We had a big primary election here in California the other day. And even though I am registered as an Independent, I was able to cast my vote by requesting a Democratic ballot at the polling place. This fact was explained to me by none other than the luscious Scarlett Johansson, who took the time from her busy schedule to call me on the phone and explain exactly what I needed to do to make my vote count. I thought it was very sweet of her to think of me during such an important time in our nation's history. I wanted to show her how much I appreciated her thoughtfulness -- hoping that perhaps we might get together sometime to discuss politics. I didn't get a chance, however, as the line went dead as soon as she finished talking. I thought perhaps her cell phone had run out of juice.
Later I found out that a friend of mine had received a very similar call from Scarlett on the same day that I did. She must have been making a lot of calls that day. No wonder her battery ran out.
So, on election day, armed with Scarlett's helpful advice, I went to the polls to vote. It seemed a little silly to me that I should have to actually walk four blocks over to the apartment complex on King Street just to put my mark on a cardboard ballot. Wouldn't it be simpler and more efficient just to 'text' my vote in? It works on American Idol. And they could have the results instantly, instead of waiting for Fox news to make an "early" projection three hours after the polls have closed. Maybe they will have that worked out by November.
The polling place was crowded when I got there so I had to stand in line for a few minutes. This gave me the chance to think about who I might want to vote for. There was one candidate who I really liked, but didn't think could actually win a presidential election. And there was the other candidate who seemed to understand what it takes to win and is willing to do make the necessary moral sacrifices to do so.
At this point, maybe I should explain that I have a pretty poor track record when it comes to voting for President: I don't think I have ever voted for a candidate who actually won. (This includes a couple of elections where I didn't vote at all -- back when I was feeling particularly disenchanted with the American system as a whole.) So, I was faced with the choice of voting for the person I thought could actually win, just to see what that might feel like, or voting for the person I actually wanted to win, and thereby dooming him to certain defeat.
Earlier that day, I had lunch with my friend Glen who was very enthusiastic about one of the candidates, who like himself, happens to be a black man. I asked him how he can have so much faith in the American system to believe a black man could actually get elected President. Hell, I'm a white, male, right-handed, blue-eyed, heterosexual Christian and I have no faith in the system whatsoever. Glen said that black people have always relied on hope, because without hope they would have little else to live for. He said he believes that one person can still make a difference in this country and this particular candidate was just the man to do it.
It was inspiring to hear Glen talk about hope and it made me want to believe that he was right. One man can make a difference. My vote is important. I should vote for the person I believe in and not the one who seems more likely to win.
But as I stood in line at the polling place, it occurred to me that hope has never done me much good. In fact, hope has almost always led me astray. You could say that hope has been my worst enemy. Nothing that I have hoped for has ever come true. In fact my persistent belief in hope has propelled me down a path of continuing disappointment and failure. If I didn't have hope, I might have had a chance at leading a normal life. And even if a "normal life" might not bring me much joy, at least it wouldn't be filled with discouraging solitude.
Hope sucks.
Now, I know what many of you are thinking -- and I've heard it all before. It's my negative attitude toward life that has caused me all these disappointments. If I believe that things won't work out, then they won't. It's a self fulfilling prophecy. We create the world we live in. Etc., etc.
Bullshit.
The reality is, I never expect things to go wrong. I always think my dreams are going to come true. That's the problem. Take dating for instance. Every time I meet a woman that I'm attracted to, I am filled with optimism and, yes, hope. I actually believe that despite all of the bad experiences in the past, this time it's going to work out. This time I've found someone who will accept me for who I am. Someone who will appreciate me. Someone who feels the same way about me as I do about her.
And what happens? I get my hopes up. And then I get them dashed on the rocks again.
'Oh,' you're thinking, 'but that's because you get your hopes up too high and you scare her off by being too enthusiastic and needy.' Not so fast, smarty-pants. I've thought of that, too. And in order to offset my natural tendency to get ahead of myself, I actually enlisted a brain trust of advisors to help me gauge my actions and responses when it comes to dating. Three close friends (two women and one man) with whom I could doublecheck my instincts before plunging headlong into unbridled optimism. The result, I spent six months wooing a woman with calm and measured actions only to find out that she had meanwhile fallen head over heels in love with a total jerk who dumped her three months later.
