Jerry Leiber

With the passing of Jerry Leiber yesterday, I thought I would share a paper my son Joseph authored (with a little help from Dad)last year for a language arts project. I read the book "Hound Dog" along with my son and learned so much about these two wonderful artists. Of course, my hat is also off to Nick Ashford, who also passed yesterday............"Ashford & Simpson" - what a wonderful pair of artists they were and boy did they ever influence my musical tastes? Who knew that they wrote "Let's Go Get Stoned" by Joe Cocker?


“Hound Dog”
Jerry Leiber & Mike Stoller
By Joseph Gaul


I was struggling to decide how to approach this project when my Dad asked me about it and made a suggestion – “you are a British citizen by birth and have spent more than half of your life living in the UK and Europe, so your cultural orientation is as much British as it is American.” Then he suggested I read a book called “Hound Dog”, an autobiography by two Jewish kids out of New York City who moved to Los Angeles at roughly the same time and became famous for writing in the black genre for groups like the Coasters, the Drifters, Sam Brothers 5, DiMaggio Brothers and Dion and the Belmonts. They also produced songs for the likes of Elvis Presley, Buddy Holly, Del Shannon, Ben E. King, Charles Brown, Melvin Sparks and a host of other musicians during the 60’s, 70’s and on up to today. But it all started with Hound Dog, performed first by Big Mamma Thornton and later Elvis Presley, who truly made the song famous.
Okay, so I know what you are thinking. How on earth is this lad going to link his cultural heritage to two Jewish songwriters from New York/Los Angeles? So this is where it gets interesting. You see, my Dad did not recommend the book just because he thought I’d enjoying reading Mike Stoller and Jerry Leiber’s life stories, but also because the music that they had written had deeply influenced his life. My Dad was born in rural North Carolina and had it not been for the radio and “Cousin Brucie”, a DJ out of NYC who hosted WABC’s teen-oriented evening shift in the 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. slot, he may well have ended-up a Country fan for life. But this particular DJ played a mix of diverse musical genres of the time (late 50’s and 60’s) including Motown, soul, pop, hard rock, and surf music. Then, in August of 1965 he introduced America to the Beatles during their historic Shea Stadium concerts.
My Dad was hooked, and that may very well explain his vast collection of Cassette Tapes, Compact Discs (Nearly 4,000 at last count) and Vinyl LP’s, some dating back to the late 60’s, and all in pristine condition. My Dad loves music and while he can’t sing a lick, he does appreciate multiple genres, especially the groups that came with the “British Invasion”. Starting with the Beatles in 1965 and closely followed by groups such as the Rolling Stones, the Dave Clark Five, Freddy and the Dreamers, Wayne Fontana and the Mindbenders, the Animals, Herman’s Hermits, The Troggs, Donovan, Chad & Jeremy, Peter and Gordon, Manfred Mann, Petula Clark and lots, lots more.
Okay, okay. Still looking for the connection – right? Well, who do you think influenced those chaps from the British Isles? Yes indeed! Mr. Mike Stoller and Mr. Jerry Leiber, whose music had reached across the sea and deeply, impressed the likes of Paul McCartney, John Lennon and Mick Jagger, just to mention a few key players.
So my link to Hound Dog, as a loyal subject of her majesty, the Queen, is that Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller helped to start the British Invasion, which hit my Dad like a ton of bricks and gave him an intense desire to spend some serious time in the United Kingdom, which he did in the 1990’. And while living in the UK, my Dad met my Mom, who is rather younger than my Dad, but also a person who loves music and that may have been one of the biggest attractions for both of them as they started the process of dating in the summer of 1992. Dad’s musical collection, which had grown substantially in the five years before he arrived in the UK (Dad lived in Tokyo during those five years and spent a ton of money building out this CD collection) fascinated my Mom and my Dad very much enjoyed introducing her to the R&B sounds of the 60’s as well as Motown, which is undoubtedly my Dad’s favorite genre.
Interestingly enough, my Mom’s Dad and Mom, who are about fifteen years older than my Dad, also remember the British Invasion and how the Beatles changed the musical landscape in England. Remember, before the Beatles, we were happily listening to likes of Pat Boone, Elvis Presley, Frank Sinatra, Tommy Steele, Guy Mitchell, Nat King Cole, Bobby Darin, Perry Como and Tony Bennett, just to mention a few. And they were all wonderful singers. But they weren’t the Beatles or the Dave Clark Five or the Stones. Music changed forever with Strawberry Fields and Penny Lane, and my Dad changed from a kid listening to Eddy Arnold, Glen Campbell, Charlie Rich, Hank Snow, Ferlin Husky and other Country greats, to a kid who was desperate to go to New York City and see the Beatles live, a dream he almost realized one evening while visiting his sister in Brooklyn in August of 1965, but alas, it was not to be. But that’s another story for another day.
The key here is that I would not have been born in the West Midlands of England in April of 1996 had it not been for my Dad’s intense desire to live in the UK, which stemmed in large part from the British Invasion, which was influenced by the music of two kids raised in New York City who met by chance in Los Angeles in 1950 and ended-up being inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1985 and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987. Their roll call is staggering – from Elvis to John Lennon, Leiber and Stoller created a wonderful portfolio of timeless music that endures generation after generation.
As for this kid from the West Midlands – well, I’m just grateful that they inspired my Dad to put England on his “Bucket List”. Oh yea, I’m also very grateful for his musical collection as well, which will be mine one day!

