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Jeff Moehlis: Kris Kristofferson Sings from the Heart at Granada
Kris Kristofferson had quite a journey on his way to making it as a songwriter. We was a boxer, flew helicopters with the U.S. Army, was a Rhodes scholar who studied literature at the University of Oxford and, after volunteering to fight in the Vietnam War, was instead assigned to teach English literature at West Point.
But he passed on that and moved to Nashville to become a songwriter, where he struggled for years while working as a janitor at Columbia Studios — catching glimpses, for example, of Bob Dylan’s classic 1966 album Blonde on Blonde being recorded.
He and his songwriting eventually caught Johnny Cash’s attention when Kristofferson landed a helicopter (uninvited) in Cash’s yard, and refused to leave until Cash listened to his hangover song “Sunday Morning Coming Down.” Cash subsequently recorded this, which won the Country Music Association award for Song of the Year in 1970. Kristofferson was suddenly one of the hottest people in country music. (He also became one of the top actors in the 1970s, but that’s another story.)
Of course, another notable cover version of one of Kristofferson’s songs was “Me and Bobby McGee” by Janis Joplin, who was dating Kristofferson toward the end of her life. Her definitive version, which didn’t come out or even get heard by Kristofferson until after she died, became a No. 1 smash in 1971.
On Friday night, the dressed-in-black Kristofferson treated The Granada to stripped-down arrangements — just him on acoustic guitar and a bit of harmonica — of these and other songs from his overflowing songbook. It sounded great!
Kristofferson even joked, “The acoustics are so good in here. I can hear what you’re thinking. So be careful.”
Kristofferson drew heavily from his early compositions, with 10 songs from his 1970 essential-listening debut album, Kristofferson (re-released in 1971 as Me and Bobby McGee), four from 1971’s classic follow-up The Silver Tongued Devil and I, including the title song — which he joked that his son, when he was 5 years old, said was “not a good song. You’re trying to blame your mistakes on somebody else” — and the biting tribute to Cash, “The Pilgrim-Chapter 33,” plus 1972’s hippie-ish “Jesus Was a Capricorn.”
His latest album, 2009’s Closer to the Bone, also was well-represented by the title song, “From Here to Forever,” “Love Don’t Live Here Anymore” and “Sister Sinead.” The latter is a response to Sinead O’Connor’s controversial performance on Saturday Night Live in which she ripped up a photo of Pope John Paul II.
One might recall that shortly after this incident, when O’Connor was booed offstage at Dylan’s 30th anniversary concert, it was Kristofferson who offered her comfort. In the song, Kristofferson sings, “Maybe she’s crazy and maybe she ain’t / But so was Picasso and so were the saints.”
The rather sparse accompaniment by Kristofferson on guitar put the focus squarely on his lyrics. This is certainly not a bad thing, as Kristofferson is a master of using clever, evocative wordplay to tell a story through his songs. How can you go wrong with lyrics such as the following, from “To Beat The Devil”: “I ain’t sayin’ I beat the Devil, but I drank his beer for nothing, and then I stole his song.” There were a few welcome embellishments, such as “Feelin’ good was good enough for me — and Janis” in “Me and Bobby McGee,” and “I wound up in jail to spend the night — true story” in the wildly amusing “Best of All Possible Worlds.”
Perhaps not surprisingly, the “left of liberal” Kristofferson also touched on politics. The first song of the evening, “Shipwrecked in the Eighties,” with lyrics such as “when they prove something wrong you’ve believed for so long, you’ll go crazy,” was dedicated midsong to the “veterans of the war in Iraq who are opposing the war in Iraq.” During “Nobody Wins,” he amusingly claimed that “George Bush was singing this song with Dick Cheney” in the shower.
It was good to see that the 73-year-old Kristofferson seemed to enjoy performing songs he already has sang countless times. To quote his song “The Heart”: “Every song is sweeter when you sing it from the heart.”
Well, it was a sweet concert.
Setlist
Set 1
Shipwrecked in the Eighties
Closer to the Bone
From Here To Forever
Darby’s Castle
Me and Bobby McGee
Best of All Possible Worlds
Here Comes That Rainbow Again
The Junkie and The Juicehead, Minus Me
Help Me Make It Through The Night
Casey’s Last Ride
Nobody Wins
Love Don’t Live Here Anymore
The Heart
Loving Her Was Easier (Than Anything I’ll Ever Do Again)
Set 2
Jesus Was a Capricorn
Come Sundown
Duvalier’s Dream
Just the Other Side of Nowhere
Jody and the Kid
The Pilgrim — Chapter 33
To Beat The Devil
Love Is The Way
Sister Sinead
The Promise
Final Attraction
Sunday Mornin’ Comin’ Down
The Silver Tongued Devil And I
For The Good Times
Encore
A Moment of Forever
Please Don’t Tell Me How The Story Ends
— Noozhawk contributor Jeff Moehlis is an associate professor of mechanical engineering at UCSB.
Comments
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» on 01.20.10 @ 10:28 AM
What an icon! How many 73 year old tall, gifted, handsome (with a headful of beautiful hair), intelligent, healthy gentlemen can still rock on like Kris kan! I was mesmerized through out the show. It doesn’t get much better than box seats in the renovated Granada. Thank you dear beloved former madame mayor, Harriett Miller; may you rest in peace.
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