HIGH
STRUNG
A
Memoir: The Five Americans
The Apopalypse: Life After Pop
Michael
Rabon was
always the epitome of Jerry West to me--- squeaky clean and
All-American--- the guy next door who you wish would marry your
sister--- the guy you wanted to look like, to emulate. He lived
the life all of us would-be musicians wanted--- an Oklahoma-Texas
Beach Boys kind of life complete with go-go girls and money and
the kind of attitude which could even in the worst situation turn
lemons into lemonade. You could tell it every time you looked at
any picture of The
Five Americans,
the pose a reflection of how good life was, the smiles proof. My
favorite memory of them was a 1966 trip down I-5 in a convertible
sports car with a friend, wind in the hair and smiles all around,
the radio turned to KASH Radio, 1600 on your AM dial, playing the
best music in the entire Willamette Valley and, as far as we were
concerned, the world. The Grass Roots' Ballad
of a Thin Man still
hung on after a few months on the playlist; there was this new
song by a folk rock group out of L.A. making waves in California,
and why not being's how it was titled California
Dreaming';
and there was a rockin' tune , I
See the Light,
by
that
band out of Texas, given new life nationally through a
distribution agreement worked out between their label, Abnak
Records, and Hanna-Barbera (the cartoon giant) which hoped to
diversify. For four teens, life could not have been better,
especially when The
Five Americans kicked
it into overdrive with that screaming Farfisa organ and monster
Wailers-like
guitar break (that would be The
Fabulous
Wailers,
my young friends, and not the later reggae band of the same name).
It was two minutes of teen frenzy, at least as intense as the teen
spirit which was to sweep the Pacific Northwest and then the world
decades later. It was Spring, our lives were in front of us and
life was good.
I thought it was good for The Five Americans, too. Little did I know. The Five Americans, it appears, had made the deal with the devil. At a time when the legalities which controlled the music industry were vague, at best--- indeed, at a time when the Texas legal system was at its bigoted and politically controlled strongest--- they hopped into bed with the devil himself. Himself in this case was the financial head of Abnak Records, John Howard Abdnor Sr. Without giving anything away, let us say that Rabon's views on life and music was as far away from Abdnor's as possible--- beyond the making hit records part, anyway. From my perspective, Abdnor was an editorial cartoonist's dream, had the music industry had such a thing. I had heard about these kinds of guys over the years, but brushed it off assuming that it couldn't possibly be. Evidently, I was wrong. I can tell you how I feel about Abdnor and his like in his own words--- “Fuck 'em and feed 'em fish heads.”
This book is not all Five Americans. Rabon gives us the dreams of childhood, the love of music and the American Dream before the dream turned bad. He gives us the nightmare of living but not living after the dissolution of the band--- the drug addiction and hopelessness and the tragedies which seemed to follow him. If anyone was Joe Btfsplk (a reference to the comic character plagued by bad luck, courtesy of the Li'l Abner comic strips), it was Michael Rabon.
While this book is not technically perfect, Rabon machine guns us through the good and the bad with a flair that makes us overlook the occasional misspellings and confusing timelines. This is not an objective treatise on the record business. This is personal! So personal that I was a bit surprised at Rabon's candor. The behind the scenes drug use can be a bit off-putting for some as can the occasional references toward scenes of a, shall we say, sexual nature. I'm sure Rabon thought twice about including those because they certainly do not make him look glorified in any way, but by the time you reach the end you know that he had to include them. If he wanted this book to have any credibility at all. My take is that it does and then some.
Music freaks, especially those who lived and/or loved the sixties, are going to find this a treasure. This is a very personal look at the music, the musicians and the record business before it became the behemoth, crumbling though it may now be, we recognize. This is also an honest and obviously painful look back at the consequences of a life gone very wrong. Will Michael Rabon survive to write another song? Will The Five Americans remain the darlings of AM radio? Will the greedy John Abdnor Sr. suck the life and breath out of the musical business itself? Tune in next week, kids, and tell your mother and father to tune in too.
An aside: Michael Rabon, besides authoring this fascinating tome, has also written a book about basic training (that's something many of us had to do back in the days of Viet Nam, kiddies) which, according to my good friend Rick Benedict, brings the nightmare back to life. It is truth-based fiction, but who cares? If you were in the Army back then or if you just want a glimpse of just how far the military can bend your head, I suggest you look into it as well. Both books are available at Amazon.com. Here are the links:
High Strung: The Five Americans--- A Memoir
Frank. O Gutch Jr.
