I REALIZE THIS NEXT story goes back sometime before the
showcase so let’s back up a bit. It must have been in March or April of 1974
when Blair and Stephen had wandered into the Record Plant sweet talking
the attractive blonde girl at the front desk into letting them past the iron-clad
wooden door. This door, once entered, you were among the elite musicians and
recording artists of the day. It was nirvana (not the grunge band) a rock and
roll Valhalla. While wandering through the sacred halls, they saw a man a few
years older working in the dubbing room with the door open editing tape with a
razor blade, very old school. They stood by the door waiting for him to notice
them and when he finally did they went into their well-rehearsed rap how they
had a band that sounded like The Beatles blah, blah, blah.
Bob Merritt, a second engineer, must have
been intrigued by this daring duo who had the chutzpah to finagle their way
past the guard dog at the front desk and approach a perfect stranger like they
had known them all their lives. But that was Blair’s smooth style and
Stephen could also talk a good show. He invited them back again, so I guess it
worked.
A few days later, we heard that John Lennon
was producing an album with Harry Nilsson which would later be called Pussycats.
As fate would have it, I was at the Rainbow one night with this young Russian
girl named Ilana when Stephen burst downstairs and said, “Jimmy you won't
believe who is upstairs in the Crow’s Nest and wants to meet you.” I looked at
him with inquisitive eyes. “OK, I give up, who?” “John Lennon, that's who.”
“Shut up!”
“No really, man. I told
him all about you, how you were a genius songwriter and he said he wants to
meet you.” I couldn't take the girl, or more honestly, I didn't want her to
cramp my style. If I was really going to meet John Lennon I had to be totally
focused, not having to deal with an awkward first date scenario, so I rushed Ilana
home to her apartment and drove like a madman the six or seven blocks back to ”The
Bow” and found a parking space right down the street. No easy task. Walking
with a purpose up the driveway into the parking lot, I waved to Tony at the
door, and weaved my way through the “moving stars" then leapt up the swirling
carpeted stairway to the room at the top –the Crow’s Nest. Turk recognized me
and opened the door and then I saw. It was him. Over in a corner booth below a
bunch of pipes hanging from the ceiling was John Lennon. What was I going to
say to this man who I have idolized since I was twelve years old and saw him on
the Ed Sullivan show? The butterflies in my stomach were running a demolition
derby. This was the period in his life when John had separated from Yoko and
was hanging out with Mae Pang, his personal secretary and Yoko's friend and it
was Yoko who encouraged the relationship between the two, thinking at least
John would have someone to lookout for him.
He was sitting having a
drink with some business manager and a few other people I didn't recognize. Now
Stephen approached Mr. Lennon and said, “Hi John, Is there anything you need,
or anything I can do for you?” John quipped, "You can buy my new album.” I
was thinking, oh great, he really laid into Stephen what is he going to do to
me? I stepped forward feeling like the cowardly lion approaching the great and
powerful Oz. “John", Stephen said, “This is the songwriter I was telling
you about. Mr. John Lennon, please met Mr. James Wesley Haymer, from one genius
to another.” How could he set me up like that? There was no way I could ever
come close to the sheer brilliance of this icon of a man twelve years my senior
who just happened to be the leader of the biggest and best pop group ever, and
there he was seated not more than two feet in front of me! I thought he was
going to cut me a new one, instead he extended his thin, pale right hand to me,
looked me dead in the eye and said. “It really a pleasure to meet you, your
friend has some very nice things to say about you.” I was stunned but managed
to reply, “It is an honor to meet you, Mr. Lennon, but I must confess I don't
know whether to praise or curse you, if it wasn't for you, I would have never
wanted to be a musician in the first place.” He just smiled and said. “Oh, I'm
sure you'll do alright.” While this was happening, I could see Stephen out of
the corner of my eye doing pull-ups on the pipes like a scene out of A Hard Day’s
Night. I ignored his antics instead savoring the magic of that special
night.
A few evenings later it had rained
heavily leaving puddles everywhere in the potholes of the Rainbow parking lot.
I am not sure where Blair was that particular night, probably with
Cynthia, his new blonde girlfriend with the yellow Corvette, but what was to
happen next was meant to be, kismet, fate. Stephen and I were penniless
and trying to figure out what to do that night when I noticed there was a piece
of paper that looked like a dollar bill in one of the puddles some poor drunk
patron must have dropped. It was a five-dollar bill. We looked at each other
and smiled. The next thing I knew we were in a taxi headed back down to the
Plant.
That night in studio B,
Lennon was doing a mix of the Jimmy Cliff song, Many Rivers To Cross
being performed by Harry Nilsson. Stephen and I listened in the shadows and
when the music stopped we opened the heavy wooden door and walked in. The music
started up again with nobody seeming to notice us. Lennon was seated in the
main chair behind the console and Harry next to him on the left. I sat down on
the floor not more than five feet from Lennon’s right. The music stopped yet
again, he turned toward me, and shot me a cold dark stare. “Who the fuck are
you?” he asked not so politely. “It's me, Jimmy. I met you the other night at
the Rainbow...” John scrutinized me for a few seconds which seemed like minutes,
“Oh yeah, you’re cool.” I was cool? John Lennon said I was fucking cool! I
stayed there listening to that song all night without uttering another word
afraid that I might say or do something to offend, which sometimes, even now, I
tend to do. How about that! Two John Lennon meetings in one week. That is hard
to top.
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