The Tim Ferriss Show - #581: Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Stewart Copeland — Fear{less} with Tim Ferriss

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Starting point is 00:02:11 Show, where it is my job to deconstruct world-class performers to tease out the routines, habits, etc. that you can apply to your own life. You will get plenty of all of that in this special episode, which features an interview from my 2017 TV show, Fearless. The less is in parentheses because the objective is to teach you to fear less, not to be fearless. Fearless features in-depth, long-form conversations with top performers, focusing on how they've overcome fears and made hard decisions, embracing discomfort and thinking big along the way. It was produced by Wild West Productions, and I worked with them to make both the video and audio available to you for free, my dear listeners. So thank you, Wild West. You can find the video of this episode, which is gorgeous. I think they did an incredible

Starting point is 00:02:55 job on youtube.com slash Tim Ferriss. Remember, two R's, two S's, youtube.com slash Tim Ferriss. And eventually, you'll be able to see all of the episodes for free at youtube.com slash timferris. And eventually you'll be able to see all of the episodes for free at youtube.com slash timferris. So you can swing over there and see what is currently up. Before we get started, just a little bit more on Wild West. Spearheaded by actor, producer, and past podcast guest Vince Vaughn, Wild West has produced a string of hit movies, including The Internship, Couples Retreat, Four Christmases, and The Breakup. In 2020, Wild West produced the comedy The Opening Act, starring Jimmy O. Yang and Cedric the Entertainer. In addition to Fearless, their television credits include Undeniable with Joe Buck, ESPN's 30 for 30 episode about the 85

Starting point is 00:03:36 bears, and the Netflix animated show F is for Family. Wild West has also produced the documentaries Give Us This Day, Game Changers, subtitle Dreams of BlizzCon, and Wild West has also produced the documentaries Give Us This Day, Game Changers, subtitle Dreams of BlizzCon, and Wild West Comedy Show. And now, without further ado, please enjoy this wide-ranging conversation from Fearless. I'm Tim Ferriss, author, entrepreneur, angel investor, and now TV host. I've spent my entire adult life asking questions, then scouring the globe to find the answers. On this show, I'll share the secrets of pioneers who have faced their own fears. We'll dig into the hard times, big mistakes, tough decisions, and how they got through it all.

Starting point is 00:04:18 The goal isn't to be fearless. The goal is to learn to fear less. Welcome to Fearless. I'm your host, Tim Ferriss. And on this stage, we'll be deconstructing world-class performers of all different types to uncover the specific tactics they've used to overcome doubt, tackle some of their hardest decisions, and ultimately succeed on their own terms. So imagine yourself a founding member of one of the most successful rock bands of all time. What happens when you break up? For many, that might be the end of the story. But for my guest tonight, who is just getting started with no prior experience,

Starting point is 00:04:51 he went on to score films for Francis Ford Coppola and Oliver Stone, compose for ballet and opera, and even take pilgrimages to Africa where he played drums with hungry lions. I am not kidding. He's a founding member of the police, a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and for the last three decades, he's been one of Rolling Stone's top ten drummers of all time. Please welcome musician master and madman, Stuart Copeland.

Starting point is 00:05:14 Stuart Copeland, music master and madman, Stuart Copeland, music master and madman, Stuart Copeland, music master and madman, All right. It's so nice to see you again. It's so nice to see you again. And we're going to have a lot of time to explore all sorts of fun stuff. I thought we would start with a video. So let's take a video so you guys know exactly who we have in front of us. one of only two drum solos i've ever done in my life Thank you. Stand the machine.

Starting point is 00:06:35 You know the weirdest thing about that performance there? Letterman, huge, you know, thing. I played with their band. It took me decades of writing music and practicing and doing my roots to get up all the skill but at the end of the thing i threw my sticks over there and that was the big hit of the appearance which is an illustration of a point that it's the dumb never. Never mind the decades of dedication to music and craft and everything else. It's the dumb shit.

Starting point is 00:07:10 Practice throwing your sticks, kids. So you said while we were watching that that this was one of only two drum solos you've ever done? Yes. I don't really believe in drum solos, even though I loved them when I was 14. They're real hard work. It's usually just a chance for the band to sell merchandise. So this is one of them. It was Letterman.

Starting point is 00:07:31 They're doing drum solo. The other was in the wilds of Africa, you see. Oh, yes. How did that come together? How did that even come into reality? Somebody had the bright idea of me going to Africa in search of rhythm and American music, because, of course, our... one of our most profound, uh, cultural characteristics

Starting point is 00:07:52 in our country is American music, the origins of which are, of course, Africa. You found a very receptive audience for your second solo. Well, we were out there with a film crew, and we had no idea what we were doing. Some of the best things happen when you don't know what you're doing and then a buddy of ours a

Starting point is 00:08:07 Khashoggi family billionaire Arabic family owned a ranch near Mount Kenya and so we went out there and they had giraffes and all this stuff like that so we shot everything and one of the things they had was a pride of lions he said hey let's put the drum set with the lions. And there, Stuart will be playing drums and the lions will be... So they built this chicken wire cage. It's not lion wire.

