by John Glatt
Janis Joplin had already played a sensational set with Big Brother when a diapered Jim Haynie made his second appearance as the New Year baby.
Then at the stroke of midnight, as hundreds of balloons were released into the audience, the sound of jet engines filled Winterland to announce the Jefferson Airplane.
“At 7:00 a.m. the music stopped a while,” said Bill Graham, “and I served a catered breakfast for 4,000 people. See, I wanted to have it be gay and festive but still make a statement . . . that the main theme of the New Year should be peace.”12
The first week of 1968, Jefferson Airplane was nominated for a Grammy Award for the Best New Artist of 1967. And Rolling Stone magazine publisher Jann Wenner gave After Bathing at Baxter’s an excellent review, calling the Airplane “the best rock and roll band in America today.”
But as their career soared upward, the band’s relationship with Bill Graham deteriorated even further. Jack Casady and Jorma Kaukonen were furious when they discovered that their manager owned the Geary Temple—where they rehearsed—and then billed them rent. And there was significant opposition to Graham’s booking them for as many shows as he could.
“He definitely wanted us to play out more,” said Casady, “and there were certain elements within the Jefferson Airplane that didn’t really want to do that. We wanted to make all our own decisions and move our career forward ourselves. We felt it was a little too much having a decision-maker as our manager.”13
In mid-January 1968 at a band rehearsal, Grace Slick announced that she and Spencer Dryden had received an offer from another record company and were leaving unless Bill Graham was fired.
“It’s either me or Bill Graham,” she told the band. “If he remains the manager I’m quitting.”
The other members of the band agreed. After all, Grace was not only the star of Jefferson Airplane but also of the entire San Francisco scene.
“And we really didn’t have a choice,” said Paul Kantner, “because he was threatening to take Grace away from us if we didn’t fire Bill Graham.”14
So Marty Balin and Bill Thompson were sent over to the Fillmore to give Graham his marching orders.
“And we told Bill, ‘We have to fire you,’ ” said Thompson. “ ‘You really have to go.’ ”
The next morning, Graham telephoned Thompson, who had now been appointed manager, and accused him of stabbing him in the back.
“He goes, ‘Mister,’ ” recalled Thompson, “ ‘You don’t ever get a Jewish kid in the gutter.’ I said, ‘Bill, I’m a hippie living in the Haight.’ ”15
Kantner now regrets firing Bill Graham, calling it a big mistake.
“Our drummer got pissed off at him,” said Kantner, “and he was along with Grace at the time. He drank too much and Bill complained about it and wanted him to back off a little. He threatened to leave if we didn’t fire Bill Graham, so we gave into that unfortunately from my point of view. And I was never good friends with [Dryden] since.”16
The next issue of Rolling Stone carried the front-page headline: “Airplane Flies!—Leaves Manager, Battles RCA.” The article said that the Airplane, along with the Grateful Dead and Quicksilver Messenger Service, were now planning to handle its business affairs as a cooperative and were renegotiating their record contract with RCA Victor.
“The Jefferson Airplane have ‘divorced’ themselves from the personal management of Fillmore Auditorium manager Bill Graham,” said the article. “We might get other management,” Thompson was quoted as saying, “then again, the earth might split open.”
A few days later, Jefferson Airplane announced a partnership with the Grateful Dead and Quicksilver Messenger Service to open a new San Francisco ballroom to compete with Bill Graham. Each band would own a 10 percent stake in the new venue they named The Carousel Ballroom, which was above a car dealership on the corner of Van Ness and Market Street.
“The Airplane and the Grateful Dead broke away from Bill Graham,” explained Bill Thompson, “and said, ‘We’re going to do our own shows.’ The coolest guy in the middle of it all . . . was Jerry Garcia. He’d say, ‘Hey, it’s us against them. We’re empowered and we’ve got to stay together.’ ” 17
The Carousel Ballroom opened on January 17, 1968, with a Grateful Dead show. Neither the Dead nor Jefferson Airplane would ever play the Fillmore Auditorium again.
