La Vie En Robe

Heaven With Checkered Tablecloths: RIP, Bertucci's Corner

It has come to my attention that Bertucci's Corner, my favorite Chicago restaurant, closed its doors a few months ago. A true old-school Eye-tralian jernt in the finest sense of the term, Bertucci's was located on 24th Street in the back of Chinatown, and had been serving up classic dishes like this plate o' red gravy-drenched fried mostaccioli and meatballs since before WWII.

I could probably recite half their menu to you right now without much prompting. Their shrimp pesto was a thing of intense garlicky beauty, their stuffed braciole melted in your mouth, their fried broccoli appetizer (drenched with fresh-squeezed lemon juice) was always a must-order, and they kept excellent cannoli on their desert menu long after most Chi-town Italian restaurants had abandoned the classic Sicilian pastry in the face of tiramisu's early-90s reign of terror. You could get a pretty decent martini there (at least, when the right waitress/bartender was on duty), and wash your meal down with a carafe of cheap-but-decent dago red. Over the bar hung several dozen decades-old ceramic drinking mugs, all emblazoned with the names of long-dead regulars from the neighborhood. The jukebox was packed with CDs by Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra, Louis Prima, Tony Bennett, Vic Damone and Al Martino; hell, they even had six or seven CDs of Jimmy Roselli's saloon songs on there. In other words, heaven with checkered tablecloths.

I was introduced to Bertucci's in 1989 by my late friend, teacher and mentor Bernie Markwell (a man who truly knew a thing or two about fine dining), and I dined there at least once a month before moving to Los Angeles in 1993. Not only was no return visit to Chicago complete without a dinner there, but arranging a meal at Bertucci's with friends was always my first priority — once I'd nailed down what night everyone was free to make the Bertucci's scene, I could relax and figure out the rest of my itinerary, secure in the knowledge that I would soon be digging into another plate like the one pictured above.

The vibe was casual and unpretentious; you could pretty much always count on seeing the White Sox (or Hawks, Bulls or Bears) on the TV in the corner above the bar. No Cubs games, though. I once brought my friend Chris there on his first trip to Chicago; I'd been trying to explain the odd Cubs-White Sox fan dynamic to him — that Cubs fans don't really care when the White Sox win (unless of course they're playing the Cubs), but White Sox fans hate the Cubs with a white-hot, all-consuming fury — but it didn't really sink in until we pulled up to the curb outside of Bertucci's, and stepped out of the car onto a chunk of sidewalk which bore the chalk-scrawled words, "CUBS SUCK". Not "White Sox Rule," but "CUBS SUCK". There you have it, I said, pointing at the graffiti. He understood.

Life goes on, things change, but I somehow never imagined that Bertucci's would ever cease to function as I knew it. The last handful of Yelp reviews seem to indicate a rapid decline in food quality and service, which I'm thankful I didn't experience; I'm also thankful that the restaurant didn't suddenly alter its menu/appearance/vibe in an attempt to lure a younger crowd, as in the recent douche-ification of LA's classic and once-reliable Canter's Deli. I will always be able to remember the place in its cozy, aromatic glory, and I am comforted by all the memories of wonderful meals I've had there with my family and friends — there is really nothing better than the combination of people you love and food you love at the same table.

I enjoyed my second-to-last meal at Bertucci's in October 2010, when my dear friends Eric and Rebecca held their pre-wedding rehearsal dinner there; Eric and Rebecca (and John and Jennifer, and Jason and Gwen) were also there for my final Bertucci's repast last summer. Best of all, Miss Howerton, my lovely bride-to-be, was my date for both of those meals; I feel blessed that I was able to share this delicious chunk of my culinary past with her before it vanished.

Salud, Bertucci's Corner. You will be missed.

He Stopped Loving Her Today: RIP, George Jones

George Jones, my all-time favorite country singer, died this morning. While this of course makes me incredibly sad, I'm also amazed and grateful that Ol' Possum actually managed to make it to the ripe old age of 81, despite a life of addiction and excess that could have easily ended twenty, thirty, forty or more years ago. Though he lived long enough to see himself (and fellow keepers of the traditional country flame like Merle Haggard) become obsolete in the eyes of Nashville and country music radio, he also lived long enough to grasp how important and influential his music was to a whole generation of artists, and not just in the country realm.

