Mark Schulman: Author and Rock Star Drummer for P!nk and Cher

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I'm Guy Kawasaki and this is Remarkable People. This episode's Remarkable guest is Mark Schulman. I think Mark is a rock star. Literally a rock star, but he modestly explains that he works in service to rock stars such as Pink. The apocryphal story is that Mark saw Ringo Starr when Mark was three and that set him off on a path of professional music. He played cello as a kid and then transitioned to drums. In addition to Pink, Mark has worked with Sheryl Crow, Stevie Nicks, Destiny's Child, Foreigner, and Billy Idol. He was also the drummer on Cher's Believe and Farewell tours. When he isn't on tour with Pink, he is a professional speaker, business book author, virtual drum instructor, and recording studio co owner. Listen up and you'll learn that being a rock star is more about yoga, meditation and kale salads than sex, drugs and rock and roll. This episode of Remarkable People is brought to you by Remarkable, the Paper Tablet company. Yes, you got that right. Remarkable is sponsored by Remarkable. I have version two in my hot little hands and it's so good. A very impressive upgrade. Here's how I use 1. Taking notes while I'm interviewing a podcast guest. 2. Taking notes while being brief about speaking gigs. 3. Drafting the structure of keynote speeches. 4. Storing manuals for the gizmos that I buy. 5. Roughing out drawings for things like surfboards, surfboard sheds, and office layouts. 6. Wrapping my head around complex ideas with diagrams and flowcharts. This is a remarkably well thought out product. It doesn't try to be all things to all people, but it takes notes better than anything I've used. Check out the recent reviews of the latest version. I'm Guy Kawasaki. This is Remarkable People. And now, here is the remarkable Mark Schulman. What happens when you hold your drumsticks too tightly?

That's a great question, and actually very few people have actually asked me that question. When you hold your drumsticks too tightly, you are actually relinquishing Control, because you need the looseness, because there are actually four points of movement when you're using drumsticks. There's the fingers, there's the wrist, there's the arm, and there's the shoulder. So you need to create an acoustic chamber. If you're holding it properly, you're just grabbing the stick between the fulcrum, and then you're creating an acoustic chamber. And then you have the drumsticks loosely so you can still use your fingers, and that gives you a lot more control. And I actually have told my students it's a good thing if you drop your sticks during a performance, because that means that you are relaxed and you're not tensing. I'd much rather you be relaxed and drop a stick and just practice picking one up than over tense, because when you tense, you're straining. When you're straining, you can feel it in the feeling of the music. The music actually feels tense because you're grabbing the sticks too tightly and your body is tense and using too much muscle. Because drumming is. Is an aerobic practice. It's not a muscular practice. You're using a lot of muscles, but you want to be very, very aerobic. So the looser you are, the more aerobic you are, the easier the groove is, and the more everybody relates, and it feels great.

And is that not a metaphor for life that.

Yeah. Even down to the 38th special song. Hold on loosely but don't let go. It's a wonderful metaphor for everything because it gives you freedom. If you're holding something so tightly, you want it so badly, then you're not free to lose at the moment you're free to lose it. The moment you're free not to have it, you are more prone to have it because you have freedom attached to the experience.

Now, this is completely an aside, completely unrelated, but I just have to ask you this before I forget it. Okay, so let's say that you somehow you went to some Buddhist temple and there was a Taiko drum exhibition, and. And they invited you on stage. Could you just pick up the Taiko drumsticks and just knock it out? People would be amazed. Who's that white guy just rocking?

Well, to honor the Taiko drummers, it is a very, very specific technique that they have mastered over many, many years. So I would never dishonor them by saying, yeah, I just pick up a stick and hit it. I can pick up a stick and I can hit it. But I'm not using the technique that they have practiced so hard for many, many years. And I have had the pleasure of being able to play a taiko drum. But I realized, wow, it'd be great to study with a taiko master. So I really knew how to do it. Also, there's a lot of dancing involved. I mean, it's a full performance. It's like playing the drum set. I'm a drum set drummer. I don't even call myself a percussionist. I don't want to dishonor percussionist because I really do only play drum set. I can focus on fake my way on percussion. But playing the drum set versus playing different types of percussion require very different techniques. When you think about all the hand drums and the. The mallet instruments and even the way that you play tympani, the way that you play a triangle, there's such a meticulous and very specific way that a master percussionist in a symphony will play a triangle that I don't possess.

That answer is also a metaphor for life.

These are all metaphors for life.

How does a professional musician, rock star like you. What was your big break? And let me tell you a story before I have you answer that. So I interviewed Jane Goodall, and believe it or not, Jane Goodall came from a, you know, let's say not a rich family. So in school she had to study and get secretarial skills, believe it or not.

Wow.

So her big break occurred because she was in Africa and the secretary for the Leakeys had quit, and so they needed a secretary just when she happened to be there. So that was her big break. So what was your big break?

My big break. I'll try to make this story as short as possible. My mother and father are both professors. My mother ran the tutorial center in a junior college, and my father had a PhD in grammar and composition. So I got the DNA for grammar. I was very, very good. And I became a tutor for my mother. And one of the people that I tutored was a very successful drummer named Armin Grimaldi, who played with Claire Fisher, this Latin artist, and Don Henley. He had quite a CV behind him. I was 19, he was 26. We played drums together. We had a ball. He said, you're really good, dude. I move away, I come back, I end up befriending a bass player named Mark Brown. And Mark Brown happens to tell Armin Grimaldi that I am back in town. And Arm was like, oh, my God, he plays so great. You know, I just got called to do the Brenda Russell tour and I can't do it. So I'm Going to recommend Mark to do it. And Brenda Russell was an R and B artist that had one hit. And so I ended up getting the gig. All I needed to do was keep the gig, which I did, and we opened up for Billy Ocean, and the rest is history. That was my first tour, and I never stopped. And that was many, many years ago.