Starting point is 00:08:33 So we had to festoon the cage with meat to make them interested in the cage. Because otherwise, they're just taking a nap. And, you know, who cares? That's not a shot. So we had to put meat around there. And eventually, I hear a thump like that. And it's one guy, big guy right there, nap and you know who cares that's not a shot so we had to put meat around there and eventually i fear thump like that it's one guy big guy right there holy crap and then the other one's reaching

Starting point is 00:08:52 under the cage and like the drums going there and i can see this arm i think holy that was the bad ass drum solo I ever did in my life. It's like audio bear spray. There you go. Yeah, yeah. Well, you know their ears are not equipped. My snare drum is loud. It will bring a bird down out of the sky. And so those lions, you know, they got big teeth. They got a lot of hair they there are

Starting point is 00:09:26 some claws that they can do some damage but i got a snare drum made out of chrome so as it so happens i've only done two drum solos in my life and so let's let's watch one of them great Great. Ah, you're getting power mad. You can feel the power rising up in your loins. You're a primate, an alpha male, the great silverback making a great noise, because you've got your crash and your kick landing hard. So that video is actually from the first day, the first time we ever met. And one of the things that so impressed me about Stuart was A, you saw the machine in action, right?

Starting point is 00:10:20 I mean, just incredible. But you're an extremely good teacher. Oh, really? Well, the result, are you going to show the result of all that? I'm not going to show the result, but I'll tell them. So I think it was... He totally rocked. Completely nailed it. So four or five days later, I had to get up in front of a sold-out audience for Foreigner and drum Hot-Blooded in front of a completely sold-out crowd. And that was just such a tremendous experience for me, and I wanted to actually read a quote of yours that I think ties into how music for me in that moment

Starting point is 00:10:53 went from being something very intimidating and sterile to very fun. So this is from Stewart's book, Strange Things Happen. That's the great thing about music. If you played it, it's correct. The worst musical train wreck hurts absolutely no one. It's all great thing about music. If you played it, it's correct. The worst musical train wreck hurts absolutely no one. It's all part of the show. In fact, it's how we get to the great stuff. There's no penalty for skating on the edge or throwing ourselves off the cliff. So we do. And this seems like it's true of music. It's true for a lot of life.

Starting point is 00:11:21 Can you provide any more context? It's not true of paragliding. It's not true of skiing. Right. Definitely don't want to literally hurl yourself on any cliffs. But when you are trying to say introduce someone to music, how do you think about doing it? Playing music, that is. Introduce somebody to playing music. It is that thing of throwing yourself off a cliff and not judging yourself. That's the most important thing is to hit a drum. Hey, it makes a sound. Cool. Or sit on the piano, just hit some notes and just listen to the notes. That doesn't have to be Mozart. Music was designed as a campfire experience. I've thought long and hard over the decades about what is music for it's obviously for something we are evolved through all culture all history music has been there it must have a purpose a behavioral

Starting point is 00:12:15 purpose and a couple theories I have one is social cohesion then I feel that in my travels across the fourth world. You feel that music bonds a community. So that's very important. But the other really important thing is sex. And you may laugh salaciously, but it's true that particularly for teenagers and young adults, music is the key to sex. It is the key to body language that would be unacceptable without music playing. The things people do on the dance floor, can you imagine without music? Oh my God. And so music, it unlocks the door so that we can show our genetic wares to each other. And what pelvic thrusting has to do with genetic superiority,

Starting point is 00:13:07 I don't know. But music does seem to have a very important function. And so you ask, how do you bring somebody who's not a musician, or how do you explain music? Well, it's just pick up an instrument and make a sound and listen to the beauty of it. And that's enough enough but there's a communication part as well and i believe um that although i personally personally am a great

Starting point is 00:13:32 beneficiary of specialization in our evolved society i get to play the music and you get to listen but i think that's not how it was evolved for our hunter-gatherer societies way back in you know before civilization i think it was something that we all did together then indeed when you travel to the small indigenous communities they all make it there isn't specialization he's not musician they're not when it comes to religion and magic yes he's the shaman and you believe but music is something they all do together you don't have to be a super musician to really enjoy playing music. Where did you grow up?

Starting point is 00:14:10 Can you describe for us your early childhood? My daddy was both jazz musician and CIA man. This is serious. And so I was born in Virginia, Alexandria, Virginia, which is a suburb of the CIA. Uh, but my dad, that's your dad. And, uh, but my daddy was away on business. He was in Cairo, Egypt, installing a dictator. And so my, that meant that I was shipped over there when I was two months old to Cairo and from there to Beirut and I didn't get back to America until I was 18. So that whole time I'm in the weird zone of the world, an American. I went to an American

Starting point is 00:14:52 school, I'm American, everything great was American. So I've always been hyper aware of being American. Most of you here as Americans, you know, you're not identified as an American every day, but I was. I was the American kid. And so that instills a strange kind of patriotism in a weird sort of way. I'm sure. At what point did you know your dad was in the CIA? It was from the very beginning? No, no.

