Today is Chris Whitley Tribute Day
November 20th, 2008 by Eric Snider in News
Chris Whitley died three years ago today. He was 45. It was unexpected, even to his diehard fans, of which I am one. I remember hearing about it and thinking “OD” — he was perilously gaunt and rumors of drug abuse swirled around him — then I was strangely relieved to find out it was lung cancer. He was a heavy smoker.
Whitley was a nomadic, uncompromising singer, songwriter and guitarist who, in my view, was an unheralded genius.
Today is Chris Whitley Tribute Day on Tampa Calling and the new CL Music website. I’m hoping to make some Whitley converts. Check out CLTV for videos of the master on stage. His Dobro playing alone is bound to blow you away.
Whitley’s first album, Living With the Law (1991) was his most successful. It had a desert blues feel, built around his acoustic slide work and haunting voice. The track “Kick the Stones” made a visceral imprint on the ’91 blockbuster movie Thelma and Louise. “Big Sky Country,” “Phone Call From Leavenworth” and other songs heralded a unique new voice that was poised for stardom.
Four years passed before Whitley released a follow-up, not exactly the best strategy for career momentum — but, as it turns out, that was just Chris being Chris.
In ’95, Whitley unleashed Din of Ecstasy, built around a thick sludge of electric guitars spraying feedback and noise. His droning voice was shoved back in the mix; the hooks were laconic, the lyrics bleak and abstract.
It was a masterpiece. I was pretty much alone in that assessment. The CD was ignored by radio and the record-buying public. A major tank job. To me it was hard to figure. The post-grunge period was in full flower, and Din was a serious helping of downcast space-blues and aggro rock that made Alice in Chains sound thoroughly pedestrian. (That may have been the crux of the album’s commercial failure.)
I know exactly one other person who has the same enthusiasm for Din of Ecstasy as I — and he happens to work under the same roof: CL marketing director Joran Oppelt. For that, I am naming him co-sponsor of Chris Whitley Tribute Day.
Much to my everlasting chagrin, I never saw Whitley perform — he didn’t tour in Florida much, and never performed in Tampa Bay — but I did chat with him once, at the South By Southwest Music Conference in, I think, ’97.
It was at a Sony party at Stubbs BBQ, and Whitley skulked around the room like an outcast. As it turned out, he pretty much was. A portion of our conversation went something like this:
Me: Chris, what happened with Din of Ecstasy? It’s a masterpiece and it stiffed. I could never figure that out.
Chris: Sony hated it. I turned it in, and pretty much everyone in the organization turned their back on it. The radio people wouldn’t push it; the publicists didn’t work it. It was doomed to failure. They wanted another Living with the Law. It was post-Nirvana. I couldn’t see doing Living with the Law redux.
Whitley released one more Sony album, Terra Incognita in 1997, and it had the whiff of compromise to it. He sort of split the difference between Law and Din.
The label ran him off after that disc, another dismal commercial failure.
Whitley went on to release 11 more solo albums, most on indie labels, and a couple of which were recorded when he had cancer. Rocket House (2001), where he messed around with electronic elements to generally good effect, came out on Dave Matthews’ ATO imprint. Perfect Day (2000) was a live-in-the-studio effort with Billy Martin and Chris Wood from Medeski, Martin & Wood.
His last recording was a fruitful collaboration with Australian singer/guitarist Jeff Lange, Dislocation Blues (released 2007). Whitley mans up on his vocals, but even so they sound forced and often feeble, which gives the performances an added poignancy.
To complement his recording career, Whitley barnstormed incessantly, playing mostly solo gigs on small stages where he would wow his audiences with a flurry of technique on guitar and Dobro. Again, I urge you to check out some of the Youtube clips on CLTV.
At a certain point, his disease forced him from the road and the stage.
Chris Whitley died quietly under hospice care. A fiercely independent, unique and ever-curious artist was gone. Not very many people viewed it as a major loss, but for us Whitley-ites, it was devastating. Still is, especially on the third anniversary of his death.
November 20th, 2008 at 1:58 pm
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November 20th, 2008 at 3:03 pm
I actually HAVE seen Chris Whitley perform. Same story, though. Austin, SXSW, 2003. Very small “industry badges only” party. Flee (WMNF) snuck me his own badge out an open window so that I could finally see my idol in the flesh. Probably about 50 people in the room and I stood three feet from Whitley the entire time. He performed on a small stage, maybe a foot off the ground in the corner of the bar. He played alone. I was frozen. Jen kept asking me if I needed a drink (this was SXSW after all) and I kept saying “No, I’m cool.”
He eventually coaxed a friend on stage to accompany him for two songs on a crappy little electric Rhodes piano that just happened to be sitting against a wall. If memory serves it was either Daniel Lanois or “Hotel Vast Horizon” producer Heiko Schramm.
In between songs, he rambled incoherently about the war, and about how we were making things so much worse. He just kept sighing into the microphone, “Just stop fighting.”