So it all comes back to your mom.

It comes back to relationships. It does, because I had established a relationship early on with this gentleman, Armand, and then he recommended me sight unseen, based on my playing six or seven years earlier, but also based on the recommendation of his friend, this bass player that I met when I moved back, Mark Brown. And timing, they say for a drummer especially, timing can be everything. But then I needed to show up with the skill set and the proper attitude and the ability to hold my own so I could sustain in that position. Because if I had shown up and I was one of just a few of the white guys in an all African American band playing with an African American artist, I needed to have the soul, I needed to have the groove. There was a lot that I needed to possess to be able to maintain that gig. And I also went above and beyond because I ended up running the electronics and I ended up learning how to use this electronic machine. And so I really did everything I could do to do the best that I could to sort of overachieve for that gig.

But then what happened when you had an audition and I can't remember the famous group's name right now, and they told you to slow down, and they even gave you a metronome. So what happened that day?

Oh, my gosh. Well, that was the impetus for me writing my first book. Actually, I was younger than that. I had just been playing in local bands. And then a friend of mine, Dan Reed, who was already touring the world, opening up for big artists, he had met the guys from Journey, befriended them, and Journey was starting this new supergroup called Bad English, which was the guys from Journey and that singer, John Waite. And they were looking for a young drummer. And Dan recommended me. He said, it'll be perfect for you, man. You're gonna nail this audition. So I was so excited, I thought, I'm gonna nail this audition. I showed up, I was incredibly nervous. And because I was incredibly nervous, I also really rushed. And your internal meter, your tempo, here's another metaphor for you. Your internal meter is critical. And I tell everybody it's not just the drummer's job in the band, it's everybody's job in the band. To perfect their internal meter. So I rushed so badly, and I was so nervous that Jonathan Cain, the leader, at some point stopped the band after the second time, threw a metronome at me across the stage. It landed near my left foot, and he said, watch the light. So I was trying to desperately watch the light while looking up and acting like a rock star. Anyway, make a short story long, I didn't get that gig. I ran to my car. I was in tears. I was hitting my steering wheel, going, accountant, a lawyer, attorney, or a doctor? Why didn't I do what my Jewish parents told me to do? I thought that day was going to be the defining moment that I got this great gig. It was the defining moment when I realized I'm either going to step off this stage for good or I'm going to remedy what needs to make remedy. And I made two promises to myself. I said, first promise is I'm going to master my meter. So nobody will ever tell me I'm speeding up or slowing down unless I want to speed up or slow down. And I spent the next two years exclusively working on my meter with the rhythm course, which no longer exists, really refining that meter. So I knew no matter how nervous I get or what would happen, I had such a. Such a internal sense of meter that was so innate that I'd be fine. And the other promise I made to myself was I was going to shift my fear into confidence. And then I began a lot of emotional inner work and a lot of theoretical study and reading of all the books that I could. And it eventually worked out to my advantage. So it was a great impetus for me, another metaphor for life that some of our greatest failures and so many of the greatest entrepreneurs talk about that their greatest failures were their greatest motivators to learn more. Because you can either take failure as an opportunity where you're just gonna. That's it, I failed. And it breaks you, or you become determined. And even above that, you jump into the mo of interest and you really refine your skills and you refine all of your knowledge to the point where you evolve. And so I evolved. So by the time I got that Brenda Russell gig, I was ready. That was a few years later.

Because you are the only rock star I know. I have to ask you, what is life like on the road for a rock star? Is it just all partying? Or is it you got to set up the equipment, you got to be there late, everything goes wrong, you're exhausted. I mean, and you're in this shitty bus driving from Cleveland to Indianapolis. So what is it like for rock star on the road?

Really, I'm honored that you call me a rock star. Thank you very much. The way that I see it is I am happy to be your own personal rock star, but I actually support and I am the one who is of service to the rock stars. So here's a great metaphor for you, or here's a great story, and you can draw your own metaphor. Imagine being on stage in front of 50,000 people, and not one set of eyes is looking at you because they're looking at the shiny brand in front. They're looking at Pink. I am in the back line. I am there to be of service. Literally. The drums, the bass, the keyboards, we are called the back line because we are there to support the front line. So I'm in a completely supportive position. And the way that I view what I do, as I've gotten older and older, I've solidified this. I am here to completely be of service to the band, to the dancers, to Pink, to the audience, to the road crew. So I need to take every single nuance seriously. And I finally came to the conclusion after a conversation I had with Billy Idol, because I play with Billy Idol, that I made the decision that when I sit behind the drum set, that every single note I play matters. Every nuance matters, every detail matters. Because it finally occurred to me that if every nuance matters, I'm attaching a sense of purpose to every note. And the more purpose I attach, the more passionate I become. The passion feeds the purpose, the purpose feeds the passion. It's like a cycle of empowerment. So the life of a rock star on the road is you damn well need to take care of your body. You need to eat well, you need to be on time. You need to be of service to everybody else. Not that we won't occasionally have party nights where we drink and we get on the bus and that all happens. But in today's environment, if you show up late, it ain't sex and drugs and rock and roll anymore. Now it's yoga, carrot juice, and the gym kale salads. Yeah, kale salads. So I need to take care of myself. So the truth is that, yes, we have some lavish dinners, we stay in wonderful hotels, I fly my wife and my daughter out. We have amazing times. But when it comes down to doing the work, baby, you gotta nail it. You gotta be the best in the world. Pink is the best performer on the planet. She is so committed, her diet is so strict, and she pays so Much attention to every detail and every nuance. I feel like a mere mortal when I'm in that audience. Watching her literally spin around doing life threatening situations, one of which she nearly died from in 2010 when her carabiner clip wasn't clipped in, she was clipped in on one side and computer operator didn't know. And she was dragged off the side of this stage, six foot drop, pulled up against the metal side railing. I literally thought she was dead. I nearly stopped breathing. And she's built like such a truck. She didn't break any bones or break any skin. But that is the artist that I'm working for. I'm working for this artist who is the best and so committed. And every single one of the 225 people on the road is the best at what they do. And if they're not, they either get fired or they eventually quit because they just know they're not the right person.

