I'm just a kid from Marseille with a dream. I'm not even supposed to be here. I'm not comfortable in my head. I still haven't made it. That's why I keep going and this is my mindset. All of a sudden, I'm on private jets playing in Romania in front of 15,000 people, obviously winning the Grand Nobody. It was crazy.

Talk about the transition into movies.

You've done four movies. It was amazing. Amazing experience. I am more focused. I'm getting better sleep. It changed my life. I mean, one thing that I can say is I don't get sick any better energy. I'm 44 now, and I feel like I'm 20 years old.

Hey, guys. Welcome back to the ultimate human podcast. I'm your host, human biologist, Gary Breca, where we go down the road of everything anti-aging, longevity, bio-optimization, and everything in between. Today is a really special day for me. I know I say that a lot on my podcast, but it's a really, really special day for me because I have a guest on that I'm proud to call a personal friend. He's become a very close friend to mine over the last few years, as has his wife and his family. And he is a Grammy Award winning artist. He's one of those artists that you go, I don't know if I've heard of that guy. And then as soon as you hear the song, you go, Oh, yeah, I know that song. And I've listened to that song. I've danced to that song. But he's a Grammy Award winning artist. He's worked with the greatest of the great Lenny Kravitz, Lonadale Ray. He's been in a number of movies with actors that you all know, like Mark Wallberg. We just talked about four movies that he was in right before we started the cameras rolling. He is an icon in his industry, a musiclike a legend.

Trust me when I tell you, you know his music if you don't know his name. We're going to get to know him today. So welcome to the podcast, Cedric Gervais. Great to have you on my brother.

Thanks for having me, brother.

We've had incredible personal journey ourselves over the last two years, which I want to get to, which is we always talk about the impact of optimal health on the podcast. I want to talk a little bit about the blood work that we've done, the gene work that we've done, the supplementation, your routine and things like that. But I really want the listeners to get a chance to know you because we were introduced by Dave Grottman.

Yes, about two years ago.

About two years ago. So shout out to Dave Grutman. But since that time, I've really actually gotten to know a lot about your career. You're French, which everybody will notice here in a few minutes. And you started your career at 19 in the music scene. So walk me through the start of your music career and building all of this momentum up to the point where you actually won a Grammy Award.

Yeah, so I'm from Marseille, south of France. Okay. I started when I was 15 years old, I got into electronic music. That was my passion. I started going to shows and sing artists such as Daft Bank, Lauren Garnier, Carl Cox, all these guys that I was going to rave as a kid. Raves, right. Yeah. I remember the moment I saw Daftunk performing live, that's when I went home. I was like, That's what I want to do. I was 15 years old. I went out and I bought some other time techniques, turntables-.

They were really.

Turntables back then too. A mixer. I remember I set it up in the basement of my grandmother's house, and I start DJ mixing for like six hours a day after school. I was like, DJ, DJ. I would go out of record store buying the record, because at the time we didn't have any internet. No phones, cell phones, no internet. No audience. No audience, nothing. The only way to find, you had to call from the mainline, your friends, and let's meet at the record store, and let's go find out what's the hardest music right now. We'll go to record store, spend days in there, and listening, asking the guy that was selling records, What is the hardest thing? They would give us the record, and then go back home and start mixing those records. That was 15 years old. I arrived in Miami, I was 19 years old. A friend of mine- So.

Honey, you.

Leave France. Basically, I started in Saint-Troppez at this club called the Papa Gallo. My father would drive me every weekend. I had a residency. I was so happy. I was like, Start playing there.

You're not in the legal age yet.

No, it's not even an illegal age. I start DJing at this club. I get the residency. I'm very excited. One night I remembered they brought this mega club from Paris called The Queen. It used to be a gay club in Paris, but it was the number one music scene club in France. Everybody will look up to this club, all the DJs. They did The Queen Night. I remember the guy that owned the club was there and heard me play, and I was like, This kid is very good. We got to bring him up to Paris.

I get.

The residency, the Queen in Paris, I get excited. I move to Paris. This time, I'm 17 years old. When I get to Paris, I do my first show, very excited, just moved to Paris. The government decide to shut down every club, every bars for drugs in Paris, in the whole city for good. No. We don't know when they're going to reopen. I show up there. I just got an apartment. I'm excited. I did one show. Everything shuts down in Paris. You're kidding me. No. A friend of mine at the time, Dimitri Franslay, that was living in Miami, goes, Listen, just come to this place called Miami. I never traveled in my life. I don't know where the United States is. I don't speak a word of English.

You don't even know where it is on a map. You don't even.

Speak English. I don't even speak. I know how to say hello all the time. He goes, Come to Miami with me on vacation. Then when everything started down in Paris, you go back to Paris, you start your residency again. I go to Miami, clubs are still close. I show up to this city. I remember he was living at The Grand in downtown. That was the only building at the time, the DoubleTree Hotel.

Okay.

And the Miami skyland, there was nothing. No Miami Heat Arena, no buildings, maybe two or four buildings at the time. It was very dangerous to be in downtown at the time. I just remember I landed in the city and this feeling, I was like, This is home for me. I'm going to stay here. Really? Itried. I got here and he hooked me up with a party at the time with a friend of his called Daniel Ersch, a Switzerland guy. He did a party at his house. At the time, the club that was popping was called The Living Room with.

The Milan Brothers. I remember The Living Room. Yeah, the Eric Milan.

