Lighten up while you still can--remembering Glenn Frey

Light up while you still can----- 

That’s good advice to heed in our hyper-sensitive out of control country, don’t you think? Thank God we have rock and roll music to help navigate us through this quagmire of dysfunction, which is why we all need practice what the late, great Glenn Frye preached and “Take it easy.”

That song was the Eagles first single and it was a smash hit, paving the way for one of the most storied and successful rock bands of all time as they forged their indelible career in the meat and potatoes days of rock and roll. 

By now, everyone knows that Glenn Frey grew up in Royal Oak, Michigan.  He lived a block away from my family’s first home but was cutting vinyl on Hideout Records by the time I was a toddler. Still, nearly everyone in the neighborhood had a story about him. He graduated from my high school, Royal Oak Dondero and the stories about him were plentiful, even though a good many of the people who said they remembered him graduated several years after he did. But so what. That’s ok. We’re all getting old and our memories are getting fuzzy.

The simple truth is that we want to be connected to greatness and rightly so. Glenn Frey was the epitome of rock and roll greatness. “He went to my high school” was something nearly everyone who went to Dondero bragged about over time. Face it, when you tell people you grew up in Royal Oak it was much cooler to say it was the boyhood home of Glenn Frey rather than the place Jack Kevorkian lived and worked.

Though the Eagles created a new hybrid of what many call “Southern California Rock and Roll,” only one of them was from California (Timothy B Schmidt) and a part of each of their youth was evident in their music. Frey was a protégé of Bob Seger and though he was never laudatory of growing up in Royal Oak, he never forgot where he came from and neither did we.

The Eagles were real musicians who wrote their own songs, played their instruments and created a body of work that brings me to the universal conclusion that it’s not that I am getting old; today’s music really does suck. 

The Eagles had something special and it wasn’t just a “right place at the right time” sound. This was evidenced by the fact that despite the amount of acrimony that existed in the band, they continued to make great music together even after they reunited for zillions of dollars.  Ultimately, they cared about the music and cared about each other. When Joe Walsh tried to sum up his grief about Glenn’s passing he said “It’s not that I can’t find the words, it’s that there are no words.” 

Very recently (and quickly) the powers that be in Royal Oak passed a resolution to rename the street that borders Dondero High School (now Royal Oak Middle School) in Frye’s memory and yesterday the sign was unveiled. There was and will continue to be a tremendous feeling of pride all of us Oaks have for Glenn and for how the Eagles music helped provide the soundtrack to our lives. I can’t help but think about Frey whenever I drive in through my old neighborhood in south Royal Oak---east on Lincoln Ave then past Longfellow, Mohawk and Wyandotte Avenues.

Royal Oak is a far cry from Winslow Arizona, but you can bet there will be plenty of people stopping to grab a picture at this corner, after all, it’s such a fine sight to see isn’t it?

40 years ago, the Oakland County Child Killer

Forty years ago. I remember it like it was yesterday.

There were five words frequently spoken in homes across Metro Detroit in the late seventies. Everyone was scared and everyone was talking about it.

“The Oakland County Child Killer.”

Those words became permanent parts of the architecture of homes in Royal Oak, Ferndale, Berkley and Birmingham. The ordeal, which lasted for 13 months was an unbearable loss that has been with the families in every step they’ve taken on this earth since 1976 and 1977. It has also stuck with the rest of us.

Friends, classmates and communities were scared (and rightfully so) because we were living a real nightmare. Four kids my age had disappeared and turned up dead over a period of almost two years. I remember reading about it regularly in the Daily Tribune and trying to make sense of why it was scaring me so much. It was probably because it was scaring our parents and parents everywhere. In my neighborhood we were either walked to our friend’s houses and back or had to call our parents the moment we were leaving a friend’s house, even less than 200 yards away, to let them know we were running home.

Was it parents being paranoid and too cautious? Of course not. The crime rate was low in our “Leave it to Beaver” world in Royal Oak and kids didn’t get kidnapped or murdered; that is, until those thirteen months in 1976 and 1977. Then everything changed. It was mass hysteria. It was the worst possible crime that could be committed; kidnapping sexually abusing and then killing a child. And the crimes have never been solved.