What is Customer Experience

For the past 2.5 years I have been gainfully employed as the SVP of Sales for Market Force Information, a firm that provides customer intelligence solutions to business-to-consumer companies, giving them the business intelligence they need to delight their customers. We enable our clients to SEE their business through their customer's eyes; to ACT with confidence and make the right decisions to GROW the bottom line.

So how do we do all of this? Well, we evaluate the customer experience from two viewpoints: first, the customer's perceptions and second, the operational realities that create those perceptions. (Remember these two because we are going to return to them shortly.) Finally, we identify actions required at the store level to improve customer loyalty and financial performance.

Okay, so let's talk customer perception. Not too long ago I was visiting our local GameStop, which is located in that small shopping complex just off of Roswell Rd. by Atlanta Ballet and Public's. You know the one - the one right between Papa John's and Starbucks. I was with my 12 year old daughter (Ellie) and she was looking at the "SIMS" line of games, but unfortunately at the ones that were age inappropriate. Brian, the store manager, helped me to convince Ellie that the games she was looking at were in fact not appropriate and confirmed that no other parent was buying those games for their 12 old daughters, or sons. He aligned with me and was my partner in helping me to keep my daughter aligned with the right level of games for her age. What do you think my perception of Brian and GameStop are as a result of that experience?

Another example: I walked into my favorite Panera Restaurant this morning at 6:30 a.m. to purchase a cup of coffee and a pastry. Pretty early in the morning, but I was met with the biggest smiles and hello's that you could ever imagine. Now I go in there on a fairly regular basis and I can tell you that this morning was no different than the first morning I walked into that restaurant over two years ago. They simply choose to be extraordinarily friendly and as a result I always find myself walking out of there with an equally huge smile on my face. What's that customer experience feel like?

You see, I've become very aware of what happens when I walk into a store, a restaurant, even my Doctor's practice. Let me give you an example of a retail store where my experience is often driven by one single individual. Joesph A. Banks on the corner of Weicua and Peachtree is a pretty typical men's retail clothing outlet where bargains and discounts are often the order of the day. I don't purchase a lot of things there, but I really like this one chap who always treats me like an individual, who always takes the time to chat and catch-up on family and how things are going with business. Yes, he is there is make a sale and he can always depend upon me to purchase from him, exclusively. I walk out of the store if he is not working at the time I visit. Two years ago during the Christmas season I purchased a leather jacket for my son Joseph. The jacket was $700 marked down to $450. I also purchased a couple of casual suits for myself, but when I went to check out I discovered the bill was significantly less than I had anticipated. Why? Because my favorite retailer (let's call him Andy) had slipped in an extra 50% off coupon on the leather jacket. Did he have to do that to close the sale? Was I even expecting him to do it? No, but in exchange for being a "loyal" customer (another term we need to examine)Andy took the hit on the sale. Guess where I still go today for my casual suits, and who I still exclusively deal with when I go into the store? An exceptional customer experience is what Andy strives to provide to every one of his customers, and believe me when I say that there are a cadre of customers who only deal with Andy when they visit that store.

