My Aberdeenshire grandmother was fey, my Mum used to say. Read people’s tea leaves, in the village she came from; until one day she saw a neighbour’s death in them.
By the time I was old enough to remember anything she said, she restricted herself to a stock of weird catch phrases that seemed to be all her own.
One that stuck in my mind was when she used to walk on the beach with us sometimes, screw her face into the wind, and say, ‘We’re a’ naebody’s children, hen.’ Then she’d look down at me and smile, and say, ‘You’ve to find your own song, ye ken? The one only you can sing.’
When she died, a whole lot of her old tea-reading clients came out of the woodwork to tell me all about what she’d forseen for them. She had healing hands, too, apparently.
I ran into a lot of New Age types in L.A., of course. Sat cross legged on on floors till my knees ached, and breathed in more incense than the pope. All that chanting!
Well, I maybe didn’t inherit Granny’s second sight, but there were a few things I could see coming. Like all those male gurus, who were after something a bit more basic than spiritual enlightenment. Which, depending on the guru, might be just fine by me.
That time in Toronto, though, coming back from backing the boys in ‘75. The airport was open, but only just. There had been a heavy snowfall overnight, and you could smell more was coming. The flight took off, then turned south in a long curve, and half an hour in we were flying through ice clouds.
Put down in Newark, which was like the seventh circle of hell, with people sneezing, babies projectile vomiting, and that anxious, sweaty scent you get off too many nervous fliers pressed up too close together.
Cut a long story short, I got another flight late afternoon. It flew direct into another snowstorm, and had to put down in Cleveland, of all places. Took the most expensive taxi ever trying to get a decent hotel for the night, and ended up in a Rodeway Inn that stank of cigarettes and floor polish.
I decided I needed a drink, and lit out to see what was on offer.
Down the street there was a disco bar nearest me, and a rough and ready place on the other side of the freeway advertising live music. I crossed the road and went in.
Everyone had dragged the slush in on their shoes: there was a steamy, wet clothesy fug of an atmosphere, foaming pitchers of beer, and a band of some sort tuning up in the corner.
I got myself a drink, and a vantage point.
The band were kids, really: probably why they’d called themselves Nobody’s Children. The lead singer looked about sixteen. He had a ripped t-shirt, oily jeans, and a Fender Telecaster with a big gouge out of the top. He muttered something to the others, the drummer counted off a breakneck beat, and they were off.
It took me a minute to recognise the tune: they’d thrown a lot of the major chords into minor, it was all at different time signature from the original, and the kid snarled the words rather than sang them. There was no missing the chorus though.
That was the first time I’d really heard punk – I mean, I’d read the reviews of bands like the Ramones, but I’d never listened to them. And here was this band of young punks, ripping So Said the Clown to shreds. The song that gave me my big break, and then hung like a millstone round my neck as I tried to make my own way. I swear the lead singer looked me right in the eye when he hit the final chord.
You had to admit they had energy. The West Coast sound had got flabby, self indulgent by then. You could see the new wave coming, out of the East Coast mainly, but even in places like Cleveland, Ohio. You could smell it, like the snow. You could predict it.
What could I do though? I didn’t have a band, just borrowed session guys, or friends, for my albums. Just me and my songs and an acoustic Gibson.
So I hit the road, and headed for Europe.
Tuesday, 13 November 2012
Sunday, 17 June 2012
Wheels Come Off
Cocaine. Lots and lots of it.
Mixed in with the smell of what the sports jocks use on their muscles – what’s it called, Wintergreen? That’s what I remember most about supporting the boys on their stadium tour in 1975.
Backstage in the football changing rooms, there were roadies with razor blades, chopping out lines for the guys, before, during and after. Sumner kept his in a little dark wood Peruvian box, like it was snuff or something. In Chicago, someone dropped a mirror, and they all laughed.
We worked our way up the States from L.A. The format was, I went on first, just me and my Gibson, as the warm up. Then the guys would come on and be my backing band – a couple of numbers, then I was done, and they were into their set. If I was really lucky and they remembered, I came back for an encore with them at the end.
