Episode 34: Jim Gordon part 3

Renowned studio drummer, Jim Gordon, is now experiencing what is called “command hallucinations”. Voices ordering him to do a multitude of dangerous things and even to harm others. He is still the most sought out drummer in the music industry but will the voices permit him to continue drumming? Listen to this episode and find out! 

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:06

Hello. Welcome back. Boy, oh boy. Welcome back to Jay's Rock and Roll Stories. I'm your host Jay. We are back on the train of Jim Gordon. Um This is intense. We're gonna we're gonna go up and down, left and right, and it's uh buckle up everybody because we're entering the world of uh mental illness and it's it's not um like oh wow, he's so crazy, he's cool. No, it's uh it's torment. Um I was uh I just picked up this uh book on Clapton a little while ago. Is it the same book I don't have in front of me, the same book that I used for the episode I did about Clapton and the Yardbirds, and uh I just kind of skimmed around looking up stuff on um Jim Gordon and like a kind of like a cross cross-referencing point when uh when I when I talked about how he and Clapton got in a fight and Derek and then Domino split up, but in this Clapton book, um Bobby Whitlock talks about how uh the it was a little bit more intense of a fight. If you if you don't know what I'm talking about, go back and listen to part two. Uh they get in a fight about the drums. Um uh Clapton says something about timing and uh Jim Gordon, they start fighting and yelling at each other, and it gets so intense that um Eric Clapton swings with the guitar strap, swings the guitar at Jim Gordon. And Bobby Whitlock is like, if it if it had hit him, it would have freaking killed him. Anyway, so um, you know, Derek McDomino's are done. Uh Jim goes back to Los Angeles. He got that car accident. He goes back to Los Angeles, Los Angeles, and he starts working with this singer named Renee Armand, and they really hit it off. Uh, they make music together. It's like they're they're serious about this, and he gets her into heroin, of course. It's like a little prerequisite, you know. Um so they the two of them go back to England together. They they're kind of like a couple now, and Jim goes to collect some um royalty money from uh Clapton. So Clapton's still at the Hertwood Edge, his little his little country house. Clapton lives in that um Hertwood Edge house with uh he has a couple servants, he has like dogs running all over the place. He's really into heroin too, so there's like dog shit all over the place. Anyway, they um they get together to make some music. Um I had to immediately stop and and look up this song. So the song is called Devil Road, and it's Jim Gordon doing drums and piano, and uh this girl, Renee Armand, she's singing, and Eric Clapton does the guitar. It's a really long song, and when you I found it on YouTube, and it's under the Derek and the Domino's, like like it's called like Derek and the Domino's last track or some shit like that, but it's not Derek and the Domino's, it's Clapton, Jim Gordon, and Renee Armand called Devil Road. It's an interesting interesting song, a little ballad. Uh Renee Armand sings. She she kind of she's like a Carol King type singer, and um little piano intro, and then Clapton's guitar work comes in. It's it's it's really cool. Um so let's see here. Uh you know, you know what I always do is sometimes when I when I uh when I do this kind of like little like down the rabbit hole on YouTube, like look at the comments, like and I found comments. Well, I mean unless someone is like lying to be funny or something, but um there was a comment from um uh Renee Armand, and she's talking about how that was her and Eric and Jim, and she has no idea who got a hold of it. And it's kind of a weird story how they're all partying, and uh Renee Armand got really sick, and they they just drop her off at this like clinic, Clapton and and and Jim Gordon do. They drop her off at this little clinic and and she's wearing like a jacket, and I guess George Harrison wrote a wrote a note with his name and a note and an address and phone number and put it in the pocket, and they call George Harrison, and George Harrison comes to take care of this this poor girl. Um anyway, so uh they are all smacked out, uh Clapton and and Jim Gordon. They're really the heroine. And while at the time while while they're in England, um Jim Gordon's father dies, Jack Gordon. Jack Gordon has died, but Jim doesn't rush home to do anything. Uh it wasn't it wasn't a very good relationship between the two later in life. Uh, as they said in part one, how Jack Gordon was an alcoholic, but then he straightened up, but then he got really religious and and