|
Page 4 of 4
Scholz became so fascinated with drum beats that he began making recordings of drum tracks and cutting them up a bar at a time. It was a kind of analog drum machine only a seasoned tape splicer would dare attempt, but it worked wonders for "Cool The Engines," probably the closest thing to an 80s feel Boston ever attempted. Scholz's involvement in his drum tracks illustrates either his brilliance or his tunnel vision. Or both. Sheehan puts it this way: "Sometimes he had a hard time seeing the forest for the trees. He really has a genius mind, and a lot of times that genius would take him in a bizarre direction to find a cure. If he was a doctor and you had a bad headache, he wouldn't say, 'Take two aspirin.' He'll go through this elaborate thing of finding a whole new cure for the problem. Ninety percent of the time he wouldn't get there, but ten percent of the time he'd find something completely different, and that's where his genius lies."
Scholz plunged on into rhythm research. When Jim Masdea took a job as a pleasure boat captain and went to Jamaica for months, Tom began looking into drum machines. Declaring what was commercially available "putrid," Scholz finally "gobbled up" an Oberheim DMX, doubling its clock speed to get more resolution, and spent several months talking to various EPROM burners to get Masdea's sounds onto microchips. Scholz even used it to complete "To Be A Man," but when Masdea returned, Tom used a set of contact mikes under indoor/outdoor carpeting to trigger the samples and had him play live. Scholz never found this feasible for cymbals, which he had Masdea record live. Thus, most of Tom's research didn't bear fruit, although it was a further step toward getting the other humans out of his project (he also bought an automated mixing system to eliminate an assistant engineer). Despite his experiments, which now qualify him as an expert on digital drums, Scholz is wary of having it known he used a "drum machine." While Scholz was experimenting CBS was getting hungry for a Boston album. In 1981 there appears the first hint that royalties might be used as leverage to speed progress. Scholz requested and got a meeting with Walter Yetnikoff. Scholz admitted the LP was coming along slowly, but that he was willing to continue financing it himself as long as CBS didn't cut off his royalties. Scholz says Yetnikoff agreed. When Scholz asked him to put it in writing, Yetnikoff allegedly told him, "You don't need it in a letter, you have got my word." This conversation would later become crucial to Scholz's court case.
Scholz went back to the studio where, by mid-1982, he'd completed the first side and some songs for the flip of what would become Third Stage. His day-job company, which was still a fairly small operation, was preparing to release the Rockman, a Walkman-influenced micro-amp/multi-effects unit. CBS had been biding its time in the four years since Don't Look Back, and in the midst of a dreadful economic downturn and big staff layoffs, felt it could wait no longer. In his deposition, Walter Yetnikoff recalled a number of occasions when Scholz would promise the LP within six months and later admit he'd been over-optimistic. Asked if Scholz had warned him the LP wouldn't sell as well if it were rushed, Yetnikoff said, "If he did, he said it as an excuse."
Why did Yetnikoff say that? "Because if a man promises you something in six months constantly, and six months go by and he says, 'I haven't got it' and then the individual says, 'You will have it in another six months,' and another six months go by and he says 'I haven't got it, but you'll have it in another six months' and six months go by and you still don't have it, after three or four years of that, one begins to suspect that the man is either lying or making an excuse."
In terms of leverage, CBS didn't have a lot to choose from. They had advanced no production costs to Scholz--he used his personal royalties to finance the recording, maintenance and upgrading of Hidaway studios. That left the royalties themselves, even though they were for albums that had already been sold and therefore already earned by Scholz. CBS froze Scholz's royalties.
In mid-'82 a woman in CBS' accounting department alerted Boston that their royalty payments were about to be suspended. In his deposition, Yetnikoff said, "There undoubtedly came a time where I said, 'You know, I just don't believe Scholz any longer. He has not complied with various promises that I believe he made to me and let's exercise our legal rights."
Scholz's new manager, Jeff Dorenfeld, had a hard time getting anyone at CBS to deal with him. An internal CBS memorandum proposing a compromise was rejected with the written addendum, "I vote to sit tight until our LP is delivered."
Early the following year, CBS turned up the heat still further, ending payments of the "deferred royalties"--in effect a CBS-administered tax shelter--that Boston had set aside in '77 and '79. By late 1984, more than three million dollars in royalties remained in CBS' hands. With no income to pay attorney fees or finance the recording, Scholz seemed checkmated. But he had one last card to play: the Rockman.
