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A Backstage Pass to Intimate Moments in Rock's Odyssey
Ed. Note: Today Los Angeles Times music critic Robert Hilburn looked back on his nearly 40-year career and the musicians who have made it so memorable, including Bono. Get the complete article, including rememberances of artists like Johnny Cash, John Lennon and Jack White, as well as video commentary and photo galleries here.
Meeting Joplin and her demons, having cornflakes with Lennon and coffee with Bono, going to Folsom with Cash and outraging Elvis.
By Robert Hilburn, Special to The Times
It was the fall of 1969, and Janis Joplin, the biggest female star in rock, seemed invincible on stage — long, reddish hair swinging wildly as she stretched her vocal cords to alarming limits: "Come on, come on, come on, come on and take it … take another little piece of my heart now, baby!"
But the 26-year-old native of Port Arthur, Texas, was so self-destructive that no one thought she'd make it to 30: too many drugs, too much booze, too much, well, too much everything.
I was a young writer, new on the job, and I desperately wanted to interview her while she was in town to play the Hollywood Bowl.
I talked my way into her dressing room. What I discovered beneath her hard-boiled image was someone I never dreamed of.
It was the first of many private moments I had with great artists in my nearly 40 years as The Times' pop critic. Among the encounters: sharing cornflake dinners with John Lennon, having a post-Grammy coffee with Bono and sitting in the kitchen with Johnny and June Carter Cash. Each one gave me not only insight into the creative process but also a deeper understanding of what drives artists — or destroys them.
Joplin's Bowl show came near the end of rock's most explosive decade. Bob Dylan and the Beatles had turned the primitive energy of teen-oriented '50s rock into an art form that could express adult themes and emotions. Rock stars were suddenly pop culture gods whose music was embedded in the social and political fabric of a generation.
But many musicians found it difficult to adjust, especially those like Joplin, whose art was driven in part by feverish personal demons and an overpowering lack of self-esteem.
As we saw decades later in the suicide of Kurt Cobain, no generation is immune from the pressures of fame. But the rock star role was particularly difficult in the '60s and '70s, an era when young people prided themselves on stepping into the unknown.
When I caught up with Joplin at a rehearsal, nothing about her suggested "star." It was as if all the flashy boas, oversized glasses and Gypsy-hippie attire were her way of compensating for the beauty that nature failed to provide. Minus that camouflage or an audience to energize her, she seemed weary.
Finally, she retreated to her dressing room, collapsed onto a sofa and reached slowly for a pack of cigarettes. She was tired, she said — tired of fighting with businessmen and musicians and the writers who wanted to know where the pain in her voice came from.
When her road manager closed the door on his way back to the stage, the room felt like a cell. Like the best rock 'n' roll, Joplin's music was mostly about freedom, and yet she seemed trapped. I felt like an intruder. I didn't want to be just one more guy asking about the pain.
"Is there anything you'd like to talk about?" I asked.
Joplin stared back at me across the room.
"Man," she finally said, "don't you even have your own questions?"
For me, the time with Joplin was a crash course in rock 'n' roll reality — an introduction to themes I'd encounter time and again. In the end, she got past my clumsy start and began talking about feeling like an outcast growing up, her music, her lifestyle and the one constant in her world: loneliness.
"Somehow you lose all the old friends," she said. "When we're not on stage, we rehearse, lay around in bed, check in and out of motels, watch television. I live for that hour on stage."
On stage that night, Joplin "the star" emerged. Ultimately, though, the lonely hours proved too much. Less than a year later, Joplin was dead in a hotel room. An accidental heroin overdose, it was said. She was within walking distance of the Bowl.
Bono, a Man in Full
In reviewing any act, but especially a new one, a critic is looking for specific qualities: originality, purpose, depth, craft — and the potential to make memorable music for years to come. U2 had all that when I first saw them at the old Country Club in Reseda early in 1981. The music spoke powerfully of youthful awakening at a time when many were losing faith in rock.
I interviewed Bono a few months later and found a remarkably focused and articulate 20-year-old. He had an innate curiosity about life, and that extended to Los Angeles and its culture. His one request was to go to an old-fashioned drive-in restaurant. And so we went to Bob's Big Boy in Toluca Lake, where he had two servings of the ice cream hot fudge cake.
A few years later, with U2's popularity soaring, I caught them at the Los Angeles Sports Arena. Influenced by Bruce Springsteen's emotional performances, Bono was looking for his own way of embracing the audience. Riding the energy of the crowd, at one point he raced to the balcony and jumped over the rail and into the arms of fans below. Two fans leaped from the balcony behind him.
That night I wrote in my review: "When you have music as purposeful as U2's, you don't need a sideshow, especially a potentially dangerous one." A few days later, Bono phoned to say the sideshow was going to stop — that the rest of the band was on his case too.
Over the years, we kept in touch. On the morning after "The Joshua Tree" won a Grammy, we had a late breakfast in a coffee shop just off Central Park in New York. He was excited, not just about the success of "The Joshua Tree" but also about all the things he wanted to do — screenplays, books, plays.