blamed um all of um all of Jim Gordon's problems on rock and roll, you know, like you're you're all screwed up because all you do is all you care about is rock and roll and it's a sin and all this shit. So um, you know, that that kind of stings for uh Jim Gordon, but it's um he doesn't really go back home for that kind of thing. So uh eventually Jim does go back to LA. He gets back to work in as a studio drummer, and he plays on uh Johnny Rivers' album, um LA Reggae, and which had that um which had the radio hit. Uh it's an old cover, Rock and Rock and Pneumonia and the Boogie Woogie Flu. Uh Derek of the Domino's song Layla finally gets radio plays in 1972. Uh Rita Coolidge uh hears it, and she uh she picks up the phone to call Robert Stigwood because that that um if you know the song Layla, that little piano outro, that was written uh by Rita Coolidge, and it's on the album uh of um what's her name? Rita Coolidge's sister. And uh let's see here. Let me see if I can find it really quick. It's it's Booker T, Booker T the MGs, Booker T and Priscilla. And the song is called Time. If you look, if you listen to that, you you can hear where they just picked it up, and and she's calling to tell Robert Stigwell, like, what the hell, man? I wrote that song. So on the on the record itself, the Layla, the Derek and the Domino's, it it's it says it's written by uh Jim Gordon and Eric Clapton, and they they just kind of write her off. Like, we're not we're not gonna help you. You're just a a little singer lady, we're not gonna give you shit. So it's you know, it's it's it's too bad because it's it's definitely they definitely just picked it up, you know, it's definitely ripped it off. And um I don't know, I think Jim may have said I think there I think it's noted that Jim said, hey, Rita and I wrote this song, but you know, Clapton and and the gang are like eh, we don't need to we don't need to include her. That's kind of fucked up. That's just how shit it was, you know. Alright, so moving on. Uh Frank Zappa uh hires Jim Gordon. Uh he he knows Jim Gordon from back uh around 1966. Uh Zappa is um is in a wheelchair right right now. He was some crazy guy jumped on stage, punched uh Zappa, and he fell into the orchestral pit. So he he's all banged up and he's he's in a wheelchair. So Zappa's putting together this album called Um The Grand Wazoo. It's like gonna be like a big orchestral uh uh you know performance. And uh Jim Gordon is the man for the job. So they're doing a concert, um they're doing a concert in the South. The Frank Frank Zappa with Jim Gordon on drums. It's like a bigger orchestral unit with a band. And um Frank Zappa's really really against drugs. He doesn't like his band members to do drugs, he doesn't let his band members do drugs. I covered that one time in the episode. A little a little boring rant I did. A little anyway, so there's a sting. And uh when Jim is outside with a couple other members of the concert before the show goes on, these like 16-year-old girls come through and they're out offering cocaine to Jim and this other guy. They're like, Yeah, sure. As soon as they say, Yeah, sure, all the cops come in, bust him up, bust him in the head with batons and take them away. And Jim Gordon felt kind of shitty because he was like, he knows Frank Zappa is probably gonna fire him and because he's against drugs, but Frank Zappa's like, that's that's a sh that's a fucked up thing to do. I I it's not it's not cool that the this kind of shit happens in the South. So no, he he gives Jim back his job. So uh Jim does uh also work with Nilsson again and plays drums and Carly Simon's uh You're so vain, uh the radio hit You're so vain, which which actually features Mick Jagger uh on the vocals, like uh background vocals. He was in the same studio. Um let's see, what else? Uh there's also a song called Apache by the incredible bongo band, and it turns out it's like the most sampled like hip-hop song. Um Jim Gordon plays on that. He also is the drummer for the 1974 um Don't Rock the Boat, that the disco song. He's on everything. Um that that song uh Don't Rock the Boat, the label sells 50,000 copies and to to like dance clubs with um no with no significant radio play, but it's like wow, these things are selling. But uh it catches on seven months later, it goes to number one, and he's the drummer on that song. The biggest disco song of the of the time. Anyway, Jim and Renee um put out a single called California Lady, and he asks Frank Zappa to do some guitar work, which is like the first time any band has like asked Frank Zappa to be like you know a side man, which is I mean it's not it's kind of rare. Like and let's see. Um Jim plays on it. Uh Jim and Frank Zappa playing the song, and uh Jim's really happy about