"You Stop Rockin' You Die" -- Billy Cowsill RIP
UPDATE: CKUA has posted a link to the full transcript of the 2004 interview with Cowsill, and it's a gem. It will be broadcasting an abundance of Cowsillbilia this weekend.
The passing of Billy Cowsill in Calgary last weekend deeply saddens me. All this guy ever wanted to do was rock his ass off and make people happy, but it was plain to anyone with even a passing acquaintance that he was a fragile soul prone to self-destruction.
Billy and his four brothers formed The Cowsills in their hometown of Newport, RI, where they built their chops playing frat parties and sockhops throughout the 1960s. They were joined later by their sister and mother, and managed by their despotic father, veering into a colourful harmonic kaleidoscope bumping against a jangly British Invasion groove.
Though they rarely get the credit because of the wholesome family image they carefully crafted -- the Partridge Family TV series is based on them -- The Cowsills were influential in shepherding in the psychedelic era and giving it some grace notes. They still reign supreme on oldie and classic rock radio stations with several hits they performed from the musical Hair, as well as The Rain, The Park and Other Things, Love American Style, and Indian Lake.
The tensions between Billy and father Bud would tear The Cowsills asunder. Most of them remained active musicians, but Billy craved the attention and adulation of fame more than the rest. It brought out the best and the worst in him. He experimented widely with his gift of harmony, trying to impose its harsh beauty on as many sub-genres of music as possible before settling on focussing on folk and country-rock. But he was easily frustrated, discovering that a second crack at stardom would be a tough climb. Alongside singer and legendary Bachannalian Warren Zevon, He would come to rely on booze and pills to find validation and confidence throughout the 1970s and 80s, when the best seemed to be behind him.
Billy moved to Vancouver in 1970s, probably hoping to leave the burden of the Cowsill Family legacy behind him, but still searching for another shot at fame. He appeared to be seduced by the mystique of the road and toured Canada with a number of bands singing harmony and playing rhythm guitar, deeply moved by the roar of the crowd. But it also allowed far too many opportunities to misbehave.
In 1993, after 20 years of false starts, broken promises and drunken hazes, Billy appeared to have stumbled on something great. He teamed up with Winnipeg songwriter Jeffrey Hatcher (of The Big Beat) and they started writing moving country and folk-inspired ballads. They formed The Blue Shadows and released two fantastic albums built around Billy's astounding gift of harmony, hearkening back to The Everly Brothers or Emmylou Harris and Gram Parsons, made even more poignant by Billy's alternate vulnerability and explosiveness. Floor of Heaven and Lucky To Me stand up as beautiful hymn collections a decade later.
I interviewed Billy a couple of times as The Blue Shadows emerged. The last time was in 1995, after Lucky To Me was released. He looked like a 40-ish James Dean, hair slicked back into a ducktail with stubborn curly bangs hanging on his forehead, complete with surly pout and old leather biker jacket. But the person was disarmingly kind and curious, though still noticeably strung out. He turned the tables and started interviewing me, asking what kind of music I was into lately, suggesting that I might like such and such if I was into this and that. It seemed that he wanted to be liked by everyone he met.
He didn't talk much about The Cowsills' glory days, but he didn't mind if you asked. His mind would race from decade to decade, picking up bits of pertinent data along the way, trying too hard to arrange them into something intelligible, and getting frustrated when he couldn't. He was at his most animated when he was talking about the mechanics of music, recalling how he captured lightning in a bottle this time or that time thanks to a clever engineer inventively arranging an obscure microphone tricked out in remarkable fashion. He had a lot of great stories to tell, but he threw them all together on the table like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle for you to put together.
After the interview, he invited me out for a drink at a bistro in Ottawa's ByWard Market. There, we met up with Hatcher, Paul Cantin, then the Ottawa Sun's music critic, who remains one of the best music writers in the bidness, and the regional Sony Music rep, the unsinkable Antonello DiDominico. DiDominico made it his personal mission to build a buzz for the Shadows, even though it was hardly a priority for his label bosses who, at the time, were launching vile chunks of Celine Dion and Our Lady Peace into the craposphere.
