Re: The Syd Barrett Movie
The most-played recording in my entire collection (which ain't tiny) is Piper at the Gates of Dawn. Sheer genius.
A few months after Barrett departed, we did a TV show with Pink Floyd, who were in the US for the Philadelphia Music Festival at JFK Stadium in July 1968. We were opening for Ray Charles and Nina Simone, they were opening for the Troggs and the Who. There was a massive downpour in the middle of Pink Floyd's set. I was really concerned someone would get electrocuted, but the promoters stopped the show. It was subsequently cancelled when lightning hit the stage (!).
In the 80s, I ran into Nick Mason in Frankfurt. He remembered the Philadelphia Floyd concert for the obvious reasons, and also remembered us from the TV show. I asked him if he had any idea where I could find the single "Point Me at the Sky," which was never released in the US. It didn't even chart in the UK, and was seemingly impossible to find. Written by Gilmour/Waters and produced by Piper alumnus Norman Smith, it was sonically very much a bridge between the Barrett era and what was to follow.
When Nick returned to England, he was kind enough to copy his record on tape, and send it to me. It was quite cool to hear the needle from his record player drop on the record. (It's so true that many times, the musicians who are highest up on the food chain will bend over backwards for fellow musicians. Joe Walsh, George Martin, and Howard Jones have all written forewords for my books. All I had to do was ask. Think that would happen in 2023?)
This was a little under 40 years ago and we didn't have smartphones back then to immortalize our existences, but IIRC in Frankfurt Mason was playing in a one-off band with David Torn and Jack Bruce. But don't quote me on that. I may have been in an altered state at the time :)
Craig Anderton
_______________________________________
Re: SAG-AFTRA Strike
As a music industry vet turned television writer, I can't stand hearing musicians complain about Daniel Ek. They have no idea how lucky they are that he is the one in charge of the big platform in their business. Imagine if it was Disney or some other corporate enterprise. Ek gives a higher percentage of profits to artists than anything else in music's entire history, and anyone can upload their material to the platform, with all the exact same advantages and tools as Taylor Swift. Watch Bob Iger say that we writers and actors are ridiculous for just asking not to be replaced by AI, all while being worth nearly half a billion dollars personally, and tell me you'd rather have him in charge of music.
Trevor Risk
_______________________________________
Re: SAG-AFTRA Strike
Spot on Bob. I've been working in media for 17 years as a programmer, in media operations, and as content strategist across linear and digital media with stints at Comedy Central, Conde Nast, and Red Bull Media to name a few. I have many friends in both SAG and WGA though I'm not I'm not in either. There is a truth about the media industry that needs to be said: there are no "liberal" owners in Hollywood. There are corporations that care about profit margins and stock price. An example of this is that mid level executive positions are being filled by people with investment banking background not by people who have experiences building audiences and developing content. Why? They are looking for acquisitions and focusing on the stock price. Audiences and content come last.
When I started at MTV Networks none of the executives had MBAs - they just had experience. Now, MBAs run the show. Why are streamers like Mr Beast killing it with eyeballs? He's grown an authentic community. Same with right wing media. Say what you will about Ben Shapiro, and I've said lots, he's built an engaged fan base over at the Daily Wire without relying on Wall Street. Don't know what it'll take to change things other than breaking the vertical integration models or investors willing to wait a bit longer to see a return on investment.
One last note. I think Netflix going into originals will go down in history as the beginning of the end. Netflix turned from being a partner (like Blockbuster was) to another competitor. It started this arms race in the streaming world and created this false reality backed by Wall Street that you needed a streaming service to survive and juice the stock. But here's the thing that anyone with experience knows yet Zaslav and Iger seem so surprised about. Streaming is f*cking expensive. As someone who has operated OTT and streaming channels, I know this, why didn't the MBAs see it? Maybe they need to get their eyes off the ticker and care about the consumer.
There are no movie moguls, only corporate stooges. Sorry for the long reply.
Regards,
Jonathan Smith
_______________________________________
Re: SAG-AFTRA Strike
You're spot on; at least in my case. I signed up for Threads specifically because I hate Musk. I won't buy his cars either.
Regards,
Mark Feldman
_______________________________________
Re: The Wham! Movie
Hi Bob
I absolutely loved the movie !!!
I was lucky enough to be in the top of the pops audience at 15 with my best friend Sophie whose Dad worked at the BBC.
We stood right at the foot of the stage and were blown away by this new band Wham singing their song Young Guns and we fell in love with George immediately!!!!
It was a perfect moment in time I'll never forget it.
I still think "everything she wants" is one of the best pop songs ever written .
God Bless George and his incredible talent !
Lauren Christy
Re: The Wham! Movie
As someone who worked for CBS Records UK in the early 80s I found this movie delightful, bringing back loads of memories of being a 20 year old A&R guy.
However, before I joined the record company I worked as a writer for the Daily Mirror at a time that tabloids were just beginning to cover "pop music." My boss wanted me to identify the new acts that were on the cusp of breaking big. I identified Wham and interviewed George and their label, Innerrvision Records.
Imagine my surprise when I was watching the movie to see my article had made it to Andrew Ridgley's Mum's scrapbook and I could just see my name at the bottom of the page.
The smile I already had on my face watching this film grew even wider. Glad you liked it too Bob.
Gordon Charlton
_______________________________________
Re: The Wham! Movie
That movie was amazing but for me what was the MOST amazing was Andrew Ridgeley!
For a partner to not have a massive ego and to allow and support his friend to grow and leave him behind is unheard of.
In 1987 when the great Jamie Cohen was at Columbia he called me to talk about working with Andrew and I thought whaaaat??
Andrew he said was wanting to make a funk rock style record but I wasn't too excited. We all thought Andrew was Fredo from The Godfather BUT was I wrong. After I watched that film I had so much respect for him that I wanted to write him a letter telling him so.
As for George this is a story most don't know. I was on the set of Top Of The Pops with Was (Not Was) in 1987 ( I played on Top Of The Pops many times or should I say lip synched on…with Was (Not Was) and Terrence Trent Darby) but one day on set at sound check a stage manager said out loud in front of everyone…Stevie Salas there is a call for you from George Michael's office. I was like Whaaat? Don Was pulled me aside and encouraged me to get back in touch with them which I did.
That's my Wham connection…and truth be told I hated Wham in the 80s but I fell in love with them after seeing this film.
Stevie Salas
_______________________________________
Re: The Wham! Movie
Young women never felt so confident, clever and shining as in London in the eighties. It was probably like the 20s for sheer fabulous girl drive. Never mind all that feminist griping- we were going places and insisting on it! Maggie Thatcher wasn't one of us - not even like our mums - she was practically a housewife herself locked into a ancient stale class-ridden world and horrendous tan tights. We were going to invent a whole new Britain (ha Tony Blair!) and the gorgeous, forthright American goddesses like Tina Turner and Farrah Fawcett were our guides. We didn't care what school you went to or what your accent was, just what you were wearing, what you were drinking or snorting, and your record collection (a first date must was perusing their vinyl for egregious LPs like Crystal Gayle or Joan Baez).
I worked for J17, Smash Hits, and Looks magazine and wore long Amish style Laura Ashley dresses with a massive petticoat billowing out and a picnic hamper handbag one day, and what would be considered deep goth today. All the blokes stole our makeup and you could never find your black eyeliner. No one really talked about being gay, because people mixed it up a lot, but if you were 100% you kept it mostly quiet from your bosses.
And Young hip London was small and very accessible. For example, of my best friends from university one worked in PR for Peter Gabriel and the other married a fine artist whose main client was Simon Le Bon. We even wangled a pass to pose on Simon's sailing yacht right after the Live Aid Marathon. We were professionals not groupies but still - it was hard not to plant a huge kiss right on the back of Sting's still sweaty neck. We thought about Trudy even though she seemed ancient and weird. Everybody was part of the same club and we all belonged so long as you dressed up, were interesting and entertaining, and mostly upbeat and alive. It was the opposite of Morrisey and his wingeing.
However, a very small moment stays with me for its incongruity in that time. Top down motoring across Piccadilly one day in my sweet white golf cabriolet ( a convertible which was rare then in London) I pulled up next to Andrew Ridgley and wouldn't you know he was driving his convertible red Ferrari at the traffic we were side by side at the long light outside Simpsons and could practically touch each other with our tops down.
He didn't even take a glance and I was crushed - not that he didn't fancy me, even peripherally, or that girls weren't his thing, just that he was so serious and unlike his playful image which was so rendolent of the times. As with Starsky and Hutch all my friends were either in one camp or the other - super hairy wide boy rough masculine true 'men' (George) or sweet wimpy cute semi posh 'boys' like Andrew Ridgeley, Rick Astley, and even Hugh Grant wannabe Rupert Everett. And everyone came to play.
Johanna Santer
_______________________________________
Re: My Hometown
Bob,
My band formed in 1981 in Jamestown, NY - western, western, NY State. Thirty miles from the shores of Lake Erie. We started with local shows to small crowds most of whom had no idea what we were doing (neither did we!), then we finally played the Big Town, Buffalo, NY and kept going from there. We've been everywhere, man, including Fairfield, CT at FTC. What a cool town and a great venue!
My family arrived in Jamestown in 1875. Furniture makers and undertakers from the motherland, Sweden. My great grandfather had a band called The Ideal Mandolin Orchestra. I have a photo of them from 1903. I grew up in the house my paternal grandfather build. I walked to the same schools my mother did. Like many rustbelt towns, Jamestown fell on hard times during the 70s urban renewal. They built a mall 3 miles out of town in 1970 and that was the death of downtown. Now the Mall is kaput and it's a constant struggle for business downtown but we're doing okay. It's my town. I love it. The worst weather disaster we get is 3 yards of snowfall over a weekend in January. But it's beautiful, quiet and you can ski! 4x4 baby.
I own 70 acres of mostly wooden land 15 miles outside of town that I paid $450 per acre in 1992. I built my house on that land and it's heaven except for deer season when the shooting starts. Freaks my dogs out something terrible.
I enjoy visiting LA, SF, NYC, Boston, Chicago, Cleveland, Atlanta, Denver, Honolulu, Seattle, Sao Paulo, London for gigs, but would never want to live anywhere but in my hometown.
Steven Gustafson
10,000 Maniacs
_______________________________________
Re: Bridgeport
Bob, I grew up in Bridgeport, lived there until I was 18, then New York for a decade, now have been in CA for 10 years.
I had to stop and start while reading your dispatch because I found it brought up so much for me - such complicated feelings about my hometown! My grandparents owned a liquor store on the West Side for 47 years. I went to Notre Dame in Fairfield. I, too, just went back east for two weeks (the humidity was real) and every time I'm there I try to imagine moving back east, roll it around in my brain for a bit, feel the pull from both coasts. But then I get back to CA and get back to work and feel like this is home, too.
Thanks for your thoughts on this. Going to go back and read it in full and absorb.
Lauren Goode
@laurengoode
_______________________________________
Re: Mailbag
The podcast with Dwight! Just immense! His empathy for all things is palpable and kudos to you for letting him find his way in sharing the stories about his family and his music-discovering youth. Not sure if folks can fully appreciate the mind blowing event of a kid from eastern Kentucky / southern Ohio betting all his chips on moving to California and then achieving the level of success that Dwight has. I listened to all 4 hours TWICE. Awaiting the follow up…
Damon
DAMON JOHNSON
(Brother Cane / Lynyrd Skynyrd)
_______________________________________
Subject: RE: Mailbag
James Montgomery the real deal.
Duke and the Drivers simply your average bar band.
"Check Your Bucket" indeed. Why punk happened.
Oedipus
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Friday 14 July 2023
Clothing Songs-SiriusXM This Week
Tune in Saturday July 15th, to Faction Talk, channel 103, at 4 PM East, 1 PM West.
Phone #: 844-686-5863
Twitter: @lefsetz
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Thursday 13 July 2023
The Syd Barrett Movie
"'Have You Got It Yet? The Story of Syd Barrett and Pink Floyd' (Trailer)": https://tinyurl.com/2k99mp63
Now this will change your mood. It and the music of Pink Floyd are the antithesis of Wham! Anything but obvious and simple. This film and Pink Floyd have an ethereal quality, there's no context, they exist on their own and you can either buy in or reject them. But if you dive in...beware, you might not end up where you started.
This film does not delineate what happened with Syd Barrett. Oh, there are facts, but what was going on in Syd's head? That remains elusive. Psychosis usually arrives in one's late teens to mid-twenties. But although there are doctors in this film, that element is never addressed. There were people who burned out from LSD, acid casualties. They indulged regularly and never came back from where they went. Is that what happened to Syd? This film does not tell you.
But it does tell you about the psychedelic sixties.
At the turn of the last century the script flipped. There was more action at home than there was out. A deeper, more scintillating experience. And the oldsters denied this, pooh-poohed it, saw screens as vapid addictions, the same way their parents judged the youth and their music in the sixties.
It's hard to describe the sixties if you didn't live through them. You can listen to oldies radio, 60s on 6, and think it was just one continuous thread of hits, first American and then British and...it wasn't really that way at all. The Beatles incited a revolution. It went beyond the music. You were told to think for yourself, by these blokes who were unrestricted by society, who were pied-pipers for the younger generation. And they caused so many to pick up instruments and play.
And by the latter half of the sixties there was a confluence of art, music and movies, all swirled into one, like an ice cream cone at Carvel. A veritable candy shop, with too many offerings to consume, but you wanted to taste them all.
But to gain the full experience you had to be out of school and living in the city. We knew we were one step removed. We couldn't wait to grow up and partake. To live in the city free from our parents and experience all life could deliver, pushing the envelope into new territory. This was back when living was cheap and you were urged to love everybody, very different from today.
So if you were in the city and you went out...
You could not capture the scene on wax or film. You had to be there and experience it. The Acid Tests, the noodling music, the underground films and the emergence of cutting edge above ground movies.
And not everybody was hip. Some were afraid. Others lived too far away. But if you got the memo, you searched out information, pieced together the story from newspapers and magazines. It required work to be hip, but it wasn't work at all.
So Syd Barrett went to art school. That paradigm seems to have died with the Talking Heads. And it's why David Byrne is still revered today. That view from one step removed, not begging for acceptance, constantly challenging the audience, that is art.
So the people who changed the world back when were middle class. They weren't starving. They wouldn't do what they were told just for a buck. They weren't building brands. As Bill Graham so famously said when he managed the Airplane, whenever the band made money they wanted to stay home and smoke dope, they didn't want to work. It was your life and you wanted to live it.
So Syd came from a culture of exploration, commercialism was not paramount. You didn't want to sell out, you didn't want to be burdened by the audience, you wanted to do your own thing and be recognized for it. You wanted to lead people into your own private universe, not to control them, but to open them up to the possibilities.
So Syd Barrett's Pink Floyd were the paragon of psychedelia in London. You had to go to their show to experience it. And it was not locked down, synched to hard drive, it was different every night, experimental. There was a light show and no dance steps.
And all of this is in the movie.
As well as all the people who had contact with Syd. Roger, Dave and Nick. And Storm Thorgerson, who he grew up with. And other childhood and adult friends. They're still alive, somewhat worse for wear, and they're testifying. Well, some died before the film was finished, but the amazing thing is they don't seem to have sold out, they seem to have made lives pursuing their dreams. These are not has-beens working at the 7-11, but thinking people.
So you've got to know "See Emily Play" didn't break through in America. As a matter of fact, the first time I remember hearing it was on David Bowie's "Pinups" album. You see, it influenced Bowie.
And the Pink Floyd of today is very different from Syd's era. Everyone acknowledges that there'd be no Pink Floyd without Syd, but once he was gone the band was no longer burdened, and inspired by Syd's ethos, they became one of the biggest bands of all time.
Syd Barrett was an enigma in America. And although this film sheds some light on his story, he still is. We knew "The Madcap Laughs," by 1970 we knew who Pink Floyd were, Syd's previous membership in the group, and I already owned "Ummagumma." There was not a news blackout, Syd was referenced, but he never came back like Peter Green, and then he died. Not from abuse, but pancreatic cancer, which was a death sentence back then and mostly still is.
And his sister is somewhat resentful, which is understandable after caring for him for the last decades of his life. And Syd was around, but nobody visited him and then he died.
So what did we learn?
That we have more questions than answers.
And you'll have so many questions that you'll want to watch this movie again.
Will this movie influence younger generations the way we were influenced by so much of the past, from W.C. Fields to the Marx Brothers to the bluesmeisters...
Well, you're either a member of the club or not, on the bus or off.
This film opens doors. Where you go once you pass through is up to you. That's what our music delivered, a starting point, an instruction booklet, and then we were on our own.
This is a weird movie. It's not that it's not for everybody, but more that not everybody is interested. Today too much is surface. If you have money you're not only rich, but intelligent, you know better. We didn't used to feel this way. And just because you had hits that did not mean we placed our faith in you. We were looking for something more, something three-dimensional that we could believe in.
This is a peek into what once was.
You know whether you have to take a look.
But those who do not... That's evidence of who you are. And we're judging you just like we did in the sixties. It's about more than long hair, it's about what's inside your brain, how you think. People were hungry for knowledge, wanted to be in the know. To be conservative was to be dead. Change was embraced.
I'm sorry if you didn't live through it. But this film will give you a glimpse of the way it used to be.
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Now this will change your mood. It and the music of Pink Floyd are the antithesis of Wham! Anything but obvious and simple. This film and Pink Floyd have an ethereal quality, there's no context, they exist on their own and you can either buy in or reject them. But if you dive in...beware, you might not end up where you started.
This film does not delineate what happened with Syd Barrett. Oh, there are facts, but what was going on in Syd's head? That remains elusive. Psychosis usually arrives in one's late teens to mid-twenties. But although there are doctors in this film, that element is never addressed. There were people who burned out from LSD, acid casualties. They indulged regularly and never came back from where they went. Is that what happened to Syd? This film does not tell you.
But it does tell you about the psychedelic sixties.
At the turn of the last century the script flipped. There was more action at home than there was out. A deeper, more scintillating experience. And the oldsters denied this, pooh-poohed it, saw screens as vapid addictions, the same way their parents judged the youth and their music in the sixties.
It's hard to describe the sixties if you didn't live through them. You can listen to oldies radio, 60s on 6, and think it was just one continuous thread of hits, first American and then British and...it wasn't really that way at all. The Beatles incited a revolution. It went beyond the music. You were told to think for yourself, by these blokes who were unrestricted by society, who were pied-pipers for the younger generation. And they caused so many to pick up instruments and play.
And by the latter half of the sixties there was a confluence of art, music and movies, all swirled into one, like an ice cream cone at Carvel. A veritable candy shop, with too many offerings to consume, but you wanted to taste them all.
But to gain the full experience you had to be out of school and living in the city. We knew we were one step removed. We couldn't wait to grow up and partake. To live in the city free from our parents and experience all life could deliver, pushing the envelope into new territory. This was back when living was cheap and you were urged to love everybody, very different from today.
So if you were in the city and you went out...
You could not capture the scene on wax or film. You had to be there and experience it. The Acid Tests, the noodling music, the underground films and the emergence of cutting edge above ground movies.
And not everybody was hip. Some were afraid. Others lived too far away. But if you got the memo, you searched out information, pieced together the story from newspapers and magazines. It required work to be hip, but it wasn't work at all.
