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What smoking music are you listening to? (2024)

This story is called Heaven or Hell

I've done some things I shouldn't have done, been places I shouldn't have been and seen and heard things I wish I never saw or heard. 99% of the time it was for a girl. This is a story about one of those times and how a concert almost caused me to go to jail.

I'm at the ice rink in Memphis in January '77, once again trying to master how to fall down safely. I can roller skate OK but put me on the ice and there is some mental block between brains and feet. After an hour of embarrassing myself I decide to go to the refreshment stand and sit for a bit. As I climb up on the stool I say to myself something like."Man I can't sit here too long or I'll stiffen up" The girl on the next stool says that it looks like I could use some help. I tell her that she is wrong, I don't need some help I need ALL the help. This gets a giggle and I introduce myself. She says her name is Pam and proceeds to give me a short course in thermodynamics, physics, geometry and Newton's laws as they pertain to ice skating. I had no idea. She offers to take me out and give me some tips and I'd be a fool not to take the opportunity to hold onto this Pretty Young Thing. After some time I actually make it twice around without having anything bad happen and decide to end on that high note.

Back at the refreshment stand I offer to buy her whatever she wants for her help and she gets a 7up, that's it. No burger, fries, milkshake, BLT just a 7up. We talk for a bit and I mention that I'm going swimming on Sunday (this was Saturday afternoon) and she looks at me like I'm a crazy person. "It's January! You can't go swimming in January!" "Sure I can, you can come watch if you want or even join in." After some back and forth she agrees to come watch and I get her address and phone.

Now I have no intention of swimming in the Mississippi in January but I do plan on swimming at the indoor pool at the Hilton where a friend has a part-time gig as a lifeguard. The Hilton used these guest passes so people staying at the hotel can invite a couple of guests to go swimming. So for a case of beer once in a while I get a handful of passes. A symbiotic relationship.

1 Pm Sunday rolls around and I go to pick up Pam and her mother opens the door not having a clue who I am. We make introductions and I tell her why I'm there and she yells "Pam, are you ready?" "I'm not going Mom!" "Did you tell this boy you would go with him today?" "Yes Mom but.." No buts, you keep leading these boys on and none of them will trust you now get ready and get downstairs!" A few minutes later Pam shows up with a little bag in hand and Mom shushes us out the door. This is going not as planned so I tell Pam we can go wherever she wants but she says her mother will expect her to tell about swimming so we might as well go there.

The attitude improves significantly when we walk into the Hilton. I show our pool passes and up we go to the indoor pool. We walk in and my friend gives me the head nod and we go to the dressing rooms. I'm waiting by the door when Pam comes out. Now I know why it was such a little bag. I have no idea what is holding that bikini bottom up and there is little doubt what is keeping the top on. There is no way anybody could actually swim in that suit. We end up having a pretty good time and when I bring her home Mom won't let me go without feeding me dinner and grilling me at the same time. Imagine 45 minutes of a conversation about yourself while you are sitting there that you have only a limited part in.

"So Pam did you have a good time?" Yes Mom it was fun we swam in the pool at the Hilton!" "So are you going out with him again?"
"I don't know Mom he hasn't asked" "Do you want to go out with Pam again?" " Yes ma'am I'd like that very much." "So its settled, you kids work out the details." Mom was sorta like a Mack truck in a housecoat. Once she got rolling you got in her way at your peril.

Of course, over the next few weeks it comes out that I like going to concerts and I'd love to take her to a show. Was there anybody she really wants to see? Out came the three worst possible words anybody who claims to be a rocker could hear: THE JACKSON 5. Now Pam and I had progressed from pool passes to getting pretty friendly up to a point and that certainly was a factor but still...me at a Jacksons concert? The show was already sold out and less than 2 weeks away. This would be a labor of love or lust in my case. I end up buying a pair of ticket for 3 times face value or about $45 for the pair and having to pay full ride at the Hilton since my buddy was away. So we get to the show and there is security everywhere since the Jackson's caused a riot at a store in Memphis during an autograph signing the day before. 8-10,000 showed up when 500-1,000 were expected. Inside it is just screaming teenage girls with a few bored looking older guys like me and some parents in the mix as far as you can see. I manage to make it through the show by thinking about the after party. We didn't spend the night since Mom might not have been to thrilled about that but she didn't say anything when I brought Pam home at almost 4 AM.