Starting point is 00:15:20 In fact, my brother Miles came home from school one day and says, Dad, are you a spy? To which my father responded, who wants to know? What did you guys think he did? Well, my mother used to said years later, my mother said you could always tell the spies by the trivial nature of their conversation. They wouldn't, you know, spies. The one guy in the room who's not talking politics. And one of my father's best friends was Kim Philby, a British double agent. And one of my friends was Harry, his son Harry Philby. We're kind of parallel families. And one day their daddy disappeared. Double agent meaning KGB as well as... Yes. One day their daddy disappeared. True blue English MI5, blue blood, disappeared.

Starting point is 00:16:04 Two weeks later he showed up in Moscow. He had been a double agent all along. He was one of my father's best friends. And they knew there was a leak. The British had a leak. And it's got to be Philby. It's got to be Kim Philby. And then he just, it was getting hot for him.

Starting point is 00:16:16 He disappeared. So that's what Harry Philby had to deal with with Spy Daddy. At least my Spy Daddy wasn't a double agent, you know. What drew you to music initially? Was it just the family influence or something else? It was something I could do. And it was, you know, listening to it, you know, everybody is beguiled by music. We're all the same.

Starting point is 00:16:40 And the re- you know, my father was a jazz trumpet player. I've still got his trumpet. And he put all these musical instruments in the house for the sibling, you know, but one by one, the sibling would pick them up, you know. You know, but I came along. There they all were. And they just came to me. And I'd pick them up and I'd break them soon, you know. But still, and so my father spotted the unmistakable

Starting point is 00:17:08 trait of a musician, which is the kid will not stop. You know, if you have your daughter and you're sending her to violin lessons or piano lessons, then if you ever have to remind that girl, isn't it time for your practice? And forget it. Forget it. Go find something else for this kid to do. If, in fact, do you think you could stop playing for a minute? Okay, now you got a musician in the family. You know, that's how you can tell. And I just don't know what it's like not to have a desire to pick up that thing and hit it or make it make a sound somehow or do you remember your first gig i do at the american embassy beach club and we played the kinks and uh animals house of the rising sun little james brown of course um and that really a very

Starting point is 00:18:03 important moment because i was the youngest of four, and my older brother, Ian, was the cool kid. And he was the cool kid in school. He had a motorcycle. And the band needed a drummer. The drummer kid went back to the States, but his drums were still there. And so Ian, obviously, we need Ian in the band, because he's the coolest kid in school. So Ian's the drummer, but he couldn't actually do it. Anyhow Ian obviously we need Ian in the band because he's the coolest kid in school see Ian's on Ian's the drummer but he couldn't actually do it anyhow and he got me in the band so there I am I've joined the Black Knights I'm hearing I'm at the Beach Club and I can hear two

Starting point is 00:18:33 fifteen-year-old girls talking now for a twelve-year-old fifteen-year-old girls are just the dream of my you know of you know the unclimbable mountain yeah you know and just so far beyond oh no no don't even don't even battle never you know and i could hear these two 15 year old girls talking about wow the black knight's got a cool a new drummer grew or hep or whatever words they use in those days you know girl who is he it's ian copeland's kid brother ian has a brother and so they're talking about this mythical being who is now the drummer in the Black Knights, who's Ian's kid brother. And they're talking, wow, is

Starting point is 00:19:11 he cute? And they're talking about this person and they're constructing in their mind, they're creating a person. And I'm a little there, I'm like three years away from puberty. I'm like, I was just a little kid, and they're talking about me! Very important moment in a musical career. What influence or lasting impact did that upbringing have on your life or your later trajectory? What have you brought with you, if anything, from that? Culturally yeah the music has a real

Starting point is 00:19:47 important thing which is that by some accident cultural accident it has the same drop kick as reggae the the mechanics of the the Arabic beat the baladi rhythms that is actually mechanically, foundationally, the same building blocks of the reggae beat, which is the emphasis on three of the bar and the absence of one. Three, four, three, four, two, three, four, nothing to three, you know. And growing up with that, kind of almost, you know, part of my genes, you know and growing up with that kind of almost you know the part of my genes you know genetic structure musically surrounded by that rhythm and then the clash had the brilliant idea of attempting to actually

Starting point is 00:20:35 play reggae and they did a track called police came along and thieved that idea. But we had a secret weapon, which was the baladi rhythms of the Lebanese mountains. When did Curved Air enter the picture? Well, Curved Air was the band that led me away from finishing my college education. I got myself in as a tour manager. And so I was the tour manager of Curved Air. Cut to a few years later, and I'm married to the singer,

Starting point is 00:21:12 and I'm in the band. I think that's a Game of Thrones move. Well, it was a wonderful circumstance. You know, we have three fine sons together, and it's a wonderful thing. I want to pull up a few letters that you sent to music magazines using different handwriting styles, spellings and stationery. So we're going to pull up.

Starting point is 00:21:35 We're going to pull up. These are letters that he sent to music magazines while being the drummer of Curved Air. Keep in mind. So the first one starts, Dear Sirs, Dear Sirs, I recently had the exquisite joy of experiencing a Curved Air, keep in mind. So the first one starts, Dear Sirs. Dear Sirs, I recently had the exquisite joy of experiencing a Curved Air concert and was most impressed by the exceptional talent

Starting point is 00:21:50 of their new drummer. That's kinda highbrow, kinda highbrow. Yeah, highbrow, so the next one. Obviously a music aficionado. Not to be thought the same person. Dear Sounds, Curved Air are brilliant with a Y. What's the drummer's name? Next, to whom it may concern.

