“Townes Van Zandt - Be Here to Love Me” (Margaret Brown (II))
One of the few regrets I have in my life is that I never saw Townes Van Zandt (spottily sourced wikipedia entry) perform while he was alive. I moved to Austin in 1981, and lived there until 1994: Townes Van Zandt performed in Austin probably every year, multiple times probably, until his death on New Years Day, 1997. Larry Monroe, a DJ for KUT whose musical taste I've usually respected, always seemed to be announcing a Townes Van Zandt performance on one of his radio shows. Unfortunately, not until after a drunken conversation with some house painter (friend of a friend) on Martha's Vineyard in 2003 did I really listen to Townes Van Zandt, and by that time he was dead.
Tom Tomorrow suggested the above documentary directed by Margaret Brown a while ago, and I just got around to watching it tonight. Wow. Perhaps slightly more resonance to me specifically since my biological-father-who-abandoned-me (Bruce Anderson) was also diagnosed with manic-depression, and given shock therapy when I was young. Maybe not, maybe just Townes Van Zandt's melancholy music strikes a resonant chord because of its poignancy.
Steve Earle, Willie Nelson, Steve Shelley (of Sonic Youth), Emmylou Harris, and many others of the alt-country scene and the Austin folk scene make an appearance.
You might have never heard of Townes Van Zandt. You might not even know his songs. But this Texan's music was profoundly influential on his peers--so much so that some of the folks interviewed for Be Here to Love Me, a documentary about Van Zandt's work and difficult life, call him one of the best songwriters, maybe even the best, in American history. That's a stretch, but there's no doubting the man's talent; his two best-known tunes, “Pancho and Lefty” (popularized by Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard) and “If I Needed You” (a beautiful Emmylou Harris-Don Williams duet), by themselves guarantee him a spot in a few Halls of Fame. But the Van Zandt chronicled in director Margaret Brown's 100-minute film was his own worst enemy. Born in 1944, he was a troubled young man who played Russian roulette for kicks, deliberately fell off a fourth-floor balcony, and was placed in a mental home, where shock treatments robbed him of significant parts of his memory and personality. Married three times, he was also wedded to the bottle, which ultimately destroyed him (he died of a heart attack in 1997). Be Here to Love Me details these events through various interviews with Van Zandt himself, as well as Nelson, Harris, Steve Earle, Nanci Griffith, and other notables. But whereas a fellow tippler like singer Guy Clark fondly remembers the good times, Van Zandt's family tells a different story: “Bummer,” replies one ex-wife when asked to describe living with him, while his eldest son, JT, betrays a good deal of bitterness about a dad who couldn't control his own life, wasn't much of a family man, and died young and unfulfilled. DVD extras include several Van Zandt performances (in addition to clips throughout the main program), which is a good thing; were it not for his soulful, affecting songs, there wouldn't be a lot to admire about this guy.
Strongly recommended for anyone who likes folk music, or Lightnin' Hopkins, or wonders what choosing the rough life of a musician is all about.
For a little while, TVZ's first song written is available as MP3 (right click to save), below.
Van Zandt’s first wife recounts how he locked himself in a closet immediately after their wedding in order to teach himself how to write a song and emerged with his first authored tune, titled “Waiting Round to Die,” rather than some love ballad or other romantic fodder.
Some other reviews since I have URLs handy
NYTimes
Extract of Heartworn Highway, doc directed by James Szalapski
hats uncle Seymore Washington, the reason hes crying is because Townes wrote the song about him, Check out the video Heart worn highways
(direct link)