I'm no artist, but George Jones was damned important to me, too. His music has soundtracked endless work hours, desert drives and good (and bad) times, and has always seemed to pop back into my life at the most surreal moments. Fr'instance: I'm a lousy pool player, but I once (about 20 years ago) held a table for eight straight games at some East Village dive, while "If Drinkin' Don't Kill Me" played over and over again on the jukebox. I won each and every game because my opponents (much better cue-handlers than me) all scratched; I can only assume that was Mr. Jones' melancholy magic at work. And as soon as the song changed, I lost...

As detailed in my new Rhino Single Notes eBook, Honky Tonk Tourist: The Night Buck Owens Almost Got Me Killed, George Jones played a major role in my love affair with country music. Here's an explanatory excerpt from it:

About a year after the release of Almost Blue, I was having dinner with my mom and sister at the apartment of my mom’s writer friend Carol, with whom I’d bonded over our mutual love of music and absurd humor.

That evening, Carol pulled out a copy of George Jones’ My Very Special Guests, a duets album featuring folks like James Taylor, Waylon Jennings and Emmylou Harris. I’d never heard of George Jones; but since my boy Elvis Costello was also on the album, Carol thought I’d like to take a listen. But “Stranger in the House,” the Elvis-penned song that he and George recorded together for the album, didn’t particularly impress me.

What did interest me, however, were the stories Carol told me that evening about George Jones — specifically, the ones regarding his rampant alcoholism. I was just about the right age to really appreciate a good binge-drinking anecdote; and while I was definitely intrigued by Carol’s assertion that Jones was considered perhaps the most brilliantly emotive country singer of all time, a far more sizeable impression was made by her tale of Jones driving his lawnmower ten miles to the nearest bar after Tammy Wynette took away his car keys. The story was rivaled only by the one Carol told me where Jones had gotten so out of his mind on whiskey and cocaine that he’d actually quacked his way through entire concerts, singing songs in a Donald Duck voice. This, then, was clearly an artist worthy of my attention.

 Of course, I'd come to appreciate George Jones' voice even more than I dug his less-than-savory personal reputation; and as much as I've always loved his up-tempo ravers like "White Lightnin'" and "The Race is On," there's no question that he did his best work on the slow, sad stuff — the way he combined operatic despair with an almost Zen-like resignation still kills me to this day. There are so many Grade A examples I could post here, but ultimately I have to go with "He Stopped Loving Her Today" — both because you just know he's imagining himself in that coffin, and because I was once walking down the street on a gorgeous California afternoon when I was passed by a Ferrari cranking the song at a level approaching booty-bass volume. Like I said, surreal... but I'll never forget just how cosmically huge his pain sounded and felt at that moment. 

Rest in Peace, George. No more pain now.

Big Hair & Plastic Grass Meets The Santa Monica Little League

You like fresh air? You like 70s baseball? You like watching published authors trying to hold the attention of Little Leaguers? Come on out to my reading/signing event tomorrow (Saturday, April 13) at Memorial Park (located at 16th street and Olympic) in Santa Monica, CA.

That's right, folks: Dan Epstein (dat's me!), author of Big Hair and Plastic Grass: A Funky Ride Through Baseball and America in the Swinging '70s, will be reading from (and signing copies of) his book between two halves of a Santa Monica Little League doubleheader. Word has it that at least one of the teams will be wearing 70s throwback uniforms — and really, how cool is that?

Reading/signing will happen at noon, following the 8-9 year-olds game. It'll be free, it'll be fun, and I'll be the guy in the Dave Parker jersey. (Here's the link to the Facebook event invite, if you're into that sorta thing.) Thanks in advance to Jay Smith and the Santa Monica Little League for inviting me!

