Time Between

by Chris Hillman

  Seeing that I was struggling, Dr. Lyche suggested that I join a support group that met at the hospital each week. I got to know an interesting group of people from all walks of life, including a dental hygienist, a real estate broker, and an older woman who was a Holocaust survivor. She still had her “camp tattoo” from Auschwitz, and I held her in great reverence for all she had endured in her life. To realize that now, at this late stage of life, she had the additional burden of battling hepatitis C helped put my own suffering in perspective. Support groups are wonderful. Sharing with and listening to others who can relate to what you’re going through while facing a terminal health issue can lessen the stress and help give you hope.

  By the sixth month, my body was falling apart from the treatment; I was toxic. I felt like I was ready to die. I developed additional disorders as a result of the initial problem, so it was as if the bulk of my time was spent seeing doctors. In the fall of 1998, after half a year on the medication, Dr. Lyche took me off all the treatments. It was killing me. I was relieved to stop putting all that stuff in my body, but I continued to feel weak. I assumed I was just really tired as a result of the toll the previous year had taken on me. But when I started having trouble breathing and continued to get weaker each day, Dr. Lyche scheduled a series of blood transfusions. Talk about a creepy procedure. Laying on your back for hours while receiving someone else’s blood is not fun.

  Living in Ojai had become difficult for all of us, especially Connie, who was raising two children and still overseeing her office while caring for me. We needed to simplify our lives, so we sold our house. We had a great last Christmas there before moving into a Spanish-style home on the hillsides of Ventura in January of 1999. Just days after settling into our new house, one of Dr. Lyche’s partners called and told Connie that my creatine level was critically low. My kidneys were beginning to shut down, and they urged her to take me to the emergency room right away. After another round of tests, I was admitted back into the hospital with a new set of questions, one of which was, “Have you ever been in a third-world country”? Of course. South Africa, 1968. That’s where, according to the doctors, I may have been exposed to a strain of tuberculosis. The dormant infection surfaced during the hepatitis C treatment because my immune system was so compromised.

  It didn’t take long before my kidneys started to fail, and I was transferred to the intensive care unit. Father Constantine came to the hospital room and gave me communion while Connie, Catherine, and Nicky stayed by my bedside. I could tell they were very upset, but I didn’t think I was going to die just yet. If I was going to die, I was at peace. That night, when everyone was gone, I prayed to God. I asked Him to take care of my family if it was my time to go, and I told Him that I was ready either way. I was perfectly at peace with whatever His will might be. I just wanted everything to be okay with the family in the event I didn’t make it through this alive. Then I drifted off to sleep.

  The next morning Dr. Lyche walked into my hospital room and said the words you rarely hear a doctor say, “We prayed for you last night, and I think God answered our prayers. Your kidneys are back to normal; this is truly a miracle.” My nightmarish year of hell was coming to an end. I had come to the brink of death, but now I was on the mend. I truly owed my life to God, Connie, Catherine, Nicky, Dr. Lyche, all of my other physicians, Maria, Dan, and everyone who prayed for me. God wasn’t finished with me yet. There was still more I was meant to do on this earth before my time was done.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  THE OTHER SIDE

  As my strength started returning, I resumed my music career with daily practice and plans for some shows. But first, in June of 1999, we took a trip to Greece. I had promised the family that when I got better, we would all take a vacation. We traveled through the islands and had a wonderful stopover on the Peloponnese Peninsula at Vervena, the village from which Connie’s maternal grandparents emigrated in the early 1900s. It was such a wonderful trip, and we would continue to visit there over the next ten summers. Finally, after some very dark times, the future was looking bright.

  The following month saw the release of a Gram Parsons tribute album that Emmylou Harris organized and produced. It included a new performance of The Flying Burrito Brothers’ song “High Fashion Queen,” which I recorded as a duet with Steve Earle. In September, I flew to New York to film a concert that would accompany the record. It was my first performance since getting over the disease, and I was certainly jumping in with both feet. Not only was it being filmed for television broadcast, but it included an impressive cast: Emmylou, Sheryl Crow, Gillian Welch, Steve Earle, and John Hiatt, who also served as the host.

