Lou Reed

The first time I heard a Lou Reed song I was 18 years old and floating down the Chattahoochee River in a canoe. A shirtless Georgia teenager stood on the riverbank slapping his paddle at some swimming kids while a boom box blasted "Walk On  the Wild Side." At one point the teen's paddle made contact with a young boy's skull. I heard a loud "thwappp"and the boy fell face first into the water. The teenager laughed maniacally as the boy's friends pulled him to safety.

This is how the music of Lou Reed entered my life. There was something magnetic about the music, the raw and minimal guitar riffs, the shocking lyrics (did he actually say "even when she was giving good head"). Most pop music was safe. Lou Reed was dangerous. The sound had a dark energy, an urgent power with distorted guitars and atonal vocals.

The first Lou Reed album I purchased was Transformer (1972). From the moment he sang the words "Vicious, you hit me with a flower" I realized there was something deeper going on, ironic storytelling in a way I'd never heard. On "Perfect Day" Reed sings, "You made me forget myself, I thought I was someone else, someone good." The line perfectly encapsulated my teenage angst, my self-doubt and dim hopes for future redemption. Reed goes on to repeat the frightening refrain, "you're going to reap just what you sow." The words penetrated my soul like a warning, a call to pay attention to my own words and deeds.

When I discovered the Velvet Underground, I was spellbound. The music was real and edgy as if made in someone's garage. The guitars were droning and slightly out of tune, the drums scratchy and dirty. This was my first experience of lo-fi music and Reed was my first rock star crush.

He was a prototypical rock and roll bad boy. He abused drugs and alcohol, trashed hotel rooms, cursed reporters and engaged in bar brawls. But Reed was different. Where most rockers had affairs with supermodels, Reed opted for trysts with transvestites. While typical pop stars sang about how much they missed old girlfriends, Reed sang about bondage and sadomasochism ("Venus In Furs").

Google the words "Lou Reed was an asshole" and you'll find dozens of incidents describing his brutal, selfish, misanthropic behavior. There was the time he slapped David Bowie after Bowie suggested Reed cut back on his drug and alcohol use. Or the time he called Bob Dylan a "pretentious kike." (Reed himself was Jewish.) His Velvet Underground band mate John Cale called Reed "a twisted scary monster." Paul Morrissey, manager of the Velvets said Reed was possibly "the worst person who ever lived."

Friends and admirers grew familiar with Reed's moody tantrums and profanity-laced assaults. At the Manhattan clothing store RRL a sales clerk told Reed he was a big fan. Reed responded, "I don't know what the fuck you're talking about. Fuck off." Howard Sounes, author of Notes From the Velvet Underground: The Life of Lou Reed writes that Reed "was constantly at war with family, friends, lovers, band members, managers and record companies." Reed even described himself as a "fucking, faggot junkie."

This begs the question does it matter? As a person, Reed was clearly complicated. As an artist, Reed inarguably shaped the musical landscape. Without him there would be no punk rock. (Sid Vicious took his name from the Reed song "Vicious.") There would also be no grunge or shoe gazer scenes. Brian Eno claimed, "everyone who bought the first Velvet Underground album started a band." Reed's songs directly informed the musical style of Joy Division, Jesus & Mary Chain, Galaxie 500, Dream Syndicate, Luna, Spacemen 3, the Dandy Warhols, the Feelies and the Pixies.

Reed was an avant-garde storyteller who wrote about misfits and lost souls. His song subjects were junkies and drug dealers, transsexuals and schizophrenics. He chronicled trips to the bad part of town to buy heroin. In the brilliant but dark album Berlin, he told the story of Jim and Caroline, a troubled couple whose relationship crumbles as they fall into drug use, prostitution, domestic violence and suicide. This is the heady stuff of literature, not the trivial fare typically found in rock music.

Reed's heroes were literary figures like Hubert Selby Jr., Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg. During his days as a student at Syracuse University, Reed started a literary journal called The Lonely Woman Review. He wrote short stories and read poems aloud at St. Mark's Church along with the New York writers Patti Smith and Jim Carroll. Reed studied creative writing with the poet Delmore Schwartz whom Reed credited for teaching him to "use the simplest language imaginable" to impart the heaviest impact. (Schwartz was the inspiration for Saul Bellow's novel Humboldt's Gift.) Under Schwartz's tutelage Reed wrote poems that ultimately became the songs "Heroin" and "Sister Ray."

One of Reed's poems was titled "We The People." The words are as fresh today as they were fifty years ago.

We are the people without right. We are the people who have known only lies and desperation. We are the people without a country, a voice or a mirror. We are the crystal gaze returned through the density and immensity of a berserk nation.

One of Reed's favorite books was the 1963 John Rechy novel City of Night. The book was a landmark of queer literature chronicling a gay street hustler's travels through America. Reed channeled this energy into his own songs about street life such as "Waiting For the Man."

Reed yearned to write the great American novel and put it to music. In a 1991 interview with author Neil Gaiman, Reed explained how he used prose technique in songwriting. "There are certain kinds of songs you write that are just fun songs, the lyric can't survive without the music. But for most of what I do, the idea behind it was to try and bring a novelist's eye to it, to try and have that lyric there so somebody who enjoys being engaged on that level can have that and have the rock n' roll too."