When he decided to market his Rockman, Scholz had not envisioned a large operation. But initial response to the product produced thousands of orders. Scholz says it was the CBS action that forced Scholz Research & Development into high gear, and as a musical instrument success story S R&D is nearly unparalleled. This small American company not only designed and manufactured the Rockman at a competitive price, but kept the market all to itself--despite attempts to copy the unit, particularly from Japanese manufacturers. "There were a lot of attempts, but they were horrendous," Scholz laughs. It's interesting that as an entrepreneur, Scholz avoided all his worst tendencies as a record producer: He brought out a quality product at a reasonable cost in a timely schedule. He delegated jobs, and used his leadership to oversee and further upgrade his product, using problems he encountered recording to generate new improved versions of the Rockman. His reward was complete independence from his record label. How many major artists have walked away from making records and succeeded in a totally different field?
Scholz took his Rockman money and went looking for a good lawyer. Los Angeles attorney Don Engel [profiled in the November Musician] was retained, and a counter-offensive planned. On October 21, 1983, Scholz wrote a six-page, single-spaced letter to Walter Yetnikoff. This "Dear Walter" letter was a specific bill of Scholz's charges against CBS, and it's a revealing look at its aroused author: "Since last summer, when CBS stopped my career short, it has become apparent that your staff at Epic Records does not intend to finance another Boston album, promote Boston, or in any way do business with Boston .... Apparently some people at Epic feel I should be punished for my refusal to sacrifice quality and deliver a record that's compromised by haste. In fact, I will never force a second rate record on the public to fill CBS' pockets or my own."
In a sweeping, self-righteous tone, Scholz goes on to invoke his "endless, unpaid and thankless hours of time" and denounce CBS' "vindictive animosity" and "numerous roadblocks," which he then lists. The first four focus almost obsessively on the Goudreau album. Lenny Petze had gone behind his back to use the other Boston members, intending to "exploit the reputation of Boston. In doing this, he disrupted and interfered with a delicate contractual and working relationship between myself and the other members of my band, causing over a year's delay in starting Boston's third album."
Upon learning that another Goudreau album was underway, he snarled, "It's especially odd since Boston sold over ten million records for CBS, while the last Barry Goudreau effort sold a miserable 100, 000. It's unbelievable that the Epic marketing department could be so out of touch with the written and broadcast comment concerning Boston after the first Goudreau fiasco. Do they expect this artist to make up the... unit sales lost by further compromising Boston's promotion?"
This argument would carry into the case as a counter-claim, but it seems brittle. Even if Petze and CBS did try to play up the Boston connection, the Goudreau album was unquestionably born of Scholz's desire to control the means of production. Goudreau had the right to leave Boston and do a solo LP, and CBS had every right to let him. Elsewhere in the "Dear Walter" letter Scholz documented his deteriorating relationship with CBS. Of the withholding of the royalties, he wrote, "It was.obviously intended to scare the members of Boston. It did. There was a flurry to get personal lawyers involved. There were accusations against me for mishandling Boston's business. There were more lawyer's discussions and renewed turmoil for an additional two or three months, and frankly, it seemed foolish to continue making a record for a company bent on suing me, although I persevered nonetheless.
"At this point, I realized that two things were probable: One, Boston was being unfairly starved to help CBS' cash shortage problem; two, someone at CBS actually believed that they could scare us into creating music at a faster pace. I was reminded at this time of a quote you made in our earlier meeting in reference to a dispute with the band Cheap Trick: 'CBS can be a real prick when it wants to be.' You thought this was important enough you repeated it word-for-word a second time."
The letter closes with the hopeful assumption "that you are unaware of this situation" and suggests a meeting between representatives to conclude a deal for "the nearly completed third album master .... If you are not interested, then CBS should release Boston from its contract with CBS."
"That letter was the last straw for Yetnikoff. It was very significant," Sheehan said in his own deposition. A week after Scholz mailed it, CBS filed suit in Federal District Court against Paul Ahern and Charles McKenzie (the managers who had signed the original record contract) and all five members of Boston (the suit was thus called CBS vs. Ahern). he war was on. 'For a brief moment in December of 1983, a compromise flickered, then died. Seven subpoenas went out and seven different answers came back. (A large surge in the employment rate for lawyers dates from that time.) Within a few weeks, Scholz and Don Engel stitched together a rough outline of their defense and countersuit and filed it in the New York City court of ex-police commissioner Judge Vincent Broderick.