I got hired by this guy. I played this party, and that night, everybody stayed at the house. Nobody went to the living room. The owner freaked out. It's like, What's going on? The promoter is like, Well, we're at Daniel's party, everybody's there. And this DJ was so good, everybody stayed until the end. The owner, Francis, goes, Go get me this kid, wire him now. I became the resident of the living room right away from Monday to Sunday. So then at that time, I was like, There's no need for me to go back to Paris. I think I'm going to be here. I'm going to stay in Miami. So they made my visa, everything. And at the age of 19, I started having a residency in Miami.

That's how I started. Wow, that is a ballsy move because you don't speak English. You've never been to Miami. It wasn't, like you said, it wasn't a particularly safe town at.

The time. No, it was.

Not safe at the time. And then I think the scene has shifted downtown, but you're on Miami Beach. That's where the.

Music scene really was. Yeah, that was Miami Beach. The scene was in Miami Beach at the time when I got there.

So you start DJing at this club, you get this residency. And when do you start really producing music that people are going to know about? Because at that time, you weren't really.

Recording music of your own. It was a process. Basically, I was DJing. At that time I was DJing. I was trying to establish a life in Miami. You're making money, getting an apartment.

And this is other people's.

Music you're playing. Yeah, I'm playing other people's music. I'm not even producing yet. I'm just like DJing, the art of DJing, making people dance. At the time, if you didn't make people dance, the owner will fire you from the club. People were not showing up to see me. People were not... You know what I mean? I was just a DJ, making sure people are dancing. And if they did not, I would get fired. Okay. So what everything started for me is when I started moving to Crowbar, right? This mega club open in Miami called Crowbar, and that's when they start bringing international DJs, right? So I became the resident of that club. That's when I start getting interested in producing music. So I was savingmy money buying gears, computers, keyboards, everything, and learning the art of producing. So at that time, I bought everything. I start making my first song. I make a first song called Burning at the time. And the air of Ultra Record, David Waxman, shout out to David Waxman, came to play. He was one of the DJ coming to play at Crowbar. I remember I came in, I made the song Burning.

I gave it to him as a CD at the time, and I went on, and my number was on it.

So you burned your own CD?

Burned my own CD. The song is on the first song ever produced. I give him the CD, I go home. The next day, he calls me, he goes, Hey, man, this song is amazing. I'm signing you to Ultra Record for an album deal. What? Yeah. That was.

Your first song that you ever produced.

My first song ever produced. He signed me up. I got signed up with one of the biggest David Wexman, Patrick Moxey, the owner of Ultra Record, and this is it. So now I have to produce an album.

How old are you now? You're 20, because you move here.

When you were 19. Yeah, I was 22, maybe 23. I don't remember exactly. It was such a long time ago. I made this first single, first single comes out. This is when I first starting to produce music. Then I start getting into making albums and everything. But my career really took off when I made the move to space. I became the resident of space on the terrace. That was, for me, working with Louis Wig, the owner of space, first of all, made me a better DJ because I had to play for long hours. I would play inside of space from midnight to 5:00, and then I had to go on the terrace to 6:00 to close, maybe 3:00 or 4:00 in the afternoon, long sets like this.

Hold on. So midnight to 5:00 AM, then you shift to another terrace, and then you're playing until three.

O'clock in the afternoon. So it was like, yeah. And same thing. Louis, if you're not on point, you get fired. Right. I'm still like, you know what I mean? No, but people would show up to the club because of space. They're not showing up for the DJs. But then I got to be around amazing DJs. At the time, everybody would play there, like DeepDish, Sander Klinenberg, Danny Taneglia, Eric Morello, Charlotte's way of Morello, rest and peace. And I remember I play with DeepDish, Sriram and Ali, Dobfire. And Sriram was like, This kid is pretty good. I think we need to sign him on our label.

But you're on a label now because you-.

Well, I'm on the label. They wanted to sign me with their agency called Bullet Booking at the time. What they did is they signed me, and all of a sudden it's like, I'm this kid playing in Miami on the plane opening for DeepDish, which at the time was the biggest band in the world. The biggest band. I'm opening for them worldwide. I'm on private jets with them, flying the world, playing in Romania in front of 15,000 people, playing in Dublin at the Oxygen Festival. Wow. It's crazy. They signed me on the agency. But one thing Show-A-M always told me is like, Listen, we're opening you up to the world right now, but now it's up to you to put the work in, make music, because when you're going to go on your own, now you need to connect with people and have your own career. Because it's easy to go with this massive artist and open- Yeah.

Somebody puts the people in the room and you just.

Show up. Correct. There's a lot of people in the room, they don't know who you are. You're playing good music, great. Now you got to connect to these people. You've got to make music.

Right.

So he always told me. That's why I kept producing, kept making music. And all of a sudden, made my first record, Molly, which became a big sensation worldwide. Molly? Yeah, became a big sensation worldwide.

Appropriately named, yeah.

Yeah. That was the first record that the whole controversy with Death Mouse, Madonna coming on stage, shouting out the record for me because I worked with her in New York on her album. So she promoted. There was this big controversy. The record became big. And after that, on the back of that, I did Summertime Sadness. That changed my life, basically.

Summertime Sadness. So whatever happened to Burning, the very.

