Things to Do: Read Giant Steps by Derek Shulman

Those with careers in the music biz usually stand on one side of a dividing line. You’re either on the artistic side or you’re on the business side. Rare is the individual whose experience finds he or she crossing that well-delineated marker.

But that was the case for Derek Shulman, who went from being the lead singer/guitarist for the well-regarded UK Prog Rock outfit Gentle Giant in the ‘70s to a record company executive beginning in the ‘80s who signed and/or developed acts like Bon Jovi, Dream Theater, Slipknot, and Nickelback. He also played a key role in revitalizing the careers of AC/DC and Bad Company.

Shulman tells his wide-ranging—and often opinionated—story of life and music in Giant Steps: My Improbable Journey from Stage Lights to Executive Heights (304 pp., $24.95, Jawbone Press).

The book starts with Shulman as a music-obsessed teen who was laughed at by his classmates and teacher for stating he wanted to have a career as a pop star. He would soon form the psychedelic rock band Simon Dupree & the Big Sound with a lineup that included his two brothers, Ray and later Phil.
They had minor UK hits with “Kites,” “For Whom the Bell Tolls,” “I See the Light” and “Reservations.” But there was no “Simon Dupree.” The band took their name from a real-life former mayor of their native Portsmouth.

In 1969, they found themselves utterly gobsmacked to be recording in Abbey Road Studios in the very same studio which the Beatles were recording their album of the same name.

Cheekily, they would play and record with several of the instruments that the Fabs had left sitting around (and definitely without their knowledge). But when John Lennon and Yoko Ono caught them jumping up and down on the bed that had been brought into the studio for Ono while she was recovering from injuries in a car crash, Shulman notes the peace-and-love duo were not amused:

John Lennon: “Jesus Christ! What kind of bullshit is this?”
Yoko Ono: “Get the fuck off the bed!”
Simon Dupree & the Big Sound would at one point have to draft a keyboard player to fill in on part of a tour when their regular member was not available. He was an excitable and affable bloke with a wide-ranging and encyclopedic knowledge of music named Reg Dwight.

Shulman notes that he and his bandmates had a great laugh when Dwight told them he would be soon changing his name to better chase his pop and rock star dreams. They said it would never work and was just plain strange. But Dwight—who began calling himself Elton John—did OK for himself.

Ironically, it was John who encouraged the band to listen to a wider range of musical influences from Spirit and Frank Zappa to Miles Davis. They did and were so moved that they decided to put a stake in the heart of Simon Dupree & the Big Sound and, with some lineup rejiggering, emerge as a new band with a new direction and name: Gentle Giant.

Their first three albums (Gentle Giant, Acquiring the Taste, Three Friends) found a dedicated but relatively modest audience of admirers. They would open for bands like Black Sabbath and Jethro Tull, but never quite make it to the next level despite a series of deep and challenging records.
Ozzy Osbourne, David Bowie, Marc Bolan, and others make cameo appearances here. Shulman does not mince words about what arrogant pricks he thought tourmates the Beach Boys and Eagles were. How the early Clash couldn’t play for shit. And Styx and Kansas were “ripping off their songs” while minting money in record sales and touring.

And he notes that—unlike a lot of others—he eschewed alcohol and drugs. But by far the most offbeat fact revealed in Giant Steps is that Gentle Giant was a favorite band of—believe it or not—actor Sherman Hemsley. That’s right, TV’s George Jefferson himself! The gushing actor even brought the band a bag of magic mushrooms backstage.

Gentle Giant disbanded in 1980 and two years later, Shulman landed a gig as an executive at PolyGram, first as a radio promo man, then moving into A&R. “Playing for the other side” he says.

And while his experience at GG’s manager helped him, there was a lot to learn. It is a bit naïve when Shulman writes “I realized that the music business wasn’t about music. It was about business. To a lot of these people, the records weren’t works of art, they were product.”

Shulman heard a catchy song on New York rock radio called “Runaway.” It was recorded by a charismatic, confident 18-year-old kid who laid down the track in his cousin’s record studio—that is, when he wasn’t sweeping the floors. He didn’t even have a band. The kid’s name was Jon Bongiovi, and soon he did, and with his new moniker: Bon Jovi.

The same Bon Jovi would, hilariously, attend the bris of the Jewish Shulman’s newborn son. Not knowing what the religious ceremony was for, and definitely not knowing it involved a knife and the baby’s penis. “Jon’s faced turned white…and it looked like he was going to throw up, faint, or both,” Shulman writes.

The book includes plenty of anecdotes about other acts Shulman worked with: Cinderella, Kingdom Come, Men Without Hats, and others.

Houston is mentioned once in the book when Shulman (now at ATCO) sent a scout to the city to size up a potential signee band called Tangier. But the coming of Hurricane Hugo meant the flight was diverted to Dallas.

So instead, Shulman sent the scout to check out another group he thought was good. They didn’t have a gig but were playing a teenage girl’s birthday party at a Mexican restaurant. The scout was blown away and told Shulman he should sign them. The band? Pantera. And he did.

Even Houston rapper Travis Scott pops up as Shulman notes that his track “HYAENA” opens with a 30 second sample of Gentle Giant’s “Proclamation.” Other rappers have also sampled their music, and Questlove and Killer Mike are huge Gentle Giant fans.

Now 78 years old, Derek Shulman definitely left his mark in the music biz. And even if you’re not familiar with the music of Gentle Giant, you’ll certainly want to seek it out after reading this.