Cold and Early

If you're still reading, let me hear from you. I get lonely. The Lonely Banana isn't the kind that people eat.
My musical history is drawing toward a close. The story currently recounts the summer of 1971, and though it continues on, my account will stop with the year of 1985.

            Playing in a band with Crowbar was the most fun thing. He was totally pure in his approach. The first time he played his brand new Hofner Beatle Bass was at a band practice. Brillo and I would point out the chord changes and direct him toward the root note of each change. There was no slappin or flappin or freewheeling: it was all root note banging at a more or less primal level. And though Crowbar’s, all our, influences were immediately from the psychedelic era, he was punk, all punk, and nothing but the punk, the living embodiment of rock ethos and demonstration. I’m serious. Crowbar had no choice but to go straight at every song that came up. He’d had no time for lessons or study, and not being a natural musician in the traditional sense (Does it count that he played French horn in the high school marching band?), he just took the path of least resistance. He never objected to any outrageous idea, and by his basic nature was prone to experiment. But that’s the essence of rock music: anybody can do it. It’s campfire music with amplifiers; however, instead of sitting around a pit full of burning wood and plucking on a guitar or thumping on a tambourine while passing around a bottle and howling to the sky, the bandsmen gather in basements and garages and spare rooms to assault life with guitars, basses, drums, keyboards, singers, and occasionally horns, until the players become proficient enough on a selection of songs to play in other basements, garages, and spare rooms and howl at and share whatever with whomever shows up. That’s all there is to it. I don’t belittle great players and playing, I love them and that, but no one has to be great to play. It takes all kinds to make a band.

A Wet Weather Creek

A creek runs through it.

            Along with our Crab pal, Cowpuncher, and my former band mate and football teammate Crowbar (he could drive), we took off for Knoxville way earlier than necessary. It was just past midday when the expedition got started, and along the way stopped at Rose Music. I saw the first Magic Chord organ that day, as well as the apple of my then eye, a Hammond Porta B organ. It was sweet. I thought of all the worlds I could conquer with a keyboard like that. I was glad we’d stopped. We messed with the keyboards and wore out our welcome before getting back on the road.

            Crowbar parked on a bridge between Gay Street and the Coliseum. There were still hours to spare, so we walked up to Gay street to see what was happening, which, in a word, was nothing. I don’t think I’ve been on Gay Street on a Saturday afternoon since that lovely April day, so there’s nothing to judge it by, but it was darn near deserted as we roamed the streets. In fact, the only people we saw on the street at all were former US Senator Albert Gore, Sr. and his wife walking alone on the other side of the street going away from us. That was the first time I had encountered a famous person in the wild (not the last, either). When we got up even to the elderly couple, Cowpuncher yelled, “Give em hell, Brock!” (Bill Brock had defeated Gore a few months earlier), as a good Crab might be expected to do.

            The celebrity hubbub wore quickly off and our little knot of assholes started back toward the Coliseum. This little knot of assholes did have definite anarchist tendencies, and I assure all that not a one of that crowd was above hurling objects for amusement, but our true aims were gentler than that. In truth, we’d all bought into the reality that love was the key to happiness. The Beatles told us that, and we loved The Beatles. The Christian religion (I believe that all The Crabs, at that time, were Christians) told us that, too. The political leaders of the country, then as now and forever more, said it, urged it on us, nearly insisted on it while at the same time waging a pissing contest war with the Soviets in Southeast Asia (using the native population of Viet Nam and America’s drafted poor as punching bags), and that great sore thumb of a contradiction riled the ire of the average Crab. Hell no we won’t go! But would we?

Blue Monday

It's kinda soggy, but I like rain.

            Word that Steppenwolf was coming to Knoxville got me excited. Steppenwolf had the coolest look of any band in the world (though I’ll confess that there was no shortage of cool at that time) and played a rough and ready kind of music soaked in distorted guitars (including slide), rock solid drumming, inventively clever Hammond organ (and other keyboards) playing, and shouted out by a gravelly voiced singer whose songs delivered timely political messages which ranged in tone from the humorous (Don’t Step On the Grass, Sam), to the very serious (Draft Resister and From Here to There Eventually), and all delivered with a little extra jab to the teeth of the establishment. The arrangements and playing in many of Steppenwolf’s songs also displayed a wide eccentric sound and manner. All in all, it was my kinda band.

            Along with Billy D and Tig, I’d been spending a lot of time with my friends Luke and Hook. We’d been buddies at school and beyond for a few years (I’d known Luke since grammar school, especially 6^th grade), and as we approached our late teens were vigorously working toward the contradictory ideals of becoming hippie anarchists. We had practiced those ends as often as possible with various acts of anarchist defiance including a brief concert for our English class (rearranging lyrics and anything else to bend three cover songs to our ends), and several sessions on the railroad tracks near Luke’s house where we would unload torrents of rocks against the windows and bodies of automobiles hauled through the unprotected air in open sided train cars. I always felt damned good when we’d damaged a Caddy or another vehicle.