Because it doesn't matter what I say or do or how I feel or don't feel. She's already decided within the first fifteen minutes of meeting me whether I am in or out -- based on a set of complex variables that I have no control over whatsoever. And my misguided hopes have no effect on the outcome other than to set me up for another fall.
The same goes for screenwriting. Every time I write a script I believe it is a winner. Every time I meet a producer or an agent, I think this is the person who's going to help me. Every time I send out a script to someone, I think they're going to love it. Every time the phone rings I think it might be someone with an offer. Every time I check my email, I think there will be a message from one of the countless people I am trying to keep in touch with, finally writing me back to tell me that they read my script and would like to meet with me.
And pretty much every time I am wrong.
So why should I have hope? It's completely illogical. Worse that that, it's insane. Sane people realize that particular actions lead to particular results. If you perform a particular action over and over again, each time with the same result, then you would be completely crazy to expect a different result the next time you performed that action. Even if you hope for it to be different. Even if you believe it will be different. Even if you visualize it and concentrate on it and ask the universe to magically deliver you a different result. That's the clinical definition of insanity.
But hope persists. Why?
I myself once came up with a logical basis for hope. If I send out a script and I hope it's going to sell, then I feel good inside. Whereas if I send out a script and I assume no one will like it, I feel lousy. Therefore it is logical to hope for the best. That way you get to feel good up until the point when you find out that you are wrong. Also, most enterprises, including dating and screenwriting, have a certain amount of luck involved -- which is to say, the more opportunities you take advantage of, the better your odds of success. Therefore by hoping for the best, you remain encouraged and continue to keep trying, thereby improving your chances.
Unless you die before you succeed. Then you are just a misguided loser.
So what's the point of hope if it leads you to continue trying to achieve something that has so little chance of success that it is virtually impossible?
Seen in this light, hope is like a drug that people become addicted to until it destroys their lives. What do you think keeps the lights of Las Vegas burning through the night? Hope. Everybody in Vegas is hoping for something. But who's really succeeding? The guys with the computer programs that keep track of every nickel, dime, and quarter that changes hands, that's who. And at the end of the day, the house wins again. To expect any other result would be crazy.
So with this in mind, I walk up to the voting booth, ballot in hand, to cast my vote. I know it would be crazy to think that the guy I believe in could actually become President. So what would be the point? I would just be throwing my vote away. Wouldn't I?
That night I watched the election returns the way a gambler watches a game on which he has bet everything he's got. It was as if my entire life's philosophy were up for validation or rejection. To hope or not to hope? That is the question.
I kept switching between five different channels to see who would make the first projection in California. I believe it was MSNBC who won the race on that one. Around two hours after the polls closed, with fifteen percent of the vote, they called the winner. And it was no big surprise. My candidate lost. As usual. I blame myself. Maybe if I hadn't voted for him, he might have had a chance. That's what I get for voting with my heart instead of my head. That's what I get for hoping.
But I continued to watch the returns as the results from the other states came in. And it was kind of weird. My candidate was doing really well. In fact you could say he was winning. The contests were pretty close in a lot of cases, but he sure did get a lot more votes than people expected.
And a week later he did it again. He won more primaries, in places nobody expected him to win. In fact at last count, he is actually in the lead.
And the Giants won the Superbowl!
I guess you never really know what's going to happen. Which I suppose might be considered another logical reason to believe in hope. Not that I'm going to go all flaky and buy a copy of "The Secret" or anything.
Is everybody in? The ceremony is about to begin...
