Stories to Tell

by Richard Marx

  Lucas arrived almost exactly two years later, on September 14, 1992, and our third son made his debut fifteen months later on January 4, 1994. We named him Jesse.

  Three boys. Holy shit, right? I was once on a plane flying to a gig when my kids were in their teens. The guy sitting next to me struck up conversation and mentioned his kids. I asked how many he had. “Three girls,” he said. “By the way, I know who you are and I’m a fan. You have three boys, right?”

  “Yep. Three boys.”

  He said, “Well, look at it my way. You have to worry about three penises. I have to worry about three thousand.”

  When Brandon was born, I was about to turn twenty-seven and my career was at full speed. I never really gave much thought to having children, as success in music was always my primary focus. By the time we got married, Cynthia wanted to be a mother and her biological clock was ticking. It’s not that I was against it, but at that time, my head was totally into my career and building it bigger and bigger. The success I’d always dreamed of had just arrived, and I wanted to enjoy it. I loved the idea of having a family but was also concerned about the juggle of fatherhood and my work. As my kids grew up, I felt I did a pretty good job at that juggle. I instituted a “two-week rule” that meant I’d never go longer than that without seeing the boys. Sometimes that meant taking breaks in a tour, which was quite costly, and sometimes the family would join me on the road. In their early years, I wrote a lot of songs and changed a lot of diapers. I never missed a birthday and hardly ever missed any school events, even if it required me to charter a jet to make it.

  By no means is this a complaint, but it was far from easy for me to feel I was both serving myself as an artist and individual and also serving my wife and kids. It was always somewhat stressful. I was a husband and young father but also the breadwinner and, at that time, a rock star. I had grown up a child who never caused problems. I was well behaved and very responsible. Now, still in my twenties as my fame was just being ignited, I needed to be more responsible than ever.

  I did concerts all over the world, wrote my own songs, and produced my own records. But I was also expected to be an attentive and focused father to three kids. Cynthia and I never employed nannies. Her sister, though never a mother herself, had experience as a nanny and moved in with us when Brandon was born and helped out Cynthia mostly when I was away, living with us until the boys were in high school.

  As school years approached, I suggested we leave Los Angeles and move back to Chicago near the suburb in which I grew up. I felt that raising our boys away from a town consumed with show business would provide a better upbringing, and I still feel it was the right decision at the time. But I was also leaving behind my closest friends, who lived in LA, as well as the true pulse of the music business at a time when my career was still thriving. I believed those personal sacrifices were needed for the benefit of my kids. Now, I’m not so sure it was the best move. It was a pretty isolating existence being in Chicago, and every time I would visit LA for work I would remember how much I missed living there.

  Parenting is the hardest job and the most important. Cynthia was and is a great mom. I did my best to balance being a hands-on, present father and a guy who needed solitude to write songs and be creative. As the boys got a bit older, they would take turns accompanying me on tour for a few days at a time. I believe it was those trips that most bonded me to each of them. Except for sharing me with fans for two hours a night as I performed, each had me all to himself. We’d have amazing conversations and be stupid and silly together. I’d put them to work, helping with guitars and gear or helping at the merchandise table. They saw me doing my thing on the road. It not only helped them understand when I had to be away, but it also lit a fuse in all of them to pursue music as a career.

  In their middle-school years, the recording and touring parts of my career slowed to near nonexistence as my songwriting and producing career flourished. That meant that I was home a lot more but also busier than ever juggling projects with an array of artists. I had a state-of-the-art recording studio built on our property, with floor-to-ceiling windows looking out onto Lake Michigan and bedrooms for visiting artists and musicians to stay during projects. My boys were able to watch the creation of songs and records that became hits and got to know all the people with whom I would collaborate. Not every kid can say that J. C. Chasez of NSYNC picked them up from day camp and Keith Urban watched one of their local rec-center basketball games.

  Like me, all three of the boys’ musical talents were evident at a very early age. They all had great singing voices and sang very well in tune. They constantly and obsessively listened to music, and I encouraged them as children to make up their own songs, which I would record in my home studio and make into pretty elaborate productions, which was great fun for all of us. Jesse named his first song “Benji” after seeing that film. Its first verse being:

  Benji goes in his cage

  And then he comes out

  And then a guy shoots him.

  Though Jesse wrote it at only five years old, I think any songwriter can appreciate his sense of lyrical economy. He just spells that shit right out.

  As evidenced by everyone from the Everly Brothers and the Carpenters to the Bee Gees and the Jonas Brothers, there is a uniquely amazing sound to musical sibling harmony. In the mid-2000s, I started an annual tradition of recording classic Christmas songs with my sons, trading solo verses and singing three-part harmony together. I would film the sessions and create homemade videos in iMovie and email the clips to friends as our family holiday card. Some of these are still on YouTube, actually. People not only looked forward to each year’s new track, but many would say, “They have to become a real group and make records!” I was all for that idea, but all the boys said no. They each wanted to pursue their own individual careers.

