MAY
PASSENGER PROFILE
By Kenny Kerner
NAME: PAUL OTTEN
RESIDENCE: CINCINNATI, OHIO
AGE: 38
OCCUPATION: Performing/musician-songwriter
YEAR JOINED TAXI: 2000
WEBSITE: paulotten.com
Among other things, Paul performs at weddings and writes jingles—two areas of the musical spectrum we seldom hear about. Until now. At no loss for words, Paul gives one of the most enjoyable interviews in a long time. Take a look:
Do you come from a musical family?
Yes, I do come from a musical family. For most of my life I thought my mom’s side of the family was the musical side. My mom sang, played piano and some ukulele. My grandpa Navaro played violin, grandma played piano and actually played piano in a silent movie theater.
As far as my dad’s side of the family goes, I was unaware of any musical lineage until about five or six years ago. I was talking with my aunt Cate (dad’s sister) and she proceeded to tell me that my grandpa Otten and his sister would sing all of the time, and that he was actually a good singer. That was news enough to me. Then she went on about “Aunt Jim,” again, my grandpa’s sister and my great aunt. She told me that she was a semi-famous country singer back in the ’40s and ’50s who went by the name of Dixie Dale.
What instruments do you play?
I play piano, guitar, drums, and some bass. When I was in 6th grade I took piano lessons and really took a shine to it. I was attracted to the challenge of playing two different things with each hand at the same time and to the rhythmic side of piano playing. It’s the only time I ever knew how to read music and I believe it gave me the fundamentals of musical timing and chord structure that I would utilize later on.
My lessons didn’t last very long though. Besides being a 6th grader with three brothers, lots of neighborhood friends, and plenty of distractions, my lessons were cut short when on the way to a lesson my mom hit a delivery driver who stepped out of the wrong side of his truck. He ended up being OK and luckily for everyone, we were driving slowly through a school zone. But it was a pretty traumatic experience watching a man bounce off the windshield in front of you. And for some reason, from that point on I never made it to another piano lesson. It’s also the first time I swore in front of one of my parents.
When I was 15, my brother Brian and I bought a drum set from a lady that played them in her church but gave them up due to a broken arm. Not sure she realized that it would heal, but luckily for us we now had a set of drums. We split duties on the kit playing along with Led Zeppelin, Beatles, and Rush records and for awesome effect, added a set of roto toms so we could play the drum fill to “In The Air Tonight” accurately.
After a while, having two drummers wailing away in a basement bedroom just didn’t add up. So when I was 16, I bought Mel Bay’s guitar book, dug up an old beat up acoustic guitar that my aunt had given us when we were kids and began teaching myself how to play. I believe my first version of a pick was a Lincoln log that I found lying around. It wasn’t very practical, but I made it work for a short time. I immersed myself in learning how to play guitar. I would spend hours everyday after school wearing out my fingers and determined to be able to play every chord I could with ease and without pain. I learned every Beatles, Kinks, Tom Petty, Guns and Roses, etc., song I could. I also started writing songs and recording them on my double cassette deck home stereo system.
While I was in my first band I began playing some keyboards as well as guitar.
I ended up re-learning the piano in 2000 after a psychic told me she saw piano in my musical future. Seemed like a pretty good reason to give it another whirl. So I then threw myself into piano as intensely as I did the guitar, learning tons of songs and began using the piano as my go to writing instrument. I feel like the piano really matured my songwriting.
Are you a schooled musician or self-taught?
Besides my short stint with piano lessons I am self-taught on all of my instruments. Over the past few years I attempted to take some jazz guitar lessons, but found that I didn’t have the patience I used to. I do regret not having some kind of music theory training. I think it opens up a whole new world of musical options for yourself. But learning music just came so naturally to me that lessons didn’t seem necessary. My music theory studies came from listening to, learning and performing hundreds of songs over the years. I’m not saying that is the best way, but that is the path I took.
When/how did you decide you could make money with a career in music?
I had been playing in cover and original bands throughout the early and mid-’90s, but never made any money from it. Back then playing music didn’t really seem like a viable money making venture. All the money we made went back into the band fund for recording or making T-shirts, etc.
When I started playing solo gigs in the late ’90s and found that I could make more in four hours than I could in an entire week at my day job, a light bulb went off. My brother joined me on drums and we started playing every week and earning a really good reputation as a live act. Some pretty lucrative gigs started to come our way, so much so that by 2003 I was able to quit my day job and just play music. I do enjoy performing live, but being a cover band, I was never really afforded the luxury of performing my own songs enough that they would really be appreciated.
Up until a few years ago, the songs I was writing didn’t really have much of a direction. I would write them for personal reasons, but didn’t really know what to do with them besides record them, make some CD’s and sell a few here and there at shows. I had been a TAXI member on and off for years but never did anything with it, god knows why. Then a few years I started writing custom songs for people. They would tell me their stories and I would condense it into a 3-4 minute song. For some reason this style of writing with a purpose made me think of TAXI. I began really taking a look at the listings and a new light bulb went off.
What is it like performing at weddings?
When we first started we had played our older brother’s wedding and a wedding for a friend. Then, people that had watched us over the years in bars started graduating college, getting older and getting engaged. They would ask us to play at their weddings because either the couple had met while watching us perform in their favorite bar, or we reminded one or both of them of their good times in college. Word of mouth spread our reputation as a good, unique wedding band. People would come to us to perform at their wedding because they either have been long time fans, saw us at a friend’s wedding or found us on the Internet and really like our set list.