A few weeks ago, on one of my frequent walks, I passed a restaurant that had a plaque on it which said that the building was once known as The Doors Workshop, where the band The Doors recorded their final album, L.A. Woman. And it occurred to me that almost everywhere I go I pass by a place connected to the legend of Jim Morrison. Not unusual -- since Jim lived in this neighborhood for several years during his most creative period as lead singer and songwriter for The Doors. Right around the corner from where I live is a quiet little street where there is an apartment building with another plaque on it that says "Jim Morrison's Last U.S. Residence." And of course there's Barney's Beanery where Jim used to hang out at the bar. Just up the hill on Sunset Boulevard is the famous Whiskey-A-Go-Go where The Doors first gained popularity. And then there's the Canyon Country Store in Laurel Canyon, immortalized in a Jim Morrison song called "Love Street" (...here's the store where the creatures meet...) Supposedly Jim and his girlfriend Pamela had a house nearby (on "Love Street").
I decided to try and find it.
According to a guidebook I consulted, Jim and Pam's house was just around the corner from the Canyon Country Store on a street called Rothdell Trail. (Apparently Jim changed the name of the street for the song.) I decided it would make a nice little hike so I headed up Crescent Heights Ave., which crosses Sunset Blvd. and merges into Laurel Canyon Blvd.
On my way up, I stopped at the corner of Sunset and Crescent Heights to browse around the Virgin record store, which is going out of business. Everything was 30% to 50% off, but the prices were still too high for me. I chatted briefly with a woman who had a shopping basket full of CDs, including several Doors albums. She had a long list of selections and was only about halfway done. I thought about asking her to join me on my adventure, but she probably wouldn't have wanted to walk that far.
The Virgin record store is in a retail complex built on the site of what was once Schwab's Drug Store. Back in the golden days of Hollywood, the lunch counter at Schwab's was a kind of headquarters for screenwriters. This was largely due to the fact that across the street from Schwab's, there stood a lavish residential hotel called The Garden of Allah. For years, whenever "serious" writers like Fitzgerald, Odets, Hemingway, Faulkner & Dorothy Parker came to town, The Garden of Allah was their address. However, in 1959, the Garden of Allah was torn down and replaced by a bank and a strip mall. There is a now drive-thru McDonald's on the site, frequented by the likes of Paris Hilton and Britney Spears. Kind of the Greta Garbo and Dorothy Parker of today. Schwab's closed in 1986.
Joni Mitchell, a resident of Laurel Canyon around the same time Jim Morrison lived there, reportedly wrote the song Big Yellow Taxi about the destruction of the Garden of Allah, "...they paved paradise and put up a parking lot."
I stopped in at the Pollo Loco (located approximately where the pool would have been in the Garden Of Allah days) for a quick taco before continuing my trek up into the Canyon. This turned out to have been a smart call.
The hike along Laurel Canyon Blvd was actually quite nice once I got away from Sunset. There is a quiet side street that runs along the main road which is shady and traffic-free. The side street took me all the way up to the Canyon Country Store. Once there I turned right to follow Rothdell Trail as it wound its way up the hill behind the store. I did not see the house I was looking for, which according to the guidebook was just around the bend. I wandered down a dirt road which dead-ended at the gates of a quaint little cottage nestled among the trees. This certainly did not look like the right house, but it did look familiar. I could have sworn it was the house used in the movie The Doors that was supposed to be Jim and Pam's house. But I didn't want to bother anyone so I doubled back.
As I came down towards the store again, I noticed a two story stained-wood building with a bell on its roof. I remembered reading in the guidebook that Jim's house had a bell on top of it. That must be it. Success. And surprisingly easy to find -- it is in fact directly across from the Canyon Country Store in plain view of Laurel Canyon Blvd. They might have mentioned that in the guidebook.
Now for the second part of my adventure. I had read that further up along Rothdell is an old staircase that leads past several houses and into an open field. A trail leads along the fence bordering the back of the residences to another set of stairs that goes back down to the parking lot behind the store. It seemed like a nice little excursion. And the guidebook said there was an amazing view from up there.
The stairs weren't hard to find. But they were a little treacherous. They look like they haven't been maintained since the days of the Garden of Allah. I passed several tumble-down cottages perched on the side of the hill, only accessible by these narrow and dangerous stairs. I wondered who lived up here? Reclusive ex-rock stars? Mountain goats?
