Barack Obama and Bruce Springsteen collaborated to produce a podcast, announced them on Monday, with the first two episodes immediately available.
Renegades: Born in the USA features the politician and rock star who thinks about their backgrounds, music and their “lasting love for America”, according to Spotify, which hosts the podcast.
Given the recognition of its two hosts, Renegades is likely to be the last major Obama family podcasting hit, following the success of Michelle Obama’s podcast in 2020.
“At first glance, Bruce and I do not have much in common,” Obama said in a trailer for the podcast.
‘He’s a white guy from a small town in Jersey. I’m a mixed race black man, born in Hawaii. He’s a rock’n’roll icon. I’m … not that cool. ‘
Despite these differences, the couple formed a friendship after meeting during Obama’s presidential campaign in 2008 and recorded eight episodes of conversations.
Spotify released the first two episodes of Renegades on Monday, along with an instant video showing Obama and Springsteen sitting in front of microphones, surrounded by guitars and recording equipment.
“In our own way, Bruce and I were on parallel journeys and we were looking for a way to connect our own individual search for meaning, truth and community with the larger story of America,” Obama says in the trailer.
‘And in the course of a few days we talked, just a few miles from where he grew up.
“What we discovered during these talks was that we still have a fundamental belief in the American idea. Not as an act of nostalgia, but as a compass for the hard work that lies before us. ‘
Spotify signed Barack and Michelle Obama to produce podcasts in 2019 and launched Michelle Obama’s podcast of the same name in 2020. The program is fast becoming Spotify’s most listened to podcast in the summer of 2020.
The Obama deal came when Spotify announced a major impact on podcasting in 2019, when it spent about $ 500 million on acquiring podcast businesses. The platform also signed Joe Rogan, one of the most popular podcasters in the world, to a $ 100 million multi-year contract in 2020, but the arrangement was not all sailing.
Some Spotify employees complained that Rogan’s production was transphobic, including an episode in which Rogan interviewed the author of a book called Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters, while Rogan hosted it in October. was for Alex Jones, a right-wing conspiracy theorist banned from all major technology platforms, causing further outrage.