Scholz was determined to keep working on Third Stage. He renewed his attempts to repair the second side, fortified by his hunger for legal vindication: "Initially, the first year, it was a big drive. I would get depressed or uninspired and think, 'Boy, why am I doing this?' Then I'd think about somebody over at CBS who was trying to give me a hard time, and go back down to the studio! I knew I had to finish it, and whenever I forgot, my wife reminded me I had to finish it. I mean, it was finally coming out the way I wanted it, musically. I really liked it, in spite of the fact that I had heard it thousands of times."
While Scholz continued to assemble and dismantle his music, the wheels of justice moved steadily. In the second week of February 1984, Scholz was deposed at great length. "He was good," notes Engel. "He had a good memory." The deal called for CBS to produce Yetnikoff, and on the l0th of February he appeared for one of the most dramatic days of the case. In his "Dear Walter" letter and in his own depositions, Scholz had maintained that Yetnikoff promised to accept a late album and not cut off royalties. If there was in fact such a promise and Scholz had relied on it, CBS had modified the original contract. Engel's job was to get Yetnikoff to admit it. It would become the Clash of the Titans.
Engel had worked with Yetnikoff on another case and heard him say to someone else the very same thing he'd told Scholz about not needing it in writing. Engel began by asking Yetnikoff if he remembered Scholz. Yetnikoff said he did not. Engel calmly asked how many other acts he had that sold eight million records their first time out. None. How many sold four? Three? Rather than wait for the follow-up, Yetnikoff admitted he remembered Scholz. Working against a steady stream of "I don't remembers" and "not that I recalls", Engel quoted Scholz's testimony of Yetnikoff’s words. Looking straight into the eyes of a lawyer who'd heard him say the same words, Yetnikoff admitted he "might have said that. In fact, counselor, I might have even said it to you."
Trying to get more out of Walter Yetnikoff made for a grueling morning. Yetnikoff seemed to tire by the fourth hour, admitting he was "getting a little upset." CBS' attorney David Eizenman interrupted frequently with objections and remarks. The mood got ugly by the end, with Engel asking Yetnikoff if he ever considered he was committing a crime by withholding Boston's deferred royalties. "Do you ever consider it?" snapped Eizenman. "Yes, very seriously," replied Engel.
Engel would need every advantage to counter CBS' anger about a new development: Scholz had begun talking to other labels about bringing out Third Stage. According to a 1985 Scholz motion, CBS warned the other five major labels--in writing--not to touch it. Then CBS let it be known that if another major wanted Boston's contract, CBS would settle for $900,000 and $.25 an album. When Irving Azoffs MCA label decided to take on the album, CBS brought a new case against Scholz and MCA, asking for a preliminary injunction to freeze the deal. The CBS demand for an injunction to stop Third Stage took only nine pages. "They put in very simple papers," says Engel. "The tactic was, hey, it's a simple matter, give us the injunction." Engel responded with a densely argued, well-organized seventy-three-page brief. The judge had to accept one to three of Engel's eight points to kill the injunction: Engel won six. Third Stage belonged to MCA. Judge Broderick also made special mention of the deferred royalties: "I don't find anything that makes this money, which was being held in a special account by CBS, as being subject to withholding on the grounds of some grievance CBS may think it has with respect to performance under the basic contract."
This last was crucial to the issue of the breached contract. If CBS unreasonably withheld the royalties,' it was they who had broken the contract. Only if they had executed their half of the deal could they argue that the deal was still in force. Engel maintained that by continuing to work on the album, however slowly, Scholz had kept his part of the bargain. "I didn't understand the legal complications involved," Scholz says, "but it was going to have to come out that I was simply trying to make this record, period. I wasn't giving up and I was working on it as hard as I could. Basically you're not going to get burned if you're trying to do the right thing." The case is expected to go to a jury trial early in 1987, but don't hold your breath.
In 1985, Scholz says, he "began to see light at the end of the tunnel." One reason was Gary Pihl, a guitarist with Sammy Hagar who helped Scholz rough out some tapes of the LP's final song, "I Think I Like It," on which Pihl is heard trading solos with Scholz. Yes, Tom Scholz was actually delegating work. "Gary was a big help going through the daily grind work of rehearsing. Jim, trying ideas I would show him, and making crude demos of them. There aren't many people I could delegate that to; Gary's an exceptional individual he knows how to play guitar and lots of other instruments, he listens to songs, and is extremely organized. I can't think of any other person I've ever met who I would've entrusted this work to."