San Francisco was great. Of course, it was the guys they mostly came to see, but I always had a real hard core following in San Fran. Someone released balloons with flowers tied to them – still no idea who: it wasn’t planned, but it was great. We sang San Francisco (Be Sure To Wear Flowers In Your Hair) as an encore.
Some of the Bible Belt was a little cooler. By the time we reached New Orleans, it was hurricane season. Let me tell you, playing guitar in a rainstorm, with your guitar plugged into the biggest Marshall stack in the history of the world, isn’t my idea of a relaxing evening.
The tour bus was a bone of contention. I mean, the band’s last album had sold in shed loads, but that didn’t mean they knew enough to change their socks. Around about Nashville I got together with Shayla and Cherry, their backing singers, and organised a clean up. Sweaty towels, dirty clothes, food containers – we got the driver to stop, and threw the whole lot into a field somewhere in Davidson County. Might still be there, for all I know. It’d be worth a lot on eBay if it was.
By the time we reached the northern States, what with all the coke, who actually stumbled on to back my last two songs was a matter of conjecture. I remember one gig – was it Portland? – where it was just Mitchell, banging a tambourine he’d borrowed from Shayla. Out of time.
Mitchell was the most paranoid of the lot of them. Maybe it comes with being a lead singer, but he was always worrying about the band’s position in the rock n’ roll universe. “Forget Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young,” he’d say, to any groupie who’d listen. And the groupie would just nod, and smile, and play with Mitchell’s moustache. They were kids, all of them.
Not that Sumner got to get involved in all of that, because he and Shayla were an item at that point in the tour. So there’d be the two of them off in a corner, and me in another, reading a magazine or trying to write a song, and all sorts of madness going on in the middle. Don’t know where Cherry, the other singer, went after gigs. To bed with a good book, very possibly.
Canada was so cold, in more ways than one. Playing ice hockey rinks instead of football stadiums. It seemed a long way from L.A. and the Troubador, and nobody was talking to me. Things came to a head when they tried to set me up with Bill, one of their roadies. I mean, nice guy, but not my type. As Sumner well knew.
So, one freezing morning in Toronto, I got Shayla to help me pack, and drive me to the airport. The flights were all over the place in those days: took me two days to reach California, criss-crossing America, and getting stuck inside of Cleveland with the Memphis blues again. But that’s another story.
Shayla wasn’t too sad to see me go, although she made a big show of hugging me at the airport. Poor girl. I don’t think she lasted as long as the end of the tour, apparently. Thinking back, I should have poached her and Cherry to be my backing singers. We would’ve made a good team.
Mixed in with the smell of what the sports jocks use on their muscles – what’s it called, Wintergreen? That’s what I remember most about supporting the boys on their stadium tour in 1975.
Backstage in the football changing rooms, there were roadies with razor blades, chopping out lines for the guys, before, during and after. Sumner kept his in a little dark wood Peruvian box, like it was snuff or something. In Chicago, someone dropped a mirror, and they all laughed.
We worked our way up the States from L.A. The format was, I went on first, just me and my Gibson, as the warm up. Then the guys would come on and be my backing band – a couple of numbers, then I was done, and they were into their set. If I was really lucky and they remembered, I came back for an encore with them at the end.
San Francisco was great. Of course, it was the guys they mostly came to see, but I always had a real hard core following in San Fran. Someone released balloons with flowers tied to them – still no idea who: it wasn’t planned, but it was great. We sang San Francisco (Be Sure To Wear Flowers In Your Hair) as an encore.
Some of the Bible Belt was a little cooler. By the time we reached New Orleans, it was hurricane season. Let me tell you, playing guitar in a rainstorm, with your guitar plugged into the biggest Marshall stack in the history of the world, isn’t my idea of a relaxing evening.
The tour bus was a bone of contention. I mean, the band’s last album had sold in shed loads, but that didn’t mean they knew enough to change their socks. Around about Nashville I got together with Shayla and Cherry, their backing singers, and organised a clean up. Sweaty towels, dirty clothes, food containers – we got the driver to stop, and threw the whole lot into a field somewhere in Davidson County. Might still be there, for all I know. It’d be worth a lot on eBay if it was.
By the time we reached the northern States, what with all the coke, who actually stumbled on to back my last two songs was a matter of conjecture. I remember one gig – was it Portland? – where it was just Mitchell, banging a tambourine he’d borrowed from Shayla. Out of time.
