A Chapter Ends…
It’s been over a year and a half since I posted to this blog. I must have been processing some deep disappointment issues since then, because I had written this draft back then. It’s easier to talk about now…
At the party to celebrate the completion of Liberty’s only recording
During the latter half of 1976 and into the following year, I gradually came to realize that my participation in Liberty was becoming increasingly stressful. The quality of my experience of being in the band had shifted from that of a joyful ride in an amusement park to something more like a job for which I was feeling less and less qualified.
It is ironic, I suppose, that as management shifted from the serious Weintraub group to the more laidback McEuen people, things felt increasingly stressful for me.
I don’t think I ever thought of that wild, magical ride with Liberty as a quest for success; for me, it was always about having fun, learning new songs, and watching audience members enjoy themselves as a result of what we were doing—in other words, it was mostly about self-expression.
Vic Garrett, however, had other ideas. I believe he had clear ideas about how he wanted the music to sound and what would be “cool” for our stage show to become. I felt that somehow I had become the weak link in a chain that’s only as strong as that link.
I felt increasing tension within the group, particularly with my dear friend Vic, and that was very uncomfortable. I felt that I was no longer accepted for the musician I actually was, but instead I was expected to become the musician that he pictured in his mind.
It hadn’t yet dawned on me, of course, that this painful conversation was mostly taking place in my own “head.” The most painful thing for me, however, was the loss of the sheer joy I had felt in the first four years of the band’s existence.
It never really entered my mind that I could leave the band. My Aspen music experience of the 1970s was itself an organic experience for me. It always felt like an unsought gift whose only purpose was to give me an avenue in which to enjoy being alive. I always thought of myself as leading some sort of charmed life in having these wonderful opportunities fall into my lap.
I thought I could just weather the gathering storms, keep practicing my instruments, and just keep going. But the stress wouldn’t leave; it just insisted, with ever-increasing force, on being heard.
I had blockages on stage, moments when the notes just wouldn’t come out. There was a series of nights opening for Steve Martin at the Boarding House in San Francisco when an up-tempo solo was due, and I just sat there, unable to play anything.
From this point of looking back, it seems so clear that it was time to face the issues and resolve them, but back then I didn’t know how to do that.
Back in Aspen one night after the last stint in San Francisco, someone called a band meeting, and I was told that I was fired. In that moment I felt only relief. There were still some dates booked that I agreed to do with the band, but for me it was like being released.
On April 4, 1977, we taped an appearance on the Tonight Show hosted by Steve; on April 8, we played the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in downtown LA with Steve and the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band. By May, I had left Aspen for Denver on what would be a five-year hiatus from the valley I love.