Reed grew up in a middle-class Jewish family in Brooklyn. When he was nine, the family moved to Long Island. His mother had been a teenage beauty queen while his father abandoned dreams of becoming an author to become a tax accountant. At a young age, Reed experienced social anxiety, panic attacks and depression. He spoke of being beat up routinely after school. He escaped into music, mimicking the guitar sounds he heard on the radio.

During high school he formed a doo wop band called The Jades. He also began experimenting with drugs. The band played gigs in shopping malls and dingy bars. His parents were overprotective and fought often with Reed. In one instance an inebriated Reed crashed the family car into a toll booth on the parkway.

Reed waited tables at a local gay bar and began having sexual encounters with men. He tried heroin for the first time and contracted hepatitis. He attended New York University but during his freshman year he had a mental breakdown. His parents drove to the city and brought their son back home. They sought professional help. Psychologists suggested Reed might have schizophrenia. He was briefly admitted to a psychiatric institution where he confessed to homosexual urges. Doctors recommended electroshock therapy. His parents consented and Reed endured more than two-dozen ECT sessions. The treatments wreaked havoc on his short-term memory. Reed never forgave his father, something he wrote about in the 1974 song "Kill Your Sons."

Reed recovered and enrolled at Syracuse University. After college, he moved to New York City and befriended the Welsh musician John Cale. The two became roommates in a lower east side apartment and busked the Harlem street corners, Reed on guitar, Cale on viola. They formed a band initially called the Warlocks then the Falling Spikes. They settled on the name the Velvet Underground (taken from a book about a 1960's secret sex subculture).

In 1965 they met Andy Warhol while playing a gig at the Cafe Bizarre in Greenwich Village. Warhol became the band's producer and the Velvets recorded four studio albums. The albums sold poorly but the work is among the most innovative music of the period. Reed grew frustrated as his peers Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen skyrocketed to fame. Reed fired Cale, Warhol and the singer Nico and the band disintegrated. Reed had another breakdown and moved back into his parents' home. He took a job at his father's tax firm as a typist for $40 a week. In 1971, he signed a contract with RCA to be a solo artist. His career was back on track.

For Reed, the 70's was a decade of substance abuse and excess. He told a friend he "was going to take meth every day for the rest of his life." He binged on scotch and according to his first wife Bettye Kronstad he became a "violent drunk." During a 1975 tour through Italy he pulled a knife on his violin player and told Italian reporters he came to Rome to have sex with the Pope.  His reputation for misbehavior grew as he hung out with drag queens and became romantically involved with a transgender woman named Rachel.

It wasn't until the late 90's that Reed finally seemed to find a semblance of happiness. He took up meditation and practiced tai chi several hours a day. After two failed marriages he began dating the musician and performance artist Laurie Anderson. The two made several recordings together and were married in 2008.

Reed's years of hard drinking and drug use led to hepatitis and liver disease. He developed liver cancer and underwent a liver transplant in May 2013. After the surgery he posted on his website of feeling "bigger and stronger than ever." He died of liver disease in October 2013. He was 71 years old.

Laurie Anderson wrote that Reed "was a prince and a fighter" and that his last days were peaceful. She did her best to debunk Reed's dark reputation saying, "I never saw the blackness." After his passing, the rock community paid tribute. Bono said, "Every song we've ever written was a rip-off of a Lou Reed song." David Bowie said, "He was a master." Cale wrote, "I've lost my schoolyard buddy." Reed's last tweet posted hours before his death read simply: "The Door." (7" x 9," black ink print)

Bowie

As a teenager, I suffered from depression.  I woke most days with a sense of ennui and hopelessness. My dark moods informed the music I listened to and led me to 80's gloom rock like Nick Cave, Bauhaus, The Damned and The Chameleons.  Occasionally I encountered albums so bleak I referred to them as "snuff music." Among these were The Cure's Pornography, Joy Division's Closer and David Bowie's Low.

Low was written and recorded in 1976 during a period when Bowie was attempting to kick cocaine. At the time, his close friend Iggy Pop was in a psychiatric hospital trying to overcome a heroine addiction. Bowie's life was bleak and chaotic and he was obsessed with black magic, the Holy Grail and paranoid delusions.  He moved to Berlin and took an apartment above an auto parts store.  Written with Brian Eno, Low is a musical exploration of anguish and suffering as Bowie struggled to remain sober.  The album became the first of Bowie's "Berlin Trilogy" (along with Heroes and The Lodger).

As my own teenage moods spiraled downwards, Low became an expression of my internal pain.  I identified with Bowie's torment and the music helped me access my own darkness.  I played the album over and over, sinking deeper into the abyss with each listen.  At one point I could no longer handle the distress.  I literally burned the album in a ritual bonfire along with Leonard Cohen's Songs of Love and Hate and Lou Reed's Berlin.

Years went by and I discovered meditation, prayer and therapy.  Slowly, through God's grace and the passage of time, my depression lifted.  My twenties became a decade of growth and self-discovery and my musical choices reflected this shift.  I turned to albums that encouraged healing and a return to life.  At the top of my list were Peter Gabriel's So, Tears for Fears The Hurting and my favorite, David Bowie's Hunky Dory.