So Syd Barrett went to art school. That paradigm seems to have died with the Talking Heads. And it's why David Byrne is still revered today. That view from one step removed, not begging for acceptance, constantly challenging the audience, that is art.
So the people who changed the world back when were middle class. They weren't starving. They wouldn't do what they were told just for a buck. They weren't building brands. As Bill Graham so famously said when he managed the Airplane, whenever the band made money they wanted to stay home and smoke dope, they didn't want to work. It was your life and you wanted to live it.
So Syd came from a culture of exploration, commercialism was not paramount. You didn't want to sell out, you didn't want to be burdened by the audience, you wanted to do your own thing and be recognized for it. You wanted to lead people into your own private universe, not to control them, but to open them up to the possibilities.
So Syd Barrett's Pink Floyd were the paragon of psychedelia in London. You had to go to their show to experience it. And it was not locked down, synched to hard drive, it was different every night, experimental. There was a light show and no dance steps.
And all of this is in the movie.
As well as all the people who had contact with Syd. Roger, Dave and Nick. And Storm Thorgerson, who he grew up with. And other childhood and adult friends. They're still alive, somewhat worse for wear, and they're testifying. Well, some died before the film was finished, but the amazing thing is they don't seem to have sold out, they seem to have made lives pursuing their dreams. These are not has-beens working at the 7-11, but thinking people.
So you've got to know "See Emily Play" didn't break through in America. As a matter of fact, the first time I remember hearing it was on David Bowie's "Pinups" album. You see, it influenced Bowie.
And the Pink Floyd of today is very different from Syd's era. Everyone acknowledges that there'd be no Pink Floyd without Syd, but once he was gone the band was no longer burdened, and inspired by Syd's ethos, they became one of the biggest bands of all time.
Syd Barrett was an enigma in America. And although this film sheds some light on his story, he still is. We knew "The Madcap Laughs," by 1970 we knew who Pink Floyd were, Syd's previous membership in the group, and I already owned "Ummagumma." There was not a news blackout, Syd was referenced, but he never came back like Peter Green, and then he died. Not from abuse, but pancreatic cancer, which was a death sentence back then and mostly still is.
And his sister is somewhat resentful, which is understandable after caring for him for the last decades of his life. And Syd was around, but nobody visited him and then he died.
So what did we learn?
That we have more questions than answers.
And you'll have so many questions that you'll want to watch this movie again.
Will this movie influence younger generations the way we were influenced by so much of the past, from W.C. Fields to the Marx Brothers to the bluesmeisters...
Well, you're either a member of the club or not, on the bus or off.
This film opens doors. Where you go once you pass through is up to you. That's what our music delivered, a starting point, an instruction booklet, and then we were on our own.
This is a weird movie. It's not that it's not for everybody, but more that not everybody is interested. Today too much is surface. If you have money you're not only rich, but intelligent, you know better. We didn't used to feel this way. And just because you had hits that did not mean we placed our faith in you. We were looking for something more, something three-dimensional that we could believe in.
This is a peek into what once was.
You know whether you have to take a look.
But those who do not... That's evidence of who you are. And we're judging you just like we did in the sixties. It's about more than long hair, it's about what's inside your brain, how you think. People were hungry for knowledge, wanted to be in the know. To be conservative was to be dead. Change was embraced.
I'm sorry if you didn't live through it. But this film will give you a glimpse of the way it used to be.
--
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--
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SAG-AFTRA Strike
People don't like the streamers. The only company with any good will left is Netflix, which even I am less than enthusiastic about since it canned the woman who made the highbrow halo productions for someone green-lighting middle of the road, dumbed-down fare, the kind that caused the networks to lose market share to the cable companies, especially pay cable, like HBO. AND WE'RE PAYING FOR STREAMING!
At first cable providers were the most hated corporations in America. Then the major record labels. I won't say that streamers are number three, but they've been hurt by focusing on what Wall Street wants as opposed to what their customers want. But it's even worse. The people who run these outlets are grossly overpaid. Tell me how Zaslav makes triple-digit millions while cutting production and telling HBO viewers they're second class citizens. Does he think we don't know all this? Following entertainment is like following sports, people know the players and their maneuvers, and the end result does not look pretty.
Amazon... People hate the company anyway. But if you sign up for a streaming outlet via the Prime app...good luck figuring out how to cancel. Re the FTC lawsuit, the response has been that if companies make it too easy to cancel, people might cancel by accident. This is the kind of insane gobbledygook that turns customers against companies. Furthermore, it's not that hard to ask again if the subscriber wants to cancel, that's normally how computers work. You go to delete and it asks you if you're sure. But Amazon, et al, know better? Give me a break.
Apple... Highbrow product dripped-out over months. And they just raised the price. I won't pay. It's an insult, no matter how much I love and am part of the Apple ecosystem.
Disney? A dearth of new product. It's child fare and "Star Wars" stuff. I mean really?
Paramount and Peacock... Really? You want me to pay for this stuff? I've got to be the most avid TV addict to pony up. These outlets are like auto dealerships filled with old cars with crank windows and no A/C. There's no there there.
Furthermore, it's all Balkanized. Like being pecked to death by ducks. Quote me an overall price, for everything. This is what saved the music business. Certainly not the major labels, but Daniel Ek, who wouldn't even launch in America until he had all three majors on board. He was worried about the customer first. And you can naysay all you want, but Daniel Ek single-handedly saved the recorded music business. The majors certainly couldn't do it. They were inured to the past. Ek incentivized the labels with stock, which in some cases was promptly sold. Think about that...you don't even believe in the future of your distributor. You're so myopic, it's about today's bottom line as opposed to the future's.
As for hating the major record labels... This has stopped, because everybody can play. The tools of creation and distribution are in the hands of the consumer, and marketing is too. As for online promotional outlets like TikTok...that's where the youth spend their time, that's the main competition for streamers. But the elements of TikTok that adhere it to its audience? The big swinging dicks in streaming don't want to employ them: honest, authenticity, credibility... Mindless escapism? There's an audience for that, but that's not what's propping up TikTok, humanity and creativity are propping up TikTok.
As for unions...
There's a renaissance.
Apple and Amazon fighting unionization is a bad look. Especially when Apple is worth three trillion. The little people should be left out? But it's the little people who sustain your business, the customer. Ignore the customer at your peril. And working at the Amazon warehouse is like being in prison. Amazon is on the verge of running out of available workers who have not already worked for the company. It's like today's "Wall Street Journal," the pompous writer who said Florida's anti-immigration law problems will be solved by the market. Yeah, when you pay farm and service workers twenty or thirty dollars an hour, which they're never going to do, hell, the minimum wage in the Sunshine State is eleven bucks. Truth is so many of these jobs the immigrants do American citizens don't want to. The work is too dirty, too intense and too poorly-paid for them to be incentivized. Ever pick crops? I have, it's back-breaking, almost any job is better.
So what we have here is an elite that believe their sh*t doesn't stink and they're better than us. That they earned their status and their riches. Rubbish, it's all on the back of us, the public, the consumers, and you constantly want to screw us in the process.
Bankers... What exactly do they add?
Private equity. You buy, lay debt on the company and frequently it crashes under said debt, even though you made money! People lose their jobs, but you come out smelling like a rose. This is the story of Warner Bros. Discovery. The company is loaded up with tens of billions in debt. Which didn't exist until AT&T decided to buy Warner Bros. and... You must pay. Wall Street must be served. Zaslav cut foreign TV production. Meaning you won't see no "Squid Game" on Max.
The tide has turned. Income inequality... We've felt powerless for years. Give us an opportunity and we take action.
That reporter saying Threads is the new Google+... Yes, this was said in the "New York Times," how ignorant can you be? People didn't have a problem with Facebook, they didn't need Google+, thus it failed. But people HATE Elon Musk and his Twitter experience, otherwise triple-digit millions wouldn't have signed up for Threads. Sans Musk's purchase of Twitter, Threads is dead on arrival. But that guy...
Doesn't matter if you feel differently. Believe me, my inbox is filled with people citing the Twitter Files and all kinds of b.s. to defend Twitter and Musk. I won't even bother going into the details, but the truth is in the number of Threads signups, people were dissatisfied with Twitter. And the truth is users want content moderation. And if you look into the Twitter Files you'll find no smoking gun, Twitter's regulators were dealing with both Democrats and Republicans looking for moderation, and wrestling with what to do. But no, we must have FREEDUMB!
You don't have the freedom to yell FIRE! in a crowded auditorium.
No one has unlimited freedom, even though these rich bozo elites think they do, that they're above the law.
What Musk and his minions want is chaos, so the truth can't out, and so they can control the narrative.
So just like with Twitter you've got all these anti-union people with loud voices. But the average citizen... They're on the other side. They wish they were a member of a union. That they had greater pay and protection. And sure, you can point out flaws in past unions, but... This is another thing that drives me crazy, the bad apples in the Democratic party are held up as evidence that the whole party must be thrown out with the bathwater. There are bad actors everywhere. Even you have made mistakes. But politicians can't even admit them, for fear of being excoriated by the party police. Just like we can't have new taxes.
Of course the streamers have costs. But should the actors pay for the streamers' overproduction? What a concept, we overspend and then we're rescued. Everybody in America would sign up for that, but it's not offered. We're supposed to be responsible. But when corporations screw up? It's our money that bails them out! Keeping the airlines in business. The subsidies to oil and gas companies. Carried interest benefits for billionaire hedge funders. But nothing can change, that's the America we now live in. Gridlock. While in other countries they build roads and other infrastructure and... You want the fire department to show up, the police too. You want to drive on the roads. But you shouldn't have to pay for it? That's what taxes pay for. As for waste... Even you waste. You've purchased products you haven't used. But the government should be held to a higher standard?
America is angry. And as James Carville famously said, "It's the economy, stupid." Everybody is worried about their finances. We're dying to stick it to the man. And when we get the option, we salivate and act. That's what the migration to Threads was all about.
Should SAG-AFTRA get everything it wants? The WGA? Of course not. There should be honest negotiation, which has yet to happen. The landscape changed. There are buyouts, no residuals, shorter production schedules. But it's all dependent on the workers at the bottom of the pyramid. The streamers can't excise them, they're the fuel that makes the operation run.
I mean really.
As for the public being unwilling to forgo Hollywood, and therefore being on the streamers'/producers' side? There's tons of entertainment out there already. People are not willing to throw everybody under the bus to get momentary satisfaction. Hell, jobs were shipped overseas... This is what the blue collar backlash is all about. The left helped eliminate their jobs but did not protect them for the future. As for the right, their solution is to own the libs, which is no solution at all. We all need progress. We all need to come to the table. All this hogwash about everyone needing to be self-reliant is just that, hogwash. Shi*t happens, which is why you need the government. Which is why you need health insurance, but you think you're immune. Same deal with car insurance. Everybody thinks the problem won't happen to them, and then it does.
You'll want more pay. You'll want more job security. These union fights are for you, don't ever forget it.
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At first cable providers were the most hated corporations in America. Then the major record labels. I won't say that streamers are number three, but they've been hurt by focusing on what Wall Street wants as opposed to what their customers want. But it's even worse. The people who run these outlets are grossly overpaid. Tell me how Zaslav makes triple-digit millions while cutting production and telling HBO viewers they're second class citizens. Does he think we don't know all this? Following entertainment is like following sports, people know the players and their maneuvers, and the end result does not look pretty.
Amazon... People hate the company anyway. But if you sign up for a streaming outlet via the Prime app...good luck figuring out how to cancel. Re the FTC lawsuit, the response has been that if companies make it too easy to cancel, people might cancel by accident. This is the kind of insane gobbledygook that turns customers against companies. Furthermore, it's not that hard to ask again if the subscriber wants to cancel, that's normally how computers work. You go to delete and it asks you if you're sure. But Amazon, et al, know better? Give me a break.
Apple... Highbrow product dripped-out over months. And they just raised the price. I won't pay. It's an insult, no matter how much I love and am part of the Apple ecosystem.
Disney? A dearth of new product. It's child fare and "Star Wars" stuff. I mean really?
Paramount and Peacock... Really? You want me to pay for this stuff? I've got to be the most avid TV addict to pony up. These outlets are like auto dealerships filled with old cars with crank windows and no A/C. There's no there there.
Furthermore, it's all Balkanized. Like being pecked to death by ducks. Quote me an overall price, for everything. This is what saved the music business. Certainly not the major labels, but Daniel Ek, who wouldn't even launch in America until he had all three majors on board. He was worried about the customer first. And you can naysay all you want, but Daniel Ek single-handedly saved the recorded music business. The majors certainly couldn't do it. They were inured to the past. Ek incentivized the labels with stock, which in some cases was promptly sold. Think about that...you don't even believe in the future of your distributor. You're so myopic, it's about today's bottom line as opposed to the future's.
As for hating the major record labels... This has stopped, because everybody can play. The tools of creation and distribution are in the hands of the consumer, and marketing is too. As for online promotional outlets like TikTok...that's where the youth spend their time, that's the main competition for streamers. But the elements of TikTok that adhere it to its audience? The big swinging dicks in streaming don't want to employ them: honest, authenticity, credibility... Mindless escapism? There's an audience for that, but that's not what's propping up TikTok, humanity and creativity are propping up TikTok.
As for unions...
There's a renaissance.
Apple and Amazon fighting unionization is a bad look. Especially when Apple is worth three trillion. The little people should be left out? But it's the little people who sustain your business, the customer. Ignore the customer at your peril. And working at the Amazon warehouse is like being in prison. Amazon is on the verge of running out of available workers who have not already worked for the company. It's like today's "Wall Street Journal," the pompous writer who said Florida's anti-immigration law problems will be solved by the market. Yeah, when you pay farm and service workers twenty or thirty dollars an hour, which they're never going to do, hell, the minimum wage in the Sunshine State is eleven bucks. Truth is so many of these jobs the immigrants do American citizens don't want to. The work is too dirty, too intense and too poorly-paid for them to be incentivized. Ever pick crops? I have, it's back-breaking, almost any job is better.
So what we have here is an elite that believe their sh*t doesn't stink and they're better than us. That they earned their status and their riches. Rubbish, it's all on the back of us, the public, the consumers, and you constantly want to screw us in the process.
Bankers... What exactly do they add?
Private equity. You buy, lay debt on the company and frequently it crashes under said debt, even though you made money! People lose their jobs, but you come out smelling like a rose. This is the story of Warner Bros. Discovery. The company is loaded up with tens of billions in debt. Which didn't exist until AT&T decided to buy Warner Bros. and... You must pay. Wall Street must be served. Zaslav cut foreign TV production. Meaning you won't see no "Squid Game" on Max.
The tide has turned. Income inequality... We've felt powerless for years. Give us an opportunity and we take action.
That reporter saying Threads is the new Google+... Yes, this was said in the "New York Times," how ignorant can you be? People didn't have a problem with Facebook, they didn't need Google+, thus it failed. But people HATE Elon Musk and his Twitter experience, otherwise triple-digit millions wouldn't have signed up for Threads. Sans Musk's purchase of Twitter, Threads is dead on arrival. But that guy...
Doesn't matter if you feel differently. Believe me, my inbox is filled with people citing the Twitter Files and all kinds of b.s. to defend Twitter and Musk. I won't even bother going into the details, but the truth is in the number of Threads signups, people were dissatisfied with Twitter. And the truth is users want content moderation. And if you look into the Twitter Files you'll find no smoking gun, Twitter's regulators were dealing with both Democrats and Republicans looking for moderation, and wrestling with what to do. But no, we must have FREEDUMB!
You don't have the freedom to yell FIRE! in a crowded auditorium.
No one has unlimited freedom, even though these rich bozo elites think they do, that they're above the law.
What Musk and his minions want is chaos, so the truth can't out, and so they can control the narrative.
So just like with Twitter you've got all these anti-union people with loud voices. But the average citizen... They're on the other side. They wish they were a member of a union. That they had greater pay and protection. And sure, you can point out flaws in past unions, but... This is another thing that drives me crazy, the bad apples in the Democratic party are held up as evidence that the whole party must be thrown out with the bathwater. There are bad actors everywhere. Even you have made mistakes. But politicians can't even admit them, for fear of being excoriated by the party police. Just like we can't have new taxes.
Of course the streamers have costs. But should the actors pay for the streamers' overproduction? What a concept, we overspend and then we're rescued. Everybody in America would sign up for that, but it's not offered. We're supposed to be responsible. But when corporations screw up? It's our money that bails them out! Keeping the airlines in business. The subsidies to oil and gas companies. Carried interest benefits for billionaire hedge funders. But nothing can change, that's the America we now live in. Gridlock. While in other countries they build roads and other infrastructure and... You want the fire department to show up, the police too. You want to drive on the roads. But you shouldn't have to pay for it? That's what taxes pay for. As for waste... Even you waste. You've purchased products you haven't used. But the government should be held to a higher standard?
America is angry. And as James Carville famously said, "It's the economy, stupid." Everybody is worried about their finances. We're dying to stick it to the man. And when we get the option, we salivate and act. That's what the migration to Threads was all about.
Should SAG-AFTRA get everything it wants? The WGA? Of course not. There should be honest negotiation, which has yet to happen. The landscape changed. There are buyouts, no residuals, shorter production schedules. But it's all dependent on the workers at the bottom of the pyramid. The streamers can't excise them, they're the fuel that makes the operation run.
I mean really.
As for the public being unwilling to forgo Hollywood, and therefore being on the streamers'/producers' side? There's tons of entertainment out there already. People are not willing to throw everybody under the bus to get momentary satisfaction. Hell, jobs were shipped overseas... This is what the blue collar backlash is all about. The left helped eliminate their jobs but did not protect them for the future. As for the right, their solution is to own the libs, which is no solution at all. We all need progress. We all need to come to the table. All this hogwash about everyone needing to be self-reliant is just that, hogwash. Shi*t happens, which is why you need the government. Which is why you need health insurance, but you think you're immune. Same deal with car insurance. Everybody thinks the problem won't happen to them, and then it does.
You'll want more pay. You'll want more job security. These union fights are for you, don't ever forget it.
--
Visit the archive: http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/
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Listen to the podcast:
-iHeart: https://ihr.fm/2Gi5PFj
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Jon Anderson-This Week's Podcast
Of Yes. Need I say more?
https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1119-the-bob-lefsetz-podcast-30806836/episode/jon-anderson-118904688/
https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/jon-anderson/id1316200737?i=1000621004013
https://open.spotify.com/episode/76qmWKhmgZaARVqSJxlVvq?si=87u2BCpfTWiAAtFmqr-i3g
https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/9ff4fb19-54d4-41ae-ae7a-8a6f8d3dafa8/episodes/3bee3d46-bc13-45a2-a874-73537a4ec618/the-bob-lefsetz-podcast-jon-anderson
https://www.stitcher.com/show/the-bob-lefsetz-podcast/episode/jon-anderson-305237766
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-iHeart: https://ihr.fm/2Gi5PFj
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https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1119-the-bob-lefsetz-podcast-30806836/episode/jon-anderson-118904688/
https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/jon-anderson/id1316200737?i=1000621004013
https://open.spotify.com/episode/76qmWKhmgZaARVqSJxlVvq?si=87u2BCpfTWiAAtFmqr-i3g
https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/9ff4fb19-54d4-41ae-ae7a-8a6f8d3dafa8/episodes/3bee3d46-bc13-45a2-a874-73537a4ec618/the-bob-lefsetz-podcast-jon-anderson
https://www.stitcher.com/show/the-bob-lefsetz-podcast/episode/jon-anderson-305237766
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Wednesday 12 July 2023
The Wham! Movie
Trailer: https://tinyurl.com/26vjsvcj
It's FANTASTIC!