Starting point is 00:22:10 Wow. Me and some mates went to see Curved Air at the Incredible, especially the new drummer. See these boots? You pull them up by your own goddamn bootstraps, you know? And I'd mail these letters in. You know, we'd play Scunthorpe. What is Scunthorpe?

Starting point is 00:22:33 You don't want to know. Okay, all right. Sounds like a Lord of the Rings character. As we're leaving Scunthorpe, I'd hit the mailbox. Hey, guys, I just got to take a piss for a second. I'd go ahead and hit the mailbox. And different handwriting, different stationery, different literal, you know, different styles.

Starting point is 00:22:50 And that was the first time I got my name in print. Thank you very much. You know. Yeah, why wait for attention when you can grab it? I learned that, all by the way, I learned that from my father. How did you first meet Sting? It was a stormy night We had a night off in Newcastle and the local journalist Phil Sutcliffe took me to see the local hero band Playing at the local college the first thing he noticed was a golden ray of sunshine

Starting point is 00:23:28 alighting upon the brow of the golden one. His name was Fred. Just kidding, that was Sting. And no, he could play bass and sing. And that was what impressed me about it. And I already had the idea of the police. I had the name, I had the the logo I had a manifesto even and You know this idea. I just didn't have any guys in the band except me

Starting point is 00:23:52 So I saw this guy and I wanted it to be a three-piece So a few months later, I was actually said well, let me actually get this thing I want to get that bass player up in Newcastle So I called up the journalists and asked him Phil Sut Sutcliffe, to give me the telephone number. You know that bass player you introduced me to? Kind of, I guess, sting. And he said, oh, no, I'm not giving you his number. I know what you're doing down there in London.

Starting point is 00:24:12 You're into this punk thing, aren't you? And you want to ruin our Newcastle band, and I'm not giving you the number. You know, he hangs up, I hang up, and half an hour later, wait, wait a minute. It's like, you know, I call him back. And, hello, it's his girlfriend uh phil's not here and uh well i just wanted to get a number of that based on

Starting point is 00:24:30 okay let me look at his phone book i'll go get it for you so she goes so she goes off and gets the number brings brings it back, gives me the number. And I thought, oh shit, now I need a guitarist. Sting and I, we actually earned our living doing sessions as a rhythm section. And we show up at the studio to do a session, and a guitarist walks in who was like way above our thing. This is a fancy session, triple scale guitarist, absolutely the top session guy in London, the name of Andy Summers. And a few weeks later, I ran session guy in London name of Andy summers and a few

Starting point is 00:25:06 weeks later I ran into Andy in London we're both getting off the underground together and hey it's you hey it's you hey he's a Stewart let's have a coffee and he pulls me aside Stewart you and that bass player you've got something but you need me in the band and i accept now i i i tell this story with love and admiration in my heart for andy summers he is a guy who is that and i you know he he gets uncomfortable when i tell that story, but it so encapsulates the power of Andy Summers. Up until that point, I supplied the songs. They were crap songs, three-minute fake punk songs. I hate people!

Starting point is 00:25:54 They hate me! Punk stuff. And the rules of punk were actually very strict. Thou shalt not write a song over three minutes. Thou shalt not write a song about love. Thou shalt not write a song over three minutes. Thou shalt not write a song about love. Thou shalt only write about being pissed off. And the dress

Starting point is 00:26:10 code was very strict. No bell bottoms, short hair. The hairdo was critical. The rules of punk were extremely strict. The rebels had a lot of rules. Exactly. Funny thing, that, isn't it? Yeah. But now Sting had an actual musician to work with.

Starting point is 00:26:29 And suddenly, you know, he comes up with a song. I think it was Born in the 50s, which actually had some chord inversions and stuff. As soon as I heard it, wow, that's great, let's do that. And one by one, these songs started coming out, which pretty wouldn't have been possible until St and andy you know andy could play the stuff that he could write and he sting himself had no idea that he

Starting point is 00:26:51 could write a hit pop song he had never attempted to he'd never really seen himself in that role but the punk world of three minute songs the discipline all that discipline of all those rules it's something clicked and he suddenly out of nowhere started to write these great songs at that point in time in your heads or maybe just in your head what did success for that band look like what was in three years later incremental some of the milestones were not the big ones but they felt like the big ones you know one milestone was the marquee club in London where everybody played there. The Who played there.

Starting point is 00:27:26 It was the club. It was like the whiskey in London. It was just the history of that place. And there was a hierarchy. The bottom of the hierarchy is you're supporting on a weekend, because they don't have... Anybody can... The weekend, they're going to do business anyway. And then the next is supporting on the weekday because that's the toughest thing.

