by Mark Lanegan
“Certainly! I’d love to hear what you’re doing. Send it on over and I’ll let you know what I think.”
He gave me the address to 4AD and I sent a cassette of the roughs out that day, knowing I was pissing in the wind. Since they already had a singer under contract with whom they wished to make a record that sounded like mine, my chances at becoming a part of their ultra-cool, ultra-stylized stable of bands were slim to none. A couple months later, still with no one willing to help me finish and release my record, out of curiosity and desperation I gave Watts-Russell a ring. I was of course sure to call during proper business hours at his office in London, as it was the only way I’d have a chance to catch him. To my surprise, they transferred me straight to him once I’d announced who was phoning.
“Hello, Mark, what can I do for you?” was his curt, borderline unfriendly comment when he picked up the phone.
“Hey, I’m just calling to see if you’d had an opportunity to listen to the tape I sent?”
“Yes, I did. I have to tell you it really isn’t right for our label, but thank you for calling. Goodbye.”
Click. Silence. End of conversation.
“What a fucking prick!” I said out loud.
“Who?” Anna asked.
“Nobody, baby, just some stupid asshole, never mind.”
While Trees seemed to be spinning our wheels, my friends’ bands had shifted into high gear. A couple of months before they went into the studio, Kurt had played me the demos for his band’s next record, Nevermind. I told him I thought they were brilliant. We had been playing acoustic guitar together at his place in Olympia a couple of years earlier when he’d written “Something in the Way,” the dark and brooding tune that was to close the record. I had always known Kurt possessed genius and believed him destined for greatness, but nothing could prepare me (and especially him) for the instantaneous, explosive popularity and blinding spotlight that was about to hit him with the heat of a desecrating sun. In late September of that year, Nirvana released Nevermind. The record blasted them from the basement of the music world to the penthouse suite with the force of an atomic bomb, replete with toxic, billowing mushroom cloud. That explosion carried Seattle’s music scene with them to the worldwide stage.
In the early days of Nirvana-mania, Kurt and I were lying on the huge bed in his room at the Hotel Sorrento in Seattle. It was just down the street from my place but it might as well have been the moon to me, the one room twice the size of my entire apartment, equal parts tawdry tackiness and out-of-reach opulence. He was living in Los Angeles by then but had come back to Seattle for some reason or another and had called me to hang. “Smells Like Teen Spirit” had taken off and suddenly Kurt could go nowhere without being harassed.
He was on the phone, arguing with someone over some financial issue. As I lay there stoned watching MTV, he got particularly angry at something that was said to him. He slammed down the receiver, pulled the cord out of the wall, and yelled, “Fuck!”
At that very moment, the video for “Smells Like Teen Spirit” came on the TV. Kurt grabbed my boot lying on the bed between us and threw a perfect strike at the television, hitting the power button and turning it off. In that same instant, we heard through the open hotel window a car rolling by three stories down blasting “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” Kurt looked stricken. He groaned “No way” and buried his head in the pillow.
Nirvana’s sudden celebrity coupled with the earlier success of Alice in Chains and the subsequent massive popularity of local band Pearl Jam had the brass at Epic seeing dollar signs. Epic were suddenly keen to keep the Trees around. They wanted to land us on the coattails of our friends and peers for this previously unheard-of chart takeover by so many bands from the same small, provincial city. Had the Nirvana phenomenon not been in full effect, they would have dropped us without a second thought.
After the Nirvana boom, Sub Pop were also flush with cash from suddenly selling shitloads of copies of Nirvana’s first record and the rights to their contract to their new label, DGC. They had also reportedly done a deal with a major where they’d sold a piece of the company for millions. Around that time, someone at the label decided I was still under contract. Months after our lunch where they’d unceremoniously dismissed me, I got a call from Jon Poneman.
“Hey, Mark, you ready to finish that record for us now?”
I would have absolutely been within my rights to tell him, “Fuck you, man, you guys told me to get lost.” But having wasted the months following our humiliating non-meal in an empty, hopeless search during which not one label had been willing to pick me up, I didn’t think twice before responding.
“Yes I am! Thanks, man!”
And just like that, I was back in the game. I was so grateful to be given another chance to complete what I intended to be a masterpiece a million times more artful than my flawed first effort (and also to collect the balance of my now-restored advance) that I began happily working on the record immediately.
But with Nirvana ascending the charts worldwide, Epic also began asking us about another album. I was already five records into my unsatisfying run with the Trees and, despite my friends’ success, I knew one thing for certain: the next time the Trees stepped into a recording studio, it would be done to my satisfaction … or not at all.
When we met up, Lee and Van were openly excited to make another record with all the attention Seattle was getting at the moment. They were also, like myself, broke. The increased money due to come our way for a second Epic offering was serious enticement for them.
“I’m sorry, guys,” I said, “but I think I’m done with the band. I’ve been trying for years to make this thing into something it was obviously never meant to be. Lee, thank you for giving me the opportunity to sing your tunes, but I can’t do another record singing your lyrics. I have no connection to them and anything I do from this moment on will be authentic or else I won’t do it.”
