In 1974, just as his father was thinking of selling Hymie's to become a stockbroker, the 18-year-old record fiend started college in New York. He got a part-time job as assistant to Joel Dorn, who had produced popular albums for Bette Midler and Roberta Flack. The city then was bubbling with experimental comedy and the beginnings of punk.
1974年，就在哈爾父親在考慮賣掉Hymie熟食店，要做一個股票經紀人時，這位18歲的唱片發燒友開始在紐約上大學。維爾納找到了一份兼職工作，擔任喬爾·多恩的助理。喬爾曾為貝特·米德勒和羅伯塔·弗萊克制作過流行專輯。當時，這座城市充滿了實驗喜劇和早期朋克。
This was just as it was heading towards financial crisis and before the beautiful people with their shiny teeth were being photographed every night at Studio 54. New York was rough, he liked to say. It had a smell about it. The block he lived on had a gay bathhouse and the small midtown recording studio he rented soon filled up with posters of Laurel and Hardy, Pop-Eye puppets, Holocaust memories and a music box that played Karlheinz Stockhausen, a gift from Frank Zappa.
同時，時代也正朝著金融危機發展，而在那個時候，還沒有人每天晚上在54號攝影棚里給長著閃亮牙齒的美女拍照。維爾納總是說，紐約很艱難。這里有一種特別的氛圍。維爾納住的街區有一個同性戀浴室，他在市中心區租的小錄音棚很快就充滿了勞萊與哈代的海報，人偶，大屠殺記憶，還有一個播放卡爾海因茨·斯托克豪森的音樂盒，那是弗蘭克·扎帕送的禮物。
Mr Willner, who had a mind like a reliquary, revered the music of T Rex as much as he favoured Kurt Weill, Lou Reed and Thelonious Monk. Since the mid-20th century the music producer has become an iconic figure in the cultural world, as much impresario as director, bringing together singer and songwriter and conjuring up the character of an album as a living entity. The producer is the ship's captain, magician and masterchef all rolled into one. As one friend of his liked to say: "The producer is in charge of everything."
維爾納先生的頭腦就像圣骨盒，他對TRex樂隊的音樂就像對庫爾特·威爾、盧·里德和特洛尼斯·蒙克一樣崇敬。自20世紀中期以來，這位音樂制作人已成為文化界的標志性人物，他既是導演又是經理人，把歌手和詞曲作者集合在一起，把一張專輯的角色想象成一個活生生的實體。在這艘船上，制作人維爾納集船長、魔術師和主廚于一身。就像他的一個朋友喜歡說的：“這個制作人負責一切。”
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