Covid 19 coronavirus: Will Johnston - There are the doers and there are the complainers

Adam Mclean in The Hits BOP 95FM studio to play his new song titled Mates. Photo / Supplied

COMMENT:

There are the doers and there are the complainers.

But when it comes to "doers", no one likes an overachiever! I'm not even talking tall poppy here, I'm talking one of those ones who's just winning left, right and centre but they're kind of smarmy and their veil of humbleness is thinner than Trump's comb over.

As I write that I worry that that might be me.

Let's move on before I capitulate in to the mess of emotions I am when it comes to what success really means.

Anyway, I don't really like the complainers either.

Except if they are complaining about my radio show – a free show that no one is forced to listen to – then I find it super interesting. Like that time, a year in to my job here in the bay, a lady hand-wrote me a vapid complaint in a Very Hungry Caterpillar birthday card about how offended she was that I'd said the word "bloody" twice in 35 minutes and that I'd also encouraged people to live together outside wedlock. I believe "living in sin" was her angle.

Snorty laugh!

I mainly find radio complainers interesting because I can't understand how they wouldn't just simply not listen, right?! But to be fair, one of the most successful radio stations NZ has had in its radio history is Newstalk ZB …

A station built on information and people who like to complain about it.

Doesn't THAT say something about who New Zealand REALLY is.

I actually listen to talkback occasionally. It makes me feel better about myself. Lol.

But also it makes me realise that, "this Covid thing" (common ZB caller lingo) has really shown who's a doer and who's a complainer.

Don't get me wrong, had I lost my job (which is still a possibility, like it is for literally everyone in the media and thousands of industries in NZ right now), I would have definitely been complaining.

But I feel it would be on the minor end of the ZB complainers scale. And then I would turn in to a doer. Mainly motivated by my mortgage, but also by the fact that I feel like I have a duty myself to not be a complete sack and waste any opportunity.

You know who wasn't a sack over lockdown? Adam McLean.

Before I tell you who Adam is. Know this. His dad's name is John. John McLean! (Die Hard) I'm told he knows literally everyone in his home town of Putaruru and if there was such a thing as a "Mayor of Putaruru" I have it on good authority that they wouldn't even need to vote.

John would just be given the job.

Can you imagine if the mayor of Putaruru was freak'n John McLean?! First order of business would be to change their town slogan to begin with: "Yippee-ki-yay" and end with you-know-what.

Anyway, his son Adam is a mate of mine and lives out the Mount. He's a local musician, as a celebrant/MC I've done a few weddings with him as the musician and I've MC'd numerous community events where he's totally set the vibe with his musical talents.

He also started and runs Bay Music School. Basically like School of Rock but with potentially a little more structure.

He's written and recorded an original song called Mates. So I had him in the studio this last week to play it for us. I also made him laugh right in the middle of his live performance of it on air. My professionalism has really taken a hit since Covid.

So when "this covid thing" happened he lost 100 per cent of his income. Like watched his entire next few months' work just completely vanish.

For a creative guy, that's the pits. He has a wife and two kids. Did he complain?

No. He grew a beard.

Oh, and started online live concerts every Friday night that were totally free on Facebook. He also did lunchtime ones for kids/parents who were home with kids and losing the will to live about it!

He then gave you the option to donate to Bay Music School so they could hit the ground running and get in to schools and get instruments in the hands of kids who probably would not have had that opportunity otherwise.

He also raised money for a men's health charity through these online gigs.

The guy raised thousands of dollars.

But what I REALLY love is that he also did a smart thing by just putting himself out there like that so his name and vibe and talent were more on display online than they had ever been … so NOW who's top of your mind for music stuff? THAT GUY IS!

He is just one of hundreds of solo operators that are currently trying to do things differently to keep relevant and in your mind and to actually help others at the same time.

Tauranga is built on small businesses like his. And if I'm really honest, I actually feel like when it's all said and done, months and years down the track, the likes of Adam McLean and small business owners/sole traders who are putting it all out here and trying thing after thing to make a living are the ones that are going to be so much more set up to succeed than big, clunky, overseas-run corporates, with that public-facing myth of being unflappable.

Plus the guy's got a sweet beard. Which he says is staying because people voted for it …

But I have it on good authority that it's ALLOWED to stay on his ol mug because his wife said it could.

That would never have been the case in John McLean's day!