SECTION FIVE
sm
COLUMN
SIXTY-EIGHT, FEBRUARY 1, 2002
(Copyright © 2002 Al Aronowitz)
GARDENING
[The following chapter is an excerpt from BOOM HARANGUE by Richard X. Heyman, 138 pages (8.5 x 11, single-spaced, with several pages of photos), available as a download from Richard's website at http://www.richardxheyman.com for the price of $15. Richard plans on self-publishing hard copies of the book through a Barnes & Noble website.]
Whenever I go
to Madison Square Garden to see a concert, I always make a joke about how I've
played this room. And it's true.
Here's what happened.
One afternoon
in 1973, while I was sitting at home watching TV (I believe I was watching Mike
Douglas at the time), the phone rang. It
was old pal Willy from the Doughboys. After
the Doughboys split up in "69, Willy had gone off to play with a New York
group called Jake and the Family Jewels. They
were managed by music writer Al Aronowitz.
Being
involved with Al had its perks. Like
the time Willy was invited to go out for dinner.
Al said he had to pick up a couple of friends on the way to the
restaurant. Waiting at a New York
corner were the two friends---George Harrison and Mal Evans.
They hopped
into the back seat while Willy had to maintain his cool as he unexpectedly shook
hands with the quiet Beatle and his long-time friend and roadie.
As they got out of the car, passers-by on the Village street were shocked
to see one of the Beatles in their midst. By
the time they reached the restaurant there was a train of fifty or more people
following the entourage.
Once inside, they met up with poet Allen Ginsberg, who was meeting George for the first time. Willy told me the reason for the get-together was to discuss the influx of some bad
Allen
Ginsberg's advice:
avoid acid
but try mescaline
acid that had
gotten into the hands and mouths of some of George's mates. George asked Allen:
"What's
going on in your culture?"
The bearded
beat poet responded that everyone should avoid the acid but continue taking
mescaline to stay in touch with their consciousnesses, or something to that
effect. The next day Willy sat
front row center at the Bangladesh concert.
Al had also
managed the Myddle Class, a Jersey based band whose bass player later married
Carole King. These two groups
merged into The Quinaimes Band that was then signed by Elektra Records.
They had a wonderful lead singer in Dave
The only
problem was, that after years of struggling, they decided to break up the day
the album came out. This is where
the phone call comes in.
Could I
possibly play drums in The Quinaimes Band?
Who from the original line-up would be involved, I asked. No one, Willy told me. Not
one of them wanted anything to do with the whole endeavor.
Willy said he'd recruit John Matarazzo and Jack Parillo, two guys we had
a band with in the early 70's out of
Willy
explained that a tour had already been booked opening up for Sly &
Oh, and by
the way, our first gig is at Madison Square Garden.
This was basically akin to diving into the deep end of a swimming pool
with no water, but
The next day,
the four faux Quinaimes band members rushed through a set of R&B cover tunes we used to know. We
only learned one song off The Quinaimes Band LP, the record we were supposed to be promoting.
If this wasn't thrown together enough, John the keyboard player had
recently sold his Hammond B-3 and had to play guitar instead, which was his
second instrument. Barely rehearsed
enough to play a gig at a lounge in North Jersey, we found ourselves in front of
a sold-out crowd at the Garden.
If you've
ever lived through an earthquake, you know that queasy feeling of your knees
buckling as the world moves from under your feet. Well, that's how I felt
climbing the six steps up to the stage. I
stopped midway and held onto the railing. I
had never been so petrified in my life. I
gave myself a quick lecture on being a man and how if I didn't calm down I would
be playing with more than a drum stool under my butt. Why, oh Lord, do you hand
us this golden opportunity at the worst possible time?
It would be one thing if we were well prepared and ready to rock, but we
were hanging on for dear life.
Frankie
Crocker, the New York DJ introduced us and we started with Baby I
Love You by Aretha. The crowd was, under the circumstances, relatively receptive.
All I could think about was not dropping my sticks.
My hands were so sweaty with fear that I felt like I had applied massage
oil to my sticks for some deviant sexual act. I had to talk myself down from
this anxiety attack or I would have gone into cardiac arrest before the end of
the first song.
There was an
Indian rug on the stage, and I pretended we were playing in a small club. I
Genya
was kicked off
the tour
for swearing at the audience
called Asparagus.
We all got to solo and when I finished my drum solo, the audience were on
their feet applauding, or so I am told. I
couldn't see a thing except for a sea of darkness around our raft of a stage
that had finally reached the safety of the waiting shore.
A singer
named Genya Ravan followed us who was soon to be kicked off the tour for
swearing at the audience, which just wasn't done in 1973.
Then Sly would hit the stage about an hour or so later than he was
supposed to. He had problems with punctuality it seems.
Sitting in
our dressing room, the whole Garden was shaking with thirty thousand people
jumping up and down in unison to Larry Graham's thumb-slapping bass.
The Family Stone were an awe inspiring live act, and we all ran out to
watch their set from the side of the stage. Sly's hairdo at the time rivaled
Marge Simpson, who clearly had taken her cue from the Illusion.
After the
show we were feeling pretty high and mighty.
We didn't get booed off the stage and I even got a standing ovation for
my drum work. As the glow of
would-be rock stardom shone from our sweaty faces, we were quickly dropped down
to the soiled earth beneath our feet. Our
station wagon, parked outside the Garden, had been towed.
How could this happen! We just played to thirty thousand people and now
were stranded out on the street.
I ended up
having to take the train back to Plainfield, filled with kids from the audience
of the concert. Totally humiliated,
I kept my head down and actually overheard two guys behind me critiquing our
performance.
"What'd
you think of that opening band?"
"They
were all right," his friend said, holding back a yawn.
"That drummer was great, though."
What do you
do in one of those situations? Do I
turn around and say by the way that was me, thank you very much, like Marshall
McLuhan in Annie Hall or do I continue to hang my head until I'm off this
wretched train? I chose the latter.
I suppose God, or whatever it is making these life plans, does have some
twisted logic in their design. Here
we're given the chance of a lifetime, but with no preparation. Instead of being
a well oiled machine promoting our own album of original material, we were
thrust into the spotlight pretending to be a group that nobody had ever heard of
in the first place and, not surprisingly, ever heard of again.
We played a
show up in Bangor, Maine where we were the only opening act before Sly.
Mr. Stone and company were their customarily late selves and the
promoters of the concert begged us to do another set.
The Bangor crowd was so starved for entertainment they gladly welcomed us
back onstage, where we went into a long trippy jam, the reason being we didn't
have any more songs rehearsed. The
Maine audience seemed to be boogying down and relishing every note as if they
hadn't had any live music up there in a long, long time.
Probably was
the case. We were very appreciative
of the warm response and it gave me something positive to think of on the bumpy
prop plane ride back to
CLICK HERE TO GET TO INDEX OF COLUMN SIXTY-EIGHT
CLICK HERE TO GET TO INDEX
OF COLUMNS
The
Blacklisted Journalist can be contacted at P.O.Box 964, Elizabeth, NJ 07208-0964
The Blacklisted Journalist's E-Mail Address:
info@blacklistedjournalist.com
THE BLACKLISTED JOURNALIST IS A SERVICE MARK OF AL ARONOWITZ