Now, he said, “Sorry to wake you, Sue. Jack Jeffries got himself stabbed.”
“You’re kidding.”
“Nope.”
“Jack Jeffries,” she said. “Wow, Baker. Lamar loves his music.”
Baker restrained himself from saying what he knew: Lamar loves everyone’s music. Maybe that’s the problem.
He said, “Millions of people agree with Lamar.”
“Jack Jeffries, unbelievable,” said Sue. “Lamar’s out like a light but I’ll nudge him- oh, look, he’s waking up by himself, got that cute look- honey, it’s Baker. You’ve got to work- he’s comin’ round, I’ll make some coffee. For you, too, Baker?”
“No, thanks, had some,” Baker lied. “I’ll be by in a jif.”
Sue said, “He’s so tired- up doing our taxes. I’ll make sure his socks match.”
Baker drove his department Caprice to Lamar’s high-rise and waited on the dark street until Lamar’s whooping-crane form lurched out the front door, a paper bag dangling from one gangly arm. Lamar’s walrus moustache flared to the periphery of his bony face. His hair was flying and his eyes were half-shut.
Baker wore the unofficial Murder Squad uniform: crisp buttondown shirt, pressed chinos, shiny shoes, and a holstered semi-auto. The shirt was Oxford blue, the shoes and the gun-sack, black. His sore feet craved running shoes but he settled for crepe-soled brown Payless loafers to look professional. His Kmart preppy special shirt was broadcloth laundered spotless, the collar starched up high the way his mother had done it when he was little and they all went to church.
Lamar got in the car, groaned, pulled two bagels out of the bag, handed one to Baker, got to work on the other, filling his stash with crumbs.
Baker sped to the scene and munched, his mouth still fuzzy, not tasting much. Maybe Lamar was thinking about that when he swallowed hard and dropped the mostly uneaten bagel into the bag.
“Jack Jeffries. He’s pure LA, right? Think he came here to record?”
“Who knows?” Or cares. Baker filled his partner in on the little he knew.
Lamar said, “Guy’s not married, right?”
“I don’t follow the celebrity world, Stretch.”
“My point,” said Lamar, “is that if there’s no wife involved, maybe it won’t dud out to a stupid domestic like Chenoweth.”
“A four-day close bothers you.”
“We didn’t close squat, we took dictation.”
“You were happy at the time,” said Baker.
“It was my anniversary. I owed Sue a nice dinner. But looking back…” He shook his head. “Total dud. Like a solo that dies.”
“You prefer a sleep-destroying WhoDun,” said Baker. Thinking: I sound like a shrink.
Lamar took a long time to answer. “I don’t know what I like.”
2
John Wallace “Jack” Jeffries, a natural Irish tenor prone to baby fat and tantrums, grew up in Beverly Hills, the only child of two doctors. Alternately doted upon and ignored, Jackie, as he was known back then, attended a slew of prep schools, each of whose rules he violated at every turn. Dropping out of high school one month short of graduation, he bought a cheap guitar, taught himself a few chords and began thumbing his way eastward. Living on handouts, petty theft, and whatever chump change landed in his guitar case as he offered renditions of classic folk songs in that high, clear voice.
In 1963, at the age of twenty-three, usually drunk or high and twice treated for syphilis, he settled in Greenwich Village and attempted to insinuate himself into the folk music scene. Sitting at the feet of Pete Seeger and Phil Ochs, Zimmerman, Baez, the Farinas was educational. He had a better shot actually jamming with some of the younger lights- Crosby, Sebastian, the heavy girl with the great pipes who’d begun calling herself Cass Elliot, John Phillips who’d do a favor for anyone.
Everyone liked California Boy’s voice but his temperament was edgy, pugilistic, his lifestyle an all-you-can-smoke-snort-swallow buffet.
In 1966, having failed to snag a record deal and watching everyone else do so, Jeffries contemplated suicide, decided instead to return to California, where at least the weather was mellow. Settling in Marin, he hooked up with two struggling folkies named Denny Ziff and Mark Bolt whom he’d seen playing for not much better than chump change in an Oakland Shakey’s Pizza.
In what subsequent armies of publicists termed a “magical moment” Jeffries claimed to be munching on a double-cheese extra-large and admiring the duo, while realizing something was missing. Rising to his feet, he hopped on stage during a spirited a capella delivery of “Sloop John B” and added high harmony. The resulting melding of voices created a whole much greater than the sum of the parts and brought down the house. Word of mouth seared through the Bay Area like wildfire and the rest was music history.
The real story was that a speed-shooting promoter named Lanny Sokolow had been trying to get Ziff and Bolt past the pizza circuit for two years when he happened across a chubby, longhaired, bearded dude crooning to a giggly bevy of porn actresses at a Wesson Oil party sponsored by the O’Leary Brothers, San Francisco’s favorite adult theater tycoons. Even if Sokolow hadn’t been racing on amphetamine, that high, clear voice would’ve tweaked his ear. The fat guy sounded like an entire angels’ chorus. Hell if this wasn’t exactly what his two borderline-intelligence baritones could use.
Jack Jeffries’s response to Sokolow’s greeting and attempted power shake was, “Fuck you, man, I’m busy.”
Lanny Sokolow smiled and bided his time, stalking the fat kid, finally getting him to sit down and listen to some demos of Ziff and Bolt. Caught at a weak moment, Jeffries agreed to take in the Shakey’s show.
Now, Sokolow figured, if three edgy temperaments could coexist…
One thing about the official version was true: word of mouth was instantaneous and super-charged, nudged along by a new electric thing called folk-rock. Lanny Sokolow got his trio amplified backup and a series of freelance drummers, and booked them as opening acts at Parrish Hall and the other free venues on the Haight. Soon, The Three, as they called themselves, were opening for midsized acts, then major headliners, actually bringing in serious money.
An Oedipus Records scout listened to them lead in for Janis on a particularly good night and phoned LA. A week later, Lanny Sokolow was out of the picture, replaced by Saul Wineman who, as head man at Oedipus, rechristened the group Jeffries, Ziff and Bolt, the sequence of names determined by a coin toss (four tosses, really; each of the three demanded a turn but none was happy until Wineman stepped in).
The trio’s first three singles made Top Ten. The fourth, “My Lady Lies Sweetly,” hit Number One With A Bullet and so did the LP, Crystal Morning. Every song on the album credited the trio as writers but the real work had been done by Brill Building hacks who sold out for a flat fee and a strict nondisclosure pact.
That exposé was among the almanac of allegations listed in Lanny Sokolow’s breach-of-contract lawsuit, a marathon feast for attorneys that dragged on for six years and ultimately settled out of court, three weeks prior to Sokolow’s death from kidney disease.
Six subsequent albums were penned with some help from Saul Wineman. Four of the five went platinum, My Dark Shadows dipped to gold, and We’re Still Alive tanked. In 1982, the group broke up due to “creative differences.” Saul Wineman had moved on to movies and each of the trio had earned more than enough to live as a rich man. Residuals, though tapering each year, added cream to the coffee.