In other writing-related news, my Rhino Single Notes eBook, Honky Tonk Tourist: The Night Buck Owens Almost Got Me Killed, is now available for download from iBooks and the Amazon Kindle store. It doesn't have anything to do with baseball (other than a cameo appearance by the home of the Bakersfield Blaze), but I can promise that it'll be a highly entertaining read, especially for any o' you music geek types out there. Joe Bonomo, author of Jerry Lee Lewis: Lost and Found and Sweat: The Story of the Fleshtones, America’s Garage Band, calls it "a bourbon-soaked blast," and he should know!

Ten Albums That Blew My Mind In 2012

You've already been "listed to death" in the last few weeks, haven't you? Well, beautiful people, here's one more.

Only, I'm not going to tell you which were the best, most important, most relevant, most vital, most Talking Heads-influenced, most gluten-free, most "they're paying me to insist that this dogshit actually tastes like peanut butter" albums of the year. (Put it this way — I spun Boston's Don't Look Back LP way more often this year than I listened to The Black Keys' El Camino, simply because it's at least 100 times more awesome.) Nope, I'm merely offering up ten albums, in no particular order, that legitmately kicked me in the head/heart/groin in 2012, and will most likely keep me coming back for more...

The Greg Foat Group — Girl And Robot With Flowers

Actually, I also really loved their 2011 debut, Dark Is The Sun, which I didn't get hip to until this year. While that one was more in the Roy Budd/late-60s British soundtrack bag, this one is kinda more like Vince Guaraldi or Dave Brubeck in space — which is, of course, a beautiful (and unfortunately appropriate) thing.

Menahan Street Band — The Crossing

Another album of songs without words, The Crossing is a bit of a departure from what you might expect from soul man Charles Bradley's backing band, a collection of widescreen (but impeccably groovy) soundtrack jams in search of a film. These guys should really be allowed to score the next Bond flick, or at least tag-team it with the Greg Foat Group.

The Assemble Head In Sunburst Sound — Manzanita

Yeah, I'd rather listen to these contemporary San Francisco psychonauts than most 60s Bay Area bands, with the exception of CCR, Sly and the Family Stone and Blue Cheer; sue me, already. Though Manzanita doesn't blow me away quite as completely as 2009' When Sweet Sleep Returned — the first AHISS I got turned on to, and still their best in my opinion — it still casts a pretty heady spell with its swirling layers of dreamy vocal harmonies, whirring organs and thick guitar fuzz.

Cody Chesnutt — Landing On a Hundred

I completely missed out on Mr. Chesnutt's critically-acclaimed 2002 album The Headphone Masterpiece; I'll be sure to check it out one of these days, at least once I've fully absorbed the soulful excellence of this album, which comes on like a 21st century (and even more damaged) Marvin Gaye circa What's Goin' On/Trouble Man/Let's Get It On, and never lets up.

Dean Allen Foyd — The Sounds Can Be So Cruel

One of the worst band names I've heard this year — and ye gods, that's saying something — and these Swedes dare to compound the awfulness by calling the first two tracks on their debut album "Please Pleaze Me" and "Lovely Sorts of Death". And yet... this is one of the best, most consistently "set the controls for the heart of your bong" psychedelic rock albums I've heard in eons, all Syd-era Pink Floyd meets early Beefheart meets Lea Riders Group. If I was into to throwing happenings that freaked me out, these guys would be my house band.

Michael Kiwanuka — Home Again

This record pretty much had me from the delay-drenched flute that opens "Tell Me A Tale," and hasn't relaxed its grip since. A 24 year-old British singer-songwriter born of Ugandan refugees, Kiwanuka sounds at least ten years older (a compliment) with a definite Bill Withers/Terry Callier/Richie Havens thing goin' on. Folky, soulful, beautifully open-hearted, and occcasionally devastating ("Worry Walks Beside Me"), this is one gorgeous debut.

The Admiral Sir Cloudesley Shovell — Don’t Hear It… Fear It!

Tongue-twisting band name meets lame album title — and are both rendered completely irrelevant by this British band's mighty, meaty brand of hard psych. There's plenty of Sir Lord Baltimore/Captain Beyond/Black Sabbath/Pink Fairies damage in the grooves here, and maybe even a touch of SF Sorrow-era Pretty Things. Which means, of course, that it's highly recommended. 