PART TWO
THE MUSIC NEVER STOPPED
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Birth of the Fillmore East
January to March, 1968
On Saturday, February 17, 1968, Janis Joplin made her much anticipated New York City debut at the Anderson Theater. A week earlier, she had flown in during a heavy snowstorm, checking into the Chelsea Hotel on West 23rd Street.
In the seven months since Monterey Pop, Janis’s career had taken off, but Big Brother and the Holding Company was falling apart. The other members disliked all the attention now being lavished on Janis, accusing her of being on a “star trip” and using them as her backup band.
Things had gone downhill rapidly after signing the management contract with Albert Grossman.
“The first thing Albert told her was to get rid of Big Brother,” said singer/songwriter Nick Gravenites, who was also managed by Grossman. “Instead of splitting the money five ways, he and Janis could work out the percentages between the two of them.” 1
Initially, Joplin resisted his demands out of loyalty, but Grossman kept up the pressure. He promised a $250,000 record deal if she went solo, saying Big Brother were amateurs and she needed more professional musicians.
At Christmas, Janis had found herself pregnant, with no clue who was the father. She spent the holidays back in Port Arthur, Texas, with her family and threw a party for old friends. Then she secretly drove to Mexico and had an abortion on January 19, her twenty-fifth birthday.
“The experience was gruesome,” wrote her friend Myra Friedman in her book Buried Alive, “but the emotional trauma was far more severe. Her reaction was one of moral horror.”2
Now a month later, Janis regretted her decision and was drinking heavily, feeling the pressures of the band’s all-important New York opening.
In the days leading up to the two Saturday shows, Janis spent hours ensconced with Grossman at his smart Gramercy Park town house. The charming bon vivant, who resembled Ben Franklin with his round spectacles and long curly gray hair, spun her colorful tales of his days as a club owner on Chicago’s tough North Side. He wined and dined her lavishly, impressing her with his knowledge of the finer things of life. But there was always an underlying message that she must cut Big Brother loose to become the rich superstar she had always dreamed of becoming.
Several days after they arrived, all the band members met in Grossman’s corporate offices at 75 East 55th Street. During the meeting, Janis was asked what image she wished to project for marketing purposes. It was only then that the rest of Big Brother realized they played no part in their new manager’s future plans.
“It was as if the band didn’t exist,” said David Getz. “He was only interested in Janis.”
To prepare for the make-or-break Anderson Theater shows, Grossman had rented the band an East Village loft for daily rehearsals. But they rarely went, sidelined by all the distractions of the vibrant big city.
Janis, who loved antique clothes, hit the thrift stores of the West Village, hunting for old dresses, trinkets, and jewelry. Few then could have predicted that her unique gypsy style, encompassing thrown-together bangles, feathers, and colorful loose clothing, would still be imitated by cutting-edge fashionistas nearly half a century later. Meanwhile, the other band members bought heavy Afghan coats and fur hats to keep warm during the freezing temperatures.
“It was real cold,” recalled Sam Andrew. “We’d go into these army surplus stores and find these old coats.”3
The band made the Chelsea Hotel thei
r headquarters for the next six weeks. It was favored by all the San Francisco bands, as they were free to smoke dope and play loud music all night.
“The Chelsea had a reputation for being lenient that way,” explained Jack Casady. “It was also an artist’s hotel and a musician’s hotel, so when the word got around, ‘Hey, where would you like to stay?’ People like Janis, Jorma, and I would stay there.”4
Jorma Kaukonen, who would later write a song about the hotel, “Third Week in the Chelsea,” loved its mystique and history.
“That was our home base,” he explained. “The Chelsea Hotel already had a history of artists and poets and writers. It was like we’ve got to stay there. And of course it was delightfully funky.”5
Janis Joplin adored the Chelsea, decorating her room with a Persian rug and hanging her favorite retro jewelry from the mirrors. One night she ran into Canadian poet and singer Leonard Cohen in the hotel elevator. She took him back to her room for a blow job, which he later immortalized in his song “Chelsea Hotel #1.”
Janis also frequented the El Quijote Restaurant next door, where she went on the prowl for attractive young men.
