When is a Musician, or Anyone Else, a Hero? Steve Earle and How and When to Separate the Achievement from the Achiever

The adulation and worship of famous people has always been problematic.  Examples of athletes, artists, politicians, and others who excelled at their craft but were dreadful humans long predate the so-called “modern” era (emperors, kings, popes are easy targets, but there are more—can you name a few?  Please share!).  That being said, however, the phenomenon does seem to be exaggerated more by the mass media and marketing machine that drives so much of our culture, especially because that machine is so often directed at young people—from the 8 year old 3^rd graders in my class up through high school and college kids working through various phases of idealism before arriving at varying degrees and flavors of jaded wisdom about the people in the world at adulthood.  And the phenomenon doesn’t really end then, either: now at 50 (*%*W@#*!!!), I still struggle with how to interpret achievements in relation to their achievers when an achievement— most often musical, occasionally literary, cinematic, political, baseball related, or otherwise— really strikes a chord in me.  Does the fact that someone has made a great record make them a hero?  If I conclude that someone is a jerk, how should that impact how I respond to their work and how I respond to their presence in our culture?  What of use can I take from any knowledge I have of how they came to excel at their craft? Are any of these people really heroes?  And what is a hero anyway?

Let me begin to answer these questions with a statement: Steve Earle is a hero.

In support of this statement, I offer my own crude and informally gathered (from sources—interviews, film / video, record sleeves, magazine articles, etc etc etc etc— too myriad to recall and enumerate over the last 18 years or so) summary and interpretation of his biography (and my sincerest apologies to my hero for any factual errors or other offenses I commit in the process of offering this up): 

Steve Earle grew up in Texas absorbing as much of the Great American Musical River as he could while cultivating a fiercely independent personality streak which resulted various kinds of turbulence and (mis)adventures growing up.  He made his way to Nashville as soon as he could, to enter the songwriting clique in which his idol Townes Van Zandt was a Player.  By the age of 19 he was rubbing elbows and writing songs there in Music City with Van Zandt and some of the other heaviest country songwriting hitters of the day—Guy Clark, Rodney Crowell, et.al.  A few of his songs were recorded by other artists (most notably Carl Perkins), and eventually he wound up with a recording contract of his own, with 1986’s Guitar Town the first in a string of records (including Exit 0, Copperhead Road, and The Hard Way) which set off a meteoric rise to country-rock fame and fortune.  The records are impressive in many ways—brilliant, vivid narrative songwriting tales featuring identifiable characters in a wide variety of familiar and moving dire straits, performed on a gritty guitar-bass-drums-piano palette devoid of the cheesy electronic sounds that poisoned almost all records of the era, executed by a tight, dynamic, fiery band (The Dukes), and supported by relentless, impassioned touring.  Earle’s own story, however, was classically, predictably tragic: suddenly rich and famous, he became a dope fiend fuckup.  His addiction to hard drugs led him to not only chemical-abuse excess but a life of street crime to support his habits, and all of this while he had a young son growing up, often in his house.  His life came crashing down around him with a drug and weapons bust that came a hairsbreadth from a much more serious charge and tragedy: as he narrates the event, while in the process of being arrested, a loaded pistol was dislodged from his belt, falling to the ground, discharging, and narrowly missing officers in on the arrest.  Despite his achievements—a string of phenomenal and successful records—this guy was not a hero.

He spent 60 days in jail, then completed an inpatient drug rehab program, followed by one of the most remarkable creative and personal rebirths in history.  Immediately following his discharge, he entered the studio to record an acoustic record—mostly of songs salvaged from his early days in Nashville—which is, in my humble opinion, the finest acoustic rock and roll record ever, bar none (Train A Comin’).  This was followed by a set of records which included 3 straight-up rock and roll albums with a reconstituted Dukes (I Feel Alright, El Corazon— I’m happy with this one and nothing else on a desert island— and Transcendental Blues).  I first saw Steve Earle live on the El Corazon tour, and the show was the most moving performance I have ever seen: a man desperately grateful for the second chance he had been given and determined to make the most of it.  He closed his 3^rd encore—at the end of nearly 3 straight hours—with a cover of my favorite song in the whole world: the Stones’ “Sweet Virginia” (his intro: “Thank you Chicago—I love any town where I can sell records and get good Mexican food, and this is the last song tonight because the tacos are on the bus.  I got me a habit of collecting British hillbilly songs, and this is one of ‘em.  Hope you like. G’night”).  He led the tune on mandolin, an instrument which I had just taken up meself.  I thought my head was going to explode— I leaned over and said to my wife and my closest friend who were with me: “Lord take me now.  Everything else will be downhill from here.”  Also woven into this creative nuclear burst was an album of bluegrass originals done with the legendary Del McCoury Band (The Mountain), followed by a searing post-9/11 political record (Jerusalem).  The songs on Jerusalem — most famously "John Walker's Blues," but really the whole damn album— implore a post-9/11 America convulsed with jingoism and xenophobia to move beyond its loathing and fear and face hard truths about itself.  For this he was castigated by persons of all stripes in American life, including no less a figure than the elder George Bush, to which he said, essentially, "Say what you want.  I have the strength of my convictions and I'm on a mission to try to make people think differently."   He has been politically outspoken and effective since his release from prison / rehab on other fronts, as well: as a fierce opponent of the death penalty he has not only written songs about the issue, but worked closely with political leaders on several fronts to achieve substantive change.  Now clean for about 20 years, he is raising a son with autism, and is active in advocating for people and families facing challenges related to autism. He has written novels and plays, appeared in televisions and films, taught classes in songwriting (here at Chicago’s Old Town School of Folk Music!), and subsequent albums (The Revolution Starts Now, Washington Square Serenade, et.al.) have been critical and commercial successes.  He works relentlessly at his craft, has fallen as far as one can fall without dying as a result of personal mistakes, learned from his grave failure, turned himself around, and now leads a life not only of high creative achievement, but of conviction and dedication to improving the lives of others and the world in general.

