Jesse McCartney on 20 Years of Beautiful Soul & All's Well Tour

Hey hey, it's Adam Havner in the YH Lounge and all's well today because I'm joined by the one and only hit maker Jesse McCartney. Jesse what's up? How are you man? Good to see you. It's been a great year for you.

Yeah, the EP dropped, I hit tour sold out. Yeah. They want more. We added more dates. Give em what they want. Yeah, we're going back out on tour this fall after an amazing run this spring. We sold out 20 of the 24 shows, surprisingly and uh, so we're heading back out. So part two, 22 cities. Yeah. October 4th.

Yeah. Do we switch up the set list or do you leave the magic alone? Because I feel like so many people didn't get to see it the first time around.

I'm going to give them sort of the same show. I might switch a couple things around in the acoustic set but it's working. So let's like not mess with it too much. Uh, so it's it's pretty much going to be the same show.

Beforehand, do you have a backstage routine or ritual? Is there a purse or a cup?

Yeah. You know, I've been traveling with a lot of the same bandmates and crew for over a decade. And so we have a rapport and we just, there's always something funny that happens that day. And whatever it is, like one of my drummers got attacked by like an eagle on in like Philly or something. And literally like he got too close to the bird's nest. And so, uh, he literally just like he had to dive into a bush and we just thought it was the funniest thing. It was on security camera too. So we got to see the footage. Anyway, like we have a word of the day. So that day was like, eagle on three, one, two, three. We usually just roast each other just before we go out. Everyone puts their hand in. Eagle on three, one, two, eagle and then we go and we play Philly. Other than that, like I'm not that ritualistic. I have, you know, I like to go to uh for a run wherever, whatever city I'm in. Sort of open up my lungs and get ready for an hour and a half or two hours of singing. But that's pretty much it.

You've been doing this over 20 years. Yeah. When you're on stage, is it second skin? Is it or is it out of body or you just like, I'm a natural. I just do it.

You know, it's definitely my happiest place, you know, being on stage. I feel like I've come a long way as a performer. I feel like a sense of mastery over performing live and and playing in front of a live audience. And I really do love the idea that something can happen on stage that's new every night, whether it's a fan interaction or I forget a lyric or something that we can make a joke out of. That it works. More often than you would think. Uh, on songs that you would think I shouldn't forget lyrics to like Beautiful Soul or Body Language, it happens. It happens to all of us. Uh, but yeah, it is sort of my favorite place to be is on stage. Live performing is where I started as a young theater actor in New York. And, um, yeah, and I'm just so grateful that I can continue to do it. Here we are 20 years, 20 plus years later, still rocking.

Let's go back to the beginning when you were young, growing up in New York. Who were the musical inspirations?

I mean, I've had a lot of musical inspirations. I think my folks were my first because my both my parents did a lot of theater growing up in New York and they both loved Rogers and Hammerstein, you know, classic The King and I and I think our first performance together was Oliver when I was 7 years old in a little community theater in outside of Manhattan. And so they kind of raised me in this musical household and they were my first sort of influences. And then I just started listening to a lot of pop music as a young person. I listened to a lot of Michael Jackson and Prince and Stevie Wonder and quickly became a fan of that genre and decided one day, like, I want to do music like that. But yeah, it all started with my family roots.

Did you ever get to meet any of those? Michael Jackson or Prince?

Unfortunately, not. I think I met briefly Prince at a I think it was Adam Levine's house. He was, this is like early 2000s. And he was there like with a guitar sitting by the fire and like, it was a long night, like everyone was drinking and having a good time. And he was just like Prince at like, what you think of when you think of Prince at a party? Huge platform shoes, walking around and like playing guitar in people's faces and I never got to like formally meet him, but I got to like watch him in his element, entertaining other rock stars, which was really fun. But yeah, I never got to meet Michael unfortunately. It's a shame that they're both no longer with us. They were two of the greats.

20 years, Beautiful Soul. Do you think, how can that be?

It's crazy. I I think about that all the time. I say a lot like in many ways, it feels like it was yesterday. I'm doing like this big tribute on on social media for the 20 year reunion. I'm going to post a bunch of photos of that time and making of Beautiful Soul, you know, the music video and the song and and I look at the photos and it's like, that was 20 years, like it feels like it was yesterday. But then I get on stage and I perform it and sometimes my knees are like, yeah, this is definitely 20 years old.

My car song is Bleeding Love. Oh, good. Which you wrote for my Leona Lewis. Yeah. But I'll be in the car and it comes on, it just comes over me. I can't sing. But for you. You can sing. No, I can't. But for you, I've heard you at a couple parties. For you, do you have a car song that comes on, not even your own, but just takes over you?

Yeah, it's probably like, I Gotta Feeling, Black Eyed Peas, you know, that's like one of those, roll the windows down, jam out. But I love that there's a new band I actually had a chance to work with the band Lawrence, who are this up and coming band out of New York. And we just had a writing session in Brooklyn together that was really successful and I'm hoping to work more with them. I think they're kind of like a young Black Eyed Peas. They're very soulful. I think they're the freshest thing in pop right now. They just have a lot of, there's just a lot of meat on the bone. They're great musicians, great singers and amazing performers. They just performed with Meghan Trainor the other night and I was out of town. I really wanted to go. Yeah, they're great too. I love listening to their new album. It's called Family Business, I think.

When you're going to finish the album? Yeah. Any new inspirations? Any things you're writing right now that you're feeling?

Yeah, I think, you know, I don't know if we're going to finish All's Well as a full length album. I haven't really decided yet. I'm just trying to stay in the studio and writing now as much as I can. I think it's shifted quite a bit where it used to be back in the early 2000s, I would finish an entire album. I'd work a year, a year and a half on it, you know, produce it, you know, we'd go out and do radio tours and market. Everything has changed so drastically now and I feel like now you stay in the studio, you pump out new music every few months, put it out. That seems to work for me now and keeps my writing muscles sharp. I think the songs that I've written in the last month or so are still in the similar vein as the All's Well EP. Whether or not it's a continuation or I just start an entirely new project, I'm not sure, but there'll be more music for sure. Next year.

Is there a favorite song of yours to perform and like a least favorite song?

My favorite is always changing. I really love playing Body Language. It's just like one of my favorite moments. It's super high energy on stage. It's very tongue in cheek too. I get very playful with the with the crowd on that one. Bleeding Love is a nice moment. I do sort of my version of the Leona Lewis song at the piano and that always works. It's like one of those like iPhone flashlights in the air moments. And then I did a cover of an extreme song called More Than Words, which is a classic sort of classic rock song. It's not really rock. It's like the most pop song they ever did. But we did an acoustic version of that, which was really fun and I think surprising for the audience.