What is it like to be a famous musical duo, on the road all the time, and married with kids?
That’s the life of Amanda Sudano and Abner Ramirez, more widely known as folk-pop band Johnnyswim, whose eclectic life is put on full display in their two reality television shows, “The Johnnyswim Show” and “In the Kitchen with Abner + Amanda.” Amanda's mother was the legendary Disco Queen Donna Summer; meanwhile, Abner's family experienced the intense political turmoil of 20th century Cuba, emigrating to the United States in the Mariel Boatlift in 1980.
In this exclusive interview, they discuss everything from family history, to touring life, to activism and faith. Plus, we include their musical performance from a No Small Endeavor show at the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville.
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Transcript:
Lee: [00:00:00] Hello friends! Lee C. Camp here. You're listening to No Small Endeavor. This is one of our "Best Of" episodes - delightful conversation with Abner Ramirez and Amanda Sudano of Johnnyswim fame. This was taped the morning after our most recent show at the Ryman Auditorium.
That reminds me, by the way - we'd love for you to come join us at our big end of year show this year at the Schermerhorn Symphony Hall ,downtown Nashville. That's the Sunday evening prior to Thanksgiving. Some pretty exciting guests being lined up for that show. You can find out more at nosmallendeavor.com/events. Come out and join us.
Again, this is "Best Of," Johnnyswim. Enjoy.
I'm Lee C. Camp. This is No Small Endeavor - exploring what it means to live a good life.
Music - Ring The Bells, Johnnyswim:
Move your feet you tiny people,
You've been hiding for so long,
Behind your statues and your [00:01:00] steeple,
I hope that hits too close to home,
I got faith to move...
[Music fades out]
Lee: Today our guests are Amanda Sudano and Abner Ramirez, husband and wife folk-pop duo Johnnyswim.
We were fortunate to have them perform at one of our live shows at the famed Ryman Auditorium here in Nashville. And the next day we sat down for an interview, covering everything from Amanda's famous mother, Donna Summer to Abner's family's refugee flight from Cuba. We talked about what it's like having such a public marriage and some lovely reflections about living life well.
[Music fades back in]
All this, coming right up.
I'm Lee C. Camp. This is No Small Endeavor - exploring what it means to live a good life.[00:02:00]
Every Thanksgiving, since 2010, we've pulled out all the stops and put on what we aim to be a most outstanding, even extravagant, live show downtown Nashville at the beautiful and famed Ryman auditorium. Of course, we always try to have some phenomenal live interview guests, but what makes these particular shows special is the way in which we honor our past as a variety show, with sketches and an amazing live house band comprised of Nashville's finest, and a chart topping main act.
Last year at the famed Ryman, we welcomed husband and wife duo Johnnyswim. Then the day after the show, I had Abner and Amanda over to my house where I taped a sit-down interview, and of course we talked about their music and about their reality television show on the Magnolia Network.
But we also got into what might be, for some, surprising territory, about Amanda's famous mother, Donna Summer, [00:03:00] and Abner's family's refugee flight from Cuba. We also talked about what it's like having such a public marriage and some lovely reflections about living life well.
So today, our conversation with Abner and Amanda of Johnnyswim.
Johnnyswim is an American folk, soul, blues, pop music duo consisting of singer-songwriters Amanda Sudano and Abner Ramirez. The duo formed in 2005 in Nashville, Tennessee. Now married with three children, they live in Southern California. And all three of us here in the room are still a little high from a show we all got to do together last night at the Ryman Auditorium here in Nashville.
Welcome!
Abner: Yeah. Thanks for having us.
Amanda: Still on that high.
Abner: Big time.
Lee: It was a good night.
Amanda: It was a special night.
Abner: It was unbelievable.
Lee: Yeah, it was very special. Good to have y'all back, ten years from your first time to be there with us.
Abner: Unbelievable.
Amanda: Isn't that crazy?
Abner: It was the very first time we ever played the Ryman was with you-- with you fine folks.
I guess it was the third Thanksgiving show--
Lee: Yes.
Abner: --for Tokens.
Lee: That's right. Yeah.
Abner: Number three. And that was our [00:04:00] first time ever on that stage. And we've been on the stage quite a, quite a bit now. And I don't say that bragging, I say that like almost looking back at the years. That's a, for us, such a crazy marker that we're still doing this thing, that, the Ryman.
'Cause to us-- we're not huge, we're not, you know, in country music, we're not all that. But we're Nashville folks, even though we don't live here anymore. Knowing I used to valet at the Hilton, valet at the Palm right there. It is-- calling it 'The Mother Church' really is the most appropriate term for the Ryman. It is the hub, the hub of music, the hub of kinda the soul of music in Nashville.
And in ten years to be back there again, to the day--
Lee: Yeah. That was pretty cool.
Abner: --was memorable.
Lee: Yes. Yeah.
So a lot-- I know that you've had three kids since then, so I'm, um, curious about what... I guess you did your first reality TV show in the pandemic?
Abner: Yeah.
Amanda: No, actually right before.
Abner: Yeah, that's true.
Lee: Right before, okay.
Amanda: We did it, we did one, one--
Lee: Oh, that was on your tour.
Amanda: Yes.
Abner: Exactly, yeah.
Amanda: And so the original, kind of, plan was, let's show what life is like on the road with a bunch of kids. But the hard, difficult [00:05:00] thing was that that's not something that gets filmed a lot because it's really hard to actually film life on the road, because there's, you know, reunion rules and there's, you know, if we go walk into a restaurant, you know, all that has to be prepped and they have to send somebody ahead of time and get, you know, doing it properly, how the network would of course, want to do it--
Abner: And I think even finding the stories is difficult for a producer on the road, because it happens sporadically. The crazy-- you know, we're doing something, something breaks, things happen spontaneously, and that's tough for a TV producer, even reality TV producer. They wanna know where their beats are, where the story is, the network's approving story before a camera gets turned on, and that just can't happen if you're filming something honestly on the road with the band and the family.