Everyone drank heavily except for Cowsill, who guzzled enough black coffee to burn a hole in his bladder. He remained quiet but intense. To say that Billy was sensitive and frayed is to say that George W. Bush might be a little conservative.
Hatcher and Cowsill had acoustic guitars with them, as they'd been doing the rounds of local radio stations playing live segments earlier in the day. The whole time Cowsill was itching to pull it out and sing his heart out. He looked at Hatcher and said something to the effect of, "Let's show these guys what we're all about," and harmonized beautifully in a rollicking impromptu song circle for the better part of an hour, in front of about a dozen tables of bistro goers. We loved it, and nobody else complained. By the time they finished, the diners were in full applause.
He just wanted to rock.
The Blue Shadows broke up shortly after that. When Billy finally did kick the pills a little later, he seemed to realize that he blew his last best chance at greatness, summing up the Blue Shadows as "three vegetarians and a junkie."
Billy toured around western Canada for a few years, and moved to Calgary about 10 years ago. Word on the street there was that he was getting a university degree so he could be a music teacher. But he was also pressed into a service at several studios, where by all accounts he was a generous and brutally honest mentor to a bunch of young fellas who thought they had the world by the balls.
He was 58 when he died, on the same weekend his family gathered in Newport for a memorial service for brother Barry, who went missing in his hometown of New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina and whose corpse turned up in shallow waters in the delta over Christmas. Billy was hobbled by emphysema and osteoporosis in his last years, but he was still recording and performing with a new band, the aptly titled Co-Dependents.
CKUA, the province-wide community radio station in Alberta, did an extensive interview with Billy at the end of 2004, when his lung problems were seriously cramping his ability to hit his high notes, and he had to perform by walking on stage with two canes after breaking a hip.
In a typically mystical manner, Billy said he was like a bird who could do nothing but sing: "You stop rockin', you die. That's the moral of my story," he said.
Billy was a natural-born performer, and he never gave up in spite of all the barriers he put up for himself. He didn't need a record label or an entourage or any of the other trappings of stardom. All he ever wanted was people to entertain, make them smile, make them cry. When it came to that, he was a master.
The passing of Billy Cowsill in Calgary last weekend deeply saddens me. All this guy ever wanted to do was rock his ass off and make people happy, but it was plain to anyone with even a passing acquaintance that he was a fragile soul prone to self-destruction.
Billy and his four brothers formed The Cowsills in their hometown of Newport, RI, where they built their chops playing frat parties and sockhops throughout the 1960s. They were joined later by their sister and mother, and managed by their despotic father, veering into a colourful harmonic kaleidoscope bumping against a jangly British Invasion groove.
Though they rarely get the credit because of the wholesome family image they carefully crafted -- the Partridge Family TV series is based on them -- The Cowsills were influential in shepherding in the psychedelic era and giving it some grace notes. They still reign supreme on oldie and classic rock radio stations with several hits they performed from the musical Hair, as well as The Rain, The Park and Other Things, Love American Style, and Indian Lake.
The tensions between Billy and father Bud would tear The Cowsills asunder. Most of them remained active musicians, but Billy craved the attention and adulation of fame more than the rest. It brought out the best and the worst in him. He experimented widely with his gift of harmony, trying to impose its harsh beauty on as many sub-genres of music as possible before settling on focussing on folk and country-rock. But he was easily frustrated, discovering that a second crack at stardom would be a tough climb. Alongside singer and legendary Bachannalian Warren Zevon, He would come to rely on booze and pills to find validation and confidence throughout the 1970s and 80s, when the best seemed to be behind him.
Billy moved to Vancouver in 1970s, probably hoping to leave the burden of the Cowsill Family legacy behind him, but still searching for another shot at fame. He appeared to be seduced by the mystique of the road and toured Canada with a number of bands singing harmony and playing rhythm guitar, deeply moved by the roar of the crowd. But it also allowed far too many opportunities to misbehave.
In 1993, after 20 years of false starts, broken promises and drunken hazes, Billy appeared to have stumbled on something great. He teamed up with Winnipeg songwriter Jeffrey Hatcher (of The Big Beat) and they started writing moving country and folk-inspired ballads. They formed The Blue Shadows and released two fantastic albums built around Billy's astounding gift of harmony, hearkening back to The Everly Brothers or Emmylou Harris and Gram Parsons, made even more poignant by Billy's alternate vulnerability and explosiveness. Floor of Heaven and Lucky To Me stand up as beautiful hymn collections a decade later.