I got to the top of the stairs and found the trail. The guidebook had described it as a "deer trail" and they weren't kidding -- there were fresh deer tracks in the soft dirt. Big ones. I followed the deer tracks along the side of the ridge to a clearing and then paused to take in the view. It was magnificent. To the south I could see the whole lower canyon and parts of the city below, brilliantly lit by the low-angled winter sun. To the west was Lookout Mountain Road snaking its way up into the hills. It was pretty beautiful. And peaceful. I couldn't believe I was smack-dab in the middle of L.A. And not even in a park. I was in some kind of no-man's land. Following a deer trail.
I kept along the ridge for a while looking for the stairs leading back down. Eventually I realized that I had gone way past the parking lot and was hanging out over the edge of the ridge with no way to get down. I started to wonder what other types of creatures inhabited this place... coyotes? mountain lions?
I decided to turn back.
At one point I spotted a gully that seemed to lead back down to civilization. When in doubt, go downhill. I scrambled down the steep walls, clutching at roots and branches as I slid past, until I reached the top of a high wall that looked down into somebody's patio. It didn't seem prudent to try and jump down onto the patio and possibly risk getting shot at in the process. So I had to climb back up the gully. Crawl is more like it. Hands and knees, eating dirt the whole way. I paused about halfway to lean against a tree and catch my breath. My heart was pounding in my throat. I was in full-on survival mode. Every time I grabbed at a root or a shrub, I half-expected a rattlesnake to lunge out at me.
Finally, I made it back up to the deer path. I followed it back around the ridge, assuming I would have to return to the original set of stairs. But I caught a glimpse of a narrow opening and on further inspection discovered that it led to the second set of stairs. I clung to the metal railing for dear life as I made my way down this equally decrepit flight.
About halfway down I passed an attractive young couple on their way up. I asked them if they were going for a hike, but they just looked at me like I was a madman from the desert. They were merely visiting a friend who lived in one of the houses along the staircase. I told them about the amazing deer trail and the wonderful view and they reacted with polite disinterest.
When I got back to the store I bought bottle of water and asked the clerk about Jim's house. He confirmed that it was the one with the bell on it. I sat on the front porch and drank my water watching as the pretty people drifted in and out of the store. I thought they probably have no idea that just around the corner was the home of the Lizard King himself, a true poet of our time, a visionary, an outlaw politician who exhorted the masses to break on through the doors of their timid perceptions and experience life with immediate passion and howling urgency. To resurrect their savage souls and burn down the cathedrals of complacency. To derange their senses and run wild in the streets, tearing down the comfortable walls of their safe suburban sanctuaries.
But they probably wouldn't care.
I hobbled down the hill back to my little room and thought about the deer, running along the trail in the moonlight, miles above the city, guided only by scent and instinct.
I thought about Jim, walking these same streets that I walk, dreaming of poetry and revolution. I think Jim's ghost is still here, still walking these streets, still trying to get us all to "WAKE UP!" His room in the "green hotel" is still there, with its window looking out over the living, breathing L.A. streets.
I saw his face today on the Sunset Strip, his searching eyes gazing into the souls of the misguided and the lost. As if to ask:
I saw a movie the other day called I'm Not There in which six actors portray different incarnations of Bob Dylan representing various stages in his life. By far, the best of the bunch was Cate Blanchett who plays Bob circa 1966 when he toured England with The Band -- outraging his old die hard fans with loud electric performances and confounding journalists with cryptic interviews.
Cate is one of those actors who seems to be able to absorb another soul and render the truth of a character in brilliant detail. There is a moment in the movie when she is onstage (as Bob) playing the piano and singing Ballad of a Thin Man -- her left hand goes flying up in an almost palsied manner as she sings a particular phrase, then lands back on the keys rhythmically hammering out the bass line. It is weird and quirky and beautiful. And it is pure Dylan.
After the movie I came home and pulled out my copy of No Direction Home, the Martin Scorsese documentary that follows Dylan from his youth in Hibbing, Minnesota through his formative years in Greenwich Village and culminates with his transformation from folk messiah into enigmatic rock star. Footage from the 1966 tour is interspersed throughout as a kind of backdrop to the creation myth. I watched the '66 clips to compare Cate's performance to the original. And it wasn't just that she nailed it so completely -- she actually managed to do Dylan better than Dylan. If that's possible.
