From that moment on we became friends. I got to know his family and I got to know this exceptional guy. His stepmother, Jacqueline, once told me, “Deering works harder at playing than most men do at working.” As the years passed I learned what she meant. Whatever Deering Howe did, he did well, and I respected that. When his passion was deep-sea fishing, he became one of the best, following the black marlin around the world and filling his home with trophies. He was a natural athlete, and when he took up golfing, he excelled at that too, becoming a scratch golfer, playing head to head with pros like Fred Couples.
I still visit Deering and his wife, Barbara, a couple of times a year at their summer home in Maine or their winter place in Florida. He’s been at nearly every milestone concert I’ve ever played and he’s a trusted friend and confidant. Deering is usually the first one to hear my new songs even before they’re finished. I can always count on him to be brutally honest with me. He’s not a musician, but he’s an astute listener, and I take his advice seriously. He always tells me straight up when he thinks I’m drifting off course musically … and he’s usually right. The relationship we established way back when I refused to be one of his entourage holds true to this day. He’s been there for me through all my ups and downs. We’ve been deep-sea fishing off Jamaica, toured the funky clubs of New York and crawled the rock & roll bars of Los Angeles, and this story wouldn’t be complete without him.
Deering Howe was not the only person I met at Steve Paul’s who would have a major effect on my life. It was at the Scene one night that folksinger Judy Collins heard me and told a friend, drummer Bobby Colomby, about me. Bobby and bass player Jim Fielder came in later in the week. When I started singing, Bobby turned to Fielder and said, “Who the hell is that? He sings like Ray Charles.” Jim replied, “I think that’s the guy Judy’s talkin’ about.” After my set they introduced themselves and told me about their band, Blood Sweat & Tears. They had recorded a debut album for Columbia Records entitled Child Is Father to the Man, but the band had fallen apart due to infighting between founder Al Kooper and guitarist Steve Katz. There were only five guys left from the original nine-piece band, but they still had a record contract and were looking to recruit some new players. First they needed a singer and they asked me if I was interested. I knew a few of the guys from the now-defunct Blues Project and I had heard the early edition of BS&T at the Cafe Au Go Go, but word around town was that they had broken up and a lot of people had written them off. I was extremely interested in this band. I shared their vision of a rock band made up of conservatory-trained jazz musicians. It seemed like an idea whose time had come. Young musicians were coming out of Berklee and Juilliard with master’s degrees, well versed in everything from Beethoven to Charlie Parker, but like me had grown up with the music of Chuck Berry and Ray Charles. In many ways it was the fulfillment of the concept that Tony Collacott and I had envisioned with the Bossmen in Toronto. I would have joined them right then and there but fate and treachery intervened.
I was still technically in the US illegally and the immigration department finally caught up with me, tipped off by someone who really didn’t want me to get the gig with BS&T. I don’t know who turned me in but they knew exactly where to find me. At four in the morning, INS agents crashed into a crib I shared with bass player Harvey Brooks and took me away in handcuffs. Ordinarily they would have politely asked a Canadian without a visa to get his documentation straight, but one check of my prison record and once again I was automatically a dangerous criminal. I spent the night in lock-up and was deported back to Canada. My two years of struggle in New York seemed to have been in vain.
Friday the Thirteenth Child
Friday the thirteenth child, Mother nearly died in pain
And you never look over your shoulder
Friends and family you’ll never see again
Friends and family you’ll never see again
Friday the thirteenth child must be somewhere roads don’t run
Put another day over your shoulder
Make it shine like silver, warm like the mornin’ sun
Shine like silver, warm like the mornin’ sun
I’m havin’ the time of my life and yours, my life and yours
Livin’ the life life intended me for
And God knows you can’t do no more
Friday the thirteenth child, there’s a rabbit dyin’ by the road
And another day over your shoulder
Shines like silver, Lord, but it weighs like gold
Shines like silver, Lord, but it weighs like gold
Lyrics by David Clayton-Thomas. Copyright © Lady Casey Music, 1972.
9
COLOMBY AND KATZ
After being deported from the US I returned to Yorkville, back to little coffee-house gigs, stoned on pot and hash and psychedelics. This was the age of acid and all musicians in rock & roll were experimenting with hallucinogens, trying to expand their consciousness. I was just trying to numb the crushing disappointment of being kicked out of the States. I had gambled everything on making it in New York and I had been so close.
The two guys from BS&T didn’t give up on me, however. Jim Fielder and Bobby Colomby got an immigration attorney on the case and began the legal process of petitioning me back into the US. They felt that I was the right singer for their band and they had the weight of CBS on their side. The first BS&T album had been on Columbia Records and was a critical, if not a huge financial, success. Columbia’s president, Clive Davis, felt that with the band’s superb musicianship, Bobby’s business smarts and the right singer, Blood Sweat & Tears was poised to blow the lid off the music business.
I had never committed a crime in the US and my deportation was on a minor technicality. The BS&T people were successful in obtaining a temporary visa for me, and soon I was on a plane back to New York. They got me a room at the Chelsea Hotel, on 23rd Street, and I prepared to audition for Blood Sweat & Tears. The band rehearsed in a fifth-floor loft above the Cafe Au Go Go. This band was a killer. The musicians were great jazz players who were well versed in the blues and R&B. Most of them had never heard me sing. They just knew that Colomby and Fielder were hot on me. The first song I chose for the audition was Al Kooper’s “I Love You More Than You’ll Ever Know,” from the band’s first album. By the end of that first song there was no doubt that something was happening here. One look around the room and I knew from the band’s faces that I had the gig. My vocal style and my jazz and blues background were perfect for this band. Colomby would later say, “We never heard anyone sing like that, he was incredible.” That first rehearsal was magic—there was absolutely no doubt that I was the right singer for this band.
We all went across the street to the Tin Angel caf
Blood, Sweat and Tears Page 8