Van nodded his head in acquiescence. He had ridden that lame horse with me every inch of the way; he completely understood my point of view. Lee’s reaction was, of course, to throw a childish fit, tossing stuff around in his own apartment. It was as predictable as everything else he did, the exact same behavior he’d exhibited many times over the years. I used that opportunity to leave.
A couple of weeks later Van asked me if I’d come over and have another discussion with him and Lee about a possible second record for Epic. I agreed out of curiosity. What kind of pitch could they possibly have dreamed up that I would agree to? But I also knew my history of quitting and rejoining probably had them just feeling me out. When I arrived, Van did all the talking.
“Look, man, we are as tired as you of making the same record over and over. We have been talking about it and both of us truly want to create something great.”
Since they were officially drummerless and singerless at the time, it was just the two of them to have their discussions. Lee chimed in and immediately blew my mind.
“Mark, you are a great singer and we aren’t going anywhere without you. If you do this record, I promise we will create it with all three of us involved at every step of the way. The lyrics will be in your hands. We will start and finish songs together as a team, not the one-man band you guys have had to be a part of all these years. I realize that we have to do things differently if we are ever going to get anywhere and make something timeless.”
It was the first time he’d ever acknowledged my contribution to the band. After years of battling him for inclusion and growth, he was now, in an open and intelligent manner, saying he needed our help if we were ever going to make something great. It was also the first time he’d ever uttered the word timeless in conjunction with our music, and I was totally taken aback by that. It was as though he’d finally allowed himself to admit what we had seen the entire time, an epiphany years in the making. For the first time, I saw another side to this man. I had for so long considered him a monster and I was humbled in a profound way by his newfoun
d honest appreciation of my contributions. It was like finding a stream of cool water in the desert when you were about to die of thirst.
Once again back in the band, I put my solo project on hold. We began to develop the music and form the songs that would become our breakthrough record, the album that would take us as close to mainstream success as we’d ever get: Sweet Oblivion.
Working in Lee’s cramped one-room Capitol Hill apartment, Lee and Van would play around with riffs on acoustic guitar until we heard something pleasing. Then I would begin formulating vocal melodies and partial lyrics. The brothers had hired on the spot the first drummer to try out, Barrett Martin, Jack Endino’s former bandmate in Skin Yard. They’d called to tell me about him and, sight unseen, I’d said, “Go ahead and hire him if he’s that good.” He was a young, talented player with crazy Afro-like hair and the huge personality to go with it, one that ran the gamut from extreme naïveté to outright pretentiousness. He had loud opinions on every subject that came up, no matter how misinformed or off the mark he might be. I was shocked at his lack of knowledge of underground rock. After a conversation about his influences, he informed me his record collection consisted of Zeppelin, Rush, and other run-of-the-mill trad hard rock but that the bulk of his listening habits had been informed by his vast knowledge of jazz. That was an art form I had zero connection to and I wondered, How’s this gonna work?
It took a while for me to warm to this big kid, almost as physically large as myself. He attempted to out-intimidate me a couple of times, once throwing a full sixteen-ounce can of beer at my head and missing from close range. I instantly collapsed in a fit of laughter. That had diffused his anger and made him start laughing as well. His keen sense of humor, his ability to poke fun at himself, and his heartfelt compassion for people won me over. But mainly it was the ferocious artistry of his jazz- and hard-rock-influenced drumming that made me accept him with open arms. Who gave a fuck that he’d never heard the Velvet Underground or most of the shit I loved as long as he got the job done? And get the job done he did.
Barrett was a powerful and nuanced player like the Trees had never had before. After years of playing with drummers who had their own particular style but were never able to adapt, we’d learned to accept what we got, no matter how inappropriate their parts might be for any particular song. Playing with Barrett was a monumental revelation. He could not only pound like John Bonham, he could also play sensitively, with a musical sense of the big picture. And he played in time with correct and steady tempos, a talent some of our previous drummers had lacked or at least not given a damn about, probably due to the chaotic, noisy quality of our early years. Here was yet another completely different weirdo thrown into our dysfunctional mix, but that, coupled with his proficiency at his instrument, made him the perfect complement to our newfound focus and dedication to excellence. His playing was a huge influence on the hard rock sound of Sweet Oblivion.
After putting together a batch of tunes we felt good about, the music ironically turned out to have a more organically classic rock feel than any of our previous work. Still, we were lacking a standout, an obvious single.
One day, Van gave me a cassette he’d recorded of himself fucking around with the guitar in his garage while tripping on acid. I tried to pay attention to it with headphones on but most of it was unlistenable crap. I thought, Van plus acid plus guitar equals shit. As I was about to fall asleep, a short, probably minute-and-a-half-long piece of a song jumped out. It was an extremely brief, catchy riff. I could hear his drug-addled voice repeating far off in the distance “I nearly lost you” a couple times and then it was over. I rewound and listened to the snippet of a song probably twenty times. That catchy little riff was unlike anything Lee would ever write. From the two or three times Van had repeated that one line, “nearly lost you,” I could clearly envision how the vocal should go. I was sure we could fashion it into a single. I phoned Van on the spot: “Van, you don’t know it, but you’ve written a hit.”