Starting point is 00:27:46 You've got to have a little bit of a draw. Then when you headline on a Thursday, you are king of the world. We're headlining the marquee on Thursday. And so, you know, headlining the marquee on a Thursday was a big deal. And we felt like we Yeah, we're getting somewhere. Yeah, baby And but we still weren't getting anywhere We were still starving and we were still written off by the press and somebody had the bright my brother miles this time

Starting point is 00:28:18 Had the bright idea. Let's go to America so we did and Punk had failed here because the Sex Pistols came over and sucked. They bombed. And the word punk just did not resonate in America in the same way that it did in England. It had wrong associations. It just didn't catch fire. So they erased, the American record company erased all the punk-a-rama on the album, which had all these pictures of us in leather jackets and looking hostile and everything. Got rid of all that and Airbrushed the American edition of our first album is airbrushed. So we look 12

Starting point is 00:28:54 And we came to America and Club by club city by city We worked our way every city was a fighting the battle all over again. But we did. And finally, I guess... So along the way, there were these milestones. While we were on tour in America, we heard that we had a hit in England, you know, that got on the BBC. And so, you know, I guess a big one was Shea Stadium. Because that's...

Starting point is 00:29:21 For an English band, even though I'm American, that was an English band, playing Shea Stadium is the Beatles. that means you're a Beatle that means you've conquered America. That's official now You've conquered America when you play Shea Stadium and not only for yourselves, but for the British press corps the British England is Conquering America when an English band plays Shea Stadium And so it's like a national thing, and the whole England gets excited about it. So I guess that would have been a pretty cool milestone, too.

Starting point is 00:29:52 Were you nervous before that gig? I guess you would call it nerves. Is there anything you did? Did you have a pregame ritual or anything like that? Oh, artists of all kinds have many pregame rituals, and they evolve and they emerge. One day you have a doughnut and you have a really great gig. That's it, I gotta have a doughnut.

Starting point is 00:30:12 You know, and they accrete, they build up after a while. Then one day you go and there's no doughnut, but you go and you play a great show anyway. Oh, maybe it's not the doughnut. You know, and so you pick up and you lose. Singers particularly, because, you know, drummer, you break something, you play through it. Singer, your voice goes, and it goes quite easily. It's quite a delicate instrument.

Starting point is 00:30:34 And when it goes, you are so screwed. And so singers particularly have rituals of the steam, the humidity in the room, there's the humidifier you breathe into, and the throat coat, and the la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la And so the singers have a lot of ritual. So did you have, what was your magic donut? My magic donut? Well, for years, I didn't have any magic donut. And then I realized that, wow, you can actually go on, feeling the way you do on the third song when you're warmed up and you kill. You know, the first few songs just aren't as good.

Starting point is 00:31:20 Unless you warm up. My God, what a difference. And I saw, I was actually with Stanley Clark, with some jazz musicians. And the other jazz musicians, one of the drummers, famous guy, was doing his rudiments. And I'm thinking, that's so, I wouldn't be caught dead, you know, publicly doing rudiments. Shit, you know. But there was this jazz cat doing it. Then he went out and his first song was just like he'd been playing all night. And so I, without anybody noticing,

Starting point is 00:31:53 started to do my rudiments. And then I noticed actually that stretching is even better than rudiments. All these muscles in here, all these tiny little muscles, the reason they play better, three songs in is because they're warmed up, blood circulating, and it's just physics biology and physics and so i have rituals of stretching and so on and uh each finger gets love and attention because this finger here actually goes up through to there and i can feel it that one thank you and uh you know so all the the the stretching rituals that's that's my particular poison

Starting point is 00:32:26 have there been particular dark periods or difficult periods but if going up to the end of the police era well the police itself was hell just kidding no I'm not kidding. No, it was both. It was like a Prada suit made out of barbed wire. It was incredible to have that effect on audiences, to get on stage and do what we did was darned exciting. But it became more and more difficult for us to resolve our creative differences. And they come from an honest place. You know, in the early days, songs would come into the band with just some chords and we'd say,

Starting point is 00:33:11 oh, cool, let's play that and let's mess around with it. And the writer of said song would be, oh, really? You like my song? You want to play it? Oh, wow, guys, cool. Can I make tea? You know, after you've written a few hits, that humility uh turns into something else it turns into confidence so the vision of where to take the band began to not be quite so symmetrical and we you know i saw the band like this stingo saw it like that and andy just saw great they're fighting again and he would he would just sort just pull up a deck chair and throw bombs. And if you are a true creative musician, you don't show up to the studio.

Starting point is 00:33:52 At that time, none of us were showing up with a couple ideas, and then the band would develop it. We would all show up. We all had home recording studios now, and we would show up with platinum demos, having thought through every aspect of the song having thought through not just what i'm going to do but what he's going to do he's going to here's a guitar part and no no no no i've already written the guitar part so play what i already wrote since i wrote the song that's a guitar part

Starting point is 00:34:20 that i wrote so play that and you know, we all felt that way about because music's really important to us. It's really important that this song, I have conceived this song, and it should be expressed like that. What do you mean you've got another idea that isn't this? Go away with it. So that caused conflict.

