Spirit drummer Ed Cassidy, bless his perpetually bald head, has passed away at the ripe old age of 89.
I have to admit that I was never the biggest Spirit fan, beyond a handful of their hits ("I Got A Line On You," "Nature's Way," "1984") and deep cuts ("Jewish," "Girl In Your Eye"). I've owned all of their 60s and early 70s records at some point, but none of them ever left me with anything beyond a deep respect for their obvious skill and musicality. Their unique Topanga hippie/jazz/psych/hard rock stew just failed to get my salivary glands going, for whatever reason.
But as much as I've found it hard to dig Spirit, it was always hard NOT to dig Ed Cassidy. There was clearly something larger than life about that grinning, black-clad, chrome-domed dude behind that giant Spirit kit, and the fact that he was a jazz vet old enough to be the father of everyone else in the band — and, in actuality, the step-father of guitarist Randy California — just made him seem that much more otherworldly. (And, of course, he was an absolute motherfucker on drums.) Cassidy was always, by far, my favorite thing about Spirit.
I only saw Ed Cassidy play once: In the summer of 1994, with a pared-down version of Spirit (Ed, Randy and a keyboard player), who were opening for Arthur Lee and Love (the Baby Lemonade version) at the Strand in Redondo Beach. The show was, unfortunately, pretty weak; Ed and Randy still played great, but there were huge holes missing in the sound where the rest of the band ought to have been, and Randy kept bogging down the pace of the show with interminable between-song monologues. Some of my most vivid memories of the show are of Arthur — who happened to be standing next to me, and who was definitely not on his best behavior that night — mercilessly heckling Randy from the audience.
"You know," offered Randy at one point, while meandering his way through an introduction to a cover of Jimi Hendrix's "Red House," "A lot people don't know that Jimi loved children, maaaan. Jimi just LOVED children!"
"He hated YOU!" shouted Arthur. "I KNOW! He TOLD me!" Amused by his own razzing, Arthur then turned and elbowed me conspiratorially in the ribs. "Heh, heh! Got him that time!" he cackled. This basically continued throughout the rest of the set, with Randy nattering on between songs about the innate grooviness of this or that while pretending not to hear Arthur's relentless wisecracks.
The other thing I remember vividly about the show was walking out into the lobby afterwards and seeing Ed manning the Spirit merch table, where he was interacting with his fans with the same kind of open-hearted enthusiasm he brought to playing the drums. I watched him sign a copy of The Twelve Dreams of Dr. Sardonicus LP for an old hippie dude, who was gearing up to tell Ed a story about the time he'd seen Spirit play at some festival back in the day... but then had a full-on "veteran of the psychic wars" brain fart, and completely lost track of what he was trying to say.
"I, uh... you were, uh... it was... Ohhh, maaaan..."
Ed — bald, imposing, still soaked in sweat from the show — just nodded patiently, grinned, and patted the guy gently on the shoulder.
"I know how it is, brother," he said.
Rest in Peace, Ed.
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