Original one that-Go back to Burning, my first record came out. A lot of underground DJ such as Steve Lawlor were pushing the record. I was freaking out. The record was getting charted. A lot of people were playing it. Then on the back of that, I did two albums with them. One song that I did that really connected was called Spirit in my life on one of the album. It was like a progression of me learning how to make music and trying to figure out how to make this. It did well, but not at a very commercial level. It put my name out there. The cool DJs were playing my music. Some people were connecting some songs, but there was not a lot of very commercial success yet. Yeah.

So what brought you together with... Because you won the Grammy for the Launa Del Rey record with Summertime Sadness, which is a great song, by the way, actually played it right before the podcast to get in the mood. But what led you to Launa? And how did that working relationship come together? Is there ever a time when you're producing, when you say, This is it?

There's that fact. To be honest with you, you never know. No, you never know. So the way it came in is like, basically, I was doing all this music before on my own. No management, just an agency for touring, because DeepDish signed me to this agency, so I had no management. I was doing everything on my own. At one point, I get a manager, Luke Allen, my manager, a Red Light management, they sign me in. We start working and we start... When we get Molly, I'm already with management. They see Molly is going on, we're getting a buzz. At the time, my manager was friend with the manager of Lanadell Ray. They had this idea of doing this record, Summertime Sadness. Luke came in and he's like, Listen, I have this amazing vocal. You need to remix the song right now. It was like, it's funny, because I'm a huge fan of the song.

I was.

Actually thinking about doing a bootleg of this song for myself to play my set. Really? Yeah. I did the song, finished it on the way to Orlando, EDC Orlando. The first time I played it was at EDC Orlando. I remember the reaction of the crowd was insane. Everybody was singing the song, and the next day on social media, it was going crazy. Really? That's when my management is like, We have a big one. But not to the level that it went, We have a big one. People are going to connect. Djs are going to play it. The song went from playing in the festival to get released on Beatport, which is a DJ website where you go get all your music for the DJs, being number one for multiple weeks on Beatport. We're happy. Now I'm happy. I'm like, Wow, all my DJ friends are playing, and DJs are playing it. That's amazing. I made it.

Yeah, you're seeing it at number one. It's probably the first big, real hit. Yeah.

So then, couple of radio start playing it. Local radios, DJ Mix Radio. I'm like, Wow, it's playing on the radio. That's amazing. Like local radio, not the top 40 radio yet.

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At the time, she was signed to Enterscope Music, and we saw that there was a momentum in the song. My manager would go to Enterscope and be, You have to release the song worldwide because this is the momentum we're having. No, we already released our album. We don't care about this song. What I do is, at the time, John Aman was the Air N'Art, Enterscope Records. What I do is I was playing in DC, Vegas mainstage at that time. I flew him in from L. A. To EDC, and I played a song in front of him. At the moment of the course, I shut the music off, and there was like 90,000 people singing the song. So he could see that. He can see that. He saw it. He went back to L. A, he called my manager, and he goes, Next week, this song will be Top 40 Radio worldwide. No. Yeah. So following week, Top 40 Radio song in the United States.

Dude, I'm getting goosebumps right now.

It's going crazy. Now I have a top 40 Radio, which, so people understand this, when you have a top 40 radio record is when you break into the masses, right? Yeah. Because you have deejay mix radio, which is BPM, Series XM, all these things, and then you have top 40 radio, which is the masses. Now you're with the Taylor Swift, Caddy Perry, you know what I mean? And then they're playing your.

Song, which.

You break into the masses. So that's massive. So then on the back of that, we sold eight-and-a-half million single. Wow.

Eight and a half million singles. Yes, of.

The record worldwide.

And you're still on this meat... I mean, you're still really chugging along in your music career. I mean, you've accomplished a lot, but this is like a parabolic. This is.

The tipping tip. Yeah, it's crazy. I remember it was so crazy because we were number one on iTunes. I remember my boy, Stevie Oakey, one time he comes to live and he goes, Man, I can't get rid of you. I keep looking at the chart and you're number one of this thing. I kept like, This is crazy. That was all nuts for me because I never expected that. Seriously, when I made this song, I made it and I was thinking about my DJ friends playing the song, and I was happy with it. I was like, Oh, my friends are playing it. Djs are playing it. When I walk in the club, the DJs are playing it. That was it. I was not thinking about, It's going to be a commercial hit. It's going to be on the radio. I'm going to win a Grammy. I was not thinking like that at all. And then after on the back of that, the nomination for the Grammy and obviously winning the Grammy was crazy.

That must have been like, talk about that moment for a minute, accepting a Grammy award. You're sitting there, how many other songs were nominated?

It was Alesso with One Direction, Bob Marley, Bruno Mars, and I forgot something else. Those are massive names. Yeah, massive names.

Massive names. Because I always wondered what it would be like, I always watch the Grammys, what it would be like sitting in that audience, and they read your names with the nominations, and then when they tear that envelope open.

And you're like, and you don't say it.

You said it to your face, Summertime Sadness. You're like, Holy shit. My life is going to change.

I know. I remember when they called my name, I just walked to that stage. I had no idea what I was going to say. I was in my head. I was like, What am I going to tell those people?

What did you say? I got to go back and look that up. We need to find that and play it as beatable.

