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Robbie Robertson – 8/2023

Robbie Robertson (the Band) was born in Toronto, Canada on 5 July, 1943. His mother, Rosemary Dolly Chrysler, was a Cayuga/Mohawk Indian who had been raised on the Six Nations Reserve near Toronto. The man whom he believed to be his father and who raised him until he was in his early teens, James Robertson, was a factory worker.

When he was a child, his mother often took him to the Six Nations Reserve, where it seemed that everyone played a musical instrument or sang or danced. He thought “I’ve got to get into this club. I think the guitar looks pretty cool.” His mother bought him one, his older cousin Herb Myke taught him how to play.

“Rock ’n’ roll suddenly hit me when I was 13 years old,” Robertson told Classic Rock magazine in 2019. “That was it for me. Within weeks I was in my first band, Little Caesar and the Consuls,” with whom he performed covers of the then current rock and roll and r&b hits. In 1957 he formed Robbie and the Rhythm Chords with his friend Pete “Thumper” Traynor (who later founded Traynor Amplifiers). They changed the name to Robbie and the Robots after they watched the film Forbidden Planet and took a liking to the film’s character Robby the Robot. Traynor customized Robertson’s guitar for the Robots, fitting it with antennae and wires to give it a space age look. Traynor and Robertson joined with pianist Scott Cushnie and became The Suedes

His parents separated around that time, and his mother told him that his biological father was a Jewish professional gambler named Alexander David Klegerman, who had been killed in a hit-and-run accident before she met James Robertson. Years later In his memoir, “Testimony”, he wryly commented on his Indian and Jewish heritage: “You could say I’m an expert when it comes to persecution.”

In 1959, the Suedes, got a crucial break when they were seen by the Arkansas-based rockabilly star Ronnie Hawkins.

Hawkins saw enough in Mr. Robertson to write two songs with him, ‘Hey Baba Lou’ and ‘Someone Like You’, which he recorded, and he later invited that teenage guitarist to join his band, the Hawks, initially on bass. Roy Buchanan, a few years older than Robertson, was briefly a member of the Hawks and became an important influence on Robertson’s guitar style: “Standing next to Buchanan on stage for several months, Robertson was able to absorb Buchanan’s deft manipulations with his volume speed dial, his tendency to bend multiple strings for steel guitar-like effect, his rapid sweep picking, and his passion for bending past the root and fifth notes during solo flights.” Robertson soon developed into a veritable guitar virtuoso.

The Hawks also included Levon Helm on drums; by 1961, the other future members of the Band were also in the fold. They toured with Hawkins for two more years and recorded for Roulette Records. By 1964, they had gone off on their own as Levon and the Hawks.

The Hawks recorded a few singles for Atco, all written by Robertson, and in 1965 he was contacted by Bob Dylan’s management and invited to be part of his backing group. While he initially refused, he did perform with Dylan in New York and Los Angeles, bringing along Levon Helm for those gigs. At Robertson’s insistence, Dylan wound up hiring all the other future members of the Band (Garth Hudson, Levon Helm, Richard Manuel, Robbie Robertson and Rick Danko) for the full tour. Three of his fellow members — the drummer Levon Helm, the pianist Richard Manuel and the bassist Rick Danko — expressed those characters in distinctly aching vocals. Robertson rarely sang lead, instead finding his voice in the guitar.

Dylan also invited Robertson to perform in 1966 on a session for his album “Blonde on Blonde.” The next year, he asked the Hawks to move to his new base in the Woodstock area, and they rented a house in nearby Saugerties that was later known as Big Pink. It was there that they recorded the music released as “The Basement Tapes” and worked on the songs that would be included on “Music From Big Pink.”

“It was like a clubhouse where we could shut out the outside world,” Robertson wrote in his memoir. “It was my belief something magical would happen. And some true magic did happen.”

When “Music From Big Pink” was released in the summer of 1968, it boasted seminal songs written by Robertson like “The Weight” and “Chest Fever,”along with strong pieces composed by other members of the Band as well as by Dylan. “This album was recorded in approximately two weeks,” according to another close Dylan associate, Al Kooper. “There are people who will work their lives away in vain and not touch it.”

For the Band’s follow-up album, “The Band,” released in 1969, Robertson either wrote or co-wrote every song, including some of his most enduring creations, among them “Up On Cripple Creek,” “Rag Mama Rag,” and “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down,” which became a Top Five Billboard hit in a version recorded by Joan Baez. The album reached No. 9 on the magazine’s chart.

The Band’s next effort, “Stage Fright,” released in 1970, shot even higher, peaking at No. 5, buoyed by Robertson compositions like the title track and “The Shape I’m In.” Those songs, like many on the album, expressed deep anxiety and doubt, a theme that carried over to “Cahoots,” released in 1971. And while that album broke Billboard’s Top 20, it wasn’t as rapturously received as its predecessors. Possibly because time were changing fast in those year. Three of his fellow members — drummer Levon Helm, pianist Richard Manuel and bassist Rick Danko — expressed his anxiety and doubt in distinctly aching vocals. Mr. Robertson rarely sang lead, instead finding his voice in the guitar.

