ALEX FREDERICKS
Alex Fredericks has been building businesses for over 30 years. He started in the music industry, moved into consumer goods (skincare, cosmetics, fragrance, supplements), did a stint as CMO of an mp3 music server in the Middle East until Arab Spring ended that, went back to New York, did ICO’s for blockchain, ran a digital marketing agency, sold it to one of the big four, and walked out the door.
Along the way, he got bored and moved to something that interested him: health. The day he left Sony, he stopped drinking soda because it was no longer free and lost 15 pounds in two weeks. "What else can I do for me?" That question became the rest of his career. It went from green to organic to wellness to longevity, and he watched each word become a sales category before moving into wellness technology. He sat on the board of a neurofeedback company treating PTSD through TBI, got into red light therapy and hyperbaric, picked up a client in the PEMF space called AmpCoil, and during a science conversation with them asked the question that became ToneWell: "You're delivering something through waveform and frequency, can we come the other way and analyze through waveform and frequency?"
He also founded the AECC Group, doing strategy and business development for wellness tech companies. If he can understand the problem, he knows what to do with it.
HOW HE OPERATES:
How Alex manages his health and energy after 30 years of building businesses:
Brazilian jiu-jitsu, seven days a week
It’s his non-negotiable. It connects his mind and body in a way nothing else does.
Trains every morning at 10am. It's in his calendar like a meeting, because it is one.
Sometimes goes again at night, not to train hard, but to see his community, hang out, check in on people
When you're on the mat, you can't think about anything else. Your brain is making real calculations in real time with immediate consequences. "Oops, I did that wrong. Guy's choking me now."
Doesn't drink, doesn't need stimulants
“I don't drink because I don't like alcohol. I also don't drink because at some point it was an impediment to my ability to go see the world and work”
"I don't actually need the stimulant to be me. If that's what it takes, I'll just go do something else, I have enough hobbies and interests."
Started in the music industry as a tour manager, being sober meant he was the one getting people paid, not forgetting things, driving the van
No fear of missing out: "I already got me. I don't understand what I'm missing out on."
Makes 99% of his food
He and his wife make their own bread with flour they order in 40-pound bags from a small mill in Arizona
Grows a garden in the backyard
“I've sold a shitload of luxury goods and you'll recognize it’s all just goop in a bottle. But, luxury to me are the choices you make for the person you want to be. So how do you educate yourself? How do you exercise? What do you eat? Do you actually pay attention to the stuff that you put in your body?”
Follows his own schedule, not the rules
Hates breakfast. Operating on an empty stomach is when he's at his best.
Eats his first meal around 3-4pm, then dinner
Falls asleep on a full stomach, "they say you shouldn't, but I fall asleep like a bear. My body wants to shut everything else down and digest. So, I go to sleep. That's it."
Wakes up early because he likes being left alone and walks his dog in silence (a 14 year old Doberman).
Trying to cut sugar and is honest about the struggle
Has been working on eliminating added sugar for years
Doesn't add it to anything anymore, but it's baked into so many things that total elimination is nearly impossible
Honest about the fact that consistency is his biggest weakness; his wife is on him about taking his supplements, which sit on his desk so he remembers, and he still forgets
The system wasn't built for the individual
Alex doesn't follow anyone else's health playbook
His circadian rhythm, his eating patterns, his training schedule, all built around what actually works for him, not what the internet says should work
"Your set of rules are what matter to you, because they will never tell you what their rules are. Their rules are to beat you at their game, not yours."
"Just because the person next to you on Instagram is taking NAD doesn't mean you need to. If your body's already producing it, you're just leaving it in the toilet. Grow a garden and get the base root instead of spending money copying someone who looks great on the internet."
Fake it till you make it is the worst phrase ever: "It should actually be: if you can see it, you can be it. Because that comes with growth. Recognizing what you aren't, what you want to be, putting the time in, being okay if it didn't work, pivoting. Faking it till you make it means that when you make it, you're a fraud. You'll never have a sense of self, ownership, or authority."
