Not many band front men become great leaders. They know how to create songs and play like a bastard. But not many know how to lead and teach to make their band great. Nor do they take the reins to learn and teach the band the business side of it, so even if after your band has great success, but ends up parting ways, it's not always on good financial terms along with any Bullshit that happens along the way.
This is more of a primer on how the top pro sports coaches and managers have become leaders more than musicians or business people like CEO's, where leadership in a lot of cases is fakery just so they can keep on making boatloads of cash. I like money like anyone else, and sucking money from gigs and CD sales is paramount to success. But where band front men like you need to be involved is making sure your sidemen work hard to make their craft better and the band better. And making sure everyone is on the same wave length creative and business wise. If not you usually have some kind of psychological, creative and monetary mutiny. It happens all the time even in successful bands who make millions a year each.
Get used to it.
Anyway...
This article is about how pro sports managers and coaches can teach you to become a great leader for your band. Even if you don't think so, I don't really care and I know enough that both pro athletes and their coaches have the ability to take totally hopeless situations and win. Whether it's a team you shouldn't be beating, or a bad injury you just had or players going into a slump.
These types of situations teach athletes how to overcome adversity and Fred Shero taught the Philadelphia Flyers teams of the 1973-74 season to beat the Boston Bruins who they shouldn't have beaten for the Stanley Cup, and win the 74-75 cup against the Buffalo Sabres as well. Fred Shero was ahead of his time as a coach and teacher who was one of the first pro sports coaches to teach actual systems to his players that actually worked. It helped them beat the Russians and almost win two other Stanley Cups in 75-76 and 76-77.
He wasn't a drill sargeant type of coach like "Iron Mike Keenan" who won a Cup with the NY Rangers in 94. But he had the ability to hone in on what a player needed to succeed stats wise and mentally to be able to overcome mistakes or slumps and to become more than just pro hockey players, but teachers and business people. Kind of diversifying as athletes and people in the public eye like you the musician.
Shero gave his players the tools to succeed and was always there in a crisis for his players. If a musician in your band is having issues getting some live or studio material down, you need to work with them until they get the material. Or if they want to do session work outside the group, encourage them to do so as long as it doesn't conflict with the band's activities.
You see where this is going guys?
Think about how pro sports coaches like Fred Shero taught his players when they needed extra help on defense or setting up plays on a power play. Or if you're a baseball pitching coach, how a pitcher who had the well known "Tommy John Surgery" to his elbow can come back strong and change his approach to pitching if the pitcher was originally a starter with a lot of power.
We all need a coach in our life, especially musicians and athletes. You can learn a thing or two from a good musician who's been a mentor to others, even if he isn't the front man in your band. Even if you have to pay for coaching to become a better musician in your band, do it.
If you as a musician need some assistance just email me. mdgrove@rock.com
If this article helped you just send a comment to me. Even if it's negative. I love my haters too.
Thanks
Mark Grove
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