Not that I was eager to watch it. The e-mail started to come in last week, absolute raves. So I read the reviews and said...maybe, but not right now. But watching a disappointing comedy special tonight Felice suggested it, and WOW!
Started off cheesy. I mean the titles. Like the Motley Crue movie. A wink, a fabrication, a step away from the real nitty-gritty. But momentarily thereafter...
This is a document of an era. The MTV era.
But even more it's a document of the post-punk world of Britain.
It's a smaller country than the U.S. And therefore there's more of a feeling of being in it together. Music is followed like sports, like horse racing. Everybody reads the charts. Which are a mash-up of all kinds of genres. And stuff that is gigantic over there never makes it here, frequently unjustifiably, like Rag'n'Bone Man's "Human."
The label screwed that one up.
Used to be the label was everything. Wham!'s breakthrough was an appearance on "Top of the Pops." The doc says it was a phone call out of the blue, but anybody on the inside knows it never works that way, that the label worked the TV show until the opportunity arrived.
And then Wham! delivered.
Times were different. The sixties were about revolution. The seventies, licking our wounds and cynicism. And the eighties were about hedonism.
Then again, Margaret Thatcher ruled from '79-'90. Not that the average person in Americas knows much about her and her conservative government, how she broke the backs of unions and musicians and the underclass resented her, to this day. Today politics is everything. You might be misinformed, but you're aware of the players. Ergo, Brexit. The perpetrators are out of government, the country is suffering economically compared to the EU and the musical touring business has been hindered in both directions, Britain to the EU and EU to Britain. But the nationalism of the ignorant drove Brexit. And the same uninformed wanting no part of the EU were supported by the EU and didn't even know it, kinda like the Republicans who bitch about the government and social programs when they're the beneficiaries thereof. Voting against your interests, it's the twenty first century way.
So Wham! was huge in England.
But it took a while for them to cross over to America and MTV. This was before the channel was a worldwide phenomenon. Today you can make it from anywhere. Who knew Latin was gonna be this big? Other genres from other countries will come down the pike. Back then, especially as the eighties played out, you were either on MTV or you weren't, you were either a hit act or marginal. That was the power of MTV. Nobody has that power today.
Nor do the labels.
Sure, the labels rejected Wham! at first, but Wham! needed a label to make it. And the band signed an horrific deal. Sure, people will sign anything to make it, but today musicians are much better informed, they know you need an attorney, and the royalty standards have improved. 2%? Nothing on twelve inches? Today an act can get 50% after expenses, or release the music themselves and make even more. And although terrestrial radio is not yet dead, it's less powerful than ever before. It was the bastion of the major labels, still is, it's where hits were solidified. Now active customers don't listen and acts are broken online in ways the major labels do not control. It's very different from yesterday, even though the oldsters like to tell us it's just the same.
And speaking of different...
I'm not sure you can find an American or Briton conscious in the eighties who does not know "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go." Nothing is that ubiquitous today, NOTHING! Everybody aware back then could sing the chorus and still can, that's how catchy the number was and still is.
And that's a point of the film, what a great songwriter and producer George Michael was.
And his father didn't believe in his career and he was gay and closeted...
The people who make it need it. They're not normal, they're flawed. They believe the success, the adulation, will fulfill them, cover up that hole inside, and when they finally realize it can't, they stop being able to deliver. But before that, they're DRIVEN!
Like George Michael.
He needed it. He reveled in it. He wanted four number ones in one year. And the power of the audience, of being on stage, is evident time and again in this movie.
So the film is a time capsule. But in this case, there's footage and photos. Yes, the eighties were documented. This separates the Wham! movie from the documentaries from earlier eras. It's all right there to see, no imagination is needed, you're just overwhelmed.
And China is still backward.
And publicity is everything. Press, TV news... They're nearly powerless today, especially for developing acts. You put it out there and try to engage your fans.
But a difference between yesterday and today is in the old days you had to build your career over time. Today, one album and you can be playing arenas. The road work was important for Wham!, as it is for developing acts today, but George Michael lived for the studio, for the hit records. Today live is everything. It's the visceral experience everybody desires in a digitized world. It's unique, you can own it.
And to see Wham!'s contemporaries... Especially recording the Band Aid single. Everybody is so young. Sting is somewhat dorky. Bono is wearing that ridiculous hat. Phil Collins can still play the drums. It's a window into what once was, and now no longer exists.
You watch the Wham! movie and remember why you wanted to be in the music business, why you NEEDED to be in the music business! Music was everything, all wrapped into one. The music, the look, the money, the meaning, the edginess... Music was pushing the envelope in ways no other art form was. And if you made it, you were more famous than anybody in the world, politicians, never mind business people.
This is not "Behind the Music." This is not a false arc. This is the story of two guys who wanted to make it, and worked hard to do so. That's the power of youth, the ignorance and the lack of experience. You believe in your talent and push on. And back then there wasn't the constant sour grapes. Most people couldn't even get a record deal, whereas today everybody can be on Spotify. And Wham! had number ones and was still broke. And then they hired Simon Napier-Bell.
A good manager is crucial.
And I love "Father Figure" from George Michael's solo career, but I can't say I was a big fan of Wham! I go for something more meaningful. But what is clear here is that George Michael and Andrew Ridgeley were incredibly self-aware, they knew what they were selling. There were no false airs. Ultimately it was good time music, for partying. And the eighties were all about partying.
You've got to see this movie, even if you hate George Michael and Wham! It's a window into what once was, which you didn't know everything about. It puts the act and the eighties in context. If this were still the eighties...
MTV would make the Wham! movie an event. Everybody would know about it. It would be the talk of the youth.
But we haven't had that spirit here...for decades.
And the Eagles are a good analogy to Wham! Don Henley never would have made it if it weren't for Glenn Frey. And as the act evolved, it was clear that Henley was the superior talent, and Frey was down with that. Ridgeley is self-aware. He went for a ride with one of the greatest songwriter/performers of the era, and he's thrilled about it, anything but bitter.
Of course Glenn Frey was much more talented than Andrew Ridgeley, but the bottom line is it's very hard to keep an act together. They break up even if their fans want them to stay together. You see it's not a business venture, but an artistic quest. Artists don't play it safe, they evolve. They're willing to change, to put it all on the line, risking everything for their vision.
Today hits require more money than ever before. As a result, there are cowriters and remixers and everybody's trying to buy insurance. But the moment in the Chateau, when George Michael is talking about pulling the line from deep within, being amazed at what comes out, unaware it was there and stunned that he's got it in him...that's the essence of creativity. You've either got it or you don't. Andrew Ridgeley didn't have that, so he had to retire.
As for George Michael, he became one of the biggest stars in the world, but that was not enough. He stopped making records on principle, wanted off Columbia, and the label broke him, he never recaptured his glory. And then he died at a young age.
You think you want what George Michael got. But almost nobody really does. It requires an incredible amount of hard work. The aforementioned drive. It's not for the well-adjusted. You must sacrifice so much. And when it's all over everybody knows your name yet you still might feel hollow inside.
Watch the movie.
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It's FANTASTIC!
Not that I was eager to watch it. The e-mail started to come in last week, absolute raves. So I read the reviews and said...maybe, but not right now. But watching a disappointing comedy special tonight Felice suggested it, and WOW!
Started off cheesy. I mean the titles. Like the Motley Crue movie. A wink, a fabrication, a step away from the real nitty-gritty. But momentarily thereafter...
This is a document of an era. The MTV era.
But even more it's a document of the post-punk world of Britain.
It's a smaller country than the U.S. And therefore there's more of a feeling of being in it together. Music is followed like sports, like horse racing. Everybody reads the charts. Which are a mash-up of all kinds of genres. And stuff that is gigantic over there never makes it here, frequently unjustifiably, like Rag'n'Bone Man's "Human."
The label screwed that one up.
Used to be the label was everything. Wham!'s breakthrough was an appearance on "Top of the Pops." The doc says it was a phone call out of the blue, but anybody on the inside knows it never works that way, that the label worked the TV show until the opportunity arrived.
And then Wham! delivered.
Times were different. The sixties were about revolution. The seventies, licking our wounds and cynicism. And the eighties were about hedonism.
Then again, Margaret Thatcher ruled from '79-'90. Not that the average person in Americas knows much about her and her conservative government, how she broke the backs of unions and musicians and the underclass resented her, to this day. Today politics is everything. You might be misinformed, but you're aware of the players. Ergo, Brexit. The perpetrators are out of government, the country is suffering economically compared to the EU and the musical touring business has been hindered in both directions, Britain to the EU and EU to Britain. But the nationalism of the ignorant drove Brexit. And the same uninformed wanting no part of the EU were supported by the EU and didn't even know it, kinda like the Republicans who bitch about the government and social programs when they're the beneficiaries thereof. Voting against your interests, it's the twenty first century way.
So Wham! was huge in England.
But it took a while for them to cross over to America and MTV. This was before the channel was a worldwide phenomenon. Today you can make it from anywhere. Who knew Latin was gonna be this big? Other genres from other countries will come down the pike. Back then, especially as the eighties played out, you were either on MTV or you weren't, you were either a hit act or marginal. That was the power of MTV. Nobody has that power today.
Nor do the labels.
Sure, the labels rejected Wham! at first, but Wham! needed a label to make it. And the band signed an horrific deal. Sure, people will sign anything to make it, but today musicians are much better informed, they know you need an attorney, and the royalty standards have improved. 2%? Nothing on twelve inches? Today an act can get 50% after expenses, or release the music themselves and make even more. And although terrestrial radio is not yet dead, it's less powerful than ever before. It was the bastion of the major labels, still is, it's where hits were solidified. Now active customers don't listen and acts are broken online in ways the major labels do not control. It's very different from yesterday, even though the oldsters like to tell us it's just the same.
And speaking of different...
I'm not sure you can find an American or Briton conscious in the eighties who does not know "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go." Nothing is that ubiquitous today, NOTHING! Everybody aware back then could sing the chorus and still can, that's how catchy the number was and still is.
And that's a point of the film, what a great songwriter and producer George Michael was.
And his father didn't believe in his career and he was gay and closeted...
The people who make it need it. They're not normal, they're flawed. They believe the success, the adulation, will fulfill them, cover up that hole inside, and when they finally realize it can't, they stop being able to deliver. But before that, they're DRIVEN!
Like George Michael.
He needed it. He reveled in it. He wanted four number ones in one year. And the power of the audience, of being on stage, is evident time and again in this movie.
So the film is a time capsule. But in this case, there's footage and photos. Yes, the eighties were documented. This separates the Wham! movie from the documentaries from earlier eras. It's all right there to see, no imagination is needed, you're just overwhelmed.
And China is still backward.
And publicity is everything. Press, TV news... They're nearly powerless today, especially for developing acts. You put it out there and try to engage your fans.
But a difference between yesterday and today is in the old days you had to build your career over time. Today, one album and you can be playing arenas. The road work was important for Wham!, as it is for developing acts today, but George Michael lived for the studio, for the hit records. Today live is everything. It's the visceral experience everybody desires in a digitized world. It's unique, you can own it.
And to see Wham!'s contemporaries... Especially recording the Band Aid single. Everybody is so young. Sting is somewhat dorky. Bono is wearing that ridiculous hat. Phil Collins can still play the drums. It's a window into what once was, and now no longer exists.
You watch the Wham! movie and remember why you wanted to be in the music business, why you NEEDED to be in the music business! Music was everything, all wrapped into one. The music, the look, the money, the meaning, the edginess... Music was pushing the envelope in ways no other art form was. And if you made it, you were more famous than anybody in the world, politicians, never mind business people.
This is not "Behind the Music." This is not a false arc. This is the story of two guys who wanted to make it, and worked hard to do so. That's the power of youth, the ignorance and the lack of experience. You believe in your talent and push on. And back then there wasn't the constant sour grapes. Most people couldn't even get a record deal, whereas today everybody can be on Spotify. And Wham! had number ones and was still broke. And then they hired Simon Napier-Bell.
A good manager is crucial.
And I love "Father Figure" from George Michael's solo career, but I can't say I was a big fan of Wham! I go for something more meaningful. But what is clear here is that George Michael and Andrew Ridgeley were incredibly self-aware, they knew what they were selling. There were no false airs. Ultimately it was good time music, for partying. And the eighties were all about partying.
You've got to see this movie, even if you hate George Michael and Wham! It's a window into what once was, which you didn't know everything about. It puts the act and the eighties in context. If this were still the eighties...
MTV would make the Wham! movie an event. Everybody would know about it. It would be the talk of the youth.
But we haven't had that spirit here...for decades.
And the Eagles are a good analogy to Wham! Don Henley never would have made it if it weren't for Glenn Frey. And as the act evolved, it was clear that Henley was the superior talent, and Frey was down with that. Ridgeley is self-aware. He went for a ride with one of the greatest songwriter/performers of the era, and he's thrilled about it, anything but bitter.
Of course Glenn Frey was much more talented than Andrew Ridgeley, but the bottom line is it's very hard to keep an act together. They break up even if their fans want them to stay together. You see it's not a business venture, but an artistic quest. Artists don't play it safe, they evolve. They're willing to change, to put it all on the line, risking everything for their vision.
Today hits require more money than ever before. As a result, there are cowriters and remixers and everybody's trying to buy insurance. But the moment in the Chateau, when George Michael is talking about pulling the line from deep within, being amazed at what comes out, unaware it was there and stunned that he's got it in him...that's the essence of creativity. You've either got it or you don't. Andrew Ridgeley didn't have that, so he had to retire.
As for George Michael, he became one of the biggest stars in the world, but that was not enough. He stopped making records on principle, wanted off Columbia, and the label broke him, he never recaptured his glory. And then he died at a young age.
You think you want what George Michael got. But almost nobody really does. It requires an incredible amount of hard work. The aforementioned drive. It's not for the well-adjusted. You must sacrifice so much. And when it's all over everybody knows your name yet you still might feel hollow inside.
Watch the movie.
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Mailbag
From: James Montgomery
Subject: Thank you
Bob, Thank you so much for writing about me and Tom Rush. I've heard from people all over the globe responding to the article. Since the stuff on Wikipedia I was in The Johnny Winter Band for 6 years and one of the people responsible for getting him off prescription drugs during that time. I also was featured in a movie about Delta Blues with Morgan Freeman, Willie Nelson, Charlie Musslewhite and others. I currently have 2 documentaries I Co-Produced, one about James Cotton that was one of 5 finalists in The Library of Congress Ken Burns Prize for Film, and another about my brother Jeffrey, an LGBTQ warrior who fought so diligently for Gay Rights that he ended up on the Aryan Nation hit-list (they actually tried to kill him a few times). Anyway, I continue to play out, have never stopped and never will. Thanks again for your kind words. Means a lot to me!
James Montgomery
www.jamesmontgomerybluesband.com
mail@jamesmontgomery.com
Grammy Nominated with Johnny Winter
Rhode Island Music Hall of Fame
New England Music Hall of Fame
Co-Producer: Bonnie Blue – James Cotton's Life in the Blues
Co-Producer: America You Kill Me – Jeffrey Montgomery LGBTQ Warrior
____________________________________
Subject: James montgomery/Duke and The Drivers
Bob,
I could not have been happier to Read what you had to say about James Montgomery. Early in my career I was given the wonderful opportunity to help James Montgomery first as a booking agent, and then as a manager. I felt exactly as you did about him.
I spent five years trying to convince the music industry and the world in general about the authenticity and incredible performances James Montgomery consistently delivered. It was an uphill battle.
Much like being the skipper of a classic sailing yacht — authentic, soulful, and original — in the era of MTV and the other converging forces of disco, rap, etc., James Montgomery got lost in the shuffle.
But James never lost his originality, and he never stopped playing. As a manager, it was tough to pull James away from playing benefits and giving back to his community at a time when it really wasn't affordable for him. He didn't care. James is the real deal.
Your mention of Duke and the Drivers, though, saddened me greatly. A lot of us worked diligently for "The Drivers" as they personified everything you could want in a hardworking band. I worked for their manager Peter Casperson and was eventually privileged to handle their first reunion tour in my own company.
Without Duke and The Drivers and James Montgomery, I don't think there would have been an Aerosmith reunion. I got to learn the ropes from those guys and actually met Joe Perry through The Drivers' drummer Danny "Doc" McGrath. The ties that bind Bostonian musicians and music industry folks run deep.
Perhaps it was an off night for them - or for a college aged Bob. I hope you know I have always maintained my respect for you even during times when I felt you were "off the mark".
I do think they deserve more respect than the all too current easily thrown out label "loser" ...
Tim Collins
(Note: As evidenced by Tim Swift's e-mail in the "Re-James Montgomery" mailbag, Duke and the Drivers were a developing band when they played at Middlebury, sans even an album release. Winter Carnival is the biggest event at Middlebury, however small that may be, and to have an unknown, developing band be the talent...wouldn't you be disappointed, especially with a history of shows by name/recognizable talent at prior Carnivals? Duke and the Drivers were not bad, they were okay, but they had the smallest attendance of any show at Middlebury while I was there. Maybe a great band at the advent of its development, but wouldn't you expect more? I certainly did. Ultimately, this is about the infrequent and lame shows we got at Middlebury, not Duke and the Drivers. Sure, Duke and the Drivers might have been hot on the club scene in Boston...but we didn't even have a club scene!)
____________________________________
From: Peter Van Ness
Subject: RE: James Montgomery?!
Well...I'm catching up on your letters (that's right I binge them) and come across this one about my friend James Montgomery. Thanks for giving him some ink. He deserves it. My wife and I hosted his "70th Birthday Bash" concert in May, 2019 at our little club north of Boston, called 9 Wallis (it didn't survive the lockdown).
____________________________________
Subject: Re: Re-James Montgomery
Bob,
Thanks for the shout out about one of my oldest friends...James Montgomery..in 1967 my parents dropped me off at the Boston University dorms...after they left I decided to go down to the street and light up a joint...on the way down the elevator opened and this guy wearing a tweed jacket with leather patches on the elbows, like some professor, got in and it was James Montgomery... the first person I ever met at school !!! We shared that joint and over the years became best friends, housemates and really like family...He is an amazing survivor!!! he has been doing this for over 50 years... and one hell of a harp player.....
As far as "Duke and The Drivers"...I was their road manager right around their first record produced by Eddie Kramer at Electric Ladyland in NYC...Although they were not the kind of name like James in Northern New England... in the Boston area they were a big draw...WBCN took them under their wing and played their great cover of Eddie Bo's "Check Your Bucket" as a tape...their shows were raucous and great energy... the covers they did were some real R&B gems.by bands like "Dyke and the Blazers"...crowds loved them... they recently released new mixes some of their old tunes and Joe Lilly know as "Sam Deluxe" has a great roots band called "The Mystics"...man did you bring back some memories of my days in Boston.....
