Steve Katz
"Blood, Sweat, and My Rock 'n' Roll Years"
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Book review by Roger Zee (04/30/21)
Rock Star Steve Katz and I come from very similar backgrounds. As Jewish nerds who grew up in Brooklyn, Queens, and Long Island, we made a lot of the same mistakes. Adventurers both, we could never sustain any success we achieved. Always dissatisfied and thirsting for more! And once we actually got what we looked for, sadly realized we liked things better before. That goes for beautiful women, bands, big time gigs, and fame. Nothing ever really turns out like we expect. But there's always tomorrow! ;)
I lucked out spending my teenage years growing up in Great Neck, Long Island on a street with three Jewish temples and a Catholic church across town. Of course I didn't appreciate it at the time, LOL! Every week or so, these places would throw teenage dances complete with local Junior and Senior High School Rock bands. These schoolmate groups would always perform the latest hits by The Doors, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Turtles, The Grassroots, Cream, Jimi Hendrix, Mountain, etc. But I loved it most when when they played Blues Project tunes like "No Time Like The Right Time," "Flute Thing," "Wake Me Shake Me," "I Can't Keep from Crying," and especially "Steve's Song." What teenage boy doesn't love to slow dance? ;-)
Great Neck spawned its fair share of successful musicians -- bassists Jeff Berlin, Doug Yule, and Seth Kimball; guitarists Dean Bailen and Mitch Weissman; and multi-instrumentalist Neil Rosengarden. I yearned to achieve similar success but never managed to make the big-time. I slowly came to realize that musical success relies half on talent and the rest on personality. Steve Katz knows how to get along. I found myself more suited to the solitary professions of coding and writing. :-||
At Brandeis University, I found little trouble attracting good-looking women. But as with Katz, the trouble always lay in keeping them. "Child Is Father to Man" morphed into my go-to "I'm depressed record!" Wore it out... The writers on that album certainly didn't appear to fare well with women either! Eventually, like Katz, I found it easier to go all Rock 'n' Roll and shift my goal to "one and done." Despite our fuzzy, "try-buy" intentions, Katz and I both still managed to wreak a lot of collateral damage. But no matter the constant turn over, we always managed to find someone new. Katz slept with, among others, Mimi Farina, Joni Mitchell, and Jim Morrison's girlfriend, Pamela Courson :-D
Like Mr. Katz, I too spent a lot of time hanging and playing in Washington Square Park and Greenwich Village, just a few years later. He lived on Jane Street while I slept in a recording studio, Sorcerer Sound, on Mercer Street in Soho and later in Chelsea right behind the infamous Chelsea Hotel. We both saw plenty of Blues men Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee. Though too young to hang with Dylan, Dave Van Ronk, and that generation of Folk singers, I witnessed the Eighties songbirds -- Shawn Colvin, Suzanne Vega, Lucy Kaplansky as well as The Smithereens. Luckily, I did get to jam with Eric Anderson on a number of occasions. And I also played many of the same remaining clubs around Bleecker Street such as Folk City, The Dugout, Kenny's Castaways, The Bitter End, Tramps, The Bottom Line, The Rock 'n' Roll Cafe, etc. :-}
Someone once told me, "Playing in a band's like being married to four people at the same time." And we all know how tough it gets with just one spouse! With both the Blues Project and Blood, Sweat, and Tears, Al Kooper appeared to play the role of "spoiler" according to Katz. They fought just like two brothers. Katz claimed Kooper couldn't sing and Kooper claimed Katz couldn't play guitar! I actually met Mr. Kooper in the Seventies at a cool little "music industry" bar on the Upper East Side called Dr. Generosity. Needless to say, Kooper dismissed me rather abruptly. Met Dave Mason there as well. He treated me just fine. But hey, I achieved a bit of celebrity too in my day and still get some complaints about my behavior! :-O
Though Steve Katz played in two bands with Al Kooper, the latter ended up leaving both of them. Eventually, Katz threw in the towel with Kooper. He found him too selfish and greedy when it came to business and publicity. Definitely not a "win-win" player. Kooper always demanded more than his fair share of the pie. In his memoir, "View from the Bottom," Harvey Brooks echoes that opinion. :-(
Another thing Mr. Katz and I share in common. We both wrote music reviews for magazines. He published three and then abruptly quit. He loved Dr. John's first album but didn't like the first records by The Mamas and Papas and Quicksilver Messenger Service. Unfortunately, he knew and had worked alongside the latter two bands. "I kept thinking to myself how horrible I would feel if I was one of them and read a bad review from a nationally syndicated magazine. I gave them a good review and quit being a Rock critic." *)
Me, I wrote hundreds of music articles and continue to this day. But I follow one simple rule. Never print a negative review. If I don't like a person, group or their music, I just won't write the piece -- or at least only accentuate the positive, LOL!~ ;-)
When Katz first began his music career singing in the Catskills, he felt shock, dismay, even loathing at all the shmoozing that all the other performers engage in. As part of the counter-culture, The Blues Project shunned that activity. But lack of support from their record company as well as their marginal status in the industry never required them to do it. That all changed when the first BS&T album racked up disappointing sales and Al Kooper jumped ship. It forced them to campaign hard to remain on Columbia Records. D=
With the blockbuster success of their first BS&T album with David Clayton Thomas, touring morphed from a joy to sheer drudgery. Every tour stop required meet and greets with local radio station personnel and their families. Same with the promoters at pre-gig soundchecks. The constant shmoozing that originally appalled Katz now became the daily bane of his existence. Ironically, he began to yearn for the freedom and lack of BS that The Blues Project's lack of major success allowed them.