Mitchell was the most paranoid of the lot of them. Maybe it comes with being a lead singer, but he was always worrying about the band’s position in the rock n’ roll universe. “Forget Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young,” he’d say, to any groupie who’d listen. And the groupie would just nod, and smile, and play with Mitchell’s moustache. They were kids, all of them.
Not that Sumner got to get involved in all of that, because he and Shayla were an item at that point in the tour. So there’d be the two of them off in a corner, and me in another, reading a magazine or trying to write a song, and all sorts of madness going on in the middle. Don’t know where Cherry, the other singer, went after gigs. To bed with a good book, very possibly.
Canada was so cold, in more ways than one. Playing ice hockey rinks instead of football stadiums. It seemed a long way from L.A. and the Troubador, and nobody was talking to me. Things came to a head when they tried to set me up with Bill, one of their roadies. I mean, nice guy, but not my type. As Sumner well knew.
So, one freezing morning in Toronto, I got Shayla to help me pack, and drive me to the airport. The flights were all over the place in those days: took me two days to reach California, criss-crossing America, and getting stuck inside of Cleveland with the Memphis blues again. But that’s another story.
Shayla wasn’t too sad to see me go, although she made a big show of hugging me at the airport. Poor girl. I don’t think she lasted as long as the end of the tour, apparently. Thinking back, I should have poached her and Cherry to be my backing singers. We would’ve made a good team.
Monday, 23 January 2012
Mairi's Wedding
Mairi’s not her real name, of course. The same way Sumner Field isn’t really Sumner Field.
She was one of the first generation of supermodels, and Sumner’s second wife. Face of Lancôme to wed Minor Rock Royalty, was how the L. A. Tiimes put it. I loved that ‘minor.’ By then, even Sumner’s star was on the wane.
So there they were, Mairi done up in some sheer silk number that showed off her bony frame, and Sumner, for some reason, in tartan trews. And all of L.A.’s beautiful people. It was the big hair era, and shoulder pads, and all that jazz. I felt like someone’s frumpy aunt. Chilled champagne in the function suite, and bowls of cocaine in the rest rooms. Bad combination.
Why I was even invited, for goodness’ sake, is a mystery.
“You look great, Linda,” Sumner said when I congratulated him. Then, as he kissed my cheek, he whispered, “It could have been you, y’know.”
Still, I got a song out of it. I still have the napkin monogrammed with their initials that I wrote the first couple of verses on.
She was one of the first generation of supermodels, and Sumner’s second wife. Face of Lancôme to wed Minor Rock Royalty, was how the L. A. Tiimes put it. I loved that ‘minor.’ By then, even Sumner’s star was on the wane.
So there they were, Mairi done up in some sheer silk number that showed off her bony frame, and Sumner, for some reason, in tartan trews. And all of L.A.’s beautiful people. It was the big hair era, and shoulder pads, and all that jazz. I felt like someone’s frumpy aunt. Chilled champagne in the function suite, and bowls of cocaine in the rest rooms. Bad combination.
Why I was even invited, for goodness’ sake, is a mystery.
“You look great, Linda,” Sumner said when I congratulated him. Then, as he kissed my cheek, he whispered, “It could have been you, y’know.”
Still, I got a song out of it. I still have the napkin monogrammed with their initials that I wrote the first couple of verses on.
Monday, 26 December 2011
Katerin
You know, people often think artists only hang out with other artists. All those celebrity pictures they shoot these days: so and so on the arm of such and such, or the guitar player and the drummer smashing up a hotel room together.
In my experience, though, it’s often others you meet while you’re doing the rounds you get really friendly with. Take Katerin, for example. She was my European tour manager, back in, what, ‘73? They’ve always liked me there, right from the get go. It was a great tour, the German gigs especially.
Then, six years later, she probably saved my life.
London, 1979. I was down on my luck big style by then. Singer-songwriters were out of favour, and I had washed up in some awful squat in Hackney, blowing any royalties I had on whatever I could lay my hands on. Heroin, mainly.
