By admin 
Introduction
In the pantheon of music royalty, the “car collection” is usually the first line of defense against humility. Elton John has his Bentleys; Rod Stewart has his Lamborghinis. We expect Barry Manilow—the man who sold 85 million records, the showman who flies above the stage on wires—to have a garage that looks like a Dubai showroom. We expect vintage convertible Jags, custom Bugattis, and perhaps a gold-plated Cadillac to match his sequined jackets.
But if you peel back the garage door of the Manilow estate, you don’t find a museum of horsepower. You find a ghost town of practicality.
The shocking truth is that Barry Manilow, one of the wealthiest men in music history, has largely rejected the “supercar” lifestyle. Sightings of the icon behind the wheel are incredibly rare, restricted to practical luxury SUVs like a Range Rover or a nondescript Porsche Cayenne with Nevada plates. Why? The answer lies in a bitter irony from his past. Before he was a star, Manilow wrote the world-famous “Like a Good Neighbor” jingle for State Farm. He was paid a flat fee of $500. Years later, he wryly noted that the woman who sang that jingle was on her “third Rolls-Royce” from the residuals, while he got nothing.
It seems this early lesson in the hollowness of material flash scarred him. While his peers collect cars as trophies, Manilow views them as tools. There is even a famous, surreal paparazzi moment where the music legend was snapped not in a McLaren, but in a student driver car, proudly showing off a new license. It was a moment that humanized the deity. He isn’t chasing speed; he’s chasing the simple, anonymous freedom that fame stole from him. The man who wrote the songs doesn’t need the engine to make the noise.