just before you start asking me questions, how do you deal with the next? I said, here's what happened to me today. I said, and I know I've walked with you through Central park so many times when I became sort of the buffer. So like, how do you deal if you're going somewhere and there's a guy in a wheelchair or a guy on crutches, or a young girl, a sympathetic character to you, naturally trying to get your attention. And you know that 30 seconds can be a life changer for them. Even though, you know, they just, they might want to say, I met your father 30 years ago, or you remember, I was at the golf club 25 years ago. Something that's insignificant in your life, but it's monumental in theirs. And you must have. How do you deal with that? How do you deal with not being able to help the guy in the wheelchair that you're walking past? Where does that come out to you as a human? And he said he's become sort of numb. He's figured out a way to sort of numb himself. But in the beginning, that was in the beginning, he didn't notice it. When he noticed it, it really bothered him. He tried to take a different way, told his handlers, please let these people talk to me. And then he realized he couldn't because it was endless, and he'd never show up for anything on time. So I think there's a lot of aspects to the fame that are really hard to deal with. And I think you hear, you get comments on social media about, this guy was an asshole. He wouldn't even stop and say hello to me. But so many times.

That's their one experience of it.

That's their one experience. But that hurts. That hurts a human who's compassionate, you know, so you have to. It's not.

It's been an interesting perspective for you because you've been so close to it for all of those years. Like you said, you had that sort of observer view of it where it's not you.

They're trying to get you. I was really the arm in between. Not really thinking about that. Yeah. Just thinking about it as my job. I didn't really think of the consequences to the person I was not letting in and the consequence to the star that was being blocked. Because, you know, I think most humans have a natural desire to be compassionate if they can be a helping instinct. You're right. Yeah.

You know what's interesting about all this, too? And now, granted, since we're on the I Love Marketing podcast, I want to obviously talk about some of the things that our audience would find fascinating and how you helped build the careers of these individuals and what you've done. I'm most fascinated with even that aspect of what you're talking about now, because that's why, you know, that was one of my first questions, because, you know, Shep, you don't know much about my background, but I. You know, when I was 18 years old, I nearly died from drugs. I weighed 105 pounds at my worst state, from freebasing cocaine for, like, three months straight. And I was, you know, just had a pretty crazy childhood, which made sense as to how it would accumulate into drug addiction and abuse and stuff. And now one of my biggest things that I'm working on is artistsforaddicts.com where we have a platform, we just launched, where we're selling art to bring in revenue to help change the global conversation about how people view addicts and how we find the best forms of treatment that have efficacy. And back in early 2001, I joined a high profile group that had Academy Award winning actors and addicts, actresses, famous musicians, a couple billionaires, NFL players, NBA players, famous politicians, all these really well known people that would be considered world leaders. And I saw them in their most broken state because we're all there because of addiction and dealing with that sort of stuff. Because many of these people could not even go to 12 step groups anonymously because they would be outed and stuff. So I always saw this very different side of what goes on, you know, in people's lives that most the public that would see these people, you know, on TV or on stage, that would have never have any clue how much these struggles. And I would see what, you know, I mean, I remember this line from Janis Joplin, you know, I would make love to 20,000 people and go back to my hotel room alone. And you know, I mean, you out of.

I never heard that line before, but that is exactly it. I'm going to steal that line.

Yeah, I mean, you more than anyone.

That's exactly what I was saying. You get that love from your audience, you go back and you look in the mirror and you're the same schmuck you were before you did the show. Right, right. In your own eyes. I don't mean that as a real, you know, we all have these gigantic self worth issues. I don't care who you are, you know, that's what humans have, you know, self worth issues. We have a brain that can think about stuff. So, you know, they're just humans who happen to get famous and happen to have a talent. Right, exactly.

So I mean, having. What's interesting about in the book, in your book, they call me supermensch. I mean, you talk about the insights and the perspectives that you got since this movie was put together.

And then at the end of the.

Book you say it's Mike Myers movie, you know, but it really, it was about you. And now that there's been this period of time that's gone by. Have you seen this as an enormous gift to you? Have you seen it as just one more thing that causes people to want to reach out to you and say, hey Shep, tell us your success secrets or tell us how you think about life or whatever. I mean, what is It. How is it?

I'm still in the middle of a journey, but it's been an amazing journey. I have gigantic self worth issues. So for me, it was very difficult to have people come up to me and say, oh my God, man, you changed my life. I saw the movie and it was hard for me to be able to look them in the eye like, what are you talking about? I'm just a schmuck, you know, I don't mean that. I said it twice and I don't mean it the way maybe it's coming out. I'm just human. What are they seeing? That was my initial part of the journey and really uncomfortable for me in the beginning. And then I started asking people what. What made you feel this way? Because I had so many people reaching out, people from. I think the first thing I got was this big box from Africa and it was a birdcage with a long letter of a girl who said she came from a village somewhere in Africa. And in the bird cage were all these beautiful, as I remember, white birds and one pink. One. They were all pink and one white. I think I still have the birdcage somewhere around. And this beautiful letter about how she didn't want me to think she was different than the other people in her village because we're all equal, but that she had special talents and that if I would let her out of the cage, she could rise to a place where she could come back and help her village. And it was so beautiful. But it was like, why me? That was sort of hard for me to accept. Two sides of it. One, that I couldn't really do anything to help bring her dream alive. It was too remote and too random and I'm too old. And two, questioning what it was. I started asking and I had a lot of celebrities and a lot of billionaires and a lot of people who I really respected reaching out, flying over on their own planes to have lunch and say, I have to spend time with you. Great, come on over and have lunch. And slowly over that process, I got to the point where I said, maybe I have actually something to offer in terms of helping people deal with who they are and getting to where they want to go in a way that's maybe different because a lot of the feedback was, you don't seem to hurt anybody. You want to have winners and winners. We want to live our lives like that.

