Take 2 with Shmueli Ungar

you've met them in our pages been inspired by their message it's time for take two dot com reconnecting with the memorable personality across the world featuring some backstage psychology who wants to tell me that he enjoys my music and he doesn't even know how to tell me unexpected here is the latest process album is going to be a little bit of a twist sometimes you interview people but i interviewed a lot of people over the years sometimes you connect with them you think to yourself this is somebody even if it wasn't my job i would want to eat cocoa with this guy i would want to chill i hope you felt the same way about me it was great to sit with you you're honest you're raw you're real and specifically we spoke last time you go up on stage i've seen you at casanas i've seen you at events you light up hashem you're the three-dimensional presence you have an ability to light up everybody and at the same time when you talk and this came through in the interview you were very vulnerable there was a lot of pain in your life and you weren't afraid to talk about it then you weren't scared to confront it and the readers and the fans felt a certain connection with you because they're like maybe that's why i like his music so much he's a person like us who's been through things tell us a little bit about the decision to talk so openly about losing your father about some of the things you went through in your life would you do it again today do you think it was a mistake i don't really understand you you asked two questions he asked the first question was was that the right decision at the time you made a decision back then it wasn't a decision a little bit of a gutsy thing to do to talk so openly about difficulties that's your mistake i didn't look at it that way i didn't look at it like i'm gonna open up now it's gonna be guts it's just i guess the person who i am i like to have a conversation like to be honest about stuff when i'm having a conversation i like to know everything about the other person and i let i let everybody in the feedback i got was tremendous from people who read it and they said you discussed in the last article if you remember that you'd been married and it hadn't worked and for a couple of years you were singing after have you ever been married and you're describing the feeling of holding a microphone and looking at a cousin in the collar and lighting up the whole room and lifting everybody thinking to yourself and i'm going home alone to my basement department all by myself and people read that line and they're like wow that's hashimiliano reaches people because it's not just check check check saying go home you're feeling it yes yes yes singing music is all about emotion it's all about feelings and it's all about giving out whatever is inside of you and making sure that the people listening that you know it's what you say there you go he said that's why you're the writer even when you talk it goes into people's eyes and when you sing especially you sing a song and after muslims in the vet there's a lot of a lot of emotion a lot a lot of maybe pain sometimes that was years ago when we did that article was you came out with your israeli too it was when i would say about three years ago it was perm time two and a half years ago i think it was mahabraga it wasn't you didn't pick me up was the first one yeah you know we gotta wait to see that you're a winner gotta hedge my best i don't know i'm not gonna gamble two and a half years ago maybe at 2018. your career has been doing beautifully and and like i said i've seen you all over since then my question are you still do you find it that easy to connect with people still you don't run a risk of just you know going checking the boxes doing a performance and going home you're still able to summon up that authenticity that realness every night i guess so like i started saying it's not a conscious decision that i'm making all the time i'm going to be open i'm going to be vulnerable i'm going to make the connection i'm just doing it i have a wedding i'm gonna go to the wedding sometimes i even told you i'm not in the best mood but when i get into the hall and i pick up the microphone i start singing i get in a good mood and i just i just so your industry is not a secret a lot of people got really hit hard and somebody's counting on it and it's easy to say oh they make so much money it doesn't make a difference you got to pay mortgage you got a family to feed everybody has their own huge brightness and to see your pedestal gigs wiped out for a month two months three months is a serious thing there's a singer i called an amazing singer and a good friend of mine i called him up i said could you write a piece for the magazine so much about what it's been like for your industry so he says no i said why he goes i don't have i don't have challenges i'm a big singer you're gonna have to you're gonna tell me the singer's name okay but for my brand he was saying i'm that guy i'm a superstar i'm that rock star go to a secular singer they're never going to a magazine and saying it was a rough few months to make sure they didn't have gigs i'm much bigger than that he's why would i do that to myself and i respected it i don't see that if i would have asked you louis sir you were able to write english and i would have asked you that you would have had that answer because i've seen on stage doing selfies with the crowd you never lost your ability to to be human right something you work on or just it's not something i work on no i'm not being about governor saying it's not something i work on a lot of other stuff i'm not perfect yet but this comes to me naturally i don't know how i'm thinking maybe from my mother just comes to me naturally sometimes i gotta fake it it doesn't come to me so natural like before we start the second dance i want to get the crowd you know excited like let's come to the dance floor being mr marcus in colorado [Music] every time i would do such a thing i don't do it every night but sometimes there's friends or the hosts or brothers do that