“She’d be downstairs in El Quijote just hanging out,” said Peter Albin. “Her word for young guys that she wanted to make it with was ‘coward.’ ‘Where’s the young coward?’ she’d ask. ‘Well Janis, I don’t know.’ ”
Each night, Big Brother and the Holding Company trooped out of the Chelsea Hotel onto West 23rd Street and hailed a Checker Cab in search of a good time. One night, Albert Grossman arranged a visit to Max’s Kansas City to introduce Janis to the city’s fashionable elite. Opened in December 1965 by lawyer Mickey Ruskin, the Park Avenue South club was then at the height of its decadent fame. Andy Warhol and his Superstars famously held court between midnight and dawn in its infamous backroom, a block away from The Factory. They would sit around a large round table bathed in red light, socializing with the likes of Mick Jagger, Salvador Dali, Allen Ginsberg, and Bob Dylan.
“Albert Grossman told me he was bringing this group in,” said Ruskin. “I remember Janis certainly.”
For his ingénue’s dramatic entry, Grossman gave Ruskin a tape of Country Joe’s song “Janis,” along with instructions to play it as she walked in.
“Max’s was packed,” recalled Big Brother roadie Mark Richards. “We entered all in a line, having a great time. Everything stopped. Not a word was spoken as we walked the length of the bar, all the way to the backroom, and sat down at a big roundtable. Max’s immediately became our New York home.”6
Janis then joined Andy Warhol and singer Tim Buckley at the celebrated roundtable, where they were duly photographed by Elliott Landy.
Janis soon became a regular at Max’s, with her own private booth, and she may well have been served by future Blondie singer Debbie Harry, who was waitressing there at the time.
“I remember her very, very well,” said Max’s manager, Robbin Cullinen. “She used to walk around Max’s holding a bottle of Southern Comfort by the neck. She was always walking around talking to people at tables. I felt she was lonely.”
On several occasions after Janis had had too much to drink, the manager had to step in.
“I used to drag her out of there when she was falling down drunk,” he said. “I’ve put her into a cab more than once.”7
Janis partied hard in New York, reveling in her new celebrity status. Big Brother’s new road manager, John Cooke, the son of the legendary BBC broadcaster Alistair Cooke, introduced her to his old school friend Bobby Neuwirth and actor Michael J. Pollard and they became close. They took her to a tough Lower East Side bar on 6th Street, where her pool skills won her the title “Eight Ball Champion.”8
That week, Janis also hung out at Steve Paul’s The Scene nightclub on West 46th Street and Eighth Avenue. It was popular with rock musicians, who often showed up unannounced to jam on its tiny stage. It was around midnight on Wednesday night when Janis arrived at the dingy basement club to find Jimi Hendrix jamming onstage. Hendrix, who had just played three record-breaking nights at the Fillmore Auditorium, was trying out new material for his Electric Ladyland double album he would soon record.
Also there was Jim Morrison of The Doors, staggering around with a drink in his hand. During one long and intense blues jam, Morrison suddenly leapt onstage, grabbed the microphone, and began improvising some obscene lyrics. He then fell to his knees and embraced Hendrix’s legs.
When a furious Hendrix kicked Morrison away, he crawled off the stage, upsetting a table of drinks over Janis’s lap. She exploded and jumped on the stage screaming, “I wouldn’t mind if he could sing!” before physically attacking him. Then security moved in to separate them.
Behind the scenes, Albert Grossman had been busy. Viewing Saturday night as Janis Joplin’s New York coronation, he had personally invited all the city’s leading rock journalists and key music business players to come and see her play.
The Big Brother show was being presented by John Morris and Joshua White, who had worked on Bill Graham’s week of Toronto shows the previous year. After finishing up road managing the Jefferson Airplane tour, Morris had decided to stay in New York and try his hand at concert promotion.
He and White had rented the decrepit Anderson Theater on the Lower East Side for a series of shows, culminating with Big Brother and the Holding Company. But first they had to negotiate their way through the druggy, violent Lower East Side, along with its dubious power brokers.