  The show ended up coming out great, but the best part of the trip was that my ten-year-old son Nicky came along as my road manager for the weekend. It was fun to visit New York together, and we enjoyed spending time with my nephew, Hillman Curtis, and his wife, Christina, who lived there. Christina and Hillman, who was a groundbreaking and very successful digital designer and filmmaker, even entertained Nicky by graciously taking him on a tour all over the city while I was at the rehearsals for the show. I was devastated when Hillman died in 2012 after a long and hard battle with cancer. Christina and their children, Jasper and Tess, were at his bedside—as were his sister Rebecca and his mother, my sister Susan—when he quietly closed his eyes and went to sleep with the Lord.

  I had the opportunity to gather with great musicians and pay tribute to another old friend the following year for a live concert at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium that was billed as “A Gathering of the Clan.” Fred Walecki—who owned a shop called Westwood Music and was a dear friend to many of us in the Los Angeles music community—had contracted cancer of the esophagus. Bernie Leadon and producer Glyn Johns organized a two-night benefit that included Jackson Browne, Ry Cooder, Emmylou Harris, Don Henley, Jeff Bridges, Linda Ronstadt, Warren Zevon, Bonnie Raitt, Graham Nash, David Crosby, Herb Pedersen, and Randy Meisner. Roger McGuinn wasn’t scheduled to be on the show, but he and David and I happened to be doing a photo shoot for Vanity Fair magazine on the first day of the two-day event. We talked Roger into coming down to the auditorium to be part of the show that night. We hadn’t played with one another at all since nearly a decade before, at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony in 1991. Fortunately, Roger had brought his Rickenbacker twelve-string along, and when he plugged it in at sound check and hit the opening notes of “Mr. Tambourine Man,” everyone stopped what they were doing backstage and lined up to watch us rehearse as if they were in a trance. Suddenly, the mythical Byrds had reappeared.

  As other performers were doing their sound check, Herb Pedersen and I visited with Linda and Emmylou in one of the dressing rooms. The four of us, with just one acoustic guitar, sang an old gospel song together. What an amazing vocal blend that was! I was already on a musical high when Herb and I came out on stage at the show that night to do a short guitar and mandolin duet. The crowd was shocked when David and Roger appeared at the end. The three of us—with a borrowed bass for me, and Glyn Johns’ son Ethan sitting in on drums—played “Mr. Tambourine Man” and “Turn! Turn! Turn!” We had a wonderful performance that night—just two songs—but they were spot-on, as if no time had passed. The audience gave us multiple standing ovations and called for more, but that was it. It was only meant to be a brief moment. There were only three of us original Byrds left, but it was a reminder of the impact we made with our music. Roger and Camilla had to pack up to head back to their home in Florida the next morning. That was over twenty years ago now, but it was the last time The Byrds ever performed. And it was a beautiful night.

  By that point, Herb and I were playing regularly together as a duo. He’s one of my oldest friends from music and is such an incredible guitarist and singer—probably the best I’ve ever encountered since working with Vern Gosdin and David Crosby in my early days. Having known each other since 1963, Herb and I just fit together like brothers. In the early 2000s, we were offered a
record deal with a small label called Back Porch/Narada that was a subsidiary of Virgin Records. We recorded an album called Way Out West that was released in 2002. It’s one of my favorite “Chris and Herb” records and includes many of the usual suspects: Bill Bryson, Willie Ornelas, Jay Dee Maness, Larry Park, multi-instrumentalist Dennis Caplinger, and Sharon Soldi, who added some beautiful accordion. Steve Hill and I wrote some wonderful new songs for the project, which was mixed in with covers of the Ray Price classics “Invitation to the Blues” and “You Done Me Wrong,” The Louvin Brothers’ “You’re Learning,” the Felice and Boudleaux Bryant song “Problems,” and the Doc Pomus-penned classic “Save the Last Dance for Me.” My niece Kim did all the artwork, which was nothing short of brilliant. She used old pictures of me and Herb as young kids growing up in California. It was a great package, but, as things sometimes go, the label completely folded not long after the release due to poor business management within the company. Sadly, the master recordings for that album may have been lost forever, which is a shame. It was a great record, and I believe that someday—somehow—it will see the light of day again with a proper re-release.