In its day, the Band’s music stood out as well by inverting the increasing volume and mania of psychedelic rock and by sidestepping its accent on youthful rebellion. “We just went completely left when everyone else went right,” Robertson said. The ripple effect of that sound and image went wide on impact, landing the group on the cover of Time magazine in 1970 and inspiring a host of major artists to create their own homespun amalgams, from the Grateful Dead’s album “American Beauty” (1970) to Elton John’s “Tumbleweed Connection,” released the same year. The Band’s music so affected fellow guitarist Eric Clapton that he actually lobbied for entry into their ranks. (The offer was politely declined.)

Robertson produced an album for Jesse Winchester in 1970 and played on Ringo’s ‘Ringo’ (1973) and ‘Goodnight Vienna’ (1974). He is heard on Joni Mitchell’s ‘Court and Spark’ and played guitar on ‘Mockingbird’ for James Taylor and Carly Simon. He was now one of the most sought after session musicians, working with Eric Clapton on ‘No Reason To Cry’ and producing Neil Diamond’s ‘Beautiful Noise’.

A collection of blues and R&B covers, “Moondog Matinee,” was released in 1973, and Robertson’s muse fully returned in 1975 on the album “Northern Lights — Southern Cross,” which included “Acadian Driftwood,” his first composition with a Canadian theme. The original group’s final release, “Islands” (1977), consisted of leftover pieces and was issued mainly to fulfill the group’s contract with its label, Capitol Records.

In 1976, Robertson made the decision that The Band would stop touring. It caused the break-up of the group but they went out with one final concert, called ‘The Last Waltz’. The Band was booked to perform at Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco on 25 November, 1976. Robbie asked film director Martin Scorsese to film the event. The Band would perform with famous friends including included Ronnie Hawkins, Muddy Waters, Paul Butterfield, Dr. John, Bob Dylan, Eric Clapton, Van Morrison, Neil Diamond, Joni Mitchell, Neil Young and Emmylou Harris.

After the Band’s demise in 1977, Robertson released five solo albums, but devoted most of his artistic effort to movies, as a music producer or score composer.

The same year as “The Last Waltz,” Robertson produced a Top Five platinum album for Neil Diamond, “Beautiful Noise,” and a double live album by Mr. Diamond, “Love at the Greek,” which made Billboard’s Top 10 and sold more than two million copies.

Robertson told Musician magazine that he broke up the Band because “we had done it for 16 years and there was really nothing else to learn from it.” Another strong factor was Mr. Robertson’s frustration over hard drug use by most of the other members.

Without Robbie Robertson, the other members of the Band released three albums in the 1990s; the last, “Jubilation,” in 1998, was without Richard Manuel, who had died by suicide 12 years earlier at 42. Rick Danko died of heart failure in 1999 at 56, Levon Helm of throat cancer in 2012 at 71. 

Over the years, other members of the Band accused Robertson of taking more songwriting credits than he deserved. To them, it was a cooperative effort, with the other members adding important arrangements and contributing elements that helped define the essential character of the recordings. Levon Helm was particularly vociferous in his condemnation, amplified by his furious 1993 memoir, “This Wheel’s on Fire.”

In his own memoir, Robbie Robertson wrote of Levon Helm, “it was like some demon had crawled into my friend’s soul and pushed a crazy, angry button.”

The collaborations with Scorsese continued. Robbie scored Martin’s 1980 movies ‘Carney’ and ‘Raging Bull’ then later ‘The King of Comedy’ and ‘The Color of Money’. For ‘The Color of Money’, Robbie co-wrote the hit song for Eric Clapton ‘Its In The Way That You Use It’. Robertson also collaborated on film and TV soundtracks such as Casino (1995), Gangs of New York (2002), The Wolf of Wall Street (2013), Silence (2016), The Irishman (2019), and Killers of the Flower Moon (2023).

With his history it was remarkable that Robbie Robertson didn’t release a solo album until 1986. ‘Robbie Robertson’ was produced by Daniel Lanois and featured appearances from all members of U2, Peter Gabriel and his former Band mates Rick Danko and Garth Hudson.

Robbie Robertson’s fifth and final solo album appeared in 2019 with a title, “Sinematic,” that underscored his devotion to film work in his last four decades. He recently completed the score for his 14th film project, Scorsese’s “Killers of the Flower Moon,” which is scheduled to be released in the fall of 2023.

Robbie Robertson took his marvelous talents elsewhere when he departed this world on August 9, 2023 after a lengthy battle with prostrate cancer.

Marveling over where life had taken him, Mr. Robertson once told Classic Rock magazine: “People used to say to me, ‘You’re just a dreamer. You’re gonna end up working down the street, just like me.’ Part of that was crushing, and the other part is, ‘Oh yeah? I’m on a mission. I’m moving on. And if you look for me, there’s only going to be dust.’”