Wait, so there's 225 people supporting Pink.

On the road when we are doing a stadium tour. And we did a sold out stadium tour in Europe in 2019, 30 to 100,000 people per night. As a matter of fact, there is a new documentary on Amazon.com called All I know so far. It's basically chronicling that particular stadium tour from the perspective of Pink as a mother and having her family on the road. But all of us are in it, of course. And it was such a fabulous tour. As a matter of fact, she broke all sales and attendance records for one week in pop music history. Out Grossing the Stones, U2, Springsteen, even Ed Sheeran. And he has no band, dancers or singers, very low production costs. She is truly stupendous. It's not just because I play with her. I play with her for 15 years. I've worked with amazing artists, foreigners, Stevie Nicks, Simple Mind, Sheryl Crow, Cher. Pink is otherworldly. And for a woman who's already in her early 40s, there is not one young artist who's even trying to emulate what she does because she's such an amazing athlete. So I am humbled by her. I'm humbled to be in the position that I'm in. And I am here to be of service, truly be of service. I don't want to be corny, but that is the way I think about what I do. I am purely to be of service. And the sex and drugs and rock and roll take a very far back seat to that, let me tell you.

Wow. Wow. Now, one more behind the scenes question. Because as I say, you are my only link to the rock business. How does the day of the performance go? What's the timing of that day?

All right. An average day, I wake up, have a little coffee, usually go to a local coffee place. I will sometimes do a workout. Sometimes I only work out on days off because the gig itself is so strenuous. I take care of business, I meditate. And then sometime in the middle of the afternoon, we get our call to get on the bus, and we go to the venue, and then we do the band sound check. So the band is just checking everything on our own. And then they do a little bit of rig checking in and around the band sound check. They're checking all of the aerials and the lights and everything else for the dancers. And then Pink shows up, and then we do a sound check with Pink, and then she checks all the aerial stuff. Then we have some time off for dinner. I almost always take a nap, believe it or not. I know it sounds strange. Me and the keyboard player, Jason, the musical director, we always talk about that. We're always sleeping together in the. In the dressing room. I take a little nap, I get up, and then I actually don't even warm up. But I stretch because to me, as a drummer, because it's so physical. I'm an athlete, so. And especially because I'm not the youngest guy on the planet anymore. I'm in my 50s, so I take very seriously the stretching. We also have a physical therapist on the road that helps kind of massage and help us work through issues and helps the dancers. So then I stretch, and then we get ready, then we get dressed, and then we have a little huddle. The band, the dancers and singers. We all go into Pink's room, we collect our energies. Inevitably, it turns into, like, a gratitude Ralph. She talks about everything for which he's grateful. You could feel the serotonin and the dopamine just rise. And then all of a sudden, you see everybody's eyes as we split. We run to the stage, and then we just rock as hard as we can, and we give everything we've got. If I'm not exhausted after a show, then I feel like I haven't played a great show. And then what we do is, when we were on the stadium tour, we immediately got in vans, so we did what was called a runner so we could beat the traffic. They'd haul us off in vans. We haul her off in her bus. We'd go to a nearby hotel, we'd change, we'd shower, and then we get on the bus, and then you have a drink, you have your after show meal. Then you get in your little bunk and you drive at night to the next city. And then you get in early in the morning and hopefully you can get back to sleep without having to take a sleeping pill and you start it all again. If my family's there and it's someplace cool, and if it's a cool city that I love, I'll go out walking around. Like, if you're in Rome or you're in the south of France or wherever you might. Might be, I mean, I. We are so blessed because we get to see some of the most amazing artifacts and museums and be in the most profound cities, and we're getting paid for it.

Here's the softball of the interview.

All right, you ready, buddy? Come on.

This is right down the middle. Slow. It's coming. I'm telling you. It's right in the strike zone. Okay, okay. You could shut your eyes and hit this one. Okay.

All right.

Do you get stage fright?

My first book was literally called Conquering Life Stage Fright. Three Steps to Top Performance.

That's why it's a softball.

After I got that horrible stage fright, I did a lot of research into a variety of methods of how one can essentially, I don't want to say get over it because that's a negative goal, but shift the stage fright into something useful. The reality is I do not get deleterious stage fright, excessive stage fright. I get a little. But a little bit of butterflies in my stomach because I think that you want to have a hypersensitivity. Like when I speak, I do a lot of speaking gigs. If I feel nothing, that concerns me. So I like having a little bit of the butterflies in the stomach Because I have a hypersensitivity. It makes me actually more acute. And when we're ready to start, it's like, bam. It's like I'm on fire. So I think it's a matter of the balance of having just the slightest bit of. I don't want to say anxiousness, but the slightest bit of a heightened awareness in your body. And your heart rate is just. Your heart rate is just beating slightly faster. But the causes for stage fright, I base on the three core concepts of that book. Clarity, capability, and confidence. You need to have a very specifically clear picture about what you are going to perform, whether you're going to speak, give a pitch, or whether you're going to play a musical instrument. Because once you have extreme clarity, then you create real capability. So you are truly well rehearsed. I remember when I first started speaking and this, I was talking to an agent who was like a mentor. She said, our favorite speaker says he won't even go on stage till he's rehearsed his speech a hundred times. So we are so well rehearsed with Pink. We start with just the band rehearsing and then we do all this pre production rehearsing that by the time we get on stage, we are extremely well rehearsed. And that's what leads you to real confidence. Because if you haven't done the work and you get up to give a presentation or a performance, you should be scared. But having the right balance is what matters. Having a little bit of excitement, having a little bit of that juju in your body that inspires you to just be acute and be more aware and be in the moment, be completely present. Because playing music is an interesting hybrid. And I thought about this a lot. It's this perfect hybrid of being completely in the moment because you want to be completely present and being really aware of everybody and everything, every note and every dancer and every thing that Pink is singing. And also forecasting just slightly ahead so you know what's next. I can't even describe exactly how that works in the brain. I have tried to analyze that, but I think maybe you can relate. I know you do a lot of speeches. It really is that hybrid of being exactly where you are, but also just being able to forecast slightly ahead.

