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The House of Pies |
The House of Pies closed in 1974. My grandmother's
philosophy was that nothing good survived. It affected her adversely. "Nothing's good like it was."
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Famous Amos |
In the hallway at school the next day Max Ten said, "Jay, picking you up Saturday." It wasn't a question, it was matter of
fact. "Tom Waits. You've gotta hear this guy. Got a voice like an emery board. Fantastic."
Max Ten had a 1969 gold Austin America. Max could have driven a four door Datsun and
it would still be cool, but the Austin America was over the top. It had a Deadhead sticker on the back
window. Paige was in the back seat and
at first I was a little taken aback. I
sat in the passenger seat and we picked up Belinda Pocket and Paigeboy. The girls sat in back. Belinda wore a mini dress that was pretty
indescribable. Imagine a gypsy-style
white top, pretty see through, then below the elbows and below the waist it was
a black and white paisley print. It was
pretty stunning, and I’ve got to admit, Paigeboy looked like a million bucks in
a pale green knitted dress, real short, her hair parted in the middle, curled real
nice.
We headed out over Sepulveda Pass into Santa Monica to a
venue that wasn’t much of anything but a converted storage space in the back of
McCabe’s Guitar Shop. It looked like the
kind of place that would catch fire.
There were a hundred guitars hanging on the walls, Gibsons and Fenders
and Rickenbackers. There was a makeshift
stage and a wall of amplifiers. Tom
Waits was crazy and drunk and sang songs like "Ol' '55" and "Rosie." Leave it to Max Ten; the music was absolutely
diabolical. It was always 2am in Waits’
music and a bottle of Jack was paying you back, whispering loneliness. I wrote that in my red journal. Long ago I’d bought another journal and then
another, but I kept that first one, the one from Gaia for the stuff I never
wanted to forget. I don’t know if I said
it or if it was Max Ten, but I at least was the one who wrote it down. It was 1974. Patti Smith was there. She scared the shit out of me. I wrote that down too.
I never mentioned my father dancing. We were in Joe and Aggie's Café in Holbrook,
Arizona. We had chili con carne with
onions and my father had a couple Coors.
We were playing a pinball machine called Gottlieb's Bowling Queen and my
father went to the bar for another beer.
A pretty lady in a cowboy hat started talking to him and the next thing
I knew he was out on the floor dancing a cowboy line dance. He didn't know what he was doing. I was so distracted that I let the fifth ball
slip down between the flippers without enough for a replay, but I matched
numbers and still got a free game. I
didn't play it. I went and sat in the
booth and watched my father dance. He
was laughing the whole time and carrying on and when it was time for everybody
in the line to tap the tip of their boots, he thought that was grand. It was the only part he really got down,
otherwise he kept doing the wrong thing.
It was real nice to see him have fun.
Tom Waits didn't sing cowboy music, but there was an
accordion and a cello in a couple of the numbers and I couldn't help but think
about the dance my father did so poorly.
Music can transport you places, so I was like back there in Arizona with
my father. Tom Waits can take you
places.
Jay and the Americans is available all over the world!