it that he he offers uh uh Frank Zappa line of cocaine like come on buddy, let's do some coke together. And Zappa's just disgusted watching him, you know, snort the shit up his nose because he's using a razor to chop it on the on the uh top of the piano, so he's like imagining that like you know paint is going up his nose or something. Um he likes his drugs, uh he likes his vodka, and he likes to drink from the bottle. It's like uh it's like his daily, daily thing. And he's he gets very jealous of uh Chris Christofferson because Chris Christofferson and Rita Coolidge get married. And Jim's anger and aggression is uh freaking uh Renee out a little bit. He agrees to see a doctor who prescribes him tranquilizers, which just kinda he just ja he just adds it to his daily routine of of of uh booze and and uh powders. Um another weird one for you. Okay, so Renee, uh Renee Armand, this is 1974, 1975. Renee is on her way home with groceries. Okay, she comes into the house, uh, it's their house, they live together, but Jim is there waiting for her. And he looks furious, his eyes look terrifying. He says to her, I know what you're doing. And Renee has no fucking idea what you're talking about. Uh Jim holds out his hand, his open hand, and in it, in his palm, there are three objects. He has a scrap of paper, he has a pen, and he has a piece of string. And he says to her, You're making the devil's triangle. And she says, uh, I as I said before, I have absolutely no fucking idea what you're talking about. And he says that she's trying to bring evil spirits to their home. So before she could even uh before she could even move, he grabs her throat, uh, beats the shit out of her, breaks her ribs. Um he's a fucking psycho. And um she's terrified. He finally takes a break from beating her just so he can go get a dr a glass of water. And he uh he's able to she's able to get up uh and go to like a neighbor's house to uh for for safety, right? To call the police. And here's a great here's a great quote from uh Joel Selvin, the guy who wrote the book. Um this this kind of really this sums it up here. He says, This was Jim's psychotic break. The nightmare inside him forcing it into the outside world, an interruption of his his paranoid delusions were becoming his reality, and he was having trouble telling the difference. The massive amounts of drugs and alcohol only made his debilitating mental state worse. Clouding judgment and impairing rational thinking, Jim tried over and over, but he couldn't connect to other humans on any empathetic emotional level. He suffered alone and in secret, not daring to tell anyone about the raging war going on in his head. The drums as always reminded uh sorry, remained his refuge. Kind of sums it up. Um so Joe Selvin, great book here. Um thank you. Another quick quote I want to just share really quick. I I don't usually do a bunch of quotes, but it's just I don't want to paraphrase it's it's it too hits it right on the head. So El uh Sulvin says um he could still escape his uh roiling mind by playing drums. Jim was there to make money. He was one of the essential components of the hit record machine, but that could unlock the mass market for poets, troubadours, and other dubious uh characters who had a way with a song. He expanded the role of the drums on every track he played, moving the moving the instrument from the background into the fabric of the composition. Jim's virtual virtuosity might not might not be immediately obvious, only that the material had somehow been elevated to another level. He could single-handedly make a record into a hit. Everybody who worked with Jim knew that about him. He contributed his con his contributions were crucial. So um 1973, uh Jim does drums on Mara Maldar's Midnight at the Oasis, that goofy schlocky 70s song. It's like he's on every like little radio crap, you know, song that got like a million, like so um 1974. Jim gets a job to work with uh Mama Cass from Mama the Papas, and they hit it off. He and uh Cass really hit it off. They kind of like go out and go to clubs and stuff. Um another hit he's on is uh Sundown by Gordon Lightfoot. And uh this is all it's it's it's good stuff. He's it's just he's very productive, he has a lot of work. Let's see. Um he plays on Steely Dan's Pretzel Logic, like every single song but track two. Uh that's a fantastic album. He listened to the song Ricky Don't Lose That Number. He has the amazing drums on that song. Um, interesting fact here um out of Santana doing uh the Willy Bobo cover, Evil Ways. If you're like a Steely Dan fan, listen to the song Song for My Father by Horace Silver. You can see exactly where that where that came from. Um let's see. 1974, he gets a gig with the band, uh sort of supergroup called uh