Tom Werman: Hot Heavy-Metal Dad

All those parents who regard heavy-metal music as sordid and degenerate probably think the person who produces those records has to be as sleazy as the bands that play it. But while Tom Werman--the most successful producer of metal records in the business--may buzz around the neighborhood on a Harley occasionally, he’s really straight out of “Father Knows Best.”

In fact, the black, menacing-looking Harley-Davidson parked in the garage at Werman’s elegant home in a quiet, upper-class neighborhood in Laurel Canyon isn’t Werman’s. It belongs to singer Vince Neil of Motley Crue.

“But I love to ride it,” Werman, 42, admitted in the den across from the garage. “I terrorize the neighborhood. I love to ride up to a guy on that bike and ask him for directions. On that bike, he thinks I’m some hoodlum who’s gonna kill him.”

Werman--smart, humorous, outgoing, outspoken--was sitting on the colossal couch that occupies most of the den. The walls are plastered with platinum albums, a testament to his success. Among the array were awards for albums he produced for Cheap Trick, Ted Nugent and Twisted Sister.

Werman, a producer for more than a dozen years, is probably best known these days for producing Motley Crue’s albums: “Shout at the Devil” (which has sold nearly 3 million units), “Theatre of Pain” (more than 2 million) and the current “Girls, Girls, Girls” (more than 2 1/2 million).

But Werman, who looks like an attorney or an accountant, has little in common with the hedonistic, excessive image of his clients.

“I get up at seven in the morning to be with the kids,” he said. “When I’m in the studio, I’m a hard-rock producer. At home, I’m Dad. I’m a major authority figure.”

But, Werman confessed, there’s a monster lurking within him. Under different conditions, he said, he might have turned into a stoned party animal. He credited the stabilizing influence of family life for keeping him from turning into a rock ‘n’ roll casualty.

“I’d probably be dead now if it wasn’t for my family. I would have overdone it. Having a family to account to keeps my feet on the ground. It keeps me from going over the edge with my artists. If I didn’t have to come home, I’d still be out there trying to party with the boys. My 42-year-old body would probably look like a 70-year-old body by now.”

Werman has three children--Julia, 14, Nina, 11, and Daniel, 5. “I’ve been married 20 years,” he announced proudly. “I’m probably the only hard-rock producer who’s been married that long or who’s not an alumnus of some drug or booze clinic. There’s a lot of stress on this job. Having a family helps keep me sane.”

Werman hasn’t been singled out for attack by the Parents’ Music Resource Center, the group that has been campaigning against sex, violence and general indecency in pop music. Still, he didn’t have anything nice to say about the organization.

“They are hypocritical and misguided,” he insisted. “I’m against gratuitous violence and misleading impressionable youth, but I’m also against censorship. They’re going about this whole thing all wrong. They don’t know what’s best for kids.”

If Werman weren’t 42, he’d make a good teen-ager. Probably the secret to Werman’s success is his kinship with teens. “I keep asking myself what I’m going to do when I grow up,” he joked. “A part of me can be a child sometimes. That’s how I stay in touch with youth.”

Werman really does have a good sense of how kids think and feel--particularly adolescent males, the primary audience for heavy metal. “They need to be angry, they need to have music they can clench their fists by, to pump themselves up by,” he explained. “They’re not always happy. They’re confused and alienated. I’m confused and alienated a lot of the time too.

“They need an outlet like hard rock. I need it too. I haven’t outgrown my need for it--nor will I ever outgrow my need for it.”

Most parents, he lamented, are out of touch with their teen-agers. “I see my peers not being even remotely interested in what’s going on in teen life today. They don’t have a clue. The youth culture is foreign to them. But I have to keep in tune with it--or else I couldn’t produce the music.

“It’s a great thing for a father not to feel like a nerd in front of his teen-age kids. . . . I know what’s going on with kids. I find them more compelling and interesting than most of the adults I know. Kids aren’t set in their ways like adults are.”

Werman’s kids aren’t metal freaks. His 14-year-old daughter Julia likes more cerebral bands like Depeche Mode. Nina, 11, likes some dance artists, including Tiffany. Werman is not too pleased about that, since dance music is one of his pet hates. He reacts to it the way other parents react to heavy metal.

“It has no emotion,” he griped, expressing particular dislike for dance-music stations like the popular KPWR-FM. “It’s junk. It’s the most disposable music.”

Actually, he doesn’t like radio period: “Radio is miserable. I don’t listen to it anymore. There’s no adventure. I prefer MTV. Even at its worst, it’s better than almost any radio station I know.”

Originally from Boston, Werman is a Columbia University graduate who started out in the advertising business. Though he played guitar in a band back in the ‘60s and was tempted by a music career, he opted to stay in school so he could stay out of the Army--and Vietnam.

By the end of the ‘60s a career in advertising didn’t seem very appetizing to Werman. So he wrangled a job as an A&R; (artists and repertoire) man--basically a talent scout--for Epic Records in 1970. Among his discoveries were REO Speedwagon, Cheap Trick, Ted Nugent and Boston. But he was frustrated as an executive.

“I was fed to the wolves in the executive suite,” he recalled. “I don’t have what it takes to be a real political in-fighter. It takes real aggressive behavior and ambition. I was never that into the job.

“People got credit for doing things they didn’t do and for things I did. The people in charge then were missing the boat in a lot of ways. There were bands I wanted to sign, like KISS, Lynyrd Skynyrd and Rush, that they didn’t want. I was frustrated. I wanted to do something else.”

So he branched out into record producing, which he sees as a natural progression. “Most A&R; men are frustrated producers anyway,” he noted. “They’d rather sign a band and produce the album and see the whole project through rather than signing a band and turning it over to some other producer.”

His introduction to producing was working on the first album by one of his finds--Ted Nugent. “I was just supervising things, overseeing things in the studio,” he recalled. “But I got more involved and wound up co-producing the album.”

Through the end of 1982, Werman had a dual role at Epic: A&R; man and record producer. His best work in those days--and possibly his best work to date--was done with Cheap Trick, which was at its peak in the late ‘70s. The band’s “Heaven Tonight” is his personal favorite of all the albums he’s produced.

Werman had his share of failures too. Of the bands that didn’t make it, Mother’s Finest, a black rock band that played “Led Zeppelin-style with a funk approach” is probably his favorite.

After a four-month stint as an A&R; man at Elektra Records in 1983, he decided to bow out of A&R; altogether. Since then he’s been exclusively an independent record producer.

His latest project is Poison, the L.A. glam-metal rowdies whose first album, “Look What the Cat Dragged In,” has sold more than 2 million. He’s also produced another Ted Nugent album--his first with Nugent since 1980.

But independent producing does have its drawbacks. You’re at the mercy of temperamental artists. You never know when a band won’t want to work with you anymore. For Werman, that’s happened with Cheap Trick and Twisted Sister. He also started an album with Dokken but never finished it because of a conflict with member George Lynch.

“These are just some of the hazards of dealing with guys who make this kind of music,” Werman concluded. “They’re not angels. They have big egos and they can be difficult. I knew that when I got into producing. If I wanted a quiet, simple life I would have stayed in advertising.”