To Have and To Hold

When I was a very little girl, my family went to London and my dad and his brother Hugh took all of us kids to see Yellow Submarine at a large fancy cinema in Picadilly Circus.

It’s hard for me to picture now. My former RAF Dad and my debonair British uncle, wandering around swingin’ London surrounded by a gaggle of tiny children watching a ridiculous animated psychedelic romp. But I can’t put this too strongly: it was the most memorable moment of my entire childhood. A year later, the film came to the US and my family went again, and as we walked out of the theater I can still remember how aggrieved I felt. “They shouldn’t have taken out the ‘Hey Bulldog’ sequence,” I griped. 

I was 5 years old and I had found my calling.

It should be noted that at this time, my family was already full on obsessed with the Beatles. Indeed, I simply cannot stress how important they were to all of us. We didn’t own a television set, but on the days they appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show, my parents would rent one. Roxanne, the older girl around the corner, had informed us we all had to have “a Beatle.” Hers was Paul, my sister had John, Corry had George and I had Ringo. They actually had me dress up as Ringo on Halloween – being a baby, I had the right sugar bowl haircut, even – and when our guinea pigs had children they were inevitably named for the Fab Four.

Years passed and history happened and the Beatles faded from the zeitgeist, like four Cheshire cats, leaving only their smiles. When John died, we mourned. When George died, my brother, then working in Options on the stock exchange in New York City, texted me: “My Beatle is dead,” and I wept again. George was the only Beatle I had ever seen perform live, at the Albert Hall in London at a surprise benefit for the TM candidate for Parliament when I was over there covering a different band. My cousin Jeff got me on the press list and it was indeed transcendental. That year I saw Nirvana perform 7 times at the height of their power but George Harrison’s Albert Hall concert was for me the highlight. 

In other words the Beatles were the most important element in my musical upbringing, and I think it was remembering that show that made me want to see Ringo Starr this week. I knew he was going to be accompanied by some musicians from bands that I don’t appreciate – to say the least – but there are times in our life when it’s just worth it to throw caution to the wind. Plus, it was my cousin Jennifer’s birthday. After the Congressional Hearings on Thursday, we both felt that seeing a Beatle sing silly love songs from our youth might be the only possible antidote to our existential sadness and – preview of coming attractions – we were right.

Venue. Sept 28, 2018.

Ringo Starr has been touring for years, always accompanied by an “All Starr Band” who play their own hits while he drums along. (Full disclosure: there’s a second drummer on stage as well, filling in the gaps. Just like with the Grateful Dead. Or the Butthole Surfers.) In the past, this tour has included such luminaries as Bruce Springsteen, Todd Rundgren, Levon Helm, Ginger Baker, Dave Edmunds and Jeff Lynne, but on this tour, we were serenaded by members of Santana, Toto, Men at Work and 10CC. I know, right? Well, you can’t have everything and our hope was that 10CC would cancel Toto out. Also, it may just be a thing for my family and me, but Jennifer and I enjoyed hearing the songs we hated almost as much as the ones we loved.

And the funny thing was, the show was split evenly between the two. Our agonized cries of “Oh god…not Rosanna!” and out howls at the opening notes of the hell spawned hit “Africa” were offset by sudden moments of the sublime, as when Graham Gouldman sang “I’m Not In Love” or when Ringo stepped forward to sing “Photograph.” Those songs rose well above the scrum and really made the night. “I’m Not In Love” is definitely one of the top songs of all time ever – a fact agreed to by everyone on my Facebook page – and “The Things We Do For Love” is not far behind. As for “A Little Help From My Friends,” while I am sure we can all think of Beatles songs we like a lot more, there is something about the sound of Sergeant Pepper that really soothes a careworn soul.

Careworn we were. Who wasn't, last Friday? But even so, despite the dreaded presence of Toto and Greg Rollie, whose fretwork I don't appreciate, Jennifer and I had a great time. It was just like being at a sing-song at a pub in Liverpool, complete with the drunken revelry. But another thing we liked about this show was that it made us feel really young. The only people younger than us were the children, or more likely the grandchildren, of audience members, who were running around in the aisles and who sang lustily along with “Yellow Submarine.” Another thing we liked was that we knew all the words to every song. We played name that tune with each other – and as you can probably imagine, in my family that game is perpetually a lightening round. 

The whole thing was like stepping into a jukebox stocked with bad hits from the 1970s, or maybe seeing a cover band at a bar in Missoula, or a jam session by your kid’s high school math teachers, like the one I saw in my hometown last week, only on that occasion they played songs by the Pixies and Metallica, which was frankly preferable song selection. '70s rock is just so degraded – the sonic equivalent of a cheap orange plastic Halloween cup with a pumpkin face that lights up carved on the bottom – but man, songs were hooky in those days! You would be surprised. Like, there’s this song by Toto called “Hold the Line,” I haven’t thought about it in a million years, but I knew its name and every word before three notes were up. Will the same be true in 2040 when members of 21 Pilots and Muse are doing some similar type tour? I think not.