Starting point is 00:34:40 It was never an ego clash. When Sting would get the attention and his face on the covers, that's a good day because, you know, we, the band, he's our guy, he's our face. And, you know, I love that. But the music part was, it just got to be such a struggle of, you know, I want to express something in this band, but I can't because the door is locked because he wrote the song and he's decided how it's going to be. By the way, the decisions that he had made, also including the drum part, were pretty good decisions, actually. The guy really does know music and he really, he has impeccable producing chops. That's where the conflict came from. Even as I understood that, you know,

Starting point is 00:35:26 he turns around and he says, you know, Stuart, that snare drum, he uses a rim chop. Fuck off! And it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. This is an important point. It doesn't matter that actually

Starting point is 00:35:44 he was right about that snare drum thing. That's actually kind of a cool idea, that fucking asshole. Yeah, yeah. But when you're young, all this wisdom, by the way, came decades later. You know,

Starting point is 00:36:00 he's deep and quiet. I am noisy and shallow. We clash. We, because of our history, get along really well and with mutual admiration, you know, we really have a deep bond that is just not breakable. After rehearsal, we have dinner together, we laugh and we hang out and it's fine.

Starting point is 00:36:23 But man, the music thing, and this is the reason I'm going on about it, because it's so weird. It makes no sense that we created such important music that so many people kind of liked, and yet it came from forcing together these elements that are disparate. So the question I'd love to ask is when you have a bad day or a down day, how does that manifest itself? Because you're a passionate guy. Is it anger? Is it depression, anxiety? What is the cocktail? Well, anger is dope. Anger is dope. It is it feels good. Oh dope. Yeah. Okay. Sorry. It feels good. Yeah Few things are more

Starting point is 00:37:10 Invigorating than a nice swelling of righteous anger You know Sometimes I wake up in the morning. I'm in the shower when the blood the brain chemistry is just bad and I'm looking for someone to pick a fight with somebody on TV a Politician my poor wife who's about to come into the room you know and it's brain chemistry and just you know and I'll get into some fantasy of Who somebody said this and then I said that and then they said this and then I said that You know and you know the great part of these anger fantasies is that you win every argument.

Starting point is 00:37:50 You just totally crush. But then I have breakfast. I get down to work. I turn on my computer, and I'm still kind of. But then I get into work, and I find that on the day. And this isn't every morning, by the way. Just some mornings you wake up, you know. And I find that after a morning like that, that I have a very serene day. Go figure.

Starting point is 00:38:12 So you've sort of prodded the monkey mind with a little barb. Yeah, what is that? It's gotten all of its aggression out. The thing is the anger, the physical sensation of anger is very pleasant. Yeah. Especially when there's nothing to be angry about especially when the anger it derives from an imaginary conversation that never took place yeah that is a rarefied purified distilled anger that just is a warm glow

Starting point is 00:38:41 all right so not everybody else has that anger and after breakfast they're like, ah. Did you learn to turn it down or turn it off or was it just it ends out of the shower and you're like, Mary Poppins after the day. It goes away. Thank God.

Starting point is 00:39:00 I mean, you know, two things that cause bad decisions are anger and sex. You know, how many people have made just stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid? You know, that seemed like a really great idea when I was really mad or, you know, was at the disco or whatever. You know, when I've been listening to that music and thrusting my pudenda, one thing leads to another. You know, that music. Yeah, music causes bad decisions. And anger's the same, you know.

Starting point is 00:39:28 It seemed like a really good idea to tell him what I thought. It wasn't a good idea. And best have those, you know, those moments in the shower. What are some of the decisions that have formed who you are today? If you look back at some of the most important decisions well some of the things good that happened were because that was my mission but other incredibly good thing happened good things happened that were not on my radar I didn't expect Francis Coppola to call up and offer me a 20-year career basically it ended up in film composing I you know that

Starting point is 00:40:07 wasn't my plan at all but I've found myself in that world and just like thrived in it and I didn't make that decision Francis did you know gave me my first shot and it turned into something so some things you strive for and you reach out for and you go for, but some things just kind of come. And I would say as a piece of advice, just stick to the answer yes. You know, orchestra in Iceland, in Norway. You want to come over and play, we have an Iceland duet. Yes!

Starting point is 00:40:43 I go over there. I have the best time in Stavanger I hadn't heard of it either but this orchestra was fantastic I just the you know I discovered anchovies you know I mean sardines you know in cured and olive oil and I have one can a day now I mean so much good stuff derived from just saying yes. I didn't know these guys. I don't know what's going to happen, but I've never been to Norway. Yes. You know, yes. Good things can come from. Yes. So Francis Ford Coppola, let's talk about this. This was correct me if I'm wrong. Nineteen eighty three. I'll take your word for it. So

Starting point is 00:41:18 where were you? What did you think you would be doing, say, a year hence, if Rumblefish had not intervened? Well, I would have gone mad. I recorded Rumblefish right after, I think it was the last or the second to the last police episode. It came straight from Montserrat to the hell of the police experience. You know, to go into a studio with Francis, who's not a musician, he's the boss, and I'm serving his artistic vision, but when he leaves the room, all the music is mine, all the music, and no debating, just like follow the instincts and create something that's beautiful without any debate.

Starting point is 00:42:03 Oh, gosh, that was fun. So there are many people out there who score films and so on. Why didn't he go to one of the usual suspects? Why did he pick you? Good question. He wanted to do something out of the ordinary. And in fact, he assembled a bunch of musicians in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where they were rehearsing the movie.