In early 1968 the East Village was a war zone controlled by the Hells Angels from their Third Street clubhouse. The mean streets were dangerous, with muggings commonplace and murders very nearly so. Hippies lived alongside Ukrainians and Russians, with a smattering of disapproving older people who deplored the area’s decline.
Morris and White were booking the Anderson through Tony Lech, a self-styled tough guy who owned a string of gay bars. Sporting curly red hair and glasses, he reportedly kept a loaded gun behind the bar.
“It was East Village ’68 anarchy,” explained Morris. “[The Anderson] was a really hairy operation and done on a shoestring.” 9
At that time all major New York rock concerts were held in the 5,000-seat Madison Square Garden, which had terrible acoustics. There were also two medium-sized venues on Second Avenue—the Anderson Theater, which held 2,000, and the Village Theater, holding 2,645, which sporadically presented rock shows.
A rash of smaller clubs and venues also dotted the city. Howard Soloman’s 375-seat Café Au Go Go on Bleecker Street had first introduced Jefferson Airplane and the Grateful Dead to New York, as well as presenting Jimi Hendrix, Cream, Joni Mitchell, and the Mothers of Invention when they were unknowns.
In July 1967, Jerry Brandt’s Electric Circus had opened to great fanfare on St. Marks Place. The 740-seat club presented a slew of rock bands, including the Velvet Underground, the Grateful Dead, the Allman Brothers, and Sly and the Family Stone.
But the hottest rock club at that time was Steve Paul’s The Scene, which attracted Manhattan’s young jet-setters, Broadway dancers, motorcycle riders, and various rock stars, including Janis Joplin, who soon became a regular.
John Morris saw a huge void in the New York market for a regular concert venue like the Fillmore Auditorium. He decided to do something about it; he would persuade Bill Graham to come and open one.
“There were two reasons to get Bill to New York,” he explained. “One, selfishly, working with Bill was just so exciting and it was so interesting. Secondly, Bill had a financial, monetary base that most rock ’n’ roll [people] didn’t have at that point.
“So I got on the phone and told him, ‘Bill, you’re out of your goddamned mind if you do not come [here]. Look you’re a New York guy. You’ve got to do this. It’s in your blood.’ ”10
After failing to make it in New York as an actor, Graham was reluctant to risk another disappointment. He
also questioned the wisdom of moving east, as everything was going so well in San Francisco.
“Well he was a big fish in a small pond,” explained Bonnie Graham. “It was easy for him in San Francisco, but he wouldn’t be able to do that in New York.”11
Morris cleverly played on Graham’s enormous ego and gambling instincts, slowly wearing him down.
“It was a big scary city,” said Kip Cohen. “[Bill] knew it well. He lived there. But it was anything but the lifestyle of San Francisco, and he really had to be convinced that it could work.”12
Finally, Graham agreed to fly in for the Big Brother concert on a reconnaissance mission, with a view toward taking over the Anderson Theater and expanding his operations east.
Around one in the morning on Sunday, February 18, 1968, while Big Brother and the Holding Company prepared to take the stage for the second show, John Morris and Joshua White escorted Bill Graham backstage. They filed past Janis Joplin’s dressing room, where she was being photographed for Creem magazine by Linda Eastman, who would marry Paul McCartney the following year. The first show had gone well, and Janis was now confidently preening and posing, swigging Southern Comfort in preparation for the second.
To lure Graham to New York, Morris and White had devised an elaborate stunt. During the interminably long set changes, a curtain of deep blue light would be projected straight onto the audience, to keep things flowing. Although these calming lights masked the frantic backstage set changes, the audience was perfectly visible from the stage.
They then led Bill Graham out on the stage as the roadies were setting up Janis and Big Brother’s equipment.
“We raised the screen and threw down the lights,” said White, “and Bill could see the house was packed to the rafters. He turned around and took a look at the house. As only a great promoter can do, he just went brrrrm! And he counted the house. From that point in his mind, he was convinced he could make a go of it. I was there. I saw the click in his eyes. I saw him realize this is do-able. Because here were these sleaze-buckets promoting Janis Joplin with two-thousand people in the house. So why wasn’t he doing it?”13