Yeah. Joe and I were talking before getting together with you that this, this idea that kind of resonates throughout the book is your idea of compassionate Business. That that really is your overriding thing of all. And you see example after example of it, of trying to create win win situations and really almost setting it up so that the other person gets the win first. I mean, there's a lot of examples of that.

There's a great one. Last night I just actually sent an email to a fellow named Scooter Braun managed Ariana Grande in terms of marketing and brilliance. What I wrote him was, congratulations, you have turned shit into shinola. Eloquent win win compassionate way. This should be a Harvard Business School study of how to take what looks on the surface as a disaster and turn it into a miracle. And that's just what he did with it. You know, Ariana Grande, people died. It was horrible. Most artists would dig their head in the sand and cancel their shows, cry for a while, go see their psychiatrist. He took that event will make her bigger than she ever could have been in her life because she's now the leader of a camp. She's bigger than herself. They raised $13 million for people who needed it. They brought awareness to a subject that really needs it. It's just a beautiful win. Instead of, oh, poor Larry, our granddaddy that had a bombing. She's probably the biggest pop star in the world. That's brilliant management. I said to my, you are my hero. Because that's what guys like me who earn our living like that should do. Yeah.

Do you know Scooter?

Yeah, he's one of the guys who reached out to me.

Okay. I was going to say, because Scooter.

If I can have a minute, I would love to tell this story.

Absolutely.

Yeah. Yeah. So Scooter reached out to me. I was in la. I went to lunch with him. He contacted me four or five times. He was going to fly to Hawaii. He wanted to meet me, had a lot of respect, saw the movie. I went to lunch with him. My granddaughter was with me. He said he had Kanye west that night playing at Staples. Would I like to go see it? My granddaughter really wanted to, so he went. He was very gracious. I didn't see him at all. I had a friend of mine, owns the building, so he gave me seats, row one up in the balcony. Perfect little spot for me. It was a difficult concert. It was very loud and it's very different than everything I do. There was no lighting on the artist, but people were going insane. I mean, they loved it. So I was sort of not comfortable at all. I was sort of in that body language of not comfort. My hands were sort of up in my ears and I got a tap on my shoulder and I turned my head to the left and there was a hand with a pair of earplugs. And I said, wow, that's wild. I took the earplugs, I put them in, but I had no idea who gave them to me. We just walked. I didn't think I knew anyone around me. And then about 10 minutes later I said to my granddaughter, is it okay if we leave now? If you had enough? She said, yeah. We got up. It was Usher sitting with Scooter Brunt. Wow. And I thought what an amazing thing to recognize I was uncomfortable. To act on being uncomfortable in such a perfect way. If I hadn't left early, I never would have known it was him. And I don't know, I've never met him. Still to this day haven't met him.

That's so cool.

Yeah. And that's I think where most humans would like to be if they're conscious of it. I think you're right.

I mean that's funny that you mentioned Scooter because it's been a lot of ways there's a lot of the things that he did early on with, with Justin Bieber were really sort of, you know, amazingly similar in the same kind of vein as the things you did with Alice Cooper in the early years. You know, figuring out how to make.

It, how to make it happen. Someone try to do win wins. Well, I can't.

I'd love to pick up from there because there's two or three things through the history of the things that you've done that I think there are probably some really great lessons that we could unpack from your telling of them. If people have seen the movie and read the book to kind of have our opportunity to get the backstory on some of them. And one of the things that really struck me if you take we fast forward through all the serendipities that got you to the the landmark hotel that got you to meet Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin and introduce you to Alice Cooper and the first couple of years of it being as a really up front for the drug.

Business.

But when it where I think it takes a turn is when what really stood out for me is when you sat down with the band and you made the conscious decision of look, if we're going to do this seriously and we're not going to quit until we're millionaires and setting that out as an intention and that seemed like a really pivotal moment in the whole timeline where Everything kind of took a turn. Do you look back at it like that?

Yeah. Very pivotal. And the second part of it is I said to him, listen, it only took, like, 10, 12 guys to start Christianity. We don't need to be that big. I keep beating him up with that. It's only because they believed. They believed. They believed. That's what makes a religion. They believe. We just got to believe. Yeah.

I always love the thing. A couple guys were sitting around one day saying, let's create Harvard. So, I mean, pretty much everything comes from something.

Yeah. Yeah. You just gotta believe.

Now, was there any. Was there any sort of. If you were to look at it, take a snapshot at that moment, look at everything that had led up to it with your relationship with Alice Cooper, was there any indication that that was the trajectory that they were on?

No, I don't think so at all. We were on the other trajectory. We were. You know, nobody really wanted us anywhere. We couldn't get dates. No, no. It was completely the other way, luckily for us, because that was when we looked at our. Once we made that decision, we then said, okay, what are our strengths? What are our weaknesses? And the biggest strength was that nobody liked us. And that's a strong emotion.

Yeah.

That emotion. That's as hard to get as liking. Yeah. Neutrality is the death of creativity and marketing. Once we had that, we then said, how do we use that? Well, let's. You know, I actually had had a lecture in school about how art goes to a very narrow audience. Cultural revolutions go to a very big audience. So one of the things that the teacher used was Elvis Presley not showing his hips on the Ed Sullivan Show. He became the hate point for parents. And once he became the hate point for parents, he picked up that cultural revolution that every child goes through of, you know, wanting to walk on the other side of the street from their parents. And so that light bulb went off on us and said, hey, why? Why go the other way? It's so hard to get kids to like you, but it's really easy to get parents to hate us. And if we can get that to be intense enough for them to tell their kids, you better not like this. You know, they're going to come flocking to us.

It's amazing to hear you tell it like that and to read it in the book as a really, like, conscious decision that that was intentional, that that's the way that you kind of look at that and sort of position that as a strategy. It's fascinating.

Yeah. Yeah.

You know, let me ask Though, if we could, like.

Shep, would you actually call all the.

