Story C
Posted: Tue Oct 18, 2005 8:27 pm
STORY C ~~~ (tied for 2nd place w/story M)
411, 424, 69
Magically, in the 1960s I lived in the Chelsea Hotel.
Tragically, in October 1970 I died.
So, in ‘72 I was safe in Heaven,
As Lenny below spoke of ’67, when we were, ahem, dating.
And he did speak, sure he did. This ain't confidential. I was the whole damn explanation for one of his songs, he nailed me to the audience in Montreux in 1985.
All these years, all these numbers, but I guess you just want to know about the old 69, the notorious time we shared, that action “immoralized” in song.
Well, first I wanna tell ya’ there’s no sex up here where I live these days, let me warn y’all. Here’s my whether forecast for every one of ya’- whether we do have sex once we’re dead or whether we don’t- I can predict a long long dry period ahead . Head.
So I know what you want to know, and now you know I know, and I ain’t got no problem taking a nostalgia trip, none at all. It’s my pleasure, it sure *was* my pleasure.
What you really want to know about, what you want to hear is my take of that so-called relationship in 1967. Well, some of it anyway. Of course, you don’t want to know if I ever knocked on his damn door to borrow a cup of sugar, or if he ever brought my groceries in. And I can you tell for free he never took me home to meet his folk, “mum, dad, this is JJ, she sings the blues”. “Come in sweetheart, would you like some chicken soup?”. None of that shit happened.
In 1967 that man paid me sweet, sweet attention. And I made him stand to attention, know what I mean?
It wasn’t just that unmade bed,
we did it on the floor,
against the door,
3 times and more,
he left me raw
and I left him sore
Boy, I just gotta tell ya’ how I laughed when he wrote that Tower Of Song track, I don’t know about a golden voice but he sure had the gift of a golden tongue. Can I say that, are you shocked? Sue me.
We didn’t care in those days, if it moved then fuck it. You seriously think I couldn’t tell the difference between good ol’ Kris Kristofferson and Leonard Cohen. I don’t regret a second. Leonard called me “pretty lady” when we spoke in the elevator. As our Brit cousins would say he gave me a “lift in the lift”. My spirits rose. He didn’t seduce me and I didn’t seduce him, it was what we both wanted and , tell you the truth, what we both needed. Don’t swallow all the image, he weren’t always gentle, but he sure was always a Gentleman. (And you know a Gentleman swallows all, and a Lady swallows all as well.)
Anyway, those were the reasons and that was New York.
But, Lenny, I want to tell him one thing. That bit about us being ugly, that’s the only downer in my book. It never mattered then. I never thought about it that way. I’m not saying that, objectively, you’re wrong but we were hot, everyone in that place was hot. The scene was alive and yes we had the music.
And our secrets, our in-jokes in 1967, he can’t have forgotten them! I know he heard me along the corridor, when I was rehearsing. I had just started out singing with Big Brother and the Holding Company. Our first album, and that track “Down On Me” and my fans thought it was a real bluesy moan, even the rest of the group thought that too! They didn’t know any better.
“Looks like everybody in this whole world is down on me”. Ha ha, but I bet he realised what that song was really about, he was the smart one, “down on me, Lenny, you went down on me”, repeat, chorus, repeat.
Hell, we were good, we were great! And we were ordinary. It was way bigger than it was and it was way smaller also. It was better than everything else I ever did and not as good as anything else I ever did. I’m glad we did it and who cares. We are talking so long ago now. My memory ain’t getting any better.
I checked out my biog. the other day and at first glance I thought they had called me an “unusually pure heroine” but nah they were just describing the dose of H that did me in. Can you believe it, it’s 35 years ago that happened. I can’t tell you I’m sorry, I can’t tell you I cry for what could have been. I lived my life to the full, all bloody 27 years of it. And a little part included Mr. Leonard Cohen and I’ve tried to tell you what it was like living next to him at the Chelsea. I hope you found it interesting, Goddamn it, what the hell am I going to do with the prize for this story, if I win.
I ain’t exaggerated and I ain’t fabricated, I’ve tried to tell it how it was. He laid on me, I laid on him, now I’m laying it on you.
Now, to the folks reading this, I need your help. Will ya' send a message from me, to Lenny, say to him “hey! and good luck with your current troubles, you’ve been let down big time. Well, it seems to me that way. I wanted to ask a lawyer what he thought your chances were but I couldn’t find a damn single one up here. Ha, ha, ha, get outta here! Sorry, friend”.
Yeah, I remember you well in the Chelsea Hotel, that's all, I don't even think of you that often.
See you later, “won’t be too long ‘til you’re coming” ( that was your catch-phrase back then, wasn’t it).