Hunky Dory is a poetic and musical celebration of life.  Though written in 1971 before Low, the album celebrates a new outlook for Bowie, one filled with hope, artistic experimentation and the inklings of joy.  Starting with the song "Changes," Bowie reflects on the "changes…I'm going through" in a Buddhist-like fashion.  He sings, "I watch the ripples change their size but never leave the stream of warm impermanence."  He has learned that all things in life are temporary, even suffering.  In the song's chorus, he urges us to "turn and face the strange, turn and face the strain."  This was a perfect accompaniment to the advice my own therapist was giving me: "face your pain, accept it and let it go."

On the song "Quicksand," Bowie acknowledges his unhealthy obsession with the occult, referencing Aleister Crowley and the frightening image of Himmler and the Third Reich.  He sings that "he's torn between the light and dark" and that "he ain't got the power anymore" to avoid "sinking in the quicksand of my thought."

Listening to Bowie's words, I felt as if he were speaking directly to my soul.  At the time I was reading books like The Road Less Traveled and the Tao Te Ching.  Hunky Dory became the soundtrack for my spiritual journey. Everything in life was teaching me that freedom comes with letting go of the ego (death of the Self) and aligning with universal energy.  Buddha spoke about surrendering one's beliefs allowing the mind to move toward release. As Bowie sings on "Quicksand"--"Don't believe in yourself, don't deceive with belief.  Knowledge comes with death's release."

The most joyous and life affirming song on Hunky Dory is "Fill Your Heart." Written by comedian Biff Rose (writer for George Carlin) and Paul Williams (songwriter for Barbra Streisand and Karen Carpenter), "Fill Your Heart" is a paean to peace and comfort.  The song promises that the suffering of life can be overcome through the power of love.  Bowie tells us, "fill your heart with love today, don't play the game of time.  Things that happened in the past only happened in your mind."  When he sings, "Happiness is happening, the dragons have been bled," it's as if Bowie is celebrating the future slaying of his own demons of addiction.  Buddhist energy runs throughout the song culminating in the lyrics, "Fear's just in your head, so forget your head and you'll be free."

"Fill Your Heart" was clearly sentimental and sugary, but it got me every time.  Like Bowie, I'd had enough of pain and misery.  I yearned for joy.  Being new to the happiness game, my initial forays were a bit simple. But they were earnest.  Jesus proclaims in the Gospels, "Unless you turn and become like little children, you will never enter the Kingdom of Heaven."  Bowie helped me become a child again, rediscovering the simple act of smiling. Perhaps this seemed infantile to others. But to me, I was learning to enjoy life.  And for this, I am thankful to Mister Bowie. (5" x 7", black ink print)

Cat Stevens

On September 21, 2004, a United Airlines flight traveling from London to Washington D.C. was diverted to Bangor, Maine. Six federal agents came aboard and took into custody a 57-year old British man traveling with his 21-year old daughter.  "Are you Yusuf Islam," the agents demanded.  The man confirmed he was.  "Do you spell your name Y-O-U-S-U-F?"  "It's Y-U-S-U-F," the man answered.  His daughter was allowed to continue traveling but the man was denied entry to the United States.  He was flown back to England the next day. Homeland Security officials explained the man had associations with potential terrorists.

Yusuf Islam was not always treated this way.  Thirty years earlier he was one of the biggest rock stars in the world.  He played to 40,000 seat arenas and hung out with the likes of Paul McCartney and Bob Dylan.

He was born Steven Georgiou in London in 1948.  His father was a Greek Cypriot and his mom was Swedish.  They owned and lived above a restaurant called Moulin Rouge where he was put to work washing dishes at a young age.  When he was 15, his father bought him a guitar.  He escaped to the Soho rooftops, a quiet refuge he called "the Upper World."  He began writing and playing his own songs influenced by the Beatles, the Kinks and Nina Simone.

By 18, he was performing in London coffee houses and pubs.  He changed his name to "Cat" because a girlfriend said he had "cat eyes."  He was signed to a record deal and his 1966 song "I Love My Dog" reached #2 on the British charts. Cat Stevens became a teen idol touring the country with Jimi Hendrix and Engelbert Humperdinck.  Hendrix introduced him to psychedelics and Stevens spent the next few years overindulging in drugs and alcohol.

In 1968, Stevens contracted tuberculosis and nearly died.  While in the hospital, he began to question his life.  He took up meditation and yoga and became a vegetarian.  He immersed himself in spiritual and religious texts.  He covered the mirrors in his hospital room "to get away from the external and to start digging deep" into himself.

After a year of convalescence, Stevens returned to music with a new beard and a new sound.  His songs embraced a folk-rock style with introspective lyrics about everyday problems and spiritual questions.  Stevens signed with A&M Records and released Mona Bone Jakon (1970), Tea For The Tillerman (1971) and Teaser and the Firecat (1972), all Gold Records.  They included the hit songs "Trouble," "Where Do the Children Play," "Wild World," "Moonshadow" and "Peace Train."  Film Director Hal Ashby used nine Stevens' songs for the dark comedy Harold And Maude, introducing his music to a wider audience.