Peter Wassyng
____________________________________
From: Holly Knight
Subject: Re: Re-My Hometown
Hi Bob
I loved your story about Fairfield .After growing up in NYC- Manhattan to be exact, I moved to LA for my career and lived here for fifteen years before deciding I didn't want to raise my kids in LA. It was the year of the Rodney King beatings, THE EARTHQUAKE, and the Malibu mud slides. I think I told you that I did the unthinkable- Iike totally backasswards - I packed up all my things, and moved back east thinking how lovely it would be to experience the four seasons again- and be closer to my (dysfunctional family) cause after all NYC is in my DNA.
I moved to Fairfield- specifically the Greenfield Hill area which is affluent and waspy but very beautiful. Three and a half years later and I wanted to slit my throat…especially after I went back to LA and saw kids in shorts playing in the school yard in January - and I said- why did I leave here? So I put my house on the market and moved back - 25 years ago. In the beginning all of my east coast diehard New Yorker friends said LA was lame, plastic and phony. And gee, they all live here now. When I need a dose of grit and film noir I go back east to visit, but honestly after a week I'm so ready to come home and take my bike on the beach path. And yeah, I wouldn't want to have grown up anywhere else. Now my favorite people are native east coasters that have moved out here and wouldn't want to live anywhere else.
____________________________________
From: James Spencer
Subject: Re: Re-My Hometown
Imagine our shock and disbelief, when family friends told us that they saw our beloved family home in the local (rural Arkansas) newspaper..
It was busted for being a METH LAB..
I drove those tiny streets a few years ago, in town for a funeral..Once proud houses were condemned..Yet people were still living in them..
The farming business had gone belly-up, and religion and meth had become the mainstays.
This isn't that idyllic quaint small town you'll hear about on country radio..That's pure fantasy..
Of course (The Boss's) "My Father's House" can't be touched for its poignancy..
But Miranda Lambert's "The House That Built Me" comes in a close second..
She's the real deal..An outlaw/rock star..She does HER..Suits be damned..Her work is anything but cookie cutter..Her Vegas show is fantastic, too..She rocks hard, sans the artificial sweetener so prevalent in Nashville pop..
Why can't we have more country acts like her?
No one has her BALLS..
"The House That Built Me": https://youtu.be/DQYNM6SjD_o
____________________________________
From: Cob Carlson
Subject: Re: Re-My Hometown
"Bridgeport is Listed as One of Top 5 Booming Cities, According to Today Show": https://tinyurl.com/yexs4xj2
____________________________________
Subject: Re: Re-My Hometown
Bob: Long time reader. A friend once said to me, "You can always go home, but you can't stay."
Marty Hecker
Denver, CO (originally from Green Bay)
____________________________________
Subject: Re: Definition Of A Rock Star
Politicians are described as "Rock stars."
Athletes are described as "Rock stars."
A child learning how to ride a bicycle is a "rock star."
You name it. I'll give up there.
In other words, three chord velvet glory has gone into the mists of time.
Jumping Jack flashes no more.
No lemon juice is squeezed down anybody's leg.
We still have the vinyl to prove our allegiance to rock 'n' roll & our glorious memories.
Michael Des Barres.
____________________________________
From: Tony Dimitriades
Subject: Re: Definition Of A Rock Star
"Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers - For Real"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gy_1FHjnI40
"Tom Petty | What If You Had A Dream Documentary - Songwriting, MTV videos, Success, Longevity"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v38g_qdckMU
____________________________________
Roberto, my newfound friend.
I loved every minute/hour of our conversation.
Absolutely one of my favorite interviews of all time. I love the way you conduct an interview. Your knowledge of the industry and your obvious intelligence make a person like myself just uncomfortable enough to stay focused, dig deep, stay honest, & be respectful.
I sincerely thank you for giving me the opportunity to tell my story knowing it will be presented the way I would want it to be presented.
Let me know if I can ever do something for you Bob
Sammy
PS: Finished the whole podcast. I love the second half of this podcast as much as any interview I've ever done. It's my book written in shorthand. And not that short by the way! You certainly know how to get a lot of information in a short amount of time.
____________________________________
In response to e-mail from listeners loving the podcast:
Well who coulda thunk that those four hours would be that entertaining for anyone else to listen to as opposed to being as boring as watching a truck rust… which is what my fear was about all my ramblings after we finished that night! Thanks again for having me on Bob and let me know if you want to finish as Paul Harvey would say "the rest of the story." Thanks also for passing along that email.
Best,
Dwight
--
Visit the archive: http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/
--
Listen to the podcast:
-iHeart: https://ihr.fm/2Gi5PFj
-Apple: https://apple.co/2ndmpvp
--
http://www.twitter.com/lefsetz
--
If you would like to subscribe to the LefsetzLetter,
http://www.lefsetz.com/lists/?p=subscribe&id=1
If you do not want to receive any more LefsetzLetters, http://lefsetz.com/lists/?p=unsubscribe&uid=0eecea7b60b461717065cbde887c8e25
To change your email address http://lefsetz.com/lists/?p=preferences&uid=0eecea7b60b461717065cbde887c8e25
Subject: Thank you
Bob, Thank you so much for writing about me and Tom Rush. I've heard from people all over the globe responding to the article. Since the stuff on Wikipedia I was in The Johnny Winter Band for 6 years and one of the people responsible for getting him off prescription drugs during that time. I also was featured in a movie about Delta Blues with Morgan Freeman, Willie Nelson, Charlie Musslewhite and others. I currently have 2 documentaries I Co-Produced, one about James Cotton that was one of 5 finalists in The Library of Congress Ken Burns Prize for Film, and another about my brother Jeffrey, an LGBTQ warrior who fought so diligently for Gay Rights that he ended up on the Aryan Nation hit-list (they actually tried to kill him a few times). Anyway, I continue to play out, have never stopped and never will. Thanks again for your kind words. Means a lot to me!
James Montgomery
www.jamesmontgomerybluesband.com
mail@jamesmontgomery.com
Grammy Nominated with Johnny Winter
Rhode Island Music Hall of Fame
New England Music Hall of Fame
Co-Producer: Bonnie Blue – James Cotton's Life in the Blues
Co-Producer: America You Kill Me – Jeffrey Montgomery LGBTQ Warrior
____________________________________
Subject: James montgomery/Duke and The Drivers
Bob,
I could not have been happier to Read what you had to say about James Montgomery. Early in my career I was given the wonderful opportunity to help James Montgomery first as a booking agent, and then as a manager. I felt exactly as you did about him.
I spent five years trying to convince the music industry and the world in general about the authenticity and incredible performances James Montgomery consistently delivered. It was an uphill battle.
Much like being the skipper of a classic sailing yacht — authentic, soulful, and original — in the era of MTV and the other converging forces of disco, rap, etc., James Montgomery got lost in the shuffle.
But James never lost his originality, and he never stopped playing. As a manager, it was tough to pull James away from playing benefits and giving back to his community at a time when it really wasn't affordable for him. He didn't care. James is the real deal.
Your mention of Duke and the Drivers, though, saddened me greatly. A lot of us worked diligently for "The Drivers" as they personified everything you could want in a hardworking band. I worked for their manager Peter Casperson and was eventually privileged to handle their first reunion tour in my own company.
Without Duke and The Drivers and James Montgomery, I don't think there would have been an Aerosmith reunion. I got to learn the ropes from those guys and actually met Joe Perry through The Drivers' drummer Danny "Doc" McGrath. The ties that bind Bostonian musicians and music industry folks run deep.
Perhaps it was an off night for them - or for a college aged Bob. I hope you know I have always maintained my respect for you even during times when I felt you were "off the mark".
I do think they deserve more respect than the all too current easily thrown out label "loser" ...
Tim Collins
(Note: As evidenced by Tim Swift's e-mail in the "Re-James Montgomery" mailbag, Duke and the Drivers were a developing band when they played at Middlebury, sans even an album release. Winter Carnival is the biggest event at Middlebury, however small that may be, and to have an unknown, developing band be the talent...wouldn't you be disappointed, especially with a history of shows by name/recognizable talent at prior Carnivals? Duke and the Drivers were not bad, they were okay, but they had the smallest attendance of any show at Middlebury while I was there. Maybe a great band at the advent of its development, but wouldn't you expect more? I certainly did. Ultimately, this is about the infrequent and lame shows we got at Middlebury, not Duke and the Drivers. Sure, Duke and the Drivers might have been hot on the club scene in Boston...but we didn't even have a club scene!)
____________________________________
From: Peter Van Ness
Subject: RE: James Montgomery?!
Well...I'm catching up on your letters (that's right I binge them) and come across this one about my friend James Montgomery. Thanks for giving him some ink. He deserves it. My wife and I hosted his "70th Birthday Bash" concert in May, 2019 at our little club north of Boston, called 9 Wallis (it didn't survive the lockdown).
____________________________________
Subject: Re: Re-James Montgomery
Bob,
Thanks for the shout out about one of my oldest friends...James Montgomery..in 1967 my parents dropped me off at the Boston University dorms...after they left I decided to go down to the street and light up a joint...on the way down the elevator opened and this guy wearing a tweed jacket with leather patches on the elbows, like some professor, got in and it was James Montgomery... the first person I ever met at school !!! We shared that joint and over the years became best friends, housemates and really like family...He is an amazing survivor!!! he has been doing this for over 50 years... and one hell of a harp player.....
As far as "Duke and The Drivers"...I was their road manager right around their first record produced by Eddie Kramer at Electric Ladyland in NYC...Although they were not the kind of name like James in Northern New England... in the Boston area they were a big draw...WBCN took them under their wing and played their great cover of Eddie Bo's "Check Your Bucket" as a tape...their shows were raucous and great energy... the covers they did were some real R&B gems.by bands like "Dyke and the Blazers"...crowds loved them... they recently released new mixes some of their old tunes and Joe Lilly know as "Sam Deluxe" has a great roots band called "The Mystics"...man did you bring back some memories of my days in Boston.....
Peter Wassyng
____________________________________
From: Holly Knight
Subject: Re: Re-My Hometown
Hi Bob
I loved your story about Fairfield .After growing up in NYC- Manhattan to be exact, I moved to LA for my career and lived here for fifteen years before deciding I didn't want to raise my kids in LA. It was the year of the Rodney King beatings, THE EARTHQUAKE, and the Malibu mud slides. I think I told you that I did the unthinkable- Iike totally backasswards - I packed up all my things, and moved back east thinking how lovely it would be to experience the four seasons again- and be closer to my (dysfunctional family) cause after all NYC is in my DNA.
I moved to Fairfield- specifically the Greenfield Hill area which is affluent and waspy but very beautiful. Three and a half years later and I wanted to slit my throat…especially after I went back to LA and saw kids in shorts playing in the school yard in January - and I said- why did I leave here? So I put my house on the market and moved back - 25 years ago. In the beginning all of my east coast diehard New Yorker friends said LA was lame, plastic and phony. And gee, they all live here now. When I need a dose of grit and film noir I go back east to visit, but honestly after a week I'm so ready to come home and take my bike on the beach path. And yeah, I wouldn't want to have grown up anywhere else. Now my favorite people are native east coasters that have moved out here and wouldn't want to live anywhere else.
____________________________________
From: James Spencer
Subject: Re: Re-My Hometown
Imagine our shock and disbelief, when family friends told us that they saw our beloved family home in the local (rural Arkansas) newspaper..
It was busted for being a METH LAB..
I drove those tiny streets a few years ago, in town for a funeral..Once proud houses were condemned..Yet people were still living in them..
The farming business had gone belly-up, and religion and meth had become the mainstays.
This isn't that idyllic quaint small town you'll hear about on country radio..That's pure fantasy..
Of course (The Boss's) "My Father's House" can't be touched for its poignancy..
But Miranda Lambert's "The House That Built Me" comes in a close second..
She's the real deal..An outlaw/rock star..She does HER..Suits be damned..Her work is anything but cookie cutter..Her Vegas show is fantastic, too..She rocks hard, sans the artificial sweetener so prevalent in Nashville pop..
Why can't we have more country acts like her?
No one has her BALLS..
"The House That Built Me": https://youtu.be/DQYNM6SjD_o
____________________________________
From: Cob Carlson
Subject: Re: Re-My Hometown
"Bridgeport is Listed as One of Top 5 Booming Cities, According to Today Show": https://tinyurl.com/yexs4xj2
____________________________________
Subject: Re: Re-My Hometown
Bob: Long time reader. A friend once said to me, "You can always go home, but you can't stay."
Marty Hecker
Denver, CO (originally from Green Bay)
____________________________________
Subject: Re: Definition Of A Rock Star
Politicians are described as "Rock stars."
Athletes are described as "Rock stars."
A child learning how to ride a bicycle is a "rock star."
You name it. I'll give up there.
In other words, three chord velvet glory has gone into the mists of time.
Jumping Jack flashes no more.
No lemon juice is squeezed down anybody's leg.
We still have the vinyl to prove our allegiance to rock 'n' roll & our glorious memories.
Michael Des Barres.
____________________________________
From: Tony Dimitriades
Subject: Re: Definition Of A Rock Star
"Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers - For Real"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gy_1FHjnI40
"Tom Petty | What If You Had A Dream Documentary - Songwriting, MTV videos, Success, Longevity"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v38g_qdckMU
____________________________________
Roberto, my newfound friend.
I loved every minute/hour of our conversation.
Absolutely one of my favorite interviews of all time. I love the way you conduct an interview. Your knowledge of the industry and your obvious intelligence make a person like myself just uncomfortable enough to stay focused, dig deep, stay honest, & be respectful.
I sincerely thank you for giving me the opportunity to tell my story knowing it will be presented the way I would want it to be presented.
Let me know if I can ever do something for you Bob
Sammy
PS: Finished the whole podcast. I love the second half of this podcast as much as any interview I've ever done. It's my book written in shorthand. And not that short by the way! You certainly know how to get a lot of information in a short amount of time.
____________________________________
In response to e-mail from listeners loving the podcast:
Well who coulda thunk that those four hours would be that entertaining for anyone else to listen to as opposed to being as boring as watching a truck rust… which is what my fear was about all my ramblings after we finished that night! Thanks again for having me on Bob and let me know if you want to finish as Paul Harvey would say "the rest of the story." Thanks also for passing along that email.
Best,
Dwight
--
Visit the archive: http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/
--
Listen to the podcast:
-iHeart: https://ihr.fm/2Gi5PFj
-Apple: https://apple.co/2ndmpvp
--
http://www.twitter.com/lefsetz
--
If you would like to subscribe to the LefsetzLetter,
http://www.lefsetz.com/lists/?p=subscribe&id=1
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Tuesday 11 July 2023
Re-My Hometown
Hey Bob,
As a fellow suburban escapee, I share your sentiments regarding the life from which I escaped. When Irving Azoff called and told John Baruck, and told him to "Grab the REO guys, and come to LA.", I semi-reluctantly packed up the smallest U-haul trailer available, and headed west. California was freedom, fun, and the center of the rock 'n roll universe. And I knew deep down that was where I needed to be.
That said, every time we play Chicago, we stay on the familiar Near North Side. I hit the streets and stroll down memory lane past all the little clubs where I used to perform pre-REO. I usually rent rent a car and drive out to the southwest suburb where I grew up, slow down as I roll through the neighborhood where I got my first kiss, the sports fields where we played pick-up games, (I was usually picked last.) Feelings flood my bloodstream as I retrace the steps from my old house, where both my parents lived to the end, along 52nd Ave to Rossi Music, where I learned to play the guitar. When the Beatles played Ed Sullivan, and I was the only kid in town who knew some chords, I went from dork to hero …overnight!
But I too had a sense that life had more for me than the white-bread suburbs of Chicago had to offer. Oak Lawn was a nice place to visit, but Californy was the place I oughta be. Still those trips to the old neighborhood have a way of grounding and resetting me like nowhere else.
Your stories always stir up my soul, and I thank you for that, Bob. Much love, kc
Kevin Cronin
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There's a line in one of the last episodes of The Wonder Years when Kevin Arnold is sent to the liquor store for ice or soda, while his parents were giving a Christmas Eve party. As he walked down the block, he remarked that he no longer knew who lived in each house. And he remembered that there was a time when he new the last name of each home owner, each kid's name, every dog's name and every cat's name. And he knew it would never be the same as that again.
Thanks,
James Starace
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Bob, I liked your post on the east coast. I grew up in LA and always wondered why people who were not from there loved it so much. I went on the road with Eddie Kendricks in 1975. 23 year old kid from Burbank, playing with the Detroit session musicians, the Funk Brothers, Uriel Jones and Eddie Willis. We did a week at Paul's Mall in Boston. I fell in love with the place, the city was so alive, to me Burbank could not even come close to the vibe of Boston.
Then in 1996 I moved to Massachusetts, I'm in the burbs and I know EXACTLY what you are talking about. I have been a stranger in a strange land ever since. Don't get me wrong I do like living here but it's in spite of the life around me, I look around sometimes at the neighbors and think that I am so glad I did not grow up here. Growing up in LA gave you a sense that anything was possible. It's a mind set that Californians have, east coasters have to conform and to dream outside the box? Fuhgeddaboudit! That's why everyone moves to LA! (and the weather of course haha)
Marty Walsh
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"It was like someone shrunk the neighborhood down to 3/4 size."
I just recently did a lecture at my Alma mater Oswego State University in upstate New York, and I took the time to visit my old neighborhood. My experience was exactly like yours. My grandparents even had a convenience store called Maloney's Superette, which is such a Syracuse landmark that the new Middle-Eastern owners haven't changed that name in nearly 40 years. My grandparents raised four kids on selling beer and penny candy at that place.
…and you were dead-on about the calcification of dreams in your hometown. Had I been able to have the music career I wanted in the 'Cuse, I probably wouldn't have ever left. But like you, I heard So Cal calling and needed to up my game at Musicians Institute in Hollywood. I packed up my bass and my dreams and never looked back.
-Christopher Maloney (US)
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I'm often moved by your letters, I find them smart, informative, and deeply considered. You have a gift. You make a dent in the universe.
I was moved by your visit to Fairfield, but honestly can't figure out why.
Maybe it's because I left Long Island for South Florida and on my rare trips "home" the place feels alien to me, like a cover of a favorite song that doesn't quite hit me like the original.
I miss the seasons, hate the heat, feel menaced by the tropics but don't miss the grayness of the northeast winters which made me long for either Southern California or Florida when I was a kid, and the world was all in front of me.
But like you, I long for a "center." I miss when facts mattered, when we had standards of behavior and it felt like we were at least loosely unified despite our differences.
I too long to make a difference, but your piece made my realize I traded one suburb for another. Mine is just hotter, more humid and now deeply red.
Jeff Perlman
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As a kid from a small town in upstate NY, this hits very close to home. When I left that small town for LA, I didn't know a single person west of the Mississippi, much less anyone in the entertainment biz. However, I knew that staying put was never a viable option for me. As Wayne Gretzky famously put it, "You miss 100% of the shots you don't take."
Glad we each get to put our own unique "dent in the universe"...
Jason Miller
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Good stuff again, Bob. I'm in the process of getting a place in California. My wife loves Carmel by the Sea.
I recently spent 5 weeks on Long Island looking at an opportunity there and I could feel the attitude about which you speak.
That wasn't the coast for this hillbilly from the Ozark mountains of Arkansas either.
Have a great week and keep making dents in the universe.
Blaine Leeds
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It can be an eerie haunting and uncomfortable feeling going back home if you've been away so long where you've made a life for yourself somewhere else. You're a stranger to that physical place you knew so well.