In this biography, we see not only achievements to be enjoyed and celebrated (some of the greatest rock and roll albums ever, creative success in many artistic media), but also heroism: a willingness to work ferociously hard not only to achieve, but also to improve as a person and to improve the world as well.

A great album is a great album, period: John Lennon’s Imagine, Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon, Michael Jackson’s Thriller, etc etc etc.  Achievement is achievement: Tiger Woods mile-long list of golf championships, John F. Kennedy’s management of the Cuban Missile Crisis, Picasso’s Guernica.  These achievements are worthy of adulation.  And the people who did these things did so because they were singularly devoted to, driven by, and disciplined in their work.  This kind of dedication is also worthy of celebration: nothing great is achieved without this kind of hard work, an instructive lesson to everyone. But, like so many people who achieve fame and fortune, these people were and are also famously difficult, unkind, disrespectful, or even abusive to the people around them—unrecovered addicts, adulterers, and tyrants whose personal foibles hurt many of the people around them terribly.  Most of us are flawed in similar ways (myself included for sure!), and so my position is NOT that these people should be reviled or castigated for their flaws, but merely viewed as human, rather than heroic.  When I see kids saying that their idols are famous athletes or musicians, and that they want to be like them when they grow up, I try to remind kids (and myself) that I don’t really know these famous people or know enough about them to know if I want to be like them, that we should all enjoy their work, but reserve judgment about them as people unless we really know more about their lives.

Rare is the person who can achieve greatness and also conduct themselves personally in a way which is exemplary and worthy of celebration.  Steve Earle’s biography helps me understand the difference and separate a person’s work from their life.  I enjoy Dark Side of the Moon no less because I have concluded that Roger Waters isn’t a hero, but I particularly appreciate the likes of the Steve Earle’s of the world when they come ‘round.

THE BEAT AND THE GROOVE: THE RESPONSIBILITY AND POWER OF LIFE IN THERHYTHM SECTION

Dear Readers, before proceeding with this entry, I must offer a FULL DISCLOSURE NOTE ABOUT MY LAST ENTRY: when I first posted the U2 piece a couple of weeks back, I did not attribute the "SCOW" (Social Conscience Of the World) moniker hung on Paul Hewson (a.k.a. "Bono") in the piece to my good friend Tony O, who coined it in a conversation after we had seen the Rattle and Hum movie together.  I have now edited the post to attribute him within the piece as the creator of the moniker and also am doing so here with this note.  My apologies to Tony for the oversight and my thanks to him for his pithy, on-target wit, and his understanding:).  We now return to our regularly scheduled post about my new Life in the Rhythm Section...

After 30 some odd years towards the front of the band-- playing guitar and singing-- I moved into the rhythm section about a year and a half ago.  I LOVE my new home at the back of the stage, but it sure is a different place, with a very different set of responsibilities and rewards.

I wasn’t planning on moving-- it just kinda happened.  I’d been invited to sit in on Tuesdays with a 2 guitar and voice combo for a guitarist who was going to be out of town for a little while, and that went just fine-- I could follow the rock, blues, r and b, and country tunes and pick a respectable solo-- but then the out-of-town guitarist came back into town, and I became extraneous, a 5th wheel: unless you’re Lynyrd Skynyrd or the Eagles, 3 guitars is just a silly lineup-- too many notes, redundancy, and / or wankery.   At the time, however, we had no proper rhythm section-- neither a bass player nor a drummer-- and so whoever was playing rhythm guitar also was the timekeeper.  This worked OK, but there’s no substitute for someone with a big-ass rumbly sound making sure that “ONE” punches down firm and strong and even every bar (and “TWO” and “THREE” and etc for that matter!).  I’ve had a cheap bass guitar lying around my house for years, and so, wanting to find myself a useful role, offered to bring it down to the bar the next Tuesday.  “Yeah, that’d be great,” came the reply.

Like, I suspect, many guitarists, I’ve had a bass player fantasy for years-- the low lying lines and chest thumping wallop intrinsic to the instrument, the rhythmic pulse and grooves it can create, its long, skinny profile (I'm kinda short and round meself, and so have always liked the look of things long and thin...), and its understated but vital importance to any performance’s sound… damn, that always looked like fun-- and so this was, literally, a dream come true.   

Getting my bearings took me a little while: I needed to play individual notes ALL the time-- no chords ever, really-- and though my left hand was familiar with the layout of the neck (the bass is really the bottom 4 strings of a guitar tuned an octave lower), the spacing was larger and so I needed some practice finding my way around smoothly.  We had song sheets with chords for some of the tunes, but not nearly all-- maybe less than half-- and so I was often following things by ear and missed the timing of changes or broke for the wrong note because of my unfamiliarity.  I guess I worked out these issues fairly efficiently, though-- the band kept asking me to coming back with the bass-- and I now feel joyously at home at the back of the band.  In recent months, we’ve also been joined by a handful of drummers who frequent the bar where we play, and so I’m usually not alone back there.  With their percussive assistance, I have come to understand 2 vital Truths about Life in the Rhythm Section...