Stuff you did marketing or what would you call it? I mean, how would you.

How will you think it? Ours was desperation. We just wanted to be able to afford to eat. We had no money. We had. We had nothing. When we made the decision to do it, I stopped my pharmaceutical business, and that dried up the money. So literally, on Thursday nights, we ate rock soup, which is a rock in boiling water. Right? The house rules. Or if anybody brought a girl over, she had to bring dinner for everybody. Wow, wow, wow. We have no money. I mean, we literally had no money. So it was all done out of desperation. And, I mean, did you ever.

At what point did you realize that I actually have a system and a formula here? I mean, like, what was. I don't know if there's anything.

After Alice, it was Ann Murray. After Alice was successful, I was getting an amazing amount of attention. I was young. Nobody ever expected Alice to make it. And I was starting to get given a lot of credit, which was hard for me to take. And I said, well, let me get the furthest thing I can get from Alice and see if this stuff really works. And one of the things I used very heavily with Alice is what I called guilt by association. So I signed a girl named Anne Murray, Canadian, had a song called Songbird, right? Great song, went to number one. I came in on the heels of that song and got her in a picture with John. And no one wanted. They wouldn't book her on Midnight Special. They wouldn't put her on anything. And she was the perfect answer to what was going on at that time. She was the female Glen Campbell. She had the purest voice in the world. She didn't move on stage, which was almost an asset in those days, but she had no spark. So my thought was, if I can get a picture with some of the greatest artists in the world and her in the middle, I can go sell that. So I got John Lennon and Harry Nielsen and Alice and Micky Dolenz to take a picture with her. That one picture broke her. If you read her book, she says that was the change of life for her. She made the Rolling Stone cover. She got hosted Midnight Special. I didn't stay with her very long because it wasn't really what I had any interest in doing. But I proved to myself I knew how to do it and that I could make a difference.

How old were you at that time?

30, 21, 22.

Wow, that's amazing. You think. You know, the interesting thing was did you talk about coupons? You talk about your idea of. And we look at that as like, you know, relationship equity. That's really the. The thing that you. You had so much relationship equity with, with Alice, with John Lennon, with the, you know, knowing that they would, if you asked them, go and take that picture with her.

Oh, yeah. But I had them sort of in a prison cell because I was the only one who had a car. My loss came in a very strange way. I got that on my knees at the Rainbow Bar and Grill. They were really drunk already. I said, listen, guys, I got this girl from Canada that I'm trying to really break through. She had number one record. If I can get a picture with you guys around, it'll take five minutes. I can drive you there. I'll drive you right back. If you don't want to do it, that's fine, but you're going to have to find a new guy to take you home tonight when you're drunk. And it was very fast. They all said yes.

You know what's funny about that? Like, if you actually go back to that period in time, for people that are young, they couldn't even fathom why taking a picture would be a big deal. But you got to realize back then, there weren't. Like, everyone didn't have a cell phone.

And also, it was John Leonard's dark days, so nobody had seen him. He left Yoko and they knew he was in la, lost. But nobody stormed. And that was a big conversation. Where's John Lennon? Is he alive? What's John Lennon doing? So now to have the first picture of John Lennon, which I couched as John Lennon comes out for the first time to see an artist. Ann Murray. Wow.

Yeah.

Yeah. So that put everybody's focus on Ann Murray for a minute. Like, why would. Holy shit. Can't believe these guys would come out. They don't come out. They're not coming out for Hendrix, they're not coming out for Joplin. They come after Ann Murray. Wow. We better check her out now.

Did you book the. Did you book her gig there, knowing that you would be able to pull that off?

I've always been fairly sick, so the reason I didn't. I was looking for. I didn't know they would be there, but I was looking for the most juxtaposition thing I could do for this girl from Canada to make noise in America, right? So it was Thanksgiving Day. I booked the Troubadour for Thanksgiving Day. She's Canadian. They don't have Thanksgiving. Right. I built a 2 ton turkey out of wood and brass, which became the backdrop of the stage. The neck of the turkey came off and the musical equipment was in where the neck was. And as she started her show, 12 violin players came out and stood in an arc around there in the wings of the turkey.

Oh, my goodness.

I had a company called the Great American Food and Beverage Company, which was in Santa Monica at the time. They had singing waiters and they served all their food without utensils on long boards. Guy named Papi owned it. So I ordered. And the Troubadour had long tables, like Vegas kind of tables. So I ordered a plaque with like six turkeys and all this stuff on it for each of the tables. And we made a walk in presentation with the singers, the waiters singing Old Canada. Wow. So in the middle of that, it just so happened. When I booked it, I didn't even know John Lennon would be in L. A. But it just. So I had a great press turnout because in those days, if you spent money, you could get people to come. And I had a reputation for being nuts anyway and throwing great parties and Canadian playing. Thanksgiving at the Troubadour just made no sense to anybody, which brought some curiosity. And then when I heard they were all up at the. At the Rainbow, I said, shit, I gotta get him. So I just got in my car and raced up and got him and put him down. Wow. I took it right back. Yeah, that's.

What an incredible story. But to make that happen, you know, it's interesting that you talk about that juxtaposition, like certainly that juxtaposition. And then from that to Blondie, which is another juxtaposition there again. And then I look at this idea of, you know, when you were representing the trifecta of Luther Vandross and Teddy Pendergrass and Rick James, all, you know, there's like three. That's all three points of difference.

Challenges. The separation amongst them was a very interesting challenge because they all were gigantic.

Yeah, but in different ways. And different crowds. Right?