I heard the door go, that morning, and one of the commune, Terry I think, mumble directions to my room. I didn’t have the energy to raise myself out of my bed. Terry wouldn’t have cared who it was.
“Hey, look at you,” I said when she appeared at my door. She was a real stunner, then, with this great mane of red hair in a plait half way down her back. She still is striking, even if there’s a bit of pepper and salt in the mix these days. Those cheekbones!
“Venus,” she said quietly. “How good it is to see you.” Hardly a trace of a German accent in her English. I could see what she was thinking, as she took in the room. The squat was just disgusting: even the cockroaches moved on to somewhere better as soon as they could.
“The record company gave me your address,” she said. “They keep an eye on you, you know.”
“Yeah, they want to protect their investment of nothing at all,” I said. That was unfair. I hadn’t recorded a single thing for them yet, and they were running their whole operation on a shoestring out of a half-derelict warehouse in Shoreditch. I wasn’t exactly on trend.
As if to prove the point, someone put the Sex Pistols on next door. Katerin wrinkled her nose.
“Well, they seemed like good guys,” she said. “Anyway, have you eaten yet?”
I hadn’t eaten for at least a day, so I let her take me to the nearest cafe that served vegetarian food. I must have looked like a ghost to her, while she just looked magnificent, in her combats and black beret. I used to tease her she was Baader-Meinhof, but I don’t know I was that far off.
“I would not use violence like they do,” she’d say.
I remember the sunlight flooding through the grubby window of the cafe, lighting up Katerin’s hair as she lit another cigarette. Around us, posters for CND marches competed with ones for gigs by bands I’d never heard of. Two-tone, reggae, styles a million miles from the music I’d grown up with.
“I need to listen to more music,” I muttered, to myself mostly. The corners of Katerin’s mouth went up a little. “I don’t see you doing a ska version of Wide-Finned Chevrolet,” she said.
Right at that moment, I didn’t see myself recording anything. I was still withdrawing from the night before: not the spectacular symptoms you read about now, they never happened to me, but still. I’d felt better.
“Finish your breakfast,” Katerin told me. “I’ve one or two things to do, then I will come back for you.”
When she reappeared in late afternoon, I was past the worst pains and was staring out the window of my room, thinking, I’d be better off in hospital. Or jail. The meals would be more regular. Terry’s punk band, Snarl If You Wanna Go Faster, was rehearsing downstairs, so there wasn’t even any point in picking up my acoustic.
“I let myself in,” Katerin said. Her mouth was twitching upwards again as she indicated the wall of sound coming from downstairs. “These guys aren’t so bad. Maybe they could be support for your next tour.”
I went to reply, something sarcastic probably, but she went on too quickly. “Anyway. So I’ve changed my ticket and we both have reservations for the Lufthansa flight to Frankfurt tonight. We need to hurry.”
And that was it. Simple as that. Apart from my Gibson, and a few bits and pieces, there wasn’t much to pack. I left Terry and the others my dirty laundry, and went with Katerin to her flat near Munich where, over the next few weeks, she got me clean.
Again, no histrionics. Nothing came out of the walls at me. I slept a lot, I seem to remember, and went for long walks in the hills above the village she stayed in then. At night, we’d allow ourselves a cognac and a joint. Well, everything’s relative, right?
And then I didn’t see her again for another thirteen years, by which time she’d married, had kids, and beaten breast cancer. I don’t know why I didn’t – well, that’s not true, I do know why. After I got clean of hard drugs, I went back to London and recorded the tracks that became Crossed Wires at the Crossroads for the guys in Sea Holly Records.
I was staying with Katerin’s cousin, who’d married a stockbroker and moved to Surbiton. So every morning I got the train in, just like any commuter on their way to the office. Except my office was the warehouse in Shoreditch, with a bunch of musicians I’d never met before.
When the record came out, I went off to Eastern Europe to promote it. Then my agent in L.A. called, I went to do some gigs there, and fell off the wagon again. I’d said to Katerin I’d be back before winter to tour Germany, and she was fixing up dates for me when I left for the States.
I never made it back before winter, of course. Didn’t make it back to Germany until the Berlin Wall came down, and even then I was too embarrassed to look her up. Took until 1992 to get totally clean again, and by then she’d moved to Bavaria. Took some time, that summer, tracking her down. Improved my German no end.