On the podcast. The speech is out there. This is amazing. I never thought doing this remix are going to be standing here today. All I wanted my DJ friend to play the record, and I was cool with that. Thank you very much. I'm just a kid from Marseille with a dream. I'm not even supposed to be here, so thank you. I had no idea what to say, and I just walk in there. But the thing is, with the Grammys is you don't know until the last second you're there. Some of those award show, you already know you're going to win. Your PR telling you and this and that, so you know what I mean? The Grammys, you don't know. You have no idea to the last second. You have no idea that they opened this envelope. You have no idea.

And so you're up there, dude, you take that stage. That moment has got to be... I remember my first public speaking moment, and it was only a few hundred people in the crowd, and I froze, and I almost felt like I was going to piss myself. Yeah, I know. Your voice starts cracking, but you get up there, they hand you this award. What do you... Do you remember what you said? Do you remember that moment?

Yeah, I thank everybody that was part of the project. I work with other people. I work with my boy, Carlos Cid, on the record, which it's an artist that I started with, and now is doing very well. I'm very proud of him. I thank my manager, my agent, everybody. And then at the end, I remember there was this speech from LeBron James that stood to my head when we won the Championship in Miami. He just said, I'm just a kid from Acron. I'm not even supposed to be here. I remember sitting on the floor looking at him saying that, and it stood in my mind. I said, I'm just a kid from Marseille with a dream. I'm not even supposed to be here. That's what I said, because I remember LeBron James.

Dude, I get.

Goosebumps, man. That was surreal. That was a crazy moment.

I'm so enthralled by the human experience, meaning, like you said, you said something to me before the podcast. You said anyone can have a moment. But not everyone can have a career.

And.

I think that you hit this pinnacle, this parabolic rise. You accept the Grammy Award. And now how do you keep your career from just going downhill after that? I'm always fascinated by the athletes that don't just win one championship, by the USC fighter that holds a belt for several years, by a Tom braided that dominates the league and goes to the Super Bowl so many times, even though he's already won that prize. So tell me about how you find inspiration in your career after.

Winning the Grand. Actually, what I did is I got lost for a year because you're trying to replicate the same thing. You try. Now, when I was telling you that I was doing this without thinking about it, and I did it with the passion and the love, right? Right. Now you're doing it, thinking about it, and you want to replicate exactly the same thing, and that's when you get lost. That's why you make music that you don't want to make. Right, because you're trying too hard. Because now you sign to big labels, now you have big record deals, and now you have to please them and try to do exactly what Summertime Sandis did. Right. And that's what I.

Got lost. And the.

Pressure is on. And the pressure is on. So that's why I couldn't do anything. I was making records that I didn't like to try to please them, and nothing was working. And then it takes you a year or two. It took me two years, and then you go back to- It's got to get inside your head a little bit. Yeah, it's inside your head. And then you go back and you say, You know what? My manager told me, go back to making music for your friends and record that you want to play in your sets. That's what I did. That's when I did a record called Do It Tonight. I redid this SOS band, Do It Tonight. I know the song. The song did amazing, blew up. It was the song of Monday Night Football, a touchdown. It was on Charlie Zengil movie. We got picked up with so many things, and everyone in the world were playing the song and charted. So this is what I'm saying. I did this song again for me, for myself to play it for my friends. So I got lost for like two years.

Wow. And I think that happens a lot. I saw an interview with Dana White the other day, and he's a close friend of mine as well. And he talked about what happens to a lot of these fighters at the top of their game. And they spent their entire lives in the grind. The fight business is a tough business. The music business is a tough business. And they get to the top of their game, they get that big paycheck. Now there's a fork in the road, right? Now you've got access. Now you're comfortable. You're comfortable. And I think that's what I want to drill into a little bit because while people listening to this podcast might not be an aspiring DJ, they are aspiring to something in their business, in their life, in their career, in their families. And maybe they've reached that place of comfort and how you made yourself uncomfortable again, so you could go back to actually your music roots and die.

You have to make yourself uncomfortable if you want to be back. You can be comfortable. And I'm never comfortable. I think one of my biggest inspiration is to see my best friend, David Gatlin, the tribe that he has and how many hits this man has.

Oh, my God.

He's a monster. And he still works like he has nothing.

Yeah, he's a sweetheart of a human being, too.

He's the best human being. But I've never seen somebody work. Sometime I look at him and I feel bad about myself because I think I don't work well enough. Because I'm like, This guy could retire right now with so many hits, and he's still working like he's a little kid. But this is what I'm talking about. He's always putting himself in a situation that he doesn't think about what he has and he keeps going.

Yeah, it's amazing. So many athlete, celebrities, a-listers, entrepreneurs, they dominate their game for a short period of time, and then they lose it. I think it's really interesting to hear that you actually had a two-year hiatus where you were wandering around, and then you finally just said, You know what? I'm going to go back to my roots. I'm going to make music for my friends. And then bang, it happens to you again. I think for the people that know you, they know about your music career. I certainly know about your music career. I love your songs, love your music. I've danced to them for years. Not very well. I'm a terrible dancer. But talk about the transition into movies. You've done four movies. You've been on four movies with Mark Walbert. So obviously a really interesting actor. How did that transition occur?

To be honest with you, my friend David Grutman helped me a lot in my career and introduced me to write people. By the way, he's.

Been a massive force in my career, too.

He's amazing. He's the best. Shout out to Dave Grutman. He's the best in the business with that. And he's a friend, and he's looking out for me every day. He's on your side. He's always introducing me to write people. He introduced me to Michael Bay, he introduced me to Peterberg, and became friend with him. What did you say?