In different ways. My job was to really refine who that crowd was and then really market hard at them. The black world has not yet crossed into the white world. It wasn't like today. Luther would do five nights at Madison Square Garden, but it'd be mostly a black audience. Same thing with Teddy. And our desire was to refine the two. A An idea that could work for anyone. So with Teddy, it was all about sex. He was just the sexiest man ever. Women would like, faint at the shows they'd throw panties up. So my thought was, how do I now tell white America what's going on in their neighborhoods? How do I get white women to be curious about this thing? So I started calling him Black Elvis. Every time. Every time we ever talked about anything in my office, every press release, every talk, every record company, Black Elvis was our thing. That was my you all. You say Teddy Pendergrass, Black Elvis. Every time you say his name, you put Black Elvis next to it.

Did you make up those words?

Yeah. Oh, wow. That's. Elvis was the biggest in that genre, right? But then it wasn't really creeping in. So then I said, okay, what can I do to double up on that? And the thought was, let's do concerts for women only. That certainly defines what he is. Let's get 5,000 women coming in a. In an arena going absolutely berserk. And let's show that to white America, women. Because, you know, then they're going to want to be there. I went to Teddy and I said, I want to do these concerts for women only. And he looked at me like I was completely insane, right? Like completely insane. And this lawyer was in the room. He said, you can't do it. It's against the Constitution. And the record company said, you can't. And I just kept telling Teddy. He would say to me, will this work? And I said, I have no idea, but we got to try it. I think I can pull it off. Just have some faith in me. I can pull it off. I can make it so we don't get sued. So what we did is we accepted men if they bought a ticket, but we didn't say it in the advertising. We got around every issue. One of the biggest challenges for me was, how do I do this and keep Teddy lovable, not arrogant, right? I didn't want arrogance. I wanted soft cuddling. You know, soft. Close the door. Come on in here. I wanted that. I didn't want an arrogant guy. So we came up with. It took us a while, but we came up with a great idea for the ad, which was, we never showed Teddy. We just had a teddy bear. With a note on it that said, come spend the night with me. Love, Teddy.

That's so great.

When they got to the hall, we gave out. Every seat had a chocolate teddy bear lollipop because we wanted that photo of them licking the lollipop, biting its head off. Oh, just poo. And it all worked. It was great. We sold out, like, eight cities. I think if Teddy hadn't had his accident, he probably People other than me today would be calling him the Black Elvis. Wow. He was on a projectile. Yeah.

Talking about Cooper's brilliant strategy, though. Yeah, go ahead, Joe.

I wanted to ask you about even just Elvis in general, because the first time I had dinner with Alice Cooper, he actually told me a story about.

Elvis and about how Elvis was so.

Protected, like, literally the people that were his handlers, the people that he surrounded, him literally like, controlled his life. Towards the end, he was so shut, like, which, you know, because we talked about, you know, the kind of the demise of Elvis and everything. And I mean, did you ever know him personally?

No, I only met him once with Alice, and I sort of got shut out of the meeting. He took Alice in the other room. They shot guns. It was really weird, but that's the only time I ever met him. But I can see his projector. I mean, he was bigger than anybody's ever been. I'm sure as confused as every other artist as to why they had a. He had a manager who was very brilliant, but very Svengali. Colonel Parker. And life can get tough sometimes if you don't have someone around you helping you out. Colonel Parker was a big gambler, had big losses in Vegas, and Elvis just had to stay on the wheel for Parker to pay off his debts. Wow.

Well, you know, there's a line in the book where I believe you say that stars are not born, they're made. I think that's what you say.

I don't know if I say it, but I would say it's like salt and pepper. I think there is a quality seeded, but that quality, but that's not enough.

That's really the same, right?

Yeah, that's probably not enough. That's my.

That's my question to you is as every. You know, I wanted to actually say something to in the beginning because like, you know, just hearing what you were saying about the. The self worth and looking here, you know, why me?

What have I done?

That sort of thing, maybe it helps people like a little bit of questioning and either that's like, you know, just because of the purposes, not wanting to have a big head. There's also an aspect of, you know, the way that I define marketing and selling because that's, you know, people come to me and Dean to learn about this stuff and we started doing this podcast back in 2010, and then everyone recently has jumped on this whole podcast podcast bandwagon. Although I did the first one back in 2005 and we put out all of this, this information for free. We've had millions of people download what we listen to and you know, this interview will be listened to by hundreds of thousands of people. And, and basically it's one of these things to where whenever you say the word marketing or selling, it always evokes a certain sort of perception. I think what people are not up on, they're down on. Marketing can be used for good or it can be used for evil. And I've started redefining it as think of selling as influence and think of marketing as storytelling. And if you tell a better story, you're going to get more buy in, get more enrollment. You know, telling your story is, you know, quite impactful and influential, obviously, because I mean, hell, that's how when, you know, when I speak to Supermensch, you know, I tell people not only is it a great damn movie, it's entertaining as hell, but there's like tons of entrepreneurial lessons in it.

And you're now, you're now in a.

Position in your life where you're, you're teaching people by sharing your life story and your life lessons. And you're also like, we have a friend named Dan Sullivan who's brilliant guy in his mid-70s, who's coach more successful entrepreneurs than anyone in the world.

I know the name. Yeah, yeah.