Do you have any practical tips for people getting over their stage fright?

Well, the three Cs are the most practical tip, obviously, because what happens is, and I interviewed a lot of people in my book. And so I will give you one of my tips and one of the late, great Tony Hsieh's tips, because Tony was a friend of mine. Tony's idea is this is a guy that never had to speak. He was a billionaire. He did it because he wanted to be of service. So let's face it, he wasn't doing it for the money, but he would still get nervous. So he said he always had a go to story that he had practiced so much that he said the stage fright would always take about 45 seconds to a minute to go away or to diminish enough till he felt comfortable. So he would always start with that story because he knew that during that story, his stage fright would gradually mitigate and gradually become controllable. So that's a good, really, really good thing for me when I play, when I'm doing my Live presentation. I open up by playing drums. That's my way of getting rid of the jitters. Right. The other thing that I think is I always peek out and take a look at the audience. And there have been times, especially in the early days of speaking, where I was really getting a lot of stage fright. And I used. And I stopped one time and I said, who are you thinking about right now? I said I was talking to myself, literally. It might have been an outer dialogue. I think of it as an inner dialogue. But somebody probably thought I was crazy because I was talking to myself. Well, I'm thinking about myself. Well, who should you be thinking about? The audience? Well, yes, dummy. It's all about them. And then I laughed, I released, and a lot of the stress fell out when I realized that I am here to be of service to them. It's not about me. So before, every time I speak or I do sort of a. I don't want to say prayer necessarily, but a mantra where I just collect my energy to be completely of service to everybody else. So they get the messaging. So I am spot on. So I can be of the greatest service to them because I am there for them. And when I get out and I look in their eyes and I remember I'm there for them, then my stage fright kind of just kind of drops off because I realize it's not about me. And I. I don't want to be a selfish bastard, because if you're thinking about yourself, if you're focused inwardly on that stage. Right. You are truly being selfish. You're putting that energy into yourself, and that's all the energy you should be putting into the people to whom you're performing.

Okay. I love that answer. I. I'll give you what I do, because maybe you can use this.

Please do, my friend.

I used to speak in person 50 to 75 times a year. So I've done a lot. And what I've noticed is that most speakers. And the more famous and the more expensive you get, the more this is true. They have their entourage, they have their personal assistant, Their personal assistant has their personal assistant, their security. There's pr, There's a phalanx.

Sounds a lot like the rock stars to me.

Yeah. And so what I figured out is, before a speech, I will often sit in the audience with the audience. I will circulate with the audience. I will take selfies with the audience. I'll do anything the audience wants to do in the first few rows. Talk to them, sign books, whatever they want. Because when I Stand up there. And I look. And when you look out, you can only see the first few rows. The rest are all dark. Right? I want to see people who are already liking me because I take the time to meet them and take a picture with them and sign a book. I want them to be beaming confidence and support to me on stage. And that has never failed me. So that's my tip.

I love it. And they become. And that's twofold because you're doing a service to them. Because they're like, oh, my gosh, guy Kawasaki's out here just hanging with us like a normal guy. And you're busy. You're of service to them, and you're creating allies. You're creating those folks that the moment you walk out there, like, oh, my God, like, yeah, you're the evangelist, man. They are evangelists. They become Kawasaki Evangelists, baby. You know what? I'm gonna. I may try that sometime and I'll let you know how it works out, because I'm sure people would love it.

I guarantee you they'll work. And I feel bad because all these assholes who have this, you know, security guards and PR people and people's people, such. And they don't get that connection.

Well, you know what I do? I enter from the rear of the. Of the. So I run up right through the crowd and I'm high vibing people. And then when I'm done, the line for autographs and photos takes longer than my speech. I make myself accessible. So think of me as being the rock star, dude, yet I'm the accessible rock star. So now with security, nobody has ever attacked me. Nobody's ever done anything adverse but just be loving and supportive. Sometimes they're nervous, but I believe that that's a great myth. Even Pink jumps down into the audience in the middle of her presentation and assigning autographs and taking selfies. She. She's the only artist that does that. Granted, she has security around her in case there's any sinister stuff, but nothing has ever happened because she's not afraid of it. I'm a true believer that if you are focusing on the fear of that happening, what you focus on, you create in your mind. So these people that overdo it with the security people and all that other crap, that just is really kind of a lot of it is ego. I agree with you so wholeheartedly. I think what you do is great, and I think I'm going to try it. I think I might actually get in the audience first, then run to the back and they'll go, what the hell? Yeah, that's wonderful.

Okay, now you said something very quickly, and I just want to touch back a little bit. So let's say that Pink decides that she's going to add a new song.

Yes.

How many times will she and her team have rehearsed that song before it goes public?

