Shine On You Crazy Diamond

Rest In Peace, Syd
May you find the peace in the afterlife that you had trouble finding in life
Roger Keith "Syd" Barrett
(January 6, 1946-July 7, 2006)

The Fourth Star in Heaven

On February 18, 1959 the small plane carrying Buddy Holly, J.P. Richardson (The Big Bopper), and Ritchie Valens crashed killing all on board. Songwriter, Tommy Dee, wrote the song Three Stars which was subsequently performed by Eddie Cochran in memory of his 3 fallen peers:

Three Stars in Heaven

Look up in the sky, up towards the north
There are three new stars, brightly shining forth
They're shining oh-so bright from heaven above
Gee, we're gonna miss you, everybody sends their love

Ritchie, you were just starting to realise your dreams
Everyone calls me a kid, but you were only seventeen
Now Almighty God has called you, from oh-so far away
Maybe it's to save some boy or girl
Who might have gone astray
And with your star shining through the dark and lonely night
To light the path and show the way, the way that's right
Gee, we're gonna miss you, everybody sends their love

Buddy, I can still see you, with that shy grin on your face
Seems like your hair was always a little messed up
and kinda outa place
Now, not many people actually knew you or
understood how you felt
But just a song, just a song from you
could make the coldest heart melt
Well you're singing for God now, in his chorus in the sky
Buddy Holly, I'll always remember you with tears in my eyes
Gee, we're gonna miss you, everybody sends their love

I see a stout man, the Big Bopper's your name
God called you to heaven, maybe for new fortune and fame
Keep wearing that big Stetson hat and ramble up to the mike
And don't forget those wonderful words, you know what I like

Look up in the sky, up towards the north
There are three new stars, brightly shining forth
They' re shining oh—so bright from heaven above
Gee, we're gonna miss you, everybody sends their love

The cruel irony of this is that, on his way to Heathrow airport at the conclusion of his tour of England, the limo carrying Duane Eddy, Eddie Cochran, and Eddie's girlfriend crashed. Cochran, age 21, was killed, and Duane Eddy suffered a serious leg injury that led to a gimp he still suffers from today. Cochran became the “4^th star” in heaven, just over a year after Holly, Valens, and Richardson were taken from us.

While Cochran has been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, his songs have been covered by the likes of The Who, Brian Setzer, Led Zeppelin, Blue Cheer, Faces, and the Sex Pistols to name a few—he’s not really been given the same level of attention as some of his peers and contemporaries.

The British Invasion was a reaction from “across the pond” to our very own homegrown talents like Eddie Cochran, Ritchie Valens, Buddy Holly, Chuck Berry, Little Richard, and Elvis Presley—On Cochran’s one and only British tour, a young George Harrison would lie about his age to get into Cochran’s shows, and a young Paul McCartney got into a certain band-- The Quarrymen-- on his ability to play and sing Cochran’s Twenty Flight Rock—and while the bands and musicians they inspired—The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Who, The Kinks, etc. etc. are well respected within the pantheon of classic rock history. Guys like Eddie Cochran, Ritchie Valens, Duane Eddy, The Big Bopper remain mere cultural footnotes.

I’m not saying the likes of the Beatles, Stones, Who, Kinks, et. al. don’t deserve credit for their musical accomplishments—they certainly do. And maybe it was the brevity of their lives and careers, but the forebears of the British “musical pioneers” American music fans and critics cream their jeans over have not stood the test of time near as well as the bands that they inspired. Isn’t it about time these guys finally got the level of respect they so richly and rightly deserve?

Terry Kath (1946-1978) - a biography and memorial

Your joy is your sorrow unmasked
And the selfsame well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears.- from The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran

Terry Kath was born in Chicago on January 31, 1946 to Raymond and Evelyn Kath. While Terry started out on drums, in 1956 he switched to “guitar” using his mother’s banjo to teach himself how to play. As a young boy he would play along to records by The Ventures. Inspired by The Ventures, Terry decided to put together an instrumental group of his own, called The Mystics, to perform instrumental music in that same vein.

After graduating high school, Terry went to DePaul University where he met a young Walt Parazaider and Danny Seraphine forming a band called the Missing Links. The Missing Links were the pre-cursor to what became The Big Thing and later Chicago.

Known for his blistering guitar solos and his remarkable ability to play rhythm and lead guitar simultaneously, Terry was held in very high esteem by many of his peers including the great, Jimi Hendrix. While the horns may have been the heart of Chicago… Terry was the soul. Songs like Oh Thank You Great Spirit, Mississippi Delta City Blues, Takin’ It On Uptown, Scrapbook, 25 or 6 to 4, and Poem 58 all demonstrate Terry’s soulful proficiency and precise rapid-fire playing style and demonstrate his ability to play guitar melodically as if it were the 4th vocalist in the band.

Providing not only blistering guitar solos and working with Peter Cetera and Danny Seraphine as the rhythmic backbone of the band but also giving Chicago some of their most bluesy soulful vocals. Terry was a free-spirit living a life on the edge with a sense of urgency that the rest of the band fed off of. Listening to hits like Make Me Smile, Colour My World, and Wishing You Were Here gives an encapsulated portrait of what a soulful vocalist Terry was.

In 1977 Chicago finished up Chicago XI. The album opens with Mississippi Delta City Blues, a song that Terry had written back when Chicago was still called “The Big Thing” and doing the club circuit in the Chicago metro area. The song opens with a troubled laugh from Terry and then the lyrics that showed his discontent… “I’ve got a smile that I put on, when I’m not at home, when I’m not alone, but it’s so hard, to fake that smile, when my insides are cryin’ and my heart’s torn in half.”

On January 23, 1978 Terry’s laughter died in sorrow. At roadie Don Johnson’s house Terry pointed a gun at his head, he showed Johnson that the clip was empty, not realizing there was a bullet in the chamber, restored the clip to the gun and pulled the trigger. Just one week shy of his 32nd birthday Terry’s life ended abruptly, leaving behind his wife Camelia, his 2 year-old daughter, Michele, and a legacy as a soulful, free-spirited musician.

*The accompanying photograph was something I photoshopped back in 2002.