And he has this term called industry transformer, where people that have literally transformed an industry and you have done that. I mean, if you just point to celebrity chefs, I mean you literally, you invented or were at least the catalyst. I mean, you know, from the little that I know of you as you know, other than just the outside books and movie and stuff, and from what I've talked to Alice about you, you know, you're. It doesn't seem like your personality would want to even take credit for that sort of stuff, but you certainly were a catalyst for it. And I think that's a huge thing. And it seems to me like, you know, both Dean and I got into what we do today accidentally. I mean, we're both converts of our own system. I was a dead broke carpet cleaner living off credit cards and I needed to survive. And I had to figure out how to successfully sell something nobody even wants to buy, which is like carpet cleaning services. And I discovered this, you know, this thing called marketing, which other people need. And so my thing that I'm most interested in with you is a lot of people have incredible talent, but they're broke. And there's other people that don't, but they do very well. When you can match really great talent with the ability to tell the world about it, to market it, to get known. Because so many people, they want to be discovered simply because they think they're good. And there's no relationship between being good and getting paid. There's only a good relationship between being good, getting other people to know about you, and then getting paid for it. And so, you know, I mean, I think without that thing, call it marketing, call it promotion, call it, you know, whatever antics you want to, you know, accidentally or on purpose, someone, you know, they're not just going to discover you unless you're really lucky. And then the cases where there is luck, and there certainly is, that a lot of people place so much emphasis on it that I think they bumble around, not really kind of thinking through how the hell to make their business, their life, their music, their talent, ever become a career that they can survive off of. And so people have come to you to do that, and you successfully done it. And I think that's why people look up to you. Like, can you send me the birdcage? And can you tell me what to do? And, I mean, I think in a lot of ways, without ever having to talk to people at this point, you're probably influencing. I can't imagine you've not influenced millions of people at this point and probably will. And I think that's a, that's an honorable thing. I think it's pretty awesome, you know, and I, I, you know, I hope that some of that sinks in for you as much as. Because it certainly sinks in for me. I mean, it's still hard for me to, you know, see, people have sent us letters saying, you know, we listen to your podcast and we've become millionaires, and they've never even bought anything from us.

But it, yeah, it's wild.

It's really wild, you know, and you.

Just put that out there. Yeah.

So, Mike, my. Quite my question out of all that is like, the whole notion of how do you, you know, how do you get yourself? What do you need to have in your mind, in your behavior to get you discovered, to get yourself. Yeah, I'd rather be well paid than well known. I mean, some people would rather be well known than well paid. It'd be nice to, I guess, maybe parlay both of those if one leads to the other. But I'd just like to get some of your thoughts on.

Yeah, it's big questions. I mean, I know my part of it is asking someone what their dream is, and then you find out if it's money or fame or A combination of both. That's the way I used to start with all my clients, was give me a dream, let me bring a dream to life. And then we can get rid of trying to figure out what each of us do and get on with the work. But I think, you know, the thing that I, in terms of marketing, what I've always tried to do, can't do it 100% of the time. But in most cases, with most of my artists, was to pick up on what I call a wave. Watch culture, watch society, see what the waves are, and try and become the face of that wave. Sometimes it manifests in a small part of a career. Sometimes it manifests in a big part. So in a small part, for example, word came out in the press that there was going to be video discs. This was back probably in the early 80s, that there were going to be video cassettes or maybe late 70s and video discs. And people were going to be able to watch stuff in their homes. And you could see that was going to be a wave. That was a gigantic wave. So I did the first video album with Blondie. Eat to the beat. But there was no. You couldn't do anything with it. Nobody had a player. But the press we got off doing the first video album was so gigantic that it put her at the forefront of this revolution.

I remember, literally, I mean, in the 80s, Blondie was certainly when MTV was just getting started. That's, of course, where.

Of being, you know, producing stuff specifically for MTV for a live album, really putting her as the face of that revolution. And that's what I tried to do with most of my artists, was make them part of a revolution. Make them part of something much bigger than them. The way I tried to make Teddy part of the sexual revolution, much bigger than him. Everybody's a sex fiend at some point in their life. With Luther, I tried to catch the romance wave. At least in those times, 85% of the population got married. Marriage was the most romantic. They put a questionnaire out. What was the most romantic night of your life? The marriage. How do I make him the face of marriage, Especially considering he wasn't married?

Especially considering. Well, pay no attention to that.

20 cities, we ran contests to get married live on the air. The marriage performed by Luther. Wow. And he became the face of weddings for the next two or three years. He was the most played at weddings. The most.

Maybe the fact that he wasn't married was an advantage in that they all fantasized about marrying him, you know.

Yeah. I think that could Help, too. But it's trying to do that with each act, you know, trying to find something bigger than them to make them the face of. Yeah. Now.

And that I see, now that you mentioned it like that, I hadn't seen or heard you talk about Blondie in that context of getting ahead of the wave of video. And then now.

She did the first white rap record in America, Rapture. And that was just catching a wave. We were looking. We heard about this thing up in Harlem that was really catching on. People on cardboard dancing with beatboxes. And we got on a subway, we went up to Harlem, and we just took advantage of that wave because we wanted her to be the underground anti society artist.

Yes. And so now you think that. Now that I hear you say that, that makes total sense. If we reverse engineer the idea of the celebrity chef that that was getting in front of the Food Network.

That was the easiest project I ever did. Because the hardest thing to do is create demand.

Right?

And the demand was there, you know, if I was mentored by a chef. So I got to see the world of chefs through his eyes. And I got tremendous respect for these artists. They were living the same lives as Alice, except they weren't getting paid. None of them got paid. There wasn't a chef in America making $100,000 a year. People like Wolfgang Puck had one restaurant. No chef had more than one restaurant. Nobu had a place. Matsuhisha, little place on La Cienega. Alice Waters had Chez Panee. It was a different world. But if you were a billionaire, you could always get a ticket on the 50 yard line at a Super Bowl. You could get a front row at Broadway an hour before the show. There's always scalpers. But you couldn't get into Charlie Trotter's or you couldn't like Vincent's in Phoenix. In the old days, you couldn't get in. Didn't matter who you were unless you had a personal relationship with the guy, and that's the man. That's gigantic demand. And it crystallized for me. I had a Kenny Loggins show on the Big island for Nissan. And Wolfgang did the dinner. And after the show, Wolfgang got paid nothing. Kenny got paid 150,000. There were maybe 25 women waiting for Kenny's meet and greet and 300 waiting for Wolfgang's. Oh, wow. What's wrong with this picture? Right?

Right.

So for me, it was very obvious then. It was just rolling up your elbows and doing the work and building what I called highways. I told the guys at that first meeting, I said, you know, it may look like a big mountain to climb, but let's look at Michael Jackson for a second, who's about the. At the top of the highest mountain that we all want.

Yes, the self proclaimed king of Pop.

