Back To School? These Classic Rockers Have Degrees!

Rock 'N' Roll might be more famous for its drop-outs, but these guys actually finished getting their degrees before they ever thought about going on tour. Lesson: always {and we mean, always!} have a back-up plan.

Tom Scholz, Master's Degree - It was 1970 when the future Boston master-mind earned his Mechanical Engineering degree from MIT. He also invented the Rockman Portable Guitar Amplifier which featured compression, distortion and echo features so you wouldn't have to go out and spend $$$$ and many years trying to copy that Boston guitar sound.

Jim Morrison, Bachelor's Degree - This is no typo. As unlikely as it might seem now, Jim attended Florida State University before moving on to UCLA where he studied film. A distinct advantage at the time was that "film studies" was a pretty loosey-goosey term; Jim received his degree and graduated in 1965. The real story here is that he never would have met future Doors keyboardist Ray Manzarek had he not gone to UCLA.

James Williamson (Lead Guitarist of The Stooges), Bachelor's Degree - Sounds incomprehensible! Punk guitar pioneer becomes successful in the soon-to-be-insanely-enormous Silicon Valley scene of the early '80's. After co-writing Iggy's masterwork "Raw Power", James' discovered the fledgling personal computer market and went whole hog (if you will), attending Cal Poly Pomona to become an electrical engineer, earning his degree and then becoming a VP for Sony where he helped develop Blue-Ray technology! Yikes!

Brian May, Ph.D. - As if his guitar work with Queen wasn't enough, right? He fell in love with astrophysics (good luck to the rest of us) and got himself a bachelor's degree with honors in 1968 at London Imperial College. Three years later, he took a break from his high-falutin' studies to form "a band" with singer Freddie Mercury, etc., etc. Fast-forward 40 years, when Queen's reign was coming to a close, Brian actually went back to school to complete earning his Ph.D. in 2007. Oh, and he's worked with NASA, analyzing outer space data, etc., etc., again. An amazing dude.