Witchcraft — Legend

There's no shortage of 70s-influenced doom metal bands out there today (which is certainly something to be thankful for), but I always find myself gravitating back to Witchcraft. Not only do these Swedes kick some vicious ass instrumentally, but frontman Magnus Pelander is their secret weapon; his measured, melancholy vocals — which completely avoid lapsing into growls, screams or any other kind of metal histrionics — mesh perfectly with the ineffable bleakness of the band's cough syrup-dark riffage.

Lee Fields & The Expressions — Faithful Man

Allow me to quote here from my eMusic review of this album, since I already got it right the first time:

"Lee Fields doesn’t mess around. On Faithful Man, his first album since 2009′s acclaimed My World, it takes the veteran soul man just eight seconds to hit peak intensity. 'I’ve always been a faithful man, till you came along,' he pleads against a tense 'It’s a Man’s Man’s Man’s World'-style groove. His voice filled with apocalyptic dread because he knows he’s powerless against temptation, but he also knows that giving in will change his life forever. It’s classic soul conundrum – and these days, nobody does classic soul better than Lee Fields."

Bill Fay — Life Is People

Widely ignored in the States, British singer-songwriter Bill Fay's first true studio album in over 40 years was hailed as a major event in the UK, and rightly so. "Humanistic" has been used repeatedly to describe this record, which is pretty much right on the money; hushed, elegaic piano ballads like "The Healing Day," "Jesus, Etc." and "Be At Peace With Yourself" all stare down the impossibly heavy truths of human existence, but do so with such beautiful gentleness, kindness and humility, you walk away feeling uplifted instead of beaten down. It's impossible to not read Life Is People as a final benediction to the human race before Fay shuffles off this mortal coil, but hopefully he's just getting started again...

Ed Cassidy, 1923-2012

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.

Blast From The Groovy Past: 20 Images From Info-Mat Magazine

Info-Mat magazine? No, I'd never heard of it either, at least until my friend Josh Mills — who always seems to have a knack for unearthing interesting and oddball things — laid this 1968 issue on me about five years ago. And as far as I can tell, this may have been the only issue of it that ever existed. Not only can I not find any info on it on the internet, but I can't even find a masthead or any mailing info inside the mag; all of which leads me to suspect that this "complimentary issue" was a trial run for a magazine that never actually got off the ground.

So what was Info-Mat, then? It looks like someone wanted to do a Los Angeles-centric Ebony, though with the exception of an excellent interview with saxophonist Charles Lloyd (conducted by photographer Paul Slaughter, who also handled record reviews for the mag's "Info-Scene" section), much of Info-Mat's written content consists of banal ad-speak regarding alleged trends in fashion, cooking — a "gourmet foods" section revolves around recipes whose "secret ingredient" is invariably one Lawry's seasoning packet or another — and home decor.

Still, Info-Mat is a fascinating artifact, if only for the ads, which (aside from being just plain awesome in their own right) say much more about the upscale black community of Los Angeles circa 1968 than the editorial content does. Only three years after the Watts riots, there was clearly quite a hip fashion and nightclub scene happening in South LA, especially around Santa Barbara Plaza in the Crenshaw district — a shopping center which has now been sadly derelict for decades. (For a fascinating/depressing exercise, try typing some of these addresses into Google Maps, and check out the 21st century street view.)

How I wish I could pick up a new suit from Lesner's Men's Shop or Esquire Men's Clothing, and then take Miss Howerton (looking fine in mod fashions from Donna Michele's or Black Foxe, LTD) out for a steak and some jazz at Earl Bostic's Flying Fox, Vee Jay's Bill of Fare or Marty's On The Hill, then pick up some classy booze from Empire Liquors and repair to our shag-carpeted mid-century modern love pad. But until I get my time machine out of the repair shop, these images below will have to do.

Beef Burgundy Flambé, anyone?

Show Me The Way To St. Louis

October is here, and with it comes all sortsa baseball madness — especially this year, it would seem. My latest High and Tight column for Rolling Stone Online takes a look at the sublime craziness of the first week of the postseason — and it was written before Raul Ibanez belted his way into the history books, or the Oakland A's burnished their "team of destiny" credentials by pulling off a come-from-behind victory to stay alive against the increasingly frustrating Detroit Tigers.