First (and this seems obvious and I always knew it but in a secondhand sort of way which is very different from living it): the first, last, and primary job back here is to keep the Beat: ONE-TWO-THREE-FOUR, ONE-TWO-THREE-FOUR, ONE-TWO-THREE-FOUR, over and over relentlessly until the song is done (or, as the case may be, ONE-TWO-THREE, ONE-TWO-THREE, ONE-TWO-THREE, or etc etc etc).  Once the song starts, the pulse has to lock in and NEVER change, NEVER stop, NEVER hiccup, NEVER speed up, NEVER slow down.  PERIOD.  It’s like putting your quarter into a rocking horse pony: once you start it, it goes like it goes until it’s done, and it can’t be stopped.  All other Rhythm Section Truths flow from this reality, and a failure to meet this primary responsibility results in nonmusic, noise, sonic barf.  ONE-TWO-THREE-FOUR, ONE-TWO-THREE-FOUR: making sure everyone knows where these are is our first job back here and if we don’t do it, everything falls apart in a hurry.  As a converted guitar player (and especially a lead guitar player!), I had (and still fight) a tendency to want to play too many damn notes.  First of all, these can get in the way of keeping that pulse vice-grip locked in time and pulsingly present in the overall sound, and second of all, my bass chops ain’t that sharp so I try to remember to not get my head out over my skis anyway. When in doubt: just play the notes on the beat. Funny enough, as I have now also begun experimenting with the stand-up bass, I find staying focused on this job easier than with with bass guitar because the stand-up is harder to play so keeping it simple is, uh, simpler.

Second: as keepers of the Beat, we are the foundation of the Groove in the rock and roll band.  The Groove-- usually composed of the aforementioned steady beat, a little bit of percussion shake (hi hat, shakers, etc), a bass line locked in to the beat maybe syncopating it a bit, but in granite firm time that wiggles your hips, and maybe topped off by a rhythm guitar riff with some grind-- is what gets in your ears and head and won’t leave, sometimes for days or weeks.  It’s like a drug that takes over first your body and then your mind.   Building the Groove properly doesn’t necessarily take a lot of notes, it just takes the right ones: the right pulse with the right shake, a bass line kneading the beat or foreshadowing or framing the chord changes or melody, a guitar riff that reaches down into your guts and won’t let go can drive a tune, can open up vocal and instrumental possibilities which can take a song anywhere.  The Allmans and the Grateful Dead have always known this about the Groove, which is why they have 2 drummers (one to lay down the beat, one to add the shake).  Even a flaccid, weak song can spring to glorious, feral life when the rhythm section finds the right groove to put behind it, and a great song can flop flaccidly without a well-constructed groove.

Thus the Beat and the Groove constitute the awesome Responsibility and the awesome Power of the Rhythm Section.  Life at the front of the band can still be fun: a haunting melody, a truth-encapsulating lyric, a blazing guitar solo can all be stunning to take in as a listener and teeth-igniting to offer up as a player, and living in the limelight up front does have its charms and allure.  But life here at the back is a Big Deal, too, and a glorious one, at that.  I’m digging my new home very much, very indeed, and have no desire to move in the near future.

A Casual Fan’s History of U2 Through Achtung Baby

U2 passed through town a couple of weeks ago.  I didn’t see the shows (my relationship with Big Concert Events is a complex enough topic to merit its own post another day), but the splash in town and the various clips posted online did prompt me to go back and listen and reflect…

I’ve always had a kind of complex relationship with U2.  I was in high school when they first broke, with the Boy, October, and War albums tumbling out in rapid succession, followed up shortly by a live document, the arresting and inspiring Under a Blood Red Sky.  Their sound was unique and cool (loved that echoey guitar and giant voice) and it fought against the tsunami-tide of 80s music which was composed of electronic sounds and devoid of grit, grind, or substance so I liked them alright, but some things kinda put me off: singer Paul Hewson’s and guitarist Dave Evans’s self-dubbed nicknames—“Bono” and “The Edge”—felt kinda put on, self-puffing, and pretentious (I feel the same way about Gordon Sumner christening himself “Sting”), and the kinda holier than thou politics the band so loudly espoused felt kinda pontifical and rubbed me the wrong way.  And so: I thought they were alright, but I wasn’t really a big fan.

I was a big Brian Eno fan, though— I gobbled up hundreds of hours of his work with art rock professor Robert Fripp, his “ambient” soundscapes, his legendary 3 album partnership with David Bowie, his solo classic Here Come the Warm Jets (Fripp’s guitar solo on "Baby's On Fire" is a brilliant combination of savagery and intellect), and many of his other experiments and collaborations— and so I snapped up the Eno-produced The Unforgettable Fire the week it came out my sophomore year in college. Dave Evans was quoted in interviews as saying that this was how the band was always supposed to sound, that this was the sound they had been driving at all along, and I agreed.  Eno and fellow soundscape sculptor Daniel Lanois had developed Evans’s noted echoey guitar sound into a tool capable of painting richly textured aural pictures while still also crumbling walls with blitzkriegs of rage.  The songs were lyrically heavy— “In the Name of Love” and “MLK” were fitting tributes to Dr. King, “Elvis Presley and America” nicely drew a picture of the King as a metaphor for much of what’s good and much of what’s bad about our country and the American Dream, and the narration and cascading musical rises and falls in “Bad” authentically limn the sadness of someone watching a friend struggle with depression or addiction—  but they’re somehow not quite as Moses-From-The-Mountain preachy as some of the earlier songs.  The album was a huge critical and commercial success, again especially impressive coming as it did in the middle of Rock and Roll’s darkest hour.  Surrounded on the charts, radio, and MTV by the soulless drek of 80s synth pop, The Unforgettable Fire stood virtually alone in every respect:  sonically composed of real instruments— guitar, bass, and drums—rather the sounds of a Pong game, lyrically serious and poetic, and the band, pompous nicknames aside, presented in jeans, t-shirts, and a distinct absence of krazy-glued hair spikes or dye.