Southern uh Souther Hillman Furry. It was um G uh JD Southern, Chris Hillman from the Birds, Richie Furry from uh Buffalo Springfield. Um it's it doesn't last too long. He gets annoyed with uh the the the group, they get annoyed with him. Um it's really it's I don't know. I I'm not a big fan of that band. It's bad, like crappy 70s music. Uh one night the band is relaxing in a bar after a gig, and Jim throws an empty glass at Chris Hillman, crashing and sending glass of glass shards all over him. Chris Hillman gets up, walks up to Jim, and does like one of those flat palm punches like right in his face. And uh Jim's kind of uh he does he fights back a little bit. Um the Souther Hillman furry band, they played uh they play with the Eagles. When they get back to the hotel after like a concert with uh the Eagles, there's it's too late to get any room service. So um Jim Gordon is just like scavenging, like like like you know, when you you have room service and you're done, you put it outside the door. He's like going through all like the scrapes of leftovers from from outside, and they see him doing this, like, dude, it's gross. Hungry though. Uh 1975, he does an album with Joan Baez. It's um it's a solo album, and uh he does an album with uh James Griffin from from Bred. Uh he plays with James Griffin and David Gates from Bred on a tour of England. And uh, let's see, Jim Gordon was um was continuously uh uh kicking the back of um Larry Netchell's uh uh uh chair, like they're on they're when they're touring, when they're uh on a flight to England. He thought that Jim was kicking his chair, he turns back and he sees that Jim Gordon is stabbing the chair with a pocket knife. Uh his but his playing is spot on, his playing is just uh as good as it gets. On the Joan Baez tour, they um they refer to him as Gordo the Magnificent. He's just he he he brings what they want, you know. During this uh Joan Baez tour, Joan Joan Baez kind of takes a liking to Jim. He she kind of hits on him, which like throws him off. Like he does, he doesn't know how to react to anything like that. And he's all he's always in a state of paranoia. He's always thinking, why are people looking at me? Why are people talking to me? Uh uh Jim has a new girlfriend by now. Her name is uh Stacy Bailey, who was the secretary for the band Bread. Uh she's the first person that Jim divulges his uh thoughts about the voices in his head. First person that gets to hear, like, what the hell's going on with this guy? Uh one morning Stacy wakes up unable to breathe, and she sees that Jim is over her, choking her. And she tries to talk him down, tries to like, you know, please get out of it. He'll let go. And then he'll start choking again. She finally escapes to neighbors, and um Jim uh starts laughing, and then when she leaves the house, he cries out, I just wanted to see if you really cared for me. Yeah, okay. Uh he also works with Tom Petty. He does um he does a track with Tom Petty and Mike Campbell. This is uh 75, early stuff, and they're in the studio, and um when they're hearing their playback, uh Jim Gordon says to one of the engineers, he says, Do you have a couple spare tracks? Uh because uh I could I could double the drums. And Tom Petty and Mike Campbell look at each other like double the drums. So that means that that means that he would have to go back in to record exactly what he did. Like the to the minute detail, just precise, you know, or else you're gonna have like a smudging audio sound. So he does. Uh it takes him one track to do. He's he's just it's phenomenal. Um Jim's upset that his mother Osa starts dating. He doesn't like that the idea of his mom being interested in sex, he doesn't like seeing his mom like going out with it with a date. And uh his mom is dating um uh a guy from Alcoholics Anonymous, but Jim doesn't like that. He he jim feels that he's she's dating way too soon after his father passed away, which was a few years before. One time uh Jim uh calls her that as as he's having a hallucination of being trapped in a room made of slime and being attacked by space creatures. Um but he he knew it was a hallucination and he just wanted his mom to help calm him down, which which she did. So she knows, she knows he's going through this stuff, but he she's convinced that everything he's experiencing is all because of his drug and alcohol use. And like it has nothing to do with any other type of mental illness, it's just just his abuse. And there are um there are type of um a specific type of hallucination, and this is what is uh Jim is experiencing called command hallucinations. This is like the worst. This is where when you hear like you know, murderers say, the voices told me to do it. This this is what it is. Um there are voices