Suck and Blow

by John Popper

  I also wrote a song for him called “Howard’s Turn.” I ran it by him on the air, but he didn’t get it at all. I wish he had.

  Still, he invited me to appear in his film Private Parts. I had been going on the show quite a bit, and despite the fact that I was yelling a lot, he really enjoyed having me on. I appear in the beginning in a scene that takes place at the MTV Movie Awards. I was standing next to Ted Nugent, and we were talking about guns, of course, and we jammed as well.

  At one point Howard called out to the audience who was there for the scene, “Do you guys wanna hear John Popper play the harmonica?” People cheered, so I went out and played, and by his look I could tell he knew how moved I was to be in the movie. I’d put that reaction up there with Dan Aykroyd beaming with pride at what he helped create.

  I could also see that Howard really had the presence of mind to think, Wow, I can’t believe we’re actually making a movie. And for someone who was so gigantic in my eyes and in the eyes of so many to be aware of how lucky he was, that’s the thing that makes him unique. I’ve always felt that way, and to have Howard think that way as well really struck me.

  When the film finally premiered I was on his show with Conan O’Brien, and Howard did something really sweet for us off the air that I’d finally like to share.

  It’s important to remember that in the late-night wars of the nineties you were either Letterman or Leno. We were Letterman, but Leno was certainly an opportunity you didn’t want to sneeze at, so we’d do our best to walk the line. Everybody on both sides would tell us there was no late-night war, but there was. And we knew they were going to tell us there was no late-night war, and we knew we still had to walk that line. If pushed, we were always David Letterman people, but there was a time when Jay Leno was the bigger rating, and the record company wanted us to go on there as well.

  Throughout all of this there was always Conan O’Brien. We liked Conan, and he wanted us on his show, but because he was NBC, that would ruin our Leno play, and because he was based in New York, that would ruin our Letterman play, so we’d always avoid going on his show. He kept getting screwed, but the way I dealt with it, because he was a nice guy, was I would accuse him of not letting us on his show. I’d write him letters: “Dear Conan, why won’t you let us on your show?” Once I also sent an entire box of cupcakes to his crew, daring them to eat the cupcakes, attesting that I had not tainted them with some sort of virulent strain of stomach flu, and everyone loved the cupcakes.

  The first time I actually met Conan is when we were on Saturday Night Live. I had a giant security guy named Raul who was this six-foot-nine biker-looking guy with a huge ponytail. He looked very intimidating and called me boss all the time. I was with my friends at the after-party and said to him half-seriously, “Raul, go out and bring me somebody famous.” He came back dragging Conan O’Brien, who was in a tuxedo and looked very confused. I said, “Why won’t you let me on your show?” It became a thing.

  Later, when I was at Howard’s movie premiere after-party, Howard called me up to talk on the air. Conan was sitting there too, so I asked him, “Conan, why won’t you let me on your show—is it because of my political ideas?” I began accusing him of towing the NBC company line and suggesting that he wouldn’t let me on because I was a Communist. I was just riffing; it was all nonsensical.

  Eventually A&M said we could do the Conan show, which we had wanted to do, but because of politics, we had put off. I think the late-night war had cooled. So Conan came up to me and said, “You know the funniest thing about that is that as soon as you left, Howard took me aside and said, ‘Why the fuck won’t you let Blues Traveler on your show? They’re nice guys, they try really hard.’” Apparently Howard delivered a lecture on our behalf to get us on Conan’s show.

  Howard doesn’t know that I know this, and it was the nicest thing. I would like to use this book as an opportunity to thank him for that. Poor Conan was getting shit on both ends because I was trying to think of a creative way to not deal with the fact that I wasn’t allowed to be on his show.

  In 1997 I had a conversation with Howard that landed me on Celebrity Deathmatch. I was at the MTV Music Video Awards in 1997 when Fiona Apple gave her “This world is bullshit” speech. I was one of the presenters; I was giving an award to Beck with Dermot Mulroney. Everyone else got copy, but they didn’t write copy for Dermot and me; they forgot. So I said, “Don’t worry, I’ll wing it.” This would not be a winning solution for Dermot, who would wind up having little to do and instead would be relying on my “wit.”

