This diary is probably a week and a half late (the anniversary of his death would have been on April 9th). But it was just this morning, while looking for music videos on You Tube, that I ran into some fascinating material I had never heard before on one of my childhood heroes: Phil Ochs. I believe I got into him because my Junior High English teacher had a record player and some albums. I actually went to see one of his last concerts; looking at his late performance dates on Songkick, I am pretty sure I went to his performance on Wednesday, June 12th, 1974 at the Troubadour. I would have been 16. It was billed as “Phil Ochs and Friends,” and there were memorable performances by people who would go on to long, important careers. I remember Warren Zevon did “Werewolves of London” and “The Ballad of Frank and Jesse James) and Tom Waits (who I had not previously heard of) did an utterly mesmerizing set that pretty much made me a fan for life. I also have a clear memory of Tom Waits trading songs with someone who looked an awful lot like Rickie Lee Jones out in front of the club. I remember Phil Ochs didn’t actually play many songs (maybe three or four over about two-and-a-half hours), and he seemed a little bored by his own material. Possibly because of this, but probably mostly because he was struggling with depression and alcoholism, he drank steadily and—by the end of the performance—he was very visibly intoxicated and rather belligerent.
It wasn’t all music. There were a number of guest speakers. The only one I remember was Tom Hayden, who I believe talked about the possibility that Robert Kennedy’s death was the result of a conspiracy rather than a lone assassin. Phil was up on stage, with him, when a guy who was sitting across the table (and maybe down one or two seats) yelled out something like, “Are you still a commie, Tom?” Definitely a jerky thing to say (even at 16 I knew that), but it made Phil absolutely livid, he started yelling at the audience, trying to find out who said it, presumably so he could kick the guy out, kick his ass, or both. He actually stormed off the stage and came down to our table. I think he angrily asked me if I said it (I believe I shook my head), as well as asking who had said it. I knew but I just couldn’t bring myself to rat the jerk out. Interestingly, no one else did either, and I think Doug Weston (who owned the club) pretty much had to talk him down.
Anyway, the real reason for this post is the video below, which I stumbled across this morning. It is not visually very interesting, But it is the last recording session he made before his suicide three and a half months later. Although the songs are uneven, he sounds in surprisingly good form.
Here something else I ran into (again, not very visually interesting, but fascinating to listen to) of one of his most ambitious songs, “The Crucifixion.” As I remember from one of Och’s biographies, he is supposed to have sung this to Bobby Kennedy on a plane (the song is often thought to be about JFK).
Here’s an actual live recording of one of his most moving songs (it’s a pretty good performance, but the video montage in the middle is distracting):
I’m sure that’s more than enough, but I’m going to include a video of one of my favorite Tom Waits’ songs, about people who got lost along the way. It should be the first thing in the comments.