instructing Jim to do specific things, to do specific things. Um if he doesn't do the things that the voice um is instructing to do, he gets this searing pain encircling in his head. And other patients have reported this too. This is this is not a solitary thing. Uh Jim refers it refers to it as the white hot cruelty pain. So um this is directly from the the book. Uh if he didn't do if he didn't do as he was told what his mother's voice, it's his mom's voice in his head, uh that it would threaten to fit. He would have a fit, inflicting this crippling pain that would leave him squirming on the floor, making him have a fit. He was uh he was his it was his mother's voice that was controlling his eating. Uh, since a kid, Jim would feel shame about uh gaining weight, and he would hear his mother's voice telling him if he ate, if he ate one more time, he would die. So that's that's the kind of shit he's hearing in his head. He would get like desperately hungry. He would um he wouldn't eat for days, and then he would go pick up like a box of fried chicken and like just like gorge himself, and then he would throw up, and then he would um then he would hear his mom's voice in his head saying, See, I told you not to eat that stuff. It's terrifying. I mean this is it's absolutely terrifying. Um he could he could quiet the voices with alcohol though. Um the voices were were we they could be quieted down with with like be you know being drunk. But remember the the command hallucinations, um, the voices spoke out against the drumming in the booze. Now the voices are telling him don't drink, don't drum. So his mom thinks his problems are solely the reason of his uh drugs and alcohol, as I said, and he continues uh he he convinces he she convinces him to take the AA classes, Alcoholics Anonymous, with her new boyfriend, Murray. Um the boyfriend he doesn't like him, they doesn't like him very much. And um Jim knew he was over-drinking like an alcoholic, but without the alcohol, the voices were too blaring. Um they're non-stop. Like, what what the hell do you do? So he's prescribed a uh a shitload of stuff. He's on all kinds of like tranquilizers and stuff, and all kinds of anxiety medication. Uh there's the icing on the tip is that he owes $100,000 to the IRS. It's just like things keep it's one thing after another, right? So now um his golden reputation as a studio drummer starts to fade a little bit because he doesn't show up to gigs. He's um he's he's late, or he just doesn't show, or he'll he'll just say, like, yeah, I can't make I can't do it. The musicians and um uh the other studio musicians, the other musicians, they they uh they kind of catch on about this, and there's like talk behind his back. And a big problem he has is that he really um he doesn't make any connections to anybody. Like there's real there's really not a lot on this book that he does. It's just shit that happens to him. Um he does his assignments, then he goes home, he calls his mom, he drinks, he has the voices. Um that's like the only person he can turn to his mom. So uh he flies out uh of the States to Canada to do um a tour with Burton Cummings. Uh Burton Cummings was the uh lead singer of the Guess Who. This is 1976. Burton Cummings is making a uh solo album. Burton Cummings uh to Canada is like you know, like Paul McCartney and because it's Bullman Burton Cummings and Randy Bachman from the Guess Who. Randy Bachman left to do you know BTO, but those two were like a uh Paul McCartney, John Lennon type thing. It really wasn't as popular in the States. So he goes and does uh Canadian tour with uh Burton Cummings, 1976, and he's not eating, and um he has a diary that he keeps with him on this tour, and there's a section describing his pain, and he breaks the pain down into three categories using Roman numerals. Stage one is the most manageable, okay? This is when things start brewing. Stage two is uh they reach a boiling point, and at stage three they overcome Jim and he finds himself immersed. So the cycles vary in length from 24 to 48 hours. By the time he reaches the third cycle, uh his delusional system would be working overtime. He would have difficulty leaving his hotel room. Um a note in his diary reads, uh, it's all over now. What's the use of doing anything anymore? This is the uh this is like the end of the line, right? Uh during a period of the Burton Cummings tour while in Detroit, he has another diary entry that reads, A Test in the Desert, hot and cold, a maze. He notes that he found himself experiencing cycles two and three simultaneously. Alright, uh wrapping up a short tour, he goes back at home in LA when the tour is over, and he's still not eating, and it's very painful. Uh he gets lightheaded, he he's like he's like uh like