Though he'd become one of the biggest rock stars in the world, he still lived with his parents.  Fans made pilgrimages to the Stevens' home and were often invited in for tea by his father.

Stevens was becoming disillusioned with the music industry.  He despised the competition and greed, feeling like a pawn subject to the whims of managers and record executives.  In 1973, he moved to Rio de Janeiro and became a British tax exile.  He continued touring, donating his profits to UNESCO.

During a 1976 trip to Los Angeles, Stevens visited the Malibu home of Jerry Moss, co-founder of A&M.  He decided to take a swim in the ocean.  He was caught in a riptide and taken far from shore.  He struggled for several minutes losing all his strength.  Certain he was about to drown, he shouted, "God!  If you save me I will work for you."  A large wave appeared and carried him back to shore.  The near-death experience rekindled his yearning for a spiritual life. "What arose within me was a deep conviction that ultimately there is a higher control over one's life."

His brother David gave him a copy of the Qur'an.  Stevens took to the book immediately.  "I couldn't put it down," he said.  "No matter what I tried to say in my songs, they were all part of the shadow.  In the Qur'an I found a light."

Stevens identified with the Biblical story of Joseph, a man who was bought and sold in the marketplace.  He felt the same way about himself and his place in the music industry.  He realized he didn't want to be Cat Stevens anymore.  In 1977, he formally converted to Islam.  He took the name "Yusuf," Arabic for Joseph.

He kept his conversion out of the public eye and gave his final concert as Cat Stevens at Wembley Arena in 1979.  At the end of the concert, he told the audience, "We've only got one life and you have to do the best with it.  You have to find the right path and when you do, you know it."  Cat Stevens walked off stage as Yusuf Islam never intending to perform again.

He sold his guitars and gold records and gave the money to charity.  While the Qur'an did not prohibit music he felt he had to give up music to become a true Muslim.  He later said, "The music business was filled with things like vanity, fornication and drug use.  If I was going to make the change, I had to get away from that."

Yusuf's life changed completely.  He married Fauzia Ali in a religious ceremony and the couple had five children.  He dedicated himself to the study of the Qur'an and his new passion became education.  He used his music royalties to establish several Muslim schools in England.  The curriculum balanced spiritual teaching with a material focus on math, science and writing. He also founded the Small Kindness charity assisting orphans in Africa and famine victims in the Balkans.

In 1989, he became embroiled in the fatwa against Salman Rushdie.  Asked for his opinion by a reporter, Yusuf replied that the "legal Islamic punishment for blasphemy was death."  The next day, newspaper headlines reported: "Cat Says Kill Rushdie."  Yusuf denied supporting the fatwa but the damage was done. American radio stations refused to play Cat Stevens songs.  The band 10,000 Maniacs was forced to remove the song "Moonshadow" from their new album. Cat Stevens became a pariah.

Yusuf continued his work for charity and education.  During the Bosnian conflict, he became heavily involved in relief efforts for Muslim war victims.  A survey of British Muslims named him the most highly regarded Muslim figure, more influential than imams and scholars.

In 1994, while vacationing in Dubai with his family, his son brought a guitar into the house.  One morning after prayers, Yusuf picked up the guitar from the couch.  He hadn't played in 25 years but he still remembered the chords.  He started playing his old songs including "The Road To Find Out" which included the lyrics:

I left my happy home to see what I could find out.
I left my folk and friends with the aim to clear my mind out.
The answer lies within, so why not take a look now?
Kick out the devil's sin, pick up a good book now.

When Yusuf learned that Muslims had introduced the guitar to Europe he changed his mind about the role of music in Islam.  Slowly, he resumed his musical career.  He appeared at a 1997 benefit concert in Sarajevo and released a children's album in 2000.  After the September 11 attacks, he publicly denounced the attacks saying, "No right-thinking follower of Islam could possibly condone such an action."  He appeared on a VH-1 Concert for New York and sang "Peace Train" for the first time in public in more than 20 years.

At the time he was denied entry to the United States in 2004, he'd been traveling to Nashville to meet Dolly Parton for a new music project.  Parton was one of the few celebrities to come to the defense of Yusuf.  She told the press, "The government made a mistake.  I can't imagine there's an evil bone in that man's body.  Those are the people you're supposed to cherish.  You don't walk on the hearts of angels."

In 2006, Yusuf released his first new pop album in 28 years.  He began touring again and included Cat Stevens songs on his playlist.  He will be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame later this year.  (6" x 7", black ink print)

Elliott Smith

This past October marked the ten-year anniversary of musician Elliott Smith's death.  Elliott wrote intensely personal songs about his struggles with depression, alcoholism and drug addiction.  His music was intricate and gorgeous with layered vocals and sweet melodies reminiscent of Brian Wilson.  He possessed a soft tenor whisper in contrast to his weathered face and melancholic lyrics.  He was one of us and his pain was our pain.  As his ex-girlfriend Mary Lou Lord said, "Elliott made music for the sad kids."

Elliott Smith was born Steven Paul Smith in 1969 in Omaha, Nebraska.  His parents divorced when he was 6 months old and he moved with his mother Bunny, a music teacher, to Duncanville, Texas.  Elliott had a difficult childhood saying he might've been sexually abused by his stepfather.  The events later appeared in his song "Some Song" which featured the lyrics "Charlie beat you up week after week and when you grow up you're going to be a freak."