I loved his enthusiasm but worried that it might mean the end of U2. He had written a few great songs, but nothing that would leave a musical legacy as rich as Cole Porter's or Hank Williams'. The point was, I told him, he was just beginning.
Bono was quiet. So, I was surprised eight years later to read about him recounting the conversation in Bill Flanagan's book "U2: At the End of the World."
"That reprimand rattles around Bono's head," Flanagan wrote. "He is still wrestling with it."
Things had changed when I interviewed Bono last year. It was at the Chateau Marmont a few days after the start of the band's world tour, and the subject was Bono's crusade to combat Third World poverty.
As he talked, I thought about how the singer had been ridiculed in the '80s for his spiritual and idealistic views. By the end of the '90s, when the band's popularity was secure, Bono began meeting with world leaders, encouraging them to tackle poverty issues. It wasn't a role he wanted, he told me, but one he felt compelled to follow.
"Look," he said with a smile, "I'm tired of Bono too, and I'm Bono."
On the way back to the office, I thought about how much he had grown and how much I admired him. I also realized there was nothing more I could tell him.
Critic's picks
These are Robert Hilburn's favorite rock albums, arranged by decade:
The '50s
Elvis Presley's "Sunrise." The tracks Presley cut for Sun Records before his "Heartbreak Hotel" fame largely defined rock 'n' roll — from the instrumentation to the attitude. The moment of celebration and discovery remains magical after half a century.
The '60s
Bob Dylan's "Highway 61 Revisited." With his literary skill and acute social observation, Dylan turned rock from youthful exuberance into a mature art form in a series of brilliant '60s albums. This was the moment of supreme breakthrough.
The '70s
John Lennon's "Plastic Ono Band." Despite his landmark work with the Beatles, this solo debut ranks for me as Lennon's finest hour. He looked at his own doubts and fears with an unflinching honesty that set a new standard for rock 'n' roll introspection.
Bruce Springsteen's "Born to Run." At a time when rock 'n' roll had lost much of its heroic lure, Springsteen gave us reason to believe again in the music and ourselves — a youthful self-affirmation that was absolutely thrilling.
The '80s
U2's "The Joshua Tree." This great Irish band combined the anthem power of rock with a restless spirituality that once again expanded the horizons and heart of the music.
The '90s and beyond
The White Stripes' "Get Behind Me Satan." After four albums that established the Stripes as the most essential American rock group since Nirvana, Jack White made music this time that was even richer and more personal than before — anxious, even desperate, looks at conflicts between innocence and morality on one side and compromise and betrayal on the other.
Ed. Note: Today Los Angeles Times music critic Robert Hilburn looked back on his nearly 40-year career and the musicians who have made it so memorable, including Bono. Get the complete article, including rememberances of artists like Johnny Cash, John Lennon and Jack White, as well as video commentary and photo galleries here.
Meeting Joplin and her demons, having cornflakes with Lennon and coffee with Bono, going to Folsom with Cash and outraging Elvis.
By Robert Hilburn, Special to The Times
It was the fall of 1969, and Janis Joplin, the biggest female star in rock, seemed invincible on stage — long, reddish hair swinging wildly as she stretched her vocal cords to alarming limits: "Come on, come on, come on, come on and take it … take another little piece of my heart now, baby!"
But the 26-year-old native of Port Arthur, Texas, was so self-destructive that no one thought she'd make it to 30: too many drugs, too much booze, too much, well, too much everything.
I was a young writer, new on the job, and I desperately wanted to interview her while she was in town to play the Hollywood Bowl.
I talked my way into her dressing room. What I discovered beneath her hard-boiled image was someone I never dreamed of.
It was the first of many private moments I had with great artists in my nearly 40 years as The Times' pop critic. Among the encounters: sharing cornflake dinners with John Lennon, having a post-Grammy coffee with Bono and sitting in the kitchen with Johnny and June Carter Cash. Each one gave me not only insight into the creative process but also a deeper understanding of what drives artists — or destroys them.
Joplin's Bowl show came near the end of rock's most explosive decade. Bob Dylan and the Beatles had turned the primitive energy of teen-oriented '50s rock into an art form that could express adult themes and emotions. Rock stars were suddenly pop culture gods whose music was embedded in the social and political fabric of a generation.
But many musicians found it difficult to adjust, especially those like Joplin, whose art was driven in part by feverish personal demons and an overpowering lack of self-esteem.
As we saw decades later in the suicide of Kurt Cobain, no generation is immune from the pressures of fame. But the rock star role was particularly difficult in the '60s and '70s, an era when young people prided themselves on stepping into the unknown.
When I caught up with Joplin at a rehearsal, nothing about her suggested "star." It was as if all the flashy boas, oversized glasses and Gypsy-hippie attire were her way of compensating for the beauty that nature failed to provide. Minus that camouflage or an audience to energize her, she seemed weary.
Finally, she retreated to her dressing room, collapsed onto a sofa and reached slowly for a pack of cigarettes. She was tired, she said — tired of fighting with businessmen and musicians and the writers who wanted to know where the pain in her voice came from.