He would have been a wandering minstrel if no one had invented records, tv, record stores, T shirts. He became what he is because there were delivery systems to get to an audience. You guys, as culinary artists have no delivery systems. Either someone's in your restaurant or they're not. And what does your restaurant have? 80 seats? Where are you going in life if that's the only way you touch your audience, you're going nowhere. So let's build some highways. Let's get a TV network to broadcast. Let's get pots and pans in stores, let's get books on the shelves, let's get videos to people can buy. Let's give them a chance to like you. And the rest was really easy.

Wow, that's now had you. Was it just the timing of you starting to represent these guys and then the Food Network just starting up? How did that come about?

There was a guy named Reese Schoenfeld who I knew from cnn. He had started CNN for Turner. And I had to. I did some business with Turner. So I knew this fellow, Rich Hoenfeld, and he left cnn and then he announced that this is the early days when he could still start networks. And he announced he was going to start a new network. He wasn't sure what it was. So I went to see him and I said, have you thought about food? And he said, I thought about it, but I really don't like chefs and the food world and all that stuff. And I said, well, I can get you all your talent if you do a Food Network. I get you all your talent for free. I've already talked to my guys. They've all agreed to do three years free if I can get someone to broadcast. So you'll have no talent fees. And talent fees were gigantic in those days. I think it was a combination of him going to the outlets who said okay, and the concept that he wouldn't have to pay talent fees. What I asked them for was a spot in each show. And we created for each of the chefs a product we could sell with Emeril was the spices. The bam. For Mary sue and sue, it was chili peppers, hot tamales. I forgot what the other people were.

I mean, you look at every Wolfgang's pizzas and the.

I couldn't get Wolfgang on because no one could understand them.

Oh, gotcha.

Okay. Yeah. Like, Danielle Wolfgang was very. I just couldn't sell it to Reese, who didn't like chefs to begin with. So when I brought in a chef with an accent, that was, like, way beyond his capability.

Right.

You know what's interesting?

Because there's.

Boy, there's so many things I would love to ask you, and I want to be cognizant of time. You know, you are such a unique packager of all of these other people's talent. I mean, you could identify these things. You could see the trends. The thing that you mentioned about becoming the face of the wave, knowing what horse to ride. I mean, these are all these things that you learned how to do. And along the way, my biggest takeaway from it, because it's something I say to people all the time. I mean, this quote that I heard early on, I'm 49 right now, but when I was in my early 20s, I heard a quote which is, be nice to the people you meet on the way up. They're the same people you meet on the way down.

Oh, my God. I've said that so many times to my clients, I can't tell you how many times. Yeah.

And it's a beautiful quote. And I always operate.

I put a second part to it. Go ahead. Which is the most selfish thing you can do as an artist? The most selfish is be good to the people on the way up, because they're going to pick you up on the way down. And believe me, you will have a way down. Right. So the most selfish thing you can do in your career is be good to everybody on the way up. And sometimes that gets through in a different way. But it is true. It's the best thing you can do, and it's the most selfish thing you can do. I like it.

So I'd like to talk about that with the. You know, because there's. I mean, again, I would recommend everyone listening to this, you know, read Shep's book. There's so many great, entertaining stories and business lessons and life lessons. And I listen to stuff, really, for the life lessons. You know, your whole notion of saying thank you about gratitude, your coupons. And that's some of the things I'd like to kind of talk with you about, especially before we wrap up.

Because.

I just think there's. If we can at least get that for people to see that. I mean, you know, I always operate with is, you know, leave the campfire better off than it was before you showed up, and that all money Earned ethically is a byproduct of value creation. And so, you know, I'd like to get your philosophical views on that.

And why?

Because, you know, you have.

I mean, you have all these people that are.

That look at you as such an amazing, you know, guy. And this movie is called Supermensch, you know, which kind of says it. And any of that that we can share with people that would have them really look at their integrity, have them really look at how they treat people, how look at their character and how. Look at also that you can't. If you go around just fucking people over and doing stupid shit and short shortchanging people karmically, I believe it's going to come back to you.

And.

And on top of the fact that unless you're, you know, there's a part of you that just has no compassion for people. I mean, you just sleep better at night knowing that, you know, you're going through the world just trying to, you know, add, you know, add some goodness to it. So I'd like to hear your perspective.

I keep going back to selfish somehow. I don't know why. What I've learned through my journey. I've been fortunate enough to have some mentors who never talked to me about anything, but I could watch them. That service, compassion make you happy. The happiest people I know are the people of service and compassionate. You know, I had the benefit of being around Mr. Verger, who was amazing, and he would do things like the first time we went to a restaurant. That I picked, not him, and it was a horrible meal, and I had a little bit of my plate, and he emptied his plate and then emptied my plate. And we walked outside afterwards, and I said, because I was still new to the relationship, and I wanted to know why I didn't like it, why he did. What was I missing? What was that secret juice that I was missing? And I said, Mr. Verget, I don't know if it's my palate isn't sophisticated enough or my taste is different from growing up, but I didn't enjoy that meal at all. I thought it was very poorly prepared. And you obviously loved it because you finished my plate and yours. What did I miss? And he said, oh, Shep, it was horrible. And I said, horrible. Oh, it was so horrible. I said, well, why did you finish my plate? And he said, because the chef will be in the kitchen watching the plates come back. And I didn't wake up this morning to ruin his day. Wow. That's not what I'm Here for. I can take a little bit of bad food. I can't take ruining someone's day.

That's amazing.

Well, you know, you asked him also to teach you how to cook. And, I mean, you tell that whole story in there. And I wanted to, like, at your stage in your life, you probably have a lot of people that reach out to you. Like you'd mentioned, you know, Shep, but you really wanted to learn how to cook. I mean, you were always at a place where you seemed to be extremely coachable and. And a lot of people aren't. And I'm curious about that. Like, about mentors, about these different.