  Jesse became a huge fan of metal and hard rock, and though clean-cut and lacking any tattoos or piercings, he has written and produced some incredible rock songs that he hopes to release very soon. His voice possesses great range and power, and his layering of beautiful melodies on top of thrashing guitar-dominated tracks is uniquely wonderful. Lucas is steeped in modern pop and though a really great singer with multiple credits as a top-line vocalist, he has become focused on writing and producing other artists, with some exciting collaborations happening as I write this. Brandon’s passion has been in hip-hop and electronic music, and he continues to both produce tracks for various artists and release his own solo work. Again, it’s his incredible singing voice and melodic sense that make his creations special. I only wish the music industry weren’t a shadow of its former self. The opportunities for real and sustaining success are few and far between since streaming has replaced the sale of music, and therefore drastically reduced the earning potential for songwriters and artists everywhere. But I know my sons love what they do, and they’ll figure out their path.

  Though certainly not perfect, I feel I have exceptional relationships with each of them and consider them among my closest friends. At this stage of their lives, I appreciate the friendship part but also really love the occasional times they come to me for help with something and simply need me to be Dad. I will never tire of that.

  At age eighteen, Brandon and his high-school girlfriend, Jessica, had a baby. A girl. It was an emotionally trying time back then for everyone involved, and that story has had its share of complexities ever since. But my granddaughter, Madison, is a lovely, wise, and soulful young lady, and I cherish having her in my life. Living across the country from each other, we haven’t spent a tremendous amount of time together, but my hope is that we develop a close and loving bond as she grows up and time turns the page.

  25 “KEEP COMING BACK”

  Luther Vandross and I met in 1990 at an American Music Awards show. I remember that on that particular night, he had won the award for Favorite R&B Male Artist, and I had lost the Pop/Rock Male Artist Award to Bobby Brown. (Billy Joel was the third nominee.) W
hat I recall most vividly, aside from the brief collapse of spirit upon not winning, was that Alice Cooper was presenting the award. I was never what you’d call a “devoted fan” of Alice’s music, but his persona is very charismatic. I’d seen him in some interviews where he came off quite wise and soulful. That wasn’t what I expected from him, so I thought he was cool. I’d wished he’d read my name as the winner but was well aware he had no control over that at all.

  Whether you win or lose an award at those TV shows, if you are nominated, or really if you are anyone who is recognizable, you are expected to greet reporters and photographers backstage in what’s called the “press room.” So, a bit down after not winning, I headed backstage to fulfill my press responsibility. As I walk into the press room, I’m greeted by a wall of music journalists and photographers; cameras snapping, flashes flashing, and microphones right in my face.

  “Richard, how does it feel to lose to Bobby Brown?” I hear someone ask. “I’m happy for him,” I said, before mumbling a few sentences about my current tour as I started to make my way back to my seat in the audience.

  As I turned to leave the room, kind of spaced out given the press experience, I smacked right into what only can be described as the widest set of black tuxedo lapels I’d ever seen. I looked up to see the one and only Luther Vandross. A man whose exceptional talent had always greatly impressed me, he was wearing a very flashy tux with what looked like a Keith Haring pattern emblazoned all over it and, yes, the widest set of lapels I’d ever seen. He was also, at that time, in one of his “skinny phases,” as he used to call them.

  He didn’t seem upset that I wasn’t paying attention and bumped into him, but I immediately apologized and told him what a fan of his I was. And that’s when I first saw it. He flashed me that wide, pearly white smile that lit up whatever already bright room he was standing in. We stood and talked for a few “mutual admiration society” minutes before he said, “Here’s my number. We should hang out. I know you’re touring a lot, as I am, but maybe when we’re both back in LA.”

  Our hanging out together took several months to actually occur, but in the interim we started talking on the phone now and then from our respective hotel rooms while both on tour. Through those phone calls, a friendship had already begun that was solidified when we were both back home in the same town.

  My son Brandon was born in September of 1990, and the first time Luther met Cynthia and me for dinner (at a cool, now defunct Studio City Italian eatery named Spumanti), he gifted us with a gorgeous sterling silver rattle from Tiffany & Co. Luther was a very generous gift giver and loved to embrace the extravagance of any situation. He routinely took his friends and business associates to Hawaii or the Bahamas for all-expenses-paid vacations, and his homes in LA and Connecticut were filled to the ceiling with beautiful furniture and rare pieces by Lalique, Lladró, and Baccarat. He drove a series of Rolls-Royce Silver Shadows. He would have friends over and screen new films in his home theater, accompanied by all kinds of gourmet snacks and desserts. He loved embracing the spoils of his labor and was more confident in (and unapologetic for) his lavish lifestyle than anyone I’ve ever known. He’d come from nothing, been handed nothing, and earned this lifestyle all on his own. Why wouldn’t he celebrate that?

  * * *

  Though I’m never one to judge what someone wants to spend their hard-earned money on, there was one purchase of Luther’s that I’ll never forget.

  At one point Luther bought a mansion in Greenwich, Connecticut. It was the late ’90s, and the first time I visited, he gave me the grand tour of the nearly 20,000-square-foot, seven-bedroom, seven-bathroom behemoth. Driving up, I was greeted by a red driveway complete with a working fountain at the center of it and a garage bigger than most normal people’s homes.