With the album’s lyrics still incomplete, we played what we had for Bob Pfeifer. After I assured him they’d be done in time, he agreed we were past due to get into a studio. The decision was made to record in New York City where Pfeifer was based so he could keep a watchful eye on what for the band was a make-or-break record. We hired producer Don Fleming, who booked us into a studio with a talented engineer named John Agnello, who had begun his career as an assistant on Cyndi Lauper’s huge breakout hit She’s So Unusual.
Where Don was a methodical, studious type we all liked and respected, John was a good-natured, foul-mouthed New Yorker with a keen eye for hilarity, a classic ballbuster. We all fell in love with him and his wicked sense of humor. We began to lay down basic tracks—drums, bass, guitars. I’d sing a scratch melody with the band with whatever words I had to help them get the instrumental tracks down. I listened to the roughs in the hotel at night and wrote until I had the lyrics done.
Unbeknownst to the band, I would sometimes go down to the Lower East Side and buy a few bindles of heroin. Since it was powdered East Coast dope and it was impossible to legally buy a syringe in NYC in those days, I would simply snort it. When I was unable to get out to score, I drank heavily. Fleming actually encouraged me to drink because he was convinced he’d get a better performance out of me. I sang almost the entire record drunk, high, or hungover. But it didn’t seem to matter to anyone which state I was in as everyone involved was enthusiastic about the results. For the first time ever, I sensed that we were actually making something special.
There had been a sea change in Lee Conner, something I’d previously thought impossible. It was strange and cool to witness. He had a newfound dedication to tone, and to when to play and when not to. His openness to everyone’s ideas, flexibility as to song arrangement, and general good-natured spirit of cooperation were inspiring. He had been true to his word. I was finally glad I hadn’t given up before we were able to collectively pull off what, until then, had seemed would never happen.
While in the city, I took full advantage of the use of record company car vouchers. On a day off, I drunkenly took a company voucher limo out to New Jersey to see a woman from Georgia I barely knew who was staying out there with her band for the night. The next thing I was conscious of was waking up in the burning-hot backseat of a small car, windows rolled completely up, baking in the hot sun with my head pounding from an obviously brutal night’s or days-and-nights drinking episode. I stumbled out of the car, no idea where I was or how I got there. I heard music playing faintly in the distance and started to stumble in its direction. I was so parched and dehydrated that I wobbled into the first business I saw, seeking water. It turned out to be a cheesesteak place—I must be in Philadelphia. As I stood in line hoping to buy a bottle of water, a huge winged insect of some indiscernible variety flew into the place, landed on the hot grill, walked around on it for several seconds, then took wing up and out the door again. Seconds later I was drawing stares, dry heaving uncontrollably on the curb until I thought something was going to burst inside me, nothing in my stomach left to puke up.
I finally found the bar where my acquaintance’s band were doing their soundcheck. It turned out I’d drunkenly ridden along with them to Philly and arrived passed out in their car. They’d just left me there to nearly suffocate in the airless, boiling-hot interior of the tiny vehicle. I got on a pay phone and called Fleming in the studio.
“Where the fuck are you, Lanegan? It’s your night in here! Get on the fucking train and get your ass to the studio!”
He was pissed off for sure, but the hungover performances I gave that night delighted him to the point that he proclaimed them to be “the greatest vocals you’ve ever done! Guaran-fucking-teed!”
When we finished recording, we turned the record over to mix specialist Andy Wallace, the same man who’d mixed Nevermind. When it was done, I thought, There—we finally made a good record.
Back in Seattle, I got a frantic call from Pfeifer.
“You have to take a cassette of ‘Nearly Lost You’ to a hotel downtown and give it to Pearl Jam’s A&R guy Michael Goldstone right now!”
“What the fuck for? What’s he got to do with us?”
Bob went on to explain that Sony was putting out the soundtrack to a movie called Singles based on the Seattle music scene and “every Seattle band is on it but you guys!”
“Who gives a fuck? That sounds incredibly lame to me,” I replied.
“Don’t you get it? They’re trying to fuck us! Every Seattle band on Sony and several others but not you? And you’re part of Sony! It’s an intentional fuckover!”
“From who, Bob?”
“I don’t know, but I refuse to let it happen. Now get your ass down there with that cassette!”
Pissed off that I had to be the ambassador as well as messenger boy for the band (especially for something I considered to be weak as fuck), I nonetheless walked over to the hotel, not far from my apartment. I walked up to the counter and asked them to call Goldstone’s room, a further humiliation because Bob had insisted, “You do not leave it at the counter! You put it into his fucking hands personally!”
When he came down to the lobby, Goldstone smiled and introduced himself as Goldie. We shook hands and he thanked me but then he asked, “Are you okay? You look like you’re in a terrible mood.”
The idea that I had to pitch something to my own record company was sitting very poorly with me. My uncontrolled displeasure must have been written all over my face.
“I’ll be honest with you, man. Bob seems to think we’re being intentionally fucked over by someone who wants to keep us off this soundtrack, and it’s something I personally couldn’t give a damn about. I’m embarrassed that I’m the one who was forced to come down here, hat in hand, and beg for something I don’t even care about. It sounds totally cheesy to me.”