Amanda: So we did it at-- we did it at first and we kind of like made-- created a tour around filming, like, we're gonna play these couple shows, we're gonna film in each city a little bit around these shows. It wasn't really like a sustainable thing, but it was like, for this, we can do it. And then the next season we're going to, we'll, we'll figure it out, you know?
Um, but then the pandemic hit, so then the next season never [00:06:00] really happened. And then they were like, well, what if we just put cameras in your house? And to which we were like, great, why not? We've realized that it's not fun to have cameras in your house.
Lee: Yeah, I, I would imagine, I mean, I, I would just think... intrusive is the word that comes to mind for me.
Abner: Oh, yeah. So, because it was the pandemic, we didn't have camera men in our house. We had one camera guy and then a bunch of robots, like little robot cams, they call 'em robocams--
Lee: Huh.
Abner: --that they have somebody in a trailer offsite or, or on, on our property, but not in the house, moving all six cameras, zooming in, panning and tilting 'em off.
Amanda: And then we filmed with our own cameras, you know, as well.
Abner: But the weird thing that would happen is-- and I realized I needed to set, like, some boundaries and some rules when we were done shooting. We'll shoot for ten weeks for eight episodes. And so you're shooting sometimes before you're awake. The crew's there. And they're there up until right when you're getting the kids ready for bed.
So 12 hour days, 14 hour days are happening. It's pretty ridiculous. For ten weeks, six days a week, five days a week. And then finally you're by yourself. I'm all alone. I've got a little guilt-free bowl of cereal I'm gonna [00:07:00] have at midnight 'cause nobody can see me having it. I got the TV on, maybe I'm just in my boxers, and I'm eating, and I look over and that robocam is looking right at me.
Now I know there's nobody in the trailer hitting record, but I just can't relax 'cause that camera's still there. And so then we had 'em cover the cameras anytime we weren't filming. I just don't want it there.
Amanda: Yeah, it was-- and we, I think originally thought, oh this will be so easy, 'cause they're like, we're, unlike the, the previous season that we had shot, we don't, we're not gonna like try to make beats or anything. We're just gonna let things happen and we'll find stuff as we go. We'll just course correct as we go. If we find things that seem interesting or fun, we'll go in that direction. But we can like play it easy and the cameras will just be rolling so you guys just do what you do.
So I was like, oh, okay, cool. Like, well, it's just gonna be us playing, hanging out with the kids, cooking dinners, like, you know, whatever. But then by the end of the, you know, ten weeks or whatever, you're like, I'm so tired, and I don't know why. I haven't really done anything, but there's just been cameras and microphones and--
Abner: You have microphones kind of taped to your chest the whole time so you can't see 'em [00:08:00] on camera. And so I would get panicked in the middle of the night that I would roll over and I could feel the microphone, even though I wasn't wearing a microphone or a shirt even. It would wake me up in the middle of the night that I was tangling the cable of the microphone, 'cause I'd gotten so used to feeling the cable on me.
It was, uh-- and we're really grateful for the opportunity to make reality TV.
Lee: Yeah.
Abner: It was a-- it was fun. Hopefully people enjoy watching it. It's on HBO Max, which is crazy.
Amanda: I mean, we would do it again. I think we would do it again.
Abner: I would do it again, but now we know what we would be getting ourselves into.
Amanda: Right.
Abner: I think it's kind of cool though that my mom from Havana, Cuba can turn on HBO Max and see herself on TV.
Amanda: Something she probably never thought you would say.
Lee: Yeah.
Abner: Yeah, exactly.
Amanda: Probably not something she expected.
Abner: Game of Thrones Marathon, Marisol in the kitchen. Yeah.
Amanda: Exactly.
Lee: So speaking of your mom from Havana, Cuba, uh, your parents emigrated from Cuba?
Abner: Yep. My mom, my dad, and my two sisters, all born in Cuba. They were there for I think four or five generations in Cuba.
Lee: Oh, wow.
Abner: And, uh, they all came in 1980 during the Mariel boatlift.
Lee: Huh. And what, what was their experience like [00:09:00] prior to coming to-- I mean, when you think about your parents in Cuba, what are kind of some of the experiences that stand out to you as kind of central to who they were and who they became?
Abner: The stories are many and plentiful. They had the classic communist experience, the transition of the revolution when my, my parents were young from, uh, a bad president Batista to then true tyrannical-- well, it slowly into this tyrannical leadership, you get one pound of meat for a family of four per week.
My mom would always, if she was here right now, I can hear her saying, "that pound of meat includes the bones," so you might get three quarters of a pound of bone and a quarter pound of meat and that's your allotment for your family to eat.
My grandfather was, uh, the head of a manganese mine. Manganese is one of the essential things of making iron or steel. In order to make steel, you need manganese. And so during the industrial revolution in America, Cuba's number one export, more than sugar, more than anything, tobacco, was [00:10:00] manganese.
Lee: Huh.
Abner: And so my grandfather, during the time of Batista, before Castro, was the head of the largest manganese mine on the east side of Cuba, Santa Rita, Cuba.
He also ran a militia, the largest collection of armed people in Cuba that weren't military, that weren't officially in the military. So-- and his name was Efraim. So when Efraim was there and Castro and Che Guavera were in the, literally in the jungles, like in the mountains, sending out low band radio wave transmissions to the people of Cuba, they asked, they requested a meeting with my grandfather.