When her road manager closed the door on his way back to the stage, the room felt like a cell. Like the best rock 'n' roll, Joplin's music was mostly about freedom, and yet she seemed trapped. I felt like an intruder. I didn't want to be just one more guy asking about the pain.
"Is there anything you'd like to talk about?" I asked.
Joplin stared back at me across the room.
"Man," she finally said, "don't you even have your own questions?"
For me, the time with Joplin was a crash course in rock 'n' roll reality — an introduction to themes I'd encounter time and again. In the end, she got past my clumsy start and began talking about feeling like an outcast growing up, her music, her lifestyle and the one constant in her world: loneliness.
"Somehow you lose all the old friends," she said. "When we're not on stage, we rehearse, lay around in bed, check in and out of motels, watch television. I live for that hour on stage."
On stage that night, Joplin "the star" emerged. Ultimately, though, the lonely hours proved too much. Less than a year later, Joplin was dead in a hotel room. An accidental heroin overdose, it was said. She was within walking distance of the Bowl.
Bono, a Man in Full
In reviewing any act, but especially a new one, a critic is looking for specific qualities: originality, purpose, depth, craft — and the potential to make memorable music for years to come. U2 had all that when I first saw them at the old Country Club in Reseda early in 1981. The music spoke powerfully of youthful awakening at a time when many were losing faith in rock.
I interviewed Bono a few months later and found a remarkably focused and articulate 20-year-old. He had an innate curiosity about life, and that extended to Los Angeles and its culture. His one request was to go to an old-fashioned drive-in restaurant. And so we went to Bob's Big Boy in Toluca Lake, where he had two servings of the ice cream hot fudge cake.
A few years later, with U2's popularity soaring, I caught them at the Los Angeles Sports Arena. Influenced by Bruce Springsteen's emotional performances, Bono was looking for his own way of embracing the audience. Riding the energy of the crowd, at one point he raced to the balcony and jumped over the rail and into the arms of fans below. Two fans leaped from the balcony behind him.
That night I wrote in my review: "When you have music as purposeful as U2's, you don't need a sideshow, especially a potentially dangerous one." A few days later, Bono phoned to say the sideshow was going to stop — that the rest of the band was on his case too.
Over the years, we kept in touch. On the morning after "The Joshua Tree" won a Grammy, we had a late breakfast in a coffee shop just off Central Park in New York. He was excited, not just about the success of "The Joshua Tree" but also about all the things he wanted to do — screenplays, books, plays.
I loved his enthusiasm but worried that it might mean the end of U2. He had written a few great songs, but nothing that would leave a musical legacy as rich as Cole Porter's or Hank Williams'. The point was, I told him, he was just beginning.
Bono was quiet. So, I was surprised eight years later to read about him recounting the conversation in Bill Flanagan's book "U2: At the End of the World."
"That reprimand rattles around Bono's head," Flanagan wrote. "He is still wrestling with it."
Things had changed when I interviewed Bono last year. It was at the Chateau Marmont a few days after the start of the band's world tour, and the subject was Bono's crusade to combat Third World poverty.
As he talked, I thought about how the singer had been ridiculed in the '80s for his spiritual and idealistic views. By the end of the '90s, when the band's popularity was secure, Bono began meeting with world leaders, encouraging them to tackle poverty issues. It wasn't a role he wanted, he told me, but one he felt compelled to follow.
"Look," he said with a smile, "I'm tired of Bono too, and I'm Bono."
On the way back to the office, I thought about how much he had grown and how much I admired him. I also realized there was nothing more I could tell him.
Critic's picks
These are Robert Hilburn's favorite rock albums, arranged by decade:
The '50s
Elvis Presley's "Sunrise." The tracks Presley cut for Sun Records before his "Heartbreak Hotel" fame largely defined rock 'n' roll — from the instrumentation to the attitude. The moment of celebration and discovery remains magical after half a century.
The '60s
Bob Dylan's "Highway 61 Revisited." With his literary skill and acute social observation, Dylan turned rock from youthful exuberance into a mature art form in a series of brilliant '60s albums. This was the moment of supreme breakthrough.
The '70s
John Lennon's "Plastic Ono Band." Despite his landmark work with the Beatles, this solo debut ranks for me as Lennon's finest hour. He looked at his own doubts and fears with an unflinching honesty that set a new standard for rock 'n' roll introspection.
Bruce Springsteen's "Born to Run." At a time when rock 'n' roll had lost much of its heroic lure, Springsteen gave us reason to believe again in the music and ourselves — a youthful self-affirmation that was absolutely thrilling.
The '80s
U2's "The Joshua Tree." This great Irish band combined the anthem power of rock with a restless spirituality that once again expanded the horizons and heart of the music.
The '90s and beyond
The White Stripes' "Get Behind Me Satan." After four albums that established the Stripes as the most essential American rock group since Nirvana, Jack White made music this time that was even richer and more personal than before — anxious, even desperate, looks at conflicts between innocence and morality on one side and compromise and betrayal on the other.
