Obituaries

A lifetime of promises, a world of dreams

Posted on by brucehhackett

My introduction to Tina Turner came in 1971, as it did for many other white suburban kids of my age, with these spoken words: “You know, every now and then, I think you might like to hear something from us nice and easy. But there’s just one thing: You see, we never ever do nothing nice and easy! We always do it nice and rough. So we’re going to take the beginning of this song and do it easy. Then we’re going to do the finish rough.”

And with that, Ike and Tina Turner launched into a slow, sensual reading of the first verse and chorus of John Fogerty’s “Proud Mary,” then abruptly segued into a frenzied double-time arrangement for the rest of the song. Holy smokes, I thought, this is way more interesting than Creedence Clearwater Revival’s ho-hum original!

Full confession: It would take me many years before I developed a full-blown appreciation for Turner’s gifts as a one-of-a-kind entertainer. I certainly knew her big hits from the 1980s — “What’s Love Got to Do With It,” “Better Be Good to Me,” “Private Dancer,” “We Don’t Need Another Hero,” “Typical Male,” “The Best” — and her reputation as one of the most electrifying live performers to ever take a stage.

But it really wasn’t until the past week, in the wake of Turner’s death May 24 at age 83, after reading all the tributes and listening more intently to Turner’s recorded legacy, that I came to understand how much she overcame and how much she accomplished in her 50 years in show business. I strongly urge you to scroll down to the Spotify playlist at the end of this essay and hit “play.” So many superb performances!

Anna Mae Bullock was only 18 when she met and first heard Ike Turner and The Kings of Rhythm perform at a St. Louis nightclub. Turner had been a formidable guitarist and songwriter in his own right, responsible for seminal rock ‘n’ roll records like 1951’s “Rocket 88,” and he knew how to present a riveting live act. But one night in 1957 during a break, the petite girl who longed to be on stage got her chance, belting out B.B. King’s “You Know I Love You,” and Turner was gobsmacked. “I would write songs with Little Richard in mind,” said Turner in his 1999 autobiography, “but I didn’t have no Little Richard to sing them. Once I heard Tina, she became my Little Richard. Listen closely to Tina and who do you hear? Little Richard singing in the female voice.”

Her potent, bluesy singing and supercharged dancing style soon made her the group’s star attraction, and Turner’s wife. The ensemble was renamed The Ike and Tina Turner Revue and became one of the premier touring soul acts of the early-to-mid-1960s in R&B venues on what was then called “the chitlin’ circuit.” Their work wasn’t yet embraced by mainstream audiences, but if you pay close attention to the first dozen tracks selected for the playlist (especially “A Fool in Love,” “Cussin’, Cryin’ and Carryin’ On” and the Phil Spector-produced “River Deep, Mountain High”), you’ll be reminded (or discover) what all the fuss was about.

Over in England, The Rolling Stones invited the group to open for them, first on a British tour in 1966 and then on an American tour in 1969, which caused rock audiences in both countries to sit up and take notice. (You could make a strong case that Mick Jagger was deeply influenced by Tina Turner’s stage presence as he developed his own in-concert persona.)

Tina with The Rolling Stones backstage in 1981

I’m reluctant to mention too much about the horrible abuse and violence Tina endured at the hands of her first husband, particularly once he developed a cocaine addiction and an irrational jealousy of her ever-increasing time in the spotlight. Suffice it to say that she suffered indignities and injuries that hurt her self-esteem and her career for many years in the ’60s and ’70s, and she deserves a huge amount of credit for eventually breaking free from his suffocating control.

“It’s very difficult to explain to people why I stayed as long as I did,” she said many years later. “I’d left Tennessee as a little country girl and stepped into a man’s life who was a producer and had money and was a star in his own right. At one time, Ike Turner had been very nice to me, but later he changed to become a horrible person.”

Desperate to be rid of him, she agreed to divorce terms that left her virtually penniless. She gave Ike nearly all their money and the publishing royalties for her compositions. “You take everything I’ve made in the last sixteen years,” she said. “I’ll take my future.”

Turner’s solo career was slow to take off. Her first few albums didn’t sell, her record label dropped her, and she was back to playing small clubs and in ill-advised cabaret acts for a time. When Olivia Newton-John’s manager, Roger Davies, began guiding her in 1980, Turner readopted the gritty, hard-rocking style that had made her a crossover star, which led to a startling cover version of The Temptations’ “Ball of Confusion” on an album of rock and soul covers called British Electric Foundation. That in turn led to a stupendous remake of Al Green’s “Let’s Stay Together,” which reached #26 on US pop charts in 1983. That success attracted Capitol Records, who approved an album with the caveat that it be recorded and released in less than a month.

