Sterling Whitaker Interview

Based in Nashville, Sterling Whitaker is a freelance music writer and musician. He is the author of Unsung Heroes Of Rock Guitar. His latest book is the highly acclaimed Styx bio, The Grand Delusion: The Unauthorized True Story Of Styx. For more info visit his website www.thegranddelusion.com.

 

Can you tell me about your writing career so far?

I have known I was destined to be a writer since I was a very small child. As soon as I was out of high school, I approached a local editor of a local music magazine in Atlanta (where I lived at the time) and pitched myself, and ultimately got to write for that paper. That led to some regional gigs, and so on. I always try to keep one eye on the future and what I am going to do next, so I can plan ahead a little way and keep growing as a writer.
In 2003 I published a book entitled Unsung Heroes Of Rock Guitar, which was a collection of interviews with 15 rock guitarists whose music is probably more recognizable than their names.  In 2007, I published The Grand Delusion: The Unauthorized True Story Of Styx, the first-ever biography of the superstar rock group Styx.

 

How long did it take you to write and research your Styx bio?

Please don't think I am a lunatic when I tell you that, from start to finish, it was probably fourteen years. I don't mean fourteen years of continuous work; I conceptualized the book in 1993 after meeting Tommy Shaw, who was at that time a part of a supergroup called Damn Yankees with Ted Nugent. I started on it then, and shortly thereafter both Styx and Damn Yankees lost their record deals when grunge came along and set the industry on its ear. So with my market apparently destroyed, I set the project aside. It wasn't until some time in 2000 or thereabouts that I picked it back up. At that point Styx had reunited and done several successful tours, and VH1 had run a very popular episode of Behind The Music about Styx, so I realized my market had returned. From there it took about five years of serious work, and then two years of follow-up to get the book into print.

 

What tips would you give to somebody wanting to write a rock bio?

Be aware on the front end of it that you can either tell a balanced, hard-hitting story that includes multiple points of view, or you can become friends with the band members. If you tell the truth, positive and negative, about each person in turn and illuminate their role in the band in both its best and worst light, you're likely to alienate virtually everyone involved. You have to accept that as part of the job, or you'll end up making compromises to appease egos and wind up writing something very trite and lightweight.
I would tell someone to be aware of how fickle and volatile the egos of performers can be, particularly if they have been successful. I would caution them never to fall into the trap of arguing with a band member or members of management; just accept what they say, agree to disagree and move on. Bizarrely, by doing that very thing I have been able to maintain positive relationships with people both in the Styx camp and the DeYoung camp, even though some of them are not entirely happy with what I wrote about them or people close to them.

 

Why did you decide to self-publish it through BookSurge? Did you try “proper” publishers?

Yes, but the reality is that for the most part, the kinds of smaller houses that will publish a book like this one have a very limited reach, and by the time everyone involved takes his bite  -  publisher, book club, book store chain, trucking company, distribution warehouse, and so on  -  the slice left over for an author is very small. By self-publishing I have been able to control both the content and the distribution of the book, as well as all of the promotion and PR, and other than a few small fees associated with selling online and shipping, I keep everything. The honest truth is that a publisher would have had to have done ten times better for me than I have done for myself to make it worthwhile, and I sincerely doubt they could have done so.  And I answer to nobody except the reader. It's hard to ask for better than that. I honestly think that print-on-demand publishing is the future.

 

In terms of sales and profit; has it been worth it?

Overwhelmingly, yes.  I'm thrilled to death by how well it has done.

 

Do you know if current members of the band have read it?

I know Todd has read it, and although he wasn't entirely happy with some of the things that other interview subjects said about the current line-up of Styx, for the most part he seemed to like it well enough. I have no idea if Tommy has read it or not. I did a radio show in Canada with JY and Gowan, and at that time JY said he had “looked at it, but read maybe a couple of pages.” I don't know if he will choose to read the whole thing or not. He tends to be very defensive about the past and might not want to be reminded of certain aspects of it. Gowan had not read it at that time, but the host of the show gave him a copy and he was thumbing through it while we were on the air, and actually made some very nice comments. I think he's read it since then. After that he became my friend on MySpace. I don't know about Ricky (who's only mentioned toward the end of the book anyway, since he is a relative latecomer), and last I knew Chuck had not read it.

 

What do you think of Chuck Panozzo’s book?

I read Chuck's book and gave it a 4 out of 5 star review on Amazon, which he was nice enough to email me and thank me for. I liked it, thought it was well done. It's not really a competing title to my book. Chuck is the first to say that his book is about his life, and since Styx was his job, it's bound to be a part of his story. Styx is just one element among many in Chuck's book, not the focus. He doesn't get into details about the music or recording process, or much about the band members as people. The focus is on how his stint in Styx coloured his perception of himself as a closeted gay man, and on that level it succeeds very well. My book is a book about Styx. By reading them both you can get two very different perspectives on some of the same material.

 

What are your favourite music books?

Though I often point to it as a book that isn't very balanced and is far too salacious (which I stand by), I find Hammer Of The Gods a guilty pleasure. I like Heaven And Hell by Don Felder a lot, and I enjoyed the authorized bio of KISS a few years ago, as well as the unauthorized book called Kiss And Sell about ten years ago. I really enjoyed Queen: As It Began. When I was a teenager there was a book about Yes that I thought was great (I can't remember the title now), but I wish someone would write a truly insightful and complete unauthorized history of Yes now.

 

What are your five desert island discs?

The Grand Illusion - Styx
Close To The Edge - Yes
Bridge Over Troubled Water - Simon and Garfunkel
Night At The Opera - Queen
Clutching At Straws - Marillion

 

Do you have other projects in mind?

I'm one of the lucky few writers who has more ideas than time. If I never had another idea in my life, I could never write everything that I've already conceptualized.But in the most immediate sense my next two projects are going to be an unauthorized bio of Journey (which amazingly has never been done), and a book about Spinal Tap in which I hope to interview all of the band members, writers, and technical people involved with that fine film and create a book as compelling and insightful as Live From New York, that great book about Saturday Night Live.

Thanks for this interview opportunity, I appreciate it very much!

 

Interview by Neil Daniels 2008