This guy's a DJ, but he'd be a good actor?

What did you say? What I did is I started making music. In Pain & Gain, I got two songs in the movie, and then Michael threw me in the movie doing something. That was a small part. Then one time, Peterberg was doing this movie, Deepwater Horizon, and me and Grutman went up and got in the movie with Mark, and each one of us had a scene in the movie. It was amazing. Amazing experience working with Kurt Russell, Mark Warbert, and Kate Hudson, too, which is a good friend now. We did that. Then after that, I mean, Obviously Dave doesn't care about these things. After that, Peter did another movie, A Mile 22, went to Colombia for a week with him. I became very close to Peter, Peterberg. I love him. He's a genius. I love what he does. He actually did this movie on Painkillers, which is on Netflix right now. Oh, that's the one on- That's Peterberg.

Oh, really? It's the one about the opioid crisis.

Correct. Which is incredible. If nobody seen it yet, you have to watch it. It's incredible. I went there, I shot that, Mark Warbert again. And then we did Patriot Day, the marathon bombing. We did that. It's a thing that I'm doing because I'm friends with them. It's fun to act, but it's not really my career. It's just like I do those things on.

The side. But it's amazing. My father, he's a salty old Navy captain, and he used to say, It was the best definition of life I'd ever heard. And he said, Life is what happens to you when you're on your way to doing something else. So your biggest song happened when you were on your way to doing something else. There you are. You're making music for your friends. And then you're like, Holy shit. I got a top 40 song. I got a Grammy in my hand. This is crazy. I'm acting next to Mark Ballberg. And I think a lot of times we put a level of expectation on ourself, just like you said, and we create this expectation. We set ourselves up for failure because we don't let our passion drive us. We set this unrealistic expectation and then by not achieving it, we start to have less and less confidence in ourselves. I think it's a great point to say, get back to what you love to do, relax.

And enjoy.

And let life be something that happens to you when you're on your way to doing something else. Exactly. I want to talk about our journey for a minute because being a DJ, world-renowned DJ in traveling in the nightclub business isn't particularly known for the place of optimal health. Drugs, alcohol, late nights, especially for a DJ, the travel, the time zone changes, just the hours that you've got to be on set, and the fact that you have to be present enough to put the right energy into the crowd. You need to show up. You don't have a choice. So we started our journey about two years ago. I remember when we first met, you were saying, Look, my goal is I want to be as optimal as possible. Exactly. I want to be a superhuman. You don't drink, you don't do drugs, so you don't have the bad habits anyway. But you were like, I really want to dial the diet in, the hydration, the supplementation. We pulled 74 biomarkers in your blood. We pulled another five genetic markers, and you started on the protocol for supplementation, what have you. Talk to me a little bit about how that's impacted your life.

And what are some of the rules that you have for travel, for staying in a hotel, for trying to keep up with your sleep, your diet, what have you?

Well, when I started, I was not worried about any of that. So I was going, When you're young, you don't really worry about anything. So I was traveling. I was not sleeping very well. I was sleeping two hours a day. I was eating very bad, and I was getting sick a lot. When I seen that my career was doing better, I start thinking, I have to change something if I want to keep going in this. The first thing that I changed, that we changed when we start working, I started making changes by my schedule, the way I fly. I wanted to make sure to get my sleep.

Because you fly a lot.

Yeah, I fly a lot. I wanted to make sure that I could sleep at least eight hours every time. No early flights, no two hours of sleep anymore. I changed that.

You started.

Scheduling your travel around your sleep. Scheduling my travel around my sleep to have better sleep. That's very important. For me, sleep is the most important thing, and I think you talk about this, the important sleep is to work out, to make sure that when I get to the city, I get my workout in because I became very big in working out every day, which I was not working out at the time.

So you're planning the hotel that you might stay.

In- To make sure the gym is there. -you have the gym. Correct. I have to make sure the gym is there. I have to get my workout in, that I continue from the week that I started on Monday, I keep my workout in everywhere that I go. Before, I was not working out at all. I was not sleeping, and I was eating bad. I changed my diet. I start intermittent fasting.

I remember when.

We started that. Yes. We started intermittent fasting, which very changed my life. At the beginning, it was very hard, and then I could not live without it. If you tell me right now, have breakfast at 9:00 in the morning, there's no way I can do this. It will ruin my day.

Yeah. I remember you weren't like that. I know everybody is not a candidate for intermittent fasting. We looked at your blood work and you had... There's a marker in the blood work called hemoglobin A1C. It's a three-month average blood sugar. This was elevated. The insulin was elevated. And we talked about it. I remember you said, There are some ways that I can get this down. I said, Well, you could do intermittent fasting. And we started talking about a fasting program. I remember it was difficult for you in the beginning.

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So now talk about what's your eating schedule like now?

So my eating schedule is my first meal is at 3:00 in the afternoon. Last meal, sometimes even more, 4:00 or 5:00 in the afternoon. Last meal, 8:00 PM.

That's 8:00 PM, 9:00 PM sometime. It depends where I'm at. The food that I eat when I'm in town, in my house, everything is organic, non-GMO organic, like you told me to do. Food, very important, like you talk about that it's very important because of the pesticides that's on it, and—and I remember you told me that when you wash the fruits, you can actually reuse the water and pesticides again all the fruits with it.