The idea of using six actors to portray Dylan makes sense. Throughout his career, Dylan has continually reinvented himself, often to the point of alienating his audience. Yet somehow he has endured, always somewhere on the scene -- sometimes in the foreground, sometimes in the shadows. And his influence is so pervasive and indelible that it has become an intrinsic element of the culture. Certainly it has become part of my own DNA. Dylan has always been part of my life, even before I knew who he was.
It ain't me, Babe...
When I was a kid, my parents were leaders of our church's 'Youth Group', which meant that my sisters and I got to spend a lot of time hanging around with a bunch of teenagers. And it was the sixties, so teenagers, even in Louisville, Kentucky, were very cool. We used to go on weekend 'retreats' at a rustic campground where my parents would engage the teens in discussions about the world, their lives and their faith. Music was often a big part of the program. I think the first time I heard Blowin' in the Wind was sitting in a circle in front of a huge stone fireplace while a few members of the group played acoustic guitars and sang harmony.
Dylan's music was already legendary, but Dylan himself was conspicuously absent. He had reportedly gone into hiding after a motorcycle accident. Or so the story went. In fact, Dylan was still writing and recording, but typically he had rejected the role that had been ascribed to him. He had no interest in being the 'spokesman of a generation' or the leader of a musical revolution. He was spending most of his time raising his family and trying to avoid stalkers and parasites.
Of course we did have Dylan's 'Greatest Hits' collections to keep us going during these fallow times. But where was Bob? Finally, I got my first glimpse of him at a midnight showing of George Harrison's Concert for Bangladesh film. Towards the end of the concert, George steps up to the mike and says "I'd like to bring out a friend of us all... Bob Dylan." And this gangly little dude ambles up to the mike, his frizzed-out 'jew-fro' haloed in the bright lights. He was indeed Saint Bob, a friend to us all. He sang the classics, A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall, Blowin' in the Wind, Mr. Tambourine Man, Just Like a Woman. And then he was gone.
But his influence remained. I noted with particular interest that while most of the other performers wore the traditional faded blue jeans (except for George, who wore a white suit) Bob sported what appeared to be beige corduroys. Even in that odd detail, Dylan seemed to be making a statement (probably unintentionally) of his individuality. From that point on, the beige corduroy became my pant of choice. I, too, would distinguish myself from the hordes of jocks and stoners in their flared Levis and the cliquish preppies with their khaki chinos.
Years later, I saw an outtake from the Bangladesh film showing Bob at a sound check the afternoon before the concert. He was wearing faded blue jeans. Oh well.
'Twas in another lifetime...
Perhaps the most influential event in my history with Dylan came with the release of his album Blood on the Tracks. From the moment I first dropped the needle onto the opening grooves of Tangled up in Blue to the final notes of Buckets of Rain, the album became a blueprint for my life. Dylan had reappeared in full force, conjuring imagery that crossed the boundaries of time and experience. The past was entwined with the present, the real with the imagined, the mythic with the mundane. He had seen it all and done it all and come back to tell the tales. Heartbreak and desire. Redemption and regret. Adoration and contempt.
At first, these songs were like movies to me. I lived them, lived through them. I saw what he saw and felt what he felt. Most of the things he sang about were unknown to me, but a door had been opened that would lead me to a larger world, painted in rich textures and deep hues and filled with romance, adventure, mystery and pain. I knew now what I would be -- a vagabond in the landscape of experience, a poet of the soul, a storyteller.
The ultimate expression of this vision was the song Shelter from the Storm. That song, which speaks so desperately of lost love and inescapable destiny, things I could only dimly comprehend at the time, got deep inside my blood and infected me with an icy fever that I have never been able to shake. I felt like Dylan was showing me the history of my future. And in a way, he was -- far more accurately than I possibly could have imagined.