And even if that were to happen, I’m not sure who would play host. Who, in 2040, will have the emcee status of an actual Beatle? Who on the planet even has that status now? Watching Ringo Starr, one is struck by two things. First, he looks and acts incredible for age 78: we could hardly believe Wikipedia when we looked it up. Second, and more importantly, is the incredible history that the Beatles bear on their bodies, and in our hearts and minds as well. Watching Ringo Starr perform on the occasion of Jennifer’s birthday made us thankful that we were born into an era during which we were able to participate so fully in their existence. 

Just Grown Ups

Last Friday night I was spitballing with a friend via text about getting some local musician to play old hippie songs on acoustic guitar at my upcoming book launch, and he laughingly suggested Bob Weir. 

Funny funny, right? Everyone knows I loathe the Dead with all my heart, but it was exactly as if by writing the words ‘Bob Weir’ in my feed, my friend had conjured the actual man up, much like that lake of ooze in “The Gone Away World” which, when people get dipped in it, their worst nightmares manifest in front of them. Because in true Gone Away fashion, less than 24 hours later I was sitting in an auditorium, awaiting that same artist’s appearance. 

Of course I was not really there to see Bob Weir. What had happened in the interim was that the morning after my text conversation, an ad popped up in my newsfeed saying there were still tickets to a Patti Smith appearance that night, and I went crazy and bought one. What the heck. It was Friday, I had nothing else to do, it was for a good cause, and I like Patti Smith. Of course, I’ve seen her perform many times, but not for ages: I think last time was at Hardly Strictly Bluegrass, in 2010.

This particular show was a benefit for Pathways to Paris, a climate change initiative organized by the group 350.org, and it served also as a culminating event in the Global Climate Action Summit, a three day meeting of minds in San Francisco that is working towards the realization of the Paris Agreement and the ultimate decarbonization of the global economy. It’s an issue I care about, and I wasn’t able to go to the protests, so I felt the least I could do was throw money at it. It’s so obviously urgent, after all. On the night of the gig, two super storms, Florence and Makhut, were bearing down on the world. How long will it be til a climate disaster hits my own neck of the woods?

It was in that spirit that I decided to attend the concert, not because I thought it would be musically fantastic, but because sometimes you need to participate in social events like these to assuage your conscience. In my mind, Bob Weir was opening for Patti Smith, but when I arrived at the arena, the Masonic on San Francisco’s Nob Hill, it seemed it was the other way around. As I entered the building, I immediately saw a man in a floor length, tye dyed, crushed velvet hippie cloak, wearing a hat with a feather in it, selling Grateful Dead pins and yacking on his cell phone.  Plus, to add insult to injury, I  overheard him saying the dreaded word ‘chick,’ as in: “It’s by that chick over there.’ (The woman in question was well over 50, btw.) My ears felt soiled.

 In the lobby I stopped to take a picture of the 45 foot high “endomosaic’  mural, designed by Emile Norman. The 45 panels in it depict the history of California, or at least, Norman’s idea of it, circa 1958: as I was positioning my camera, a woman said to me, “I’m trying to decide if I should take a picture, but I’m really only interested in women’s issues.” She and I contemplated the panorama for a while, silently considering its version of the world.

Me (hopefully): “Maybe there’s a woman in the covered wagon?”

Inside the auditorium, things were less patriarchical but a lot more pious. The evening opened with a young girl, Rhiannon Hewitt, reading a poem she’d written about species extinction, and honestly, it was amazing poem, possibly the highlight of the entire proceedings. The next performer, Imany, was really good, as was the band from Greenland, Suluit. There was also a singer from Tibet, Tenzin Choegyal, backed by Tibetan children’s choir singing “Om Mani Padme Om,” as they do – they looked so sweet in their Tibetan robes, but later on I ran into the whole passel of them in the washroom and they were just as obnoxious as any passel of kids you’d meet in such a spot, covered in cheesecake crumbs.