Robbie Robertson was inducted into the Canadian Juno Hall of Hall in 1989. In 1994, The Band were inducted into The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Robbie was inducted into Canada’s Walk of Fame in 2003. In 2005, he received a doctorate from York University and in 2006 the Governor General’s Performing Arts Award. In 2008 Robbie was given a Lifetime Grammy Achievement Award. In 2011, he was inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame and in 2011 made Officer of the Order of Canada.

Robbie is also on Canada’s Walk of Fame, he received the Lifetime Achievement Award at the Native American Music Awards in 2017 and was given the keys to the city of Toronto in 2019.

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Jeff Beck – 1/2023

Geoffrey Arnold “Jeff” Beck was born on 24 June 1944 in Wallington, South London to Arnold and Ethel Beck. Before Beck discovered guitar, his mother had wanted him to play the piano. But once his parents saw how Beck took to the guitar, they allowed it.  They probably thought, ‘If he’s got the guitar, he’s not going out stealing.’ The only friends he had were pretty low-life; most of them were one step away from jail.

Beck said that he first heard an electric guitar when he was six-years-old and heard Les Paul playing “How High the Moon” on the radio. He asked his mother what it was. After she replied it was an electric guitar and was all tricks, he said, “That’s for me”. As a ten-year-old, Beck sang in a church choir and his original musical direction was essential formed by the music his older sister, Annetta, brought home.  As a pre-teenager he learned to play on a borrowed guitar and made several attempts to build his own instrument, first by gluing and bolting together cigar boxes for the body and an un-sanded fence post for the neck with model aircraft control lines as strings and frets simply painted on it.

“The guy next door said, ‘I’ll build you a solid body guitar for five pounds’,” he later told Rock Cellar Magazine. “Five pounds, which to me was 500 back then so I went ahead and did it myself.
“The first one I built was in 1956, because Elvis was out, and everything that you heard about pop music was guitar. And then I got fascinated. I’m sure the same goes for lots of people.”

Beck’s sister Annetta introduced him to Jimmy Page when both were teenagers. Eventually, Beck bonded with another boy who was a budding guitarist in his neighborhood, Jimmy Page. The two musicians shared a passion for rockabilly music (Beck credited his older sister with buying the records that shaped his taste) and would try to impress each other with their skills. After leaving school, he attended Wimbledon College of Art. Then he was briefly employed as a painter and decorator, a groundsman on a golf course, and a car paint sprayer. In his early years he spent time in bands such as The Nightshift, the Tridents and then the Yardbirds, which he joined in 1965 to replace Eric Clapton.

The legacy of The Yardbirds three iconic guitar heroes Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page is a little bit convoluted, but Page did his best in later years to explain it in a video for Fender taped in connection to his signature Fender Telecaster, which is based on the guitar Jeff had gifted him and he used in the Yardbirds and in the early days of Led Zeppelin.

Page says he and Jeff initially connected due to their mutual interest in the guitar. Electric guitarists were a rare breed in rock and roll’s early days, he noted. “There weren’t many guitarists in the area at that point,” Page recalled. “You’d hear of other guitarists, you’d meet other guitarists, but nobody was in really close proximity to me. There was an art college at Epsom that Jeff Beck’s sister Annetta was attending.”

 Somehow Annetta heard about Page and got the idea that she should introduce her brother to the other local guitarist Page. One day, Jeff and Annetta just showed up at Page’s house. “There was a knock on the door, and there was Jeff’s sister, and there was Jeff holding his homemade guitar,” Page recalled. “We just bonded immediately.” Jeff eventually upgraded from his homemade guitar to a 1959 Fender Telecaster. Page came to possess the Tele after scoring Jeff a big break playing for the Yardbirds.

Page says he was a studio musician, working his way up to being a record producer, when he was approached about joining the Yardbirds. But he wasn’t ready to give up working in the studio, and he suspected Clapton was unaware of the conversation, so he recommended Jeff for the job. Jeff got the gig and soon bought himself a new guitar. But rather than keep his Tele as a backup, he gifted it to Page as a thank you. The Yardbirds were one of the U.K.’s biggest blues bands at that point.

Jeff Beck rose to fame as part of the Yardbirds, where he replaced Eric Clapton, before forming the Jeff Beck group with Rod Stewart.
His tone, presence and, above all, volume redefined guitar music in the 1960s, and influenced movements like heavy metal, jazz-rock and even punk. Beck earned two spots in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, in 1992 with the Yardbirds and as a solo artist in 2009. During the first induction he vented: “I have done other music after the Yardbirds, and somebody told me I should be proud tonight, but I’m not—because they kicked me out. They did. Fuck them.” Next to him, Jimmy Page, who’d eventually shared lead guitar duties with Beck during his final months with the band, burst out laughing.