Then, The Joshua Tree— a perfect album from beginning to end.  I've listened to it front to back a half-dozen times in the last week, and I can’t find a place where interest or energy leaks out anywhere.  From the windblown opener “Where the Streets Have No Name,”  through ballads  of love and / or self-reflection (“With or Without You”), paeans to land and laborers “Red Hill Mining Town”), political anthems both thunderous (“Bullet the Blue Sky”) and meditative (“Mothers of the Disappeared”), and beyond, every track is a killer.  The lyrical ideas and opinions, while every bit as socially and culturally on-point as anything on “War,” are expressed more artfully.  The sound is enormous and gorgeous.  The songs, with Hewson’s booming baritone carving out soaring melody lines and potent ad libs between Evans’s alternately delicate and ballistic echo-driven guitar riffs, and undergirded by Adam Clayton’s muscular bass lines and Larry Mullen Jr.’s rock solid and sensitive drumming, are arranged impeccably to maintain interest and maximize impact by Eno and Lanois.  The Joshua Tree shows were Rock and Roll Revivals on a massive scale, leaving concertgoers with a sense not only of joining in an event of musical communion, but having been exhorted to higher purposes by the band’s fiery fusing of politics and rock and roll.  Arguably, the band had reached a place in Western Culture to which no one had been since the Beatles: commercially successful on a scale almost impossible to comprehend—record sales in the 10s of millions, globe and calendar spanning tours of the largest arenas and football stadiums— but also with a cultural impact transcending mere rock- or pop-stardom.  Not merely unabashedly outspoken on issues such as apartheid, the IRA, and world hunger, the band was an active leader in fundraising for those causes, and also willing and able to use their stature to take their commitments to the top, lobbying and conversing with political leaders around the world.

A clarifying note here: no one, NO ONE, I repeat NO ONE—including U2 has ever had the musical and cultural impact of the Beatles.  In all probability no one ever will—they changed the world musically and culturally forever.  Everything that U2 has done has been possible because of the Beatles, and so when I say “the band had reached a place in Western Culture to which no one had been since the Beatles” I do NOT mean that they had the same impact or have the same long-term importance as the Beatles.  Rather, I am pointing out that no band since the Beatles had become both musically important and culturally and politically forceful on a global scale, especially relative to their peers.

And so U2 was Mighty Big, Mighty and Big, indeed. Heads swelled, expectations swelled, ambition swelled: the next step was a double album (a mixture of live takes from the Joshua Tree tour and new studio recordings) and major motion picture— Rattle and Hum.  Here’s where things kinda went south for me.  Rattle and Hum contains a number of excellent cuts: the opening reading of the Beatles’ (!) “Helter Skelter” stands at least shoulder to shoulder with the original while adding to, if not radically re-interpreting, it, “Van Diemen’s Land,” featuring a haunting vocal by Evans, details the impact of a little known Irish political activist, the gospel-chorus recasting of “I Still Haven’t found What I’m Looking For” is electrifying as is the band’s take on Dylan’s “All Along the Watchtower,” and “Silver and Gold” is as vivid a portrayal of the desperation in Apartheid South Africa as could be written.  But energy leaks in many places: the Bo Diddley knockoff single “Desire” is merely eh, the bleating and wanky “Hawkmoon 269” doesn’t really go anywhere, and the band’s attempts to converse with American Blues—“Love Rescue Me” and “When Love Comes to Town” (featuring a cute but unremarkable cameo by B.B. King)—fall flat, as do most of the rest of the tracks.

Most troubling of all, Hewson launches into an ad lib diatribe decrying greedy TV Preachers during a concert performance of “Bullet the Blue Sky.”  Sitting in the movie theatre watching him performing this song in the Rattle and Hum film, the following occurred to me: this guy in the movie is up on stage in front of a football stadium filled with roughly 75,000 people who each paid around $20 each, selling t-shirts for another $20 apiece, trying to get people to buy the Joshua Tree record album at $10 apiece, turning the show into a movie which people pay another $10 apiece to see, and also putting the show on a new album mostly moving in the form of CDs, now at $15 piece, and he’s monologuing about a TV preacher “stealing money from the sick and the old????”  What the fuck?  This guy is more full of shit than a septic tank.  Why is what he’s doing any less a type of brainwashing hucksterism than any TV preacher’s spiel, and who’s to say that the feelings people get from watching and sending money to TV preachers are any less legitimately uplifting than the ones people get forking over cash to listen to and see U2?  I mean, I hate the kind of religious moralistic diharrea that Jimmy Swaggart and his ilk spewed (and continue to spew) as much as anyone, but everyone is entitled to like what they wanna like, say what they wanna say, spend money on what they want, and do what they want in pursuit of a dollar, and that includes TV preachers, rockstars, and anyone else.  Mr. Hewson was making a mighty phat living as the Social Conscience Of the World and had a lotta nerve casting stones at anyone else making phat dough from his glass mansion built with money from people (who might well be described analogously to Swaggart's fan club members as "young and innocent") who chose to believe in him.  “Bono” my ass—my new nickname for him was SCOW (FULL DISCLOSURE NOTE: when I first posted this I did not attribute the "SCOW" moniker to my friend Tony Oakson, who coined it in a conversation after we had seen the movie together. My apologies to Tony for the oversight and my thanks to him for his pithy, on-target wit:)) .