Elliott learned to play piano and guitar by the time he was nine and he wrote his first song "Fantasy" at 10.  At 14, he moved to Portland, Oregon with his father Gary Smith, a psychologist.  Around this time he began experimenting with drugs and alcohol. After graduating from Hampshire College in 1991, Elliott formed the band Heatmiser with classmate Neil Gust.  They moved to Oregon and released four albums.  Elliott worked odd jobs to survive: construction, house painting and transplanting bamboo trees.

In 1994, Elliott released his first solo album Roman Candle.  He followed this up with the self-titled album Elliott Smith in 1995.  The album cover featured fuzzy images of bodies falling from a building.  His third album Either/Or came out in 1996; the album name came from a book by Kierkegaard dealing with existential angst and despair.  (Elliott was a philosophy major in college.)  By this time, Elliott was drinking heavily and taking anti-depressants.  Friends attempted an intervention but Elliott rebelled, moving to Brooklyn.

Filmmaker Gus Van Sant used Elliott's music for the soundtrack of Good Will Hunting.  The song "Miss Misery" was nominated for an Academy Award leading to the surreal scene of Elliott, in a rumpled white suit and greasy hair, playing live at the 1998 Oscars.  He was terrified until fellow nominee Celine Dion told him, "You're going to do great, sweetie."  This calmed him down and Elliott enjoyed himself saying, "I wouldn't want to live in that world but it was fun to walk around the moon for a day."

In 1998, Elliott signed with Dreamworks Records.  Around this same time he fell into a depression and spoke openly about suicide.  His first Dreamworks-era album was XO, written over many nights at the Luna Lounge in Manhattan. XO would be the best-selling album of his career but Elliott was suspicious of commercial success and he disliked his experience with a big label.  "I threw myself into it because it seemed to make my friends happy."

In 1999, Elliott moved to Los Angeles settling in Silverlake.  He released the album Figure 8 in 2000, the last one completed in his lifetime.  His condition deteriorated as he began using crack cocaine and became addicted to heroin. Neighbors reported seeing him walking the streets alone at night mumbling to himself.

By 2001, Elliott displayed signs of paranoia, believing a white van was following him wherever he went.  He also believed Dreamworks was trying to steal music from his computer.  He began having difficulties performing live, forgetting lyrics. He rarely slept and barely ate, living on ice cream.  Elliott demanded that Dreamworks release him from his contract or he would take his own life.

In 2003, Elliott tried to turn his life around and began treatment for his addiction with a technique called neurotransmitter restoration (injecting amino acids as a form of detox).  He also started work on a new album Basement On A Hill.  He moved in with his girlfriend Jennifer Chiba and the relationship gave him a sense of optimism.  His life seemed to be improving.

On October 21, 2003, Elliott and Chiba had an argument at their Silverlake home. As the argument worsened, Smith threatened to commit suicide.  Chiba locked herself in the bathroom.  She heard a scream.  She returned to the living room and saw Elliott with a knife sticking out of his chest.  Elliott died 20 minutes after arriving at the hospital.  He was 34 years old.

The coroner's report on Elliott's death stated "...several aspects of the circumstances are atypical of suicide and raise the possibility of homicide." Notably, there were no "hesitation wounds" prior to the stabbing and there were lacerations on both his hands and under his right arm that could be "possible defensive wounds."  The toxicology report revealed he was clean of illegal drugs at the time of death; only non-abusive amounts on anti-depressants and medications for ADD were found in his system.

Though some fans blamed Chiba for Elliott's death, she was never charged.  A few years later she tried claiming money from Elliott's estate for managing his career but the State of California ruled against her since she was an unlicensed talent agent.

Though Elliott lived in Los Angeles and played all over town, I never saw him play live, but in 2006, pianist Christopher O'Riley performed a tribute at the Getty Museum.  My wife and I attended and after the performance, my wife pointed to a middle-aged man in the lobby.  She said, "He looks just like Elliott.  I bet that's his dad."  I urged her to approach him and despite her shyness, she agreed.  The man was, in fact, Gary Smith and for the next half hour he and my wife talked like old friends.  He explained how much he appreciated the love shown his son.

Every October on the anniversary of Elliott's death his fans turn out in droves to Solutions Audio in Silverlake where the album cover of Figure 8 was photographed.  They write farewell messages on the wall and leave flowers, candles and empty bottles of alcohol.  At some point someone sings the song "Waltz #2."  The lyrics provide a perfect coda for the sad day.  As Elliott sang so beautifully, "I'm here today and expected to stay on and on and on...I'm never going to know you now but I'm going to love you anyhow."  (5" x 7", black ink print)

The Music Supervisor

Gary Calamar is an LA-based Music Supervisor and radio DJ.  He's hosted a Sunday night radio show on KCRW for 15 years and he's responsible for one of the signature moments in Music Supervision history: the Sia song "Breathe Me" that concludes HBO's popular series Six Feet Under.

