Janis: Little Girl Blue Page #6

---

band, from what I could see.

And it was just a matter

of time until somebody

tried to polish her up and

make a big star out of her.

It's crazy, now, to think back

at it that we signed, you know,

a management agreement

with the guy.

But I think from

the very get go,

I think there was a sense that

he was not a big fan of ours,

that he really was into Janis.

But we wanted to believe that he

would work for the whole band.

And the guys in the

band were powerless.

No one had the ability to

stop that from happening.

She was a singularity,

and she attracted

that kind of attention.

She cared about Big

Brother's career.

She loved those guys, but

there was something that she

saw that was beyond that.

And if she didn't do it,

she'd never know if she could.

Dear family,

so we're back in California

for two more weeks.

After that, begins

my hardest task.

I told you, remember, that

I was leaving Big Brother

and going to do a

thing on my own.

There will be a whole lot of

pressure because of the vibes

created by my

leaving Big Brother,

and also just how big I am now.

Nobody ever saw her wearing

those kind of clothes,

but that's the

kind of clothes she

had when she came for Texas.

If someone said, well, what

did you learn from Janis?

What did she teach you?

If I had to say

it in a sentence,

it's emotional honesty and the

price of not emotional honesty.

She started to lose that.

She started to become something

that people expected of her.

She started to

become a caricature

of what she was and play

it for people, you know?

And I think that

hurt her in some way.

Take this lonely heart

from one lonely girl.

Reach in to high, babe, can't

help from getting burned.

Everything she ever wrote

pretty much is autobiographical.

And I thought the

reaching too high, babe,

too, this is done

right at the time

when she's leaving Big Brother.

She knows she's kind of

going to go for some higher

level of fame and

stardom and, you know,

she might fall on her face.

She knew that.

It might not work out.

She might get burned.

The fallout for James

and Peter and David

was significant because

Janis asked Sam to come

with her to her new band.

I loved Jan.

I loved her all the way through.

You know, the first

time I ever saw her,

she just had this

attitude that I liked.

It wasn't belligerent, but

it was non-compromising.

She's loud.

She's one of these

loud Texas women.

She's real smart and

considerate most of the time.

And we both had

real quick tempers.

They called me up

to play with Janis,

so they sent me a ticket.

And I went to New York.

And I went there, and

they opened the door.

And this girl had on a

bra and some panties.

She said, hi, I'm Janis.

I said, hi, I'm in

the right place.

And she started singing.

I said, damn.

Are you sure she's white?

When you quit Big Brother

and the Holding Company,

why did you do that?

Well, just because it was

sort of just time for us,

I think, to go on and

do something else.

You know what I mean?

Like, you grow together,

you know, a certain way,

and you sort of

exhaust each other.

You exhaust the good that

you can do for each other,

and it was just

time for us to start

growing in other directions.

You know what I mean?

You know, I think you

really grow as a musician.

And that's what, after all,

we're supposed to be all about,

is trying to get better

at what we do, you know'?

San Francisco was

the first place,

the first community, Where

Janis really felt at home.

When she left Big

Brother, she lost it.

The pressure to

succeed was huge,

and she was carrying

around this weight.

You know, she didn't

know how to lead a band.

That's one of the

reasons it was a mistake.

She didn't know how

to lead the band.

And she was in charge, so she

had people putting together

that band for her, along with a

lot of other strange people who

were appointed band directors.

It wasn't working.

There were changes in

personnel, and none of it

solved anything.

We went to Europe only, like,

two months into touring.

She's there with a new band

which doesn't know what

the hell it's supposed to be.

OK, You GUYS-

You know what?

I make it a policy.

We played in Frankfurt,

and Janis was freaking out.

We peeped out a curtain,

and all of these dudes

were sitting there with

their little haircuts,

like you put a bowl on their

head and cut around the bowl.

(Is everybody read)

But we felt like playing.

We said, hey, man,

we'll play the show.

If y'all want to boogie, come

on up here with us and boogie.

If there's something you need,

hun, that you've never ever

had, I know you've never had it.

Oh, honey, don't you

sit there crying.

Don't just sit there

feeling bad, no, no, no.

You better get up.

Now, do you understand?

Raise your hand.

Hey, hey! hey.

Raise your hand.

Right here, right now.

Hey.

Whoa, oh, yeah.

I'm nobody.

I'm just a fan.

No, I'm just a fan.

I'm crazy about her.

Where from you are friend?

I can't talk.

Quit taking pictures of me.

Why not?

Because I'm not groovy.

She's groovy.

Look at her.

I guess because we're

strangers in foreign lands,

the Cosmic Blues

Band came together.

The Albert Hall in London

was the last concert,

and Janis knew that

Bob Dylan had sold out.

And she was really excited

about playing the Albert Hall,

and she did sell out.

She got people dancing in the

aisles at the Albert Hall,

and she was just ecstatic after.

Excited,

woo, nobody ever-nobody,

anybody, ever thought

it would be that good.

Nobody's ever

f***ing got up yet.

No one's ever got up

and danced and dug it.

No one's ever done anything

there, and they did it, man.

They f***ing got up and grooved.

Then they listened.

God, I'm so happy, woo-hoe.

When Janis was on stage

and things were going well,

all was right with the world.

But after that hour, you've

got to come off stage.

She used to say that

it was like making love,

being on the stage, you

know, but it's an illusion.

When the show's over,

the audience leaves,

and you're left with yourself.

She rarely was using

heroin before a concert

because it wasn't the right

kind of energy for onstage,

and she cared about that.

But her after-the-concert

fix was a real regular thing.

We were devolving into this drug

use that was way out of hand.

I have to, you know,

digress for a second say,

when Janis was in Big Brother,

Peter didn't do any drugs.

You know, so out

of respect to him,

we kept it toned down a lot.

So now she's in Cosmic

Blues so we're doing really

a lot of drugs, you know,

because Peter's not-...

Daddy isn't there anymore.

We're free, and we can

do all these drugs now.

So it really got out of hand.

In Los Angeles, in particular,

at the Landmark Hotel,

she called me to her room.

And she said, your services

are no longer needed.

And so then we shot up

some heroin, and she said,

well, aren't you

Rate this script:0.0 / 0 votes