If you grew up in that area in that time, I’d reckon these words might still make you uncomfortable:
Task force
Stranger danger
Shotgun blast to the face
Big Beaver Road
7-11
American Legion Hall
Tiny Tim Hobby Store
Skateboard
Drug store
Candy
And fried chicken, the last meal fed to one of the victims before he was sexually abused, meticulously bathed and killed by a psychopath who has never been caught. This case remains the most remembered in the area forty years after it happened. Was it incompetent police work? A cover up or just bad luck that it could not be solved?

Today we are no closer to finding answers than we are counting the snowflakes that fall outside in this February flurry that brings a chill to our bodies, much like the chill we felt when we heard the words “late model blue Gremlin” on the evening news.

The never before told story of how I was almost never born

When I think about my Dad, it is impossible to fully understand what his life was like before I came along. Granted, my brother and sister broke him in and wore him down by the time I was born and in truth, they did an admirable job preparing him for the line of work I eventually fell into as a musician and a writer. Sadly, I’m not doing much of either these days but I know my Dad would be proud of my effort, commitment and the short career we always hoped would fly but hasn’t quite taken off.

Very few of my friends knew my Dad was a great musician and vocal music teacher in his early years. Before he was my Dad, he was in a Barber Shop Quartet called “The Four Bearers of Harmony.” (He is pictured second from the left)

They were the Barbershop Quartet State Champions of Michigan sometime in the 1950s in whatever the competition was at the time for these harmonic non-rock stars. However, their success brought a demand for their performances and they appeared all over Michigan, taking a single engine airplane belonging to the family of one of the members, Bob Mulligan, to the shows in Northern Michigan.

I recently found an article in the Traverse City Record Eagle mentioning their performance in 1957. I am not sure if this was the infamous “The time they could have crashed” incident, but my mother remembers it this way; more or less.

The quartet was in the single engine plane, tying to take off but the load was too heavy,wind blowing too hard or perhaps there was an unknown mix of both combined with the fact that the pilot of the plane was cocky, young, inexperienced and may or may not have been a democrat.

The plane failed to take off, so one of the guys got out and at the self-confident pilot’s instruction, lifted the tail off the ground and ran along with it as the plane picked up speed. At the last second the guy was pulled into the plane by the other members and somehow got the plane got off the ground and took flight. Fortunately, they had all packed extra underwear.

I know my father was not the one performing that act of asinine heroism. I speculate with a fair degree of certainty, however, that after he told that story to my mother (who was pregnant with my brother or sister) that perhaps he sang something in witty three part harmony with the other members, lyrically describing that the previous, near-fatal maneuver should never be attempted again by the pilot.

Something like:

“If this plane should ever crash,

We’ll kick your melodic, imprudent baritone singing ass.”

Let it never be said that Barbershop Quartet Members didn’t lead exciting lives in the 1950s.

I am melancholy tonight and am grateful for the relationship I had with my Dad and the things he gave me. He loved me even thought I never quite flew like he did. But 2016 makes me want to reach higher for him.

Gordon Lightfoot's OTHER song about a sinking ship

The Yarmouth Castle November 13, 1965

There’s been a lot of coverage these past few days (and rightly so) about the 40^th anniversary of the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald. There is no question as to the enormity of this song and what it did for Gordon Lightfoot’s career. But it also took what was only a moderate news story at the time and brought it into almost every living room in the United States and Canada.

Prior to writing the Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald, Lightfoot already had numerous hits including songs like: If You Could Read My Mind, Beautiful, Sundown, Carefree Highway and many others. But what is much lesser known and even less talked about is Lightfoot’s first song about another doomed ship, the SS Yartmouth Castle, a cruise and cargo ship that sank 50 years ago today, November 13, 1965.

Lightfoot recorded five albums on the United Artists" label before signing with Warner Brothers, where his success skyrocketed in the 1970s. In his first nautically themed song, The Ballad of  Yartmouth Castle, (Sunday Concert, 1969, recorded live but never in the studio) he describes a true to life event in the same, folk-style, song structure using a repetitive melody, like he used in the song about the Fitz.  To me, the lyrics are just as haunting as those he wrote for The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald—and in some ways more haunting as the story is told. Excerpts follow:

Now the many years she's been to sea, she's seen the better times

She gives a groan of protest as they cast away her lines.