I left Cincinnati with my first wife and we subsequently divorced. I went to college in the south, married a southern woman and became an engineer. I got into a "profession." I have a son.
My family was merciless to me concerning my divorce and me getting into a profession. I have multiple college degrees and engineering licenses.
I actually own a home.
I stayed gone from my hometown, infrequently returning. My grandparents passed as did my parents.
My father's hobby was magic. He was a magician. There was a magic shop in Cincinnati that recently closed but, it was where my Pop and his buddies would hang.
On one of my trips back home I went in there and saw all the pictures of my father and his magic crew on the walls of that place as a memorial. It hit me hard that they were all passed, my family members too, everything all at once. It's like I experienced a huge painful shift in time. I began to cry and had to leave. It was very painful and uncomfortable.
Tim Pringle
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Damn, Bob. This hits home. I'm only 53 and left Northeast Ohio for Nashville 15 years ago. I wrote a second lyric/poem for "My Hometown" for an English class in undergrad at Kent State but I'll spare sharing it. I feel the same when I go back. No regrets. So many people I know there are living the same lives and it's sad. I'm no one but I'm living a life I never could have back there. I've played on the Ryman stage and I have a book coming out next month. I love the place but I'm so grateful I got out.
Steve McClain
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I left Stamford twice.Last time was 23 years ago.I want a pizza and a cannoli.But the west is the best.Stay well Bob,Ted Keane
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I left Grand Rapids, Mi, my hometown, when I graduated from High School. I have been back a very few times since leaving. There still are hazy memories of the good times. But all in all it is a very small place where people want to be a big fish in a small pond or are just hanging by a thread. You see a huge percentage of high paying auto manufacturing jobs are gone.
I am glad I left, it was never the place for me!
Mike Busch
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That was a beautifully told story of a return to your place. I could relate to every detail.
I grew up in Branford, CT. My parents are side by side at St Agnes Cemetery. All the names are different, but the experience of driving around and seeing the building fires the synapses of stories long forgotten.
We had one true love in common, on Wooster St in New Haven. Frank Pepe's Neapolitan Pizza. To this day when we return East, Pepe's is a must do. And perhaps like your first true love, no other pie has the same magic.
There are now numerous franchises of Frank Pepe throughout Connecticut and even near Boston.
We've also moved to the desert after a long radio career on both coasts. Seattle was home for 25 years.
And now that the literal final sunset looms near, life is all about meaningful moments with and for real people who care.
I've always appreciated what you do Bob. Thank you.
Bob Rivers
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Hi Bob. Like you I grew up in Fairfield. My recent film, THE GREATEST RADIO STATION IN THE WORLD, is about WPKN in Bridgeport. The station has moved from their 55 year plus home on the campus of the University of Bridgeport to downtown Bridgeport. Across the street there is Trattoria 'A Vucchella, a five star restaurant. Wish I could have taken you there for a knosh.
One block away is Miss Thelma's, a world class soul food joint. Another couple of blocks away is Berlinetta Brewing, making some of the best pilsner you'll ever taste. New artist lofts are being built. Positive things are happening to the city. Slow, yes, but definitely happening.
Thrilled you revisited Seaside Park, one of the most scenic park combos of beach, lighthouse and playing fields you'll find on the East Coast. All ethnicities recreating on a daily basis.
Head west on US 1 and you'll come to the Black Rock section of the city. Terrific restaurants and the new Park City Music Hall, which has just got the local music scene exploding. And the upcoming "Porch Fest" is an absolute delight with musicians of all ilks playing on neighborhood front porches.
I hope you drove around downtown Fairfield and the beach area. In the summer it is kinda like Cali, your turf. Folks are active...bicycling, walking, skating, scootering...there is a definite energetic buzz. And Sacred Heart University bought and renovated the old Community Theater where they showcase films, live theater, and live music. In the building behind the Community sits FTC, a two stage venue that presents national music acts every week.
So, like you, even though I got out of Fairfield, in my case to work in the world of documentary film in Boston, I'm considering moving back to the home turf. Really good artistic and cultural stuff is blooming there. And a great food scene with the best pizza in the world.
Peace...
Cob Carlson
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Both my parents attended grad school at Brandeis, and my first home was down the street in Waltham, MA. We'd do Passover Seder in Queens and see the sights in NYC when I was growing up. So, I was up and down from Boston to NY frequently, and it never dawned on me how backward Connecticut was, stuck on I-95 in the middle. I lived in Burlington VT from 85-88, and by far the most broken, un-diverse place in New England is CT. I operated a business in Fairfield Center from 1990-2000, and I am forever grateful for that journey, I learned so much. But as you said, I also escaped, and I am even more thankful for that.
Micah Sheveloff
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Bob---In 1959, when I was 13, my family moved from Woodmere, Long Island (just outside Queens) to Westport. To me, we might as well have moved to Iowa.
Still, I got used to it. Now, 60 years later when I occasionally journey back to Woodmere and walk around (Woodmere is small and walkable), it looks weird and I feel like you felt when revisiting Fairfield.
Anyway, when I was 16 in Westport, some friends and I fell in with some kids from Roger Ludlowe. Westport and Fairfield kids partied together, swimming in the river at Devil's Den (Weston) and Falls Hole (Redding), and dancing at two Westchester roadhouses north of Stamford, the Hearth and the Three Pines.
We all hung out at Cindy's, a diner in Fairfield on the Post Road at the corner of Unquowa Road. Made out in the Community Theater balcony, or at the two drive-in theaters on the Bridgeport line.
Although the two towns differed markedly (Westport a celebrity enclave and Fairfield semi-tough) we hit it off and had memorable times together.
Paul Lanning
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Still miss CT this time of year.
Marth Winsch
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Funny my wife has been visiting her fam and old haunts in westport last several days
We often talk about those who stay or move back home. It's a different wiring I think than those who leave for LA (best choice by far) and NYC
If u see a 15yo who looks like me flying back to la w my wife tomorrow early morn on AA say hi
Evan Harrison
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hi Bob...i always love these columns when you talk about Fairfield...like you, it was a town I couldn't wait to leave when I was young but every now and then I have really good memories of friends, family and experiences...I hope you are well. Bob Dranoff
Dr. Robert Dranoff
Commissioner
East Coast Conference NCAA DIVISION II
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I too am from Fairfield, and went to Fairfield Woods when it was a Jr. High (82-84) and then to Andrew Warde HS and in my senior year we were the first year of the new 'history' becoming Fairfield High School, and the Mustangs. (I lived near Lake Mohegan in a neighborhood that was built in 1973 when my parents bought the house.) I have continued to come back to Fairfield in the decades since I left, as my father lived down the street from another landmark liquor store, Harry's Liquor Warehouse, just off of the Post Road as Fairfield becomes Southport becomes Westport. (He ended up there following my parents divorce).
I know exactly what you mean about the standards and expectations there. Had I followed the path that my parents suggested- I would have ended up at Pfizer or Met Life- they were both successful in those industries, and had connections I could have exploited to leap right into the upper middle class. Had I been very successful, I may have been lucky enough to purchase a home just like you describe, despite the fact that in Fairfield they are literally double or triple the cost of most places in the country.
Like you, I fled Fairfield and New England- my landing place ended up being in Eugene OR instead of California, but not too far from your experience I'm guessing, and I'm a bit younger than you. I too felt the need to strike out from a corporate and conformist lifestyle- and was able to build a booking agency and now I spend my time producing shows and acquiring them for my clients.
I do feel pretty strongly that the very skills that I needed to be successful at not conforming to the Fairfield life path, were learned and earned right there in Fairfield. How did a kid Bar Mitzvah'd off of Stratfield Rd in Fairfield end up in rural New England, running a meshuggenah music agency? Likely because of the confidence that I gained there, and the quality education and bucolic yet civilized surroundings of that area.
I'm a little sad like you that I have lost a primary reason to visit Fairfield, my Mom moved from there around 1992 or so to Florida, and my father passed almost three years ago. I do still have a lot of friends in the area that are helping me to keep Fairfield in my peripheral vision.
I'm always amused at the similarity of our upbringing.
Phil Simon - Simon Says Booking
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Good one, Bob.
I've had a similar experience but NJ to NYC.
Jack Morer
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I think the old adage "You can't go back" is incorrect.
You CAN go back.
It's just maybe you shouldn't.
Mark Hudson
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Thanks for sharing --- I can identify with a lot of what you wrote --- very true. East vs. West ---
R. Lowenstein
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Did that trip back once… got to leave twice!
Keep giving,
Terry Gottschalk
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This resonated with me Bob. All the same we never really leave the town we were born in.
Mike Howard
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I grew up down 91 from you in Longmeadow, Massachusetts, first exit in Massachusetts north of Hartford. I'll be 69 in a few weeks so we are of the same generation.
I am wondering if you remember the Shaperos of Fairfield? They were my cousins. Sanford Shapero was the rabbi in town until he took the pulpit of a major reform synagogue in Beverly Hills. My brothers and I were awestruck by the stories of our beautiful cousin Andy hanging with stars and especially musicians. We would drive down to Fairfield once a month as my grandmother relocated there to be near her daughter, the rabbi's wife. As the years passed their family fell apart, Sandy left the rabbinate and became executive director of the City of Hope in LA.
In any case your musings often closely parallel my own experiences, family, cultural etc. We probably saw some shows together.....Mountain and Johnny Winter at Quininpiac College in High School? My first Dead show was July 1971 at Yale Bowl. The entire crowd was given spiked cool aide.
Bands like NRBQ, Clean Living, Fat.....those were the days.
I was the staff cartoonist for the Valley Advocate. Anyway, nice to trip down memory lane with you....even in 3/4 scale.
Best regards
Jonathan.
Jonathan Plotkin
Chief Imagination Officer
The Spontoonist
www.spontoonist.com
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A similar story…
Last September, I returned to Massachusetts' North Shore, where I grew up in the '60s. My favorite drive from Logan, up Rte 1A, through my hometown of Salem and on to Rte. 127 up through Rockport, where I used to titillate the coeds from Endicott Junior College, from my high school senior year until I left for the Navy after a fruitless freshman year at Colorado State. That was my turf. High school dances featuring Teddy & the Pandas - a killer cover band that had 2 top ten hits on WMEX radio in Boston in '66 & opened for The Dave Clark Five at Boston Garden. We had Devereaux Beach in Marblehead & Singing Beach in Manchester. Woodman's 'eat in the rough' in Essex for lobster rolls and fried clams, Treadwell's Ice Cream for the best hot fudge sundaes.
In the summer of '65, I ventured into Harvard Square to the well-known Club 47 to see and hear The Paul Butterfield Blues Band with Mike Bloomfield for the first time. This was before FM radio made its way into our consciousness. The folkies brought them to my attention from the Newport Folk Festival, the Bob Dylan connection and who could be more 'in the know'. Bloomfield's Les Paul & Butter's blues harp blew me away - the seminal event in my passion for period rock. From August '68 to February '69, I saw Hendrix first, then Cream in October, followed by Led Zeppelin's 1st tour in February and a week later, The Jeff Back Group with Rod Stewart. I'm still gobsmacked that I saw Jimi, EC, Page & Beck in a span of 6 months while stationed outside Chicago in the Navy.
After college, I moved to San Francisco, launching a career in radio, tv and recording tech. Not long after, I moved to New York City to join ABC TV Network. Then back to the Bay Area, down to Calabasas and up to Portland, OR to follow the tech migration. The next 11 years I spent in Beijing, notching my 4th Olympics as a tech in '08. Along the way, I saw The Stones' and Clapton's 1st shows in China - both in Shanghai - not to mention both acts separately in Japan multiple times.
I've lived in Las Vegas for the past 13 years, enjoying a more quiet life phase. But that recent trip to Boston's North Shore struck a chord. All the old haunts have evolved - not for the better. People are less polite than I recall. Pretension abounds without foundation. Theirs is a smaller world, despite the hoopla of the New England tech corridor. They ain't seen nothin' until they witness a sunset at Malibu, or an Irish coffee at the Buena Vista in San Francisco. How homogenized our beautiful land has become.
These days, I yearn to return to Europe - one of my past sales territories. But these days, on my dime - my chosen destinations for whatever interval I determine. Burgundy and Tuscany in the past 14 months. Bordeaux, Spain and Portugal on tap, with a taste of Nova Scotia tossed in.
Through it all, there's that soundtrack playing, from 'East-West', 'Kind of Blue', Derek & the Dominos, Little Feat to Chet Baker, Keith Jarrett and, most recently, Buddhattitude.
Thanks for the trip down New England's memory lane...
Kevin Dauphinee
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Just got off work, and having my Irish coffee at home (the surf sucks, it's foggy, and I have all day to exercise). Anyway, an Irish coffee is my usual concoction that gets me in a writin mood.
Hometown.
Yeah. I used to look forward to going to my hometown every year around Christmas, even though my parents had moved away (late 90s, early 2000s). I had some really close friends there. It was always like a homecoming. I'd see people I knew in the bars. We would kick it and play music at a friend's house. But then a lot of people also moved away. Now, if/when I connect with someone on Insta (I gave up FB in 2011) from home, they are all complete MAGA sheep. Hey man, I get it, we all got our tribes. But if your tribe can't even acknowledge climate change, or that the leader is a crook/con man/liar, then I got no time for you. So, I never go back to my hometown any more. I don't care where I'm buried, or if I'm buried. When you're dead, you're dead. I have some paintings and drawings I've made. And guitars. They will last longer and be more practical, as something my family can remember me by, than a plot of grass and a stone grave marker. Not to mention the funeral/casket biz is nothing but a racket anyway.
Chris Flesher
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At some point I wanted to move away. But the thought of living on top or in between other people where I didn't have a yard in a city was not negotiable.
I also played softball, hockey still make original music, write for the regional newspaper and had a family.
Maybe Mellencamp was right
"I was born in a small town , and I live in a small town, probably die in the small town, oh those small communities"
John Emms
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Enjoyed reading that Bob. We were very lucky to have the era's that we did. Not putting down the future and present, but it's mind-blowing the talent that has flown through the years. I think in the future they will refer to the 60 years from 1950 to 2010 as a golden delicious apple for music, artists, actors and the arts. Steve Jobs included. I for one, born in '59, would not have wanted to have missed it.
Simon & Garfunkel "America" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eo2ZsAOlvEM
Eddie Gordon
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Good one!
I felt your disappointment.
Fact is NOTHING is the same. How could it be?
We grew up at the best of times. Best Music, sex didn't kill you, drugs were weed and acid and beer and Boones Farm . haha NO one died and there was almost zero violence. You might get youir ass kicked at the flag pole after cschool. You HAD to show up no matter what
Have a good one my friend
Luke
(Steve Lukather)
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From a reader:
Someone told me: If Columbus had landed on the West Coast of the United States, New England would still be uninhabited.
As a fellow suburban escapee, I share your sentiments regarding the life from which I escaped. When Irving Azoff called and told John Baruck, and told him to "Grab the REO guys, and come to LA.", I semi-reluctantly packed up the smallest U-haul trailer available, and headed west. California was freedom, fun, and the center of the rock 'n roll universe. And I knew deep down that was where I needed to be.
That said, every time we play Chicago, we stay on the familiar Near North Side. I hit the streets and stroll down memory lane past all the little clubs where I used to perform pre-REO. I usually rent rent a car and drive out to the southwest suburb where I grew up, slow down as I roll through the neighborhood where I got my first kiss, the sports fields where we played pick-up games, (I was usually picked last.) Feelings flood my bloodstream as I retrace the steps from my old house, where both my parents lived to the end, along 52nd Ave to Rossi Music, where I learned to play the guitar. When the Beatles played Ed Sullivan, and I was the only kid in town who knew some chords, I went from dork to hero …overnight!
But I too had a sense that life had more for me than the white-bread suburbs of Chicago had to offer. Oak Lawn was a nice place to visit, but Californy was the place I oughta be. Still those trips to the old neighborhood have a way of grounding and resetting me like nowhere else.
Your stories always stir up my soul, and I thank you for that, Bob. Much love, kc
Kevin Cronin
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There's a line in one of the last episodes of The Wonder Years when Kevin Arnold is sent to the liquor store for ice or soda, while his parents were giving a Christmas Eve party. As he walked down the block, he remarked that he no longer knew who lived in each house. And he remembered that there was a time when he new the last name of each home owner, each kid's name, every dog's name and every cat's name. And he knew it would never be the same as that again.
Thanks,
James Starace
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Bob, I liked your post on the east coast. I grew up in LA and always wondered why people who were not from there loved it so much. I went on the road with Eddie Kendricks in 1975. 23 year old kid from Burbank, playing with the Detroit session musicians, the Funk Brothers, Uriel Jones and Eddie Willis. We did a week at Paul's Mall in Boston. I fell in love with the place, the city was so alive, to me Burbank could not even come close to the vibe of Boston.
Then in 1996 I moved to Massachusetts, I'm in the burbs and I know EXACTLY what you are talking about. I have been a stranger in a strange land ever since. Don't get me wrong I do like living here but it's in spite of the life around me, I look around sometimes at the neighbors and think that I am so glad I did not grow up here. Growing up in LA gave you a sense that anything was possible. It's a mind set that Californians have, east coasters have to conform and to dream outside the box? Fuhgeddaboudit! That's why everyone moves to LA! (and the weather of course haha)
Marty Walsh
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"It was like someone shrunk the neighborhood down to 3/4 size."
I just recently did a lecture at my Alma mater Oswego State University in upstate New York, and I took the time to visit my old neighborhood. My experience was exactly like yours. My grandparents even had a convenience store called Maloney's Superette, which is such a Syracuse landmark that the new Middle-Eastern owners haven't changed that name in nearly 40 years. My grandparents raised four kids on selling beer and penny candy at that place.
…and you were dead-on about the calcification of dreams in your hometown. Had I been able to have the music career I wanted in the 'Cuse, I probably wouldn't have ever left. But like you, I heard So Cal calling and needed to up my game at Musicians Institute in Hollywood. I packed up my bass and my dreams and never looked back.
-Christopher Maloney (US)
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I'm often moved by your letters, I find them smart, informative, and deeply considered. You have a gift. You make a dent in the universe.
I was moved by your visit to Fairfield, but honestly can't figure out why.
Maybe it's because I left Long Island for South Florida and on my rare trips "home" the place feels alien to me, like a cover of a favorite song that doesn't quite hit me like the original.
I miss the seasons, hate the heat, feel menaced by the tropics but don't miss the grayness of the northeast winters which made me long for either Southern California or Florida when I was a kid, and the world was all in front of me.
But like you, I long for a "center." I miss when facts mattered, when we had standards of behavior and it felt like we were at least loosely unified despite our differences.
I too long to make a difference, but your piece made my realize I traded one suburb for another. Mine is just hotter, more humid and now deeply red.
Jeff Perlman
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As a kid from a small town in upstate NY, this hits very close to home. When I left that small town for LA, I didn't know a single person west of the Mississippi, much less anyone in the entertainment biz. However, I knew that staying put was never a viable option for me. As Wayne Gretzky famously put it, "You miss 100% of the shots you don't take."
Glad we each get to put our own unique "dent in the universe"...
Jason Miller
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Good stuff again, Bob. I'm in the process of getting a place in California. My wife loves Carmel by the Sea.