A number of prominent songwriters and producers — Rupert Hine, Mark Knopfler, Ann Peebles, Terry Britten — came forward to offer their songs and their services, and the result was “Private Dancer,” one of the biggest albums of 1984 and, indeed, of the 1980s, selling upwards of 10 million copies worldwide. The LP was described by one critic as “innovative fusion of old-fashioned soul singing and new wave synth-pop.” Seven tracks were released as singles in either the US or the UK, with “What’s Love Got to Do With It,” “Better Be Good to Me” and “Private Dancer” all reaching the Top Ten here.

At age 44, Turner had finally attained the superstardom she’d dreamed of since first stepping on stage. Four more albums over the next 15 years achieved platinum status (especially the 1986 follow-up “Break Every Rule,” which reached #4), and she cemented her reputation as one of the top concert draws in the world. She also showed her chops in film, playing the ruthless Aunty Entity in the 1985 blockbuster dystopian action hit “Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome,” which spawned another #1 hit, “We Don’t Need Another Hero.”

One of the things I most admire about Turner is her ability and willingness to record covers of popular R&B songs and rock tunes with equal flair. Check out some of the titles you’ll find in her catalog: “Come Together” and “Get Back” (The Beatles), “Living For the City” (Stevie Wonder), “In the Midnight Hour” (Wilson Pickett), “Reconsider Baby” (Elvis Presley), “The Acid Queen” (The Who). I’m even more impressed by the number of major rock stars who have partnered with Turner on various duet projects over the years: Eric Clapton (“Tearing Us Apart”), Rod Stewart (“It Takes Two”), Bono (“Theme from ‘Goldeneye'”), Bryan Adams (“It’s Only Love”), David Bowie (“Let’s Dance”).

Her tempestuous first marriage provided much of the material for the 1993 film “What’s Love Got to Do With It,” with Angela Bassett and Laurence Fishburne in the lead roles. Turner re-recorded some of her hits, and one new song, “I Don’t Want to Fight,” but otherwise declined to participate. “Why would I want to see Ike Turner beat me up again?” she said at the time.

The best indication of how much respect artists have earned is the number of major players who praise them, both in life and in death. “How do we say farewell to a woman who owned her pain and trauma and used it as a means to help change the world?” Bassett said last week. “Through her courage in telling her story, and her determination to carve out a space in rock and roll for herself and for others who look like her, Tina Turner showed others who lived in fear what a beautiful future filled with love, compassion, and freedom could look like.”

Beyoncé, arguably the most popular singer on the planet at the moment, said, “My beloved queen. I love you endlessly. I’m so grateful for your inspiration and all the ways you have paved the way. You are strength and resilience. You are the epitome of power and passion. We are all so fortunate to have witnessed your kindness and beautiful spirit.”

The Who’s Pete Townshend, who had suggested Turner for the part of The Acid Queen in the 1975 film version of “Tommy,” described her as “an astonishing performer, an astounding singer, an R&B groundbreaker. If you ever had the privilege of seeing Tina perform live, you will know how utterly scary she could be. She was an immense presence. She was, of course, my Acid Queen in the ‘Tommy’ movie, and it is often my job to sing that song with The Who, so she always comes to mind, which isn’t easy to deal with. The song is about abuse at the hands of an evil woman. How she turned that song on its head! All the anger of her years as a victim exploded into fire, and bluster, and a magnificent and crazy cameo role that will always stay with me.”

The multi-talented Oprah Winfrey noted, “I started out as a fan of Tina Turner, then a full-on groupie, following her from show to show around the country, and then, eventually, we became real friends. She contained a magnitude of inner strength that grew throughout her life. She was a role model not only for me but for the world. She encouraged a part of me I didn’t know existed.”

The time Winfrey was invited on stage in Los Angeles to dance with Turner “was the most fun I ever had stepping out of my box. Tina lived out of the box and encouraged me and every woman to do the same.”

The industry has given Turner many accolades. Twice she was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (with Ike in 1991 and on her own in 2021); she received a Kennedy Center Honor in 2005 and a Grammy lifetime achievement award in 2018.

Rest in peace, Tina. Your place in music history is iron-clad secure.

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The feeling’s gone, and I just can’t get it back

Posted on by brucehhackett

In early 1971, I wasn’t yet 16, but my good friend Ben had just earned his driver’s license, so I would ride shotgun and locate tunes on the AM radio stations. Among the songs that came up during those times was a lovely, poignant ballad called “If You Could Read My Mind.” The song ached of lost love and regret, told with wonderfully descriptive language and metaphors: “If I could read your mind, love, what a tale your thoughts could tell, /Just like a paperback novel, the kind the drugstores sell, /When you reach the part where the heartaches come, the hero would be me, but heroes often fail, /And you won’t read that book again because the ending’s just too hard to take…” 

This was my introduction to the musical talents of Gordon Lightfoot and, within a week, I bought the album it came from, “Sit Down Young Stranger,” a pleasing mix of original folk and country tunes played and sung impeccably by Lightfoot with his gifted accompanists (Red Shea on guitar and Rick Haynes on bass). With warm melodies like “Approaching Lavender” and “Minstrel of the Dawn” and a gentle reading of Kris Kristofferson’s “Me and Bobby Magee” (before Janis Joplin’s version made it her own), the album became glued to my turntable, at least until a newer LP, “Summer Side of Life,” was released a couple months later.