It was Fidel, Che, and like eleven other guys trying to take over the country, trying to, you know, cause a revolution, spark revolution in Cuba. They met with my grandfather for several days at his house in Santa Rita, and they wanted the use of his militia, use of his influence in the region, to support them.
And after spending time and getting to know Che Guavera and Fidel Castro, my grandfather said, absolutely [00:11:00] not. Not only will I not help you, but I want you to pack your things and get off my island. You need to leave. Apparently a pretty, uh, intense moment.
Lee: Mm-hmm.
Abner: My father, I think, was eight at the time. The next day, my grandfather was stabbed in the back, was assassinated in his own manganese mine by somebody that was part of his militia.
So that changed my father's life drastically. They moved across the country to Havana, uh, the communist revolution began in earnest in the years to come after that. And now, you know, he's got two girls. My dad became a pastor. He was a street kid, grew up on the streets of Havana after that. Became a pastor.
And at the time, especially, the number one enemy of state was any organized religion, because the country is not only your mother and your father, it's your god, it's your family, it's everything. And so he became, my dad became an enemy of state, not only because of who his father was, but now he's a pastor in Havana and that's a story for another podcast, the, [00:12:00] the punishment that ended up lasting for decades in my dad's life for that.
But it was, became clear soon thereafter, now there were attempts on my father's life, that they needed to get outta Cuba. So 1980, the Mariel boatlift, this huge kind of boiling point moment in Cuba, uh, the Peruvian embassy is in-- you say invaded, but you have these desperate people in Cuba that just want to get out. They just started jumping the fence.
At the same time, there's this bus driver who wants to get his family out of Cuba, and my dad's in Havana at the time. He's trying to figure out how to get out of Cuba. Hundreds of thousands of Cubans are trying to figure out how to leave, in any way other than an inner tube, from the island.
This bus driver stops his bus right before, you know, he's supposed to turn to go to his next stop and kicks everybody off of his bus except for his wife and kids. This is somebody that we don't know. This is just a guy in Cuba trying his best to survive. His family lays down, he guns it. [00:13:00] Straight ahead at the end of the street are the gates to the Peruvian embassy, because the embassies in Cuba to this day are guarded, not by the military of that embassy, they're guarded by the Cuban military because the Cuban military doesn't want you to claim asylum in these places so they're keeping you essentially on the island by guarding it.
So he guns it for the gates of the Peruvian embassy, and they blast through the gates, and in the crossfire, Cuban military guys are shot by their own-- they're killed by their own crossfire. The family makes it in, the Peruvian embassy takes them in. They claim asylum. They don't give 'em back to Cuba. Fidel's demanding them to come back, they need to be held responsible for the deaths of the military men and women that were killed in the crossfire of their illegal move to go into the Peruvian embassy. Peru wouldn't give them back.
So what Fidel does, is he takes away the military from the Peruvian embassy, and there's movies about it, there's stories about it, tens of thousands of people, of Cubans, bombard the Peruvian embassy to be able to leave. But Fidel won't let them leave the physical island, even though they've [00:14:00] all claimed asylum in Peru.
They're eating su spoonfuls of sugar to survive, they're eating leaves off the trees 'cause it's weeks and weeks and weeks, 'cause now these people can't leave. They've essentially betrayed the country, betrayed communism, the, the ideals.
And Jimmy Carter was president of the United States at the time. He has a plan and he says, all right, if you have, if there's Cubans here in America, expats of Cuba, here in America, you can go get your family, we'll take 'em. We'll create this whole government sponsored situation. Go get 'em.
My uncle had gotten out, he was in the US at the time, comes to get my family. And then, Castro is nothing if not full of guile. And he was, he was a fox. He says, okay. He cuts the deal with Jimmy. Fine, you can take 'em, I don't want 'em here anyway.
This is the Mariel boatlift . 1980. You had to sit on this beach. You couldn't touch the boats, you couldn't touch the water. And my family was there. My mom, my dad, my two sisters were on the beach for four or five days. They lived on the beach. They had to bring water with them, any food they could do, 'cause they couldn't [00:15:00] leave the beach, couldn't go back home. And you couldn't shower to bathe, use the bathroom.
Then, when a, a tropical storm was in the Caribbean, Fidel said, now you can get in the boats.
He didn't stop there. My uncle was a janitor at the main insane asylum in Havana. This is the same uncle that brought a boat to Havana to pick up my family. There was supposed to be thirteen people, thirteen members of my family on this boat. There were 150 people or more, like, there's pictures of it online. They looked like sardines in a can, just falling over. Like people sitting on the roofs, it's-- and you wonder where are all these people coming from? And all of a sudden my uncle starts recognizing people.
Fidel had literally emptied the insane asylums onto the boats to litter the streets of Miami with folks that are ill and have no family in America and have no hope there. Violent [00:16:00] criminals, he put on the boats and sent them all during a tropical storm. Many boats capsized. There's the boat my parents were on, towed a boat whose engine had died. The rope snapped, that boat sank, and everyone perished. My family made it.
My sister every year on June 6th buys a can of Pringles because that's what the American Coast Guard gave them as they arrived to Key West. And she, to this day, it was the most delicious meal she ever had, was a, a can of Pringles. And all that to say, my family came here with absolutely nothing, came from Cuba.
It was my father who said to me when he dropped me off in Nashville, Tennessee. He said, "son, don't come home until your dreams come true." And that's always stuck with me. The, the essence that we didn't come to this country for you to settle, for you just to have a job that gets you by. You have a life and a heartful of passion. Put that somewhere. If it's music, go do music. If it's something else, go do the other [00:17:00] thing. But don't come home until your dreams come true.