So customer experience is both personal and emotional. It's that feeling you get in the bottom of your stomach when you know that you are being treated exactly as you want and expect to be treated when you frequent an establishment. It's the person in Starbucks who knows what you typically order when you walk in the door. It's the bartender who knows your favorite drink. It's that guy at the Marriott Courtyard in Louisville, Colorado who always remembers your name and always has the room you like to stay in reserved for you!

Notice I haven't mentioned any unpleasant experiences. Why? Because we all have them and they are just simply too easy to focus on. I would rather you focus on the outstanding experiences and think about how you nurture those experiences. Do you fill out the web survey and tell the company that you had a great experience? I do, every chance I get. I look for names and try to write them down so I can specifically call out an individuals extra care. We live in an "Experience Economy", but we often fail to appreciate the extra attention and care it takes to make an experience exceptional. Interestingly, we are equally reluctant to take the time to articulate unpleasant experiences as well, as least not to the stakeholders that care most about understanding what happened. Instead, we post to Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, Linkedin, etc. We tell our friends and business associates, but we don't complain to the landlords.

So at Market Force we help the landlords understand what is happening inside of their retail stores, their restaurants, their banks, their petrol stations and their motion picture theaters - we evaluate the customer experience from the perspective of the custoemr and then we examine the operational realities that created those perceptions; for example: were the toliets clean? Were the staff smiling and helpful? Was the popcorn hot? Was I offered a receipt? Did the young woman walk me to the asile that contained the product I had just inquired about? How long did I wait in the queue? Was my food hot when it arrived? How long did it take for a server to appear to take my order? Was my favorite ice cream in stock? Was the water clean when I went to clean the windscreen on my car? Operational realities!

So why am I rambling on about customer experience? Because it's important that we don't dismiss postive expereinces as being unimportant. You are loyal to certain businesses because of the experiences you enjoy when you visit those establishments. Why do people stay with the same Doctor for years? In fact, the reason that I go to Holy Spirit Catholic Church instead of the Catholic Church that I first attended when I arrived in Atlanta is down to the fact that my family and I find the "experience" at Holy Spirit more satisfying. It's not a spiritual thing, but the sense of community and belonging at Holy Spirit is powerful, and that is the experience that makes it more comfortable for us. And that sense of loyalty we feel towards Holy Spirit is something we share with every new Catholic we meet who is moving to our community. The same goes for you because loyalty drives word of mouth as well as return business. That is why it is such a powerful driver in business today. As Jeffrey Gitomer said in his book, "Customer Satisfaction is Worthless, Customer Loyalty is Priceless!"