Usually not that much. Generally, when we add a new song, it's a song that we have already done. But she has so many hits and we do so many songs, we may change out something in the set. So what we'll do is the band will just go over it and sound check a couple of. We'll usually maybe run it two or three times, two or three different days. Then she'll come in and we'll rehearse it with her maybe once or twice, and then we're in. And it also depends on if there's choreography. If there's choreography. The choreography is what takes the time, because the singing and the playing is actually the easiest part, even for her.

But what if it's a brand new song? She's never performed it live, or. There's no such thing.

No, that's. There is a such thing because we have put songs in, but generally speaking speaking, we take songs out. What we generally do is we rehearse more songs than we need to. And as we're going through the full production rehearsals, we start changing the order. We start changing, taking some of the songs out. Usually the songs. Usually there's too many choreographed songs, and it's too much for her. It's like the choreographers might have done, like 10 choreographed songs. She's like, give me a break. Can we just do a rocker where I can just get up and sing? And so we'll do something like Bohemian Rhapsody, or we'll do some cover, some Zeppelin cover, or we'll do AC DC cover, or we'll do one of her songs. So it's very rare that we put in a brand new song. We have done that. And as I said, if there's no choreography, it doesn't take very long. It just takes a few rehearsals. Because she knows the song. We've learned the song, and we've learned the song very well. So by the time I come into rehearsal, I damn well know that song, and so does every other musician, every other singer. So we are ready. So by the time she comes in, she has the confidence of knowing, oh, they got my back. She may forget the lyrics to some songs. There was one tour, I kid you not. She, for some reason was forgetting the lyrics to one song. And the audience loves her so much, and she so interacted with the fans that they started bringing cue cards. Because, for example, she got a metal block on this one section. This one. I don't remember what song it was. They were bringing cue cards.

It was the funniest and most endearing freaking way.

Because there's a lot to remember. People forget. There's a lot that for her, between the aerial stuff, all the lyrics, all the choreography, every movement, every step, it's all so meticulously planned. And then there are spots that are improvised where she gets to relax. But there is so much going on in that show, more going on in that show for her, I can guarantee you, than any other artist on the planet. Because nobody else does their own stunts. Whether you see Lady Gaga or Katy Perry or anybody, they're not doing the stunts. Other people are doing the stunts. They may be doing dance moves. And Beyonce does some great dance moves, but she ain't getting up and doing aerial stunts from which she can literally die, man. So she knows her life's in her hands, but she loves it. I mean, she's an athlete. Her husband's an athlete. These are incredibly athletic people that have produced some very athletic children, by the way. So the DNA definitely worked.

So I hope I've been asking you questions that very few people ask you, but I'm about to ask you a question that I guarantee you no one has ever, ever asked you this. And no one will ever ask you this. And no one, if I had not brought this up, would ever have noticed. Are you ready for this?

That is the biggest wind up for a question I've ever had in my life.

I will switch from Macintosh to Windows if you tell me somebody has already pointed this out to you.

Okay, Mr. Evangelist, I believe you. Go.

I read this book. I really enjoyed reading this book. And I am an author. I have written 15 books. And one of the things that is really part of my OCD perfectionist personality is I like parallel structure. I want parallel structure. So you have four bullet points. I want them to be all parallel structure. And you have in this book. Let's see here. I'll go to that page. You have 32 chapters in this book. You have any idea what I'm coming to yet?

I have an idea, but I'm gonna let you get there.

Okay, so you have 32 chapters in this book. Every chapter title begins with a verb. Everyone, you always say, define, prepare, get, hone, make, visualize, remind, understand, get, find, completely parallel except for two chapters.

Oh God.

Chapter 11 is the highest good for all concerned. And chapter 23 is some pre performance rituals. So I am so impressed that of 32 chapters, 30 start with an active verb. That is sign of an organized mind. And I appreciate and organized mind. But I have to point out that there's two chapters that don't begin with a verb. So you could fix that and make it absolutely perfect. But I don't mean to be criticizing you, I'm just telling you I am so impressed that 30 out of 32 times you started a chapter with a verb. That is very impressive.

And I am so impressed that you noticed that nuance. And I will say that I did have a book editor who's editing this next book because I love her so much, Jesse states. And that is something that I will call to her attention. And now you damn well know that this next book, when it comes out, is going to have absolute parallel structure. Because I'll be thinking, I don't want to do my next interview with Guy and he's going to chastise me because I don't have parallel structure. Now, just like. Like you, though I will say I am incredibly fastidious about stuff like that. And having been a grammar tutor and having been a guy who's literally the DNA from my father, I really love the absolute continuity. So I will make sure in your honor, I might even dedicate write a sentence about it in your honor, that we will have absolute parallel stretchers. But this book, this next book is very different because this next book, you notice I did a lot of interviews in that book. This next book, I've done a lot of interviews. And I like to interview you too as well. Because after this interview I was like, I need that brain. We are actually going to keep the interviews intact. We'll abridge them somewhat, but we are going to base the content around the interviews rather than putting little snippets of a line in here and there to support the contact. Because we believe that interviewing the great performers and this book is on the power of attitude. It's what I speak about now. Interviewing the greatest performers on the planet, about how attitude has shifted and affected and shaped their lives, is so critical. And what my editor is doing is she is giving the readers specific points to look out for at the beginning of the chapter so as they read the chapter, they can pay specific attention to what they will get out of it. So I like the fact that we decided to change up the structure because I've never seen A book that has a very defined concept, yet is still based around the interviews, as opposed to just interspersing the interviews where it's convenient. Well, then that features the interviewees to me as much as we can.

You know, the concept of other people's money. Opm, that would be other people's wisdom.

How about opm, Other people's minds.

Okay, that would work, too. That would work.

Parallel structure, buddy. You want a parallel structure?

Is your father still alive?

No, my father passed 10 years ago.