Junk logic, that’s what I call it. When you’re dependent, you make decisions which are really about how easily you can get your hands on the stuff. I should never have gone back to L.A. Who knows what might have happened if I’d have really pushed that record. Sea Holly might still be in business, for one thing. They were good guys: Katerin was right about that.
I stay in touch with her now. When you get older, you tend to work a few things out. If life doesn’t kill you first.
In my experience, though, it’s often others you meet while you’re doing the rounds you get really friendly with. Take Katerin, for example. She was my European tour manager, back in, what, ‘73? They’ve always liked me there, right from the get go. It was a great tour, the German gigs especially.
Then, six years later, she probably saved my life.
London, 1979. I was down on my luck big style by then. Singer-songwriters were out of favour, and I had washed up in some awful squat in Hackney, blowing any royalties I had on whatever I could lay my hands on. Heroin, mainly.
I heard the door go, that morning, and one of the commune, Terry I think, mumble directions to my room. I didn’t have the energy to raise myself out of my bed. Terry wouldn’t have cared who it was.
“Hey, look at you,” I said when she appeared at my door. She was a real stunner, then, with this great mane of red hair in a plait half way down her back. She still is striking, even if there’s a bit of pepper and salt in the mix these days. Those cheekbones!
“Venus,” she said quietly. “How good it is to see you.” Hardly a trace of a German accent in her English. I could see what she was thinking, as she took in the room. The squat was just disgusting: even the cockroaches moved on to somewhere better as soon as they could.
“The record company gave me your address,” she said. “They keep an eye on you, you know.”
“Yeah, they want to protect their investment of nothing at all,” I said. That was unfair. I hadn’t recorded a single thing for them yet, and they were running their whole operation on a shoestring out of a half-derelict warehouse in Shoreditch. I wasn’t exactly on trend.
As if to prove the point, someone put the Sex Pistols on next door. Katerin wrinkled her nose.
“Well, they seemed like good guys,” she said. “Anyway, have you eaten yet?”
I hadn’t eaten for at least a day, so I let her take me to the nearest cafe that served vegetarian food. I must have looked like a ghost to her, while she just looked magnificent, in her combats and black beret. I used to tease her she was Baader-Meinhof, but I don’t know I was that far off.
“I would not use violence like they do,” she’d say.
I remember the sunlight flooding through the grubby window of the cafe, lighting up Katerin’s hair as she lit another cigarette. Around us, posters for CND marches competed with ones for gigs by bands I’d never heard of. Two-tone, reggae, styles a million miles from the music I’d grown up with.
“I need to listen to more music,” I muttered, to myself mostly. The corners of Katerin’s mouth went up a little. “I don’t see you doing a ska version of Wide-Finned Chevrolet,” she said.
Right at that moment, I didn’t see myself recording anything. I was still withdrawing from the night before: not the spectacular symptoms you read about now, they never happened to me, but still. I’d felt better.
“Finish your breakfast,” Katerin told me. “I’ve one or two things to do, then I will come back for you.”
When she reappeared in late afternoon, I was past the worst pains and was staring out the window of my room, thinking, I’d be better off in hospital. Or jail. The meals would be more regular. Terry’s punk band, Snarl If You Wanna Go Faster, was rehearsing downstairs, so there wasn’t even any point in picking up my acoustic.
“I let myself in,” Katerin said. Her mouth was twitching upwards again as she indicated the wall of sound coming from downstairs. “These guys aren’t so bad. Maybe they could be support for your next tour.”
I went to reply, something sarcastic probably, but she went on too quickly. “Anyway. So I’ve changed my ticket and we both have reservations for the Lufthansa flight to Frankfurt tonight. We need to hurry.”
And that was it. Simple as that. Apart from my Gibson, and a few bits and pieces, there wasn’t much to pack. I left Terry and the others my dirty laundry, and went with Katerin to her flat near Munich where, over the next few weeks, she got me clean.
Again, no histrionics. Nothing came out of the walls at me. I slept a lot, I seem to remember, and went for long walks in the hills above the village she stayed in then. At night, we’d allow ourselves a cognac and a joint. Well, everything’s relative, right?