do that thing you did over there so it's like i must do it but i'm not feeling it so that's when i gotta fake it i just gotta you know do that that i thought it has to be has to be in the right time in the right place i can't just can i do the thing that you did three weeks ago [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] you know three weeks ago there was 10 times more people at the wedding there was a much bigger band and i don't know yeah it was it was a massive it's all in the ears sometimes i get to a wedding it's not such a not so much friends or not so much not such a big family well you're not in that place or i'm not in that place exactly and just to put myself there people won't know the difference if i fake it if i'm for real but i will know it and it will take everything it takes everything out of me i even feel myself turning like red like oh my god what are you doing well okay this is my job this is my panusa i gotta do this today have you been evolving and changing in the way you think itself have you yes yes yes the way i pronounce words it's very very important i see it more by the albums than on live on live jobs you just sing but on the albums when you say you sing a song uh [Music] hello [Applause] [Music] i do it with my producer he tells me when i'm recording in the studio naphtali say this word say you're not saying let me hear it so that's in the pronunciation and then also voice lessons the way i use my voice i have a voice teacher's name is sherman cohn i started seeing him a year ago around and i think i've been to five different voice teachers and i never believed in it i just did it because it's something i was supposed to do i'm a singer i got a voice lesson i always thought it's a scam there all a bunch of phonies whatever and i realized by shimmer cohn he's a kassidish guy i realized by him that the reason i thought it's a phony scam till now is because i didn't have it wasn't such good chemistry between me and the teacher i had a teacher who is mexican so it wasn't so clear there was no not such a good understanding and a lot of times i would just say like yes yes i get it just not to be in the place where there's confusion but by shimon cone i understand when it talks to me yiddish and he says do like this and feel a shape and you know so say the way i pronounce the words inside this and also the way i use my voice you just mentioned something interesting keep someone evolving people in the world that are very busy with their brand everything has to be a brand and has there anybody giving you advice to be less there all the time because you're really a hazy guy yes all the time i have people giving me ideas and isis and i should do this and i accept it i always like to hear from people what they say but it's also it's it's the way people say it and there can be a person he's a nice guy but he doesn't have he can't bring himself to come up to you and say something so he has to be auberch so he has to come back with an insult or like to get my attention and and they don't realize that if you come to me and instead of saying like miliano i enjoy your music i love your music you come up and you say um you remember that gig you did that wasn't your best gig you know it wasn't so and maybe it wasn't so because i'm not a robot i'm not a machine every night is different you know so and maybe i can even remember of the wedding the guy is talking about maybe a taco wasn't so the best but how how how do i gotta you know continue this conversation i'm not in the mood of talking to the guy i don't want to have kegel with him i don't want to hear his ideas he has nothing to offer me other than he wants to tell me that he enjoys my music and he doesn't even know how to tell me that so he has to be annoyed so people always come over and but it's the way it's amazing because you're really a little bit of a psychologist because you're right it's passionate that the person is looking for a way to connect with you and he doesn't have the guts to just say a nice word you once told me something so beautiful i think about it all the time that sometimes you see a kid who wants to ask you for a selfie or autographed and he's too shy and you see him like lingering and happening finally and you see you always talk ah thank you for coming over yes i will stick with it i encourage yes i encourage it i encourage it because people are afraid i remember the first time i saw betty webber i was a monroe he maybe only released his first album he was it was nothing like it was today it was probably in 2010 really he still lived in monroe and i saw him in the grocery and he was checking out and i was walking in and it made such an impression on me i was thinking to myself it's betty webbish i got to tell him i got to ask him should i tell him i'm also a singer should i sh you know what should be the question yeah yes how do i go about this and la masa i didn't have the guts to go over he went home but the impression stayed with me that i saw him and i remember it so i gotta remember that that when i'm in some place and somebody else sees me that the same thing is happening to that guy he understands so interesting because besides anytime people see a celebrity or somebody famous it makes a very shame an impression especially with music because it's they know you much better than you or them because your views they know me no i'm saying they they know it's really anger music really affects people so maybe they're alone in the car on a bad day maybe they're going for a doctor's appointment and so they see you they're they're connected and you know they look at you as something so alive to them that's you see i didn't think about that that's right that's right so they think they know me but it doesn't matter if they think so or or if they really believe they know me but they listen to the music and they get inspired and they feel some kind of connection and then when they see me it's more than just seeing that if they want i understand what you're saying since the last time we met you became a father how did that change you