Playing weddings gave me my first lesson in treating music as a business. We had to or we would have never earned the reputation that we have. I never thought I would end up being in a wedding band, but I don’t regret it at all. As far as gigs go, it is very satisfying because someone has personally asked you to perform for them as apposed to a bar owner hiring you hoping to sell more booze and line his own pockets. Plus, the money is a lot better, let’s be honest. Weddings have taken us to Omaha, Florida, New Jersey, Rhode Island, Chicago, Pennsylvania, North and South Carolina, Atlanta, St. Louis, Tennessee, Kentucky, and all over Ohio. My brother actually purchased a new SUV en route to a wedding in northern Ohio back in 2007.
Tell us about jingle-writing. Is it difficult?
A jingle uses one musical theme, which is looped for 15, 30, or 60 seconds. The lyrical info is most times already provided by the company’s phone number, web address, and/or tagline. It’s just up to the writer to create some simple music in a style that the company requests, which is more often than not a style that is used by a competitor or another jingle that is being played all the time.
The toughest part is coming up with a quick, catchy melody with enough syllables to fit the one or two lines of info and sing it in a clear, convincing way. And then being ready to sing that melody in about 10-15 slightly different ways until the company is satisfied, or decides to change their ad campaign all together and subsequently asks for an entirely new jingle.
Writing a song is like creating and filling in a Mad Lib because unless you’re given a theme by a lovely TAXI listing company (love those kinds of listings), you have to create a coherent story from scratch and come up with enough musical and lyrical ad libs to fill in the blanks and keep the listener interested. There is still the basic formula of a beginning, middle, and ending but what you put in there better be just unusual, clever and emotionally engaging enough to make yours stand out and want to be read (Mad Lib reference) by all of your friends and your friends’ friends over and over.
How did you first hear about TAXI?
I learned about TAXI back in the late ’90s through my good friend and then songwriting partner Jeff. We thought we were going to write the next country music hit. We dabbled in TAXI every now and then but didn’t really pursue it with any sense of urgency. I know at least from my end of it I had my doubts about TAXI’s legitimacy and didn’t see much of a future in it for a couple of guys from Cincinnati, far from the action of LA or Nashville.
Over the years I would let my membership lapse, sign up again and take no action, let it lapse again and so on. About three years ago I actually submitted some songs for a few listings and got contacted by two different companies. But, as I am currently kicking myself, I don’t think I trusted the legitimacy of these companies, so I stupidly let those opportunities pass me by. In hindsight it’s probably best that I did let them pass me by because I was clearly not mentally ready to seriously pursue the songwriting business. But alas, I have pulled my thick head out of the sand and have seen the light. I believe that the realization that I will actually turn 40 sooner than later has given me a keen sense of urgency that woke me up and told me, “Hey, I bet if you start laying ground work now and actively pursue your dream of being a successful songwriter then one day you will wake up and realize that you are a successful songwriter.”
How has TAXI helped you?
TAXI has given me a songwriting compass and sense of purpose to my days and my future. It has answered the question I have been asking myself for years, “what am I going to be when I grow up?” The opportunities presented by the listings, the Monday TAXI TV Live shows, the awesome and honest feedback from the screeners and the fantastic feedback, encouragement, and knowledge on the TAXI forum are all priceless. It makes this a fun and fruitful pursuit.
The one thing I have not experienced yet is the Road Rally, which I plan on attending this year, without a doubt. I have marked it on my calendar. I regretfully couldn’t make it last year because I had a wedding booked. Weddings book out a year, sometimes two years in advance, so it makes it hard to plan anything. I am looking forward to it! TAXI has also helped me improve my lyric writing, my production skills and has given me the tenacity to complete a song for a deadline.
What has TAXI taught you about the music business?
Since truly involving myself within TAXI, I have learned that the music business is not going to wait around for me. It is a constantly evolving roller coaster ride, but if I keep my hands in the car and stay strapped in, it will take me where I want to go. Also, the music business may be a beast, but it is not as scary as I once thought it was. It is a business just like any other, and it deserves to be treated as such if I want it to work for me.
What accomplishments are you most proud of?
I have three accomplishments in music that I am really proud of. Number 3 is seeing someone wearing one of my T-shirts in the Red Hot Chili Peppers video for “Snow (Hey Oh).”
Number 2 is hearing my song “Leave It Alone” on a TV show. It was on an episode of High School Confidential and so far is my first and only TV placement. I found out because I think someone I know heard it in the show and e-mailed me to tell me … then I wondered what they were doing watching High School Confidential.
My number one accomplishment in music happened last year when I wrote a song for some third graders. My brother Brian has twin first graders that attend school here in Cincinnati. Last spring the school asked us to participate in their career day and talk to three third grade classes about our career in music. I decided the best way to communicate with them about what I do was to write a song that they would participate in. So I wrote a song about a mystery and created the lyrics in a Mad Lib style. I then had each of the three classes complete the lyrics. We performed in the school’s library later that day for the preschoolers up to the third graders. And we performed each of the three versions for them. They were hilarious and I went on to record each version and give them each a CD.
What are your goals for 2011?
My goals for 2011 are to improve my production skills, get at least two placements as a result of my forwards, decrease my procrastination, attend my first Road Rally, increase my income as a result of one of my songs, write a song that I did not think I was capable of writing a year ago, and of course, write, submit, and forget.