This is.

How bad.

It is. Yeah, in non-organic.

Non-organic.

Food, yes. So you go organic on your fruits, you're eating in a window from 3:00 to 8:00 PM, so about a five-hour window. And from people that have never intermittent fasting, talk about the struggle. How much of a struggle is that now? It's just what you do.

This is just what I do. It's part of my life. It's very easy. It's very easy. It's very easy. The only thing that's difficult for me is when I travel to control what I eat. For example, when I get to a city, I make sure my tour manager goes to Whole Foods and gets me the organic fruits, my water. I only drink Mountain Valley water, which is in glass bottles. One of the best water to drink. I also change that. I carry my non-GMO sea salt with me, so I can.

Use that. The guy is carrying his own sea salt, ladies and gentlemen.

This is what I do. I carry my sea salt.

This is some.

Next-level shit here. I'm very big on not using any seed oil, sunflower oil, and everything. And as you know, a lot of restaurants are cooking with that. So one thing that I learned, if I eat at a restaurant, I'm going to ask the chef to cook with butter. If I do a steak, I'm going to mention that I want the steak to be cooked in butter, which is much better for you than the seed oils. So there's a lot of tricks like this that I can do. I would love to be home all the time and follow my diet, but I cannot. So that's what I try to do on the road and stay healthy.

And what impact has that had on the wear and tear that travel.

Takes on you? It changed my life. One thing that I can say is I don't get sick anymore. I do not get sick since I've been on the program with you, and I changed my diet and the supplement that I'm taking. I'm since I'm never getting sick.

No, you look amazing. And when you look at blood work, there's something in there called the CBC, the complete blood count. And you can look at how strong some parts of the immune system are, what your blood counts are certain white blood cells that help you mount an immune defense, and that has improved dramatically in your case. But it's nice to take lab values like sugars going from high to low or insulin going from high to low or the amount of blood fat, triglyceride going from high to low, and relate that to how it's impacting your life. And so when you're on planes, so you're fasting.

On airplanes. I'm fasting on airplanes. That's why I try to travel in the morning.

So.

I get to the city and then I can do my things. I'm fasting. It's very easy on the plane. I drink a lot of water, coffee.

It's funny. I had dinner at your restaurant, Matamouchi, in Aspen the other night with my wife, Sage, and your wife. You were out of town. She goes, Oh, man, Cedric. It's a pain in the ass when he orders, you're like, I want my steak cooked in butter. She told me the exact same thing.

That's what I do. She hates sitting.

With me. But it makes such a difference. And do they ever have a problem accommodating you?

No, never. You can always ask a restaurant, they will do.

It for you. Yeah. And these are some of the little shifts that people can make to totally change the trajectory of their life. And I talk about... I like talking about little shifts that you can make that make a major difference in your life because there's people listening to this that don't travel at all. So they work at 9:00 to 5:00, Monday to Friday. There's certainly nothing wrong with that. And they're not consistent at home about what they're eating. And yet with your travel schedule, which is different time zones, different cities, different countries, different food, you set up some rules, and you stick to those rules, and it's helped you in your career, and it's helped you.

With your sleep and your immune system. Yeah, I'm more focused. I'm getting better sleep, better energy at everything. And I see it. I see it. It changed two years ago, I was not like that.

So now we know that this is the next big shift you've made in your life. And I want to get back to that conversation about what makes somebody transition from having a moment to having a career. How are you staying interested in music right now? How are you staying interested and passionate about your career? What do you key into after having such a long career in music, winning a Grammy and acting? What's next for Cedric Gervais?

In my head, I still haven't made it. Really? That's why I'm always- You're still hungry. I'm still hungry. I haven't made it. I don't think I accomplished anything yet. That's why I keep going. And if I would put my manager here, he would tell you that I'm a crazy man. Because every time I call them, I call them like I haven't done anything. Really? And I harass him like, We need to do something. We need to do this. We need to do that. And he's like, You need to chill out. You need to like, And this is my mindset. I'm not comfortable. I'm not.

Where are you getting your creative inspiration from now? Earlier in your career, you got it from wanting to just make music for your product.

Yeah. So where are you getting that creative- Listening to other people, listening to going out, listening to DJs, listening to the music out there, and performing in front of crowds every weekend, that's very inspiring. You get energy from that. The beauty of being a DJ is, which I think a lot of producers don't have, is we can make music and try it in front of a crowd on the weekend.

Oh, in.

Real time? In real time. Yeah. And then go back to the studio and change the thing that you want to change, and go back to the following weekend and try the record again and perfect the.

Record all the time. I never thought.

About that. You see what I mean?

There's a certain connection you have with that crowd, like a certain energy, and you're.

Like, They're catching this vibe. You see if a record works and it doesn't work, as some producer, like massive producers are going to make a record in the studio, and then they're going to be like, Okay, let's release that and see what happens. Yeah, see.

How it goes. Yeah, exactly. Right. You can fail in small increments. Yeah, I love that.

You can fail in small increments. Yeah, you can see. Some record works, some record don't, some you have to tweak, some... You know what I mean? And that's the beauty of DJing and being on.