Another new aspect in Scholz's work was a unified lyrical theme. No one will ever say Scholz has Elvis Costello's gift for words, but he was aware of wanting to make a personal
statement about the "Third Stage after youth and adulthood." "I had the message embedded in the songs that I wanted," Scholz explains. "And that's the first time I'd ever consciously done that. They may go undiscovered forever, but they're in there. For me it has a very exact meaning. I wrote an essay on what every song says and how it fits in. I actually did that, just for myself as I was putting the pieces together.
"There isn't anything on this record that isn't straight from the heart. It's not autobiographical, but it's close. Like on 'I Think I Like It.' What does the guy like? Change. People don't like change, something immensely different that alters your whole life. Like, let's say you go through a terrible lawsuit and come out the other end. There are good parts and bad parts. Some changes may appear bad, but in the end have a silver lining that's better than what existed before. That's what that song is about, a person realizing he's been made to change, and discovering he likes it. He didn't like it, but he does now."
Perhaps the fullest statement of Scholz's theme comes on the LP's closer, "Holly Ann," which Tom grappled with for almost all of the six years spent on the project. It's a tribute to the Woodstock era, halcyon days of youthful idealism: "In my mind I can see reminders of a past decayed / So far behind, like the shadows linger at the close of day." Viewed from his 80s world of lawyers, accountants and sharks, the song has a special poignancy, an innocence he can never regain. "It/s a tribute to an exceptional time, having gone through it myself," Scholz nods. "A lot of people never realize that they've gone through it when something is over and they've finished. See, that's the key: Maybe acceptance of the passing of something is the ending of the third stage."
HIDEAWAY HAPPINESS
Scholz's basement laboratory is not a showplace of new high-tech gear, because Tom is no fan of digital equipment: "Anyplace you've got a microprocessor, you've got a disaster waiting to happen. I avoid them like the plague." This means analog tools wherever they work. The main multitrackers are two 3M M-79s, which Scholz uses to dupe his masters so he can wear out the copy. There's also a couple of Studers, his first Scully 12-track, and a Scully mixdown deck for mastering. This last is equipped with a special meter to precisely set the high frequency bias tone so he can take advantage of a notch in the signal-to-noise characteristics of Scotch 226 tape; this gives him exceptional low-noise, big headroom master mixes.
Incredibly, most of his recordings are fourth generation, which he gets away with by plenty of masking and gating. To sync his big decks together, Scholz tried an expensive SMPTE synchronizer, but found it had too much wow; now he syncs up by putting each deck on a side of his headphones and slowing the reel down with his hands so the sound is in the center of his head. His method of punching in and out is similarly low-tech: a bent coathanger to simultaneously hit the play and record buttons with his toe.
His outboard gear includes an EMT plate reverb, Lexicon PCM 41s and an ancient digital delay, an Eventide 910 harmonizer and a ranger, Kepex noise gates, dbx 263X de-essers and 160 compressor/limiters, Urei LA4 and 1176 limitors, parametric eq’s by White, Ashley, Synergistic, and SA, and other nondescript boxes and oscillators. The main board is by Audiotronics, with a Fadex automated mixing system added. There's also a Soundcraft Series 200B mixer for the drum triggers going to the Oberheim DMX (which Tom calls "Dummy X"). House monitors are Cizaks, monitor amps are unknown, and house microphones include an Electro-Voice PL20 for vocals and AKG 414s for cymbals.
Scholz still plays his prized gold-top Les Paul Standards with DiMarzio Super Humbuckers, while his acoustics are by Guild. His keyboards (no synths need apply) are a Hammond M Series organ, a Yamaha CP-70 electric piano and his old Wurlitzer which died right after he recorded "The Destination." There are Pearl drums with Zildjian cymbals, an old Marshall amp now replaced by about a dozen Scholz Sustainors and Chorus/Delays, plenty of MXR stomp boxes and eq’s, an Ovation electric 12-string, and an old Echoplex. But Scholz's favorite piece of equipment is his flashy red radio-controlled model airplane, which draws a crowd whenever he takes it out for a spin.
<< Start < Prev 1 2 3 4 Next > End >>
|
Articles 
Subscribe to this comment's feed
Show/Hide comment form