  I parked and walked through the front door to be smacked in the face with some of the most magnificent black and white marble tile work I’d ever seen in my life. He must have had someone polish it every single day. There wasn’t a smudge anywhere. I was taken through the massive state-of-the art kitchen that put some Michelin-starred restaurants to shame, through a library lined with solid oak walls and rare books, and all of the rooms were wide open and full of windows overlooking a meticulously manicured back lawn with a marble terrace, pool, and tennis courts.

  When we entered the formal living room, I was mesmerized by the cream-colored walls that seemed to be made of fabric. I pointed to a wall without saying a word and Luther smiled and said, “Cashmere.”

  Now, I don’t know about you, but if someone tells me a wall is made of cashmere, what’s the first thing you’re going to do? Touch it, right? So I move my hand toward the wall until I was startled away.

  “Richard Marx! Don’t you even think of putting your nasty hands on my cashmere walls!”

  I turned to him and said, “Oh, yeah? Guess what? I’ll tell you what I’m going to do. I’m going to drive my kids over to this house and on the way, I’m going to give them a bunch of M&Ms. Then I’m turning them loose in here.”

  As he turned to continue the tour, I heard him say out of the corner of his mouth, “Yeah, well, that’ll be the last muthafuckin’ thing you do.”

  * * *

  Prior to my knowing Luther’s taste in wall fabric, he and I cemented our friendship one winter when we were both off the road for a bit. We started hanging out somewhat regularly. I was never the most social person in LA, so “regularly” means something different to me than it might mean to you. But I made a point to spend time with Luther because he was both a gracious host and a really fun guest.

  I think at least 83 percent of my time in Luther’s company, we were laughing. He was wickedly funny, with an infectious laugh that came from the soles of his Bruno Maglis up through the top of his Jheri curl. And nothing could beat him regaling you with a story in which he’d given someone a piece of his mind. He had several about Anita Baker, with whom he’d toured and truly detested. Sometimes just to get his blood going, I’d say, “Hey, tell me more about your lovefest with Anita.”

  During one of our first dinners together, Luther very casually said, “So, you’re starting your new album soon, right?”

  “I am,” I said. (Is the Neil Diamond song in your head right now? Because it’s in mine.)

  “Well, if at any point you need any background singers, let me know.”

  I stared at him.

  “Dude. Are you fucking with me? You know what that’s like? That’d be like me having dinner with Michael Jordan, and saying, ‘You know, Michael, on the weekends I like to play pick-up basketball with a few of my buddies at the park.’ And Michael Jordan replying, ‘Really? Well, if you ever need someone for your team, let me know.’ ”

  He laughed and said, “Well, just know I’ll be there anytime you want.”

  I’m not a stupid man, so I immediately began plotting how to get Luther to sing on my album. A few weeks later, with car keys in hand, I started to leave my house for a session at the studio where we were scheduled to cut two rock songs, when a melody crept into my head. It stopped me at my front door. It was really memorable, I thought.

  So, I threw my keys down and ran to the piano in our living room and the chorus to “Keep Coming Back” spilled out of my mouth and through my fingers on the keys. I could hear the whole record in my head, and it was reminiscent of the classic ’70s R&B records I worshipped growing up. Records like “Just to Be Close to You” by the Commodores, “Love’s Holiday” by Earth, Wind and Fire, and pretty much anything by Donny Hathaway. I sat and wrote the rest of the music within about twenty minutes and was already singing the chorus: “I don’t know why… I… keep coming back to you, baby.”

  I was really excited about this tune, but then it hit me. I was in the midst of recording the hardest-rocking album I had ever attempted. This was partly because I was listening to mostly that kind of rock stuff by other bands and artists for enjoyment, but also to silence critics who had labeled me a mellow ballad singer. It
didn’t matter that 90 percent of my recorded work at that point was up-tempo rock, my label had released five ballads over three years. They realized early on that these ballads were an easy sell to radio, which then sold more albums.

  After the massive success of “Right Here Waiting” off Repeat Offender, I had begged the label to next release a track called “Nothin’ You Can Do About It.” I felt it was a really solid song and would cross over between the Top Forty charts and the rock charts. It would also be a harder, guitar-based rocker that would show my diversity and also better represent the album overall. Instead, they released “Angelia,” which became my seventh straight Top Five single but also pigeonholed me as simply a balladeer in many people’s eyes. That’s a perception I still battle today, and it kind of pisses me off.

  I had already written and recorded a few songs for album number three that were edgier, musically, lyrically, and sonically, than anything I’d ever recorded, so I felt I could branch out a bit on some other songs to give the album variety. “Keep Coming Back” would simply fill a slot that was currently vacant.

  The track was cut in about three takes. Effortless. Nathan East played bass, Jonathan Moffett on drums, Bruce Gaitsch on guitar, and, feeling the Fender Rhodes part needed much more proficiency on this song than I possessed, I asked the crazy talented Greg Phillinganes to play. Though I almost never used my band members on my albums, I thought my then–sax player, Steve Grove, would be great on this track, and he was. I recorded my lead vocal in lightning-fast time. The only thing left were the background vocals.