            We started calling ourselves, and the others who hung around with us, The Crabs (after, yes, those crabs) because we were the unwanted, the cast outs, the shunned, the not ready for anything players. And yet, none of us really wanted to be establishment darlings. We wanted society girls (because they looked good and dressed so well), but the rest of the scene was a big, fat drag to us. Hook’s poem said it best: “I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again,/It’s not a lie, it’s not a sin,/But we are Crabs, we’re tried and true,/ And if you don’t like it—fuck you!” Hardly upscale political discourse, though it captures the essence of Crabdom.

Black Friday

Shop your brain at The Happy Banana.

            Just a little before my second concert, mom and dad announced to me one evening that mom was expecting a child. That news was a shock. Mom was 37 years old, and I thought she was too old to have another baby. I immediately went across the street to talk to my grandmother about the news. I’d figured that she already knew it, but was taken by surprise that she didn’t. I’m not sure she really believed me. It was true, however, and my sister was born in July of 1971. Her birth brought a whole new layer to our existences, especially since Crystal was born with severe cerebral palsy.

            Mom was born in 1934. My grandparents lived in Louisville, Tennessee at that time, but I believe mom spent a lot of her early youth in Kentucky, where her daddy and several of my grandmother’s relatives worked in the Lynch coalmine. She was one of five sisters (one died in infancy) living under the same roof with many of granny’s said relatives. Sometime along the way the family lived between Madisonville and Vonore, where granddad was from, and sometime before or shortly after granddad was drafted into the army, the family lived in Loudon, which is where my grandmother had spent a lot of her childhood.

            Granddad left for the service in 1944, on the day his fifth child was born. Before that year was over he had trained, shipped to Italy, been wounded and captured by Germans, and died a POW. Mom was only 10. Granddad was only 34. He was posthumously awarded The Bronze Star and Purple Heart. The war had been over for several years when his body was returned to the family for burial.

            Even before granddad died the family had led a hard scrabble existence, and nothing changed after he was out of the picture, so mom was used to living on the edge. In fact, she’s lived like that in one way or another most of her life, including all of my childhood, and at times beyond. I can’t say we were destitute, especially since we had a house to live in, but the thin times were very lean. I think we were lucky that we processed a lot of our own food. In 1960 I remember granny and company buying a bunch of chickens for the freezer. My impression was that my family had expected the chickens to be packaged. They weren’t. The poultry waited with bound legs in the carport. In less than an hour granny had set up a makeshift block, got out the old, dull ax, and started chopping heads. With help from neighbors a packaging line was established from block to freezer. The operation took all day, but we ate chicken for a couple of years.

            I can honestly say that my mom is both physically and mentally tough. If there was ever anyone equipped to handle the challenges of having a special needs child it’s my mom. She and my grandmother drove Crystal to physical therapy in Knoxville several times a week for several years. Mom had to organize with other special needs parents to push like hell to make the school system obey the law with regards to handicapped children. One county school superintendant once remarked to my mom that if the state required him to jump eight feet but he could only jump three, what more could be done? Well, more was eventually done, but not without constant pushing against the reluctance of those in power.

            I think that my sister’s living nearly 38 years is as much a testament to mom’s iron will as any other factor. On a daily basis mom had to clean my sister’s immediate habitat and body, dress her, often several times each day, prepare and feed my sister all meals and snacks, as well as do all the usual tasks necessary to run a household. There were lots of other things too, as in all lives, and she handled most of them pretty well. If I had a hat on I’d tip it to her now.

Happy Thanksgiving

Thanks for reading The Happy Banana.

            At that point I figured we’d really be in for big doings with Savoy Brown. Of course, being average and only 16 years old, I didn’t know the ways of the world. I didn’t know that the bands on a bill were lined up as much by seniority as talent (which is why Led Zeppelin opened for Iron Butterfly and later Vanilla Fudge on its first trip to the states). I thought the best band took the top spot, but I was wrong.

            Not to be unfair, Savoy Brown was very good. The band members were good players and the musical direction was that of a progressive rock n roll group. The band’s leader and lead guitarist was named Kim, and that caught my interest, too. The musicians came on full of fire (they had to after The Faces) and warmed up on two pretty decent numbers. The third song was very dramatic with a longish section of excellent scat singing. But just when I was about to be won over, Kim Simmons bid the auditorium farewell and the band left the stage. The crowd, small as it was, got rowdy, felt, as did I, cheated. Some official looking gentleman took the stage and announced that we had to leave. A chant of “Hell no, we won’t go,” filled the room. After several warnings of dire consequences by the poor fellow charged with verbal crowd control, Savoy Brown took the stage again. It was easy to see that the band wanted to go home, and the song it played was nothing more than an instrumental three chord shuffle that was half-heartedly executed, but enough to dupe the crowd into standing down and heading for the exits when completed.