And so I was done with U2—couldn’t take them seriously anymore.  They were a joke, a self-caricature.   Their egos and ambitions had turned them into hypocrites.  I believe that you can combine rock and roll and political activism, I believe that rock and roll really can change the world or at the very least metaphorically (or even literally) save the lives of people who feel strongly about it, but you have combine the two very carefully and you have to know and walk carefully amongst the mines that your own ego and the business and industry of rock and roll lay in your path.  Having walked that line, having danced through that minefield successfully for a long time, U2 had become unable to do so anymore.

I picked up Achtung Baby, spun it a few times, and that was it.  Maybe because SCOW had blown the bloom off the rose for me and maybe because I just didn't like the songs and sound as much-- whatever the case, the record never grabbed me, musically or lyrically.  After that I didn’t care.  The band, of course, has soldiered on, and impressively so (how they have done so without my support I can’t imagine, but they seem to have gotten over itJ).  Their records and tours—Zooropa, Pop, All That You Can’t Leave Behind etc etc etc—  have continued to sell millions and garner critical acclaim.  They remain more relevant musically and socially than any band approaching the 40 year mark in their career, regularly selling recordings and concert tickets to people born long after they began playing.  They continue to effectively leverage their celebrity to make positive impacts on social causes (AIDS, 3^rd World Debt, etc etc etc).  More power to them.  Me? I’m gonna go back and listen to Under a Blood Red Sky, The Unforgettable Fire, and The Joshua Tree again.

THE ONE NIGHT BAND QUESTION: who would you hire?

Because this is the kind of thing I spend my spare cognitive moments thinking about (DORK!), I posed this as a discussion question to some of my closest friends on a recent boys cabin weekend in Wisconsin:

You’ve been tasked with putting together the Greatest One Night Rock and Roll Band Alive.  Quick—you’ve gotta hire living musicians for the following chairs:

·      MASTER OF CEREMONIES:
·      LEAD VOCAL:
·      RHYTHM GUITAR:
·      LEAD GUITAR:
·      BASS:
·      KEYS:
·      DRUMS / PERCUSSION:
Who ya gonna call?
Weigh in now and explain yerself
GO!

Well the boys hemmed and hawed and clearly had spent much less time thinking about this kind of thing than I, but did come up with some interesting suggestions.  Theirs and, of course, mine, with editorial annotations by me, are offered below.  Please share your thoughts on who to hire…