I recently spent 5 weeks on Long Island looking at an opportunity there and I could feel the attitude about which you speak.
That wasn't the coast for this hillbilly from the Ozark mountains of Arkansas either.
Have a great week and keep making dents in the universe.
Blaine Leeds
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It can be an eerie haunting and uncomfortable feeling going back home if you've been away so long where you've made a life for yourself somewhere else. You're a stranger to that physical place you knew so well.
I left Cincinnati with my first wife and we subsequently divorced. I went to college in the south, married a southern woman and became an engineer. I got into a "profession." I have a son.
My family was merciless to me concerning my divorce and me getting into a profession. I have multiple college degrees and engineering licenses.
I actually own a home.
I stayed gone from my hometown, infrequently returning. My grandparents passed as did my parents.
My father's hobby was magic. He was a magician. There was a magic shop in Cincinnati that recently closed but, it was where my Pop and his buddies would hang.
On one of my trips back home I went in there and saw all the pictures of my father and his magic crew on the walls of that place as a memorial. It hit me hard that they were all passed, my family members too, everything all at once. It's like I experienced a huge painful shift in time. I began to cry and had to leave. It was very painful and uncomfortable.
Tim Pringle
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Damn, Bob. This hits home. I'm only 53 and left Northeast Ohio for Nashville 15 years ago. I wrote a second lyric/poem for "My Hometown" for an English class in undergrad at Kent State but I'll spare sharing it. I feel the same when I go back. No regrets. So many people I know there are living the same lives and it's sad. I'm no one but I'm living a life I never could have back there. I've played on the Ryman stage and I have a book coming out next month. I love the place but I'm so grateful I got out.
Steve McClain
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I left Stamford twice.Last time was 23 years ago.I want a pizza and a cannoli.But the west is the best.Stay well Bob,Ted Keane
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I left Grand Rapids, Mi, my hometown, when I graduated from High School. I have been back a very few times since leaving. There still are hazy memories of the good times. But all in all it is a very small place where people want to be a big fish in a small pond or are just hanging by a thread. You see a huge percentage of high paying auto manufacturing jobs are gone.
I am glad I left, it was never the place for me!
Mike Busch
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That was a beautifully told story of a return to your place. I could relate to every detail.
I grew up in Branford, CT. My parents are side by side at St Agnes Cemetery. All the names are different, but the experience of driving around and seeing the building fires the synapses of stories long forgotten.
We had one true love in common, on Wooster St in New Haven. Frank Pepe's Neapolitan Pizza. To this day when we return East, Pepe's is a must do. And perhaps like your first true love, no other pie has the same magic.
There are now numerous franchises of Frank Pepe throughout Connecticut and even near Boston.
We've also moved to the desert after a long radio career on both coasts. Seattle was home for 25 years.
And now that the literal final sunset looms near, life is all about meaningful moments with and for real people who care.
I've always appreciated what you do Bob. Thank you.
Bob Rivers
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Hi Bob. Like you I grew up in Fairfield. My recent film, THE GREATEST RADIO STATION IN THE WORLD, is about WPKN in Bridgeport. The station has moved from their 55 year plus home on the campus of the University of Bridgeport to downtown Bridgeport. Across the street there is Trattoria 'A Vucchella, a five star restaurant. Wish I could have taken you there for a knosh.
One block away is Miss Thelma's, a world class soul food joint. Another couple of blocks away is Berlinetta Brewing, making some of the best pilsner you'll ever taste. New artist lofts are being built. Positive things are happening to the city. Slow, yes, but definitely happening.
Thrilled you revisited Seaside Park, one of the most scenic park combos of beach, lighthouse and playing fields you'll find on the East Coast. All ethnicities recreating on a daily basis.
Head west on US 1 and you'll come to the Black Rock section of the city. Terrific restaurants and the new Park City Music Hall, which has just got the local music scene exploding. And the upcoming "Porch Fest" is an absolute delight with musicians of all ilks playing on neighborhood front porches.
I hope you drove around downtown Fairfield and the beach area. In the summer it is kinda like Cali, your turf. Folks are active...bicycling, walking, skating, scootering...there is a definite energetic buzz. And Sacred Heart University bought and renovated the old Community Theater where they showcase films, live theater, and live music. In the building behind the Community sits FTC, a two stage venue that presents national music acts every week.
So, like you, even though I got out of Fairfield, in my case to work in the world of documentary film in Boston, I'm considering moving back to the home turf. Really good artistic and cultural stuff is blooming there. And a great food scene with the best pizza in the world.
Peace...
Cob Carlson
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Both my parents attended grad school at Brandeis, and my first home was down the street in Waltham, MA. We'd do Passover Seder in Queens and see the sights in NYC when I was growing up. So, I was up and down from Boston to NY frequently, and it never dawned on me how backward Connecticut was, stuck on I-95 in the middle. I lived in Burlington VT from 85-88, and by far the most broken, un-diverse place in New England is CT. I operated a business in Fairfield Center from 1990-2000, and I am forever grateful for that journey, I learned so much. But as you said, I also escaped, and I am even more thankful for that.
Micah Sheveloff
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Bob---In 1959, when I was 13, my family moved from Woodmere, Long Island (just outside Queens) to Westport. To me, we might as well have moved to Iowa.
Still, I got used to it. Now, 60 years later when I occasionally journey back to Woodmere and walk around (Woodmere is small and walkable), it looks weird and I feel like you felt when revisiting Fairfield.
Anyway, when I was 16 in Westport, some friends and I fell in with some kids from Roger Ludlowe. Westport and Fairfield kids partied together, swimming in the river at Devil's Den (Weston) and Falls Hole (Redding), and dancing at two Westchester roadhouses north of Stamford, the Hearth and the Three Pines.
We all hung out at Cindy's, a diner in Fairfield on the Post Road at the corner of Unquowa Road. Made out in the Community Theater balcony, or at the two drive-in theaters on the Bridgeport line.
Although the two towns differed markedly (Westport a celebrity enclave and Fairfield semi-tough) we hit it off and had memorable times together.
Paul Lanning
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Still miss CT this time of year.
Marth Winsch
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Funny my wife has been visiting her fam and old haunts in westport last several days
We often talk about those who stay or move back home. It's a different wiring I think than those who leave for LA (best choice by far) and NYC
If u see a 15yo who looks like me flying back to la w my wife tomorrow early morn on AA say hi
Evan Harrison
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hi Bob...i always love these columns when you talk about Fairfield...like you, it was a town I couldn't wait to leave when I was young but every now and then I have really good memories of friends, family and experiences...I hope you are well. Bob Dranoff
Dr. Robert Dranoff
Commissioner
East Coast Conference NCAA DIVISION II
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I too am from Fairfield, and went to Fairfield Woods when it was a Jr. High (82-84) and then to Andrew Warde HS and in my senior year we were the first year of the new 'history' becoming Fairfield High School, and the Mustangs. (I lived near Lake Mohegan in a neighborhood that was built in 1973 when my parents bought the house.) I have continued to come back to Fairfield in the decades since I left, as my father lived down the street from another landmark liquor store, Harry's Liquor Warehouse, just off of the Post Road as Fairfield becomes Southport becomes Westport. (He ended up there following my parents divorce).
I know exactly what you mean about the standards and expectations there. Had I followed the path that my parents suggested- I would have ended up at Pfizer or Met Life- they were both successful in those industries, and had connections I could have exploited to leap right into the upper middle class. Had I been very successful, I may have been lucky enough to purchase a home just like you describe, despite the fact that in Fairfield they are literally double or triple the cost of most places in the country.
Like you, I fled Fairfield and New England- my landing place ended up being in Eugene OR instead of California, but not too far from your experience I'm guessing, and I'm a bit younger than you. I too felt the need to strike out from a corporate and conformist lifestyle- and was able to build a booking agency and now I spend my time producing shows and acquiring them for my clients.
I do feel pretty strongly that the very skills that I needed to be successful at not conforming to the Fairfield life path, were learned and earned right there in Fairfield. How did a kid Bar Mitzvah'd off of Stratfield Rd in Fairfield end up in rural New England, running a meshuggenah music agency? Likely because of the confidence that I gained there, and the quality education and bucolic yet civilized surroundings of that area.
I'm a little sad like you that I have lost a primary reason to visit Fairfield, my Mom moved from there around 1992 or so to Florida, and my father passed almost three years ago. I do still have a lot of friends in the area that are helping me to keep Fairfield in my peripheral vision.
I'm always amused at the similarity of our upbringing.
Phil Simon - Simon Says Booking
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Good one, Bob.
I've had a similar experience but NJ to NYC.
Jack Morer
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I think the old adage "You can't go back" is incorrect.
You CAN go back.
It's just maybe you shouldn't.
Mark Hudson
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Thanks for sharing --- I can identify with a lot of what you wrote --- very true. East vs. West ---
R. Lowenstein
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Did that trip back once… got to leave twice!
Keep giving,
Terry Gottschalk
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This resonated with me Bob. All the same we never really leave the town we were born in.
Mike Howard
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I grew up down 91 from you in Longmeadow, Massachusetts, first exit in Massachusetts north of Hartford. I'll be 69 in a few weeks so we are of the same generation.
I am wondering if you remember the Shaperos of Fairfield? They were my cousins. Sanford Shapero was the rabbi in town until he took the pulpit of a major reform synagogue in Beverly Hills. My brothers and I were awestruck by the stories of our beautiful cousin Andy hanging with stars and especially musicians. We would drive down to Fairfield once a month as my grandmother relocated there to be near her daughter, the rabbi's wife. As the years passed their family fell apart, Sandy left the rabbinate and became executive director of the City of Hope in LA.
In any case your musings often closely parallel my own experiences, family, cultural etc. We probably saw some shows together.....Mountain and Johnny Winter at Quininpiac College in High School? My first Dead show was July 1971 at Yale Bowl. The entire crowd was given spiked cool aide.
Bands like NRBQ, Clean Living, Fat.....those were the days.
I was the staff cartoonist for the Valley Advocate. Anyway, nice to trip down memory lane with you....even in 3/4 scale.
Best regards
Jonathan.
Jonathan Plotkin
Chief Imagination Officer
The Spontoonist
www.spontoonist.com
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A similar story…
Last September, I returned to Massachusetts' North Shore, where I grew up in the '60s. My favorite drive from Logan, up Rte 1A, through my hometown of Salem and on to Rte. 127 up through Rockport, where I used to titillate the coeds from Endicott Junior College, from my high school senior year until I left for the Navy after a fruitless freshman year at Colorado State. That was my turf. High school dances featuring Teddy & the Pandas - a killer cover band that had 2 top ten hits on WMEX radio in Boston in '66 & opened for The Dave Clark Five at Boston Garden. We had Devereaux Beach in Marblehead & Singing Beach in Manchester. Woodman's 'eat in the rough' in Essex for lobster rolls and fried clams, Treadwell's Ice Cream for the best hot fudge sundaes.
In the summer of '65, I ventured into Harvard Square to the well-known Club 47 to see and hear The Paul Butterfield Blues Band with Mike Bloomfield for the first time. This was before FM radio made its way into our consciousness. The folkies brought them to my attention from the Newport Folk Festival, the Bob Dylan connection and who could be more 'in the know'. Bloomfield's Les Paul & Butter's blues harp blew me away - the seminal event in my passion for period rock. From August '68 to February '69, I saw Hendrix first, then Cream in October, followed by Led Zeppelin's 1st tour in February and a week later, The Jeff Back Group with Rod Stewart. I'm still gobsmacked that I saw Jimi, EC, Page & Beck in a span of 6 months while stationed outside Chicago in the Navy.
After college, I moved to San Francisco, launching a career in radio, tv and recording tech. Not long after, I moved to New York City to join ABC TV Network. Then back to the Bay Area, down to Calabasas and up to Portland, OR to follow the tech migration. The next 11 years I spent in Beijing, notching my 4th Olympics as a tech in '08. Along the way, I saw The Stones' and Clapton's 1st shows in China - both in Shanghai - not to mention both acts separately in Japan multiple times.
I've lived in Las Vegas for the past 13 years, enjoying a more quiet life phase. But that recent trip to Boston's North Shore struck a chord. All the old haunts have evolved - not for the better. People are less polite than I recall. Pretension abounds without foundation. Theirs is a smaller world, despite the hoopla of the New England tech corridor. They ain't seen nothin' until they witness a sunset at Malibu, or an Irish coffee at the Buena Vista in San Francisco. How homogenized our beautiful land has become.
These days, I yearn to return to Europe - one of my past sales territories. But these days, on my dime - my chosen destinations for whatever interval I determine. Burgundy and Tuscany in the past 14 months. Bordeaux, Spain and Portugal on tap, with a taste of Nova Scotia tossed in.
Through it all, there's that soundtrack playing, from 'East-West', 'Kind of Blue', Derek & the Dominos, Little Feat to Chet Baker, Keith Jarrett and, most recently, Buddhattitude.
Thanks for the trip down New England's memory lane...
Kevin Dauphinee
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Just got off work, and having my Irish coffee at home (the surf sucks, it's foggy, and I have all day to exercise). Anyway, an Irish coffee is my usual concoction that gets me in a writin mood.
Hometown.
Yeah. I used to look forward to going to my hometown every year around Christmas, even though my parents had moved away (late 90s, early 2000s). I had some really close friends there. It was always like a homecoming. I'd see people I knew in the bars. We would kick it and play music at a friend's house. But then a lot of people also moved away. Now, if/when I connect with someone on Insta (I gave up FB in 2011) from home, they are all complete MAGA sheep. Hey man, I get it, we all got our tribes. But if your tribe can't even acknowledge climate change, or that the leader is a crook/con man/liar, then I got no time for you. So, I never go back to my hometown any more. I don't care where I'm buried, or if I'm buried. When you're dead, you're dead. I have some paintings and drawings I've made. And guitars. They will last longer and be more practical, as something my family can remember me by, than a plot of grass and a stone grave marker. Not to mention the funeral/casket biz is nothing but a racket anyway.
Chris Flesher
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At some point I wanted to move away. But the thought of living on top or in between other people where I didn't have a yard in a city was not negotiable.
I also played softball, hockey still make original music, write for the regional newspaper and had a family.
Maybe Mellencamp was right
"I was born in a small town , and I live in a small town, probably die in the small town, oh those small communities"
John Emms
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Enjoyed reading that Bob. We were very lucky to have the era's that we did. Not putting down the future and present, but it's mind-blowing the talent that has flown through the years. I think in the future they will refer to the 60 years from 1950 to 2010 as a golden delicious apple for music, artists, actors and the arts. Steve Jobs included. I for one, born in '59, would not have wanted to have missed it.
Simon & Garfunkel "America" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eo2ZsAOlvEM
Eddie Gordon
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Good one!
I felt your disappointment.
Fact is NOTHING is the same. How could it be?
We grew up at the best of times. Best Music, sex didn't kill you, drugs were weed and acid and beer and Boones Farm . haha NO one died and there was almost zero violence. You might get youir ass kicked at the flag pole after cschool. You HAD to show up no matter what
Have a good one my friend
Luke
(Steve Lukather)
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From a reader:
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Re-James Montgomery
Hi Bob,
Thanks for writing about James Montgomery Band. I had totally forgotten those guys. It was one of the first records I produced with Tom Dowd. We cut much of the record at Phil Walden's Capricorn studios in Macon – that was a long time ago.
Best,
--albhy galuten
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James went to the same HS as me here in Grosse Pointe, MI. He comes back from time to time. I have backed him up on local gigs and consider him a friend. His late brother Jeff was a local gay rights activist and his brother John was a VP at I think Epic? He has great stories of the record biz and the majors and he came home to raise a family.
James is a great entertainer, and has all kinds of showmanship! He toured heavily with Johnny Winter.
Thanks for bringing him up! That Capricorn record was a favorite when I was in HS!
RJ Spangler
Grosse Pointe Park
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I was a sophomore at Tufts University in the Fall of 1971 living in Carmichael Hall. It was an all men's dorm and the Animal House of Tufts.
I had seen James and his band at my friend's frat at MIT and was totally blown away by his act.
My roommate and I decided to try our hand at concert promotion, so we hired James and the band for $100 to play in the common room of the dorm. He absolutely killed it.
Over the years since, I have seen James many times and we always joke about that gig. He insists that we gave him $200 but I don't think so.
I do remember that the band came back to our room after the set and smoked at least $200 of weed, so maybe we are both right.
Cheers, Will Vogt
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I was on the concert committee at Penn State in the late 70s. Penn State is in the middle of nowhere but it's a big school so we managed to get good shows. I remember Van Morrison on the Wavelength tour with Rockpile opening. We had The Kinks, the Grateful Dead, the Jerry Garcia Band, David Grisman, Utopia, Hall and Oates, Poco (you didn't mention the excellent A Good Feeling to Know), Graham Nash, Graham Parker, John Hall, Ornette Coleman, Pat Metheny, Charlie Byrd, Talking Heads, Gregg Allman playing with the Nighthawks. We booked Elvis Costello on the Trust tour but there was a big snowstorm and they cancelled multiple dates. Speaking of Mahavishnu, we even had John McLaughlin, Al Di Meola, and Paco de Lucia. These are just the bookings I remember. I imagine I'm leaving out a few.
One of my favorite stories is about Bo Diddley. He was booked to play an outdoor music festival I was in charge of. He was a little prickly at first. The first thing he said was he wasn't going on until he was paid. He was great once I paid him.
Music is my passion. Live shows are the best. There is nothing like being anywhere in the building at a show. I wish I had had the courage to pursue a career in it.
Harold Love
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James is my neighbor. Super nice guy, I park my car behind his JMBB license plates often. Plays locally in Rhode Island and Connecticut frequently. He's still great!
Larry Webman
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Saw James and his hot band open for J Geils in Long Island around 1975. He plays free shows for the city of Boston every summer. Was just here a few weeks ago. Hasn't lost a step.
Check Your Bucket was played all the time by Stoneman on WPLR back in the day. Was sorry I never got to see Duke and The Drivers live but still play that record in the car.
Ira Sperling
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Pure magic, thanks for asking Tom to provide that gift. You left Midd a little too early. I got to see B.B. King and Jackson Browne in the chapel and the Rolling Thunder Revue at UVM.
Michael March '77
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When The Malibooz went to college, we changed our name to Sageworth. After college, Walter Egan took the band to Boston where they did many, many nights with James Montgomery band. James was the man on harp and I can see he still is. He used to wear a fishing utility belt when he performed. Each loop of the belt contained a different harp; that way he could switch keys very quickly and effortlessly. I've really never seen anyone else do that before or since.
By the way, Sageworth also did a bunch of shows with Duke and the drivers as well. I just saw Tom Swift from the band last September and the boys are still out doing it , there's no money in it anymore. We know that, but some people just do it for the magic.
Best,
John Zambetti
The Malibooz
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Hey Bob, when my band Sageworth played in Boston in 1972-73 we were managed by the same people who managed the James Montgomery Band. We got to see them close-up and get to know them. What a great band!
And James was always a great friend to us.
Thanks for giving him some notice.
Walter Egan
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You're right about how some of us got started in the music biz—and how loose it was. I got my start at Michigan State by becoming the poster artist for the student government's concert organization. Within a year, I was its chairman, running what was really a million dollar operation, booking and running dozens of shows every year. Other than being a pretty good poster artist, and a serious music freak, I had ZERO experience. Thankfully, my five years at the helm were quite successful and lots of fellow students and colleagues went on to make their marks in the music business. Those were the "daze."
