Leaves of Grass

Who spilled the whiskey on the blotter acid? Who cut and pasted William Blake into The Leaves of Grass? Jeff Calder that's who.

A plethora of sordid tales as well as touching, tear-welling moments in the life of Jeff Calder have been crossing my countenance ever since it was suggested I might add something to this rockumentionary. Can't recall when I first met my fellow outside/insider, perhaps when I was "on tour," or when he visited the NY Rocker offices looking for some ink.

But  rather quickly we were long distance friends crashing on each other's floors after shows,  digging the scene and trying to get to the bottom of certain perplexing questions that had to do with that elusive core of truth and beauty inside the perfect popular song or at least the songs we thought should be popular and the alchemists that made them-- Lou Reed, Beefheart, Television, Richard Hell, The Byrds-- all come to mind.

Yeah we wanted to get to the heart of it and be part of it and grok the essence of it all. I remember Jeff bringing the pre-MTV Kurt Loder over to my NYC apt. so he could play him the Black Monks (a '60s group of amped up Marines that wanted to be part of the times but because of their military hairdos had to resort to shaving a bald spot on the top of their heads to look like Monks, crazy evil monks pounding out proto-punk rock shouting "It's Hot time, it's Monk time!" in a hillbilly drawl, and Jeff knew it was important to pass this information along. I gotta believe that was a pivotal moment in keeping an important underground talisman alive in the culture. Indeed, years later the Black Monks stuff was put out on CD, and Kurt did a whole segment about them on MTV News. Yes, it was Jeff who brought the 60s to the 90s.

Jeff is a cat who finds meaning everywhere. Like the time we were in a South Carolina nightclub sharing a double bill, and afterwards we were at the bar asking the owner to shine a light down on his balding pate so we could all inspect the giant boil that resided there.

I remember my band The Individuals breaking up just as Jeff and Becky gave birth to Laura in '83. My voice was all ripped up from two farewell shows and appreciating the new found raspy quality I quickly recorded an anthem to their newborn based on information Jeff had given me about the beauty of the birthing experience (being one of those modern dads who wanted to be there) The song was called "Shot Out Like A Rocket And the Doctor Had to Catch It"

I wrote another song called "Jacksonville FLA." I can't recall much of the song except that it was a true story of Jeff being escorted out of that town after exhorting a crowd while standing on top of a police car that had come to shut down a Pool Qs show. It was Jeff who taught the kids how to "break stuff up" when Limp Bizkit was still in  diapers.

The years moved on and I dropped out of performing and attempted to raise  a family on the funds generated from the money pit known as the Bar/None Records. But Jeff soldiered on with various new incarnations of the Pool Qs, various major label hookups, even a tour with Lou Reed. In recent years there have been multiple reunions of previous lineups as well as albums and shows by his supergroup with Glenn Phillips, The Supreme Court. The recent reissue
of The Deep End is a testament to the time and care he took back in the day to make great recordings that would stand the test of time and he continues to create work with a level of care to detail few of his contemporaries could ever hope to muster. What most people don't know is much of his disciplined work ethic and secret performance techniques comes from a book I turned him on to a number of years back: John Davidson's The Singing Entertainer.  He in turn passed the wisdom on to Pearl Jam while they were recording in Atlanta. I kid you not, just ask the man how he single handedly brought "The Glitter Era" to "The Grunge Era."

Jeff always has his fingers on the pulse. Whenever I need info about some band coming out of the Atlanta/Athens region Jeff already knows their home phone numbers/sexual preferences and drugs of choice.

"We got to get to the bottom of this" is a phrase I've heard him utter at all hours of the day and night, from swank hotel rooms in Austin TX to flop houses on the Lower East Side. "We got to get to the bottom of this" he'd howl, about many things from Oscar Wilde's tour of the South to the whereabouts of lost Beefheart tapes or the ownership of the electric sitar used on the BoxTops "Cry Like A Baby." I suspect by now he's got this whole terrorist thing sussed out as well.

Well read, well dressed, and never at rest... Jeff Calder burn baby burn those shooting roman candles must get blown out tonight and for goodness sake take a look at your cake.
Love from Glenn and EVI