Page was tapped to induct Beck into the Hall of Fame as a solo artist in 2009. “He’d just keep getting better and better and better,” Page said, recalling the records his friend began cutting after striking out on his own. “And he still had, all the way through. And he leaves us mere mortals, believe me, just wondering.” During that event Beck – said: “I play the way I do because it allows me to come up with the sickest sounds possible.”
“That’s the point now, isn’t it? I don’t care about the rules.
“In fact, if I don’t break the rules at least 10 times in every song, then I’m not doing my job properly.”

The formidable pair of guitar slingers then reunited on stage at the ceremony, dueling through “Beck’s Bolero,” an epic rock instrumental Page had composed 43 years earlier, to be Beck’s first solo recording. 

It is somehow impossible to describe the talent and musician ship of Jeff Beck. Outerwordly maybe, but then I curse myself for not having the vocabulary to do him true justice. I guess it was 1966 or 67 when I first ran into his guitar playing, when my amateur band took on Yardbirds’ songs like Heartful of Soul, For Your Love and especially “Shape of Things”. The last one in particular posed a challenge in the lead as bottlenecks were not yet on sale in our neck of the woods. I decided to use a beer bottle for the slide part, as I had seen Jeff do on TV. By the time he hooked up with Rod Stewart and Ron Wood a couple of years later, for the blues rock album “Truth”, Jeff was already in a different stratosphere. 

After the Yardbirds, Beck wielded his firepower to form the Jeff Beck Group, and was improbably joined by two more giants of rock history—singer Rod Stewart and rhythm guitarist Ronnie Wood. Even more volatile than his previous band, the Group lasted all of two albums before imploding on the eve of Woodstock.

Later came Beck, Bogert & Appice, a supergroup he created alongside former Vanilla Fudge bassist Tim Bogert and drummer Carmine Appice. The power trio produced one stripped-down record termed “docile” by Rolling Stone before Beck decamped. He cut an all-instrumental solo album, 1975’s Blow by Blow, which quickly went platinum.

Over the course of Beck’s solo career, seven of his 10 albums went gold. He was nominated for 16 Grammy awards, winning eight. In 2014, he was honored with the British Academy’s Ivor Novello Award for Outstanding Contribution to British Music. A year later, Rolling Stone gave him the No. 5 spot on its list of 100 greatest guitarists. They had no clue.

He also collaborated with the likes of David Bowie, Tina Turner, Mick Jagger, Stevie Wonder, and Jon Bon Jovi.

His solo output slowed down, until the release of 1999’s You Had It Coming, featuring Imogen Heap on vocals, followed in 2003 by an album he simply called Jeff. Around this time, he started incorporating more electronic and hip-hop elements into his music; culminating in his fourth Grammy victory for the tempestuous, shape-shifting instrumental Plan B. He toured extensively in the 2010s, including a joint-headline venture with Beach Boy Brian Wilson.
The duo had hoped to record together but those plans fell apart. Instead, Beck ended up befriending actor Johnny Depp, with whom he released a full-length album, 18, in 2022.
But the musician’s legacy lies in the balance between the fluidity and aggression of his playing, his technical brilliance equalled only by his love of ear-crunching dissonance.
“It’s like he’s saying, ‘I’m Jeff Beck. I’m right here. And you can’t ignore me’,” wrote Mike Campbell of the Heartbreakers in an essay for Rolling Stone’s Greatest Guitar Players of All Time, where Beck placed seventh. Of course Rolling Stone played to the popular ear, because really, no one could do what Jeff did on a guitar. Jeff transcended music, much in a way as Michael Jordan and Pelé did theirs.
“Even in the Yardbirds, he had a tone that was melodic but in-your-face – bright, urgent and edgy, but sweet at the same time. You could tell he was a serious player, and he was going for it. He was not holding back.”
“He’d just keep getting better and better,” Led Zeppelin’s Jimmy Page once recalled. “And he leaves us, mere mortals”.

Marking Beck’s death, Page tweeted, “The six stringed Warrior is no longer here for us to admire the spell he could weave around our mortal emotions. Jeff could channel music from the ethereal.”.

Jeff Beck had been sick over the Christmas Holidays and died on Tuesday, January 10, 2023 at a hospital near his home in Surrey, England. The cause of death was bacterial meningitis.

Some Tributes:

• Responding to news of his death, singer Rod Stewart called Beck “the greatest”.
Posting a picture of the pair together on Instagram, he wrote: “Jeff Beck was on another planet. He took me and Ronnie Wood to the USA in the late 60s in his band the Jeff Beck Group and we haven’t looked back since.
“He was one of the few guitarists that when playing live would actually listen to me sing and respond. Jeff, you were the greatest, my man. Thank you for everything. RIP.”

• US rock band Hollywood Vampires, comprising Johnny Depp, Alice Cooper, Joe Perry and Tommy Henriksen, also saluted “the passing of our dear friend and guitar legend”.
“Jeff’s incredible musicianship and passion for guitar has been an inspiration to us all,” the band wrote. “He was a true innovator and his legacy will live on through his music. Rest in peace, Jeff.”
Eric Clapton simply tweeted: “‘Always and ever’…….. ec”.

