A Little Bit About ...

JANIS JOPLIN

Raised in Port Arthur, an oil refinery town, that was "more louisiana than texas", Janis forged an identity out of the harsh Texas dust, the books of Jack Kerouac and the records of old blues-belters like Bessie Smith and Odetta. Her radical notions of purpose and freedom had nothing to do with what was expected from a girl from the Golden Triangle.

A non-conformist in a Republican conservative town, Janis suffered bitterly because she didnt fit in. She tried college, bragging she had attended four different institutions of higher learning, toyed with marriage, sang in a few Austin nightclubs, and auditioned for - but was rejected as a singer with the 13th floor elevators - but none of this seemed to satisfy her.

She was a closet intellectual who voraciously devoured books, although when caught in the act by an interviewer, insisted that he keep her secret vice to himself. She was also an accomplished visual artist. "I was raised in Texas, man, and i was an artist", she once saidI had all these ideas and feelings that i'd pick up in books, and my father would talk to me a out, and i'd make up poems. And man, i was the only one i'd ever met. There weren't any others." Seth Joplin, Janis' father, echoed those sentiments in an interview shortly after her death. "There were no people she could relate with, talk to ....she was one of the first revolutionary youth" in spite of this, it was also true that Janis ran with a group of people who were united in their sense of alienation and their love of the arts.

Being a maverick and an outcast contributed to her sense of pain and disclosation, but was also one of the key ingredients of her extraordinary success. However, she did find a kindred spirit in Texas expatriate and San Francisco impresario Chet Helms, whom she met in Austin while she was singing at a club. Helms convinced her one particularly tedious night in the winter of 1963 to hitchhike with him to San Francisco, a 50-hour road trip which landed Janis smack in the middle of the burgeoning Beat scene.

Janis did not make the sojourn to the West Coast so set off the first flares of revolution. "I started out in the world to be a beatnik, i wanted to do what felt right to me." She said. "I didn't want to to be an executive or a teacher just because i could do it, i didnt want to be something just to make money, i wanted to be something because it felt right to me".

After a false start, and an unfortunate run-in with amphetamines, Janis returned to Port Arthur to restore her equilibrum, and re-enrolled in college, and for a time even gave up singing. But the siren call of freedom and possibility lured her to San Francisco once again, and by the summer of 1966 she was back. This time Chet Helms introduced her to the members of Big brother and the Holding Company, the house band at the San Francisco's Avalon Ballroom, where he worked as the manager. While never having sung rock nd roll before, she introduced this free-from-psychedelic outfit to ehr brand of the blues. Together they fused together the two genres creating one of the foundations of what would later be called The San Francisco Sound.

Janis moved in with the band, and after rehearsing for afternoons on end, the band started gigging locally and developed what would become a formidable reputation that even extended as far as Chicago. The band was invited for a four week residency at the Mother Blues club in Old Town, where they were offered an unheard of $1000 per week. During their stormy tenure in the windy city, the band was offered a recording contract with the upstart Mainstream Records. IN between shows, they recorded a few cuts, with the promise of reconbening in Los Angeles to finish the record.

But before the record was even released, the band cam to national prominence after they played at 1967's Monterey International Pop Festival. They were only scheduled to perform a single afternoon show, but the reaction was so overwhelming and contract differences had prevented their being filmed, so the promoters quickly stuck them on the bill for an evening show. By the time Janis' little sling back pumps hit the back stage area , the jungle drums were beating and the myth was set into motion. Bob Dylan's manager Albert Grossman signed them on the spot.

MORE TO COME GUYS, MORE TO COME ....