  So as I was standing there, wondering what I was going to say, Fiona came off stage after having given that speech. I didn’t see the speech, but she said, “I can’t believe I did that. That was the dumbest speech.” And I said, “I’m about to fuck it up. They don’t even have a speech for me,” and we bonded over that. Then her boyfriend at the time, David Blaine, the performance artist, came over and said, “You were perfect, baby.” It was such a cheeseball pimpy way to say that. I kept it to myself, but I thought he was all wrong for her.

  So I listened to Stern the following Monday, and she was on, defending her speech. I was at home and thought, “Man, they’re railroading her.” So I called in and said, “Hey Fiona, don’t let them back you in a corner. You told me you were drunk and that you didn’t mean it.”

  And as soon as I said the word drunk, I heard “Ooohhhh . . .”

  It turned out she was nineteen and wasn’t supposed to be drinking. And I was like, Oh God. Now they’re off the speech and into her drinking. I just threw her into the fire.

  So I sent her a Bundt cake because that’s an old rule of thumb: nothing says I’m sorry like a Bundt cake. No one can refuse that apology.

  That became the premise for a feud, and a month or two later we were opponents on Celebrity Deathmatch. My first line was “Nice to be here, I guess.” That was my persona, a well-meaning, easygoing, slightly indecisive hippie who was going to come in and sit on your picnic—“Sorry, did I just sit on your picnic? I didn’t mean any trouble. Sorry I just squashed your thing on the Stern show.”

  But back to the MTV Music Video Awards. Poor Dermot Mulroney. I sent him a sweater for leaving him out in the cold because my “clever improvisation” was “I can’t believe they didn’t write me any copy.” Then I said a bunch of incoherent babble like a lunatic, which was fine because Fiona Apple had given such a worse speech.

  Dermot did send me a thank you note for the sweater. But I never did hear back from Fiona Apple about the Bundt cake.

  I also had an issue with Chris Robinson on Stern in 2001, when we were the two guests and he wouldn’t come out until I left.

  He had developed this thing, which I kept to myself for a long time. I felt I had been reasonably nice to the guy, but at some point in October 1999 I was sitting in with Warren Haynes and Gov’t Mule at the Fillmore—this was a giant jam session in which they brought out Gregg Allman, Audley Freed, and some other players—and Warren told me that Chris Robinson wouldn’t come on stage until I left.

  This was long after they’d done H.O.R.D.E. with us. At that time they were doing a lot of drugs—the only other one in our band who was doing that was Bobby—and they said in an interview that the only person they could hang with from Blues Traveler was Bobby, that he was the only cool guy in the band. Brendan is convinced that they stopped liking us when we did a version of the Rolling Stones’ “Miss You” when they sat in with us and we ended on an upbeat, so they lost respect for us. This is exactly the kind of thing that makes Brendan a cool guy in a way that the Black Crowes may never grasp, and by that I mean the worry. In another article they said we were corporate. Maybe we were corporate, but it was a business; the band was also a corporation, and we were there to work.

  The first time I spoke to him he was including me peripherally in a conversation in which he was saying that when he’s recording, he needs the lights dimmed and there needs to be a giant candle melted a certain way. I kept t
hinking, God, I like the lights on when I’m singing; otherwise I’m going to fall asleep. I don’t like all the cool ambience; I want to see what I’m reading if I need to read words. I want to feel like I’m awake and doing something.

  The Crowes’ style was more to do repetitive blues solos rather than the school we came from, which was from the bebop guys. I was a Coltrane student with the modal approach I took on the harps. I was trying to extend the solo, and they found me kind of noodley.

  But that never explained to me the decision he made to never be on stage when I was there. When Warren told me this, I said fine and I left the building because why do I want to be around if somebody doesn’t want me there? I’d already played, so I left.