  I used to refer to the mid-2000s as my “awards time.” In 2004 I was honored by the Americana Music Association with their Lifetime Achievement Award for Performance. My good friend Marty Stuart presented it to me at the ceremony in Nashville, which also gave me a chance to play a short set with Herb, Bernie Leadon, and Al Perkins—all friends from the many groups we’d played in together over the years. Then, in 2005, while on a tour of England with Herb, I was honored with the Mojo magazine Roots Award. There were so many interesting people receiving awards who attended the show, including Bill Wyman, who treated us all so well in Manassas, Jimmy Page, Robert Cray, Dr. John, Steve Earle, and Jeff Beck. Stars galore! That kind of event is normally something I would shun, but being honored that night was such a thrill. And getting to catch up with some old friends, like Bill, made for a perfect evening.

  In June of 2005, Sovereign Records released my solo album The Other Side, which Herb produced. This time we approached it all acoustic, though I used the same players we’d been working with: Bill Bryson on bass, Larry Park on lead acoustic guitar, Skip Edwards on accordion, Gabe Witcher on fiddle, and Sally Van Meter on dobro. That was yet another fun project, with just the right people working together on songs as diverse as “Eight Miles High,” “It Doesn’t Matter,” and “The Water Is Wide.” It was a chance to give some Byrds and Manassas songs a different feel in a different setting, and it worked so well. Herb was a good producer who knew exactly how to wrangle a wild man like me.

  On March 17, 2006, Herb and I played at the Crystal Palace, Buck Owens’s beautiful club in Bakersfield, California. Buck came down and listened to us warm up at rehearsal. I’ll never forget when he put his arms around me and Herb and told us how much we reminded him of the duets he used to sing with his right-hand man Don Rich. Such a compliment. Having been a fan of Buck and Don’s amazing vocal blend for so many decades, it was an honor to have the blessing and approval of one of my heroes. At the end of our show that night, Buck’s assistant handed me a check for our fee, but it was more than we were owed. I found Buck, who was still in the club, and alerted him to the mistake. “Buck,” I said, “you overpaid us by $1000!” He gave me a wink. “You boys keep it,” he replied. “You earned it.” As he walked away, he turned back and, without missing a beat, added, “and save your money!” Not only was Buck country music royalty, but he was also a shrewd businessman. What a great guy. We lost Buck the following week when he passed away in his sleep right after playing his last show at the Crystal Palace. He wasn’t feeling too good that night and had planned to go home early, but he decided to take the stage when he found out some fans had driven all the way down from the Northwest just to hear him perform. Herb and I were honored to be asked by the family to sing “Turn! Turn! Turn” at Buck’s funeral at the Valley Baptist Church in Bakersfield. He was a truly amazing artist and an amazing man.

  The Academy of Country Music awards show was held in Las Vegas on May 23, and Dwight Yoakam was asked by the show’s producers to put together a band to honor Buck’s memory with a medley of his hits. Dwight invited me to play bass and sing harmony. Tom Brumley—a veteran of both The Desert Rose Band and the classic lineup of The Buckaroos—played steel guitar, while Brad Paisley and Billy Gibbons played electric guitars, and Travis Barker of Blink 182 held down the drums. We played bits of “Act Naturally,” “Together Again,” “Buckaroo,” and “Cryin’ Time” before Buck’s son Buddy joined us for a rousing version of “Streets of Bakersfield” that was dedicated to the memory of his father, as well as his mother, Bonnie Owens, a singer who was married to Buck before she later married Merle Haggard. Bonnie, too, was an important part of the Bakersfield Sound that reshaped country music forever. It was a lot of fun to participate in that tribute, and I always say it was the very best band I was in for less than fifteen minutes. Dwight has remained a close friend for many years—a very intelligent, well-read, and multitalented man who always makes a point of playing up my contribution to country music. I’ve been honored to have him record some of my songs, and he has kept the Bakersfield Sound alive through his music and his XM satellite radio show.