He got about a block away from Trevecca Nazarene University, where I was going to school, and he called me crying. He's, "you know, mijo, you know you can come home anytime. It's just the idea, the idea."
I said, yeah, dad. I know. I know.
Lee: That's beautiful. Yeah. Thank you for sharing that.
You're listening to No Small Endeavor and our conversation with Amanda Sudano and Abner Ramirez of Johnnyswim.
I love hearing from you. Tell us what you're reading, who you're paying attention to, or send us feedback about today's episode. You can reach me at lee@nosmallendeavor.com.
You can get show notes for this episode in your podcast app or wherever you listen. These notes include links to resources mentioned in the episode, as well as a PDF of my complete interview notes, and a full transcript.
We'd be delighted if you'd tell your friends about No Small Endeavor and invite them to join us on the podcast, 'cause that helps us [00:18:00] extend the reach of the beauty, truth, and goodness we're seeking to sow in the world.
Coming up, we discuss Amanda's famous mother, disco queen Donna Summer.
So Amanda, you, you have a, a different kind of family experience.
Amanda: I do. I have a different, different story.
Lee: So you're, you're the daughter of two very prominent people in, in the music business.
Amanda: Yeah.
Lee: Donna Summer, your mother?
Amanda: Mm-hmm.
Lee: And your father Bruce Sudano.
Amanda: That's right.
Lee: Very well known, uh, producer who, if I remember correctly, worked with people like Dolly Parton and Michael Jackson some, and--
Amanda: Yeah, he wrote songs for them. He's, he did, he's a producer as well, but I think those two people in particular, he wrote songs for.
Lee: Yeah. Yeah. So when you think back, I've wondered, what's it like to be in kind of the shadow of that kind of celebrity when you're young?
Amanda: So, interestingly enough, my mom was adamant about not putting awards around the house. So she had won, you know, five Grammys and, you know, Golden Globes and all these, and an Oscar, and we [00:19:00] never saw 'em. And so literally, like, I think Abner and I were married and I was helping her, like, organize some boxes in her library and like, she pulled an award, uh, pulled an award out and it was a Golden Globe. And I was like, what is this? It's like in a random box. And she was like, oh, just put it back in there. It's whatever.
You know, like-- not that she wasn't proud of herself, but she, because she, she didn't want us to grow up feeling like we could never achieve the same things, or that it was like we were in the shadow in any way.
Um, she wanted us to just, you know, home to just be a place where we could thrive and be creative and feel like we were supported and not like we had to, you know, match somebody else.
Lee: Yeah. She passed when?
Amanda: She passed, uh, 2012.
Lee: Okay. Yeah. But when you think, so it's been 10 years.
Amanda: Mm-hmm.
Lee: What have been some things that you've-- or are there things that you've kind of habitually recollected since her passing about her?
Amanda: Uh, there's one thing that we say in our house a lot, and I've, I say to as many people as I can. When we first started out and we were playing, you know, [00:20:00] shows for four people, you know what I mean? Like we would, we would spend all of our money to like be on the East coast and play at little coffee shops and, you know, stay where we could, like, had a friend and nobody would show up until we had-- we were staying with my parents in New York, they were there for work.
And so we stayed, like, we slept on the couch in their, like, hotel room. And we're like, well, we got this show in Connecticut, so we're gonna like jump on the train and do the show. And my mom was like, well, I mean, I'm coming. I'm gonna rent a car and we're gonna, your dad and I will drive you.
And I was like, mom, no. It's like, It's an hour and a half away. There's gonna be four people. Like that's embarrassing. Like absolutely not. And she was like, no, I would not miss it. These are the good old days. These are the good old days. And so she would always say that to us at kind of every step of the way.
And so it's something that we still say to each other to appreciate the moment, appreciate the season that you're in, especially now with three little kids. And there's days where they all are screaming and one of them's got a fever and the other one's, like, you know, has a new obsession with banging a spoon on a pot and, you know, whatever it is, and you feel overwhelmed for a [00:21:00] second.
And when we slow ourselves down and go, these are the good old days, all of a sudden it becomes like this beautiful renaissance painting and not the chaos that it could all, you know, otherwise feel like.
Lee: Yeah.
Amanda: Uh, so that, that's one thing. I think the thing that I, I miss, because my dad is so very involved in our life, still in our kids' life, his memory isn't as good as my mother's was.
And so there's times where I think, oh, we're on the tour bus and I don't know what to do about this situation with the kids' school or, you know, whatever it is, and I wish I could call her and be like, mom, what would you do, if you had a show, but it was across the country... We had a ballet recital. How would you have made that work?
You know, like I wish that I could ask her some of the practical things, you know? Because my dad is like, I don't know, it all worked out. I'm like, well, okay. I need more specifics, you know?
So I do, I, I, I really miss, I, I miss, obviously I miss her, but those are the times where I'm like, oh, like she does, she's not here to see all this and to see that we're basically like little [00:22:00] miniature versions of her and my dad schlepping our kids around. But my dad appreciates it, so.
Lee: That's a beautiful reminder. These are the good old days.
Amanda: Mm-hmm.
Lee: Yeah. Yeah, I, I think for me too, the, that whole notion of learning simply to pay attention to the moment that you're in seems to be one of the key practices to living a good life, doesn't it?
Abner: Mm-hmm.
Amanda: 100%. And to kind of like step outside of yourself in a way.
Lee: Yeah.
Amanda: Like sometimes I think, if I was watching this in a movie, what would I think? You know what I mean? Or, or if I was like, this was on video and ten years from now I'm watching this, what am I thinking? What am I feeling? And most of the time, even in the, like pure, chaotic wildness, I'm like, teary-eyed at, you know, thinking of how I would see it from the outside.
