Rock n’ Roll: Management Learning Lab
I learned most of what I know about managing highly creative people from my high school days running a rock ‘n roll band and playing in it. Those episodes gave me a low-risk, highly relevant way to make mistakes and see the effect of my decisions quickly.
One of the more intriguing pivot points came as a result of some significant success we had. We won the big Combo Clash in our town, Birmingham Michigan. This was a huge deal; we were competing against big names who had done recordings.
We had a great singer who I had recruited, Mike Vincent. He really won it for us. And a week after the big win, when we had tons of jobs coming in, he stopped me at my locker to tell me he was quitting. He wanted, in his words, “to spend more time with Shelley.” (Shelley was his girlfriend.) The learning was that you have to stay close to the influencers of your highly creative people. The reason they’re highly creative is that they’re sensitive to others. I had not managed him well enough.
I wasn’t going to change things with Mike once he’d announced. The other key guy in the band was George Moser. He was the keyboard player and he was both talented and reliable. I had to pull my weight by managing and getting jobs and recruiting, and George would make sure we sounded great. Oh, and I had to learn the solos for any song we needed to play.
So it was time to recruit. We had done this before; that’s how we got Mike Vincent in the first place. George had heard about this kid from somewhere. He made the appointment for after school within a day or so after Mike announced. Another piece of learning: when you start recruiting you do it intensely and fast.
We drove down to Royal Oak, a couple of towns south of Birmingham. We find the address, a white two-story house in a pleasant neighborhood. We knock on the door and a high school junior opens it and leads us down to his basement.
There he sits on his amp, picks up his Gibson single cutaway guitar, and starts to play and sing. Two things I instantly pick up: a high, reedy voice without feel or emotion, and very little ability to handle chord changes on a guitar. He could get from one chord to the next, but he had to look and move his fingers carefully.
It took a lot of self-discipline, but I asked for a second song after the first one. George barely made it through the first song; he was fidgeting and uncomfortable as soon as he heard a couple of bars. He went almost crazy when I asked for the second song.
Finally, after we’d given a good listen, and nobody could say we didn’t, I spoke. I didn’t have to ask for a moment to confer with George; I knew what he was thinking. I said, “You have some talent here and you should keep working. You’re not right for us. The reason is that we have work now. I mean, we have a job Saturday night and we have to pull together something that will play well enough to justify our cost.
“We could work with you, but it would take a long time and we don’t have that right now. Stay on it and I think your career will go okay in music.”
The kid was disappointed but he seemed to understand. We went directly up the stairs and out the back door of the house. George could barely contain himself on the way up the stairs. “Why did you say that? He was terrible! I mean he could barely…”.
“George, hold it down. Shhhh… Wait till we get outside.”
We went back and forth after we got outside. George felt I had encouraged the kid too much; he saw zero talent. I said you should be nice to people. you never know how things are going to turn out.
Our band was called The Individuals. One of the other big bands in town was called the four of us. They all dressed alike and did a lot of Beatles songs. We dressed differently and leaned more towards Rolling Stones, James Brown, etc.
The kid found a home with the four of us. After high school he joined the lead singer and super talented guitarist of that band and migrated to California. He was a likable kid and ended up as the rhythm guitarist for well-known female singer. He then started his own band, the Eagles. The kid was Glenn Frey.
Over the years, I reevaluate my decisions every decade. This one, passing on Frey, I’ve put on the reevaluation list. George and I made the right decision for the time. Glenn would’ve shown up for practices but he was just not ready to be our lead singer. If we’d put up with the short term problems of training him, though, I might still be in the music business. Would that be better? I don’t know.
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I got this epilogue from George. I wasn’t there, but I’m sure it’s accurate. George became a physician. One night he saw that the Eagles were playing at Pine Knob, a local outdoor concert venue. He went out and walked in, which physicians can do at places like that.
He said he enjoyed the show and afterward went up to the stage and caught the eye of one of the roadies. He told the roadie to, “Tell Glenn Frey that George Moser is out here and wants to say hello.” Reluctantly, the roadie did so.
A few minutes later George was escorted backstage where Glenn introduced him to the rest of the Eagles. He pointed out to them George’s importance to his career and said to George, “I have to thank you, George. That day you and Bill rejected me for your band in my basement is the day I really started to work hard and practice.”