It was about a year later that Bob Dylan came to my house. He had followed up Blood on the Tracks with another album called Desire and then went out on the road with a kind of traveling carnival called the Rolling Thunder Revue. A live album was recorded at one of the Rolling Thunder shows as well as a television special. The special aired on NBC to coincide with the release of the live album.
I can still remember my excitement as I sat in front of the TV set in our family room. The show began with no introduction whatsoever, the camera simply focused on a microphone. Then Bob leaned into frame singing the opening lines to A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall. I was glued to the set for the entire hour. In those days we had no VCRs and there would be no rebroadcasts on cable later in the week. You got one shot and that was it. I have never seen it again, but the impression was indelible. Despite whatever misery he had suffered during his divorce which led to the creation of Blood on the Tracks, he was moving forward, transforming once again. In fact he was soon to make one of his most extreme transformations of all.
You gotta serve somebody...
When I was in college, Dylan was practically part of the curriculum. I lived on a hall with several accomplished musicians and one thing we all seemed to share was a knowledge of Dylan's music. Likewise in my English classes, amid the references to Ovid, Wordsworth or Eliot, it was not surprising for someone to toss in a Dylan quote here and there. Actually it was quite common.
Once again, however, Bob had left us all behind. While we were looking to him for inspiration, he was looking somewhere else altogether. Somewhere we never would have expected. Somewhere many of us thought was completely uncool. Bob was looking to Jesus.
I'll never forget the night we were all sitting around the dorm when one of our hallmates, George, returned from New Haven having just seen Dylan in concert. George was one of the original, dyed-in-the-wool, hardcore Dylan fans. He had been with Dylan from the get-go. He was a true believer. But when he walked into the room that night, George was a broken man. His faith had been shattered, his loyalty betrayed. He had gone to the show having heard the rumors, but he just couldn't believe what he had witnessed. Dylan had gone GOSPEL! It was an unforgivable sin. A travesty. An outrage. George was inconsolable.
Personally I thought it was pretty funny. And it made sense. Gospel was always a huge influence on rock music, not to mention folk music. And Dylan was always searching for new sources of inspiration, why not turn to gospel music? Besides, I knew it wouldn't last. By the time everyone got all up in arms about Dylan going gospel he would probably be off doing something else. Years later I heard a bootleg tape of one of those infamous gospel shows and the truth is, I thought it was pretty damn good. Dylan is a great songwriter no matter what he is writing about. Some of those songs stand up among his best. And the band was tight and funky.
To live outside the law you must be honest...
In the 80's, Dylan seemed to drop out of sight again, but he never really drops out of sight. He is almost constantly touring and recording, putting out new material on a regular basis. I saw him live for the first time with Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers in Washington D.C. It was a good show, the Heartbreakers being especially impressive. It also served as my introduction to the inner sanctum of "unofficial" Dylan recordings.
I attended the show with one of my housemates, Dave, who was a big fan of the Grateful Dead and an avid "taper". Through Dave I met Doug, who was also a taper but of a different ilk: Doug was a Dylan taper. The difference between being a Dylan taper and a Dead taper is that the Dead don't mind people taping their shows -- they encourage it. But at a Dylan show, taping is expressly forbidden. So we had to smuggle in a pair of 18-inch-long shotgun microphones, plus stands, plus a state-of-the-art (at the time) DAT tape recorder. My complicity in these shenanigans gained me entry into the world of Dylan bootlegs, which are never sold, only traded. And since I now had a first generation copy of the Dylan-Petty show, I had something to trade with.
One of my early acquisitions was a tape of the legendary '65 Newport Folk concert where Dylan "went electric." I had heard about this event, read about it, imagined it -- but to finally hear it was like being handed a tape of the Sermon on the Mount. First of all I was surprised how short it was -- only three songs in the electric set, plus two more with Dylan playing solo. I was also surprised at how completely un-radical it sounded. It was just some good old blues-based rockin'. I couldn't understand why people had gotten so upset. I had a recording of Muddy Waters from the very same festival and he was playing electric. Nobody tried to boo Muddy off the stage. But for Bob to do it was a sacrilege. Just like going gospel was in '78. I guess there's always going to be somebody bothered about something.
Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me...
