President Barack Obama & Bruce Springsteen are co-hosting a new podcast for Spotify titled Renegades: Born in the USA. Across eight episodes, they will discuss “their lives, music, and enduring love of America—despite all its challenges.” The podcast is made via by Barack and Michelle Obama’s Higher Ground Productions, and here’s Barack Obama’s introduction from the first episode:

“How did we get here? How could we find our way back to a more unifying American story? That topic came to dominate so many of my conversations last year – with Michelle, with my daughters and with friends. And one of the friends just happened to be Mr. Bruce Springsteen. On the surface, Bruce and I don’t have a lot in common. But over the years, what we’ve found is that we’ve got a shared sensibility. About work, about family and about America. In our own ways, Bruce and I have been on parallel journeys trying to understand this country that’s given us both so much. Trying to chronicle the stories of its people. Looking for a way to connect our own individual searches for meaning and truth and community with the larger story of America.”

The series was taped at Springsteen’s home between July and December of 2020, and the first two episodes are available now: “Outsiders: An Unlikely Friendship,” where “President Barack Obama and Bruce Springsteen discuss the making of an unlikely friendship, growing up as outsiders”; and “American Skin: Race in the United States,” where they “reflect on their early experiences with race and racism and the uncomfortable conversations we need to have.” You can listen to both below.

Bruce performed as part of President Joe Biden & Vice President Kamala Harris’ inauguration celebration in January, and starred in a Super Bowl commercial for Jeep — his first-ever ad — which ended up getting pulled after it was revealed he’d been recently arrested for DWI.