And that helps a lot. Especially in the morning when the kids are jumping on my bed at 7:00 AM, and I'm [00:23:00] still waking up.
Lee: So, so going back kind of to the questions around public celebrity around, kind of your, your marriage, just a minute. So in, in some ways your public brand is your public marriage.
Abner & Amanda: Mm-hmm.
Lee: And so I wonder, you know, classic wedding vows, 'for better or for worse...'
Amanda: Right.
Lee: In what ways might you say that having a very public marriage, including ten weeks of cameras in your house--
Abner & Amanda: Yeah.
Lee: In what ways has having a public marriage been for better? And in what ways maybe has it been for worse?
Abner: I think, and this is gonna be corny, but the very first thing that comes to mind, the way it's for better, is that I feel like it helps people. I think seeing us and seeing that we're real folks, I think it can help other people feel seen and known.
'Cause our struggles and our fights sometimes are public too, as much as a, you know, really romantic song and a kiss on the cheek [00:24:00] or whatever could be. So I think. I dunno, for better, I get to be with her. For, for better, I get to-- my business is with her. My life's with her. My babies are with her. All of them.
[All laugh]
Amanda: Every last one!
Lee: Thought we were gonna get something there for just a second.
Amanda: [All
Lee: laugh]
Abner: Exactly. Very public announcement.
That's the for better. The for better is that this is-- uh, you know, it's funny, I, I think about this a lot. I love her. I love my wife. I love my wife. Deeply. Love her.
But I like her so much. I like her. I like being around her. I like spending time with her. I do. I like getting yelled at by her. I'm just kidding. That's right.
Amanda: Yeah. I think, I think there is a sense of... I mean, I think when he says helping people, like there's a lot of times where people will come up to us and be like, you know, my husband and I wanted to start a business together, wanted to do this thing together, and you know, people kind of made us nervous about like working together with our spouses and like how does that work and how does it work with family? And I think being able to see us do something creative and adventurous together [00:25:00] and with our kids, you know, is something that can help people not be so scared to, to make some steps of faith, you know?
So I think that's the for better. Definitely on Season 2-- uh, yeah, the second season of the show where the cameras are in the house, we get into a very big fight. For us, it was a big fight.
Abner: Literally, a therapist shows up.
Amanda: Yeah, we have, we have a friend that's a therapist come over. But, what's funny actually though, this is a complete sidebar, but I was so mad in the moment. I was so mad at him. And I walk in and there's cameras on me, and I feel like I, I am on fire, I'm so, I'm so angry. I watched that episode back and I look... mildly annoyed.
[Lee laughs]
And I was like, is that what I look like when I'm angry? I had this, like-- I, I was feeling fierce, you know, and it was like, no, I was like, 'I'm really upset about this.'
[Lee laughs]
You know, I was like, wow, I thought I had more passion than that. Um, but yeah, I think the, I think the-- I don't know that there is a, for worse. Because I think for maybe some people, the for worst would be like, oh, there's a [00:26:00] lack of privacy. And when you do have struggles, maybe you don't have like a cocoon for it.
But I think that's actually something that we want to portray as well, that it's, you know, that it's not just the, you know, the cake parts of marriage, that like, you have to work on stuff. And I, I always say, I don't feel like marriage is work. I feel like marriage is work as much as I feel like a buffet is work.
Like, it's not just there to serve you all the time. Like, you have to get up, there's like things for you to do in order for you to enjoy what's in front of you. But like, the point is to enjoy, to me at least. So even the work you put in is like, that you can enjoy.
Like it's not work for me to be like, let me spend time with him and see how he's feeling and check in. Ugh, that's so much work to check in with you. You know? It's not work.
Lee: Yeah.
Amanda: It's, you know, sure, I have to get outside myself and put myself--
Abner: She'll say often, it does-- it's not work. It doesn't take work. It takes attention. And if you lack attention, if you don't pay attention to things you're supposed to, then it can become work.
But, she pays attention to me a lot.
Amanda: But yeah, I don't know that there's, it doesn't [00:27:00] feel like there's a lot of, for worses.
Abner: We don't wanna portray some perfect blissful couple thing either. That's not-- that would be a lie, first of all. But it's also not, like, attractive. That's not a thing that's-- I have no desire whatsoever to be seen as a perfect couple. At all.
Our artwork, much of our artwork for our band Johnnyswim, is romantic skeletons, literally skull and crossbones, like the sign for death, holding the flower, is much of our imagery in our art for Johnnyswim. And the reason being, till death to his part has been said so much, it's begun to lose a bit of its edge.
So for us, we say it's till toe tags and body bags. We signed, we signed up for this until either you're miserable without me, or I'm miserable without you, or maybe our plane went down together and everybody's miserable without us, but we signed up for, this is a-- ultimately a romantic tragedy that we signed up for.
And uh, along the way, it's not all perfect either.
Lee: Hmm. That's lovely. Thank you.
Amanda: [00:28:00] Death.
Lee: Yeah.
[All laugh]
Death, yeah.
Gonna take a short break, but coming right up, we discuss the couple's public faith and hear a bit more of their performance from our live show at the Ryman Auditorium here in Nashville.
So let me shift keys to something else that you seem to have done in public, and that is, you seem comfortable calling yourself, acknowledging that you're Christians in public.
Abner: Hmm.
Lee: Uh, while also having some things to say, certainly in some of the lyrics of your songs--
Abner: Mm.
Lee: --about your frustration or anger, really, better said, about what Christianity in public is these days--
Abner: Yeah.
Lee: --in, [00:29:00] in this country. So talk to us a little bit about that. Maybe Amanda, maybe you start.