Gary was born on Friday the 13th in Yonkers, New York.  As a boy, he slept with a transistor radio under his pillow.  He fell in love with film music after his parents took him to see West Side Story and A Hard Days Night.  He also began a love affair with record stores spending hours scouring bins for new and obscure music.

Gary moved to Los Angeles in the 80's.  He began working at iconic record stores like Licorice Pizza and Moby Disc.  He managed the famous Rhino Records in Westwood and he came to appreciate the community of the record store and the social function it provided.  "I worked in Licorice Pizza when John Lennon was killed.  I had the day off but I came in anyway because people needed a place to mourn and I needed to be there...To this day, the first stop I make in any new town is to the weird local record store.  It's how I get my bearings."

In the mid 90's, Gary began volunteering at KCRW opening mail and filing CD's in the station's music library.  He became friendly with music director Chris Douridas.  One day, Douridas mentioned they were looking for a new weekend DJ.  Gary literally dropped to his knees and begged Douridas to give him a shot.  Douridas obliged and Gary's DJ career began.  (His radio show was called "The Open Road" until 2006.)

In 1998, Gary ventured into the world of music supervision.  His first film was Slums of Beverly Hills and his first placed song was "I'd Love to Change the World" by the band Ten Years After.  Gary's next film was Varsity Blues.  The resulting soundtrack earned a Gold Album.  In 2001, filmmaker Alan Ball (American Beauty) chose Gary and partner Thomas Golubic to supervise music on his series Six Feet Under.  The show established a new model for placing indie music in cable television and Calamar & Golubic were nominated for Grammy Awards for Soundtrack Volumes 1 & 2.

Six Feet Under ran for five seasons.  The final episode concluded with a 9-minute scene where Claire says goodbye to her family as she finally leaves home.  As she drives into the desert, a montage ensues and we see how all the characters ultimately die.  The scene is extraordinarily moving and it required a perfect piece of music to heighten the emotion.  As a KCRW DJ, Gary had been playing the song "Breathe Me" by Australian singer Sia for several months.  He presented the song to show runner Alan Ball and a masterful music/image pairing was born.  To this day, it's impossible for Six Feet Under fans to listen to "Breathe Me" without tearing up.

The job of Music Supervisor involves overseeing all aspects of music placement in a film, tv show, commercial or video game.  A Music Supervisor finds the songs, negotiates the licensing and often helps secure a composer for a project. In the late 60's and early 70's, American directors began prominently featuring rock songs in films.  Notable examples include Harry Nilsson's "Everybody's Talkin'" in Midnight Cowboy and Steppenwolf's "Born To Be Wild" in Easy Rider.  Some directors structured entire movies around a specific band or musician like Mike Nichols' use of Simon & Garfunkel in The Graduate or Hal Ashby's inclusion of Cat Stevens in Harold & Maude.

Song selection plays a crucial role in film and television.  Francis Coppola's use of "The End" by The Doors in Apocalypse Now brings the story to an intense dramatic pique.  Poor song choice can mar an otherwise great film.  (One of my favorite movies is Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid but I always cringe during the "Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head" bicycle sequence.)  Though some filmmakers have a strong personal sense of music (Wes Anderson, Jim Jarmusch, Quentin Tarantino, Sofia Coppola) the majority need the help of a capable Music Supervisor.  This is where Gary steps in.

"We get the scripts early on.  We read the script, take notes then wait to see a rough cut of the show.  We go through the show scene by scene [with the producer and director] and decide what we're going to do musically: whether it's going to be scored or whether it'll be a song.  Everyone will throw in their two cents and then I'll go back to my office and start putting ideas together...trying different songs.  I'll try to narrow it down to three to five songs and I'll work with the music editor to cut them into the scenes.  Then we show them to the producer and director and a final decision is made."

In 2006, Gary founded GO Music with colleague Alyson Vidoli to manage his various music supervision projects.  This led to his work on some of the most acclaimed shows on television: House, Dexter, Entourage, Weeds and True Blood.  GO Music also hosts a very popular concert series, The Mimosa Music Series which showcases great artists on Sunday mornings.

Gary's lifetime love and knowledge of music comes into play everyday.  His job requires a critical ear and a comfort level with all musical genres.  True Blood features Louisiana swamp blues and gothic jams while Dexter opts for Cuban and Latin music.  Gary finds songs from a multitude of sources:  music blogs, demo tapes, iTunes and live shows.  Gary's Sunday night radio gig grants him access to music most people never hear.  It also gives him freedom to experiment with songs.

"The big difference between the radio show and the TV work is that I don't have to work by committee on radio.  I'm the DJ, I can play what I want and suffer or get praised by that.  With TV it's much more of a collaboration and the song that I might think is perfect may get shot down."

Gary is also a writer.  His 2010 book Record Store Days: From Vinyl to Digital and Back Again (written with Phil Gallo) recounts the evolution of record stores from bastion of music culture to their current near-death status.  In 2010 and 2011, Gary was honored as "Music Supervisor of the Year" by his colleagues in the Guild of Music Supervisors. (6" x 7", black ink print)

Thom Yorke

Radiohead came to prominence in 1992 with their hit single "Creep." Lead singer Thom Yorke wrote the song as a college student after being rejected by a girl with whom he was infatuated. The song is about not feeling good enough or as Yorke explains, "There's the beautiful people and then there's the rest of us."