The St. Louis Cardinals are in the mix as well; even if they no longer have Tony Scott and Garry Templeton (pictured above in a wonderful 1979 Walter Iooss photo) and no longer play on Astroturf, they're still pretty fun to watch right now, especially if you have less-than-positive feelings for the Washington Nationals. (Yeah yeah, I know, they're descendents of the Montreal Exposl but gimme Ellis Valentine over Bryce Harper, any day.) St. Louis has to be rocking with playoff fever at this point, and I'm heading right into the thick of it — or, at least, the outskirts...

Thanks to the friendly folks at the Steelville Arts Council, I will be doing a reading and signing event for Big Hair and Plastic Grass tomorrow night (that's Friday, October 12) in Steelville, MO. The shindig will be held at the newly-opened Gallery Zeke on 106 East Main Street (next to MO Hick BBQ) in Steelville, and starts at 7:30 pm. Junction 19 will kick off the good times with an acoustic set — the first time I've ever had an opening band for one of my readings — and then I'll take the stage around 8 to preach the 70s baseball gospel, followed by a Q&A session. The new paperback edition of the book will be on sale, and beer, wine and appetizers will be served — click HERE for more details. Oh yeah: The event is FREE and open to the public.

It's the only event I'm doing in the St. Louis area, and the last reading I'll be doing this year. And need I mention that an autographed copy of Big Hair & Plastic Grass would make a great gift for that baseball fan on your Christmas list? Hope to see ya there...

Eddie Money: Best Interview Ever (Encore)

Back in the spring of 1999, when I interviewed Eddie Money for the long-gone BAM Magazine, I didn't even know what a "blog" was — and I certainly couldn't have guessed that one day it would result in the most popular thing I've ever published online. A snippet from that interview, posted here on La Vie en Robe in 2007 as "Eddie Money — Best Intervew EVER" has been picked up or passed along by several music and pop culture blogs over the years. And now, thanks to the Money Man's cringe-inducing new Geico ad, that post is once again getting a ridiculous amount of hits.

Which is truly awesome, and I'm quite relieved that it's finally supplanted "Is Gary Fencik Gay?" as the most popular post on "The Robe". But anyone who digs that snippet REALLY needs to read the whole mind-blowing interview, which was finally published in its entirety by Jake Austen at the great Roctober fanzine a few years later. While it's not available on the Roctober site, I scanned the whole thing and posted a PDF file of it about two years ago; and in the interest of public service/spreading the Money Man gospel, I'm posting it again here. Click the link below to read all about his "stroke," his days of drug-fueled debauchery (incl. doing blow with the late Andy Gibb and John Belushi), his brief tenure as a bell-bottoms salesman, fighting with his wife, why he doesn't think he'll get into the Rock n' Roll Hall of Fame, why he's got the right to sing the blues, and so much more. Whatever you think of the man's music, I guarantee you will come away with a greater appreciation for the Überschlub himself, Mr. Eddie Money — as I wrote in the intro, the man "keeps it real" in ways that the Wu-Tang Clan never even imagined...

Download PDF: Eddie Money Interview (1999)

Life for the taking, indeed!

 

 

Joe South: Decency, Empathy and Electric Sitars

Joe South died this past week at the age of 72. Songwriter, producer, session man, pop star, Grammy winner — the man born Joseph Souter in Atlanta, Georgia was all of those things, though his greatness was long obscured by decades of self-imposed solitude.

I knew the songs of Joe South long before I ever knew who Joe South was. I heard Lynn Anderson sing "(I Never Promised You A) Rose Garden" countless times during car rides to and from nursery school and kindergarten, when my mom would have the local country music radio station dialed in. I remember hearing Billy Joe Royal sing "Down in the Boondocks" on LA oldies station KRLA, shortly before beginning my first day of 7th grade at John Burroughs Junior High, the song's twin messages of alienation and perserverance somehow meshing perfectly with the dread I felt about starting a new life at a new school in a new city. There was "Hush," the hard-grooving Hammond workout that put Deep Purple on the charts for the first time in 1968, but which confused me in my youth because it sounded nothing like "Smoke On the Water." And I'm sure I heard "Games People Play" at least dozens of times as a kid, though I never connected it to the aforementioned songs — and, at the time, I didn't connect much with the song itself; the tune was catchy enough, but the lyrics and production were too subtle, too adult to resonate with me.