Initially ecstatic about landing a really good singer in Canadian David Clayton Thomas, the band's mood quickly went South as Thomas' true character emerged -- misogyny, pomposity, lack of personal hygiene, and most devastating of all, a love for schmaltz! Due to a felony conviction in Canada, the U.S. State Department refused to renew his visa unless BS&T undertook a tour of the USSR and Eastern Block. The trip proved unenjoyable and disastrous for their reputation. >:O
As well, over time, the band morphed into a Jazz/Fusion unit complete with lengthy horn solos and lackluster material. As the Rock disappeared, Katz found he didn't even know how to play the new songs . When the band took a residency in Las Vegas, that killed any credibility left remaining.
Immediately after David Clayton Thomas departed BS&T, Katz jumped ship as well. He soon climbed on board the music industry corporate money train and began signing and producing bands. He achieved no breakout success until he hooked up with Lou Reed, managed by his brother, and put together Reed's two biggest albums, "Rock 'n Roll Animal" and "Sally Can't Dance." Unfortunately, Katz grew to despise Reed and his drug-addicted, nasty, cruel behavior. At about that time, the world fell to questioning Reed's sexual preferences. According to Katz, he didn't care one bit. Because once Reed got deep into amphetamines, he couldn't get it up anyway! Heroin didn't help the matter much either. :-O
One more time, Steve Katz fell victim to another vocalist's dreaded "lead singer syndrome" -- acting entitled, ungrateful, and under the delusion that s/he's the greatest performer to grace the stage. When Katz finally couldn't take it anymore, he left and decided to get back into music. He helped put together the Country-Rock band, American Flyer, with Eric Kaz (Bonnie Raitt), Doug Yule (Velvet Underground, and Craig Fuller (Pure Prairie League). Though they signed with United Artists and recorded two records, the first produced by The Beatles' George Martin, the LP's failed to break out because the band never toured. The group started quarreling and eventually broke up. :'-(
More bad news... During Katz's Lou Reed and American Flyer period, he married Melissa Stoneburn, who eventually suffered a nervous break down, became a "Born Again" Christian, attempted suicide, and finally looted their joint account. Furthermore, the lawyers who negotiated their divorce left the exes flat broke.
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After working five years signing and producing Irish acts, Katz found himself completely burned out, broke, and at the end of his rope. On the day of his move to a new rental in Westchester, a few friends gathered at a pub to eat before they loaded the truck. A local woman, Alison Palmer, knew one of the helpers, and stopped at their table to say hello. And so began Katz's final and remaining romance. :-))
The key to Steve Katz's success in life? His sense of humor, ability to play nice with others, and his genius at constant re-invention -- from Rock star, journalist, record producer, record exec, to co-owner of a ceramic studio with second wife Alison Palmer. He laughs at himself now. Amazed at how he's gone from selling 28 million records worldwide to ending up "a Menorah salesman!" =^_^=
In the book intro, Mr. Katz shares, "Rock stardom, real or imagined, drives people to some pretty weird places. I'm one of the fortunate ones. I walked through that door, and for the part, stayed fairly sane." He managed to make love to some of the most beautiful and talented female Rock stars of the Sixties, tour the world, find true love, and maintain his health. Me, well I loved some very special women, managed to lose them all, fathered two wonderful and successful children, tour the lower echelon of NYC clubs, and unfortunately sacrifice my health. But now as the Pandemic fades away, watch me get back to doing what I do best -- running around. You see, "There's no time like the right time. And baby, the right time is now!" One <3
YouTube - Steve's Song - The Blues Project
©2021 Roger Zee