Right now he's in heaven and he's saying, thank God that guy pointed out to my son that he was only 30 for 32 to. What's wrong with my son? He didn't start two chapters with verbs. Tell you something, Mark, if you look at most people's business books, they're all over the map. They start with verb, subject, the be. There's like. It's all over the.

That drives me crazy. That drives me crazy. Crazy, yeah. So thank you and I honor you for even having the wherewithal and the awareness to notice that. My God, what a mind you have.

I could take that as an insult that I would notice something like that.

No, no, I think it's fantastic because I have the same kind of mind that the lack of parallel structure will drive me nuts. It will.

You got to tell me some great story about any. It could be Pink, Cher, Billy Idol, anybody. When people find out that I work for who, Steve Jobs? I always have to tell them a Steve Jobs story. So when people find out that you hung out with all these rock stars, you got to tell me one great story that's just like an oh, gob smack and no, can't be true story.

Foreign. I will tell you a quick share story. Because a lot of people don't. Don't think about Cher as being this way. So we go on stage. It's the third show of the tour. It's Cleveland, Ohio, right? And the band is on the stage. Cher is on. She's 40 foot above the stage on what you might call it. She's in side. A model of a chandelier that's modeled after her very own chandelier. It's a platform. So they bring her down on the platform, right? So we open up the set with the song still haven't Found what I'm Looking For. So we're playing the song. Everything's going great. It's time for Cher to sing. There's no voice like, what the heck's going on? Maybe her mic's turned off. And so I look up and I realize that the platform is coming down and Cher is not in it. I kid you not. What happened was the air conditioning was so voracious that day that it literally blew her platform up against the scaffolding behind her. And she got caught. She has a little safety harness about that thick. It's a steel safety harness. The safety harness got caught on the scaffold leveling, and the platform is coming down, and all I see is little dangling share feet. I was freed. I was like, oh, my God, this is the craziest thing ever. And then by that point, talk about assistance and assistance, assistance. Everybody's running out on the stage and people are crying and they're freaking out. And they quickly realize the only way that they could get her down, because there was no way to get her down, they would need to bring the platform back up and she would need to unhook herself. So literally, the audience of band, dead silence. They bring the platform back up. I can no longer see her. And I hear this thump. And I'm thinking, please, God, make sure that she's okay. Then they start bringing the platform down, and she's on the platform and she is safe. And they escort her off. And I saw her eyes, and that poor woman was petrified. And they escort her off. And then we are awkwardly all on the stage, looking at the musical director, all the other band members, not knowing what the hell we're going to do. I'm thinking, okay, you know, it's the third show of the tour. Homegirl doesn't need the money. I bet the tour's over. I bet everything's over. That's it. She's not going to do this, right? So after a while, look at the musical director. I take my stick back, I'm about to jump off the stage. Cher comes running out of the backstage like a bat from hell. And she's got the mic, and she just runs up to the audit unit with the mic. She goes, come on, everybody, let's do this. And we were all, like, completely gobsmacked by the fact that she had the guts after all of that and to be so selfless. And that turned out to be the longest recorded tour in pop music history for a female artist. And we went nearly three years, and she was the highest record female artist of all time at the time. And you gotta think, what if she had never run back out onto that stage that day? What if she let her emotions get the best of her? And I will never forget who would have thought of all people, Cher would do that. Except for life threatening situations. The chemistry in the body for fear and excitement literally are the same. They're like flip sides of the the same coin. So the very same stuff that makes you afraid, you can also reframe it to make you excited. And that must have been what she did. She just probably said, oh, the hell with it. I'm so hyped up, I'm running back out. And everybody's like, what are you doing? And she runs back out and she does the show. And it turns out to be her greatest tour ever. The farewell tour that would never end. It was a joke. It ended and then it started back up again. And then she would make jokes. The best way she would make jokes about it. She said she would talk. That became the her monologue. She said, yeah, people were talking like, yeah, share with his father were death. And all anybody be talking about is the fact that she ruined a $40,000 Bob Mackie dress. Great woman, man. And that's, that's, that's, that's commitment. That's a real level of tenacity and commitment for what you do.

Well, that's what you call a professional, Right? This show must go on. Yeah.

Good story, right?

That is. That's pretty good story.

Completely true. Completely true.

Right up there.

Yeah.

Definitely trumps my story where I once gave a speech with a migraine headache.

But, oh, I get vascular migraines where I can't see. And I've gotten those right before a speech. Fortunately, they went away.

I know all about migraines. So what do you do? Just the show goes on.

The show goes on. I was doing a recording session where I'm reading charts and I got a vascular migraine and I literally just kept on going. I read what I could read. It was a vascular migraine. You see halos? I read what I could read. Got a whole cluster of them within six months. They take 25 minutes. As long as I just take a gazillion Advil, I don't get the really bad headache. So I've literally just played through it. Fortunately, didn't need to talk through it. But I know now that I can. I know that I can survive a migraine because they're not debilitating as far as pain. The ones that are debilitating as far as pain, that'd be hard to survive. Do you get the ones with pain? You get the vascular ones. What do you get? Or ocular, I guess they call them.

I get the. The first thing that happens is If I were looking at a license plate that has seven characters on it, I could see the first two and the last three. And like nothing else, now I have max alt and drugs that take care of it. You also grow out of migraines, apparently. So I'm at that age where I've grown out of it. But when I had migraines, it would be like someone was pounding a nail in your head. It's hard to describe how much pain the migraine can be. We don't want to turn into a HIPAA episode. So I am very interested in your transition during the pandemic of how you went from in person to virtual and could still rock a speech.