• Elsewhere, Led Zeppelin’s Jimmy Page paid tribute to Beck as “the six-stringed warrior” and praised his “apparently limitless” musical imagination which could “channel music from the ethereal”.

• In another rock tribute, Rolling Stones frontman Mick Jagger shared a video of the pair playing together, saying music had lost “one of the greatest guitar players in the world” and “we will all miss him so much”.

• Black Sabbath frontman Ozzy Osbourne said it had been “such an honor” to know and play with Beck, adding: “I can’t express how saddened I am…”

• And Queen guitarist Brian May said he was lost for words, but called Beck “the absolute pinnacle of guitar playing” and a “damn fine human being”. Then he took the opportunity to record a video praising Beck for making “possibly the most beautiful bit of guitar music ever recorded” with his track “Where Were You.” “If you want to hear his depth of emotion and sound and phrasing and the way he could touch your soul, listen to ‘Where Were You’ off the Guitar Shop album,” The Queen guitarist said in the clip. “Just Google ‘Where Were You Jeff Beck’ and sit down and listen to it for four minutes. It’s unbelievable.” “It’s possibly the most beautiful bit of guitar music ever recorded, probably alongside Jimi Hendrix‘s ‘Little Wing,’” he continued. “So sensitive, so beautiful, so incredibly creative and unlike anything you’ve ever heard anywhere else. Yes, of course he had his influences too, but he brought an amazing voice to rock music which will never, ever be emulated, or equaled.” May ended his video tribute with more praise for his fellow guitarist. “Jeff was completely and utterly unique, and the kind of musician who’s impossible to define,” he said. “And I was absolutely in awe of him.”

• Members of Kiss, Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley, also expressed their shock.
Simmons called the news “heartbreaking”, while Stanley said he had “blazed a trail impossible to follow. Play on now and forever”.
Singer Paul Young added in a Twitter post: “He was loved by everyone in the know; the guitarists’ guitarist!”

• “Jeff Beck has the combination of brilliant technique with personality,” the Heartbreakers’ Mike Campbell wrote when Beck placed Number Five on Rolling Stone’s list of the 100 Greatest Guitarists. “It’s like he’s saying, ‘I’m Jeff Beck. I’m right here. And you can’t ignore me.’ Even in the Yardbirds, he had a tone that was melodic but in-your-face — bright, urgent, and edgy, but sweet at the same time. You could tell he was a serious player, and he was going for it. He was not holding back.”

On a Personal Note:

Jeff Beck didn’t have a lot of songs that resonated with the masses in the way that other guitar heroes’ songs have. HIs music was too quirky, too outside, and just plain not catchy enough for him to have become as well known among the masses as a guy like Eric Clapton, Eddie van Halen or Jimmy Page.

Jeff Beck didn’t have a song like Cocaine where you just play the first few notes and everybody instantly recognizes it.

Instead he has classics like Freeway Jam. Not as many people will recognize this song as they will Layla or Voodoo Chile, but this is less rock and roll and more jazz fusion.

Yes, that’s Jimmy Page with Jeff Beck. And others! Listen to the part where they play some of The Immigrant Song. Hearing Jeff Beck play part of the vocal melody with all the whammy bar inflections he adds is pretty cool.

Jeff Beck isn’t known like Page and Beck doesn’t have a song like Stairway To Heaven and he doesn’t have a song with the popularity of The Immigrant Song either – at least not a song where Jeff Beck gets top billing. He had People Get Ready with Rod Stewart but wasn’t exactly the most cutting edge guitar playing Beck had to offer.

I saw Jeff Beck open for Stevie Ray Vaughan on SRV’s last tour, just a few months before the helicopter crash that took his life.  I loved Stevie Ray Vaughan’s set but Jeff Beck, even for us as guitarists was a little outside for our tastes. That was extreme though. He was really doing some real unusual stuff that night with the vibrato bar, intentionally bending notes out of tune just by micro-tones, and I guess Jeff Beck loved doing that, but while I have a ton of respect for him as a musician, I can understand why there were so many more kids trying to be like Eddie Van Halen than trying to be like Jeff Beck. Of course, if a kid wanted to try to be play like Jeff Beck, the big problem is: Where do you start? What would “playing like Jeff Beck” even call for? The concept is so nebulous! Play outside notes, sure, but which outside notes?

While I obviously didn’t always fully appreciate what he was artistically going for all the time, I’m glad that I got to see Jeff Beck play. He was and is a legend and will always be considered as one the best at what he did. Rest in Peace Jeff.

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Gary Rossington 3/2023

Garry Rossington (Lynyrd Skynyrd) was born in West Jacksonville Florida on December 4, 1951. Anybody familiar with the area knows, that West Jacksonville was considered the tough part of town where things were different. It’s the area where Lynyrd Skynyrd was born.  And now every original member of Lynyrd Skynyrd is dead. A Southern Rock band of musicians that passed before their time. The kind that used “to rape and pillage” across the country, who got drunk, did drugs, got laid… That was Lynyrd Skynyrd or at least that was the band’s reputation.

