First Person:
By Al Carlos Hernandez
I’ve recently read several rock stars’ bios – Sammy Hagar, Keith Richards, Eric Clapton, Steven Tyler and the latest was Ozzie Ozbourne. They all have a couple of things in common. Of course they have talent, but they also have legendary egregious, almost mythological, substance abuse issues as well. Robin Williams said, “If you remember the 70’s, you weren’t really there.”
Like most cats of my generation, I wanted to become a rock star. The music at that time spoke to our angst, hopes, and dreams. And girls liked rock stars more than pro-athletes. I had everything it took to become a major rocker. I came from a musical family. We were raised on Jibaro salsa, Johnny Mathis, Nat King Cole standards, housing project Motown DooWop, Jimi Hendrix and, most of all, “East Bay Grease.” After the film “Woodstock,” I grew Santana hair and a Hendrix Fu Manchu moustache. Our extended family even had a history of substance abuse. I was once asked to join a Latin rock band because I looked like I belonged in one. But nothing ever happened because I never learned how to play an instrument or developed my voice as a singer. I guess today this would be considered “Rockero Racial Profiling.” An advantage I did have is the ability to know all of the words. But too much ‘head knowledge’ has kept me from an invitation to the church choir.
To my credit I have to say I have written lyrics and I’ve gotten to ride Eugene Rodriguez’ and Los Lobos’ coat tails to a Grammy nomination in 1996. But as I look back, I realize that I have sublimated a lack of ‘rock stardom’ by working in rock radio, then contemporary Latin, and finally moving directly to the record business. This allowed me to just to be on stage and bask in the glow of monumental hipness. Being on stage with tens of thousands of people appreciating you is the highest high. Fame is the most addicting drug there is. But unfortunately, for some of the best, many have to be “high” to do it.
It is amazing to look behind the curtain (via the actual reading of books) at my childhood heroes. I realized, as I listened to ‘this’ album or saw ‘that’ group on stage, that many of these cats were seriously sleeping on someone’s sofa and drinking warm beer for breakfast.
They asked David Lee Roth of Van Halen if drugs and alcohol were a problem, He answered, “With the money we made, NO Problem!” (Historical footnote: Van Halen with Sammy Hagar sold millions more albums than they did with Diamond Dave.)
Pop/rock lyrics usually manifest through pain, longing, a catch phrase, something stupid a roadie said, or an accidental guitar riff. Often times what they wrote, they wrote only because it rhymed. The band Steely Dan called their lyrics “Junk Sculpture.” For those of you who don’t know, Jimi Hendrix said, “‘S’cuse me while I kiss the sky,” not, “Kiss this guy…”
A composer is a guy who goes around forcing his will on unsuspecting air molecules, often with the assistance of unsuspecting musicians.
-Frank Zappa
What inspires me about these music people is their relentless drive to keep doing what they love, no matter what the cost. My high school friends from Tower of Power (and this particular band, for those who don’t know, is the best band on the planet) travel around the world almost continually. They are on the road two hundred days every year to put food on the table and trumpet/sax/boogie the funk into the future.
Fame and fortune, I have found, are not mutually applicable dialectics. Did I mention that I went into teaching? Teaching is ’show business’ for really smart, altruistic people who care. No fame or fortune here either.
Success is a lousy teacher. It seduces smart people into thinking they can’t lose.
-Bill Gates
As an editor for the Euro-based Herald De Paris, I have had the opportunity to interview some of the biggest British rock stars: Jon Anderson, Rick Wakeman of Yes, Peter Noone, Joey of Badfinger, Kevin Godly of 10 cc. They all have the same artistic sentiment as the US rockers and a similar artistic process. Everyones’ goal is to make it in the States. They think American bands are big. We think the Euro bands are bigger. I’m told the Euro bands have lots of precision but no soul. Euro bands sometimes believe that US music died when Elvis did.
Throughout my research, writing, and first hand knowledge, I realize that all ‘music men’ have one thing in common – they all have the fire down below and the visceral need to impress themselves (and everyone around them) with their art.
For my generation, the aspiration to rock stardom never really leaves. I know a major TV producer who can play keys like Gregg Rolie, a presiding Superior Court judge that can sing Motown like Smoky, and a phone executive that can play bass like Stanley Clark. If they had the chance they would say, “Drop what you’re doing! I am about to ruin the image and the style that you are used to!” (Okay, this is a direct quote from Shock G of Digital Underground.)
If our history can challenge the next wave of musicians to keep moving and changing, to keep spiritually hungry and horny, that’s what it’s all about.
– Carlos Santana
Musicians don’t retire; they stop when there’s no more music in them.
– Louis Armstrong
My music defines me and has been a soundtrack of my life. Ask someone who they listen to and I’ll tell you who they are . . . or at least who they had hoped to be.
Respect to the memory of Don Cornelius and Whitney