Lightfoot’s rich baritone, compelling acoustic guitar arrangements and, especially, his gorgeous melodies and poetic lyrics made me a big fan, placing him right up there with James Taylor and Cat Stevens in my singer-songwriter rankings. I enjoyed learning his music on guitar, especially “Miguel,” a heartbreaking tale of a man whose love drives him to desperate acts, and “Canadian Railroad Trilogy,” his epic retelling of the construction of the cross-country railway in the 1880s. All this kicked off a lifelong admiration of his music, including his earlier LPs from the late ’60s as well as future releases in the ’70s and beyond.

So it was with great sadness that I learned of his passing a few days ago at the age of 84. His deft merging of folk traditions with pop and country influences appealed to a broad swath of music lovers in his native Canada as well as in the US and elsewhere, as evidenced by his multiple appearances in the upper echelons of the popular music charts over the years, particularly in the Seventies. The great Bob Dylan has spoken of Lightfoot in glowing terms: “Often when I hear one of Gordon’s songs, I wished I had written it. It’s like I want it to last forever.”

Indeed, they’re in mourning this week all over Canada, where he is considered a national treasure. As Prime Minister Justin Trudeau put it, “We have lost one of our greatest singer-songwriters. Gordon Lightfoot captured our country’s spirit in his music, and in doing so, he helped shape Canada’s soundscape. May his music continue to inspire future generations, and may his legacy live on forever.”

Lightfoot grew up in rural Ontario and showed an early interest in music, singing in barbershop quartets and teaching himself folk guitar. He spent a year studying music composition and orchestration at Westlake College of Music in Los Angeles and developed an appreciation for jazz, but he soon returned to Canada and began performing in coffeehouses and clubs in Toronto, becoming an important contributor to that city’s burgeoning folk scene. Inspired by Dylan’s astonishing early work, Lightfoot honed his songwriting skills “to inject some personal identity into my songs,” he noted decades later. “I wrote songs about where I am and where I’m from. I took situations and wrote poems about them.”

Lightfoot in 1965

He won a contract with United Artists in 1966 and released five albums in four years, offering four dozen original songs, some of which (“Early Morning Rain,” “For Lovin’ Me”) were made famous in cover versions by artists like Ian & Sylvia, Peter Paul & Mary, Judy Collins and even Dylan himself. His albums sold reasonably well in Canada, and he began a decades-long tradition of performing an annual concert at Toronto’s famed Massey Hall, where he recorded his live LP “Sunday Concert,” which was the first to break into the American charts (albeit at only #143).

Lightfoot’s career really took off when he signed with Warner Brothers/Reprise in 1970 and released “Sit Down Young Stranger.” It took nearly a year, but “If You Could Read My Mind” eventually reached #5 on US pop charts, and the album peaked at #12 here. A quick look at the title song shows how strong Dylan’s influence was on the structure and content of his lyrics: “Now will you try to tell us you been too long at school, /That knowledge is not needed, that power does not rule, /That war is not the answer, that young men should not die, /Sit down, young stranger, I wait for your reply…”

Over the next decade, all his albums peaked in the Top Five in Canada, with a dozen hit singles in the Top 20. In the States, his chart successes were more sporadic but still impressive. I call his 1972 release “Don Quixote” his most underrated album, managing only #42, while its single — “Beautiful,” one of the prettiest love songs ever written — inexplicably stalled at #58. Two years later, though, his 1974 LP “Sundown” and its title song both topped the charts in the US, and “Carefree Highway” from that same album reached #10.

Lightfoot wrote often and thoughtfully about betrayal — his own failings as well as those of his romantic partners — and “Sundown” was merely the most famous: “I can see her lying back in her satin dress, in a room where you do what you don’t confess.” On 1978’s “Endless Wire” album you’ll find “The Circle is Small (I Can See It In Your Eyes),” a powerful indictment of an unfaithful partner: “It’s all right to leave, but not all right to lie, When you come home and you can’t say where you’ve been, /The city where we live might be quite large, but the circle is small, /Why not tell us all, and then all of us will know…” He offers this gut-wrenching scenario in the 1971 minor classic “Talking In Your Sleep”: “I heard you talking in the night, that’s right, yes I heard you call, /Though I could hardly hear the name you spoke, it’s a name I don’t recall, /I heard you softly whisper, I reached out to hold you near me, /Then from your lips there came that secret I was not supposed to know…” 

He addressed many topics in his lyrics, from whale hunting (“Ode to Big Blue”) to the 1967 Detroit riots (“Black Day in July”) to the consequences of war (“The Patriot’s Dream”). He was an extraordinarily good story teller as well. “People have seemed to like my songs because they’re so simple, and I’m handy with the turn of the phrase. They’re tunes that move along, which is what I look for in my writing. Forward momentum.”

