How Grief Taught Award-Winning Producer Jack Antonoff to Be Less Cynical: NPR

A comment from Wild card host Rachel Martin: I've noticed something about the current cultural moment. Regret is a bad word. Nobody has them anymore. Instead, the emotionally enlightened among us look back and see only “experiences and choices that made me who I am today.”

And I understand that. We understand that it's not particularly healthy to obsess over things we've done wrong in the past. But I think we lose something when we don't take into account our bad choices. Somehow, dismissing those things feels like just “part of my journey” as a police officer. There is no responsibility in that.

I talked to music producer Jack Antonoff about this. I told him that the biggest regret of my life was not being at my mother's bedside when she died. At the time, I convinced myself that I could only stay away from work for so long – that my siblings could stay and that I would be the one to come back and be with my father after she died.

Antonoff shared something similar. One of his biggest regrets was touring so much when his sister died of cancer. He felt that if he turned down opportunities, they would not come back. We all justify the choices we make at that moment. It's okay to regret those things. To wish we had made different choices. The key is to absorb the consequences of the choices and move past them.

Antonoff's life isn't defined by regrets, but he told me it is is defined by sadness. He didn't say it in a sad way. Just as a fact. It frames his songwriting, how he interacts with people and how he sees the world.

The sadness, he says, makes things feel more precious. And he has a lot to be grateful for. His band Bleachers released a new album earlier this year. He has won a ton of Grammy awards and has produced for some of the biggest names in pop music, including Taylor Swift. Last year he also married actress Margaret Qualley. He has made peace with the regrets he has and takes nothing for granted.

This Wild Card interview has been edited for length and clarity. Host Rachel Martin asks guests randomly selected questions from a deck of cards. Tap play above to listen to the full podcast, or read an excerpt below.

Question 1: What is something about your hometown that you have come to appreciate over time?

Jack Antonoff: The slowness of my hometown. I grew up in New Milford, New Jersey. I was there until I was eight and I just stared at the walls.

All I wanted to do was break out, I wanted to go everywhere and do everything and travel the world and, you know, make my mark. And that slow, slow, slow boredom of where I grew up made my imagination run wild.

I can't recreate it and I can't change it and I never would. I'm just glad I have it. My life consisted of cars waiting for my mother to do whatever she did.

Question 2: What is the proof that someone really knows you?

Antonoff: The proof that someone really knows me is when they understand my rituals around feeling clean.

Martin: Oh, so many follow-up questions here.

Antonoff: It's not easy. It's not like, “He's a germaphobe.” It is very specific in my definition of what is and is not clean.

Martin: OK. Tell me an example of what that looks like for you.

Antonoff: My only concern about cleanliness is around my face. I haven't touched my eyes, nose, mouth or ears with my hands, unwashed, in probably twenty years. So it's very specific.

Martin: But how is that even possible? While you were talking, I realized I was rubbing my eyes.

Antonoff: That's how you get sick. This is how germs spread. I'm going to play for people, but I don't have to rub my eyes, nose, mouth and hands if they haven't been washed.

Question 3: How has grief shaped your life?

Antonoff: Whole.

Martin: Whole?

Antonoff: I think of it almost as an emotional lens. It's not like what happened and what you feel sometimes. It's how you see things now. My sister died when I was 18, but she had been sick since I was five. So it was a big part of my life.

Martin: So how does that manifest in how you see the world?

Antonoff: The problem with sick people, people who are not sure how long they will live, especially children in that position, is the lack of cynicism. The obsession with creation, joy, love, family. If you may not have much time on earth, you don't define yourself by the things you hate, very simply put. And so that just lives in me.

I don't really do a bit, you know, I feel very sincere about the things that I do and say. And I think a big part of that is just confronting time and vulnerability, and that was always on the table.

Martin: How do you feel most connected to her?

Antonoff: Probably through my family. I think when you have a big loss, people run or cling to each other. We definitely did the glue method.