Another highlight of my early days at PolyGram came when I worked with the German band Scorpions. I was introduced to them by Dan Young, the guy who first told me about the job. Soon after I met them, they told me they were big Gentle Giant fans and that we’d had a big influence on their early progressive material. At the time, Scorpions were relatively unknown in the US and wanted to work as hard as they could to become more recognized. This was 1982, and we were working their 1982 album Blackout, which contained the sure-thing radio rocker ‘No One Like You.’ At first, radio stations were reluctant to play this foreign band, but once they agreed it had the potential to reach a mass audience—and it did—it helped grease the wheels for the band’s 1983 breakthrough, Love At First Sting, which featured the hit singles ‘Rock You Like A Hurricane,’ ‘Big City Nights,’ and ‘Still Loving You.’ Those were all sure things at radio and didn’t require much work at all, but I’d like to think we made radio programmers more receptive to the new songs by breaking them in the US market first. Lead guitarist Matthias Jabs was so grateful he gave me his Gibson Explorer as a thank-you present. It sits happily in my guitar closet.
KISS were on Mercury when I was there, and it was fun working with Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley, in part because they both have incredible memories and are whip-smart. It probably has something to do with not drinking or taking drugs. That was something we saw eye-to-eye on and that they respected me for. I had first met them long before I started at PolyGram. In 1975, KISS and Gentle Giant had played at the Temple Theatre in Philadelphia on the same night (we played the early show, they played the later show). Gene and Paul remembered that almost ten years later, and when they saw me at the PolyGram office, Gene did a double take.
‘Wait, are you the same guy we were introduced to in Philly? What the fuck are you doing here in a suit?’ he joked. ‘What are you doing at a record company, for God’s sake? Are we going to have to work with you?’
I set them up with all kinds of radio interviews and worked their Animalize album, which rebooted their career with the hits ‘Lick It Up’ and ‘Heaven’s On Fire.’
When I wanted to win over a radio station, I first relied on the music I was working on, then on my personality. If those didn’t work, I moved on. I never promised anyone front-row tickets or exclusive party invites. I never sent care packages of whisky and records. I knew there were people in the same position as I was in—at PolyGram and other labels—who offered programmers expensive gifts and even money in exchange for airplay. If that worked for them, fine, but it simply didn’t fit my code of ethics. Besides, whatever I did worked well enough to keep me on the payroll, and bands kept asking to work with me, so I must have done something right.
Being at Polygram was a real eye-opener. I worked hard and paid attention to everything around me in every department at the label. I was polite to everyone and became good friends with many of my co-workers. I wanted to get started signing bands as soon as I could, but I didn’t shortchange the radio department in any way. And I strongly felt that before I moved to A&R, I needed to help bring an artist over to the label.
My first toe-dip in that pool came when good old Gerry Bron called me. He was managing Uriah Heep but had been unable to get an appointment with some of the higher-ups at the company, so he appealed to me to help the band out. It was a terrible time in their career. They had no label and were clutching at straws to stay afloat. I felt bad for them since Gentle Giant had done many shows with them when they were in their prime. At the same time, I knew they were no longer in the public eye, and some of their old fans didn’t even know they were still around. They would be a hard sell.
‘Would you like to hear the new album?’ Bron asked, a pleading glint in his eyes. ‘It’s out in Europe, and I think there are a couple of songs here that could be hits. Maybe if you like it, you can set up a meeting between me and Jerry.’
‘Well, I’m not sure if that’s my job per se,’ I said. ‘But you know what? Let me hear it.’
Gerry played the album, Abominog, and on the whole, I thought it was just okay. The artwork depicted this ferocious-looking demon with razor-sharp teeth, which suggested it would be an aggressive metal record, but the only real teeth on the album were on the cover. At the same time, they had gotten Russ Ballard—a former member of Argent who had become a major hit songwriter for artists like Roger Daltry and Santana—to write one of the songs, ‘On The Rebound,’ and it had done well in England. Another track, ‘That’s The Way That It Is,’ sounded like a decent AOR ballad.
‘Look, Gerry,’ I said, ‘I can’t promise anything, but let me play just those two songs to some people and see how they react.’
Skipping over all the stinkers, I was able to convince Jerry Jaffe to bring up the band at the next A&R meeting. He told me to come with him and help sell the album.
‘We’ve got a good shot here to get a deal for a small amount of money,’ I explained to the team. ‘These two radio songs are good, the band has a history, and they’re going to tour here. It seems to me that the potential reward far outweighs the minimal risk.’
Everyone agreed, and PolyGram signed Uriah Heep to a relatively tiny deal, which they knew was the best they would get. We put out the record, and ‘That’s The Way That It Is’ went into the Top 20 at AOR, giving the band a reboot that no one expected. It was a major moment for me at the company, and it put me in a position of scouting and helping sign bands. It also made me realize the value of engendering multitiered support—not just from my team but from the entire label—for a band I thought was worth signing. I used that approach many times, playing a song or two by relatively unknown artists to people in business affairs or marketing to help bring them onto the team. It sounds simple, but it was a revelation for me. A lot of record label departments work independently from one another, and as a result many good bands never saw the light of day.
That team-building lesson helped me about a year later, when I wanted to make a major move out of radio and into A&R. The whole department had expanded, and I figured I could grow with them and build my reputation at the company.
CHAPTER
EIGHTEEN
DESIRE
In 1983, I moved out of radio promo and into A&R. I was thrilled to be in a position to help decide which deserving artists got record deals. By then, Sharon had joined me in New York, and we were able to buy a three-bedroom apartment in the area where I lived. At the same time, I had a lot of catching up to do, since some of my peers had been signing big-budget bands for more than ten years, and all I had on my résumé was an inexpensive deal with Uriah Heep. My inexperience clouded my confidence, and I started to feel overwhelmed. I felt like I wasn’t learning the ropes but clutching at miles of loose, greased string and frantically trying to keep it from slipping between my fingers and out of my hands. I had been in similar positions before, however, and I had always prevailed. Once again, being in the dark was illuminating. I had to follow my intuition to make things happen instead of adhering to an established set of practices.