Program Aids More Than Rock Stars

Who in the music world is most likely to need help with substance abuse problems?

Singers in rock bands with alcohol or heroin addictions are the most prevalent, according to breakdowns of people helped into treatment programs by the Musicians Assistance Program, which is marking its 10th anniversary.

That’s no surprise, given rock singers’ issues with ego and the pressures of the spotlight.

Of the more than 250 people who turned to MAP in 2001, 36% were in rock bands, 23% were singers and 34% listed alcohol as their primary drug of choice, with heroin right behind at 31%.

The surprise may be who was next on the list behind vocalists. It wasn’t musicians at all, but people working in the music business--record company executives and staffers, managers, agents, promoters, producers, engineers and journalists, among them--accounting for nearly 20% of the people put into treatment by MAP last year.

That statistic caught even MAP founders Buddy Arnold and Carole Fields-Arnold off guard.

“I was startled when I saw the number,” says Fields-Arnold, sitting with her husband in the organization’s small office suite in the American Federation of Musicians’ Hollywood headquarters. “I knew we’d helped the odd agent or lighting person along the way.”

Says Arnold, “But 49 people last year? Wow!”

They don’t believe that the statistic reflects an increase of non-artist music professionals developing addictions. The music business--with easy access to the same vices in which the artists indulge--has always been fertile ground for substance problems. But it does mean that more music business personnel have been seeking help from MAP.

“We’re finding that more [non-musicians in the business] will come here, even if they have insurance and funds that would get them access to other treatment,” Fields-Arnold says. “There’s a support group here. We have representatives in other cities, peer networking.”

MAP board member David Adelson, executive editor of the trade weekly Hits magazine and music producer and correspondent for E! Television, says that in this case, success breeds success.

“Musicians have been more forthcoming and more willing to deal with their problems. It may have been a motivating force for others in the music industry to take action to help themselves,” Adelson says.

There’s another arresting MAP statistic: 59% of the more than 1,000 people treated in the 10-year span--the vast majority in residential treatment facilities--have remained sober, Arnold says. In Alcoholics Anonymous, “you hear figures as low as 12%.”

The Arnolds started MAP in 1992 out of their condominium, with eight people helped the first year. Arnold was a jazz saxophonist who had been a heroin addict for 31 years before getting clean in 1981 during a prison stint (for impersonating a doctor in order to write prescriptions for fake patients). He initiated the organization simply to address the specific needs of addicted musicians.

“When we started, it was musicians, because that’s all I cared about,” Arnold says.

In the mid-’90s, Kurt Cobain’s failed addiction treatment and ultimate suicide and the overdose deaths of Blind Melon’s Shannon Hoon, Sublime’s Bradley Nowell and others brought more attention to the issue of addiction among musicians and led to increased referrals to MAP.

It also brought music business funding for the shoestring operation, including a seven-figure grant from the Recording Industry Assn. of America.

Along the way, artists such as the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Neil Young, the Foo Fighters and Bonnie Raitt participated in benefit concerts and fund-raising events. However, with the music business’ attention elsewhere now, MAP is back on the shoestring, existing basically as a mom-and-pop operation with the Arnolds and their small staff. They spend more of their time “begging for money” than they care to, Fields-Arnold says. With Arnold about to turn 76, they are concerned about the program’s future.

They’re grooming L.A. musician Bob Forrest as a successor. Forrest, who has frequently discussed his addiction and recovery in the press, has long been active in MAP, helping with interventions for musicians in trouble and with the day-to-day operation. He’s currently studying to become a licensed counselor. Forrest will be the recipient of MAP’s annual Buddy Award at an event planned for November.

The rest of the MAP statistics? After singers and music business personnel come drummers (17%), guitarists (16%), bassists (10%), keyboard players (7%), writers/composers (5%), and reed and brass players (1% each). Broken down by style of music, rock was followed by performers from pop (19%), jazz (8%), blues/R&B; (7%), country (6%), classical and Latin (1% each), with 2% unspecified.

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Steve Hochman is a frequent contributor to Calendar.