It wasn't until my senior year of college, when I stumbled across a thrift store 45 of Billy Joe Royal's rendition of "Hush," that I became curious about who this Joe South cat — who got both the songwriting and production credit on the 45 — actually was. Digging through the stacks at WVKR before my Friday evening radio show, I came across a copy of Joe South's Greatest Hits, which (along with "Games People Play" and "Down in the Boondocks") contained his version of "Hush". I played it on my show that night, and it completely blew me away... Still does, in fact.

A year or two later, I picked up Rhino's Best of Joe South CD compilation. The CD booklet featured wonderfully informative liner notes by Ben Vaughn, which shed plenty of new light (for me, at least) on this enigmatic gentleman. A budding guitarist and electronics whiz, South had scored a minor novelty hit with the vari-speeded goof "The Purple People Eater Meets The Witch Doctor" in 1958, when he was just 18. In 1962, Georgia R&B group The Tams enjoyed their first hit with the South-penned "Untie Me," and South further bolstered his resume in the years that followed by recording with Eddy Arnold, Tommy Roe, Solomon Burke, Simon & Garfunkel, Bob Dylan and Aretha Franklin, to name a few. Hell, the guy played bass on Blonde On Blonde's "Visions of Johanna" and came up with the shuddering down-tuned guitar intro for "Chain of Fools" — that's some serious record geek cred, right there!

But what struck me most — both in Vaughn's liners and the music itself — was the sense that South was a troubled soul, a talented musician who could have made a lucrative career as a full-time session cat, but who could only find spiritual solace in the songs he wrote and recorded himself. The title of Introspect, South's brilliant first LP, pretty much sums up its contents. A largely homebrew affair, soaked in slapback echo, hard-earned wisdom and the tangled twang of fuzz guitars and electric sitars, Introspect is a country-psych-soul masterpiece. It's the work of a guy who has seen some bad shit, experienced some serious pain on the personal and professional fronts, and possibly dropped a tab or three of Sandoz LSD-25 while trying to sort it all out. He wants to turn humanity's attention to some harsh truths (see "Games People Play"), but he doesn't spare the self-scrutiny, either; as South sings in "All My Hard Times" (a song which would practically become my mantra during a particularly lousy stretch in my own life), "I blamed the whole world for the shape I was in/I was too blind to see/My worst enemy was under my skin/It was me."

As the fates would have it, "Games People Play," the opening track of Introspect's second side — and a song which may or may not have been inspired by psychiatrist Eric Berne's best-selling 1964 book about transactional analysis — only compounded South's inner struggles by making him a star. "God grant me the serenity/To just remember who I am," he prayed in the song's penultimate verse, and the surprise success of "Games People Play" would give him ample cause to repeat that entreaty. "The Grammy Awards are a very nice gesture by the record industry, but they can really mess up your head," South told the L.A. Times in 1970, months after "Games People Play" won him Grammys for Song Of The Year and Best Contemporary Song. "The Grammy is a little like a crown. After you win it, you feel like you have to defend it. In a sense, I froze. I found it hard to go back in to the recording studio because I was afraid the next song wouldn't be perfect."

As other artists — including King Curtis ("Games People Play"), Paul Revere & The Raiders ("Birds of a Feather") and Elvis Presley ("Walk a Mile in My Shoes) — flocked to cover his songs, South seemed to struggle to find his own voice again. He numbed his anxiety with booze and drugs, retreating even further into himself after the 1971 suicide of his brother Tommy, who'd played drums on South's albums. After several years of self-imposed exile from the music business, he made a brief comeback attempt in the mid-70s, before the demons and drugs pulled him back down again. South reportedly got clean for good in the 80s, and continued to perform on occasion well into the last decade; but like Tony Joe White, another soulful Southern cat who emerged in the late 60s with a similar (if funkier and bluesier) brand of cosmic backwoods ruminations, he was largely forgotten in his homeland. Which is a damn shame, of course; on the other hand, it's probably a good thing that his substantial song royalties allowed him to step away from the toxic environment of the music business, and take refuge in the relative safety of anonymity.

