Quotes from Tom Scholz

I've sort of decided that I can settle for being just the artist, arranger, writer and part-time engineer. That seems like enough to do.

If you listen to my tapes, you'd hear 14 different ways to arrange the rhythm guitar behind the harmony vocal, and then 14 different ways with a different vocal. You'd have to really be a music lover to sit through that and find it entertaining. I enjoy it, but I'm easy to please.

When I write a song and come up with an arrangement and a vocal part, it's always a challenge trying to find a singer who can interpret it sort of the way that I hear it, and it's a very difficult thing to do. I mean, singing is like playing an instrument - everybody does it a little bit different - singing maybe even more so.

Someone will say, 'Well, that's good enough.' As soon as I hear 'Good enough,' it really bothers me. I spend as much time as I think I can on anything I do. I try to do that with the people that work with me. I try to get the best out of them.

I'm one of those artists that doesn't actually hate my old hits. I love Boston music. I really like 'More than a Feeling.' After playing it to myself in a basement for such a long time, I'm happy to do it out on stage.

I can sit down at a piano or with a guitar and just chug away for hours and be perfectly content with whatever comes out. But when it comes to something that somebody else is going to listen to, then I do feel a great deal of pressure to do something that's exceptional, at least in what I consider to be at the limits of what I can do.

The pressure is all self-imposed, and it's to live up to the expectations of people who are going to shell out their hard-earned cash to listen to the music. It's actually more than that, though. I wouldn't want to make a record that didn't live up to my expectations.

No one was more surprised that that first Boston record took off than the record company itself.

There aren't a lot of cover bands that do Boston material or do it well, and the reason for that is that they are hard to play. So we put a lot of work into it. The musicians that I've managed to surround myself with after all of these years are individuals who really excel at what they do.

I'm certainly aware of the fans. I'm always hoping that what I'm doing is something they'll like, because I do appreciate them. But, no, when I get into the studio, it's all about what I like. It's the same thing that led me to the possibility of making that first Boston album, which was to divorce myself from all other influences.

Musical accidents are a gold mine. The thing about accidental discoveries is they won't be made unless you put yourself in a position to make that discovery. To do that means hundreds of hours, days and weeks where you do things and don't discover anything.

Fun is when you're writing a song and you're trying a rough shot at a demo and... it works. That's when it's fun. After that, it's work.

I heard 'More Than A Feeling' for the first time when somebody came running into my office in the engineering department and said, 'Your song's on the radio in the drafting department!'

And sometimes I actually start to think human life is just as cheap to corporate America as animal life, so long as there are big profits to be made.

The studio work is the nasty, tedious, hard and nerve-wracking part, interrupted by moments of exhilaration. Playing live is the chance to actually have some fun and get on a stage.

I will say that I know Nirvana did a show and played a few chords from 'More Than a Feeling' before they did 'Teen Spirit,' and it wasn't very good. But in all seriousness, 'Teen Spirit' was a great song. If subconsciously or somehow I had any influence on that, I'll take that as a compliment.

The one thing I will say for digital, and you won't hear me say that many complimentary things about it, is that it's cheap. It pretty much enables anybody to record as long as you can deal with the sound.

There are an awful lot of people out there that don't want to see Boston go away, and I'm one of them.

Music doesn't have to have lyrics; it doesn't have to be a particular type of music - it has the ability to bring out really strong and hopefully good emotional reactions in people.

I'm very realistic in my outlook on everything in life. When I look ahead in my mind to see what's going to happen next, I see the good and I see the bad.

People have been convinced that growth for growth's sake is a good thing.

Everybody's seen a stream or a wood they knew replaced by a strip mall.

I don't work out a lead section and practice it for a day and then lay it down. I don't do that. The first time I do something I think is expressive or really cool, that's what's actually on the recording.

Playing live was always definitely a lot more fun. You picture it: working alone in the studio eight or 10 hours a day with nobody else there, being frustrated and driven crazy by all of the things that you have to deal with, vs. thousands of people screaming and singing along with you playing.