|
Engineering a Rock and Roll Life |
|
|
|
|
Page 2 of 2
He's seen his fair share of the dark side of the music industry—not the artists, he notes, but some of the people on the business side who are driven by drug addiction and greed. He weathered (and ultimately won) a series of lawsuits in the 1980s, including a $20 million claim brought by CBS, owner of the Epic label, because it was displeased with Boston's productivity. Through it all, it's Scholz’s love of music that has sustained him, as well as the devotion of fans.
Scholz's engineering skills have been an integral part of his success; to date, he has some 34 patents to his name. In 1980 he formed Scholz Research and Design (SR&D), an audio-electronics company that built signal-processing equipment for musicians. Two of his inventions, the Power Soak and the Rockman headphone amp, became widely used by other rock musicians. "I run into more people who want to talk to me about the Rockman guitar amp than about Boston albums," Scholz says with a laugh.
Scholz decided to close SR&D in 1995. Innovation was what inspired him, not maximizing profits, so he hated the emphasis on the bottom line and worrying about competition. These days he only toys with projects that are of interest to him, without regard to marketability, and they don’t all revolve around music. For example, as an avid freestyle skater, Scholz wants to improve current skate design, which he calls "basically walking boots from the 1800s with a steel blade stuck on them."
He's also involved with several charities, including the Sierra Club. During Boston’s summer 2003 concert tour, the band donated more than $170,000 in ticket sales to the environmental organization.
Still, music remains in the forefront of his mind. Scholz spent much of the spring in the studio working on a rerelease of Corporate America (2002), which had a "disastrous" release because its record label, Artemis, ran into financial troubles. This summer he's on a limited tour with the band. Even after all these years, he loves touring. "If I could, I'd pack a suitcase and a guitar, and I'd stay out on the road for the rest of my life," he says.
But he's got a good reason to stay close to his home outside Boston. Scholz's son, who he claims is "a lot smarter than I am," will be a senior at MIT this fall. And does he like his dad's music? "I think he does," says Scholz, "but he’s such a nice kid that he would pretend he did even if he didn't."
<< Start < Prev 1 2 Next > End >>
|
Subscribe to this comment's feed
Show/Hide comment form
