Sometimes I practice to Allan Holdsworth or John McLaughlin, but I don't just practice to jazz and jazz-fusion albums. I'll practice to TV theme music - one of my favorites is 'M*A*S*H.' I'll just play along with anything on the TV.
I think TV composers don't get enough credit. I really think it is one of the hardest jobs.
I've been doing a lot of music for films and television for quite a few years.
I did write a lot of TV themes - I wrote about 45 of them, and a couple of which are still reference and popular today, like 'Diff'rent Strokes' and 'Facts of Life.' But I was a limited musician.
I think music on television is just uniformly dreadful. It is mundane, it says nothing.
I love 'Modern Family.' And I love 'Glee' - the singing, the music - Jane Lynch just kills me.
I had written movie scores, television series, played with other people. Carl had done the same with Asia, with other bands, everything. We weren't about to entrust Greg automatically with a production credit.
Most television, the music is very much the same from show to show.
There's no real music on television unless it's music television, and then it's expensive videos, which people like me can't do.
I directed an early episode of 'Supernatural' the first season called 'Skin.'
I grew up on Michael Jackson, Pat Benetar, and Van Halen - all the things coming out of the television.
I was obsessed with 'The Twilight Zone' as a kid, and one of those things I didn't realize until I was in college was that I had been listening to Bernard Herrmann all my life.
I've lost so many gigs composing commercial or television music because I can't repress my inclination to work against conventions.