  Sadly, losing musical friends like Buck Owens was becoming increasingly common. So many of my old friends were dying after struggles with health issues. Sneaky Pete Kleinow had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease and was living with his daughter Anita who was taking care of him. After arranging a time with Anita so that she could prepare him, I called Sneaky, and we had a nice conversation about playing together again some time. At the end of the call he said, “Thanks for driving up to see me today.” He didn’t realize that I was at my home in Ventura, while he was in San Francisco. It was hard and really sad to talk to my old friend that day, realizing how the disease had devastated his way of life. He soon moved to a skilled nursing facility, where he remained until his death a few months later.

  A few years later, we lost Chris Ethridge. I was blessed to speak with him while he was in a hospital in Meridian, Mississippi, before he died of pancreatic cancer in 2012. Chris was an amazing bass player and songwriter, having co-written three classics with Gram Parsons: “Hot Burrito #1,” “Hot Burrito #2,” and “She.” He went on to play in Willie Nelson’s band for many years. Of course, Gram, Michael, and Sneaky were already gone. With Chris’s passing, I became the last surviving member of The Flying Burrito Brothers. I’ve tried my best to keep the legacy alive and to keep it honest.

  Legacy is a funny thing. Sometimes you have opportunities to revisit the music of the past, and it just feels “right.” The impromptu reunion with David and Roger at Fred Walecki’s benefit concert was a great example. Other times, it can be tricky to capture the right spirit. In 2008, we played a couple of Desert Rose Band reunion shows at the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park and at Copper Country, a festival held at Copper Mountain, about three hours outside of Denver, Colorado. John Jorgenson, working closely with our former Desert Rose Band manager, Bob Burwell, brings in the acts for Copper Country each year. John wanted to put together a show at the festival that would pay tribute to The Byrds. He asked me to play bass. I was confused. “Let me get this straight,” I said to John. “You want me to be a part of a tribute to a band that I was an original member of? I’m paying tribute to myself?” Very odd. I should have listened to my inner voice telling me not to do it. Just as we were getting through the second song, a huge thunder storm came upon us, which stopped the show. The sky was crying, to quote the great Elmore James. Perhaps God was angry at us for messing with The Byrds’ glorious legacy.

  While The Byrds will always be a treasured and important part of my musical identity, it’s interesting to look back on the ways that I’ve personally changed since my time in that band. In those days, I was so shy that I would secure a place at the back of the stage when we played a show.
Over time, I’d become much more comfortable being in front of a crowd. In 2009, I was invited to give a lecture at the Library of Congress in Washington, DC. I had never attempted something like that before, and it was all very new for me. I prepared for three weeks, and it went very well. In fact, speaking in front of the Library of Congress audience that day opened up a whole new world for me. I was asked to do speaking engagements at various venues over the next few years, including the Grammy Museum, the Getty Museum, the Museum of Ventura County, Point Loma Nazarene University, and John Hartman’s UCLA music course. What frightened me as a young man, in terms of addressing a crowd, had become almost second nature.

  Life is all about change and growth. We never fully “arrive,” and as long as we’re on this earth, we can allow ourselves to be shaped, molded, and chiseled by our Creator. I have faced a number of challenges in my personal life, and while shyness was something I overcame, there were still lingering places of anger inside that would get the better of me from time to time. One of those times happened before a show at Edwards Barn in Nipomo, California, that was going to be recorded for a live album for Rounder Records in 2010. Herb and I had already played two benefit shows at the Barn to raise money for the Annunciation Church, a Russian Orthodox congregation in Santa Maria. We loved the sound at the venue, so when I approached Ken Irwin of Rounder Records about Herb and me recording a live duo record there, he was enthusiastic. I hadn’t done a live record since Last of the Red Hot Burritos in 1972, so I wanted it to be just right. We brought in our old friends Bill Bryson and Larry Park, as well as David Mansfield—whom I’d worked with in the Ever Call Ready days—to play fiddle. We had everything in place for a fantastic evening. Then, during the afternoon sound check, I lost my voice. Not only did I lose my voice, but I lost my focus and then lost my temper. I got so upset with myself—as in Hillman mad!