In the month of March, I was slated to do about 100 speeches. In 2020 because I finally had the year off. When I'm out with Pink, I tour with Pink for six months. In 2019, I did 50 speeches and toured with Pink. So all of a sudden, 19 speeches gone. And admittedly I was freaking out. And I did a lot of research about what's going on, at least in my opinion. And I really decided that it comes down to how we manage change. We either embrace it or we resist it. And I was so resistant because I had never done what I call my rock show disguise as a keynote, virtually. So for a few days, I was telling myself I could never do it. I was anxious, I was afraid. I was telling myself all these stories. And I literally woke up about the third day and I thought, what kind of pathetic story am I telling myself? And I purposely, literally raised, reframed the way I was thinking. And I decided I am going to embrace the virtual experience. And it's funny, when you make a decision, you're cutting off all other possibilities. Literally, when I embraced it, my mind went with me. My mind started getting creative, started becoming solutions oriented, goal oriented, rather than barrier fixated. And then I started to get really excited about putting together the virtual speech. And it shifted. The moment you become interested, then all your attention goes to, okay, what cameras do I need to get? What lighting do I need to get? I need to find a tech. And now I've done dozens and dozens of virtual speeches. But the transition was I went through all these sort of different emotions, fortunately, very quickly and caught myself, and caught myself whining. And I like to think of myself as a winner and not a whiner, so to speak speak. But literally by reframing it, I believe that there's something above us, like we are not our minds. So when we make a Decision, our minds follow. And you literally change your focus. Then everything changes.

I'm really into details. So tell me the setup. What do you have three cameras? Do you have a, you know, do you have a mixer or do you have a whole crew? How do you do this? Rockstar Virtual Keynote.

Now I got the biggest green screen I could find. I got a 13 by 7 foot green screen. We had just converted our garage into a photo studio for my wife. I kid you not. It was done right when Covid was done. So I had this huge space. I got the biggest green screen. I hired a tech that could help me figure out if I needed multiple cameras, what kind of lighting. And we did everything online because of COVID I found out a way to switch because what I do is I use. Right now I'm using obs. I was using ECAMM so I could switch scenes because I have scenes of me playing drums live. I have scenes of Pink. So how can I switch the scenes? And I tried from switching it on my phone to using a clicker. Finally figured out a way I could do it with a foot switcher. And I realized that any more than one camera for me really doesn't apply because I move around a lot. So I have this big green screen, all this lights, one camera in the front. My Macintosh is 12ft back because I'm 12ft away. I'm in front of this huge green screen and I'm constantly switching with the switcher. And then I use a headset mic. I'm a real stickler for audio. I'm an audio guy. So I use the same mic that Pink used to use live when she was swinging. And I have a whole rack with a mixer and a really high end audio interface. Interface and a high end compressor. And I feed all of that into the OBS program. So the OBS program is reading my Canon camera and I have a lens that's 1.2 f stops. So it lets in as much light and as clear as possible. I have front lighting, side lighting, and a little bit of rear lighting. This huge green screen. And I've never used anybody but myself to do it. I switch everything myself.

You do it yourself?

I do it all myself.

Wow.

That was because that was the goal. Because I thought I was really a stickler about not wanting anybody near me. So that was why I needed to figure out a way to switch it. So I switch it using a foot switch.

What model of Canon camera are you using?

E50, I believe it's called.

And. And even more interesting with A custom lens. With a custom lens, what microphone are you use?

I'm using the countryman, that really thin countryman dynamic mic that just clips over one ear. Is that what you use as well?

Okay, Mark, you'll be impressed.

You mean like this dude? That's it. And the reason why I use that is because I'm wearing in ear monitors, because I do interactive clapping with the audience and interactive performances with the audience. And I need to hear what's going on when I do that because I can't have it coming out of like computer audio, right? So I'm wearing these molded in ears. So I need as little as possible just to wrap around. And that's why it works.

I swear. We're separated at birth. Okay, so, Mark, let me tell you my countrymen story. So when I was making in person appearances, I carry my own countrymen. And you know, in my contract it says, guys coming with a countryman, you need to get the body pack that works with the countryman. And so there's really two reasons. One is I don't want to look like the Madonna with the thing that goes behind your head. I don't want the lavalier clip. I want a countryman. I want that thing right in front of my mouth. So that's number one. It's just a better result. But honestly, between you and me and whoever listens to this podcast, I think the even more important effect of bringing your own countrymen is that when you go backstage and you see the guy in the black T shirt who's listening to Pink Floyd on his Windows laptop, who's running the mixer, and. And you go to him and you say, okay, I brought my own countryman. Here it is. Those people are so impressed because no speaker brings their own countrymen. Everybody just shows up and whatever you got, you got. And so they are so impressed that you bring your own countrymen that they treat you better and they give you better results and life is good. People should buy a countryman just to carry, to say they brought their own countrymen. That alone would make those AV people care more about how you sound. That's my theory.

Well, I agree with that. And also, you do sound better. A countryman's a great mic. It works much better than a lavalier. You know what I travel with? I travel with a rack. I travel with all my own packs, my own audio interface. I do my own switching on stage. I bring my own perfect cue. So, you know the high end one that they all use, I bring my own and we hire out A local drum set. So I have a lot of tech when I perform live. And the only thing I don't do when I do my virtual presentations, I don't play drums live. The drums are pre recorded with a great green screen and all these great shots of pink in the background. So it's very exciting. And they get the same feeling because that's just a little too much tech for me to be able to handle myself.

Well, there you go.

There you go.

If you don't know this by now, I give up. But the Remarkable People podcast is sponsored by the Remarkable Tablet Company. This is a tablet that helps you focus. It helps you focus so you can do your best and deepest thinking. Not check email, not check social media, not check all the other kind of stuff that can defocus you. So guests are asked, how do they do their best and deepest thinking? Remarkable People podcast, sponsored by the Remarkable Tablet Company. Just a few more questions. First one is, how do you mark Rockstar do your best and deepest thinking?

