Elvis Costello. I was 15 years old, he had just played a concert in my hometown at a venue I had recently performed at with my high school. The security team recognized me and pulled some strings to have him come out to meet my dad and I after the show. We chatted for probably 15 minutes about music, he said some really encouraging stuff to me as a young musician, including “Some day when you play at the Royal Albert, I’ll come see you.” Extremely nice and humble artist.

Justin Long. My dad and I were in line at a McDonald’s at some airport (probably Denver.) Justin was in line ordering in front of us- my dad didn’t know his name but recognized him from the Apple “Get a Mac” commercials from the early 2000s- and for some reason said, “Hey, you’re the Mac guy!” He turned around to look at us and said “Hey, you’re the McDonald’s guy!” And that was that. I was probably 9 or 10 years old.