Beefheart

I’ve refrained so far from writing anything in tribute to one of my musical heroes. Mostly, I think, because the plethora of tributes that were paid to him in the weeks after his death seemed to have all bases covered and I felt that what I had to add was not important. I mean, who really gives a toss about what a man in his mid-forties writes on a blog? Not me, that’s for sure.

However, the passing of Don Van Vliet, alias Captain Beefheart, on 17 December 2010 needs to be marked by me in some small way, if only in recognition of the large part he has played in my musical life since I first heard him on the radio back in 1984.

The man responsible for my introduction to Beefheart was the DJ John Peel (in fact I would say that a great deal of my musical taste is either directly or indirectly attributable to the influence of this great man). Back in those days I was in the habit of taping Peel’s two hour show on a battered BASF C120 (ask your grandad) and then filleting the show, transferring the tunes that I liked onto numerous C90s, which I would then play to death.

I remember it very clearly. It was a Thursday night (although it could have been a Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday, really. I make all this shit up as I go along) and I was in bed, listening to the radio, with my trusty C120 rolling again. Peel was playing his usual wildly eclectic mix of tunes – in fact the shows were so varied, I am sure that the only person who enjoyed everything he played was Peel himself – and I was drifting into pre-snooze mode, secure in the knowledge that the whole show would be preserved come morning.

My reverie was rudely interrupted, however, by a tune that was quite unlike almost anything I had heard before. I was wide awake in an instant. Fuck me, what is this?

This was “Circumstances” by Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band. It’s the second tune in the Youtube clip linked below, wind forward 2 minutes and 50 seconds and you’ll get the gist:

So this tune gets transferred to another tape, and is played constantly. I mean it was an obsession. Who was his Beefheart bloke and why did this tune have such a visceral effect on me? I was hooked. I couldn’t get bored with it. Still can’t, as a matter of fact.

Days pass and on a fine Saturday evening I find myself at some kind of gathering at someone’s house. I don’t remember whose house it was, although I’m sure I went there with friends, and I certainly left in a far more inebriated state than the one in which I arrived. None of this is important. What is important is that someone in that house decided to play “Circumstances” by Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band. At volume. Bloody hell it’s that tune again.

And so it began. Later that year I got my first full-time job in an HMV shop and vigorously utilized the generous staff discount, often to the detriment of food. I bought all the Beefheart records I could lay my hands on and immersed myself in them. From the off-kilter rhythm and blues of “Safe As Milk” through to the career epitaph “Ice Cream For Crow”. And I loved all of it, even the bad stuff.

Beefheart’s music has a singular quality about it. Plenty of people have been influenced by him, but no-one, and I do mean no-one, sounds quite like him.

Anyway, I’m not going to bang on too much, as writers better (or better paid) than me have already showered fulsome and fully deserved praise onto The Captain since he died last year. I just wanted to express my gratitude to a man who enriched my life, although I know that 600 or so words cannot do him justice.

(As I write this, I can hear Katy Perry’s “California Gurls” coming from my nine year old daughter’s bedroom).