  Then the next festival we played that the Crowes were at, he wouldn’t come out of his trailer until I left. We were always parking next to the Black Crowes, so it was kind of annoying. Oddly they had a Winnebago and we had a tour bus—maybe that had something to do with it? I never wanted to go outside because why would you want to go outside when there’s somebody who just loathes you out there?

  After that Stern appearance people would come up to us and say, “Fuck the Black Crowes,” and we’d make a point to say, “No, they’re a really awesome band.” “She Talks to Angels” is one of the greatest vocal deliveries ever, and I never really had a problem with them.

  We were in airport bar in 2006. It was Chan, Tad, and me, and one of them saw Chris. He was sort of hiding, trying not to be recognized. They said, “Go buy him a beer.” So I did, knowing that he was cornered and had to wait for a plane, and he was like, “Hey John. How’s it going? I’m just dealing with stuff after the divorce.” He stuttered on the word divorce. He seemed smaller, like the wind had been taken out of him, and he wasn’t as feisty. We did some gigs with him later when he didn’t seem as adamant about me not being there. Some part of it made me sad; I almost missed his anger.

  Back in the day when they couldn’t stand us I don’t really think it was us. I think they were doing a lot of heroin and their whole world was pissing them off. It was such a dark cloud with them—“Everybody Sucks. . . .These people are terrible. . . . They don’t know rock and roll.” And some time later I was backstage, and Marc Ford, who was no longer with the Crowes and was not partying like that, said about someone who was playing, “These guys are pretty good.” I kind of lit up.

  For me there was negativity about them I never understood. I think they lumped us in with a time they were going through, when things were not really good in their world.

  About a year before Chris Robinson and I were on Stern, I went on there to thank Howard for helping me lose the weight. I ended up taking off my shirt, which was a big deal—it was something I never did. I also got three grand for it.

  I didn’t go on the show intending to take my shirt off, but I figured that they might ask me, so I was ready with a number if they wanted me to. The key was to pick a number that Howard wouldn’t balk at but was the most money he was willing to give me. I had heard some people ask for five thousand to do something embarrassing and they got denied, and I heard some people do something embarrassing for two thousand, and I felt that they could have gotten more, so I felt good about the three thousand.

  I really have to credit Howard for pushing me. My thought at the time after Bobby died was that I was going to die too. My best friend had died, but I still had all of this press booked for my solo record. I had commitments. I was on Stern and talking about what happened, and he said, “I’m worried about you. I’m worried that you’re going to die.” It was very confrontational but in a very loving way. And that was a real tough interview to get through.

  Roseanne had a new talk show and had me on, and she did the same thing. Having someone confront me like that about my weight, I couldn’t get away from it. Fame had been a way to hide, and they turned it on its ear because it became how they were going to confront me.

  Oprah also wanted me to come on her show as someone she was going to help lose weight. The thing about Oprah, though, is she didn’t want me on as the guy from Blues Traveler, just as a regional musician. She didn’t really know who I was, so that was going to make it even worse. Plus, it was too scary; I didn’t think I could do it.

  But then I decided to get the bypass, and Howard kept in touch with me about that—again, in a very public way. Then when I had lost 150 pounds, I went on the air with him. I knew they were going to weigh me, but I didn’t know they were going to ask me to take my shirt off. That was a big thing to me because taking my shirt off was something I never did. The cash made it all the sweeter, but the truth is that if it weren’t for Stern, I wouldn’t have lost the weight in the first place.

  27

  THE PRINCE INSIDE THE MICHELIN MAN

  My imagination was always a real boon when it came to songwriting and other creative endeavors, but it became a real hindrance for my romantic life or the facsimile thereof.

  I was in love with Sarah, the girl who played alto sax in the high school band. One day during senior year I had called her up and revealed my feelings to her, but she told me she didn’t feel that way about me and just considered me a very good friend. So then I became her confidante, her Duckie if you will (Pretty in Pink, anyone?).

