How perfectionism stopped Boston from becoming the biggest band in the world
Boston are arguably one of the biggest anomalies in the music industry. In the 1970s, the formula was pretty simple when bands were trying to make it big. You needed to write some songs and do plenty of gigs, and maybe someone would spot and sign you. Label executives got a good idea of a band’s sound from going to their shows; however, that isn’t how they discovered Boston.
Tom Scholz is the leading brain behind Boston’s music, and he had incredibly humble beginnings. Unlike other rockers at the time, rather than just starting a band with some friends and seeing where things went, he had a clear idea of how he wanted his music to sound and no interest in making that music with other people.
As such, he set to work in his basement, recording demos of songs he had written and was proud of. Scholz wasn’t just a great musician, but he also had a pretty extraordinary technological mind. He worked at Polaroid and so spent a lot of time putting together amps and different effects that would allow him to create a unique guitar sound.
The result was that the music on Boston’s early songs was some of the most potent and hard-hitting out there. It had a huge sound that could fill the corner of any stadium, and it subsequently was referred to as stadium rock. When he was eventually signed to a record label and his debut album was released for real, he had to put a band together as audiences worldwide were desperate to see the band live.
At first, there was no escaping the euphoria that Scholz felt following the release of the first album. He had been able to take his time making a record that he was well and truly proud of, equally he was playing the songs that he loved in front of adoring crowds. The album and early shows were a roaring success, but then things started to become a little more complicated.
The music industry is driven by money. It’s a harsh truth that many fans and artists often have to face, given passion lies so sternly at the centre of it, but without money, the music we know and love can’t be made and distributed. This means that once a band succeeds and there is demand for a particular style of music, it’s no longer the case that records could be released as and when an artist saw fit. Instead, schedules that coincided with press tours, marketing campaigns and gigs had to be made. Scholz wasn’t a fan of this new rigid structure.
When it came to making Boston’s second album, Scholz wanted to take a similar approach to the first. He was keen on making effects, locking himself away, and spending a lot of time on the music he was trying to perfect. His record label couldn’t allow this, though, as they had a schedule to keep and money to make.
Scholz had to rush the second album, which led to the production of work that he wasn’t remotely passionate about. The record still did quite well, but it wasn’t a reflection of the person who made it. Similarly, on tour, Scholz had a terrible time and considered quitting music altogether.
Scholz was a perfectionist; he wanted to take his time with the music he was making and put together an album that he was well and truly proud of. The money that drives the music industry and strict time constraints don’t align with a perfectionist schedule, leading to Boston breaking up and Scholz turning his back on the project for some time. More Boston albums were eventually made, but they never quite met the innovation and passion of the first album. Subsequently, despite their success and influence, Boston remains a footnote in rock history.