It was about this same time that the band I was in, called The Charismatics, decided to break up. The Charismatics was a decent little rock band that never really got off the ground. But we had an excellent lead singer named Jay who was also a very good songwriter. I learned a lot from Jay about writing songs. The Charismatics played one of my very first compositions, called Baby Never Cries. After we broke up, I wanted to keep on writing and playing. I had just read the Robert Shelton biography of Dylan and learned that Dylan's life had been changed forever when he read Bound For Glory by Woody Guthrie. I got a copy of Woody's book and read it in one sitting. Then I read it again.
Bound For Glory is part autobiography, part mythology, part parable and part how-to book. Once again a door had opened and I was introduced to a world of folk musicians, ramblers, gamblers, prophets, peddlers, thieves, beggars, saints and sinners. I began seeking out recordings of Woody's music and learning his songs. Then I found the music of his contemporaries and learned that too. I became an amateur folk musicologist, putting together my own little archive of folk, blues, country and gospel.
I started writing more songs, many of them directly influenced by Woody's words and imagery. I played at open mike nights three or four times a week, introducing at least one new song each week. I even had a semi-paid gig at a vegetarian restaurant called Food For Thought where I played my original songs along with Woody's and Bob's. Between sets I'd pass the basket for tips. Just like Bob used to do. Just like Woody used to do.
At one point I was so immersed in the folk music scene I was offered a job at the Smithsonian Institute overseeing the digital conversion of the entire catalog of Folkways Records -- perhaps the greatest archive of folk music ever collected. I interviewed for the job with Tony Seeger, nephew of Pete Seeger -- who was a good friend of Woody and Bob. I felt like I was very nearly in touch with my mentors. I would have loved that job. I would have done it for free. But the Republican Administration slashed the Smithsonian's budget and the job was cut.
Perhaps the culmination of this period was when I played onstage at The Gaslight Cafe in Greenwich Village. The very stage where Bob had played at the beginning of his career. I stood where he stood playing the songs I had written which he had inspired. It was overwhelming. The fact that it was only an open mike, very late on a Sunday night, and there was hardly anybody in the audience made little difference to me. I was in heaven.
It's all over now, Baby Blue...
I decided to leave Washington after the Smithsonian job failed to pan out. But not just because of that. I was also heartbroken. My girlfriend of the past four years had left me and I couldn't stand being in the city that reminded me so much of her.
It was during this very low point that the songs of Blood on the Tracks came back to me. I had been playing and singing them for several years, but now when I sang them, the voice came from a much deeper place than before. The pain was real to me now -- the sadness, the longing and the emptiness were tangible. But singing these songs also helped me weather the storm of my emotions. They gave me an outlet. They helped me to distinguish between the many conflicting feelings that were threatening to steal my sanity. I learned that buried within my despair, there was redemption. Beneath my anger was forgiveness. Beyond my death was rebirth.
I had gotten hold of a copy of the so-called 'New York Acetates' -- a recording of the original sessions for Blood on the Tracks. According to the story, Bob recorded the entire album over the course of two days with studio musicians in New York. In those days, artists were sometimes given demo versions of the records called 'acetates' to take home and listen to on their own. Supposedly Bob brought the acetates back to Minnesota and played them for his brother who apparently made a few suggestions. As a result Bob re-recorded half the songs in Minnesota with a completely different band.
Hearing those original recordings was fascinating. The whole record has a subdued, plaintive tone. It's almost like one long song with ten movements. Like a sonata with lyrics. In the state I was in, this more somber, moody recording seemed fitting. It was as if Bob were speaking to me from the past to remind me of where we had been and how he had warned me of what was to come. Not in a chiding way. Just as a matter of fact. We knew this would happen, and now it has, so let's just keep moving forward.
It took a while, but I did manage to move forward. And for my progress, I was rewarded. In November of '94 I was sitting front row center for the taping of Bob Dylan's MTV Unplugged concert in New York City. For this best of all birthday presents I have the lovely Lauren Lazin to thank. The concert was incredible, Bob was at his very best, and to be sitting so near to my longtime idol was like a dream come true.