• MASTER OF CEREMONIES: Steve Earle a rock and roll musicologist if ever there was one, from Amazing Grace to Nirvana to Bob Marley to Hip Hop to Beyonce to bluegrass to the Beatles, Stones, and everything else this guy knows it all and gets it all.  Let him call the tunes, assign the parts, sit in and sing, play, or do whatever he wants to direct the evening.  He’ll cover all the bases beautifully.  Put yourself in Steve’s Hands and things will be fine.
• LEAD VOCAL: Mark says Tom Waits.  Hard to argue with that.  Certainly one of the most amazing voices and singers we’ve got, and a true American Treasure.  Dave says Lowell George.  First of all Dave gets a penalty flag because Lowell Left the Building many years ago.  Second of all, while he was a wonderful singer and kickass guitar player, Lowell was and is, appropriately, most revered as a songwriter.  He might’ve been a good MC, but to give him the vocal gig for one night—nope.  Sorry Dave, sorry Lowell.  Brad says Linda Ronstadt.  I kinda like that—the girl can sure as hell wail.  Funny enough one of my favorite stories is that after 250 arena shows in one year, the only song she still looked forward to singing every night was Lowell George’s “Willin.’” My picks are Paul McCartney (I mean, since John is dead, really no one is a better straight up rock and roll singer than Sir Paul) or Paul Westerberg, who not only has a gorgeous voice and uses it with skill and precision, but has a way of singing that is absolutely personally naked and honest.    
• BACKING VOCALS: I’d’ve hired Linda Ronstadt and added Emmylou Harris here.  Perhaps this is some rock and roll sexism on my part coming through, putting the ladies on backing vocals, but these 2 have gorgeous voices and a long track record of success as backup singers.  Together and individually, they have graced hundreds of songs by dozens of musicians with clear, ringing harmony vocals.
• RHYTHM GUITAR: Mark says Neil Young.  Actually I dunno if Mark meant to hire Neil for the Rhythm Guitar or Lead Guitar chair, but my notes show Mark placing him in the Rhythm category.  Hell, hard to argue either way: the churning riffs under so much of both Neil’s acoustic and his heavy Crazy Horse work are primal lessons in the job of the rhythm guitar player, his acoustic leads are elegant and gorgeous, and his electric leads are (in the word of young William Miller in Almost Famous)…incendiary.  Incendiary.  Still, for me the rhythm guitar really is an easy choice: Keith Richards.  Never a big guy with smoking leads, Keith’s job has always been to create the riff around which the song is built and to help his rhythm section tunnel and mine that riff for the heaviest grooves possible.  If Keith is busy, you could also call Malcolm Young from AC/DC.  His brother Angus thinks up the riffs, but it’s up to Malcolm to lay ‘em down hard, thick, and heavy, and drive ‘em through the whole song.  Relentless, absolutely relentless for over 40 fuckin’ years.  Alas, Malcolm is unwell and would probably have to pass on the gig…
• LEAD GUITAR: Rich says Lindsey Buckingham, which is an interesting, heady choice.  Buckingham’s leads on classic era Fleetwood Mac albums are incredible—precise, musical, innovative, and unique.  He’s not as strong live, however, and lacks the gritty, bluesy, grindy, wail that I’d want out of a lead player for a One Night Rock and Roll Band. Brad says Hoyt Axton.  Like Ed, Brad first draws a penalty flag: Hoyt departed the scene here on Earth in 1999.  And, while Hoyt was a fine player, if I was going for superhot lead cowboy pickers, Chet Atkins is pretty much the beginning and end of the conversation there, my friend.  Still while I love country, I’m more of a rock and roll guy so I’d first call Izzy Stradlin.  Izzy has that gritty, bluesy, grindy, wail that I was talkin’ about and man can he take a solo over the edge.   While not quite as raucous or raw as Izzy, if Izzy’s not available, then I’d call Warren Haynes, who packs a potent blue whallop of his own, with jaw dropping slide skills to boot.  For straight up electric guitar picking, there’s also Angus Young who still hammers out solos that sail over the cliff in a flurry of rock and roll rubble, lightning, and thunder.
• BASS: 2 names here: the Stones’ Bill Wyman and Soul Coughing’s Sebastian Steinberg.  Wyman and drummer Charlie Watts (see below) were the foundation of some of the greatest rock and roll albums of all time: everything the Stones recorded up until 1993.  Their ability to lay down a heavy, hip shaking groove around guitar riffs is unmatched.  Soul Coughing’s Sebastian Steinberg helped that band (a truly unique and tragically short-lived outfit) build songs around drum and acoustic bass grooves, without heavy duty guitar riffs, that are as funky as anything laid down by Bootsy Collins, George Clinton, or anyone else on the Mothership.  Either of these guys would hold down the bottom of the rhythm section in wonderfully funky and fun ways.
• KEYS: Leon Russell or Gregg Allman would have to get the call.  Both of these guys are steeped in the blues and comfortable swimming, riffing, and jamming in all parts of the American Musical River: gospel, jazz, country, folk, you name it.  Both can plunk out a mean honky tonk, a soulful blues, or a complex jazz solo, and can pitch in on vocals, too.
• DRUMS / PERCUSSION: The Stones’ Charlie Watts and hired gun Jim Keltner, who has recorded with Joe Cocker and Leon Russell, Jackson Browne, John Hiatt, and hundreds of others, work in similar ways, using hi-hats, snares, maracas, and incredible wrists to set up shaking grooves with the bass.  If one of those guys isn’t available, the Black Crowes’ Steve Gorman can get it done the same way.  If your promoter says you can splurge for 2 players here, you can add percussionist Steve Scales, who provides rhythmic backing for the Talking Heads, to play shakers, bongos, etc. or, instead, you can the hire the Allman’s drum duo Jaimoe and Butch Trucks who pioneered the 2-drum-kit setup that powers so much jam band work, and are still its finest practitioners, laying down lush, intricate pulsing foundations for whoever is jamming out in front of them.

OK, that’s how I’d staff my Greatest One Night Rock and Roll Band Alive.  How about you?  A fun variant might be Greatest One Night Rock and Roll Band in Heaven.  Thoughts, anyone…??

Thanks for reading…!!!

mk

MUSIC IN THE 'HOOD-- a photoblog entry

Hi everyone,
Walking the other night I had the idea that it would be cool to take pictures of any musical references observed on a walk one evening, and so: here are some music connected pics from my walk along Irving Park Road between Kedzie and Ravenswood this evening, with commentary.  Looks like plenty of music has been woven into the local fabric of Old Irving Park and North Center ' hoods.  Let's walk...


 

Is this Lady Gaga?  Some other popstar?  Or not really a musical reference?



 

 

Bloodshot Records HQ, home of Justin Townes Earle, Robbie Fulks, and so many more.

 

A very humble but serviceable music store--need strings, picks, or a tuner in a pinch? 

The Music Store (yes, that's what it's called) has got ya' covered.

 

Pawn shop-- a wall full of cheap guitars available cheaply...bought my cheezy Strat copy from a pawn shop.  It'd be hard to resist a real Telecaster if it turned up in a Pawn Shop, methinks.

 

Get that subwoofer for your car's music system right here.

 

Horner Park-- no specific musical reference in the shot, but worth noting that in the Field House at Horner, there a super amateur Park District Jazz Band of mostly old guys from the neighborhood that plays in the basement a couple nights a week.

 

St. Benedict's Bells but it sounds kind of a mess...???

 

 

This place used to be a jazz club called Katerina's and awhile back Liz and I came in here and saw a guy playing trombone who used to play at The Nature's Table in Urbana... Katerina's and Nature's Table RIP, but at least they still have music here.