And then I didn’t see her again for another thirteen years, by which time she’d married, had kids, and beaten breast cancer. I don’t know why I didn’t – well, that’s not true, I do know why. After I got clean of hard drugs, I went back to London and recorded the tracks that became Crossed Wires at the Crossroads for the guys in Sea Holly Records.
I was staying with Katerin’s cousin, who’d married a stockbroker and moved to Surbiton. So every morning I got the train in, just like any commuter on their way to the office. Except my office was the warehouse in Shoreditch, with a bunch of musicians I’d never met before.
When the record came out, I went off to Eastern Europe to promote it. Then my agent in L.A. called, I went to do some gigs there, and fell off the wagon again. I’d said to Katerin I’d be back before winter to tour Germany, and she was fixing up dates for me when I left for the States.
I never made it back before winter, of course. Didn’t make it back to Germany until the Berlin Wall came down, and even then I was too embarrassed to look her up. Took until 1992 to get totally clean again, and by then she’d moved to Bavaria. Took some time, that summer, tracking her down. Improved my German no end.
Junk logic, that’s what I call it. When you’re dependent, you make decisions which are really about how easily you can get your hands on the stuff. I should never have gone back to L.A. Who knows what might have happened if I’d have really pushed that record. Sea Holly might still be in business, for one thing. They were good guys: Katerin was right about that.
I stay in touch with her now. When you get older, you tend to work a few things out. If life doesn’t kill you first.
Saturday, 30 July 2011
She Sees Round Corners
Man, how I hated that waitressing job. It was in a coffee shop on Mulholland Drive. I mean, looking back now, it doesn't seem so bad, but that doesn't matter, does it? Not when you're there, when you're in the moment.
So, sure, I can laugh at my younger self now, whining to my new-found mentor, Josie.
“Why is it the richest guys give the meanest tips and are most likely to hit on you?” I'd say to her.
“At least they still hit on you, honey,” Josie would say, and laugh that big, wheezy laugh. She didn't own the coffee shop, but she might as well have. The real owner gave her the run of the place.
“Look and learn, listen and learn,” she'd tell me. She was about fifty, a big woman who made the best pancakes I've ever tasted, but it was the way that she picked up things about the customers that fascinated me.
"Those two are having an affair," she told me one day, after a couple left the cafe. "Pure and simple. Both got out of the same car, but two sets of car keys on the table. Why would you bring your own car keys when your husband's drivin' you?"
Sure enough, a few minutes later, the woman drove past in a different car. Josie looked at me sidelong with those eyes of hers. "Dangerous waters, Venus, dangerous waters."
There was no triumph in her voice, just a kind of sadness. Later, she told me about her own times in those waters, and I understood. Two messy divorces, and a whole lot of heartache. You could have written a whole album of songs just about her love life.
I don't know why I gave the coffee shop my stage name when I applied for the job. I guess it was a point of pride, a gesture that meant if I kept using it I'd soon be up and out of this crappy job that was such a cliché, waiting tables in L.A., waiting for the big break.
I mean, didn't they know about So Said The Clown? I hated that song, almost as soon as it became a hit. Every so often it would come on the radio in the coffee shop, and I'd feel myself go tense, maybe drop something. And I'd feel Josie's big brown eyes on me, knowing more than she needed to.
I learnt a lot from Josie, but not very much of it was to do with waitressing. I got flustered if I had more than one customer to deal with at once. I spilt milk over Paul Newman once, and you could have heard a pin drop. And then he laughed, and said it was time he changed that shirt anyway, and fixed me with those baby blues until my knees went weak. He was a perfect gentleman, unlike quite a few I could mention.
Luckily for me the coffee shop wasn't that busy that often. I used to bring my guitar in and sing a song or two to Josie when the shop was empty, or it was just one or two of our regulars.
“Who wrote that one?” Josie would say, then act surprised when I said it was one of my own. “Get away,” she'd say. “It was kinda good, too.”
One day, I came in and sang her one of the songs that ended up on the first album. It was called She Sees Round Corners.
“You know,” she said quietly, when the regulars stopped clapping, “that's the first song I've heard you sing that's not about you.”