            We dropped my cousin off in Strawberry Plains and headed toward home. Billy D had an eight track player in his car and we were able to listen to Santana on the way back. As we sailed through Greenback, I went nuts when Soul Sacrifice came on. Anyone following the car might have thought that I was having some sort of fit with my bobbing, weaving, and spasms. A lot of it was an exaggeration on my part designed to get some reaction from Billy D, but partly because good music has the power to pitch one outside the usual boundaries of normal existence. I got home around 1:00 a.m.

The Teen Years

I'm thinking of the holidays.

            Never assume. I didn’t expect much from The Faces, and thought that Savoy Brown had better be good lest I was out time and money. I watched the crowd between acts. Smoking was allowed at the Knoxville Civic Coliseum. I wondered if we’d encounter the demon weed. Tobacco was all I could identify. The crowd seemed as restless as I felt. The opening acts were busts and nearly everyone probably thought so.

            The first thing I noticed about The Faces was that two of the band members, tall, skinny fellows full of pep, had the most unusual hair styles I’d ever seen. The hair designs looked like English shags with fountains of spikes exploding from the crown. It was a different world. The first number began with a solo slide guitar part (I’d never heard a live slide since Brillo played one in grammar school). The blond singer opened his pipes and let out the voice of god. He and slide man (Ron Wood, current long time guitarist for The Stones), traded off for a bit. The singer, Rod Stewart (I’m not sure I caught his name that night), said, “But she’s my girl,” and the band launched into a measured RNR explosion. The crowd went nuts at the song’s end. I clapped and yelled, but was also in shock. I’d never heard the likes of The Faces. I expected some warmed over 60’s stuff and got hit square in the face with the 70’s.

            Rod was totally different from anything I’d seen or heard. Besides the great voice, he also had a winning manner as a front man. Unlike the guy in Big Brother, Rod didn’t have to say fuck to make a statement. He also had this little shuffling dance he did when Ronny cut to a lead. While the band played Maybe I’m Amazed, Rod put his arm around the bass player’s shoulder like a best pal or brother might do. The entire set looked like the band was having a great time and was glad to be there. The Faces rocked and rocked and were called back for three encores during a set that lasted nearly two hours.

I Dig Music

The saga continues.

            Right at the end of the 1970-71 basketball season, I got the chance to attend my second ever concert. I can’t remember why I got so excited, but when I learned that Savoy Brown had booked a stop in Knoxville, I couldn’t wait to see the concert. The strange part is that I didn’t know anything about the music of SB, and was basing my excitement on a review of the band’s newest album and singer. There were to be two other bands, The Grease Band, who had been Joe Cocker’s band at Woodstock, and Faces (formally The Small Faces), who I had not heard anything from since Itchycoo Park in 1968, on the bill.

            I had scraped up enough money to buy tickets for Billy D, who would be doing the driving, my cousin, who was supposed to be BD’s date, a girl named Ruby, who was supposed to be my date but allegedly came down with some ailment and didn’t make it, and me. We went out to my cousin’s and ate with my aunt and uncle. My cousin allowed us to listen to her copy of Jimi Hendrix’s Monterey Pop album. We also listened to the Otis Redding side of the same disc. We left about an hour and a half before concert time.

            I bought three first balcony tickets at $3.50 a pop, and we waited outside The Knoxville Civic Auditorium until the doors opened. The crowd milling around near us was certainly groovier looking than the bunch I’d seen at my first concert the previous summer, but by the time we had found our seats I could see that the auditorium less than half full. I hoped like hell that the small size of the crowd wasn’t because the bands were going to be shitty. I read the rock press a lot and I didn’t know much about the bands and I figured no one else did either. I kept an open mind.

            Just like my first concert, an unannounced opening act warmed up the crowd. I don’t remember the guy’s name, and hence have no idea of his place in music, but he was in my eyes a fairly average folk singer, and probably a local act. I’m sure I watched him while listening intently, yet no lasting impression marked itself in my brain.

            Same’s true for The Grease Band. To be perfectly frank, they were terrible. I don’t mean that the members couldn’t play. Everybody had heard the band backing Joe Cocker in Woodstock (one of the highlights of the film), but whatever fire exhibited during the movie was absent in Knoxville. I could see a Hammond organ on stage and was excited about what might come from it, but nothing ever did, save for one song that sounded like Three Dog Night’s Out in the Country.