Starting point is 00:42:24 And there were various musicians there and Something that I had learned at most a drummer where the deal is you got to get the other guy off the stool so you can take his job and in punk rock, which You know and I pretty much just nuked all the competition There were no survivors, but me How did you nuke them? Was this like a false flag?

Starting point is 00:42:47 We're going to have a... I got into a studio and while the others would talk about what they're going to do I got into a studio and recorded some stuff. And I guess that's what it was. You just beat them to the punch.

Starting point is 00:43:02 Like with band leadership or any kind of leadership, it's not about being given some chevrons. It's about having the best idea first. That's a leader. When I got an idea, let's do it like this, and you're the first one with the idea, which the best people follow because they're relieved that somebody had a fix for the situation.

Starting point is 00:43:22 And so I just had the best idea first, in the opinion of the boss man. When you think of the word or hear the word successful who's the first person or thing that comes to mind? It can be a tricky term. I mean a lot of people chase this specter and they end up in a place that is worse than where they started in some cases or they've sacrificed everything along the way. What is success to you and how has it changed over time? I think the only measure is happiness.

Starting point is 00:43:49 You know, you can achieve what you thought was, you know. And in my case, happiness comes from my family, my kids. You know, I've got Grammys. You know, you get a Grammy. You know, you look at it you know for the first couple of days it fills you oh man man and then it goes to your shelf and a week later you walk by i go and then a month later you walk by and uh oh yeah and then a year later you don't even see it just it doesn't mean anything and so all those things that you think are success they lose their thing the kids

Starting point is 00:44:27 the family your relationships your life are so you know so i'm going to go to some audience questions and we have a number of them do you have any advice for someone who wants to pursue film scoring coming from a rock and roll musical background? It's a very tough world to get into because there are so many who want to be there. And the dreams that take you to rock and roll are very different from the dreams of a film composer. And you're developing, you're working on the director's artistic vision, which means that you are there to serve his emotional needs and it's very different mindset and many rock and rollers get into the film composing and the conductor says I'm just not feeling I wanted happy sad and this is sad happy

Starting point is 00:45:12 and and and I don't like it do something else you know the hardened wizened flinty eyed film composer says throw that away I got more and you do by the way you do have more you can throw out your children and come up with another idea and in fact after a few years of film composing you get pretty confident about that and you can shed you don't like that it's gone you'll never hear it again I'll come up with something else and you can and um that's really surprising how much stuff is in your brain that you can pull out when you need to let me digress for a second here i've done lots of episodic tv where the show comes in tuesday i gotta ship it friday next tuesday another show i gotta it's it may not be my finest hour but i gotta put something on tape and it's going out

Starting point is 00:46:02 the door and you just get into this grind and you would think you run out of ideas that you're going to get stale. Oh my God. I, you know, I'm, I'm used to the opposite happens. You got to deal with that. And I'm here to tell you, you can't, but that's a, that's a tough threshold to cross. Next one is the music industry has changed so much since when you started. What advice besides the never-ending hustle would you give a budding musician today? I guess the only advice that I can give you would be creatively how to find your own sound and urge you above all artistically to get a unique sound, look for different sources of inspiration, somehow set yourself apart from other artists by just different sources, you know, different stuff

Starting point is 00:46:51 in, different stuff out is my philosophy. But how you crack the business, you probably know more about that than I do because you've been in this business for the last 10 minutes, not the decades before that. And I think also, I don't have the music experience, but it seems like the barrier to produce music is lower. You have the software. Yes, that's the good news. But the barrier to attention is higher because you're going to have more competition due to the aforementioned low barrier to production. So a few things that have helped, at least in the startup world, quite a lot, where you have a very similar issue, where now you have rentable infrastructure

Starting point is 00:47:29 that before would have cost $500,000. I would recommend checking out 1,000 True Fans. It's an essay by a guy named Kevin Kelly, which I think is very good. There's a revised version coming out very soon. And also the Law of Category. It's a chapter in a book called The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing,

Starting point is 00:47:47 but it talks about exactly what you just mentioned, which is being a clear and distinct category compared to whatever you are competing against and sort of creating a blue ocean in that respect. So those two have been very helpful, at least in the startup world, which I think at this point in time, a lot of musicians breaking through that attention barrier would be well served to start thinking of

Starting point is 00:48:10 at least the band, not necessarily the music, as their own startup in a sense. Let me just tell you one more thing about that artistic identity. Don't be fearful if your music doesn't sound like everything else on the radio. And don't be complacent if it does. This sounds just like Beyonce. That's when you gotta be worried. Yeah, hard to out Beyonce Beyonce. The next question is from Facebook.

Starting point is 00:48:44 This is from Ong Jab, which I like. What interests you musically now? Well, input these days is my own radio station I listen to. It's on iTunes. It's called Shirley and Spinoza. I have nothing to do with it, but I can't shout its name loudly enough. It is the best radio station ever. It is so eclectic. One minute they'll be playing Beach Boys. The next minute, you know, Armenian chants.

Starting point is 00:49:16 What was the name of it again? Shirley, S-H-I-R-L-E-Y, and Spinoza. It's just the name right there. It's the mix and match. And sometimes I'm listening to it as I'm rodeoing in the studio. Is that even music? It's like white noise. And then they've got a weird 50s cigarette commercial playing over it. And then it goes to country and western.