 

A little kids music and fine arts here by Irving and Damen.

 

Off the Vine should probably play here at Silvie's,

but Jen sez the owner / guy who does the booking is kinda surly.

 

Stop at an ATM before you go into Foley's because it's...

 

 

They've got a cool jukebox at Timber Lanes.

 

St. Benedict's again from this side on my way back but the bells have stopped.

 

Unmarked storefront, but a PA, mics, a wall full of handbills-- something musical happening in here.

 

 



Did drop an OTV CD off here at the Windy City Inn once,

and the lady seemed nice and interested, but never called.

 

Almost home...Ronnie "Elvis" Vegas playing The Peek Inn around the corner from my house.

 

A little John Cage for you all here to close: music is everywhere because sounds is everywhere and all sound is music.

 

Family Gifts, Family Business: A Musical Autobiography, Part IV

After graduate school, I put a together a new band from scratch, careful to assemble a group of people with not only similar musical skills and interests, but also similar time, money, and goals to contribute to the project.  The Hacksaw Three played occasional gigs and recorded 4 albums in my friend Johnse’s basement studio.  I stand by 2 of these records—our 2^nd album entitled Pipe Dream and our last entitled Musical Chairs—as the proudest musical accomplishments of my life.  After about 6 years a number of personal and artistic forces converged to end the run.   Holly left The Hacksaw Three, leaving my old professor and I as just A Couple of Hacks.  We soldiered on, but lacking the versatility provided by Holly’s piano and with a notably more basic sound palette and limited range and repertoire, things stagnated.  The band was dying.

So it goes.

As noted earlier, however, I have come to regard playing in a band as a kind of need and entitlement.  I kept my eyes and ears open and before long came fortuitously upon a teaching colleague— Jen— with an affinity for country, rock and roll, blues, folk, and bluegrass music, a few guitar chops, a killer, professional grade, conservatory trained voice, and a love of red wine similar to my own.  I invited her to sit in with Patrick and I one Sunday afternoon.  Things fell quickly into place.  Christening the new outfit Off The Vine, we quickly built up a songbook of country, rock and roll, and bluegrass tunes, covers and originals, stuff pulled from previous bands, and stuff put together in this incarnation.  We play gigs at bars and coffeehouses around Chicago, and have returned to my friend Johnse’s basement to record an album’s worth of material so far.  Off The Vine is a very different ensemble than The Hacksaw Three—more tightly focused stylistically and sonically, with everyone’s role more clear and specific: Jen mostly sings and also provides a bit of background strumming, I play the bulk of the guitar parts (several kinds including some mando once in a while) including all the leads, and Patrick is the 1-man rhythm section on bass.  Patrick and I sing backup and take a lead vocal verse every once in awhile, but mostly our job is to support Jen, whose unbelievable voice is the main draw in the band.  My guitar playing has grown tremendously as a result of this focus, as has Patrick’s bass playing, and Patrick, Jen and I have all introduced each other to some wonderful songs which Jen now sings the hell out of.

BRANCHING OUT

Off the Vine chugs along, I keep a guitar and a mandolin in my classroom to use with my 3^rd graders, I continue to purchase music, play it at home constantly, and spend hours every week listening intimately as I walk for exercise, and I also continue to sit in on song circles of varying stripes, all of which make me very happy.  I have come to terms with the Great Gift of my parents and grandfather.  A couple of summers ago, with great ambivalence, I also joined Facebook (apparently I was the only person on Earth who had not done so), but while the pics people post of their kids every hour on the hour are cute, and reconnecting with some souls otherwise lost to me has been nice, I really do not find myself motivated to broadcast much in the way of my own family’s triumphs or tragedies.  As I joined the FB stream, I was, however, moved at various points to post musings on various musical stimuli, and found that I couldn’t resist replying to almost any musical tidbit that floated through my news feed, and thus I came to the realization that what I really wanted to do was have a place to publicly ramble on about music.  And so, in addition to all of my playing and listening, I have started walknroll— this humble music blog.  Mark (my writer friend and songwriting partner) says that really what I’m doing is writing a book with these postings, and who knows?  Maybe so.  In any case, sharing my musings, as it were, has been really fun and satisfying, and I have been surprised and gratified to realize that people actually read the thing.  Each week, a few comments on whatever I share come floating back, and they are invariably thoughtful, thought provoking, enlightening, funny, and / or touching.

Also as noted in passing here in this rambling musical autobiography and in some of my other postings, I have discovered in the last couple of years that sitting in on a song circle— a group of folk, bluegrass, country, or especially for me, rock and roll musicians sharing an informal musical experience on musical common ground for no other audience than themselves, usually in someone’s living room or around a campfire— can be a transcendent experience.  I have also learned, happily, that it also serves as a kind of exercise in musician networking.  After sitting in on a circle at my old friend and bandmate Banjo Mike’s house one night playing rock and roll standards last winter, one of the guys (also named Michael, funny enough) stopped me as we headed out to our cars at the end of the evening.  He explained that he had a standing gig at Phyllis’ Musical Inn— a venerable Chicago music bar in Bucktown / Wicker Park— on Tuesday nights, and invited me to stop in and join him if I was ever free on a Tuesday night.  I thanked him for the invite, truly flattered that I had presented in the Circle with enough musical game to spark his interest, but drove home without giving the matter much thought beyond that.  My hectic life continued, with lots on my plate at work, my son’s ballgames, my daughter’s dance competitions, Off the Vine band practices, blog postings, etc etc etc.  A couple of months later, however, Michael emailed me, saying that his regular Tuesday guitar player was not able to be regular anymore, and wondering if I could step in at least sometimes.  I couldn’t resist.  He sent me some sound files and song sheets with chords and lyrics of stuff ranging from bluesy originals to 60s R and B classics to rock and roll standards right in my wheel house, asked me for a few song ideas (predictably, I offered the Stones “Sweet Virginia” and Lowell George’s “Willin’” to start with) and I trooped down to Phyllis’s.