Mind-body connection is the real lever
His biggest advice: do a movement activity that also requires your brain
Not a treadmill. Run outside where you're doing math in real time to avoid ditches and adjust your spine
Play racquetball, squash, do obstacle courses, anything where your brain is firing as fast as your body is moving
"The more sedentary you become, the less everything works"
"Your intentions and your attention need to be aligned. That's actually how you change your life."
Listens to the universe
"There's no such thing as coincidence. It's God's way of being anonymous."
Found his first band this way. Found his business partner this way.
Found his business partner by saying yes to a random bar meetup he didn't want to go to.
"I'm a yes-and person. I can always just get up and leave. But I'll follow that breadcrumb first.
“The world's drowning in data, but you still come up short with two very basic but super important questions: why don't I feel well, and why aren't I functioning well?”
MY TAKEAWAY:
Alex is the most unapologetically himself person I've talked to, and it was genuinely so much fun going down the rabbit hole with him.
He’s also hysterical…“I ran an agency of 200 fucking people. Do you have any idea how little I got done? Like me, as Alex is the individual, I got very little done. I was stressed out of my mind. I had certain ringtones for certain clients, and when they rang, Pavlovian-ly, I got sick”. This killed me, the Pavlov reference is so out of pocket.
Alex also discussed how if you don’t update all of your business systems, one will crack; if your corrugated box company moves to freezer packs but never updates the packaging, you get soggy cardboard. It's the same thing with health. People don't look at everything as connected when they all are. You get one glimpse into one piece of data and think that's your whole body. In business, you have a CEO who overlooks everything. In health, your doctors don't talk to each other. There's no one connecting the dots. That's what I want to build.
Additionally, your diagnostics themselves don’t take everything as a system. Your blood and urine are a moment in time, and you the need all the different tests to get a complete picture. Alex explained how your voice is where everything comes together, your lungs, your spine, your brain, etc. Your blood biomarkers are captured at a moment in time, and results take days to weeks. ToneWell captures your health and turns it around in minutes so you can actually do something about it.
Lastly, I think this is such a good reminder of finding the silver lining in things and trusting that everything works out. Alex started being a math and science whiz, with poor reading skills, which led him to music. His wife’s journey of Western medicine not getting to the root cause, then using that to spark her passion in helping others, led Alex down a health rabbit hole. The combination of his music experience, analytical brain, and passion for health, IS ToneWell.
(not to mention the fact that I find the entire concept of ToneWell insanely awesome)
WHAT MOVES THE NEEDLE (From Alex):
Learn to connect your mind and body. Do movement that requires your brain. Not a treadmill, not a stationary bike, something where you have to think and react in real time. Jiu-jitsu, racquetball, obstacle courses, even running outside on uneven terrain. The more your brain and body work together, the better everything else functions.
STEAL THIS:
Actions you can take right now
Try one physical activity this week that requires real-time problem solving. Something where your brain has to engage with your body. Rock climbing, a martial arts class, pickleball. Notice how different it feels from a standard gym session.
Audit how much added sugar you consume in a week, and see what happens when you slowly remove some of it.
WHAT HE IS BUILDING:
ToneWell - Voice-Based Health Analytics
You talk for 30 seconds. ToneWell analyzes your voice to derive thousands of biomarkers: vitamins, minerals, hormones, organ function, nervous system state, etc., and gives you back your top 3 wellness priorities, specific actions for today, and a Day 1 / Day 3 / Day 10 roadmap.
It's not a diagnostic. It's an analytic. Alex isn't telling you what's wrong. He's showing you what's happening right now so you can make choices today.
The launched platform will let you store scans over time, upload wearable and blood test data, and interact with an LLM trained on your personal health history. The vision is guided 40, 60, and 90-day journeys built around your intentions and what your voice reveals about what’s happening inside you right now.
Alex's thesis: "If I can help people build better relationships with themselves, we win."
CHECK OUT TONEWELL:
Thank you for reading!