The road. What do you think makes the difference between a good DJ and a great DJ? I'll tell you what somebody told me one time, and it made a lot of sense. Roman Zago, who was a partner of mine in a nightclub years ago called Mint Lounge. I remember when he was trying to get DJs and talent, he would say, The difference between a good DJ and a great DJ is the transition. I was like, What do you mean the transition? He was like, The transition between songs because the crowd should never feel an abrupt stop and an abrupt start again. If you break things up too much, then you break the momentum and the energy of the crowd. Right? But what do you think makes the difference.

Between a good and a great DJ? I think being an amazing DJ is like... I mean, there's so many different DJs, right? For me, it's like when you're a DJ, you have to tell a story, right? You have to take people on a journey. I come from a different era of DJ, which I have to start from the beginning of the night, warm up the room, get people walking in, have them dancing, take them somewhere to the end of the night, right? Right. For like five hours, six hours. It's a long process. It's a long journey. Yeah. Now you have this kid coming, they get success, they get put on, and they play for one hour. You know what I mean?

Right.

I think there's an art in DJing. It could be hip hop, it could be open format, it could be any music. There's always telling a story and keeping people dancing and having a great time.

Are you ever adjusting in real time? Are you reading the crowd? They're not feeling this. I'm going to- You have to adjust. I had this plan, but I'm going to shift.

You can tell when you walk to a place. I can tell when I walk to a place, I'm like, I'm going to have to change my style. I'm going to have to play different. Really? I'm going to have to go in a different way. But this is when you have this in you, right? Right. But then you have DJs that have prerecorded set that goes everywhere and play the same thing. But those are producers that became DJs. Right. It's a big difference that they had a big record, and then they put on the road of being a DJ, and they have no idea what they're doing. They're learning as they go.

Right.

You.

Really are in live format. You're in that booth sometimes, and you go, I was going this direction, but based on what I'm feeling from the.

Crowd, I'm going to shift up. I'm going to go in a different direction. I never know what record I'm going to play. Really? I'm going to play the same record many times, but in not the same order. You never know when I show up what I'm going to play. Even here, I live, when I play Live, my residency, I never play the same song in the same order. You're going to hear same songs, but never in the same order because you have to create a vibe. And some people, sometimes you don't know, they start drinking. You don't know at what level they are. You look at them and sometimes you show up, the energy is insane and it starts right away. It's always different.

So you just start pounding on the crowd right away.

You have to feed yourself with the energy of the crowd, and then this is something that you have to learn.

How to do it. I imagine you can't really stand on a crowd too hard for too long. You got to give them a little.

Bit of break. I mean, it depends the amount of hours you're playing. I remember this deejay, Danny Taneglia, which was a legend from New York. He used to do 10-hour sets, 12-hour sets at space. Oh my God. And he would take you on journeys. It would be like fast beat and downbeat, this and that. And people dance for 12 hours. But then you would give them rest and then go back up. It was just a crazy experience. Now, everything is very short, very like they want it now. Now everybody's there with their phone watching. Right. It's a different era.

Yeah. That's got to be an interesting part of your career, too, because when you started, the cell phones were not in the nightclubs. They went, they heard that music, they went home. But now, I've been in the DJ booth with you, it's like thousands of phones just pointed at you. So all that's out all over social media everywhere.

Which is-You play a song, they shazam it, they know what it is right away.

Yeah, they shazam it right away, and then they're recording you. Now that you're at this point in your career, you've focused on your health, which I'm a huge fan of yours, and I'm a huge fan of the discipline that you've shown because you have been very, very disciplined. Sometimes when I'm working with different people, you try things, they go off the wagon, they go back on the wagon. You basically got on the wagon and never got off. If anything, you've improved the wagon. You've got travel hacks that you use, you've got sleep hacks that you use, you look great, you're in fantastic shape. It's obviously affecting your career. So again, where do you see Cedric Gervais? I love the fact that you said, I don't feel like I've done anything. Because I think that mindsetthat hungry, young mindset that you're tapping into back when you were in a small club in France at 19, is a different mindset than the one that you tap into after you've won a Grammy and you're like, Hey, I'm already here. I love that because people can actually reorient the way that they approach their career and they can try to find that hunger again for their business, for their music, for their career, for their marriage or what have you.

So what's next? Where's Cedric Gervais over the next five years? Where does he go?

I'm making a lot of music right now at the moment, and also doing.

Different-i mean, are there artists that you're in with, I would love to work with this artist. You could work with one artist who would it be?

I think it would be The Weekend.

The Weekend? Yeah.

I love The Weekend. Bruno Mars is one of my favorite artists. There's many.

Artists I would love to work with. He's one of those two. Obviously, I know some of his songs, but I was in Vegas with this Swedish House Guys, and they're like, Hey, we're going over to... Or with Alessio. He's like, Hey, I'm going over to the weekends concert. I was like, I'll go over there with you. Then I sat there and I was like, Hes a singer. He does that song? He does that song?

He does that song?

He's massive. He does that song. I couldn't believe it. It was like nine of 10 songs.

The weekend is.

You'd love to do an album with him?

Yeah, a song. I would love to do a song. The weekend, I don't know if you know, but the weekend started his career as giving his music for free. He was signed to nobody. You would sign up to a website, which I was signed up to the website. When he would drop an album, you'll get it for free. Back in the days, yeah. I would get his album for free.

And he was producing.

That music. He was producing everything, singing everything, and giving it away to his fans for free. He was signed to no label. They don't want to be signed to anybody. And that's how he blew up and created his crowd.

Wow. And so would DJs like you take that music and hear.

