Greaser Car Culture Not only did Kenny Edwards help me land a most unlucrative job in San Francisco in 1963, and carry Arthur Lee and me to surf movies, but he was a student of cello.  I tried him out in Pasadena on a borrowed cello, and he played "Louis Louis."  Absolutely true story.  But he was passed over in favor of Emmet Sergeant.  Kenny and Linda actually went to New York and lived in the same apartment building as Frank Zappa at one point, and I would be most interested in seeing if that is mentioned in Linda's memoirs. 

It likely will be, because Frank Zappa is a famous name now.

And on the flip side, "Talk to the microphone in the piano strings."  Frank recorded ALL of that and kept ALL the tapes.  They probably could find what Linda or Kenny said to the piano strings, if speak to them they did.  And depending on what you've written, Linda, this might be on some record in the future and you might not get royalties because no one not even record company loggers might be able to recognize your voice.

Kenny and I as kids would hold hands and run across 8 lanes of Los Angeles freeway traffic at night and surge with a mutual adrenaline rush when we made it across safely.

I could run pretty fast, because of the physical fitness programs John Kennedy had installed in the schools so we could better fight against Russians or other landforces, and I took two gym classes back to back so I could fulfill those requirements and graduate high school early, as I really didn't want to be stuck in there too much longer.  And of course there was all that bike ridin' up into the foothills ... where I never made it to the top of Mt Baldy because I was on an English 3-speed and I would fall over from exhaustion along the way, but I got to coast downhill very very fast.

One time a friend of mine whose father owned a gas station in Pomona drove me up there in her brother's 56 Chevy sedan, nosed but not decked, and painted a light blue.  He had been working on the engine which he seemed to do constantly but when he worked in the station on Saturdays he would sometimes let her have his car ... and in the altitude, the fuel line would sputter a bit ... and cough .... Hell's Angels would ride up there, too, and they were behind us on motorcycles and closing in fast ...

The car sputtered and stalled and they passed us, then turned around to return to the car filled with two teenage girls.  We were stuck alongside the road in the car and they were off their bikes approaching us in the middle of nowhere.  They wanted to help us with the car, just like good Bubbas do everywhere for ladies in automotive trouble, so they opened the hood, and would tell her when to gun the engine or pull the choke while they fiddled with the carburetor settings (and they complimented her on her brother's choice of exhaust).  But it was frustrating, because the engine kept choking out.  

One of them grew frustrated and pulled his gun and held it to the engine laughing as he did and threatened to shoot it.  My friend and I just looked at each other in growing concern.

Then the car started, and the Angel without the gun slammed the hood shut.  The guy with the gun came over to my side of the car and invited us to join them for beers.  They'd obviously had a few.

At which point my friend became a stunt driver, threw the car into reverse (and this was a column shift) and I yelled "Thank You!" out the window as I leaned out and waved in a friendly way while she backed up down the curvy mountain road at tremendously high speed with the tires squealing and burning smoke until she reached a wide point in the road where she could turn the car around facing the downhill all without stopping.  And so we went home laughing a bit.

So for Don to fail at The Dips was sad for me .... he did drive fast, though, his foot was heavy on the pedal just like all people who are raised driving on desert highways. 

Although, sometimes because of my upbringing I could feel we could all be real losers.



 







  ¶ 10/16/2013 10:56:00 AM