He spun many yarns (“Cherokee Bend,” “Miguel”), but most famously, he recounted the fateful journey of a Great Lakes ore freighter that sank on Lake Superior in 1975 in the richly detailed epic “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald,” which became an unlikely #1 hit despite clocking in at a lengthy 6:30. “It was quite an undertaking to do that,” Lightfoot said in a 2014 interview. “I went and bought all of the old newspapers, got everything in chronological order, and went ahead and did it. I already had a melody in my mind, from an old Irish dirge that I heard when I was about three and a half years old.”

His rural roots showed up in the country-inflected songs he included on nearly every album, from “Cotton Jenny” (which Anne Murray took to #11 on US country charts in 1972) to “Brave Mountaineers” with its celebration of simple living (“Born in the country and I like that country way, /Of the uncles and the cousins and the card games they would play…”). Lightfoot often described himself as “a cosmopolitan hick,” which succinctly describes the dichotomy of a man from simple rural beginnings who became world-famous.

He said he was flattered by the number of cover versions of his songs that exist, including ones by Eric Clapton (“Looking at the Rain”), Kenny Rankin (“Pussywillows, Cat-Tails”), Nanci Griffith (“Ten Degrees and Getting Colder”), Poco (“Ribbon of Darkness”), Sarah McLachlan (“Song For a Winter’s Night”) as well as Barbra Streisand (“If You Could Read My Mind”) and Elvis Presley (“Early Morning Rain”). “I never heard a cover of one of my songs that I didn’t like,” Lightfoot said in 2008. “Sure, I heard some strange versions occasionally, but they always seemed to do a good job. I would be amazed that people would enjoy my songs enough to want to record them, and it inspired me and made me want to work harder.”

Imitation may be the sincerest form of flattery, but Lightfoot just couldn’t ignore it when he first heard “The Greatest Love Of All,” written in 1977 by Michael Masser and turned into an international hit in 1985 by Whitney Houston. “The first time I heard it was on an elevator,” he recalled in 2015. “There were about 24 bars of the melody that were really obviously taken from ‘If You Could Read My Mind’ and I noticed it. So we initiated a lawsuit for plagiarism, but three weeks later, I let it go because I understood that it was affecting Whitney Houston, who had an appearance coming up at the Grammys, and the suit wasn’t anything to do with her. So we settled out of court.”

Life threw Lightfoot quite a few curve balls along the way. Because he was an inherently shy man who wasn’t that comfortable with the spotlight, his stage presence was sometimes misinterpreted as arrogance, and he subsequently struggled with alcoholism before getting clean in the mid-1980s. The fact that Lightfoot lived to reach 84 is fairly amazing in light of the serious illnesses he suffered in his later years, from a bout with Bell’s palsy to a stomach aneurism that required multiple surgeries and put him in a coma for six weeks in 2002.

A tracheotomy damaged his vocal cords and made him consider retiring from live performances, but his work ethic wouldn’t permit it. “In the final analysis, the job was what mattered,” he said in 2018. “When I was recuperating, it was good being preoccupied in a very constructive way with a project in the works; one which would carry itself forward, right up through the artwork and editorial, until its ultimate completion.”

That project was “Harmony,” a 2004 LP that proved to be his final album of new material. Nevertheless, he continued performing about 80 concerts a year over the past two decades, gamely offering his hits and a cross-section of his repertoire despite a singing voice that had become a shadow of its former self.

Lightfoot’s pointed references to Canadian locales in his song titles (“Christian Island,” “On Yonge Street,” “Alberta Bound” and, of course, “Canadian Railroad Trilogy”) forever endeared him to his Canadian audiences and made him something of an ambassador while on tour in other countries. He has been inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame, won numerous Juno awards (Canada’s version of the Grammy) and honorary degrees, and was featured on a postage stamp. As Tom Cochrane, frontman for the Canadian rock band Red Rider, put it, “If there was a Mount Rushmore in Canada, Gordon would be on it.”

Rest In Peace, good sir. To his many fans and my blog readers, we would be well served to follow his advice from his 1976 song, “Race Among the Ruins”: “If you plan to face tomorrow, do it soon.”

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