Herein lies the conundrum of Thom Yorke. He's one of the most beloved rock stars in the world but he despises celebrity culture. "I'm surrounded by a world of grinning idiots and I don't want to be another one."

Thom Yorke was born in 1968 in Wellingborough, England. At birth, his left eye was fixed shut after doctors determined the eye was paralyzed. Yorke endured five eye operations by age six. He wore an eyepatch through much of his childhood and today he has a permanent droopy eyelid.

Yorke's father was a nuclear physicist and chemical equipment salesman. The family moved often causing Yorke to attend multiple schools. At age 7, Yorke received his first guitar. He mimicked the guitar sounds of his childhood hero, Brian May of Queen. Yorke wrote his first song at age 11. The song was called "Mushroom Cloud".

Yorke met his future Radiohead bandmates at an all-boys public school. They formed a band called On A Friday (they could only rehearse on Fridays). Yorke sang, wrote the songs, played guitar, bass, piano and drums. Despite his talents, he never learned to read music.

After college, Yorke briefly worked as an orderly in a mental hospital. In 1987, Yorke and his girlfriend were involved in a serious car accident. The experience instilled a lifelong car phobia in Yorke which later inspired the songs "Airbag," "Killer Cars" and "Drunkk Machine."

In 1991, Yorke and his bandmates were signed to EMI. They changed their name to Radiohead taken from a Talking Heads song. (Yorke's early musical heroes were David Byrne, The Pixies and Joy Division.) In 1992, Radiohead's first album "Pablo Honey" brought them immediate success. Yorke confessed that his ego got out of control bolstered by an excess of drinking. "I was unbearable. As soon as you get any success you disappear up your own arse."

Yorke disliked his own singing voice. His vocal range stretched from tenor to falsetto. "It annoys me how pretty my voice is, how polite it can sound when what I'm singing is deeply acidic." Only after seeing Jeff Buckley play live in 1994 did Yorke realize "you could sing in a falsetto without sounding drippy."

After their second album "The Bends" in 1995, R.E.M. chose Radiohead as the opening act for their European tour. Michael Stipe gave Yorke advice on dealing with fame and the demands of being in a rock band. The two became lifelong friends.

In 1997, Radiohead rented a mansion in Bath once owned by actress Jayne Seymour to record their new album. The band immersed themselves in the music of DJ Shadow, Underworld, Ennio Morricone and Pink Floyd. The result, "OK Computer," did not conform to standard verse-chorus structure. The music is fragmented and pieced together with hooks buried beneath layers of atmosphere and melodic dissonance. Though some critics claimed the album was "commercial suicide," today "OK Computer" is considered one of the greatest albums ever made.

Radiohead were not afraid of experimenting and reinventing themselves. Yorke fell in love with sampling and programmed beats and the band's post "OK Computer" music relied heavily on looping and processed vocals. In 2007, Radiohead revolutionized the music industry with the digital release of their album "In Rainbows." Fans were allowed to choose the amount they wanted to pay for the album download. The average price paid was 2.90 pounds.

When he's not playing music, Thom Yorke is spokesman for Friends of the Earth, a group advocating the perils of climate change and carbon emissions. Yorke also plays in the band Atoms For Peace with Flea (from the Red Hot Chili Peppers) and Joey Waronker (from R.E.M.).  (6" x 7", black ink print)

Tom Waits

"I'd rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy." 

Tom Waits is a street poet with a heart of tarnished brass. With a voice like broken tiles spinning in an old washing machine, Tom Waits fuses the pathos of Louis Armstrong, the ramblings of Charles Bukowski and the earnestness of Bing Crosby.

In the 1980's, Waits lived in the Tropicana Motel on Sunset Boulevard.  He could be seen driving the streets of Hollywood in his Cadillac Coupe DeVille, his arm slung out the window holding a cigarette.  He could also be heard playing music at the Troubadour or Burbank Airport.

Waits once witnessed an altercation between local musicians and plainclothes police officers at Duke's Coffee Shop in Hollywood.  When he and his pal Chuck E. Weiss came to the aid of the musicians, Waits was roughed up and arrested by the police.  Waits subsequently won a $7,500 settlement against the Sheriff's Department for false arrest and false imprisonment.

Waits' music has spanned the cultural landscape for four decades. He's a brilliant songwriter, an imaginative lyricist and he's one of the funniest men around. In 2006 he appeared on Bob Dylan's now-defunct radio show "Radio Bob" with a list of famous Jewish curses. (Imagine these uttered with a gravelly, hungover voice):

"May all your teeth fall out except one which should remain for a toothache."

"May you grow like an onion with your head in the ground and your feet in the air."

"May you have a good long sleep and may your dreams be only of your troubles."

"May you be the proof that man can endure anything."

"May your wife eat matzohs in bed and may you roll in the crumbs."

(4" x 6", black ink print)

Jeff Buckley

It was November, 1994 and I was feeling under the weather.  I ventured to Luna Park in West Hollywood to see my old college friend Jason Luckett play a set of music.  I didn't want to be there.  My throat was sore and my head was pounding.  After Jason's gig, I paid my respects and prepared to return home to bed.  Jason's words changed my life.  "You might want to stay and see this next performer. He's pretty interesting."

