- How are you? (audience applauding)
- I'm great!
- You're great? Oh-
- I'm great! It's good to be here.
- [Kelly] Oh my God! Seeing you is reminding...
Okay, I can't remember what...
I saw y'all play and it was in Nashville.
- [Dan] Yeah, yeah.
- And it was in the woods and a singer owned it,
a country singer.
It was in the woods, it was outside.
I'm trying to remember.
Does it start with an "f"?
- I was trying to think of that venue, too,
but yeah, I don't remember.
- [Kelly] The name of the venue, it's such a random venue
in Nashville.
- It's beautiful, it was outside, yeah.
- I know! That's what I'm saying!
I was trying to remember what it was,
'cause it was the coolest place to see a concert, one,
and y'all killed it!
- Thank you.
- Anyway, I love seeing you live.
It's incredible to see someone live that sounds even better.
(Dan chuckles)
You sound even better than your records. It's rare.
- Thank you, thank you. (audience applauding)
Appreciate that.
- Anyway, have y'all met before?
- Yes, we have. - Yeah, oh yeah, yeah.
We go way back. - Yeah, we go way back.
- Aw, bromance! (audience laughs)
- Yeah. - Yeah. Wow, your shoes!
It's crazy! - Oh, you like 'em?
You like' em? (Kelly laughs)
(audience laughs) - [Dan] Wow!
- [Shaq] Nice, right? - [Dan] They look amaz...
What size is that?
- 22. (audience gasps)
- What? - Yes.
- I never knew that was a shoe size!
- It is.
- Just for you? (audience laughs)
Do other people have that size?
- Yes, they do. - Oh my God!
(Shaq laughs) That's a big shoe, okay!
(Shaq laughs) (audience laughs)
Well, there's no segway there, just a lot of jokes.
(audience laughs)
You've got four kids at home, that's a lot of kiddos.
So do they enjoy hearing dad play music?
Do they think you're cool still?
- I think they think I'm cool.
I play music for them everyday.
I write everyday and between them and my wife,
they're the ones who pick what goes on
an Imagine Dragons record.
I play them the songs, and if they wanna hear it again,
then I'm like, "Okay, there's something here."
- [Kelly] Wow. - And if they don't,
then it doesn't make the record.
So you can thank my four year olds for putting it together.
(audience applauds) - They have great taste!
- Yeah, so they hear the records, yes.
- They have great taste.
So Shaq, your kids like to rap and DJ with you, don't they?
- Yes, they do. - Yeah?
Are they good at it?
- They're pretty good.
- They're... (Kelly laughs and claps)
He's like, "Not as good as me."
(audience cheers)
- [Shaq] This is during the pandemic
and we all had to stay in the house, so-
- That is...
First of all, you had the best pandemic
family thing happening.
Nobody was having that kind of fun during the pandemic.
That's amazing! (audience laughing)
Well, Dan, I've heard this new album was a tough one
to work on.
Why?
- Well, first of all, Rick Rubin produced it,
who's a legend in himself. - [Kelly] Yeah.
(audience applauds)
And when you're sitting down with... Yeah.
- You feel intimidated? - Well, yeah. I mean it's-
- "I gotta bring my A game"?
- Well, I already...
I've never gone over my lyrics with anybody.
I've always self-produced for the most part,
and I always write all the lyrics and melody,
and sitting down with Rick Rubin,
he wanted to go over every lyric
and would question me about it.
Like, "Why did you say this about that?
Do you really feel that way?"
- Oh, now that gives me a panic attack.
- I'm just like, "Oh, gosh!" (Kelly laughs)
I wanna hide and it's Rick Rubin,
and his beard, and he's like, "Well"...
And he would say things like,
"You know,
that line feels like you're not really being honest."
- [Kelly] Oh my God, it's like therapy!
(Dan laughs) - I'm like, "Oh!"
- That's like my therapist calling me out.
I'll be like, "Oh my God, bad connection! I can't..."
(audience laughs) All of a sudden the Zoom ends.
(Kelly laughs) - But, that being said,
it was great, it's what I wanted on this record.
I wanted someone to push me,
so between Rick and Shaq being in the studio with me,
(Kelly and audience laughs)
it pushed me. - You're two friends!
- [Dan] My two friends! (indistinct)
- You have amazing friends!
- That'd be really cool if my best friends were
Rick Rubin and Shaq since I was 12.
(Kelly laughs and claps)
- [Kelly] That's amazing!
That would give me a panic attack being in a room
and someone questioning every lyric that I'd wrote.
- Yeah, it was tough. - [Kelly] Oh my God.
- But it was great.
It's our fifth record,
I wanted someone to push me like that, so, it helped.
- Oh!
Oh, and look, it just appeared!
(Kelly laughs) (audience and Shaq laughs)
Thank you, Justin!
I love this! - [Dan] Thank you.
I love all the art that always comes with your albums, too.
I think it's so cool.
And you've also started up a special charity.
Can you explain what it is?
- Yeah, it's LOVELOUD.
It's in Utah, is where it started,
and we wanna bring it to other places,
but it's really just focused on igniting the conversation
about what it means to love and celebrate
your LGBTQ children.
When a child is raised, especially in a religious community
and they're LGBTQ, their suicide rate skyrockets.
The depression, anxiety rates skyrocket,
so it's really about changing the conversation,
igniting these conversations with these families about,
"Hey, how do we celebrate our children?"
I really don't like...
The term "accept" kind of feels like,
it's like, "I'll accept you."
But "celebrate" is really the word we try to use,
which is like, "How do we let our LGBTQ children know
they're perfect just the way they are?"
And they deserve to be celebrated,
and especially in these religious communities,
let's have these uncomfortable, hard conversations
and help the parents know that,
there's really only one choice and that's to let your child
be who they need to be, love them, and celebrate them.
(audience cheers) That's what LOVELOUD is.
- Yeah, love their story.
It's so crazy, we all have kids.
It's crazy to me.
I'm just hopeful that my kids find love.
I don't care who it's with, you know what I'm saying?
- Right.
- If you find love, real love, authentic love,
hold on with both hands.
I'm gonna tell my...
Regardless of who you're into.
- [Dan] For sure. - I just think,
well, if you find that, count yourself so lucky.
It's funny that we worry about all the other stuff
when really it is just that fundamental.
We all wanna be loved. - [Dan] Yeah.
- We wanna be respected, we wanna be successful,
all those things.
It's so funny how we complicate it.