Yours in eternal Rock and Roll,
Janis.
411, 424, 69
Magically, in the 1960s I lived in the Chelsea Hotel.
Tragically, in October 1970 I died.
So, in ‘72 I was safe in Heaven,
As Lenny below spoke of ’67, when we were, ahem, dating.
And he did speak, sure he did. This ain't confidential. I was the whole damn explanation for one of his songs, he nailed me to the audience in Montreux in 1985.
All these years, all these numbers, but I guess you just want to know about the old 69, the notorious time we shared, that action “immoralized” in song.
Well, first I wanna tell ya’ there’s no sex up here where I live these days, let me warn y’all. Here’s my whether forecast for every one of ya’- whether we do have sex once we’re dead or whether we don’t- I can predict a long long dry period ahead . Head.
So I know what you want to know, and now you know I know, and I ain’t got no problem taking a nostalgia trip, none at all. It’s my pleasure, it sure *was* my pleasure.
What you really want to know about, what you want to hear is my take of that so-called relationship in 1967. Well, some of it anyway. Of course, you don’t want to know if I ever knocked on his damn door to borrow a cup of sugar, or if he ever brought my groceries in. And I can you tell for free he never took me home to meet his folk, “mum, dad, this is JJ, she sings the blues”. “Come in sweetheart, would you like some chicken soup?”. None of that shit happened.
In 1967 that man paid me sweet, sweet attention. And I made him stand to attention, know what I mean?
It wasn’t just that unmade bed,
we did it on the floor,
against the door,
3 times and more,
he left me raw
and I left him sore
Boy, I just gotta tell ya’ how I laughed when he wrote that Tower Of Song track, I don’t know about a golden voice but he sure had the gift of a golden tongue. Can I say that, are you shocked? Sue me.
We didn’t care in those days, if it moved then fuck it. You seriously think I couldn’t tell the difference between good ol’ Kris Kristofferson and Leonard Cohen. I don’t regret a second. Leonard called me “pretty lady” when we spoke in the elevator. As our Brit cousins would say he gave me a “lift in the lift”. My spirits rose. He didn’t seduce me and I didn’t seduce him, it was what we both wanted and , tell you the truth, what we both needed. Don’t swallow all the image, he weren’t always gentle, but he sure was always a Gentleman. (And you know a Gentleman swallows all, and a Lady swallows all as well.)
Anyway, those were the reasons and that was New York.
But, Lenny, I want to tell him one thing. That bit about us being ugly, that’s the only downer in my book. It never mattered then. I never thought about it that way. I’m not saying that, objectively, you’re wrong but we were hot, everyone in that place was hot. The scene was alive and yes we had the music.
And our secrets, our in-jokes in 1967, he can’t have forgotten them! I know he heard me along the corridor, when I was rehearsing. I had just started out singing with Big Brother and the Holding Company. Our first album, and that track “Down On Me” and my fans thought it was a real bluesy moan, even the rest of the group thought that too! They didn’t know any better.
“Looks like everybody in this whole world is down on me”. Ha ha, but I bet he realised what that song was really about, he was the smart one, “down on me, Lenny, you went down on me”, repeat, chorus, repeat.
Hell, we were good, we were great! And we were ordinary. It was way bigger than it was and it was way smaller also. It was better than everything else I ever did and not as good as anything else I ever did. I’m glad we did it and who cares. We are talking so long ago now. My memory ain’t getting any better.
I checked out my biog. the other day and at first glance I thought they had called me an “unusually pure heroine” but nah they were just describing the dose of H that did me in. Can you believe it, it’s 35 years ago that happened. I can’t tell you I’m sorry, I can’t tell you I cry for what could have been. I lived my life to the full, all bloody 27 years of it. And a little part included Mr. Leonard Cohen and I’ve tried to tell you what it was like living next to him at the Chelsea. I hope you found it interesting, Goddamn it, what the hell am I going to do with the prize for this story, if I win.
I ain’t exaggerated and I ain’t fabricated, I’ve tried to tell it how it was. He laid on me, I laid on him, now I’m laying it on you.
Now, to the folks reading this, I need your help. Will ya' send a message from me, to Lenny, say to him “hey! and good luck with your current troubles, you’ve been let down big time. Well, it seems to me that way. I wanted to ask a lawyer what he thought your chances were but I couldn’t find a damn single one up here. Ha, ha, ha, get outta here! Sorry, friend”.
Yeah, I remember you well in the Chelsea Hotel, that's all, I don't even think of you that often.
See you later, “won’t be too long ‘til you’re coming” ( that was your catch-phrase back then, wasn’t it).
Yours in eternal Rock and Roll,
Janis.
!