personally and musically it still changes me it still changes me it it gives me something to you know when i'm when like i'm in a bad mood or whatever and i'm not feeling it the way to for me to get out of that place is gratitude if i start thinking let's say i start thinking oh my god what's going to be with panusa i don't have money i need to buy a house i need i know people thinking he's making so much but it's in the head so then i think to myself you know why do you feel so tired because you don't have any money but where's the money going it's my kids it's for my wife it's for the mortgage it's i have a house i have a car to go to places so you get to the place of having gratitude and that usually puts you in a good mood so my kids my kids are everything it changes me every day every day let's see yankee and ricky yes yank is after my father and ricky's after much figure's mother oh it's been very powerful to name a baby for your father i thought it's going to be a powerful but it's always normal that's okay no i thought to myself i'm going to give my father's name every time i'm going to call them i'm going to think about my father maybe i shouldn't give my father's name do you think to them no not so much how did it change you musically you feel like it's more depth it's just more understanding i get older it's as as you get older you understand more it's just like like i said depth it's more depth you said something i wanted to ask you a question you said that you saw very web or you were kidding monroe and ah is there anybody now who would have that effect on you is there anybody today that would still do that to you or is it modi shapiro if i see mother shapiro mori i think he is very you ever heard him singing you like how he sings i love everything i i think i think there's no inaudible he's not afraid to be human on stage he lets himself go he's in he's all in he's not again he's not just singing out he's not singing to the people he's singing with the people yes right he's feeling he's feeling the music i have a lot to learn from him also because he's i'm not so musical people think i'm musical i'm not i can know if it's a good chord if it's a bad chord i have taste when somebody would send me a song i remember bissell there's this thing called called and people call in and they give they they make songs they compose songs and they there's three judges and they judge the songs and one week one of the judges had to cancel out so they asked me if i could fill in as a substitute i had time i told them yes i didn't want to do it because i don't feel like i'm not a judge because the other two guys were moishe laufer and and jj fried they're producers and they're arrangers they have an understanding to music i i have my taste is all i have i listen to a song and i can see if i like it i can see if i don't like it and i will tell you if i don't like it i will tell you and i was on the panel over there and i i didn't like any of the songs and because it wasn't it was not any great songs it was just bukharan it was nice it was a good program but it was nothing real and people were upset with me like you can't give a compliment you can't so then i told him see i told you i shouldn't have been there crowd man you're surrounded by tough people a lot of criticism do you hear songs like that you've used and said right away this is a winner are you able to do that i remember song it was he he wrote it for me what's his name i forgot his name he sent it to me i i saw it say it i liked it but it was bashmerely too still and i didn't feel i can do vaihubi's shooting me like in the hebrew style i got to be more hasidish and betty webber came into the studio and he heard it and he said i must i love the song i tell them go i'll take it it's yours so i remember that song so you want to know if a song i heard and i knew it was going to become a hater then it became a hit or what it sounds like yeah if i care to have a lot beetho the song beat her [Music] i never did a song i didn't like i only do songs that i like but seeing if it's going to become i like beethoven yeah it's good i'll give the girl a member when it was a little bit of a twist but i didn't think it's going to become a hit and people are going to love it i liked it [Music] like in the summer different had counselors like they asked them questions which songs they said which song could you sing any time shabbos in the dining room and you're going to light up the whole so he said the cover chat was kindness always never fail he could jump up on a bench and start and the whole place is on fire that's nice the cover chaba is the reason i took it we had like a big vision for it it's going to start the view but by lakov i i had a vision that the whole the whole whole the bukharam would just instead of dancing by lakovic they would just take a break everybody look over just really feel it and then we go into the high part and we start dancing again that was the vision for it but it didn't really work out people just danced throughout the whole thing but that was the reason i put it on not because it's gonna be a hit and we put a track nine like we we filled up the album i remember like a few weeks before the album came out naftali says he's having a hard time mixing this song nobody's understanding what he wants to hear and he's thinking maybe it should go out it can't be here and i was already on board you know it's three weeks before making a master nobody has koi kane we just want to see it out so i was quickly on board saying yes okay you don't think it's going to be all right out and hashi weinberger was there in the story and he says no no no it's a good song it's the whole picture maha brocado and there's lamandas we need this labor day song to fit the puzzle and we started talking nathalie became in a better mood we got him in it and it went on but it almost went off [Applause] [Music] foreign [Music] [Applause] asking if if there's songs i didn't think is going to become it i didn't think begged me he begged me said shmeely you want to you want to step out of this kid's shoes and