Other moments, such as short speeches by Patti’s daughter Jesse Paris Smith (the organizer), by some teenagers who run a  youth activist group called Zero Hour, by climate scientist and 350.org activist Bill McKibben, who asked us to write postcards supporting the state’s divestment from fossil fuel industry to the next governor of California, and by actor Nikolai Coster-Waldau, who plays Jamie Lannister on “Game of Thrones” (“Winter is coming” yelled the audience, gleefully), were fine but less stellar, and I was particularly off put by the lady from the UNDP  that thanked the event’s sponsor, Salesforce.com. I’d spent a full ten minutes earlier in the evening driving up California street to the venue considering just how much I loathed the Salesforce building which now looms over the horizon wherever you are in San Francisco, like some kind of dark tower of Sauron. At night it flashes a giant green light show and it dominates every single angle of the city to an extent that makes it impossible to ignore. It’s existence couldn’t possibly be climate friendly, in any way, shape or form.

Another lowlight for me was Eric Burden, though I may be being unfair here. He performed two songs, beginning with Ledbelly’s “In the Pines,” and although I like that song, choosing to sing a song about domestic violence in that setting was not the best idea, I thought. His next song, “Mother Earth” by Memphis Slim, was less tin-eared, but it did nothing for me. I know, I know, all those 60s English guys appropriated black music like crazy, Nirvana did it too, it is what it is, but I just didn’t like it. So sue me.

After Eric Burden, the Danish artist Olafur Eliasson did an arty thing with these cute solar lamps that we all had under our seats (you can click on the link to see a picture and get a description of the project). And then, to my great joy and amazement, the next performer was Patti Smith. 

The joy wasn’t at her appearance, it was because it meant that I wasn’t going to have to suffer through Bob Weir, since he was going to close the show. Perhaps the organizers knew that Grateful Dead people are open minded enough to enjoy Patti Smith, but Patti Smith people don’t have the same forbearance for the Grateful Dead’s music. Or perhaps, like me, she just wanted to go to bed early. Anyway, Patti performed four songs, one dedicated to the activist Rachel Corrie entitled “the Peaceable Kingdom,” as well as “Pissing in the River,” from Radio Ethiopia, an abbreviated version of “People Have the Power” and finally, “Because the Night,” which I now know what it sounds like without drums and guitar. She was accompanied by Tony Shanahan on keyboards and Flea on bass. Yes, that Flea. I forgot to say he performed solo as well.

He didn't look like this in real life

In short, Patti Smith’s performance was a token gesture, at best, and while I appreciated her presence, it reminded me of the problem with these kinds of benefits, many of which I remember from my distant youth:  Bangladesh, No Nukes, the Secret Policeman’s Ball, Live Aid, Live Earth. They all cast this same super earnest veil over their issue that doesn’t feel all that helpful. Granted, I didn’t expect Patti Smith to recite “Piss Factory” or sing “Horses,” a song about male rape that stands alone in the rock canon for its blistering violence and its insistently honest gaze, but I suppose I must have been unwittingly hoping for something transcendent, because that’s the kind of thing I’ve always experienced in Patti Smith’s  presence. The first time I saw her, in 1978, it was on the hottest day of the year and I took the Caltrain from my suburb and my cousin Jeff picked me up at 4^th and Townsend on his motorcycle. It was so hot in Winterland that I took my top off and a bouncer threw me over the barrier and walked me out the side of the stage and I remember my terror in thinking I’d never see Jeff again. At that show she sang “Horses” and “Gloria” and “Rock n Roll N word,” and  “You Light Up My Life,” and I don’t think I understood a single thing she said or sang about, but I loved the show and the cadence and the beat. I believe that seeing that show changed who I am very profoundly.

This is from the Winterland show

But another thing that has changed since then, and that is Patti Smith’s role in culture.  She’s no longer just a punk poet from the lower East Side or even in the lowly world of Grammies and charts and world tours and such like; rather, she wins the National Book Award and accepts Nobel Prizes and is made a Commander of the French Order of Arts and Letters and has an honorary doctorate from Pratt. I am surprised and grateful that she has been recognized for what she is, but even though Patti Smith has all the cultural and symbolic power a single human can amass in one life time, it’s nothing compared to the power of a Jeff Bezos or a Mark Benioff or the GOP to ruin people’s lives and wreck the planet.

Does that sound sour? I’m sorry. That’s how the Pathway to Paris show made me feel. I fled it at 10:30, dropping off my protest postcard and my solar lamp in the big box at the door, and got in the elevator alongside 5 other Grateful Dead haters. It carried us to the bottom floor of the Masonic, so low that when you drive out there you’re at the very bottom of Nob Hill, in an area I’ll call Humble Valley, where the shadow of death is sadly in evidence in the wrecked faces of the bums and hobos and drug addicts who lie on the pavement all over it. They are a blatant reminder that the world’s gone horribly wrong.  Surely protesting, however one does it and for whatever cause, isn’t entirely futile. Yet I am afraid it is ridiculously naive of artists – and those who love them, like myself, for instance — to think that art can somehow save the day.