This book is subtitled Lowell George: guitarist, songwriter, and founder of Little Feat. That's less poetic than encyclopedic -- Brend's personal equivalent to Little Feat's "Day at the Dog Races". Just as that elongated jam by the other band members would drive George off the stage in boredom, so too will this subtitle stop some Lowell George fans appropriately cold. As this Little Feat book arrived after the deaths of its most colorful characters -- George and his early mentor, Frank Zappa -- it requires a writer who's not afraid to capture the spirit of the man and his music in other ways. If you go by Brend's description of Fred Neil in American Troubadours, his talent is up to the task:
"He was able to write personal, confessional songs that transcended their origins to become standards. But he only managed this on a few occasions, and after such vertiginous achievement rapidly fell back into aimless improvisation and pointless retreads of his best moments. It was as if he could never really maintain an enthusiasm for his own music for so long." (American Troubadours, 97)
American Troubadours never wavered from Brend's mission to honestly articulate the careers of neglected masters, but he wrapped his subject matter in phrases ("his own music...for so long") that helped you feel Neil's sadness or Phil Ochs' tortured mind. It wasn't creative journalism a la Tom Wolfe; it was creative writing that excited and inspired readers to check out Tim Hardin or Tim Rose. In short, it did its job admirably.
Rock and Roll Doctor, Brend's first book-length biography of a single artist, is less successful. By ignoring almost all of George's personality and concentrating on physical attributes like his weight, Brend fails to make George particularly interesting. The mere mention of Little Feat could get a fan to sing "Dixie Chicken" or "Oh Atlanta", but the writing here provides no additional inspiration. I was never moved to drop the book and revisit my Little Feat tapes. Part of this failure is definitely caused by Brend's good intentions.
While respect for the singer and group dictated Brend's decision to focus almost entirely on Little Feat's published recordings, he adds an unnecessary constraint by never connecting facts or quotes with intelligent guesswork. Therefore, after interviews with excessively polite band members or peers, Brend simply pastes vague compliments from Payne, Barrerre or Van Dyke Parks next to his own discussions of Little Feat records, where "filler" is stated as much or more than "masterpiece".
Brend's brand of honesty -- in which "conjecture" is a dirty word -- is perfect for a record review, but detracts from a historical understanding of George. It judges him on the songs we know about, and on the precise facts that dictate sessions; the attached compliments and praise from peers seldom stick, because they don't go hand in hand with the finished product.
Look at the book's back cover and you'll learn that Bonnie Raitt finds Lowell George to be the best of the best. In actuality, though, George tried to produce a record (Takin' My Time) for her. She found him bossy and domineering and she fired him as producer. That, for me, is enough to question Raitt's kindest words for him; if she really believed he was "the best I have ever heard", why wouldn't she trust his opinions at least as much as her own? Was he that much of a pest? More pest than genius, or a very mean lover? Leaving the issue a mystery does not serve George well; it's as if his friends might be pitying him with exaggeration because his shadow does not yet loom as large as all fans think it should.
There are so many superb musicians who think highly of George's talents that one need not doubt it, but where does the brilliance show? It smokes the joint up in "Willin'", the Shakespearean pop ballad for kids who like driving and dope, but there are few other instances in which his songs appear as timeless or as vital as, say, Robbie Robertson or Allen Touissant (from whom both he and Robertson shared admiration). In the case of solo songs, or those written with members of Little Feat, George simply was not prolific enough. Even in the early seventies, when he lived with real ambition, he'd only crank out about five songs and fifteen minutes of music every year. Further on down the line, he was basically just a singer -- an interpreter of material that would be used as background music in pool halls. Without question, then, Rock and Roll Doctor was a task for Brend to repair "all that was" with "all we should have also heard from George."
In order to showcase George's infinite talent, Brend had to look into George's obsessive quest for perfection. Such work demands some speculation. Brend has to see how the perfectionist zeal diminished George's output and his ability to fully project the range of his often-stated brilliance. Then he needs to make us see it too. Judging by everything said about George, he was a brilliant performer who too frequently struck down ideas that were damn good to any other ear. Because Brend did not try to reconstruct or imagine that brilliance as witnessed by peers like Jackson Browne or Bonnie Raitt, we're left with the Lowell George who made a couple of excellent songs and a few dozen tracks that were quality imitations of the Band, or of Little Feat themselves.
A fictional reimagining of George's life that captures his spirit sounds far better than a factual narrative about mediocrity -- from failed sessions for the Grateful Dead, where George could not quickly realize what made that band great, to the latter years of Little Feat, when George's public output was both limited and critically maligned -- and then a little about his greatness. His overbearing, power-hungry, drug-raddled greatness.
Lowell George (and Frank Zappa, whom I'm certain would have given good quote) died too soon for any of us to have a good understanding of this possible genius. The remaining members of Little Feat, who were frequently disparaged by George, cannot afford to totally explain their side, as they've toured enough without him to realize that George's songs remain their fans' favorites. They've said he was bossy, dismissive of their own music, and troubled enough by drugs in the end to diminish his vocal abilities, his production and his songwriting skills. But of course, they loved the old lug.
As for peers like John Sebastian, Valerie Carter or Raitt, you have to almost respect their decision to be nice and generous about George. He was certainly supportive of their careers, and probably deserves the kind words... but overall, the reader is left with more of the same. George was bossy, domineering, and a real bitch on any project he cared about. Only when he produced your work with more interest in the paycheck than the product did it appear he was a helpful, friendly studio wiz.
This sort of thing makes a fine chapter in a book about musicians, but it does not make a book. I was very surprised -- as page five gave way to page six and eventually to page 52 -- that I found myself less interested in George, a musician I revered as a kid, than I had ever been before. For example, I did not know his solo album was mostly covers until I read this book, and now I'm no longer too interested in it. Most critics were underwhelmed by the record, too, so why pay extra on EBay for a "collectable" that sounds like a wisely-deleted let-down? At other times, when brief inclusions of George's personal life made songs more interesting to me, Brend was there to lessen my excitement. After learning that George's early Zappa-era friends were responsible for the song "Don't Bogart That Joint" (under the group name Fraternity of Men), I found myself quite touched that George included it on Little Feat's Waiting For Columbus album. I thought Brend might explore that angle a little, and give their official live album an autobiographical sweep. Instead, he deems the track "inconsequential" (117). And as for those initial Little Feat records that I loved so fondly throughout my childhood, is this the prose that would help me remember them?
"("Trouble")...highlights yet another feature of George's writing, this time the introduction of expected images and abstract elements into apparently conventional lyrical themes and structures." (49)
Is there any good point to this prose? Does it prove that the subject is a better musician in ways that simply listening to the song won't do? I loved Brend's American Troubadours, and I know he can make a fascinating musician equally fascinating on print. I also think he proves, in this book, that he's a great listener (if academic explainer) of a musician's work. However, until the last few pages (when readers will anticipate George's corpse with perverse excitement), he never proves that George or Little Feat deserve a book-length treatment. And by then, the song is over, the artist is dead, and the legacy of Little Feat is still in doubt after a so-so box set and this so-so book.
-- Theodore Defosse
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