Starting point is 00:49:38 Some, you know, Okie from Muskogee. And it's like everything. That is the best. That's the input right there. And another source is driving my 16-year-old to school. I have been forced to admit that Kanye is a genius. Now, you know, my cultural environment has only exposed me to Kanye grabbing someone else's Grammy. You know, that's all I know about him.

Starting point is 00:50:09 Until I start hearing his music. And him, and the Black Eyed Peas, and, you know, Ocean, and Kamar, Kendrick Lamar, Lamar Kendrick. All of my friends who don't have a 16-year-old daughter, you know, I actually haven't listened to this stuff. Oh, that's not music. There's no backbeat. They don't even have guitars. They sound like my dad, you know.

Starting point is 00:50:38 And I listen to this stuff, and they have just thrown away all the building blocks that I grew up with. But they push the boundaries of the, it sounds like the soundtrack to a really strange movie. And, you know, and these are hits. And they finally, since Chuck Berry and Bill Haley invented the guitar, bass, and drums combo,

Starting point is 00:51:01 and my father, that was the enemy. That's not music. And there was that divide. My dad listened to trumpets and saxophones. I listened to long hair music. And that same music hasn't changed through all the 60s, the 70s, the 80s, the 90s. Punk is still E, A, and D chords with a backbeat. Whatever it is, it's a backbeat. Whatever it is, it's a backbeat, whether it's funk or rock or whatever, it's the same

Starting point is 00:51:29 building blocks until Kendrick. And these guys just throw out all those ingredients and start again. And driving my daughter to school in the morning, hearing this stuff, that's the first time I'm hearing music. I wouldn't know how to make that.

Starting point is 00:51:46 The, all right, let's, let's go with this one, and I'll explain what I mean. Do you have a favorite failure? And what I mean by that is a failure that, in retrospect, set you up for a later success. Great. I, I'm stumped to think of a particular one, but this has been a motif that I keep coming back to that a disappointment something goes bad something's wrong something's broken creates an opportunity and I screwed this up and because I screwed this up I'm in this position here and since I'm in this position this opportunity arises and that is a recurring theme and I wish I could think of a great example for you, but it just is that sometimes a door that closes is a window that's opening. A glass that breaks is a something.

Starting point is 00:52:37 I didn't mean to interrupt you. That's pretty much the way I'm feeling about America right now. If you had a gigantic billboard, you could put anything on it, and you had a few words, short message, you just wanted to get out to the world. It's another one of those questions. What would you put on it?

Starting point is 00:52:57 Don't worry, be happy. And that's a total cop-out. Riding home this afternoon, I'm going to come up with it. Well, let's put it a different way. So we have a lot of people in the audience here. We have a lot of people watching who are maybe inspired to take the next step in a new chapter. They're probably nervous. They might have some misgivings.

Starting point is 00:53:20 They might be leaving something behind. Who knows? They might be leaving something behind who knows but for someone who is striking out attempting something new What would your? Parting thoughts advice recommendation me I would say that obsessed over every minute detail of what success looks like and imagine You know, I believe that a daydream is a very useful exercise and when I was a kid I daydream and if it's a really a daydream is a very useful exercise. And when I was a kid, I'd daydream. And if it's a really good daydream, then you fill in the gaps.

Starting point is 00:53:53 If you keep going back to what you really, really want, you go back to that daydream. And every time you go back to it, you fill in the things. And eventually that daydream starts to flesh out into an actual game plan. And so that, you know, it's good to daydream. And so thinking, thinking, thinking, overthinking, don't be scared to overthink. But when it comes to throw the switch, just do it, baby, and don't be thinking anymore. And don't let any of the thinking slow you down. Just be in a position where you have thought of everything, but don't let any of that slow you down.

Starting point is 00:54:23 Just throw the switch, leap off the cliff. Yeah, baby, let's go. And that's how you do it. Ladies and gentlemen, Stuart Koblen. Hey guys, this is Tim again. Just one more thing before you take off. And that is Five Bullet Friday. Would you enjoy getting a short email from me every Friday that provides a little fun before the weekend? Between one and a half and two million people subscribe to my free newsletter, my super short newsletter called Five Bullet Friday. Easy to sign up, easy to cancel.

Starting point is 00:54:54 It is basically a half page that I send out every Friday to share the coolest things I've found or discovered or have started exploring over that week. It's kind of like my diary of cool things. It often includes articles I'm reading, books I'm reading, albums perhaps, gadgets, gizmos, all sorts of tech tricks and so on that get sent to me by my friends, including a lot of podcast guests. And these strange esoteric things end up in my field and then I test them and then I share them with you. So if that sounds fun, again, it's very short, a little tiny bite of goodness before you head off for the weekend,

Starting point is 00:55:30 something to think about. If you'd like to try it out, just go to tim.blog slash Friday, type that into your browser, tim.blog slash Friday, drop in your email and you'll get the very next one. Thanks for listening.

The Tim Ferriss Show - #581: Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Stewart Copeland — Fear{less} with Tim Ferriss

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