00:00Hey Sammy, how are you? You know, is this Big Jim? First of all, let's get one thing straight.
00:06This is Big Jim himself? This is me, man, sitting here in the Motor City. I'm a Bob
00:11Seger over my shoulder. Life's good, brother. Well, I got my Red Rocker Logger shirt on. Life
00:17is good. Well, I just want to make sure I'm talking to the right guy, Big Jim. I can't be
00:21just telling anybody how you ask me how I'm doing. I can't just say that just, you know,
00:26to anybody that I'm doing great. I got to be talking to the man himself. You know what
00:30I mean? I don't want to waste a great statement like, Jingon! You know what I mean? That's
00:37how I feel. I got to tell you, Sammy. So this morning, 4 a.m., I'm at the radio station getting
00:42ready to do the show, right? And I'm looking at the website. I know it's oh dark early,
00:46right? But I'm sitting there and I'm like, I got to get some of my Logger. I got to get
00:50some Red Rocker. So there's a number locally, a 313 number. I text it and I said, hey, it's
00:55Jim at CSX. Whoever the guy is sends a note back going, Big Jim. So I said, I need to
01:01get two cases. It's coming to the radio station. I'm buying it tomorrow morning. It'll be there
01:05at 7 a.m. I'm the first drop on his day of delivery. That's how powerful your Logger
01:10is here in the Motor City.
01:12Well, I am working with the right people. And the idea of having, you know, beer made in
01:19Detroit. Come on, just like that guy up behind you, Bob Seger. Come on, it's American-made
01:23music, American-made in Detroit, no less, right? The car capital of the world.
01:30Well, yeah. I mean, and you know the love from Pine Knob, I mean, for all your years
01:34here in the Motor City, Sammy, but we love our beer here and you have no idea how people
01:39flipped out when they heard about this. Were you nervous? Do you get nervous about this
01:44when you unveil something like it?
01:46Well, no, no. I get excited. You know, I have a different chemistry wiring. I'm wired
01:52different than most people. Things that make people nervous, like walking out in front of,
01:55you know, 40,000 people or something. That doesn't make me nervous. You know what makes
01:59me nervous is walking out, you know, into a living room where there's five people and
02:04somebody says, hey, man, play and sing us a song. I'm going, shit, man, that's scary.
02:08I'm not joking. It's like I'm just wired different, I guess. You know, the bigger the
02:12crowd, the less nervous I am. I get up. I really get up for it. So releasing a new product
02:18like this. First of all, I wouldn't release it if I didn't think it was the best beer
02:21I could possibly make. So that's the whole confidence thing comes from. When I made tequila
02:26Cabo Wabo way back in the day, it was the best tequila in the world. I knew it. Anyone
02:30that tasted knew it. I wasn't afraid of nothing. I was fearless. Same with Santo. Now it's
02:35Santo with my rum, with this beer. I worked on this. I got to tell you, I worked on this
02:40formula since before I made tequila. I was trying to make beer way back. The first thing
02:47I tried to do was make beer. And it was early Van Halen days. I said, you know, I wanted
02:54to make beer. So I started talking to beer companies. I almost had a deal with one of
02:57the number two, the number two beer company in the world. And then I sold, it was going
03:02to be Cabo Wabo Cerveza. So I already had my formulas. I had my formula made. I know
03:06what I like. So they, then when I sold Cabo Wabo to a group of companies, they said, well,
03:12we don't want to make beer. And I said, damn, I, you know, I just lost my beer deal.
03:17So now I'm making it again. You know, Eric Schubert from a local Detroit boy who bought
03:23the, just the brewery, the old Detroit brewery called and said, Hey, I want to change the
03:29name to Red Rocker, the Red Rocker brewery. And I said, well, we got to make a deal. I said,
03:34but I want to make beer. He said, Oh, you want to make beer? I said, yeah, I want to make
03:37beer. I've got a formula and everything. I showed him my formula that I developed with the other
03:40big guys. And he, we immediately started making it, tasting it. I said, no, my taste changed
03:47a little bit. You know, I can use a little more hops, make it a little more bitter. But
03:51I like a little sweeter than your average Mexican brew. You know, I like to, and a little
03:55thicker, a little, not like an IPA, but a lager, but with a little more body and, you know,
04:01like Ducati and Corona. I mean, yeah, you know, it's like drinking water, you know? So I like
04:06a little, a little more bump in it. So, uh, we just tweaked the formula a little bit and boom,
04:12there it was Red Rocker lager. It was the easiest thing I've ever done. So I'm so confident. I'm not
04:17nervous. I'm jacked. So like, I was always wondering about the Sammy, like, so say when,
04:22when you write a song outside of your friends and family, I assume there's someone you go to and say,
04:27I'd like you to hear this. Is there someone when you're working on a beer or tequila or something
04:32that you go to outside of that immediate circle of the people who will love it no matter what,
04:37and you want their opinion? Oh, wow. You know, that's a big gem. You got a big brain on this
04:42early in the morning. You know what I'm saying? I'm impressed because no kidding. Yes, you
04:47absolutely. I have to try it out on all my friends. I'll have a party at my house. I'll invite all my
04:53beer connoisseur friends, you know, or my tequila guys that like tequila. And I say, Hey,
04:59I want everybody to try this. Let's let's and take notes. You know, I passed a little
05:02paper and a pencil around, you know.
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