So I stayed.  I watched as a skinny guy with a passing resemblance to James Dean stepped on stage.  He had dirty brown hair and he wore a full-length feather overcoat like something you'd find at an old lady's garage sale.  He plugged his electric guitar into an amp with a "Kiss" sticker across the back. The surrounding crowd was oblivious...loud, rude, immersed in their cocktails and movie industry blathering.

The performer began tuning his guitar and testing the microphone with high-pitched squeals and sighs.  Then something amazing happened.  The singer's atonal sounds morphed into a soft falsetto backed by the slow build of a dreamy guitar riff.  Slowly, almost imperceptibly, the crowd became silent and turned toward stage.  They had no choice.  They were magnetized, lifted, pulled toward this compelling force.

Then came the opening lyrics sung with the voice of an angel: "I'm lying in my bed, the blanket is warm, this body will never be safe from harm."  The next hour passed like a blur.  The music blended Jimmy Paige inspired electric guitar with soft soulful ballads reminiscent of Marvin Gaye.  Between songs, the performer cracked jokes about his days of starvation living in Hollywood and how there was a period in the music industry when "Paul Williams was God."

My headache vanished.  My throat seemed to clear.  By the time the set ended with a majestic cover of Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah," I felt transformed.  I sat in silence, my skin covered with goose bumps.  Women crowded the state to get closer to the performer.  Men simply stared, trying to process what they just experienced.

Jeff Buckley was a musical virtuoso.  He wielded his Fender Stratocaster guitar like a gunfighter brandishing a pistol.  His music was an amalgam of his favorite performers: Elizabeth Fraser of the Cocteau Twins, Pakistani legend Nusrat Fateh Ali Kahn, Freddie Mercury, Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd.  He covered performers as varied as Edith Piaf, Jimi Hendrix and Nina Simone.

Buckley was born into music.  His father, whom he met only once, was Tim Buckley, the revered 60's folk musician who died of a drug overdose at age 28.  His mother, Mary Guibert, was a classically trained pianist and cellist.  He was born in Southern California and began playing guitar at age five.  He played in his high school jazz band and developed an early affinity for the progressive rock sounds of Genesis, Yes and Rush.  He studied music at the Musicians Institute in Hollywood then moved to New York City in 1990.  He toured with several struggling bands and experimented on his own with jazz, blues, punk rock, funk and R&B.

In April, 1991, Buckley made his public singing debut at a tribute concert for his father called "Greetings From Tim Buckley."  He performed four of his father's songs including "I Never Asked To Be Your Mountain," a song Tim Buckley wrote about infant Jeff and his mother.  The performance made a strong impression and became a springboard for Jeff's career.

Buckley began building a following at small clubs throughout Lower Manhattan.  He gained a regular Monday spot at an Irish cafe in the East Village called Sin-E.  Slowly, his reputation spread.  Crowds became larger and record company executives took notice.  In 1992, Buckley signed a deal with Columbia Records.  Two years later, he release his first album Grace.  In 1996, the album went Gold.

Buckley's shows attracted fans such as Chrissie Hynde, Chris Cornell, Lou Reed and The Edge.  Bob Dylan called Buckley "one of the great songwriters of the decade."  David Bowie said Grace was an album he'd take with him to a desert island.  Rolling Stone called Buckley's rendition of "Hallelujah" one of "the 500 greatest songs of all time."

Buckley toured the world, preferring intimate clubs to large venues.  He disliked self-promotion and bristled when people referred to him as "Tim Buckley's son."  In 1996, he began writing songs for his second studio album My Sweetheart The Drunk.

Buckley chose to record the album in Memphis, Tennessee.  On the night of May 29, 1997, his band flew to Memphis to join him.  That same night, Buckley jumped in to Wolf River Harbor, a water channel of the Mississippi River.  He was fully clothed, including his boots, and he was singing Led Zeppelin's "Whole Lotta Love" at the top of his lungs.  A river tugboat passed creating a wake that pulled Buckley beneath the water.  A roadie in the band, Keith Foti, was standing on shore.  He realized Buckley had vanished.  A search and rescue effort was launched.  Buckley remained missing for several days.  His body was finally found down river on June 4.  An autopsy showed no signs of drugs or alcohol in his system.  His death was ruled an "accidental drowning."

Fans around the world united in grief.  Several musicians wrote tribute songs. These included "Teardrop" by Elizabeth Fraser, "Memphis" by PJ Harvey, "Grey Ghost" by Mike Doughty and "Memphis Skyline" by Rufus Wainwright. Columbia Records released the demo recordings for My Sweetheart The Drunk.  They followed this up with several live recordings.  Buckley had been poised for super stardom.  His legacy grew after his passing.

I was blessed to see Jeff perform twice in Los Angeles.  My wife and I fell in love listening to his music.  On the day we learned he was missing, we walked around in a stupor as if we had lost a family member.  Seventeen years later, it's still hard to believe he's gone.  Jeff Buckley was a comet blazing across our musical skies, burning out far too soon.  He will always be missed.  (4" x 6", black ink print)