Some of his vocals and things like that? Yeah, at the time, I was just listening to his music. I was a fan. But then he became massive after that.

Who are some of the, in your career so far, who are some of the favorite artists that you've worked with? I mean, working with Lenny Kravitz has been pretty cool.

Yeah, that was very cool. I mean, that's a living legend. That was very cool. Lenny, by the way, when it comes to health, he's very- Oh, yeah. He's a friend now, and he's very strict with his health. He's the same. He's an amazing guy.

Yeah, he and I have been down the rabbit hole in.

That before. Yeah, he's unbelievable. Him, Leonard Del Rey, I worked with Miley Cyrus, working with Madonna was pretty crazy.

And when you collaborate with these artists, is it their way or the highway? Or are they really coming in and collaborating with you? What's it like to.

Work with some of those iconic legends? It's always different. Lenny was very cool. I did Stillness of Heart from his album, worked with him.

So you took a.

Song of his and remixed it. Yeah, I did in my version. Then I went to his house, played for him, and actually he was listening. I didn't know what he was thinking. He was listening to it. At the end, he goes, You blew my mind, man. This is incredible. I was a little kid. I was looking at Lenny Kravitz like this. I was like, Oh, my God. Did you just say that? Yeah. So some artists, they just let you know. I worked with Oneyess, which is an incredible legend from Colombia. We did a song together, and he came in, we worked together, and he was like, He didn't understand because he's a rock artist. He's like, Well, how are we going to do this? So I just told him, I said, Listen, just write one of the songs that you will write, like a ballad, and then just give me the vocals when you're done. And then I've done the song, brought it back to him, and it was like, Oh, my God, this is incredible. You know what I mean?

Because that's the cool thing about your style of music, too, because you can take rock, house, hip hop, pop, even a funky blues tune, and you can put your spin to it and really put it on a different stage. Yeah, you know.

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Lenny Kravitz, some of these other artists, who did you say was an artist that.

You- Miley Sars as well. Miley Sars. Yeah, it was cool to work with that.

Yeah. What did you guys do together?

We did the song Adore You. She wanted me to work on that song. At the time, I think I was saying no to remix that song. I remember.

One time- Why is that?

It was at the time that she started. She was a little crazy and doing all these things, and I was busy doing other things. I remember I get a phone call, and I'm like, Yo, what's up? Why don't you want to work on my song? I'm like, Who's this? She goes, It's Miley.

I'm like, What? No way she called you.

Yeah.

It sounds like.

Something she did. Then she came down to Miami with her mom. I went to hang out with her. I live. Then I did the song. I remixed the song Adore You, which is an incredible song, and she's super cool. But the fact that she called and asked, and I think- Yeah, I love that. When she was such a huge artist, I thought it was super cool because why would she call me? You know what I mean? Right. I did it. She was such a great... And the song did amazing.

Yeah, well, fantastic. Well, the health journey, the music journey, you're clearly almost in your mind at the beginning. Yeah, I am. Again, and I think that's a great point for people to leave with. Is there anything else that you want people to know about Cedric Gervais and your career? What's one piece of advice you would give to a young DJ like yourself starting out 19 years old and wants to break into this career? I think.

The advice that we give somebody that start now at 19 years old is to really work on your craft, right? Because right now, everybody sees this guy up there on stage, putting his hand up in front of thousands of crowd, and the kids are like, This is where I want to be. That's what I want to do. But I think they have to see the work that goes into that.

To.

Get there. Because it was not handed to me. I had to work for it. And some get handed to them, and then they're here for a quick minute, and then they're gone. So really put the work and see how much work you have to put into this and what comes into it. And it comes to... When we're talking about athletes, there's so few athletes that are there and the best in the world, but why are they the best in the world. Cristiano Ronaldo, Messi, LeBron James, Don braided. Why? It's their dedication to the work, the hours they put in day in, day.

Out, into the stage. When they're not on the stage, yeah.

And this is why they're on top, and this is why they're the best in the world. Kobe Bryant, all these people. And I think that's what a kid should look at. And what comes in, and look at David Gatlin. David Gatlin comes from the same background that I come from, from nothing, DJing, learning, producing.

Was there ever a time that you really just wanted to throw in the towel and quit? Were there those low moments?

Yeah, of course, many moments. Many moments, because everybody, you have to understand this, everybody loves you, and you're as good as your last record.

Yeah.

That's it.

When.

Your last record is getting old, people are like, Oh, whatever.

And.

You start feeling like you feel all this love, and all of a sudden you don't feel this love anymore, and you start questioning yourself and you're like, Oh, my God, what's going on here? Where am I going? Am I done? I have to keep producing.

Yeah, there used to be this show I used to love to watch. It called One Hit W wonders. You would always know the song and these people would spike and hit. They would have this one hit wonder, and then you'd never hear about them again. That's some of what I hope we tapped into today. Cedric, this has been amazing. Man, and I'm really appreciative that you took the time to come on the show today. I end all my podcasts the same way by asking every guest what it means to them to be an ultimate human. What does it mean to you to be an ultimate human?

To me, it means that I'm 44 now, and I feel like I'm 20 years old. Awesome. That's what it means to me.

Awesome. Yeah. Well, we're going to end with that. And as always, guys, thank you, Cedric, for joining us today on the ultimate human podcast. You're an.

Absolute beast. Thank you, my brother.

You're a good friend. And as always, that's just science.