Tragedy in Tucson

Listening to President Obama last evening was an interesting experience, especially since I was surrounded by my British wife and her parents, who are visiting us at the moment from the West Midlands of the UK.
On first reflection, I thought the President did an amazing job of keeping the focus on the victims and those around them that displayed remarkable courage under fire. He could have taken the opportunity to point fingers, to assess blame, to campaign for gun reform, etc. Instead, he spoke like the leader that this nation wants him to be. Marcus Buckingham wrote in his book, “The One Thing You Need to Know”, that “Great leaders rally people to a better future”. I believe that is exactly what President Obama attempted to do last night. He spoke about this country in terms that resonate with me and I suspect many Americans. We are a much better nation than we have acting over the past few years and we can raise the bar again if we collectively decide to put the rhetoric and divisiveness aside.
I remember as a child listening to President Kennedy’s inauguration speech. As he addressed those nations “who would make themselves our adversary”, he offered not a threat, but a request that we all look for “what problems unite us instead of belaboring those problems that divide us.” He said that “civility is not a sign of weakness, and sincerity is always subject to proof.” It is a speech that transcends time and one that I keep printed and close to me because I believe Jack Kennedy demonstrated extraordinary leadership that day in setting out a course for the future with a clear vision around what he believed this nation needed to do over the coming years.
Barack Obama is not Jack Kennedy – but that isn’t the point. Our President attempted last evening, under the most tragic circumstances, to reset the tone. To ask that we all take a moment to pause, to reflect on the dialogue, and to move forward with conversations that heal and not wound. Can we do it? Are we willing to take a step back and look at what happened in Tucson and agree that we don’t want to ever raise the discourse to a level of violence?
We don’t know what caused that young man to go off the deep end – to reach a mental state of mind that motivated him to purchase a gun and then randomly kill and wound a dozen innocent bystanders. I can’t point my fingers at Sarah Palin or anyone else and say that person was responsible for this horrible event. Nor can you, although many of you will try.
The point is not to dwell on what occurred, but to think seriously about what can be done to prevent another occurrence; i.e.: how do we as a nation raise the bar on how we engage one another? Throughout the history of our government, people have disagreed, and yet they found ways to communicate. Tip O’Neill, Ted Kennedy, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, George Bush Senior, Ronald Regan, Bill Clinton are just a few who come to mind. These are/were men who believed that compromise was not a sign of weakness, but the normal “give & take” expected of a government leader. What drove us to the current environment of “take no prisoners?”
Of course, I would be remiss if I did not at least mention the issue of guns; especially given I was surrounded by folks who long ago gave up the right to own handguns to ensure the safety of the majority of Brit’s. Yea, I know the argument. “Guns don’t kill people, people kill people.” But when over 14 million plus guns are sold in the U.S. in 2009, which is more than 21 of the worlds standing armies combined, and over 14 billion rounds of ammo are purchased and stockpiled, you got to wonder if this is exactly what our founding fathers envisioned when they wrote the Bill of Rights!
Amendment 2 of the Bill of Rights, which was written at the same time as the Constitution, reads that “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a Free State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.” I certainly understand the context at the time the Constitution was written – we would fight another war with the UK in 1812 and it was won by citizens bearing arms. The West was won by citizens bearing arms. Jessie James and his gang were defeated in the streets of Northfield, Minnesota by citizens bearing arms. In fact, our history is filled with stories about courageous men and women who defended their homes and the homes of their neighbors. Guns are part of our history – no doubt. But do they have a place in our current history, especially when millions of them are finding their way into Mexico and literally arming the drug cartels there?
I don’t pretend to have the answer. I grew up with guns. I got my first single shot .22 cal when I was 11 or 12 years old. There were four boys and we all had rifles and shotguns and there always seemed to be plenty of ammo on those occasions when we actually fired our weapons, which actually wasn’t very often. We will spend hours in the woods or down by the river, but mostly guns were just something we carried because it was sort of cool to do so. We played lots of war games when we were kids and sometimes we would remove the bolt and use our rifles as our war guns. Don’t forget, I was born just 5 years after WWII ended and there was lots of surplus army gear to be had at the local Army Surplus Store. We had helmets, uniforms, tents, first aid kits, c-rations…………the store was like a warehouse and you could buy just about anything there for a buck or less. The guns were just part of our playtime, although we had all attended gun safety courses and would get our ears boxed severely if we did anything to violate the basic rules.
Vietnam and nine years in the Marines eventually took their toll and I lost my fascination for guns. I don’t own any today and haven’t since the day I got out the Marines in 1976. I can’t say I’ve ever missed them or felt a need to have one. Just not part of my personality I suppose. When I used to take Joe to the annual Scout camping trip where the kids got to shoot all sorts of older weapons, I never had an urge to participate. The old timer who used to bring the guns to the river for the Scouts to fire once asked me if I wanted to shoot a few rounds from an M14 he had on the table. He had heard that I was in the Marines in the late 60’s and knew that I would have qualified on the Rifle Range with the M14. I just smiled and said no thanks. He looked at me for a few moments and then moved on the next adult in the line. But I think he knew what was swirling about in my head and he understood.
If it were up to me, we would ban the sale of all handguns starting yesterday, and we would require all rifles and shotguns to be maintained at gun clubs. Not practical of course and it will never happen. Still, it would be nice to see some tighter regulation around the requirements for acquiring a handgun – things like requiring a permit, requirements for gun safety courses, background checks, registration of the serial numbers, etc. I would also like to see a requirement that anyone who purchases a handgun must first demonstrate that they have a secure place to maintain once it gets to their home or office. And finally, only folks with a need to carry a gun would be given a permit to do so, and carrying a gun without a permit would result in a significant fine and jail time, depending upon the circumstances.
Okay, enough of that rant.
Back to Tucson, and what we are going to do to raise the level of discourse. How would you suggest we get back on track? Love to hear your thoughts.