PS. In fact, James Montgomery's brother, Jeff, was a member of that committee for awhile!
Hugh Surratt
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Saw James Montgomery in Omaha Ne in about 1976 or so opening for Jefferson Starship. His band blew me away . Ran out the next day to the local record shop in Lincoln Ne ( Dirt Cheap) and found his album (which I still have someplace) Listened to it a lot. Then like a lot of acts, never heard from him again. I think about that band a lot more than I should and now , thanks to you, I know the story. Great job ,Bob, finding these folks after all these years!
ceetee
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In my college days, 70-74, I was like a vacuum when it came building my LP collection. At the CCNY bookstore there were record bins which always attracted my attention, which is how I became one of the relatively few owners of the Live Yardbirds Featuring Jimmy Page LP before Peter Grant(?) had it quickly pulled from the shelves.
One day I saw two LPs that I decided to take a chance on. Already a devotee of Al Kooper, I picked up the eponymous Lynyrd Skynyrd, their first. Seeing his name and the album cover both intrigued me enough to drop ~$3.00 on it. And First Time Out by The James Montgomery Band. I knew nothing of either of these, but in those days that was merely a minor criterion.
And I couldn't get enough of either of these two discs, both exceptional. I really loved and still do love First Time Out, and figured this band would be going somewhere, although their followup was a disappointment and they soon disappeared from national exposure as I recall. But that initial release was something that my ears could not get enough of. Jump Blues I suppose is the category that it fell under. Pretty much most all the cuts were delicious and addictive, still to this day. This band knew how to lay down a bass groove and work from there.
One doesn't need to get past I'm Funky, But I'm Clean and/or Going Down to understand where they were coming from. But if this title is still available, please do yourself a favor, give a listen to the entire LP and you will be richly rewarded.
Alan Fishman
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I was a huge fan of the Allmans and anything on Capricorn records! The Capricorn release of JMB is one of my favorites. Back in the early 2,000s I was able to find and buy a copy of it on CD much to my delight! Hard rockin' blues and R&B. My favorite track starts at 11:30 "If You Want Me."
I saw them open for the Allmans in ~ 74 (?). Had never heard of em'. They jammed, and I do mean jammed on "Train" "Drive myself Crazy" and the other tunes. I couldn't believe how f*cking good these guys were. Incredible dynamics! They were killer!!! I was gob smacked…(!)
JMB "First Time Out" link below:
https://youtu.be/rtPB8uCYnrg
Tim Pringle
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The track I'm Funky But I'm Clean is pretty funky!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-EFW3pIjK18
Kevin Kiley
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I Can't Stop (No, No, No)
One of my favorites that a band I was in ages ago did. I'll spare you the cover, and I apologize for the quality. I couldn't find it anywhere other than my 30 year old iTunes rip.
Pamela Arnold
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Love the mention of college concert boards! College radio also a gateway drug to getting into the biz I'd have to guess...
My bridge/training wheels for the music biz was joining the Vanderbilt Programming Board committee in the fall of 05 to book Rites of Spring the next semester. Helping get my new (at the time) favorite band My Morning Jacket (currently still my favorite band half a life later) that year was (and still is) one of the peak experiences of my time here. A little known frat/bar circuit group called Zac Brown Band played very early in the same day. The next year I co-chaired and we had The Roots, Wolfmother, Drive-By Truckers, Amos Lee among others.
Fun tale: I was in a booking meeting when our grad advisor was going through booking inquiries / CD packages and asked the three of us running Rites booking if we wanted to sign up this virtually unknown teenage starlet with a demo single called "Tim McGraw" for pennies. We, being the ripeage of 20/21 or so, decided she was too young and in no way refined or hip enough for our highly developed music tastes/festival we envisioned and passed. Whoops.
I only lasted a few years in the music biz before moving on to my current world/industry, but look back at that whole experience above everything else I was paid to do in the several years that followed bouncing around the industry, what a ride!
Thanks Bob,
Wesley Hodges
freelance music journalist / former music biz hack / lawyer
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Your comments brought back the memories... I worked on the shows in college because there was a lot I wanted to see, and needed them to come to me in Troy, NY if possible. Rensselaer was in a good position between NYC and Buffalo, so we had a pretty good selection. Freshman year I saw Chicago, Mahavishnu Orchestra with Jean-Luc Ponty, Frampton's Camel, and some more. My strongest memory is of the show we were not allowed to put on because the financial people thought it too risky. The show offered was Mott the Hoople, with a tour opening on Broadway, NYC. They had a new opening act on its first US Tour, and that band was my primary interest: Queen. Queen's first album doesn't get much air play but is fantastic. So the accountants won the day and the show bypassed us on its way to the rest of the country. The memory still brings a deep sigh about "what could'a been".
Amazing how music brings life into focus. I am about your age, and we had an incredible soundtrack for the world and our lives.
Cheers.
Todd Jackson
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I always love your stories about Middlebury. I went to St. Lawrence (1967-1971) where I was Coffee House Chairman and then Concert Chairman.
After college, I became a Lecture and Literary agent, which I am to this day.
I do identify with how hard it was to get A+ entertainment to an out-of-the-way college. We did have Jethto Tull, The Box Tops, Chuck Berry,
and The Chambers Brothers while I was there. Clarkson (10 miles away) had The Happenings, The Foundations, Jefferson Airplane (on acid),
Gordon Lightfoot, Judy Collins, and The Yardbirds (Page using the violin bow), among others.
Unfortunately, just prior to my becoming Chairman, we also were forced to contract for Every Mothers Son.
I booked Townes Van Zandt for one week of shows, which was a highlight. Hanging with Townes was a trip.
Also, I booked Seatrain for February 1971 and Boz Scaggs for 2 shows on his first tour (Moments LP) in May 1971.
It was a 525 seat theater and I convinced the Student Activities Director that we would sell out. We paid
$1100 total for 2 shows. Tickets were $1.50.
Just as with many other events in my life, we lost money. I graduated 3 weeks later and never looked back!
At my 50th reunion, several of my classmates thanked me for bringing Boz to campus.. Lifelong fans of an artist do that.
Nevertheless, the musicians were all cool, very nice to us students and I cherish the memories. Also, they gave the illusion
of "not mailing it in", which we appreciated.
Tony Colao
Easthampton, MA
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That brings back some memories. I believe I'm the same age/graduation year as you—Brandeis University 1974. Back in the day, the James Montgomery Blues Band was a regular at Brandeis' coffee house, Cholmondeley's (pronounced "Chumley's). My friends and I saw them quite a few times; we even travelled once into either Boston or Cambridge (I don't remember which) to see them perform. I remember they did get signed and put out an album, which went nowhere, and their major label career was over. I'm glad to hear he's still around and doing well.
Speaking of on-campus concerts, in those days, the only performance space suitable for a rock band that could seat more than about 150 people was the gym. Our first year, we went to see Mountain there. The sound was so horrible that we passed on going the next year to see the act that came in, a "local act" that none of us had heard of—Aerosmith.
Don Friedman
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I went to school in Boston at Brandeis in the mid-70's. James Montgomery was all over WBCN, and I really enjoyed the music. I especially loved Duck Fever, with its parody of a duck in the John Travolta white Saturday Night Fever suit and a big yellow bill.
Paul Kaytes
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Bob, In the fall of 1971, maybe your junior year at Middlebury, Mahavishnu Orchestra opened for The Byrds at the University of Vermont. Blue Oyster Cult was also on the bill, sandwiched in between. Did you make the 30 mile drive north for that show? I never served on the concert bureau but did own a nightclub called Hunt's in Burlington, Vermont post graduation from UVM. James Montgomery and his band played there many times and we booked Tom Rush, like clockwork, twice a year. He always sold out four shows over two nights with a $5 ticket! I won't tell you what we paid Tom but the club only had 140 seats in its earliest incarnation so you can do the math. Saw Tom last summer at the Barre Opera House and he still puts on a great show. Chico Lager
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Sounds like you kids at Middlebury didn't know how to have fun. During my years in Boston and we had our share of bands that hit it big, but the ones that didn't still had value. One of the most under appreciated on a larger scale was James Montgomery, so good on you for giving him some ink. I saw him not long ago in Boston, he's still amazing. But music is more than name acts and exceptional talent, it can be about a good time. Duke and the Drivers were nothing but fun. Now I'm talking about the first couple of years and the album on ABC which may have been before your college run. Just a great house band if you like to boogie. The Modern Lovers don't get enough props, punk before anybody knew what punk was.
John Brodey
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James Montgomery has always been the real deal. My friend Barbara Holliday sang a lot with him over the years.
As for Taj Mahal's first album and his "Statesboro Blues," there is no better version. I saw him on a tiny workshop stage at the Newport Folk Festival, with his band including Jesse Ed, in 1968 and he blew me away. I got the album as soon as I got home. I was there at the Fillmore East when the Allmans did it, and theirs is a great version, I mean how could it not be with Duane's playing. But I'm sticking with Taj.
I remember ALL those bands you mentioned, saw pretty much all of them at one time or another.
Toby Mamis
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When The Allman Brothers went to LA for the first time the band that knocked them out was The Rising Sons, Ry and Taj's band, and one of their staples was Statesboro Blues arranged about like the version on Taj's first album, an album that gives me the same thrill today it did 50 odd years ago. The Allmans heard it and the rest is history.
Phil Brown
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I had the absolute joy of hearing James Montgomery play nearly every month during my time at BU. In fact, a friend of mine (hello, Peter) and I snuck into the student government structure and started putting on "Ballroom Boogies" in the student union ballroom. They grew to the point that the real student government "took over" (the money) and tried putting them on in the larger gym. And then booked Aerosmith instead of James, and it was all over. Aerosmith were aiming for MTV stardom before there was MTV, and it showed in their playing as well as their stance. James Montgomery wanted to play. And still does, as you rightly note.
David Frail
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Thanks for filling my afternoon with the 3 versions of Statesboro I have. All great but Blind Willie brought a tear….probably for all the old blues guys….from them it always feels more like life than performance.
Keep writing, I'll keep reading.
Joan Grayson SF
____________________________________
I started out working the Orpheum in Boston for Don Law 1971 as usher ticket taker security stage hand and stage manager. All the great bands in a 2842 seat theater..Steely Dan Kinks Queen and everybody else ...James Montgomery was the local band that rocked. We used to see them in the basement at Brandys
With Bonnie Roomful of Blues James Cotton…sometimes after 2am with the door locked. Aerosmith was playing on the street outside BU ...Bruce at Joes in Cambridge and then opening up for Bonnie at the Music Hall ...Little Feat on Halloween 2 shows first one was on WBCN unbelievable . Lots of great shows. I have been doing this for over 50 years now. I eventually, after touring with Eagles Joni CSN Neil and many more as a lighting designer and tech, ended up being Brian Murphy's Head Production manager at Avalon for 13 years.
…I did sneak into the Fillmore on closing night, even have the poster..ended up in Bill's office. rolling a keg in the front door with the caterers…Woodstock ,Concert for Bangladesh and many more.
Sometime I feel like Forest Gump with all the great moments I have seen…
Always a pleasure
Danny O'Bryen
____________________________________
Fifty States of Freedom was on the third Brewer & Shipley album.
John Hughes
____________________________________
I was surprised to see you mention Illinois Speed Press. Paul Cotton's partner in that project was Kal David. Kal went on to form the Fabulous Rhinestones with bassist Harvey Brooks. Then Kal spent the rest of his career singing and playing the blues, and doing it quite well. I was fortunate to catch a great benefit show in Willimantic CT with Kal teamed up with James Montgomery and keyboard wiz Mike Finnegan (who introduced Gregg Allman to the Hammond B-3). Sadly, James us the only one of the three still with us.
Bob Levy
Branford CT
____________________________________
On several occasions during my days in the radio business I worked with both James Montgomery and Tom Rush. They are truly great men and really incredible artists. We are very blessed here on the East Coast to have them living and performing regularly here.
Jack Casey
____________________________________
I remember seeing James Montgomery at Ed Burke's on Huntington Ave in Mission Hill. What a show from a quintessential bluesman!
I must say, Tom looks very comfy at home on Cape Anne on a Sunday afternoon. Why tour when you can hang out at home in your slippers and have your friends come over to jam?
Thanks, Ed
Ed Fleck (MRG shareholder)
____________________________________
I have been a loyal subscriber for many years now. In all those years this is the first time I have seen you straight-out disrespect a working Rock n Roll Band. Unfortunately, it was my band.
I had 12 wonderful years with Duke and the Drivers. In 1973 when we got the Middlebury gig that you said was a "loser show", we were just breaking out of the clubs having only finished at Boston University the year before. A new band. Working up a show.
I don't remember much about the Middlebury gig, but I do remember that we got paid $1,200.00 to drive up from Boston, unload our own equipment and set it up, do a 90-minute set, break it all down, then, stuff all the equipment and ourselves in two station wagons and drive the three and a half hours back to our communal barn outside of Boston to save the motel expense and, that we were thrilled that we each got $100.00 for the show after expenses.
Over the next several years, when we were not doing a show, we were rehearsing, every day. We went on to record with Eddie Kramer at Electric Lady Studios, had good chart action, and recorded a second record in L.A. with Producer Deke Richards. In those days, the labels gave real cash tour support so we could play every roadhouse from Boston to Cleveland to Los Angeles and even a stint as the "House Band" at the old Starwood Ballroom on La Cienega Blvd. The Salt Palace in SLC with Deep Purple was a memorable show. Later, Tommy Bolan with whom I made friends, came, and jammed with us at the Bottom line in New York Unfortunately, it was his last appearance on stage before he died.
It is the camaraderie with other working bands that makes it all so special. Duke did a series of gigs with Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes. During our soundcheck at a shed somewhere. Southside boys ran onto the stage and pushed over all our equipment and then ran off. We laughed and laughed backstage. We called them "Juke Joint Johnny and the Jersy Joy Boys," they called us "Puke in the Driveway." We were tight and we honored each other. It's the best feeling.
Duke did at least 50 shows with James Montgomery who I still count among my favorite friends and Maybe 20 shows with Aerosmith all over the US. Steven, Joe, and Brad especially remain friends, we are all still very fond of each other. Of course, Peter Wolf, Seth, Danny and Steven Jo came on stage with us numerous times, we played the Boston Garden together.
We did a show one evening with James Cotton, I remember him telling the venue owner, "These boys can stop on a dime and give you nine cents change." We still use his tagline in our Spotify description. Our show got super tight, we had 3 frontmen, a lot of theatrics, and always a full house with our rowdy fans. Duke holds the record for the highest liquor sales ever at Legendary Paul's Mall. You may recall that our fans were so crazy they tore out the ceiling after the show.
I'm proud of the determination that drove us to rehearse and record and rehearse again which enabled us to hold the #1 spot at WMMS for 2 weeks and gain "Hot 100" action. We accomplished a lot as far as we are concerned; we were a working Rock N' Roll Band. What is better than that?
The work ethic we developed (sometimes 8 shows in a week) carried a lot of weight. I would never have been able to complete Law School without it that experience.
That is the true legacy of a working band. The collective energy to entertain and perform and the identification as a member of a tribe of hard-working traveling performers which includes the sound engineers, lighting directors, drivers, roadies and producers, and the folks like you who oversee, analyze and report on the state of the world we live and work in.
There are thousands of us out there right now, in garages and rehearsal spaces, playing the VFW lounges and the small colleges. Spending hours and years working up a show and giving it all to Rock N Roll. Maybe they will never fill a stadium or have a platinum record, but it is a musical tradition that deserves all of our respect as the backbone of the genre.
Duke is still at it in our own way, still best friends. We are even releasing a workup of re-mastered and previously unreleased live tracks this summer "Showtime" a fun-filled project meant to keep us in touch and involved. We love it. Here's a link to a Boston Globe Article written when we had our reunion summer. https://archive.boston.com/news/globe/living/articles/2003/11/15/the_boys_and_the_band/
I have always felt through my limited correspondence with you over the years, that you too are a member of that tribe I mentioned. So, to read from you, whom I have so long respected and enjoyed, such a seriously harsh comment is amazingly hurtful. Bob, you are one of us, like it or not even if you hated the show 50 years ago at Middlebury College.
Still a fan:
Tom Swift
(Mad Mississippi Buffalo)
____________________________________
Poco, Tom Rush, Duke and the Drivers, James Montgomery... Your post felt like a history of my booking career. At some point, I represented all four, and we still represent Tom.
James Montgomery has always been a great guy - talented, funny, warm, honest, hard worker - and, sadly, a very underappreciated talent.
Thank you for remembering and for shining your spotlight on James.
Bruce Houghton
____________________________________
Thanks for the shoutout, Bob. If you liked this week's Rockport Sundays posting, you're going to LOVE the one that goes up this Sunday — James Montgomery and me again, jamming on Bo Diddley's "Who Do You Love" and Sleepy John Estes' "Drop Down Mamma".
Best,
Tom Rush
Rockport Sundays
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Thanks for writing about James Montgomery Band. I had totally forgotten those guys. It was one of the first records I produced with Tom Dowd. We cut much of the record at Phil Walden's Capricorn studios in Macon – that was a long time ago.
Best,
--albhy galuten
____________________________________
James went to the same HS as me here in Grosse Pointe, MI. He comes back from time to time. I have backed him up on local gigs and consider him a friend. His late brother Jeff was a local gay rights activist and his brother John was a VP at I think Epic? He has great stories of the record biz and the majors and he came home to raise a family.
James is a great entertainer, and has all kinds of showmanship! He toured heavily with Johnny Winter.
Thanks for bringing him up! That Capricorn record was a favorite when I was in HS!
RJ Spangler
Grosse Pointe Park
____________________________________
I was a sophomore at Tufts University in the Fall of 1971 living in Carmichael Hall. It was an all men's dorm and the Animal House of Tufts.
I had seen James and his band at my friend's frat at MIT and was totally blown away by his act.
My roommate and I decided to try our hand at concert promotion, so we hired James and the band for $100 to play in the common room of the dorm. He absolutely killed it.
Over the years since, I have seen James many times and we always joke about that gig. He insists that we gave him $200 but I don't think so.
I do remember that the band came back to our room after the set and smoked at least $200 of weed, so maybe we are both right.
Cheers, Will Vogt
____________________________________
I was on the concert committee at Penn State in the late 70s. Penn State is in the middle of nowhere but it's a big school so we managed to get good shows. I remember Van Morrison on the Wavelength tour with Rockpile opening. We had The Kinks, the Grateful Dead, the Jerry Garcia Band, David Grisman, Utopia, Hall and Oates, Poco (you didn't mention the excellent A Good Feeling to Know), Graham Nash, Graham Parker, John Hall, Ornette Coleman, Pat Metheny, Charlie Byrd, Talking Heads, Gregg Allman playing with the Nighthawks. We booked Elvis Costello on the Trust tour but there was a big snowstorm and they cancelled multiple dates. Speaking of Mahavishnu, we even had John McLaughlin, Al Di Meola, and Paco de Lucia. These are just the bookings I remember. I imagine I'm leaving out a few.
One of my favorite stories is about Bo Diddley. He was booked to play an outdoor music festival I was in charge of. He was a little prickly at first. The first thing he said was he wasn't going on until he was paid. He was great once I paid him.