And the grumble of her engines and the rust along her spine

Tells the Castle she's too old to be sailing.

There were tales of both courage and cowardice among the crew of the SS Yarmouth Castle. Many fled the ship without helping the passengers. Others pulled passengers from the windows of their cabins and directed them to rope ladders on the side of the ship. Some crew members had to physically throw weak and panic-stricken people off the side of the ship, away from the spreading flames.  Many people broke portholes and jumped into the sea while most of the lifeboats would not operate because the lines were painted over and jammed the winches. Even the captain abandoned ship without calling for help.

There was plenty of blame to go around for the tragedy but unlike the Fitzgerald, there was no mystery surrounding it.  The absence of sprinklers in Room 610, where the fire started was a huge contributor to the disaster. It was a room that wasn’t used for passengers because it was located directly above the boiler room.  Mattresses had been stacked improperly close to the ceiling light, which started the fire. There was also too much paint on the walls, including a fresh coat that hadn’t yet dried during the last voyage creating a flammable skin on the ship, a major catalyst for the spreading fire.

All amidships, oh she's blazing now, it's spreading fore and aft

The people are a-scrambling as the fire blocks their path

The evil smoke surrounds them and they're falling in their tracks

And the captain in his lifeboat is a-leaving.

At 77 years of age, Lightfoot’s voice is noticeably weaker than it once was but the Fitzgerald ballad remains as popular as ever in his concerts and on the radio while The Ballad of Yarmouth Castle is a great tune that has faded into obscurity.  His booming, vibrato baritone voice doesn’t have the same depth it did during his peak years on the charts, but who cares? Lightfoot gave us great, meaningful music and an amazing tribute to the crew of the Fitz as the song commemorated the tragedy. Unfortunately it never hit #1 on the Billboard charts and peaked at #2. The song that kept him out of the #1? Disco Duck by Rick Dees.  Thanks a lot Rick.

The fire on the SS Yarmouth Castle was so intense the ship’s hull was glowing red and the sea water was boiling all around it. Ninety people perished in the accident, most of the survivors were picked up by a ship called Bahama Star that noticed the Yarmouth Castle slowing down and then disappearing from their radar as she burned. The ship was not required to conform to American safety regulations since it was registered under the Panamanian flag and the loss of the ship prompted new and stricter safety laws on the high seas.

The Ballad of Yarmouth Castle is an obscure gem by Lightfoot, obviously overshadowed by the success of the song about the Fitz, but his 1969 recording is still worth the listen and Lightfoot ends the ballad with this haunting description of what happened 50 years ago.

Oh the Yarmouth Castle's moaning, she's crying like a child

You can hear her if you listen above the roar so wild.

Is she crying for the ones who lie, within her molten sides or crying for herself, I'm a-wondering.

But the living soon were rescued, the ones who lived to tell

And from the Star they watched her as she died there in the swells.

Like a toy ship on a millpond she burned all through the night

Then slipped beneath the waves in the morning.

https://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ssl#q=gordon+lightfoot+ballad+of+yarmouth+castle

On Grouse Hunting

Do you want to know what makes for a good day of grouse hunting? Getting up before 6 AM and hitting the road north, with one of your oldest and best friends. The miles fly by as strong, fresh, coffee ignites spirited conversations while you discuss youth, aging and the life choices you made which are spiked with both laughter and melancholy.

Hunting thunder chickens is a tough task; you don’t bait a pile and wait. You seek them out between the woods, streams, fields and shadows and rely on your most primal senses of sight and sound. If you’re lucky you get a few shots off. It you are good, you plug a few birds. But even if the best shot of the day is from your camera, it is still a great experience as mine was yesterday. 

To me, this photo illustrates a human life. It began as a seed and in its early years it grows steady and strong. The branches represent the different pathways our lives take and through this delicate cycle, the irony to me is that the oldest part of the tree provides the support to sustain the newer, always fragile life.