Everything is going well and good and I was going to meet her older brother who is a cop in some little town a few hours down the road later that month. We're sitting in the living room talking about cars and guns when he offers me a beer. "If you wear the uniform you can have a beer" Never asking my age. He asks me if I had been treating his baby sister right. I say that she can answer that better than I . So he yells into the kitchen, "Pammy, this boy been treating you right?" "Oh yes we're having lots of fun." I ask if she isn't a little old for you to be calling her your baby sister? "Naw she'll always be my baby sister - (yelling) Pammy, you're going to be 17 in what, 2 months?" "Yeah"

She told me she was 18, had a fake ID that said 22 and I never asked directly to see any ID, If the bottle I was holding didn't have the cap on it I might have crushed it in my bare hand. Now this is Tennessee where you can get married at 14 with parents permission, 16 without or you could be 25 and date a 14yo (I'm talking to you Elvis) but she had to be 18 to have sex without being married. I'm going to jail or I'm getting married I thought to myself over and over.

It was about a 40 minute drive from the base to her place or an hour from my place. We hardly ever saw each other on the weekdays since she had school but we did that Monday. I'm freaking out but she is taking it in stride. I almost manage to calm down when she says that her Mother knows all about it. I lost it, I'm going to jail if I stay and certainly if I go. Pam says she isn't getting married before finishing High School, Mom says she isn't getting married before finishing High School and as long as I treat Pam right and she doesn't get pregnant there is no reason for her brother to know. We ended it a week or so later and I thanked my lucky stars every night until I left in October even though the statute of limitation wouldn't run out for almost 7 more years.

Moral of the story?

The Jacksons were not worth the cost no matter what I thought at the time.

Same tour, different show
 
I’ve probably performed David Allan Coe’s version of “You Never Called Me By My Name” well over a hundred times over the years. We all know it was written by Steve Goodman - as Coe famously references in his version - but I just found out today that John Prine was technically a co-writer of the song as well. I don’t know how I didn’t already know that. I found a video of Prine performing his and Goodman’s original version.

 
AVB said:
This story is called Heaven or Hell
Click to expand...
You swerved me pretty good, as I was almost certain this was going to end with "We are approaching our 47th anniversary in August."
I can somewhat relate, as my baser instincts once caused me to endure:

American_Idol_Live_2015_Poster.jpg
 
Bill w/ eoPd said:
You swerved me pretty good, as I was almost certain this was going to end with "We are approaching our 47th anniversary in August."
I can somewhat relate, as my baser instincts once caused me to endure:

View attachment 84279
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I've never seen a reality show for more than the 2 or 3 minutes it took to realize what it was. I don't know if you had to watch all of the season or just the finale but either way I'd trade you. Having your life depend on the whims of a 16 year old girl is not something you want.

To your first point I've often wondered what might have been.
 
AVB said:
I've never seen a reality show for more than the 2 or 3 minutes it took to realize what it was. I don't know if you had to watch all of the season or just the finale but either way I'd trade you. Having your life depend on the whims of a 16 year old girl is not something you want.

To your first point I've often wondered what might have been.
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Watching on television would have been bad enough but I had the displeasure of attending a stop on the Live Tour. At that time, the few hundred dollars spent~wasted was the kicker; these days, I want the few hours of my life back.
 
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Bill w/ eoPd said:
Watching on television would have been bad enough but I had the displeasure of attending a stop on the Live Tour. At that time, the few hundred dollars spent~wasted was the kicker; these days, I want the few hours of my life back.
Click to expand...
I didn't know such a thing as Idol live shows existed.
 
Continuing the theme of both MMM and Monday Morning blues, here’s a video from a little solo gig I did back in 2012. This was a little upscale restaurant in Zionsville, Indiana where my brother worked. They had a little patio with about 8-10 tables, and in the summer they would have live music. They used to hire me to just play blues guitar over backing tracks. Most of the time I didn’t even sing, but on this particular night my parents showed up and my Dad asked me to play “Still Got the Blues For You“ by Gary Moore. I had my laptop plugged into the soundboard to play the backing tracks, and I managed to get on the restaurant WiFi and find a track for it. I had a copy of the lyrics in a big chord sheet binder I carried with me back then. Needless to say, I did not usually tack on 2.5-minute guitar solos onto the end of songs when doing little patio gigs, but I made an exception here.

 
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