pale. Uh he finally finds the strength to pick up his um his daughter, Amy, from her ice skating lesson, but his ex-wife Jill is there, and this completely throws him off. He leaves, he runs to his car, he drives to Kentucky Fried Chicken, he gorges himself with a big box of fried chicken, he vomits, and then he hears the voice in his in his head of his mom saying, I told you not to eat that. Oh my god. Now the voices are telling him to stop drumming. So um he even turns down a Barbara Streisand gig. Like, you know, everyone knows who Jim Gordon is. So, you know, someone like someone called up Jim, hey, we need you for a Barbara Streisand gig. That's probably gonna get paid, man. Is it 1976? Uh to make matters worse, much worse, um, he's receiving command hallucinations to eliminate all the weeds in the backyard area. Uh, in California, in Southern California, he lives where he has like a hill backyard, it goes into like a canyon, and that dirt is solid rock and it's full of weeds. So his his uh commands are that he needs to stop drumming and needs to pick all those weeds out of the dirt. This is March of 1976, it's really hot, it's kind of dry. So uh somehow he gets back on tour in Florida with the same Burton Cummings band, and he is uh not drinking so much as he used to. Uh he won't party with the other band members. He keeps to himself he has to he has to have uh his his stage clothes, he has to have them altered because he lost all his weight from not eating. And uh in his diary, he writes he writes Burton up all night banging on walls. So the story is that um Burton Cummings, they're partying, man. It's a band in a hotel in 1976. So Burton Cummings is rolling beer cans down the hallway and like uh trying to hit the the doors of his fellow bandmates. And uh Jim Gordon comes out of the into the hallway, hey, what the hell are you doing? And he's wearing pajamas. He has like um uh what's that guy? Uh uh sorry, what is the character? Um Pac-Not Pac-Man. Um Pop Popeye. Popeye pajamas. He has Popeye pajamas on and they're laughing at him, then he's go back, he shuts the door and goes back in. Um now he's having these like now he's acting on his uh his his voices in his in his head. Like when he has when he's getting together with his band, he'll walk by a band member and he says, What did you just say? And the the other guy's like, What? What did you just say to me? You said I'm stupid, didn't you? Like that kind of thing. And the guy's like, I don't know what the hell you're talking about. And uh, you know, the manager will come in and say, Hey, leave Jim alone. And the guys that were witnessing this like start laughing because like nothing happened, no one said anything. And Jim goes, Shut up, leave me alone! Yeah, it's it get it's getting to that level. Uh let's see. I'm gonna wrap this up. I I have to cut this in in two parts. Like this book was just so up and down, and though the whole book is like uh he didn't take this gig because with the voices. Then he took the gig and you get in a it's oh god, it's so hard. This is mental illness, man. If if you if you if ever if you ever meet anyone who's who's suffering like this, get them help. Because this is like these types just fall through the cracks, and it's just like they and you know something bad happens. Um let me just wrap this up with a with a quick little story and I will end it there. So he's doing the last part of the tour in New York, and Jim gets to go see uh Led Zeppelin live. So he's pretty stoked about that because that's his favorite band. And the tour uh ends, and he goes back home, and uh Led Zeppelin comes to LA and he gets he like he's like, Yeah, I get to see them again. But the voices say, No, you can't go. You can't go see Led Zeppelin. And and if he and if he goes against the voices, it it it becomes painful. It it becomes the the the the white heat uh torture pain. Amy has a broken leg. She's in the hospital from um a skating ice skating practice uh accident, and Jim goes to visit her, and the voices are tormenting him saying he's a horrible father, that he doesn't deserve Amy. He's that like you know this it's just one thing after another. This poor bastard, okay? So uh we're gonna stop here. This is part three. We got a whole nother part. Uh I would say the best thing to do, listen, listen to a couple of the songs I mentioned. There's some good music there. I especially that um the song with uh Renee Armand, Eric Clapton, and Jim Gordon when they when they did that song in the Eric Clapton's house. The road. Anyway, tune in for next time. I'll come back with one more punch of Jim Gordon. It's gonna get worse, alright? Just stick around. I promise we'll wrap it up and get to something else. Jim Gordon, everyone. See you next time.