If you prefer to receive these recaps weekly instead of daily posts, you can manage your subscription preferences right by viewing this email on the web. Look for your profile icon in the top right of the browser, and you can update your settings from daily to weekly (and vice versa) there. However I can get you the full narrative arc without it feeling cluttered - I'm just happy you're here!

Let's connect some dots from this week's notes...

The rules at one of our favorite local bars are unspoken and everybody knows them anyway - you don't have to talk to anyone, but you're all playing America Says together, and nobody had to organize that.

Quote from the Personal Archive - on what you can't pitch or sell

"You can't market or sell or pitch this. Nobody opens a bar with this as the genius idea. You just have to experience it. It just has to happen."

Flea was a jazz kid who became a punk kid who became whatever the Red Hot Chili Peppers were, and now he's picked the trumpet back up - and the reason he felt safe doing it is worth sitting with. The old jazz world was built on elitism, on who could hang and who couldn't. What Kamasi Washington's generation showed him was that you don't have to look down on anything anymore, that it's all music and energy and love, and that opened a door he thought had closed on him.

Quote from the Personal Archive - Flea on what changed

"When I heard Kamasi's record, I was like, that's that feeling of the street, that revolutionary spirit, that spirituality, that togetherness that I want."

Questlove pulled a 1981 Rock and Soul magazine question out of nowhere and aimed it at Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis like it was about AI - because it basically was. Michael Jackson stood in Quincy Jones's studio staring at an Oberheim synth and an 808 and wondered what the machines would be doing in 50 years. 2031 isn't that far away.

Quote from the Personal Archive - on optimism and what we can't predict

"I get the call back. I get 'the Simpsons did it' fun of old predictions. But I'm still an optimist on man and machines and making cool stuff we can't predict yet."

Terry Lewis, the often-silent half of one of the most decorated songwriting duos in pop history, dropped one line when Questlove asked about pressure to modernize - and it went straight into my notes. Instead, remember: the people lining up to give you advice have no actual insight about the future. They won't know if they like what you're doing until they get familiar with it.

Quote from the Personal Archive - Terry Lewis on taste and familiarity

"Most people don't know what they like. They like what they know."

"Bastards of Young" is a major key song that starts every verse in the minor - and that musical tension is basically the whole point. I wanted to explain that to Joseph Moore when we sat down to talk about songs that best describe American life, because it colors everything Westerberg is saying: arrogant enough to think you're the rejected byproduct of your own youth, gritty enough to figure out the next step anyway. I had a copy of Tim in every car I drove through my 20s and 30s. I wasn't in crisis exactly - just lost on what everybody else called the career ladder.

Quote from the Personal Archive - Westerberg on the rite of passage

"We are the sons of no one / bastards of young."

Ian Cassel started with $20,000 in a brokerage account at 16, weaseled his way into a CEO meeting in Manhattan wearing his high school senior photo suit, and spent two decades quietly becoming one of the most trusted voices in a corner of markets most people never find. You can treat reputation like a flywheel, because it actually compounds, and Ian built his by making himself impossible to ignore before he ever asked for anything.

Quote from the Personal Archive - Ian on making yourself impossible to ignore

"I'm gonna make it so he has to respond to me. I'm gonna find some piece of information on one of his companies that he likes that's gonna make him sit up a little straighter in his chair and realize that I'm worthwhile to communicate with."

Where Else I Showed Up This Week

The week's theme of knowing what you know showed up in my Excess Returns conversations too - just with more charts.

David Rosenberg came on to make the case for Treasury bonds while most of the market wants nothing to do with them.

Jenny Johnson, the CEO of Franklin Templeton, joined me to talk about AI, private markets, and what advisors are actually for - and when a CEO of that stature sits down to talk about where the industry is going, you pay attention.

Jack and I also had a big week on the Weekly Wrap, covering hidden bond fund risk, durable moats, and how to think about aligning your portfolio with the risks in your own working life.

Jim Paulsen also joined us with 27 charts and a tech bear market warning worth your time.

Over on the Epsilon Theory YouTube, Joseph Moore joined me to talk about what writing is actually for - which connects almost too perfectly to his Human 100% essay on Panoptica this week, where he makes the case that offloading the writing means offloading the thinking, and the thinking was always the point.

What did you love before the world told you it wasn't serious?

WHO IN YOUR NETWORK WOULD SIT UP STRAIGHTER IF YOU SHOWED UP WITH SOMETHING USEFUL FIRST?

What works in your life precisely because nobody designed it?

WHAT ARE YOU STILL WAITING TO GET FAMILIAR WITH BEFORE YOU DECIDE IF YOU LIKE IT?

Which relationship shaped you most - and did you know it at the time?

ARE THE PEOPLE CLOSEST TO YOU ALONG FOR THE RIDE, OR WAITING ON THE SIDELINE?

What are you making right now that the people giving you advice can't predict yet?

As always, I did my part, now it's your turn to write some reflections in your own Personal Archive.

(then, be sure to let me know where you're keeping it, I'm in search of the others too)

ps. Claude helped me organize and synthesize these thoughts from the week's posts. If you are curious how I use AI, read this post: Did AI Do That: Personal Rules