I take comfort in that thought because, while I certainly didn't know the man, the overriding impressions I've always taken away from Joe South's songs are ones of a man capable of extreme decency and empathy, qualities that — much like electric sitars — are in woefully short supply these days. Even on "These Are Not My People," a song where he parts ways with a hard-partying girl in the interests of self-preservation, his attitude is one of reluctant detachment ("It's been a gas/But I'm gonna have to pass") rather than Stonesy misogyny. Ditto for "I Knew You When," later covered by Linda Ronstadt, which has the opportunity to take some brutal pot-shots at a past love, but respectfully chooses to take the high road instead. And as unflinchingly clear-eyed as songs like "Games People Play" and "Mirror of Your Mind" could be about the foibles of humanity, South was always happy to make room for the listener in his idyllic reveries like "Shelter" and "Don't It Make You Want To Go Home," the country lullaby that provided the title for his third album. Since the clip of him singing the latter track on The Johnny Cash Show is about the best live non-"Games" Joe South footage I can find on the interwebs these days, I think we'll end there...

Rest in peace, Joe. Now the grass don't grow and the rivers don't flow like they did in our childhood days... but may your journey home be an easy one.

 

Chuckie and Ross The Boss

Sorry, my fellow Dictators fans, this isn't a post about the shredular genius of Ross Friedman, aka Ross "The Boss" Funicello. Rather, it's another musing on the way a song can suddenly dislodge a stray memory from the silt of time...

This afternoon, Miss Howerton and I were on the way back from getting the oil changed in "The Thermos" (aka my '05 Honda Element), when "The Boss" by Diana Ross popped up on XM Radio's Studio 54 channel. I can't remember the last time I'd heard it... but hearing it again immediately took me back to the late spring of 1979, when Miss Ross's Ashford & Simpson-penned disco jam was initially released, and somebody brought a copy of the 45 in to my Seventh Grade music appreciation class at John Burroughs Junior High in Los Angeles.

I can't remember who brought the record in, but I do recall the reaction of this kid who sat in the row across from me, a black kid named Chuckie. Chuckie had a huge, extremely nappy Afro, heavily-lidded eyes, a raspy speaking voice, and a gigantic grin which revealed a broken front tooth. Judging by the state of his dental health, and the generally ragged condition of his clothes, Chuckie's family evidently didn't have much money, but the kid had some serious swagger and groove; on more than one occasion, he interrupted the class by hopping out from behind his desk to shout "I said FREAK!" a la Chic's "Le Freak," and bust a brief move or two. Looking back, he was kind of like a sixty-year-old chitlin' circuit comedian (or maybe Rufus Thomas) trapped in the body of an inner-city adolescent.

So anyway, on this particular day, the students were allowed to bring in a record they liked and play it for the rest of the class. I brought in Electric Light Orchestra's Out of the Blue, both because I loved it, and because I thought ELO's classical music elements would score me some brownie points with the teacher. Somebody brought in Sister Sledge's "He's the Greatest Dancer," which the class enjoyed a helluva lot more than ELO's "Sweet Talkin' Woman," and I remember someone else brought in Switch's "There'll Never Be," which to this day remains one of my favorite late 70s smooth soul jams.

(I also remember being totally unconvinced by our teacher's clearly made-up-on-the-spot explanation of the group's name: "They're called Switch because they switch to falsetto when they sing," she said. Later on, I found out that it actually had to do with the DeBarge Brothers' impressive ability to switch instruments onstage.)

Chuckie tapped his foot and nodded to Switch and Sister Sledge, but generally seemed disinterested in the entire exercise — at least until another kid brought that brand-new picture sleeve of "The Boss" up to the record player at the front of the class.

"Aw yeah, Diana Ross," Chuckie rasped to no one in particular, while breaking into that broken-toothed smile. "She an' I used to ball ALL the time!"

Wherever you are, Chuckie, this one's for you.