I interviewed Billy a couple of times as The Blue Shadows emerged. The last time was in 1995, after Lucky To Me was released. He looked like a 40-ish James Dean, hair slicked back into a ducktail with stubborn curly bangs hanging on his forehead, complete with surly pout and old leather biker jacket. But the person was disarmingly kind and curious, though still noticeably strung out. He turned the tables and started interviewing me, asking what kind of music I was into lately, suggesting that I might like such and such if I was into this and that. It seemed that he wanted to be liked by everyone he met.
He didn't talk much about The Cowsills' glory days, but he didn't mind if you asked. His mind would race from decade to decade, picking up bits of pertinent data along the way, trying too hard to arrange them into something intelligible, and getting frustrated when he couldn't. He was at his most animated when he was talking about the mechanics of music, recalling how he captured lightning in a bottle this time or that time thanks to a clever engineer inventively arranging an obscure microphone tricked out in remarkable fashion. He had a lot of great stories to tell, but he threw them all together on the table like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle for you to put together.
After the interview, he invited me out for a drink at a bistro in Ottawa's ByWard Market. There, we met up with Hatcher, Paul Cantin, then the Ottawa Sun's music critic, who remains one of the best music writers in the bidness, and the regional Sony Music rep, the unsinkable Antonello DiDominico. DiDominico made it his personal mission to build a buzz for the Shadows, even though it was hardly a priority for his label bosses who, at the time, were launching vile chunks of Celine Dion and Our Lady Peace into the craposphere.
Everyone drank heavily except for Cowsill, who guzzled enough black coffee to burn a hole in his bladder. He remained quiet but intense. To say that Billy was sensitive and frayed is to say that George W. Bush might be a little conservative.
Hatcher and Cowsill had acoustic guitars with them, as they'd been doing the rounds of local radio stations playing live segments earlier in the day. The whole time Cowsill was itching to pull it out and sing his heart out. He looked at Hatcher and said something to the effect of, "Let's show these guys what we're all about," and harmonized beautifully in a rollicking impromptu song circle for the better part of an hour, in front of about a dozen tables of bistro goers. We loved it, and nobody else complained. By the time they finished, the diners were in full applause.
He just wanted to rock.
The Blue Shadows broke up shortly after that. When Billy finally did kick the pills a little later, he seemed to realize that he blew his last best chance at greatness, summing up the Blue Shadows as "three vegetarians and a junkie."
Billy toured around western Canada for a few years, and moved to Calgary about 10 years ago. Word on the street there was that he was getting a university degree so he could be a music teacher. But he was also pressed into a service at several studios, where by all accounts he was a generous and brutally honest mentor to a bunch of young fellas who thought they had the world by the balls.
He was 58 when he died, on the same weekend his family gathered in Newport for a memorial service for brother Barry, who went missing in his hometown of New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina and whose corpse turned up in shallow waters in the delta over Christmas. Billy was hobbled by emphysema and osteoporosis in his last years, but he was still recording and performing with a new band, the aptly titled Co-Dependents.
CKUA, the province-wide community radio station in Alberta, did an extensive interview with Billy at the end of 2004, when his lung problems were seriously cramping his ability to hit his high notes, and he had to perform by walking on stage with two canes after breaking a hip.
In a typically mystical manner, Billy said he was like a bird who could do nothing but sing: "You stop rockin', you die. That's the moral of my story," he said.
Billy was a natural-born performer, and he never gave up in spite of all the barriers he put up for himself. He didn't need a record label or an entourage or any of the other trappings of stardom. All he ever wanted was people to entertain, make them smile, make them cry. When it came to that, he was a master.
posted by Raymaker at 1:06 PM
3 Comments:
This post has been removed by a blog administrator.
A lovely evocation, Mr. D. Long live the fragile souls.
Billy was a sweet and lovely person. He had a huge amount of love to give, share, and he couldn't quite ever figure out how or with whom to share it.
He was lost to a world that should have idolized him; he was overshot as so many of the truly talented are.
He coulda been a contender.
Love you, Wills!
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