She was right, of course. And it wasn't her way to say she knew who it was about.
So, sure, I can laugh at my younger self now, whining to my new-found mentor, Josie.
“Why is it the richest guys give the meanest tips and are most likely to hit on you?” I'd say to her.
“At least they still hit on you, honey,” Josie would say, and laugh that big, wheezy laugh. She didn't own the coffee shop, but she might as well have. The real owner gave her the run of the place.
“Look and learn, listen and learn,” she'd tell me. She was about fifty, a big woman who made the best pancakes I've ever tasted, but it was the way that she picked up things about the customers that fascinated me.
"Those two are having an affair," she told me one day, after a couple left the cafe. "Pure and simple. Both got out of the same car, but two sets of car keys on the table. Why would you bring your own car keys when your husband's drivin' you?"
Sure enough, a few minutes later, the woman drove past in a different car. Josie looked at me sidelong with those eyes of hers. "Dangerous waters, Venus, dangerous waters."
There was no triumph in her voice, just a kind of sadness. Later, she told me about her own times in those waters, and I understood. Two messy divorces, and a whole lot of heartache. You could have written a whole album of songs just about her love life.
I don't know why I gave the coffee shop my stage name when I applied for the job. I guess it was a point of pride, a gesture that meant if I kept using it I'd soon be up and out of this crappy job that was such a cliché, waiting tables in L.A., waiting for the big break.
I mean, didn't they know about So Said The Clown? I hated that song, almost as soon as it became a hit. Every so often it would come on the radio in the coffee shop, and I'd feel myself go tense, maybe drop something. And I'd feel Josie's big brown eyes on me, knowing more than she needed to.
I learnt a lot from Josie, but not very much of it was to do with waitressing. I got flustered if I had more than one customer to deal with at once. I spilt milk over Paul Newman once, and you could have heard a pin drop. And then he laughed, and said it was time he changed that shirt anyway, and fixed me with those baby blues until my knees went weak. He was a perfect gentleman, unlike quite a few I could mention.
Luckily for me the coffee shop wasn't that busy that often. I used to bring my guitar in and sing a song or two to Josie when the shop was empty, or it was just one or two of our regulars.
“Who wrote that one?” Josie would say, then act surprised when I said it was one of my own. “Get away,” she'd say. “It was kinda good, too.”
One day, I came in and sang her one of the songs that ended up on the first album. It was called She Sees Round Corners.
“You know,” she said quietly, when the regulars stopped clapping, “that's the first song I've heard you sing that's not about you.”
She was right, of course. And it wasn't her way to say she knew who it was about.
Friday, 29 July 2011
Stan the Man
Stan the man. I haven't thought of him in a long time. He was Lickety Split's drummer, and also their fixer, a bit older than the rest of them, the guy that held it all together on and off stage. If there had been mobile phones in those days, he'd always have been on one. As it was, he was always in phone boxes, arranging the next gig.
Phone Box Stan, the others called him. No wonder he fell out with the new management regime of bloodsuckers that moved in after the hit single. He was an unpaid manager before then, really. There was some bloke called Billy G, but he was just always pissed.
Anyway. There he was, on my doorstep in L.A., looking off back down the track when I opened the door.
"Hello, Linda. You got my letter, aye?"
"Sure, of course I did," I said. I was still half-asleep. We often slept till noon in those days.
I showed Stan into the living room, where the remains of last night's party were scattered around. Empty bottles, the ends of roaches, and a half-dressed girl called Marianne whom I'd never met before last night. She rubbed her eyes, and looked past Stan to me. "Hey, Venus."
Stan raised an eyebrow at the cannabis residues. "You're all grown up, Linda. "
Marianne was lighting up her first cigarette of the day, that passive hit of sharp smoke making my own cravings stir themselves. She pushed her golden mane of hair out of her eyes, squinting in the light.
"People call her Venus around here. She's gonna be a huge star. You heard her songs?"
Stan looked slightly foxed. Looking back, I guess he must have been totally jet lagged, but that didn't occur to me then. "You doing your own songs now?"
"Yeah," I said. "Grown up ones."
Days passed. Maybe just a day. Memory's hazy about that period. Next thing I can remember clearly is walking along Lookout Mountain Avenue with Sumner. Stan was ahead of us, joking with Marianne, who had never remembered to leave.