It was a blast.  The bar is usually nearly empty, and, although Tuesdays are nominally the open-mic night there with Michael as the “host,” usually somewhere between no one and 2 people show up to play the open mic, and so we just play most of the evening.  It’s music for its own joyful sake.   Michael has recruited a super singer, and some other great players who rotate in and out (the "regular" guitarist has a ferocious blend of rock, blues, and jazz chops that’s wonderful to groove with), and  I’ve had a chance to play some electric guitar, which I haven’t done in a band setting since my heavy metal days in high school, and also some electric bass, which has been much more fun than I can possibly express— a whole new way of looking at, conversing with, and contributing to a musical situation and a whole new set of responsibilities and options.  The cast of players has welcomed me warmly, and so I am turning over yet more new musical leaves even at this late date.  Indeed, the latest leaf, prompted by my electric bass explorations on Tuesday evenings, is a stand-up bass: for the holidays this past December, my wife set up a trial rental of an acoustic bass fiddle which I have taken to with quick joy (why have I been playing guitar all these years?!).  I’ve established some basic proficiency already, and look forward to adding this to the Tuesday night mix over the next few weeks.  Please come on down to Phyllis’ one Tuesday evening and check us out.

I am not a professional musician, though I think maybe I could have been.  I do regret never having given myself the chance to pursue some kind of musical career— even entering graduate school in elementary education, it somehow didn’t occur to me until after I was well into my course- and field-work that I could have pursued a graduate degree in music education, which seemed like a pretty fucking stupid oversight when I realized it.  To live a life in which the whole point of your day is to get to the stage and play for an hour or even 2… that’s the one thing I wish I had done in this life that I haven’t.  But in some ways, the fact that music has never been my job, never been a business proposition for me has also been a blessing:  I’ve never had to rely on it to feed, house, or support myself or my family.  Music has only ever made me happy, more fulfilled.  It has never, ever let me down, and I can always count on it to get me through the toughest moments.  It doesn’t cause me stress, it relieves it.  It is a source of pure joy in my life, and to my bandmates Holly, Patrick and Jen, to Johnse who records me and my cohorts, to Michael who has invited me in to his Tuesday night thing, to Banjo Mike and his wife Irene and our friend Carol who invited me in to their family band, to Brook for showing me all the possibilities in music, to the Stones, Steve Earle, the Nature’s Table, and everyone else who has ever played me a record, taken me to a show, held a musical conversation, sat in a circle, put my band on a bill at the bar or coffeehouse, listened to me hacking and yowling, endured my desk tapping, read my blog postings…  I am grateful to all of you beyond words.  But most of all, I am grateful to my parents and my Grandpa Sam, who have bestowed this priceless, enormous gift upon me. 

CODA: THE REST OF THE GANG

The gift of my parents and grandfather, of course, has touched the lives of many people—not the least of which are the thousands of students they have taught over the years.  But other members of my family are also part of our great musical river.  My sister has continued the family’s violin tradition, teaching and gigging around Baltimore, and holding down a steady chair in the Harrisburg Symphony Orchestra. Her husband, Trent, plays in the Army’s prominent Herald Trumpets (frequently turning up in Super Bowl halftime shows and TV network New Year’s Eve broadcasts) and also plays in and is the historian for the Army’s Jazz Band.  My uncle Ron has had a career as a violist in Army’s prestigious White House Strolling Strings, the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, and the Metropolitan Opera in New York City.  His wife— my Aunt Judy— as I noted served as the Artistic and Executive Director of Carnegie Hall from 1986 until her death in 1999, following a stint as an administrator for the Cincinnati Symphony— roles in which she sought to bring the finest classical music not only to the traditional well-heeled clientele of high end concert halls but also to people in small towns and school children of much more modest means and backgrounds. Ron and Judy’s son Eddie is a gigging cello soloist and chamber musician operating out of New York, but performing regularly all over the country.  Growing up with my father and uncle in Sam’s studio, their cousins Sheldon and Bob moved to California and have had long careers playing on movie soundtracks and on records by many of my favorite artists (I got a big thrill when I spotted Sheldon’s name on a Tom Waits album). 

My daughter Alex, has taken piano lessons from my mom since she was six.  Her first love is dancing, but she plays quite nicely— indeed, her playing can be breathtaking when she puts in the time— and, most satisfyingly, she has become a consumer of music.  Like myself, she listens constantly (“Alex, take your headphones off—I’m trying to talk to you!”), actively pursues new sounds, makes connections between things she hears, and appreciates a wide array of styles— from the roots traditions that her Old Man is steeped in to the newer pop stylings of Adele and Mumford and Sons to the dance grooves and Lorde to the classical greats her grandparents have passed on to her and beyond.  We don’t know yet exactly what lies ahead on her musical path, but she has received our Family Gift and is a worthy heir to our musical heritage.