The Soul of It All

by Michael Bolton

  Once I established myself in the jingle world, most of the rules relaxed. I worked mostly with Susan Hamilton, known as the “Jingle Queen.” Susan was a classically trained pianist and music lover who was president of HB&B Productions, a jingle-making machine. A great champion of singers, she gave me license to improvise more than most. She’d tell the advertising execs or clients that I was temperamental and might walk out if they tried to rein me in too much. The truth is, I was willing to sing jingles in Swahili if the big-paying advertisers wanted to hear it.

  You would never hear me arguing that to be a successful singer you need to do commercial jingles, but it sure didn’t hurt me. Commercial work has helped pay the bills—or paid all of them—for many of the top studio and session musicians, composers, and talented singers who otherwise might not have been able to make a living doing what they love. While some may not ever admit it publicly, there are more than a few jingle performers who went on to sell millions of records.

  Richard Marx, whose father owned a renowned jingle company in Chicago, began singing for commercials as a boy before going on to a hugely successful career as a pop singer, songwriter, and record producer. (Richard is also one of the funniest people I know and a great friend.) Grammy-winning jazz singer Patti Austin, who later recorded one of my songs; the soulful singer and songwriter Marc Cohn; and, of course, the late Luther Vandross, who earned eight Grammys and sold more than twenty-five million records, all shook the jingle-house money tree.

  Luther had an amazingly flexible voice with phenomenal pitch, and he had the ability to blend with other singers so that his vocals didn’t overwhelm the others. He was already a major R & B star when I began doing jingles, but he continued to do them, too. His fans rarely noticed because he was singing background vocals, not lead vocals, so people couldn’t usually pick out his voice. Commercial producers always wanted him to perform their jingles because his pitch was so great and his voice so flexible that Luther made their commercials sound better even when he was blending into a chorus of singers.

  I’d see Luther often and we got along well. Then we had one of those odd moments that can easily occur in a chaotic business with strong personalities; one that is plagued by miscommunications and misunderstandings because we often see each other only while on the run from one appearance to the next.

  Luther and I were backstage at Dick Clark’s American Music Awards just after Luther had a monster hit with his Power of Love album, released in 1991. That album won every award in sight, and on this occasion Luther took home two awards in one night for favorite soul/R & B male artist and for favorite soul/R & B album. I went to Luther to congratulate him as one jingle survivor to another. I’d just told him how great the album’s first single had been when his expression turned very sad.

  “Yeah, but the new one is over already,” he said. “They released the second single and it isn’t happening.”

  I knew his record company team was really proud and excited about this album so I asked a question that is typical in the business: “Who picked that single for release?”

  Obviously, my innocent question hit a sore spot because Luther suddenly tensed up, glared at me, and jabbed a finger in my face, stating, “I don’t particularly appreciate what you are saying!”

  Just as Luther was doing that, Dick Clark came walking around the corner behind him. Dick’s eyes met mine as he recognized that he’d stumbled onto a confrontation. The beloved television host of American Bandstand, my favorite childhood television show, then shot me a comical Uh-oh, I’m outta here! look—like a kid who’d wandered into a grown-up fight—and scooted back around the corner in a theatrical sort of 180-degree move, as if he’d walked into the ladies’ room by accident. I will never forget that visual.

  I won a couple of awards that night, too, but my misunderstanding with Luther put a damper on things. Later, Tommy Mottola explained that Luther was eager to push into the mega-platinum-album sales level and was determined to make every song a hit, so when the second single didn’t take off, he was frustrated.

  “Don’t worry, Michael, it wasn’t personal,” Tommy said. “You just walked into a buzz saw.”

  Still, I didn’t want my relationship with Luther to end that way. I was a big fan of his, too. We didn’t meet up again until about two years later, when we both were asked to perform at a Richard Marx fund-raising event. I was in my dressing room when someone knocked on the door and pushed it open.

  There stood Luther.

  I flinched, fearing he might give me the finger again.

  To my great relief, he gave me a warm greeting and told me he just wanted to say hello. I gave him a hug. There was never another cross word between us, and I was very grateful that our friendship was renewed. So was Dick Clark. I know because years later Dick and I joked about it. I teased that I wished I had a video of his reaction to put on his blooper reel.

  JINGLE HOUSE ROCK

  As I said, I did a lot of my commercial work with Susan Hamilton, who ran HB&B, one of the biggest “jingle houses” in New York City, from a brownstone on the Upper East Side. It was a crazy hive of creativity and really a fun place to work. HB&B’s recording studios were like most, except, as the inside joke went, the music was all about “the Generals”—General Motors, General Foods, and General Electric.

  My first gig was a commercial for Subaru cars, and once that was in the can, the opportunities began pouring in. The U.S. Army, too, drafted me for one of their celebrated marketing campaign commercials, “Be all you can be.”

  I did all sorts of commercials, but mostly I rode the beverage cart. I did a lot of Coke, Diet Coke, Cherry Coke, and Coca-Cola, not to mention Pepsi, 7-Up, and Budweiser (“I’m a BubabaBud Man”). In some cases, the client company would want different versions of the commercial or jingle for different parts of the country, so I might sing one version for the East Coast, one for the Midwest, and another for the Deep South.