step into the daddy's shoes you gotta make mahabharata you gotta name it and i just now it makes sense i just spoke to somebody before it says such a good idea it's really great and i told them you know a year before i came out with this i would ask you should i give a name stay away from that but surely was fighting and fighting and fighting for it and and it did it it's it's an amazing thing maybe by the hasidum it's not they're not so comfortable but in flat bush and crown heights and in the five towns and that areas became something really special [Music] foreign [Music] what are you busy with now now we're doing album what does that mean oh it's a good question i did this album still now but till now i sang the yeshiva buddha it wasn't the modern ruthless album exactly relax yeah it was modern orthodox but it was it was yeshivish a little bit and also i there's a lot of songs there was i i was inspired to put in yiddish lyrics because it brings out the message but i was told to do otherwise because you want to appeal to the big crowd don't put in yiddish keep it to the second keep it simple these two things mainly when i say the album is going to be meaning i'm going to be comfortable singing it because the other one i think it took me so long at first because there's ellie gerstner right and he is uh javare it has basis for a whale it's really ra and then there's there's the jessie shivers is so there's there's always degrees and how those so you're saying now this time you're done exactly and i would tell naftali in the in the studio why am i i'm having such a rough time let's just do it and he said no he got appealed to marketing and maybe he was right maybe not but that's what we did then and i didn't and now i decided we're doing just strictly hastily time and that's also because i've grown i i see the people who listen to me sing they don't care if if it's hasidic if it's ishid so i do what's easier for me and what's what's inborn and also if it's if if there's like in a song a message in yiddish i would do an english no no no no and hebrew hebrew is out english song is out there's more clarity there's going to be a hasidis album it's going to be a little bit of a twist it's going to be something nice because there's a few old songs but not complete five-minute tracks just small it's going to be very very cool you put out an album this year earlier in the year and you're saying pretty much all these you're saying a lot of other songs too you're talking about on stage yes that was a big success yes it was a great great success i told you then i left your message you're saying a song the hain babica yeah and well nobody could do justice for that it's too fat scientist don't touch it i do somehow you made it 20 20 20 i so you are able to do that too to respect the past and give it a twist that works i guess so by on stage i also i felt free to do what i want to do and we came to the kumsits part and i thought to myself what kumzit song do i like and i i just like this song boys [Music] and it was surprising for me that hershey and naftali both knew it and both were on on page on the on the same on you know now you're doing it your way you're following your instincts and yes even though there is a big appeal you see in hebrew in israeli music even you know you don't care that you do a big appeal i don't know only in the rebel that's what i'm talking about i forget about you but you see you see it making albums with uri davidi moshe tishler morga shapiro benny friedman even those guys in the last few albums there was very much hebrew that's what i'm saying because you're saying there's appeal i don't think so you think people love it i think that you share people got into everybody's mind forget about you represent israeli i'm talking about this saying something's going on that that somehow he's in everybody's brain right he makes up a song 10 minutes later everybody in america knows it what's going on he's a little french guy from from by forgotten how did that happen so i think that made certain singers rethink things so you're taking it out we're thinking nothing i don't think i don't think so for me for me it didn't i mean i like twecky stuff when i did mom in banisim shrek can pull it off but i'm looking at all these new artists so to say you're not seeing it you're seeing that they're just copying them yeah they don't know what they're doing they're just okay hebrew is now the haqq will do hebrew and goddesses okay so you were also young ones when you people talking about i did yeshiva exactly i got it so that's the princess now you're a big boy and you're saying die enough there's always respect but yeah i'm trying to get myself out i'm trying to think of myself like when even had she weinberg shows me a song he says i composed it back in the day i would just listen to it and i would try to think is it good is it not good i wouldn't i wouldn't just be my samala lev what do i feel what does it do for me i couldn't get to that place it just didn't work now it's it's it's happening more i listen to a song and i can i can be in touch with myself and if i if it doesn't do anything for me i can tell the guy it's a nice song because i don't think it's for me i can even like there's a song now it's called pasha you know it so it's a hershey one biggest song and it's a very it's very catchy especially with the book it's a new parsha and the kids come on from school so it's combining it to make a song and then the the lyrics is how much we suffer and there's a new parsha he brought it to me and i saw that it's something there but i also i also felt that it's not my message it's not for me beautiful you understand i think that you were like introduced to schmillianger for the first time you finally got to understand who you are right and now i was talking it's happening every day more and more it's just everybody not just me people grow and people get to know themselves better amazing amazing what a good therapist can do surely thank you so much thank you for your time yes you can get help waiting to sit with you always [Music] you