Amanda: Yeah. Uh, you know, I think for both of us, like we were both raised in Christian homes and not in a, like, vaguely Christian home, but like very deeply religious, but spiritual homes, you know, where that was the foundation.
It was the foundation of, of us meeting, of our marriage. That was always the foundation of our friend group. Our closest people in LA, our friend group, started from Thursday night dinners that turned into us just praying for one another. And now everybody has kids and is married and we still have our foundation friend group, you know?
Um, and so, I think for me, because my parents were not in the Christian world, you know, like I would go into some places and people would be like, oh, your mom is like, I'm not allowed to listen to her, you know. And I'm like, yeah, she's dressed as a prostitute on the front of her album and my dad's a police officer. I'm sure I'll go to therapy for that one day.
[All laugh]
But, um, [00:30:00] but you know, I I, there, there wasn't like a-- the heart for my family was always love God, love others. Like, break it down to the simplest forms, you know. There's a lot of gray area and different things. There's a lot of people like, you know, my dad grew up Catholic and he is like, yeah, my mom and our mo-- that side of the family really strongly believes in this. And your mom's side doesn't really believe in that. And in this house, this is how we talk to each other about what we think.
So there was always this like openness and this graciousness and it was always founded on love. And I think that his family was the same way. So going into, I think, the storm of, you know, especially, you know, 2016 elections and, and at that point I think we were having, you know, we had our own kids.
It was all of a sudden, it was like, wait a second. How do we want our kids to be raised and like, what do we want them to think of as Christianity? What do we want them to think of as, what does God look like? Who is he? How do we want to portray him in our house? How do, how do we introduce him in our house properly?
And I think we got really pissed [00:31:00] off thinking about the ways that we were seeing God's name used and... I don't know, I, I don't feel like I'm doing a great job describing it.
You are
Abner: doing a great job.
Amanda: But yeah, I think, I think that was a big turning point for us. 'Cause we were, you know, we've never been like a Christian band.
We're Christians who have music and some songs we talk about drinking whiskey and sometimes we talk about, you know, Jesus. And it, and there's never been a, there's never been a differentiation.
Lee: Hmm.
Amanda: And I think some people, early on, it was like, well, you gotta choose a lane, you know? And we're like, why? Like, why? Who said, you know?
Lee: Mm-hmm.
Amanda: I don't think we do.
But yeah, I think once we had kids it was kind of like, a little bit more frustrating because we realized, oh, we have to raise them up and they need to have, you know, we want them to have a foundation of people around them that believe the same things and that are fighting for the same things and that love in a similar way.
And it's really kind of hard to find right now. Like, and the people that we thought would be around aren't really around in the same way [00:32:00] anymore. And how do we, how do we make this work? And so I think a lot of that frustration came out in some songs.
Abner: Yeah. I think there's a lot to it. I think there's a lot to it.
We are, we were both raised deeply spiritual, as you said. Uh, Christian. We're raised Christian. And it was the foundation for everything, all the hard times... uh, for my family growing up, there was times when my dad wasn't, wasn't there for stretches of time, outside of his control. And I remember mom just walking me to the car as we're gonna school and praying and thanking God for the angels that are watching over the house.
We were the first people of color in the neighborhood we moved into, in the west side of Jacksonville. We had the local, uh, I don't know, local KKK put a burning cross in our yard when we first moved in. People telling us to leave, go back where we came from. Neighbors, tell us, you need to go back where you came from. Like, not welcoming us.
But that was mom's first house she bought. And she was super proud of it. And every day she would thank God for keeping us safe, 'cause we couldn't be there without him. God taking care of us. And it was such a real palpable belief. Not just, uh, not just a need, but a, it was beautiful.
I was raised in [00:33:00] a beautiful spiritual environment where there was, yes, this God that we needed desperately, but we weren't begging him for stuff. The prayers of my father and my mother were so wrapped in gratitude, not begging to get out of poverty, not just begging to whatever. There's needs, we're praying for the needs, we're covering those, but so grateful, so honoring, and so beautiful.
And that's this, that's the culture of spirituality that I believe both of us, we're raised in it. It's, and it's awesome and it's such a, it's a beautiful thing. Uh, and then fast forward to kind of the state of affairs where now we see religion, the name of God weaponized, uh, whether it's for political advantages... it, just because it, it-- Christianity is a beautiful thing that I was raised-- and I'm looking around and it's so defensive and it's so terrified of everything, and everything's out to get us.
So much of the prevailing voices that we hear nationally and even, I think in [00:34:00] some ways internationally, are so built in fear. I feel responsible, with our platform, with who we are, with our belief, with the deep spiritual roots in our life, to say something about it.
I can't, and I'm not gonna get it right all the time, I'm not gonna say it perfectly or, or eloquently, but lyrics have a way of, of saying simply something that this whole thesis I'm saying now can't do.
Music - Ring The Bells, Johnnyswim:
Move your feet you tiny people,
You've been hiding for so long,
Behind your statues and your steeple,
I hope that hits too close to home.
I got faith to move a mountain,
Have we watch that mountain move,
It's time for words to fall like thunder,
Sound of justice breaking through.
Lee: Move your feet you tiny people, you've been hiding for so long, behind your statues and your steeples, does that hit too close to home?
And I noticed last night when you sang this song that you changed, you changed it, [00:35:00] to make it a bit more pointed. You said, you said, 'you've been hiding for so long, behind your statues and your steeples, I hope that hits too close to home.'
So when, when did you make that shift?
Abner: Oh, when I, when I wasn't making people mad enough.
Lee: Yeah.
Abner: Like this, you should either love this song or hate this song. It shouldn't be a song that just feels kind of fun to you.