I know I can’t say “rape and pillage” anymore. But that’s how we described the rock star lifestyle back in the seventies, and Lynyrd Skynyrd were part of the firmament of the seventies, even after the plane crash.

Rossington had a strong childhood interest in baseball and aspired as a child to one day play for the New York Yankees. Rossington recalled that he was a “good ball player” but upon hearing the Rolling Stones in his early teens he became interested in music and ultimately gave up on his baseball aspirations.

It was Rossington’s love of baseball that indirectly led to the formation of Lynyrd Skynyrd in the summer of 1964 when he was not yet 13 years old. He became acquainted with Ronnie Van Zant and Bob Burns while playing on rival Jacksonville baseball teams and the trio decided to jam together one afternoon after Burns was injured by a ball hit by Van Zant. They set up their equipment in the carport of Burns’ parents’ house and played The Rolling Stones’ then-current hit “Time Is on My Side”. Liking what they heard, they immediately decided to form a band. Naming themselves The Noble Five, with the additions of guitarist Allen Collins and bassist Larry Junstrom, they later changed the name of the band to The One Percent before eventually settling on the name Lynyrd Skynyrd in 1969.

Rossington grew up in a single-parent household and said that early in their relationship, Ronnie van Zant became something of a father figure to him. He credited Van Zant, who was three years his senior, with teaching him and his bandmates how to drive a car, as well as introducing them to “all that stuff you learn when you’re 14, 15, 16”.

According to a New York Times article, Lacy Van Zant, patriarch of the Van Zant family, once went to West Jacksonville’s Robert E. Lee High School to plead Rossington’s case to school administrators after the fatherless Rossington was suspended for having long hair. Lacy Van Zant explained to the assistant principal that Rossington’s father, who died shortly after Rossington was born, had died in the Army and that Rossington’s mother needed the money Rossington made playing in his band. Lacy Van Zant further explained that, like his own sons, they were working men and long hair was part of the job. It is not known if the elder Van Zant’s efforts were successful, but Rossington later dropped out of high school to focus on Lynyrd Skynyrd full-time.

Rossington’s instrument of choice was a 1959 Gibson Les Paul which he had purchased from a woman whose boyfriend had left her and left behind his guitar. He named it “Berniece” in honor of his mother, whom he was extremely close to after the death of his father. Rossington played lead guitar on “Tuesday’s Gone” and the slide guitar for “Free Bird”. Along with Collins, Rossington also provided the guitar work for “Simple Man”. Besides the Les Paul, he used various other Gibson Guitars including Gibson SGs. Gibson later released a Gary Rossington SG/Les Paul in their Custom Shop. For most of his career, he played through Marshall and Peavey amplifiers.

“Free Bird” was not an immediate hit. After all, Skynyrd was on Al Kooper’s Sounds of the South label, distributed by MCA, and you remember Skynyrd’s song about MCA, right? And just a sidenote re Al… He produced the first three LPs, the band’s best work… Better than the iconic Tom Dowd’s stuff thereafter.

So… Skynyrd penetrated the populace kind of slowly with their first album “Pronounced ….. This was not “Led Zeppelin IV,” where “Stairway to Heaven” was immediately added to playlists. In truth, Skynyrd didn’t really break through nationwide or globally until the second album, “Second Helping,” with “Sweet Home Alabama.”

It’s when their tracks started to permeate FM radio…

God, if today’s youngsters lived through the days of AOR in the seventies. EVERYBODY listened, the FM rock station was the heartbeat of America. If you tuned in, you learned everything you needed to survive. And you never missed a show because you were unaware of it, when a band came to town…

So as the decade wore on, and they had the Memorial 500 and other holiday countdowns, number one was always “Stairway to Heaven.” Number two was “Free Bird.” And eventually “Kashmir” was number three. Always, year after year.

You see Lynyrd Skynyrd had three lead guitarists. We’d seen two drummers, but three lead guitarists? It pushed the music over the line, made it special, magical. It was called a Guitar Army…Not Navy or Air Force, but Army, because that’s where most Southern Boys ended up in real life.

In 1976, Rossington and fellow Skynyrd guitarist Allen Collins were both involved in separate car accidents in their hometown of Jacksonville. Rossington had just bought a new Ford Torino and hit an oak tree while under the influence of alcohol and other drugs. The band was forced to postpone a tour scheduled to begin a few days later, and Rossington was fined US$5,000 for the delay his actions caused to the band’s schedule. The song “That Smell”, written by Van Zant and Collins, was based on the wreck and Rossington’s state of influence from drugs and alcohol that caused it.

“Sweet Home Alabama” was one of those one listen records. Looped you right in. I asked Al Kooper the backstory. Just after the first LP was released, the band called and asked to come up to Hot Lanta to record a new song. That wasn’t released for another year. I asked Al if he knew it was a hit. He said…IT WAS SWEET HOME ALABAMA!