  I performed more than thirty commercials, so many that while recording one day I opened a drink cooler and it hit me that I’d sung a jingle for every form of liquid refreshment in the entire selection. When I was really cranking them out, I’d go to the mailbox at home and many days there would be a stack of checks—like gifts from the gods—piled a foot high. Some would be only for a buck ninety, but others would be for $900 and more, and they just kept on coming.

  I’d also signed a songwriting deal with CBS Songs around this time and they were paying me a salary, so I suddenly had more income than ever before. You can imagine how it felt to finally have a decent source of income for the first time in my life. My commercial jingle earnings allowed me to move my family into a nice home in Stamford, Connecticut, closer to New York City to cut my commute. I also rented a New York City apartment in the Symphony House building on West Fifty-Sixth, because the jingle work and songwriting often went late into the night.

  This line of work quickly became so lucrative that after a few months, I told my daughters, “Ladies, I’ll be going into the city today to shake the money tree.” There’d been times when I couldn’t make a dime and I felt like a lousy husband and father. After nearly two decades of struggling and perseverance, it felt like I was living the American Dream.

  The joy of finally being able to provide for my family really hit me while I was working on what turned out to be my favorite commercial of all. This one was for Kodak and it was called “Daddy’s Little Girl.” The commercial first aired during the Academy Awards show and became a classic, running over and over, and it is probably the only commercial I did that was also played by wedding bands across the country and around the world. I am very sentimental about this one as the father of three girls whose lifestyles benefited greatly from the success of this commercial.

  That Kodak commercial was also one of the last jingles I did because my musical career was finally taking off in a couple of other directions. I’d had such tremendous, life-altering success with jingles that I never thought the day would com
e when I’d stop shaking the money tree, but in 1987 I was driving into New York City when one of my commercials came on the radio, followed by one of my hit records, followed by another of my jingles. I became worried that hearing my voice on both records and commercials would confuse radio station program directors and they’d say, “Isn’t that the same guy?” I didn’t want them putting me in a box as a jingle singer and not thinking of me as a solo performer who could have hits as an artist.

  Then, around the same time, I was recording a solo album with producer Jonathan Cain, one of the key members of and primary songwriters for Journey and a rock-star producer as well. We were in his studio’s waiting room and the television set was on. As luck would have it, a Sure deodorant commercial began blaring—and it was one in which I sang the jingle.

  I cringed because Jonathan isn’t a big fan of artists doing commercials. He’d gone into another room and I was hoping he couldn’t hear the commercial, but my friend had very good ears.

  “Bolton! Is that YOU singing on a deodorant commercial?” he demanded.

  (Gulp!)

  “Uh, yeah, but that was from back in the lean years. I don’t do those anymore,” I assured Jonathan.

  I later told my manager, Louis Levin, to stop booking me as a jingle singer. He didn’t argue, because by then we had other trees to shake.

  PART II

  The Rewards

  Credit: Bree Belford

  Chapter Eight

  The Talent I Didn’t Know I Had

  When looking back at my long climb, I’m reminded of Woody Allen’s response when he was asked, “Do you believe in life after death?” His answer was, “I’m still trying to figure out if there’s life before death!”

  I’d made unsuccessful records as the lead singer in the band Joy, as the solo act Michael Bolotin, and as a member of Blackjack. Music industry professionals, including Denny Cordell, Leon Russell, and Clive Davis, had told me my voice could sell records, but so far, I’d come up short.

  By the early 1980s, I was open to suggestions.

  That marked a major change in my attitude—one that paid off in buckets. I was about to enter a decade in which opportunities flowed to me as never before.

  My teens and most of my twenties were spent in determined pursuit of a career as a rock ’n’ roll musician and singer. As a single guy I was all about the music and not the money. I was focused and driven, and adamant that I would sing the way I wanted to sing and play the way I wanted to play. I didn’t think you could be a true artist and live and work any other way.

  Most high-achieving people I’ve known, in any field, do not have “balanced” lives because their level of accomplishment requires such intense focus to attain and then build upon. Most have had to make sacrifices in other areas, especially in their relationships and, sometimes, in their health.

  I see it with the professional golfers I meet in Pro-Am tournaments and I see it with the members of my touring band. To reach the top of your game and to take full advantage of the opportunities, you can’t maintain the ideal work-family balance. Some of my touring band members have been traveling with me for nearly twenty years. Most have struggled personally due to the rigors of the road. They perform with joy and they love playing for audiences around the world, but I’ve seen it wreak havoc on their relationships.

  Record producers, talent managers, and other type A professionals tend to take responsibility for every aspect of their work, and that leaves them little time for life outside the “office,” the creative laboratories we call recording studios. Their schedules are dictated, often by factors beyond their control—including the hectic schedules of the busy and quirky artists they work with—so the needs of their families cannot always be accommodated.