It was an unforgettable experience, and more people need to hear this man’s catalog. “Accordingly” from Dirt Floor is one of the greatest ballads ever written. EVER. It was played at my wedding. My favorite Whitley track, “Above the Din” from Din of Ecstasy.
November 20th, 2008 at 4:04 pm
Eric, thanks for the tribute. I was lucky enough to see Chris Whitley many times, the first time opening for Tom Petty in Albany, NY in the fall of 1991, and meet him a couple times, too. He was a gentle, sweet guy, interested in who you were or where you came from and genuinely grateful that you liked his music, but definitely followed by some dark unhappiness. I’ll never forget hearing him play “Automatic” on his national steel at a solo show at Fletcher’s in Baltimore a few months before Terra Incognita came out and having the hair on my arms stand up, an effect his music always had on me. The experience of getting an advance copy of Din from a record store friend in DC and listening to “Narcotic Prayer” on repeat for an entire overnight. Bruce Springsteen has ordered Living With The Law to played in the arenas before many of his shows over the past few years, and I’ve been there and heard it. Chris told me that the only musician he met who made him feel like a bashful fan was Iggy Pop. I’ve always harbored this dream of Spike Lee directing a video for “Wild Country” from Dirt Floor; I have no idea why, but I know what it should look like. Dirt Floor as a whole was so criminally overlooked: “Scrapyard Lullabye”, “Dirt Floor”, “Accordingly”? Or his work on Joe Henry’s Fuse album? Being in a Burlington, VT bar on the “Good Red Road” tour in 1992 when women in their 30s tossed bras at him like he was Tom Jones. Or the big review/profile of Whitley and Din in the New York Times, and the Hendrix comparisons. I’m still surprised that “Big Sky Country” hasn’t been covered by a male or female soul singer yet to become a big hit. I don’t know. I have a picture of him and me, his cds, an autographed box of Marlboros, good memories and the lingering sadness of his early death and his being overlooked. Thanks for bringing him back today.
November 20th, 2008 at 5:02 pm
Whitley remains a personal hero, from his early stuff to Reiter In. Still can’t quite believe he’s gone… Thanks for this post.
November 20th, 2008 at 5:52 pm
I, too, am marking this anniversary with some sadness and regret, along with a whole heaping pile of LOUD Chris Whitley on the stereo. No better way to celebrate the man’s career than with his music!
I saw him live in Calgary in 1991. He played the show with a band and it was quite enjoyable, but by far the highlight was Phone Call From Leavenworth, during which he dismissed the band, the lights went low, the spotlight focused on him… and he blew us away with that song. Never in my wildest dreams could I have imagined being so transfixed by just one guy on a guitar with a footboard!
I know it’s an overused, trite thing to say, but Chris Whitley really was utterly unique – and while the world is poorer for his passing, we are all richer for having known at least some small part of him.
RIP Chris – and all my best to Trixie and Dan et al
November 24th, 2008 at 1:37 pm
Thank you Eric.
YOU were the guy that handed me the copy of “din” that day in the office at JAM Magazine and said “I think you’ll like this”.
That sent me DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE, did it not?
Later that year, I was at CMJ, and was working with an artist named Dan Zanes.
After Dan’s set, he came out and said “I have a special surprise for you all, ladies and gentlemen CHRIS WHITLEY”
I nearly fell off my barstool.
There were about 14 people there, since Clive Davis had given everyone from BMG passes to the Annie Lennox show, I was the only record company “geek” there.
Chris came up, with three Nationals, a female guitar tech who kept lighting cigs and incense, and tunes his guitars as he thrashed them SOUNDLY.
It was like time had stopped for me. I had heard “din”, but had NO IDEA that he could do all this stuff solo.
Afterwards, he came up and sat next to me at the bar.
I nervously asked if I could buy him a beer. It was the start of something beautiful that continues to this day.
And thankfully Eric, you were a guy who always “got it” when it came to Chris. It is a bond that you and I share, and so do a lot of others.
RIP dust brother…..on the good red road…..my secret jesus.
November 25th, 2008 at 12:20 pm
Thanks for this, Eric. Still miss him.
November 29th, 2008 at 4:34 am
I remember just having survived Hurricane Wilma in South Florida when I heard from a mutual friend that Chris was sick and then soon after that he passed away. That was a bad year for me.
I am thrilled though to see there are other Floridian fans. I know he didn’t tour here much hwew but I was fortunate enough to see him in many other states (lost count) in the country and make some of the best friends ever through Chris…. (who I know will remain life long friends)
Watching him perform live still remains on the top 3 best things ever for me. Especially the last time I saw him perform in my living room for a friend who had cancer. She survived but sadly Chris did not.
I also remember the first time I ever heard him when I was just a kid in school back in 91. I’ve never been the same since.
Great to see some of the old familiars posting on this thread too ;-)
Peace
Erin Elizabeth