Though in time Rossington fully recovered from the severe injuries sustained in the plane crash, and later played on stage again, with steel rods in his right arm and right leg, he battled serious drug addiction for several years, largely the result of his heavy dependence on pain medication taken during his recovery. Rossington co-founded the Rossington Collins Band with Collins in 1980. The band released two albums, but disbanded in 1982 after the death of Collins’ wife, Kathy.

One important thing you’ve got to know is Ronnie Van Zant was the frontman and the band leader, and not a reluctant one like Gregg Allman. Ronnie had a large personality, he was full of quotes, and he didn’t give a fuck, he’d say whatever he wanted. Point being, the rest of the band stayed relatively faceless. You only knew the rest of the players from the album covers. But the key songwriters were Van Zant, Allen Collins, occasionally Ed King and Gary Rossington. Rossington had his hands all over the hits.

Even though no one could replace Ronnie, the Skynyrd legend could not be kept down. Ultimately, around 1987, the band was reformed with Ronnie’s brother Johnny as lead vocalist, and over time the original players came and went, and then they ultimately passed away. For the next 30 or so years they kept touring with limited interruptions and no…It’s not like Gary Rossington’s death is a shock. He had so many health problems, it seemed inevitable. He  suffered a heart attack on October 8, 2015, after which two Lynyrd Skynyrd concerts had to be canceled; he underwent emergency heart surgery in July 2021…and then he finally gave out on March 5, 2023. 

Even if every original member of Lynyrd Skynyrd is dead…the music of Lynyrd Skynyrd is still young. Doesn’t sound dated. Sounds as fresh as the seventies, when rock ruled the world, when we thought it could never die.

Skynyrd was not background. It wasn’t the soundtrack to a video game. The band and its music stood alone. That was enough. No brand extensions were necessary. Ronnie Van Zant’s identity, the band’s image was enough. Long after all the perfumes and other chozzerai the “musicians” of today are purveying is gone, they’ll still be playing Skynyrd music.

You see our music wasn’t momentary, it was FOREVER! And a good portion still is.

But you can only really get the hit by listening to the records. And no one else could be Ronnie Van Zant and Gary Rossington. Without them, without either of them, it’s not Skynyrd. A band. Self-contained. Living the life we all wanted to. The dream was to go on the road, at least go backstage, just to touch, to be in the presence of these giants.

So it’s the end of an era, and those of us still here are left with this empty feeling. 

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Hilton Valentine 1/2021

Hilton Valentine – The Animals, was born on 21 May 1943 in North Shields, Northumberland, England, and was influenced by the 1950s skiffle craze – a kind of fusion of American folk, country, jazz and blues-. His mother bought him his first guitar in 1956 when he was 13, he taught himself some chords from a book called “Teach Yourself a Thousand Chords“. He continued to develop his musical talent at Tynemouth High School and formed his own skiffle group called the Heppers. They played local gigs and a newspaper described them at the time as, “A young but promising skiffle group”. The Heppers eventually evolved into a rock and roll band, the Wildcats in c. 1959. The Wildcats became a popular band in the Tyneside area, getting a lot of bookings for dance halls, working men’s clubs, church halls etc., and it was during this period that they decided to record a 10″ acetate LP titled Sounds of the Wild Cats. 

But then came the Animals! The group was formed in 1963 when Eric Burdon joined the Alan Price Rhythm and Blues Combo, which already included the other original members of The Animals. There are different versions of the origin of the name of the band. Some say they were nicknamed that way because of their “animal” attitude on stage and because they were sticky. Others say it was in honor of a friend of Eric Burdon’s who was nicknamed “animal”. They soon began to get noticed and in 1964, they moved to London to play at various well-known clubs in the capital.

Their style drew elements from blues, creating a style of psychedelic rock and hard rock that was unique for its time and influenced many later bands and artists. The Animals’ best-known song is “The House of The Rising Sun”, which reached number one on the popularity charts in both the UK and the United States.

Now the Animals were hobbled by being on MGM Records, which was never cool. We knew that back then, we saw the labels on the 45s, we knew the orange and yellow of Capitol, the red of Columbia…MGM was a lame label, without the infrastructure of its big time competitors. But the Animals were giants.

It was the summer of ’64. The summer of “A Hard Day’s Night.” The British Invasion was in full swing, our minds had expanded to encompass the work of seemingly everything from the U.K., assuming it was good. And the Animals were.

At that point most people had no idea “House of the Rising Sun” was a Dave Van Ronk staple, never mind being on Bob Dylan’s first LP, it was the rock sound that put the Animals’ version over the top. Of course you had Eric Burdon’s vocal, but there is not a boomer alive, that’s how ubiquitous hit songs were back then, who doesn’t know the opening guitar lick to “House of the Rising Sun.” That arpeggio lick was played by Hilton Valentine.