  High achievers in every field tend to be consumed by their passions. With me, it’s not so much the idea that “winning is everything” as it is that losing—in my case, not making the most of my gifts—is intolerable. That is what drives me to perform to the highest possible standards, and to push those around me to do the same. I can’t enjoy the garden until every weed is removed. I’m not okay with a recorded song that is good. I need it to be great. That’s the reason I stay in the studio until I’ve done all I can possibly do to produce the best I am capable of doing. Working the hours that I work, whether touring or in the studio or writing songs, makes it very difficult, if not impossible, to be as great a friend, boyfriend, husband, or father as I would like to be.

  It’s the price I pay and often it weighs on my heart. I wish it weren’t that way, but it seems to be the way things work in my world.

  Failure can lead to success, sure, but you have to learn from your failures, give up on behaviors that haven’t worked for you, and find more productive patterns. I realized I couldn’t keep doing the same things over and over again, refusing to make changes, if I wanted to achieve better results.

  I changed my entire approach to the music business in the 1980s. My name change was simply an indication that I was willing to make adjustments—sometimes major, sometimes minor—to stay on the path to my dream. My last name had always presented problems because people, from telephone operators to record label designers, didn’t know how to pronounce or spell it. I’d spent enough time around advertising people by then to know the importance of “brand clarity,” and mine was a little muddled due to the difficulty of my last name. I thought record companies and radio deejays might have an easier time with Bolton than Bolotin.

  I wanted better results, so I changed my approach and reaped the benefits.

  In 1982, my new management team, spearheaded by Louis Levin, David Krebs, and Steve Leber, took my demos to Columbia Records and convinced the president, Al Teller, to sign me to a recording contract as a solo artist. David set up the meeting with Teller, whom he’d known for a while, and he also brokered the deal with Columbia after taking my demos to them. At the same time, I entered into a publishing deal with CBS Songs to write for other artists. Louis negotiated the deal, making sure I had enough time to pursue my solo career as well.

  My songwriting contract was for twelve complete songs or twenty-four co-written songs, so it was more of a side gig. I started my own publishing company, called ISHOT, named for Isa, Holly, and Taryn. People told me that the serious money was in music publishing, and I had dreams that income from songs I was writing would take care of my children and grandchildren. CBS Songs was confident I would keep delivering songs on a regular basis, and I did.

  I’d had recording and publishing contracts before, and they had not resulted in any major hits or big paydays, so I knew there were no guarantees. Yet the success of my work in jingles and radio and television commercials had given me more confidence and more optimism than I’d ever had. Maybe things were finally beginning to turn my way.

  Sadly, my biggest champion, the guy who’d always told me to keep charging, keep punching, and keep swinging away at life, was not around to see me finally earn some rewards for following his philosophy of self-determination. His doctor called one night and said simply, “I’m sorry, but your father is deceased.”

  Dad died in April 1981, at the age of sixty-nine, from lung and heart problems related to his long addiction to unfiltered cigarettes. His slow decline was painful to watch. He’d always been a powerful man, the former fullback who could snatch me up and hold me high over his head. In his later years, he survived both a stroke and quadruple-bypass heart surgery. Yet he seemed to shrink before my eyes, losing weight and muscle, so that he finally needed a cane to walk. Orrin, always the stylish son, found our dad a very fashionable walking stick.

  I swear that sometimes I still hear that voice when I’m performing at concerts. I have this image of him forever in my mind from one such event just a few years before he died. I looked out and there was Dad in the third or fourth row, poking the guy in front of him with his cane, telling him, “Down in front! Down in front!” I watched as the guy turned around in irritation, prepared to pop whoe
ver it was poking him. He turned and there was my dad, wagging the cane in his face and pointing at the stage, saying, “That’s my son! My boy’s up there! I wanna see him! Sit down! Sit down!”

  I’ve long had this sense that my dad did see my success happen in a way. His constant assurances that I was going to make it left the impression that he’d looked into the future and confirmed that my day would come. I didn’t realize how much I was driven to fulfill his vision and win his approval until shortly after his death. His sister, my aunt Harriet, called to console me. She talked about how proud he was of me and how he talked with such enthusiasm about my singing. My dad often was very loving, but he could be gruff and distant—especially if the Yankees were on television and he wanted to focus on the game. When Aunt Harriet talked about his feelings for me, she said, “He used to call you his Jesus.” I lost it. I broke down and sobbed.

  Later, my therapist would help me walk through the father-and-son issues that burden so many men. Dr. Rabiner told me that I hadn’t found closure with my father’s death even after many years because I was still striving for his approval, or, as he put it, “You are still carrying conquered land to his grave.” In gentle tones, he also suggested that I still carried other baggage related to my childhood—the trauma of watching him ordered out of our home as a result of the divorce initiated by my mother. My father was a good man in so many ways, and I aspired to have those good qualities while letting go of less desirable attributes.

  A friend once described his father as “just another geezer trying to get through life,” and that may be an apt description of my own dad. He tried to do the right thing. He was proud and stuck in his ways, like most of us, but he didn’t believe in stepping on people to get ahead. He had friends from every walk of life, and he practiced forgiveness in admirable measure. I have looked constantly at the opportunity to self-sculpt rather than allowing time and outside forces to make me what I don’t want to be. Like a sculptor working with stone, I want to remove all that is less compassionate, less patient, and less present until I become the best of me.