I wanted to learn to cook just to be able to communicate better with him. That was his path to letting me into his life. And I would really be a moron if I wanted to follow him and then listen to him. So the first thing he said to me was, do you know how to cook? And I said, no. And he said, well, if you'd like to work in the kitchen, if you learn how to cook, I'd be happy to share some time. So, for me, that was the first step to my journey. And then I found that I actually had a little talent for it. And then as time went on, I found out that it was really my passion. Maybe because it brought back the memories of him or not. I am not completely clear on that, but my life has evolved into cooking. I wake up in the morning, I think about what I'm going to have for dinner. I remember my life through my meals. I just get excited by every meal. I found my passion. Music was never my passion. Music was my job, and making films was never my passion. I was very removed from it. I enjoyed Teddy's music and Rick James and Luther. That was sort of my musical pocket. But I lived here the last 20 years until Rick Rubin came without a stereo. Rick got me sonos for. For my house.

Wow, that's something. I got the sense.

I got a stove and a pizza oven and a wok.

I got the sense that when I was at your house and we had the dinner, that that's not an unusual occurrence, that.

That.

I mean, just everything that's set up. I mean, the group of people that.

Were there.

It was a wonderful experience. And I get the sense that that happens, that that was just a Tuesday.

Yeah, I was just gonna say that's.

Just a Tuesday at chef's house.

That's what I really enjoy. I love being a service. I love cooking. I love the dialogue. The conversations are always really interesting. It's interesting because people come and go fast from the island. So when I lived in la, the rhythm was you have dinner with the same people two, three times a week right here. It's a new crowd almost every dinner. That's true. Yeah.

You get great, fresh conversations.

It's great conversations and great people. And. And because it's a small island and I've been here so long, I just got an email from somebody I used to go out with and the ambassador, the Israeli ambassador is coming to Maui. Would I throw a dinner for him? Oh, wow. That happens. I'm doing one Friday night for a great winemaker, Bob Cabral, who makes three sticks wines. The next week I got a couple of chefs who are coming in to do so. It's always exciting and fun and, and it's really what I love doing.

In my prep of all of this, prior to the interview here, it got me thinking. It didn't really occur to me. I've kind of had these conversations with Mark Tarbell a couple of times, like, hey, you should really show me how to cook. And I'm literally going to go. I mean, Mark is a dear friend of mine, so I've known the guy.

That's the right guy to learn from. Oh yeah. You want to talk about service, compassionate, selfless, all the things that make a great chef. That's Mark Darbell. Yeah. Yeah.

I've got a great interview with him on our podcast. So those of you that like this one, you can look up mark tarbell on ilove marketing.com and you'll hear like.

How he is just. He's remarkable. He's very quiet. Hard to really, he's just very quiet. He's very humble. He leaves no footprint on the planet whatsoever. But he's unbelievably joyous. Great chef and great intentions. Always well intentioned.

No, absolutely one of the sweetest guys. And that's how I met Alice. I actually met Alice through Mark. And, and first time I met Alice, we had dinner at Tarbell's. Well, actually the first time I met him, he was actually, I saw him, this was like years ago sitting across from me in Cheesecake Factory. But then when I actually got to know him and they were actually played at the Tavern, which is another one of Mark's restaurants, his main one's Tarbell's here in Phoenix. And they played a very small show. I think it was the first time Alice played like a, like a gig, like that.

It was a man.

Yeah, it was unbelievable. I want to ask you, like how do you choose who goes into Shep Gordon's inner circle? Meaning, like, the way that I decide who's going to be, you know, really going to become a dear friend versus just an acquaintance or a business acquaintance, because I know hundreds of people. I mean, I kind of violate the Dunbar's law thing. I mean, I track hundreds of relationships and I really like meeting amazing, interesting people. And, you know, like, with what we're doing now, I've interviewed over 500 people that are well known business icons. I'm Richard Branson's largest fundraiser. I've met all kinds of interesting people. One of the things who I decide who to spend more time with is not only just a vibe that I get and if I truly enjoy them. And we have sort of a shared value system, or at least, I mean, I have friends that politically believe the polar opposite of me and that sort of stuff, but they're still dear friends. But the criteria for me is, how are people that are more powerful? How do they treat people that are less powerful than them? So when I, you know, meet a real wealthy person or famous person and they're rude to wait staff or they don't hold doors open, or they just, you know, they're just kind of assholes, I mean, it immediately is like, I don't, you know, I don't put that person in my inner circle. So I'm curious as to. You meet so many people, you have all these dinners, but like, the people that truly become your closest friends, your confidants is there, like, I'd love to hear your standards, some of the things that really cause you to.

It's a wide range. I think I'm very attracted to power. I'm definitely a groupie of people who have accomplished something in their lives, like a grouping. So I get really excited when someone sends me an email that someone's coming to the island, wants to come over, would you have them over for dinner? And I Google them and I they've really done something, or I know them because I think that always bleeds off. And I think it's just by filtering. I sort of know the people who recommend people for the house. So mine is different. The relationships are much more temporary, I would say. Most of my close friends are sort of locked in a lot from high school, a lot from college, from my years in Hollywood. Here, people come and go fast. So there are people who come to the house for dinner for 20 years in a row who I consider really good friends, but different than a good friend that you're with all the time. So I don't really have a complete answer. But people who are compassionate and who have done something with their lives, those are the ones I'm really attracted to. The ones who scream about it, really turn me off. The ones who are humbled by their success are the ones I really get attracted to. I mean, it's definitely an attraction.

Yeah, no, I hear you. Yeah, I like achievers.

I just.

But I think, you know.

I mean.

I like people that are definitely doing stuff on the planet and putting stuff forward. I mean, everyone has potential, but potential means you just haven't done it yet. So I like people that have that are out there pursuing it, but not leaving shrapnel and killing people along the way.