Neither of them knew where Carole King lived. But I did.
It was early evening. The roadside bushes were alive with crickets, sawing away at those violin legs of theirs. A motorbike sailed past, adding a smell of two-stroke to the scent of vegetation starting to exhale.
Carole met us at the door herself. "Come in," she said, smiling. "Find a place on the floor, if you can."
You know the picture on the front cover of Tapestry, with Carole King barefoot and a cat in the foreground? Well, it wasn't an official launch party for that album, but it was that time, that Laurel Canyon house, that cat rubbing himself in and out of all the partygoers as Carole took her turn at the piano.
"Oh, that Carole," Stan whispered to me, as she sang Will You Love Me Tomorrow.
You know how she sings that song on the album, right? Slow, her voice a little raw to catch the edge of the emotion? Now imagine that in a little house in Laurel Canyon, and you're sat on the floor with twenty or thirty other people, and she's singing it like she wrote it that morning, instead of in another lifetime. I don't think Joni Mitchell was there that night to sing backing vocals like on the record, but Sweet Baby James, James Taylor, was, with his guitar.
"Yes," I said. "That Carole."
Phone Box Stan, the others called him. No wonder he fell out with the new management regime of bloodsuckers that moved in after the hit single. He was an unpaid manager before then, really. There was some bloke called Billy G, but he was just always pissed.
Anyway. There he was, on my doorstep in L.A., looking off back down the track when I opened the door.
"Hello, Linda. You got my letter, aye?"
"Sure, of course I did," I said. I was still half-asleep. We often slept till noon in those days.
I showed Stan into the living room, where the remains of last night's party were scattered around. Empty bottles, the ends of roaches, and a half-dressed girl called Marianne whom I'd never met before last night. She rubbed her eyes, and looked past Stan to me. "Hey, Venus."
Stan raised an eyebrow at the cannabis residues. "You're all grown up, Linda. "
Marianne was lighting up her first cigarette of the day, that passive hit of sharp smoke making my own cravings stir themselves. She pushed her golden mane of hair out of her eyes, squinting in the light.
"People call her Venus around here. She's gonna be a huge star. You heard her songs?"
Stan looked slightly foxed. Looking back, I guess he must have been totally jet lagged, but that didn't occur to me then. "You doing your own songs now?"
"Yeah," I said. "Grown up ones."
Days passed. Maybe just a day. Memory's hazy about that period. Next thing I can remember clearly is walking along Lookout Mountain Avenue with Sumner. Stan was ahead of us, joking with Marianne, who had never remembered to leave.
Neither of them knew where Carole King lived. But I did.
It was early evening. The roadside bushes were alive with crickets, sawing away at those violin legs of theirs. A motorbike sailed past, adding a smell of two-stroke to the scent of vegetation starting to exhale.
Carole met us at the door herself. "Come in," she said, smiling. "Find a place on the floor, if you can."
You know the picture on the front cover of Tapestry, with Carole King barefoot and a cat in the foreground? Well, it wasn't an official launch party for that album, but it was that time, that Laurel Canyon house, that cat rubbing himself in and out of all the partygoers as Carole took her turn at the piano.
"Oh, that Carole," Stan whispered to me, as she sang Will You Love Me Tomorrow.
You know how she sings that song on the album, right? Slow, her voice a little raw to catch the edge of the emotion? Now imagine that in a little house in Laurel Canyon, and you're sat on the floor with twenty or thirty other people, and she's singing it like she wrote it that morning, instead of in another lifetime. I don't think Joni Mitchell was there that night to sing backing vocals like on the record, but Sweet Baby James, James Taylor, was, with his guitar.
"Yes," I said. "That Carole."
That Bloody Clown Song
People ask me why I never sing So Said the Clown. "It's your biggest hit," they'll say. "It's so catchy!"
Yeah, well so are various things I don't want to catch again. So, once and for all: it's not my song, it was a long time ago, and I've forgotten the words. Entiendes?
Yeah, well so are various things I don't want to catch again. So, once and for all: it's not my song, it was a long time ago, and I've forgotten the words. Entiendes?
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