  Still, in her yearbook I taped a key to a little treasure box that I put on her doorstep. Inside the treasure box was a note professing my undying love for her. I had also enclosed a locket with a glass slipper that I’d gotten from Disney World at precisely midnight—I’d had to wait around because Disney World closed at midnight and I wanted to be there at that moment to buy her this glass slipper. The box also contained a tape with a song I’d written for her called “Honesty and Love.” I did the vocals, harmonica, keyboard, bass, and guitar, and I had poor Brendan do the drums for this four-hour session. By the end it started to sound like “Piano Man” with fifty verses.

  She was going off to Switzerland to study structural engineering, and we would remain friends and exchange letters. I swore to her I would never give up loving her even though she didn’t feel the same way about me.

  Sarah would set the pattern that would keep me socially cloistered, which was putting a crush or an unrequited love in a bubble. I would formulate a love affair in my mind, and rather than disturb the bubble, I would keep it a secret. Sarah was the source of songs like “Alone,” “100 Years,” “Sweet Pain,” “The Best Part,” and most if not all the early acoustic songs where I would play guitar. She represented the perfect love that I could never have for some reason.

  I think a real part of it was that I was very obese and felt that she was failing me because she didn’t see the prince inside the Michelin Man.

  It took over a decade and the help of a shrink for me to acknowledge that I wasn’t obsessing over fat girls. I was looking at healthy women. So that was on me. Why shouldn’t any woman I judged incapable of seeing the real me instead seek out someone who looked vaguely healthy. I should have wanted to look vaguely healthy.

  I wooed Sarah over a period of eight years. She was in Switzerland and then came back and saw that everyone was singing these songs that I’d originally written and sung just for her at gigs we were playing at Nightingale’s and Wetlands. This is when she started to take me a little more seriously.

  Our first kiss happened at a diner where the waiter kept coming back to our table asking us if we wanted more ketchup. I mention this because it was extremely odd how often the waiter came back to interrupt us as we were having this pivotal moment it took eight years to arrive at. You might think I am saying this to embellish the story, but I am not kidding. As soon as I said, “I’m still in love—” the waiter swept in and asked, “Are you sure you don’t need more ketchup?” Then he came back again and again with the same damn question. Was the waiter secretly in love with Sarah? I’m not sure; they didn’t seem to know one another. But finally after we had the all the ketchup we could possibly have at the table and we assured the man after much discuss
ion that we indeed had enough ketchup, we got back to our discussion eight years in the making about how finally she felt the same way.

  I still don’t know if he was putting me on.

  When we finally sealed the deal, it only lasted a month. I think it was because I had put her on such a high pedestal that she thought she couldn’t live up to it. After all, I had written eight years of songs about this woman and this magical time. Now we were beginning an actual relationship that was almost impossible to live up to. I finally broke up with her, but she wanted to end it as well. The last straw was when she said, “Why can’t you just be dumber?” I’d heard that one before because I’d found that a lot of women just wanted to control me.

  I was virgin until I was twenty-one. The first girl I ever had sex with saw us at Nightingale’s and brought me home to get back at her mom. When she found out I was a virgin, she said, “I’ll have sex with you, but it’s just this once.” I looked at her and said, “I think I can handle that.”

  The next day she called me to let me know that she’d be going away for the weekend, and I thought that was odd for just once. But then she came to the Lizmar Lounge the following week where we were playing and said, with a jarring urgency, “I have to talk to you.” I thought, Oh my god, she’s pregnant (or in my weaker moments, Oh my god, she has herpes). But instead she said, “I’m in love with you.” So I figured, Okay, I guess this is normal.

  But then we went to her house, and I assumed at least I’d get sex out of it, but we just talked about what a bitch her mom was. When I decided to break it off with her, she went fetal on Second Avenue, sobbing. So I had to rescind my breakup order just to get her off the pavement. Two days later she dumped me, and that was my first adult experience with women.

  I’ve thought about mentioning her name, but this was the microcosm of a long, torrid, horrible relationship all compressed into a week. And we only had sex once.