Music is my passion. Live shows are the best. There is nothing like being anywhere in the building at a show. I wish I had had the courage to pursue a career in it.
Harold Love
____________________________________
James is my neighbor. Super nice guy, I park my car behind his JMBB license plates often. Plays locally in Rhode Island and Connecticut frequently. He's still great!
Larry Webman
____________________________________
Saw James and his hot band open for J Geils in Long Island around 1975. He plays free shows for the city of Boston every summer. Was just here a few weeks ago. Hasn't lost a step.
Check Your Bucket was played all the time by Stoneman on WPLR back in the day. Was sorry I never got to see Duke and The Drivers live but still play that record in the car.
Ira Sperling
____________________________________
Pure magic, thanks for asking Tom to provide that gift. You left Midd a little too early. I got to see B.B. King and Jackson Browne in the chapel and the Rolling Thunder Revue at UVM.
Michael March '77
____________________________________
When The Malibooz went to college, we changed our name to Sageworth. After college, Walter Egan took the band to Boston where they did many, many nights with James Montgomery band. James was the man on harp and I can see he still is. He used to wear a fishing utility belt when he performed. Each loop of the belt contained a different harp; that way he could switch keys very quickly and effortlessly. I've really never seen anyone else do that before or since.
By the way, Sageworth also did a bunch of shows with Duke and the drivers as well. I just saw Tom Swift from the band last September and the boys are still out doing it , there's no money in it anymore. We know that, but some people just do it for the magic.
Best,
John Zambetti
The Malibooz
____________________________________
Hey Bob, when my band Sageworth played in Boston in 1972-73 we were managed by the same people who managed the James Montgomery Band. We got to see them close-up and get to know them. What a great band!
And James was always a great friend to us.
Thanks for giving him some notice.
Walter Egan
____________________________________
You're right about how some of us got started in the music biz—and how loose it was. I got my start at Michigan State by becoming the poster artist for the student government's concert organization. Within a year, I was its chairman, running what was really a million dollar operation, booking and running dozens of shows every year. Other than being a pretty good poster artist, and a serious music freak, I had ZERO experience. Thankfully, my five years at the helm were quite successful and lots of fellow students and colleagues went on to make their marks in the music business. Those were the "daze."
PS. In fact, James Montgomery's brother, Jeff, was a member of that committee for awhile!
Hugh Surratt
____________________________________
Saw James Montgomery in Omaha Ne in about 1976 or so opening for Jefferson Starship. His band blew me away . Ran out the next day to the local record shop in Lincoln Ne ( Dirt Cheap) and found his album (which I still have someplace) Listened to it a lot. Then like a lot of acts, never heard from him again. I think about that band a lot more than I should and now , thanks to you, I know the story. Great job ,Bob, finding these folks after all these years!
ceetee
____________________________________
In my college days, 70-74, I was like a vacuum when it came building my LP collection. At the CCNY bookstore there were record bins which always attracted my attention, which is how I became one of the relatively few owners of the Live Yardbirds Featuring Jimmy Page LP before Peter Grant(?) had it quickly pulled from the shelves.
One day I saw two LPs that I decided to take a chance on. Already a devotee of Al Kooper, I picked up the eponymous Lynyrd Skynyrd, their first. Seeing his name and the album cover both intrigued me enough to drop ~$3.00 on it. And First Time Out by The James Montgomery Band. I knew nothing of either of these, but in those days that was merely a minor criterion.
And I couldn't get enough of either of these two discs, both exceptional. I really loved and still do love First Time Out, and figured this band would be going somewhere, although their followup was a disappointment and they soon disappeared from national exposure as I recall. But that initial release was something that my ears could not get enough of. Jump Blues I suppose is the category that it fell under. Pretty much most all the cuts were delicious and addictive, still to this day. This band knew how to lay down a bass groove and work from there.
One doesn't need to get past I'm Funky, But I'm Clean and/or Going Down to understand where they were coming from. But if this title is still available, please do yourself a favor, give a listen to the entire LP and you will be richly rewarded.
Alan Fishman
____________________________________
I was a huge fan of the Allmans and anything on Capricorn records! The Capricorn release of JMB is one of my favorites. Back in the early 2,000s I was able to find and buy a copy of it on CD much to my delight! Hard rockin' blues and R&B. My favorite track starts at 11:30 "If You Want Me."
I saw them open for the Allmans in ~ 74 (?). Had never heard of em'. They jammed, and I do mean jammed on "Train" "Drive myself Crazy" and the other tunes. I couldn't believe how f*cking good these guys were. Incredible dynamics! They were killer!!! I was gob smacked…(!)
JMB "First Time Out" link below:
https://youtu.be/rtPB8uCYnrg
Tim Pringle
____________________________________
The track I'm Funky But I'm Clean is pretty funky!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-EFW3pIjK18
Kevin Kiley
____________________________________
I Can't Stop (No, No, No)
One of my favorites that a band I was in ages ago did. I'll spare you the cover, and I apologize for the quality. I couldn't find it anywhere other than my 30 year old iTunes rip.
Pamela Arnold
____________________________________
Love the mention of college concert boards! College radio also a gateway drug to getting into the biz I'd have to guess...
My bridge/training wheels for the music biz was joining the Vanderbilt Programming Board committee in the fall of 05 to book Rites of Spring the next semester. Helping get my new (at the time) favorite band My Morning Jacket (currently still my favorite band half a life later) that year was (and still is) one of the peak experiences of my time here. A little known frat/bar circuit group called Zac Brown Band played very early in the same day. The next year I co-chaired and we had The Roots, Wolfmother, Drive-By Truckers, Amos Lee among others.
Fun tale: I was in a booking meeting when our grad advisor was going through booking inquiries / CD packages and asked the three of us running Rites booking if we wanted to sign up this virtually unknown teenage starlet with a demo single called "Tim McGraw" for pennies. We, being the ripeage of 20/21 or so, decided she was too young and in no way refined or hip enough for our highly developed music tastes/festival we envisioned and passed. Whoops.
I only lasted a few years in the music biz before moving on to my current world/industry, but look back at that whole experience above everything else I was paid to do in the several years that followed bouncing around the industry, what a ride!
Thanks Bob,
Wesley Hodges
freelance music journalist / former music biz hack / lawyer
____________________________________
Your comments brought back the memories... I worked on the shows in college because there was a lot I wanted to see, and needed them to come to me in Troy, NY if possible. Rensselaer was in a good position between NYC and Buffalo, so we had a pretty good selection. Freshman year I saw Chicago, Mahavishnu Orchestra with Jean-Luc Ponty, Frampton's Camel, and some more. My strongest memory is of the show we were not allowed to put on because the financial people thought it too risky. The show offered was Mott the Hoople, with a tour opening on Broadway, NYC. They had a new opening act on its first US Tour, and that band was my primary interest: Queen. Queen's first album doesn't get much air play but is fantastic. So the accountants won the day and the show bypassed us on its way to the rest of the country. The memory still brings a deep sigh about "what could'a been".
Amazing how music brings life into focus. I am about your age, and we had an incredible soundtrack for the world and our lives.
Cheers.
Todd Jackson
____________________________________
I always love your stories about Middlebury. I went to St. Lawrence (1967-1971) where I was Coffee House Chairman and then Concert Chairman.
After college, I became a Lecture and Literary agent, which I am to this day.
I do identify with how hard it was to get A+ entertainment to an out-of-the-way college. We did have Jethto Tull, The Box Tops, Chuck Berry,
and The Chambers Brothers while I was there. Clarkson (10 miles away) had The Happenings, The Foundations, Jefferson Airplane (on acid),
Gordon Lightfoot, Judy Collins, and The Yardbirds (Page using the violin bow), among others.
Unfortunately, just prior to my becoming Chairman, we also were forced to contract for Every Mothers Son.
I booked Townes Van Zandt for one week of shows, which was a highlight. Hanging with Townes was a trip.
Also, I booked Seatrain for February 1971 and Boz Scaggs for 2 shows on his first tour (Moments LP) in May 1971.
It was a 525 seat theater and I convinced the Student Activities Director that we would sell out. We paid
$1100 total for 2 shows. Tickets were $1.50.
Just as with many other events in my life, we lost money. I graduated 3 weeks later and never looked back!
At my 50th reunion, several of my classmates thanked me for bringing Boz to campus.. Lifelong fans of an artist do that.
Nevertheless, the musicians were all cool, very nice to us students and I cherish the memories. Also, they gave the illusion
of "not mailing it in", which we appreciated.
Tony Colao
Easthampton, MA
____________________________________
That brings back some memories. I believe I'm the same age/graduation year as you—Brandeis University 1974. Back in the day, the James Montgomery Blues Band was a regular at Brandeis' coffee house, Cholmondeley's (pronounced "Chumley's). My friends and I saw them quite a few times; we even travelled once into either Boston or Cambridge (I don't remember which) to see them perform. I remember they did get signed and put out an album, which went nowhere, and their major label career was over. I'm glad to hear he's still around and doing well.
Speaking of on-campus concerts, in those days, the only performance space suitable for a rock band that could seat more than about 150 people was the gym. Our first year, we went to see Mountain there. The sound was so horrible that we passed on going the next year to see the act that came in, a "local act" that none of us had heard of—Aerosmith.
Don Friedman
____________________________________
I went to school in Boston at Brandeis in the mid-70's. James Montgomery was all over WBCN, and I really enjoyed the music. I especially loved Duck Fever, with its parody of a duck in the John Travolta white Saturday Night Fever suit and a big yellow bill.
Paul Kaytes
____________________________________
Bob, In the fall of 1971, maybe your junior year at Middlebury, Mahavishnu Orchestra opened for The Byrds at the University of Vermont. Blue Oyster Cult was also on the bill, sandwiched in between. Did you make the 30 mile drive north for that show? I never served on the concert bureau but did own a nightclub called Hunt's in Burlington, Vermont post graduation from UVM. James Montgomery and his band played there many times and we booked Tom Rush, like clockwork, twice a year. He always sold out four shows over two nights with a $5 ticket! I won't tell you what we paid Tom but the club only had 140 seats in its earliest incarnation so you can do the math. Saw Tom last summer at the Barre Opera House and he still puts on a great show. Chico Lager
____________________________________
Sounds like you kids at Middlebury didn't know how to have fun. During my years in Boston and we had our share of bands that hit it big, but the ones that didn't still had value. One of the most under appreciated on a larger scale was James Montgomery, so good on you for giving him some ink. I saw him not long ago in Boston, he's still amazing. But music is more than name acts and exceptional talent, it can be about a good time. Duke and the Drivers were nothing but fun. Now I'm talking about the first couple of years and the album on ABC which may have been before your college run. Just a great house band if you like to boogie. The Modern Lovers don't get enough props, punk before anybody knew what punk was.
John Brodey
____________________________________
James Montgomery has always been the real deal. My friend Barbara Holliday sang a lot with him over the years.
As for Taj Mahal's first album and his "Statesboro Blues," there is no better version. I saw him on a tiny workshop stage at the Newport Folk Festival, with his band including Jesse Ed, in 1968 and he blew me away. I got the album as soon as I got home. I was there at the Fillmore East when the Allmans did it, and theirs is a great version, I mean how could it not be with Duane's playing. But I'm sticking with Taj.
I remember ALL those bands you mentioned, saw pretty much all of them at one time or another.
Toby Mamis
____________________________________
When The Allman Brothers went to LA for the first time the band that knocked them out was The Rising Sons, Ry and Taj's band, and one of their staples was Statesboro Blues arranged about like the version on Taj's first album, an album that gives me the same thrill today it did 50 odd years ago. The Allmans heard it and the rest is history.
Phil Brown
____________________________________
I had the absolute joy of hearing James Montgomery play nearly every month during my time at BU. In fact, a friend of mine (hello, Peter) and I snuck into the student government structure and started putting on "Ballroom Boogies" in the student union ballroom. They grew to the point that the real student government "took over" (the money) and tried putting them on in the larger gym. And then booked Aerosmith instead of James, and it was all over. Aerosmith were aiming for MTV stardom before there was MTV, and it showed in their playing as well as their stance. James Montgomery wanted to play. And still does, as you rightly note.
David Frail
____________________________________
Thanks for filling my afternoon with the 3 versions of Statesboro I have. All great but Blind Willie brought a tear….probably for all the old blues guys….from them it always feels more like life than performance.
Keep writing, I'll keep reading.
Joan Grayson SF
____________________________________
I started out working the Orpheum in Boston for Don Law 1971 as usher ticket taker security stage hand and stage manager. All the great bands in a 2842 seat theater..Steely Dan Kinks Queen and everybody else ...James Montgomery was the local band that rocked. We used to see them in the basement at Brandys
With Bonnie Roomful of Blues James Cotton…sometimes after 2am with the door locked. Aerosmith was playing on the street outside BU ...Bruce at Joes in Cambridge and then opening up for Bonnie at the Music Hall ...Little Feat on Halloween 2 shows first one was on WBCN unbelievable . Lots of great shows. I have been doing this for over 50 years now. I eventually, after touring with Eagles Joni CSN Neil and many more as a lighting designer and tech, ended up being Brian Murphy's Head Production manager at Avalon for 13 years.
…I did sneak into the Fillmore on closing night, even have the poster..ended up in Bill's office. rolling a keg in the front door with the caterers…Woodstock ,Concert for Bangladesh and many more.
Sometime I feel like Forest Gump with all the great moments I have seen…
Always a pleasure
Danny O'Bryen
____________________________________
Fifty States of Freedom was on the third Brewer & Shipley album.
John Hughes
____________________________________
I was surprised to see you mention Illinois Speed Press. Paul Cotton's partner in that project was Kal David. Kal went on to form the Fabulous Rhinestones with bassist Harvey Brooks. Then Kal spent the rest of his career singing and playing the blues, and doing it quite well. I was fortunate to catch a great benefit show in Willimantic CT with Kal teamed up with James Montgomery and keyboard wiz Mike Finnegan (who introduced Gregg Allman to the Hammond B-3). Sadly, James us the only one of the three still with us.
Bob Levy
Branford CT
____________________________________
On several occasions during my days in the radio business I worked with both James Montgomery and Tom Rush. They are truly great men and really incredible artists. We are very blessed here on the East Coast to have them living and performing regularly here.
Jack Casey
____________________________________
I remember seeing James Montgomery at Ed Burke's on Huntington Ave in Mission Hill. What a show from a quintessential bluesman!
I must say, Tom looks very comfy at home on Cape Anne on a Sunday afternoon. Why tour when you can hang out at home in your slippers and have your friends come over to jam?
Thanks, Ed
Ed Fleck (MRG shareholder)
____________________________________
I have been a loyal subscriber for many years now. In all those years this is the first time I have seen you straight-out disrespect a working Rock n Roll Band. Unfortunately, it was my band.
I had 12 wonderful years with Duke and the Drivers. In 1973 when we got the Middlebury gig that you said was a "loser show", we were just breaking out of the clubs having only finished at Boston University the year before. A new band. Working up a show.
I don't remember much about the Middlebury gig, but I do remember that we got paid $1,200.00 to drive up from Boston, unload our own equipment and set it up, do a 90-minute set, break it all down, then, stuff all the equipment and ourselves in two station wagons and drive the three and a half hours back to our communal barn outside of Boston to save the motel expense and, that we were thrilled that we each got $100.00 for the show after expenses.
Over the next several years, when we were not doing a show, we were rehearsing, every day. We went on to record with Eddie Kramer at Electric Lady Studios, had good chart action, and recorded a second record in L.A. with Producer Deke Richards. In those days, the labels gave real cash tour support so we could play every roadhouse from Boston to Cleveland to Los Angeles and even a stint as the "House Band" at the old Starwood Ballroom on La Cienega Blvd. The Salt Palace in SLC with Deep Purple was a memorable show. Later, Tommy Bolan with whom I made friends, came, and jammed with us at the Bottom line in New York Unfortunately, it was his last appearance on stage before he died.
It is the camaraderie with other working bands that makes it all so special. Duke did a series of gigs with Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes. During our soundcheck at a shed somewhere. Southside boys ran onto the stage and pushed over all our equipment and then ran off. We laughed and laughed backstage. We called them "Juke Joint Johnny and the Jersy Joy Boys," they called us "Puke in the Driveway." We were tight and we honored each other. It's the best feeling.
Duke did at least 50 shows with James Montgomery who I still count among my favorite friends and Maybe 20 shows with Aerosmith all over the US. Steven, Joe, and Brad especially remain friends, we are all still very fond of each other. Of course, Peter Wolf, Seth, Danny and Steven Jo came on stage with us numerous times, we played the Boston Garden together.
We did a show one evening with James Cotton, I remember him telling the venue owner, "These boys can stop on a dime and give you nine cents change." We still use his tagline in our Spotify description. Our show got super tight, we had 3 frontmen, a lot of theatrics, and always a full house with our rowdy fans. Duke holds the record for the highest liquor sales ever at Legendary Paul's Mall. You may recall that our fans were so crazy they tore out the ceiling after the show.
I'm proud of the determination that drove us to rehearse and record and rehearse again which enabled us to hold the #1 spot at WMMS for 2 weeks and gain "Hot 100" action. We accomplished a lot as far as we are concerned; we were a working Rock N' Roll Band. What is better than that?
The work ethic we developed (sometimes 8 shows in a week) carried a lot of weight. I would never have been able to complete Law School without it that experience.
That is the true legacy of a working band. The collective energy to entertain and perform and the identification as a member of a tribe of hard-working traveling performers which includes the sound engineers, lighting directors, drivers, roadies and producers, and the folks like you who oversee, analyze and report on the state of the world we live and work in.
There are thousands of us out there right now, in garages and rehearsal spaces, playing the VFW lounges and the small colleges. Spending hours and years working up a show and giving it all to Rock N Roll. Maybe they will never fill a stadium or have a platinum record, but it is a musical tradition that deserves all of our respect as the backbone of the genre.
Duke is still at it in our own way, still best friends. We are even releasing a workup of re-mastered and previously unreleased live tracks this summer "Showtime" a fun-filled project meant to keep us in touch and involved. We love it. Here's a link to a Boston Globe Article written when we had our reunion summer. https://archive.boston.com/news/globe/living/articles/2003/11/15/the_boys_and_the_band/
I have always felt through my limited correspondence with you over the years, that you too are a member of that tribe I mentioned. So, to read from you, whom I have so long respected and enjoyed, such a seriously harsh comment is amazingly hurtful. Bob, you are one of us, like it or not even if you hated the show 50 years ago at Middlebury College.
Still a fan:
Tom Swift
(Mad Mississippi Buffalo)
____________________________________
Poco, Tom Rush, Duke and the Drivers, James Montgomery... Your post felt like a history of my booking career. At some point, I represented all four, and we still represent Tom.
James Montgomery has always been a great guy - talented, funny, warm, honest, hard worker - and, sadly, a very underappreciated talent.
Thank you for remembering and for shining your spotlight on James.
Bruce Houghton
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Thanks for the shoutout, Bob. If you liked this week's Rockport Sundays posting, you're going to LOVE the one that goes up this Sunday — James Montgomery and me again, jamming on Bo Diddley's "Who Do You Love" and Sleepy John Estes' "Drop Down Mamma".
Best,
Tom Rush
Rockport Sundays
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