Lee: Yeah, yeah.
Abner: I should either insult you or say something that you wish you were saying. You know what I mean?
Lee: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Abner: And now, and I think that discourse can be healthy. I don't think it always has to end up in, in, uh, I don't know, some like caveman shouting or something. I think it could be a good discourse.
Lee: Right.
Abner: And there's this wielded power from the pulpit that I, I wanna speak carefully about, certainly. But that needs... the, the voices can be challenged in a healthy, respectful way, I believe. And that's a, those lyrics particularly, I felt like I wasn't, I wanted to just twist the proverbial knife just a little bit more, just make you a little more... uncomfortable.
You know, our kids wake us up really well. They do a really good job of waking us up. It's [00:36:00]uncomfortable every time. It is not a pleasure, ever. It's literally-- my son will wake me up literally by putting his face in front of mine and then slapping me really hard. But it does a really good job of waking me up.
And I think some of those lyrics and some of those changes are to, to do what I've learned from my eight-year-old, my seven-year-old.
Lee: Yeah.
Abner: That maybe a little discomfort is good for waking up.
Lee: So, with that sort of willingness to have that forthright speaking something into the world, like you have in those lyrics, how does that translate to your personal relations?
You know, how, how do you, how do you navigate trying to have conversations around this kind of stuff or other challenging stuff, personally?
Amanda: I think, uh, well, I was telling somebody the other day, uh, about that, because in LA I think because there's, there's so much diversity, you know, all over the city, I feel like it's a lot easier to have discussions, like our little friend group that I was just talking about, there's a, [00:37:00] a wide variety of beliefs in, in our, just our little friend group. But we have a way of being able to talk about it. Nobody's like, nobody's, you know, disrespectful. Nobody's, you know, nobody's weird about it. If somebody believes something, kind of-- even if we're like, huh, really interesting, tell me why.
You know, you can have a conversation. You can, you can ask questions. I think that's the hard part is I, I-- and I, maybe it's cultural. Maybe it's something where we're just so amped up from hearing discourse all the time that it feels like you have to be reactionary right away--
Abner: Or you're gonna lose.
Amanda: Or you're gonna lose, yeah. And it's like, that's losing, you know? Um, and you can still, we can still disagree at the end of this, but at least walk away with an understanding of one another. And we'll both be winning if we can do that, you know? And so, I don't know.
There's definitely like certain relationships in, you know, the past couple years I would say that are, you know, have been tweaked a little bit because there's, you know, certain things that you can't talk about or there's certain, you know--
Abner: Yeah, we--
Amanda: There's certain eggshells, I guess.
Abner: [00:38:00] There's a extended family that's been known to show up to parties that we're not at, like family events, with printouts of things that I've tweeted or said on Instagram and be like, "can you believe Abner said such and such?"
And that was a, a massive shock for us to realize that we were being--
Amanda: It's not people that we even, we even see anymore. Yeah. It's not people that we see or talk to really.
Abner: I'll say this. I grew up Southern Baptist. Super religious. Religious religious, right? Right next to the projects, right next to like, all African-American projects.
We spent more money going to Guatemala and going to Mexico and serving poor communities there than that church ever did. God bless 'em for what, the work they've done, but they never reached out ever, once. I went to that church my whole life, to the projects.
I, I was in my twenties the first time I had a meaningful conversation with a Muslim. Well into my twenties probably.
It was this event in New York called Dot To Dot, kind of a 30 under 30 thing, like people of, of influence or whatever, in diff-- [00:39:00] many different arenas. And they broke us up into little groups and we were talking about certain political things that were happening in that day. And I remember-- if I know anything about myself, if, if I really know anything about my spiritual growth, my spiritual life, is I believe, for whatever that's worth, that I can sense the presence of God.
I believe that I'm sensitive to feel the change in the air, the change in the moment, the change in the conversation, when what, the language I would use, the Holy Spirit shows up. Like I feel like I know that moment. And it's been in the most sacred spaces. It's been in the most holy moments. It's been at weddings, at funerals, at a, a particular sermon that you didn't expect it was gonna happen, or during a song especially.
Amanda: Or during a No-- No Small Endeavor.
Abner: Or during No Small Endeavor last night. A hundred percent. A hundred percent. Many times.
And I felt that same sense of weight of heaven in this one-on-one conversation with a Muslim that I had in my mind sequestered for only these safe, sacred places.
And here I am talking to [00:40:00] somebody that sees the world much differently than I, than I thought I did, at the time. And I feel what I know to be the presence of God. It had me-- just that sense, just that understanding that this is a sacred, holy moment changed my life.
And I feel like so often with these, with what politics, the discourse around politics and religion has become today in America, we're not allowing for those holy moments between people that disagree.
Lee: Yeah.
Abner: I feel like that tension is in the air. I feel like static in the air now. That changed my life. That day, speaking with that, this, this woman that was a Muslim.
I was, I'm embarrassed to say I was in my twenties when I had my first meaningful conversation with somebody that believed religiously much different than I did. But I believe the same thing, we have the opportunity for the same thing in the political arena. And all these arenas, man, where we just see the world differently and there's, it's okay to disagree and make space for something sacred.
Music - We Shall Overcome, Traditional:
We shall overcome,
We [00:41:00] shall overcome,
We shall overcome someday.
[Song fades out]
Lee: So speaking of last night, I, I wondered... near the end of the show, we did, uh, We Shall Overcome,
Music - We Shall Overcome, Traditional:
We shall overcome someday...
Lee: And I think, Amanda, I saw you tear up, looking-- it makes me kind of tear up thinking about it. I saw you tear up looking at Abner singing the last verse.
Amanda: Mm-hmm.