When I allow myself the less luxury of doing nothing else but doing some form of physical exercise, or sometimes when I'm driving. Either when I'm driving or when I'm walking or when I'm running, because everything else goes away. And then I'm constantly taking notes on my phone. You know, I rarely sit down at the computer and do my deepest thinking unless I'm writing a piece. When I'm going to write something, that's a different approach. When I'm just thinking about concepts, thinking about. Because I always am evolving my live presentation, I usually like to be physical. I run my speech four times a week, four or five times a week. I'm always practicing it. Clarity, capability, confidence. I always customize it for the client. But the basic speech, I'm always running. And literally when I run it, I'm either running physically or I'm walking. Because I like the activity, because that's part of it for me. It's like getting the body moving. The body inspires the brain.

Wait, what do you mean you run your speech four times a week? You mean you, you say it out loud four times a week?

I practice it four times a week.

Really? Wow.

I am committed, man. I am so committed to that formula. Because what happens when I do that is I discover greater nuances and then I can always evolve it and it gets better and better. Then I try putting things in and taking things out. And also with a customization of what I've got for each client. Like I'm speaking for Johnson and Johnson this upcoming week. There's always a customized part, but there's a basic foundation. But ever since that agent told me that her top speaker runs this speech a hundred times before they. They perform it, I just feel like I want to keep my chops up. It's like practicing like before. Like, I know the Pink tour is going to be starting up, or now that we're coming back in and doing live shows again, I'm going to be practicing a lot more than I have been.

Once you really know your speech well, then, then this is your concept. Then you have the freedom to. To improvise. If you don't know your speech well, then you just have to read the.

Teleprompter or you're doing a TED talk. Because, you know, most of these people, like, everything is memorized. My shtick is that I want the foundation of it to be basically the same, but I want to play and improvise a little bit inside of it. I'm a musician, man. We love to improvise. It's what I'm used to. And I don't want every speech to be exactly the same, even though the foundation of it is the same. I want to perform it. I want it to be fresh.

My last question is this.

It better be good, man. It better be good.

May not be as good as the others, but let's suppose that I'm an aspiring musician or I'm a parent of aspiring musicians. What is your advice?

There's a few bits of advice. One is listen to everything you possibly can and find what you like about everything you listen to. Because if you find what you like, you will learn from it. The moment you say, I don't like that, you. You miss the chance to learn. So you never know what you're going to listen to that's going to inspire something brand new in your thought process. The other suggestion is study with a teacher that you trust and listen to everything they say and do everything they say, because you'll know what resonates with you and you'll know what doesn't. But if you start to judge what they're trying to teach you, when you really are not qualified to judge, you may miss out on something that's critical. Yet when you start to actually do what they do, you'll know what resonates the most and what you might need, what you might. Let's slide a little bit. Also play with better musicians than you play with people that are going to help you grow and elevate you to the next level. And Try to teach other musicians as much as you can. Teaching is one of the most honorable professions. My parents are both teachers. I learned more about my drumming at 19 years old when I started teaching little kids how to drum, because something about breaking it down and getting down to the real fundamentals. What did John Madden say? Like, you know, the three things he works on with. With the greatest athletes are fundamentals, fundamentals, fundamentals. The more you break things down and the simpler you make it, then you can really get in tune with the nuances and the minutiae of simplicity and the. The art of playing pop music. Music is the art of making simplicity interesting. So I play pop music, which means I may play the simplest groove. I need to love that groove. I need to make that groove feel so good that I'm loving it. I'm interested. The audience is interested. It's not just about playing. Playing all the chops and all the licks. I know. So you need to love and embrace the simplicity, because that is what pop music is really based on, is the art of making simplicity interesting.

Wow. I mean, that's so Zen, like, Buddhist guru mantra ish.

I love that.

I love that.

All right, thank you, man. I'll take that as a compliment.

Okay, so now go play us something. I hope the audio works well enough. Let's hear something.

You should put the camera on it, too.

Yeah, why not?

All right, let's see if I can focus the camera on the drum set. I'll play a little groove. And I'm in my gym clothes below my shirt, so I'm about to go to the gym. That's what's so great. This is what's really going on. Nobody ever gets to me below the waist. Okay, ready? Let's jam. Here we go.

That is the best ending of a Remarkable People podcast ever. I have to admit that.

Well, Guy, you are a remarkable man. And we're both evangelists of our own.

God help us.

Yes.

When you get around to it, it would be great if you could send us some pictures to use. You hanging out with Pink or Pink Floyd or whoever.

We won't tell them that story, will we?

Or Cher or Robert Kiyosaki, whoever it is.

Dude. Oh, that hurts.

Okay, so I freely admit that the recording of his drum playing wasn't the greatest, but the microphone was far away. Nothing was planned about that, so you're just going to have to deal with it. But Mark Schulman is a remarkable person, and he has remarkable rock and roll stories. I hope you enjoyed this episode. Getting a little insight into rock and roll stars and stardom and this little joke at the end. Let me bring you into the picture here. So in one of the first emails that we had, he thought I was Robert Kiyosaki, author of Rich Dad, Poor dad, as opposed to Guy Kawasaki. Poor dad, Poor Dad. After all, all Japanese names sound alike. So ever since then, I've been busting his chops about what it's like to play with Pink Floyd as opposed to Pink. You had to be there. What can I say? Anyway, I'm Guy Kawasaki. This is remarkable, people. My thanks to Jeff C. And Peg Fitzpatrick, who once again made it rock and roll. Also my thanks to Julie Masters, who introduced me to Mark and really made this episode happen. All the best to you. And remember, please get vaccinated. Mahalo and aloha. This is remarkable, people.