If you look very closely at the DVD, you can catch a glimpse of me sitting in the front row in a state of pure euphoria. I'm easy to locate, just look for the woman in the front row with the long shapely legs (that's Lauren) -- I'm the lucky guy sitting next to her. I can't prove this, but I'm pretty sure that you can catch Dylan stealing glances at Lauren's legs during the concert. Quite a distraction to be sure, but somehow he kept his cool. It's just another testament to his masterful powers of concentration.
But me I'm still on the road...
A few years later, I saw another Dylan show at the Beacon Theater. I went with my sister Susan who has been a Dylan fan even longer than I have. The show started off a little shaky -- it didn't seem like Bob was all that interested in being there. He was just kind of punching the clock. 'Here's a song. Here's another.' Then about midway through the first set, something odd happened. Bob started out one of his old chestnuts, but he wasn't doing it the same way we'd all heard it on the record. This is not unusual, Bob often rearranges old songs, sometimes changing the tempo, the chords, even the lyrics. But this time it felt like even Bob wasn't sure where he was going. The tempo was slow, he may have changed the key, and he seemed to be singing the melody inside out. He struggled his way through the first verse and plowed on.
Then, in the middle of the second verse, something sparked. It was like Bob had been searching for another melody that was hidden inside the original one and all of a sudden he'd grabbed hold of it. His voice filled with confidence and the rhythm started to flow. The band picked up on it and got into the groove. The song took off in a totally new direction, fresh and alive like it had never sounded before. Bob was into it. The band was into it. The crowd was into it. The rest of the show really cooked. By infusing that one song with new blood, Bob had rediscovered his purpose for being onstage. It was inspiring.
After the third encore, as the band played a coda, Dylan stepped off the front of the stage and walked up the aisle, right past the cheering audience, and out the front doors. I later found out that he walked out onto Broadway, hailed cab and went home. I guess he figured he'd done his job that night and there was nothing further to be said.
Stuck inside of Mobile with the Memphis blues again...
Ever since I saw I'm Not There, I've been revisiting a lot of Dylan's music. Especially Blood on the Tracks. I don't have my bootleg tape of the New York Acetates, but that's OK, because I love the 'official' version just as much.
I did a little research on the acetates and found out exactly what happened between September and December in 1974 -- musically that is. There is a very good reason that the acetates sound the way they do. They are in fact ten songs all written in the same key and played, on Dylan's guitar at least, in the same 'open E' tuning. Supposedly, Dylan was influenced by Joni Mitchell's use of open tunings and decided to try one out. He ended up composing ten masterpieces in a row, then went into the studio and laid them down. Upon hearing them later, he may have concluded that ten songs in a row using the same tuning and the same four or five chords might get a little tiresome to the ear. So he re-recorded some of them using different keys, different tunings, and different musicians. And in most cases, I happen to think he improved on the originals.
I think it's interesting that Joni comes into the picture at this point. Something she said once in an interview has always struck me as one of the wisest comments I have ever heard concerning interpersonal relationships. At least the wisest comment I ever read in a magazine. What she said was something like 'As soon as you think you know the other person, that's when you stop knowing them.' I have found this to be true time and time again and yet I keep falling into the same trap.
I believe the same thing applies to knowing yourself. As soon as you think you know yourself, that's when you stop knowing yourself. I think of Dylan, constantly reinventing himself, even right there onstage in front of my eyes. He's playing a song everybody knows, but he's hearing something different in it. And he wrestles a new song out of the old one, allowing us all to witness the rebirth. And when the miracle is complete, he hops in a cab and goes home.
Dylan has never traveled the well-paved road. His career is full of hits and misses. But he is always on the lookout for the 'next' Dylan. Who is that guy gonna be? Who am I going to be next? Never standing still. Always moving forward.
So I'm sitting here with my guitar tuned to 'open E' trying to go back and relearn those ten amazing songs from Blood on the Tracks the way they were originally written. To see how that felt. To hear new things in familiar places. To rediscover my future in my past. To pay tribute to a songwriter and a storyteller. Bob and I have come a long way together.