Lee: That was very powerful. And very beautiful. And so I just wondered, kind of, you know, like even some of the stories you've told today, and the, the cultural meaning of that song in the United States in the 20th century, but what was that like for you singing that song?
Abner: It [00:42:00] was holy. It was holy. That was, that's what you sign up for. That's like, seven-year-old Abner saw a guy-- I saw a guy sing at a church at my church growing up one day, and I went to go buy his cassette, ask Mom to buy the cassette for me. And I said to Mom, a passing thought, I can't believe this guy's gotta go back to work tomorrow. Like, it's crazy.
And Mom's like, no, this is his job. I was like, he gets to do this? At that moment, that's all I ever wanted to do. And it wasn't for statues that we don't have, and it wasn't for the tour buses. It was for the opportunity to be around holy moments on purpose. And that's what that felt like last night.
It felt like a on purpose, holy moment.
Lee: What was that like for you?
Amanda: To watch him?
Lee: Yeah.
Amanda: I would say a similar thing, but I, I think it was, um... I mean, honestly it was just the, that that whole moment. It was the choir singing we will, we won't be afraid.[00:43:00]
Music - We Shall Overcome, Traditional:
We are not afraid,
We are not afraid today.
Amanda: It was just like, this is what we all sign up for. You know, like, whether you're on stage or off stage, these are the moments that heal us, you know? And so it, for me, it felt like a healing moment and honestly, I wasn't really thinking about anybody else at that time, but, but I'm assuming for other people, like I was basking in it.
Music - We Shall Overcome, Traditional:
The whole wide world around,
The whole wide world around,
The whole wide world around [00:44:00] someday...
Amanda: But I would assume a lot of other people felt the same way.
Lee: These are the good old times.
Amanda: These are, these are good old days.
Lee: Yeah.
Amanda: Yeah. These are the good old days.
Lee: So as we kind of come to a close, um, recent kind of snapshot of, if you think about habits, practices that you're trying to be intentional about to kind of move you in a direction of living better, what would you say are things recently you're, you're working on or trying to develop?
Abner: We started going to therapy for the first time in the pandemic.
Lee: Hmm.
Abner: And it, it's been a really, it's, it's been awesome for me. I don't know how else to say it. We'll go every week and it's like, man, I didn't know I still, I didn't know I even felt that way, I didn't know I had this. It's kind of sucked [laughs] 'cause I'm feeling, I'm feeling stuff on it that may, I've done a really good job training myself not to feel, I didn't realize it, but I did.
I know that's probably not what you're asking, but for me, that's a practical thing that's helping me--
Lee: Yeah.
Abner: --to move [00:45:00] forward is, is literal professional help.
Lee: Yeah. No, that seems huge.
Abner: Yeah.
Lee: Yeah, yeah.
Abner: And being on my phone list.
Lee: Yeah.
Amanda: Uh, I think for me, just the, the actual practice of slowing down and not being in a hurry.
I, I've been trying to take the long way places.
Lee: Hmm.
Amanda: I've been trying to get in the slowest lane in traffic.
Lee: Oh.
Amanda: Brushing my teeth for two whole minutes.
[Lee and Abner laugh]
You know, all the things that kind of purposefully slow you down in my day, to kind of remind myself that I don't need to be in a rush all the time. And I think, you know, having three little ones, getting to school on time, trying to fit work in where we can when there's not, you know, chaos in the house, and, you know, working from home.
So it's like, you know, you're always juggling a lot and I found that I just felt anxious a lot for no reason. I would stop and be like, why am I anxious? Be like, there's literally no reason to be anxious. I just need to slow down.
These dishes, it doesn't matter whether they take 10 minutes or 20 [00:46:00] minutes. But if they take 20 minutes, I'll probably enjoy it and I'll probably enjoy the water and how the warm water feels on my hands.
Then I'll, I'll enjoy the process of making up-- my house look nice. I'll enjoy it and it won't be this like stressful thing. Trying to eliminate hurry, I think is, has been the practice and I've been doing that by purposefully being slow.
Lee: We've been talking to Abner Ramirez, Amanda Sudano of Johnnyswim fame.
Amanda: Woo-hoo.
Lee: Thank y'all very much for your time.
Amanda: Thank you for having us. It's always, always a treat.
Abner: Let's start over. I could do better.
Amanda: Yeah.
[All laugh]
Run it back. Run back, run back.
Music - We Shall Overcome, Traditional:
We [00:47:00] shall overcome,
We shall overcome,
We shall overcome someday,
Deep in my heart I do believe,
That we shall overcome someday.
Lee: You've been listening to No Small Endeavor and our interview with Amanda Sudano and Abner Ramirez of folk-pop duo Johnnyswim.
We gratefully acknowledge the support of Lilly Endowment Incorporated, a private philanthropic foundation supporting the causes of community development, education, and religion, and the support of the John Templeton Foundation, whose vision is to become a global catalyst for discoveries that contribute to human flourishing.
Our thanks to all the stellar team that makes this show possible. Christie Bragg, Jakob Lewis, Sophie Byard, Tom Anderson, Kate Hays, Mary Eveleen Brown, Cariad Harmon, Jason Sheesley, [00:48:00]Ellis Osburn, and Tim Lauer.
Special thanks to the world class band that night at the Ryman, led by Brian Sutton, along with Ethan Jodziewicz, Dan Needham, Justin Moses, Sam Hunter, Tammy Rogers, Steve Hindalong, plus the outstanding Out For Souls Choir, led by Cedric Sesley.
Thanks for listening, and let's keep exploring what it means to live a good life together. No Small Endeavor is a production of PRX, Tokens Media, LLC, and Great Feeling Studio.