Now the original incarnation of the Animals only lasted until 1966. Sure, their hit-making era was only three years, from ’64-’66, but they’d paid dues before that, beginning in ’62, in Newcastle upon Tyne, an industrial area without the hipness of Liverpool, never mind London. The Animals had a dark name and they were perceived as dark. But they had a slew of hits.

“House of the Rising Sun”, of course was their breakthrough, and went to #1, but “We Gotta Get Out of This Place,” which only went to #13 in the U.S., was a bigger song, probably better remembered. Barry Mann and Cynthia Well wrote it, but the Animals made it their own, and it did not have the legacy of a standard, it was fresh, brand new.

As for “It’s My Life”…Eric Burdon was gonna ride that serpent, he was gonna break loose, because..

“It’s my life and I’ll do what I want
It’s my mind and I’ll think what I want”

This was the ethos of the sixties, it’s not the ethos of today. Our parents were not fighting us for attention, there was no question of them being our best friends, we were throwing off the chains of society, of expectations, we were gonna forge our own path.

It’s a great song, Burdon delivers it, but never underestimate the importance of Hilton Valentine’s twelve string guitar. And the Animals had other hits, but “Don’t Bring Me Down” is probably my favorite.

“When you complain and criticize
I feel I’m nothing in your eyes
It makes me feel like giving up
Because my best just ain’t good enough”

The hormones had awoken. Puberty was in full swing. What you wanted was too often unattainable. You had crushes. But to them you barely existed, if at all. But to you, they were everything. The only thing you had to soothe yourself was this music.

“Oh, oh no
Don’t bring me down”

Now in the case of “Don’t Bring Me Down” one cannot underestimate the importance of Dave Rowberry’s organ, and Eric Burdon sings with nuance, something absent from too much of today’s music, and it’s a great Gerry Goffin/Carole King song, but what truly makes “Don’t Bring Me Down” a hit is Hilton Valentine’s fuzz guitar. It’s a bedrock element of rock history. And you probably had no idea who Hilton Valentine was. He’s that guy!

Valentine left The Animals for a solo career after the original line-up split in 1966. He was very close with Eric Burdon and while there was no touring Hilton lived in the downstairs basement apartment of Eric’s Laurel Canyon home and when Burdon became frontman for War, he took Hilton Valentine with him on tour as their guitar tech. Valentine went on to take part in several reunions and toured with Burdon in 2007. He never left the music.
Based in Connecticut with his wife Germaine in recent years, he also released music with his band Skiffledog.

Hilton Valentine died 29 January 2021 at the age of 77.

Our heroes no longer die before their time, they don’t O.D., their bodies give out and they’re gone, and there are so many of them these days that their deaths are less shocking and get less attention, after all, nobody lives forever.

Eric Burdon paid tribute to Valentine on Instagram, writing: “The opening opus of Rising Sun will never sound the same!… You didn’t just play it, you lived it! Heartbroken by the sudden news of Hilton’s passing.
“We had great times together, Geordie lad. From the North Shields to the entire world…Rock In Peace.”

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Joe Moretti 2/2012

Joe MorettiFebruary 9, 2012-  Joseph Edward “Joe” Moretti  was born in Glasgow, Scotland on May 10, 1938. Moretti moved to London in November 1958 with his wife Pina, and instantly became part of the burgeoning rock and roll scene based around the The 2i’s Coffee Bar in Soho.

There he found opportunities backing up singers such as Gene Vincent, Vince Eager, Colin Hicks & The Cabin Boys and other skiffle acts and nascent rock n’ roll outfits. It was in the 2i’s, in early 1959, that Moratti learned that guitarist-singer Tony Sheridan had quit Vince Taylor’s band, The Playboys, and Moratti was asked to take his place.

Moretti toured with Taylor in the UK and cut the iconic “Brand New Cadillac” in the spring of 1959. Shortly after, Moretti left the band to take up with Johnny Duncan’s Bluegrass Boys. The following year, 1960, Moretti was to play guitar on another session after being called into the studio by Johnny Kidd & The Pirates’ guitarist Alan Caddy to play leads on two songs: UK #1 single “Shakin’ All Over” and its follow-up “Restless”.

Throughout the 1960s Moretti continued to tour and record with artists such as Nero and the Gladiators, Ronnie Jones and The Nightimers and Eddie Calvert. In addition, Moretti was in demand as a session musician and, along with other UK guitarists such as Big Jim Sullivan, future Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page and Vic Flick, often himself having played guitar at a recording date without being credited. Moretti claims to have played guitar on hits for Jet Harris and Tony Meehan (“Scarlet O’Hara” and “Applejack”) and Donovan’s hit record “Mellow Yellow”.

It is now acknowledged that he played guitar on at least two more UK number one records: Tom Jones’ “It’s Not Unusual” and Chris Farlowe’s Rolling Stones cover “Out Of Time”.

He lived in South Africa until his death from lung cancer. Joe Moretti was 73 years old when he died on 9 February 2012.