One thing I don't allow in the house is business talk and anyone getting on a very tall ladder, looking down at someone and telling them what they should do. Right? Oh, right. Yeah. That doesn't sort of work for me, you know, but people who are willing to share their life journey, have a few laughs, know what coupons are, you know, can you.

Because you did mention it. But for people that may not really.

I'd love to. What is.

What is a coupon? I mean, what do you. What do you really.

What do you mean by that? Doing something you can do. I just had a great exchange with Sammy Hagar. There's a wonderful guy in la, David Arquette, who has a club that has these puppets, you know, the actor, and he came here for Christmas, gave me a puppet which blew my mind. And he emailed me that his friends are having their 10th anniversary. They're huge Sammy Hagar fans. They're going to be at the show in Connecticut. Could they get to meet him? So I emailed Sammy and hey, Sam, do I have a few coupons with no problem. Then he emailed me back a few seconds later, hey, would you ask David if he could maybe carry my new tequila at his club? And of course, the answer came back in one second. Yes. And those are coupons, like doing the right thing. Just you keep the circle moving. Sammy doing what he can do to help out. Dave is doing what he can do to help out. I'm doing what I do to help out. And life goes on in a nice way.

That's so great.

A perfect example.

So, Dean, I wanted to mention something like it. Another thing that you say in the film is that you spent your life living other people's lives and now here you are. What's next for you? And how do you. I mean, the whole thing of saying thank you every day. I mean, I think there's a lot that is valuable. I mean, even on the back of your book. I think it's Michael Douglas. He says, I have never been so hungry after finishing a book. Shep Gordon loves his life and they Call Me Supermensch is his joyful, soulful, and hilarious account of how he found some purpose for his own life. One of the good guys. Thank you. Thank you. So I'd like you to speak to that being. I mean, I would view it as your way of having gratitude.

Yeah, I think tricks to keep yourself in line are useful. I have a new one now. I did a talk in Carmel, and the guy who came on in the morning was Zach Anner is his name. He's a cerebral palsy victim in a wheelchair who is a comedian and has a couple of TV shows. One on Oprah's network, a travel show. And I showed up in the morning. It was in Carmel last week, and there were a few people having coffee. And he was at a table alone, but he was in his chair. And obviously life difficult for him. And I didn't sit at his table because I felt a little bit uncomfortable. I didn't know what to say, what to do. And then he got up and gave a speech. And he probably was the most inspiring human I've ever been around in my life. And from that point on, I went to him every morning and stayed with him. But I come home now and I start my day in the Jacuzzi and I think about him. It's like a trick I use for myself. I say to myself, wow, can you imagine what this kid's got to go through every morning to get to where I am? Just to get up, get his teeth brushed, maybe go to the bathroom. What it takes. And he's laughing and joking. There is nothing in my life that's going to happen to me today. You know, that's like. I had some cancer things taken off last week. So if I feel sorry for myself because I look weird for a day, shame on me. Shame on me. And it's been every day. So that's a trick. But I love using tricks. Thank you, thank you. Thank you. As a trick for me, it's like a harmonic, I guess. Some people do it through meditation, some through yoga. I have these visual and auditory triggers for myself that keep me in line because it's so easy. We live in a society where you get so fooled by false gods and jealousies and greeds and how come not me and why don't I have this? At any level, you're living. So if you're a wealthy guy, how come I don't have a plane? If you have a plane, why don't I have a bigger plane? If you're starving, how come I don't have a meal? So at any level, I think it's important to get some kind of things that make you realize how lucky you are. Even if you're hungry, that you know you're hungry. Oh, my God, what a miracle that is. Now I can go get some food. Hungry, right? Right.

No, so true. So true. That's really great. Well, Dean, I mean, I could ask Shep questions forever here, but I want to be. I want to be cognizant of the time. So do you got any final. I mean, this has been fantastic and I really, really appreciate it.

Shep. Yeah.

Thank you so much.

Yeah. And let's say in terms of everybody out there living in Phoenix, go try Tarbells. It's a great experience.

Is there any.

Another book?

Are there any things that you're doing that people should pay attention to?

I have no. You know, I don't really. I've been having a really good time going around the country doing talks, and so I made. Excuse me. I may pursue that a little. I'm not sure. I think Alice and I are going to go out. We did a talk in LA together. We had a great time.

I saw that and it was fantastic.

I said to Joe that we need.

To arrange that for the annual event. Be fantastic.

So I think we're going to go out and maybe do a week.

By the way, when we wrap here, don't hang up right away because I want to. To share with you a couple of things. But yeah, for sake of this, have you set up any sort of website or anything that is like a blog or anything?

I think it's shepgordon.com okay, we'll check.

That and we'll put that in the show notes.

But I'm not sure if there's anything else.

Yeah. And what I'll say to all the people listening, if you enjoyed this, which I can't imagine, you would not share it with anyone that you think would find this useful. And we'll put the trailer for Shep's movie Supermensch, and a link to get his book and just anything that we think would be useful for you to follow with Shep.

We will put it out there.

And I really appreciate it by Anthony.

Bourdain, by the way. Just As a side note, say that again.

Published by Anthony Bourdain.

Was published by Anthony Bourdain. It's an Anthony Bourdain book. Wow. Okay. Cool. Cool. He came up to me at a. The way the book started is he came up to me at an event and he said, I want to do your life story. And I said, why? And he said, because if it hadn't been for you, I wouldn't be here.

Right. Without you, there's no me.

What does that mean? He said, well, you made Emerald famous. And I got famous by beating up Emerald. So I sort. Oh, yeah.

That's so great. I love it.

It was really great. That's all. Thanks, guys. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Thanks for listening to this episode of I love Marketing. If you'd like to learn more about the Genius Network annual event, go to geniusnetworkevents.com that's geniusnetworkevents dot com if you would like access to the full interview, the show notes, and the special resources for this episode, please visit ilovemarketing.com 301 that's ilovemarketing.com 301.

Sam.