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Janis Joplin: A Biography

I gotta go on doin it the way I see it… I got no choice but to take it like I see it. Im here to have a party while Im on this earth… Im gettin it now, today. I dont even know where Im gonna be twenty years from now, so Im just gonna keep on rockin, cause if I start saving up bits and pieces of me… man, there aint gonna be nothing left for Janis. — Janis Joplin, 1967 (excerpt from David Daltons Janis) This is exactly how Janis lived her life – one big party. Her philosophy for life was centered on three things: music, sex, and drugs.

Unfortunately, most people remember Janis for mainly sex and drugs. They overlook the fact that she has been one of the most influential white women in the history of rock. Her emotion-packed, soul-baring blues rocked the nation (along with her hair-raising lifestyle) and made her the first woman to achieve the status of a full-fledged superstar. Janis was born on January 19, 1943 (the first of three children) to Seth and Dorothy Joplin in the town of Port Arthur, Texas. Her childhood was very quiet. She was involved with Girl Scouts, her church, and the library.

She took art lessons and received straight As in school. The problems started when she reached adolescence. Most of her childhood friends had moved away (Friedman 11) and Janis tried very hard to fit in with the crowds at Thomas Jefferson High. She had a weight problem and acne, which, to students in Port Arthur, was certain death for the social life. She tried everything she could to be like everyone else, but the only acknowledgement she received was the title slut (Amburn 16). She finally found acceptance with a group of three guys, Jim Langdon, Dave Moriaty, and Grant Lyons.

Jim played trombone, Dave was editor of the school paper, and Grant was a varsity football player (Amburn 20). They were a group of intellectuals that were respected in the school and when Janis joined them, no one dared harass her. They loved to party – drinking, raising hell, music, and even some sexual explorations (though none of them were ever romantically involved with one another) (Amburn 20). Jim, Grant, and Dave helped to make her high school years more bearable, but she had already started to become more and more dependent on alcohol.

The guys were a year ahead of Janis and, unfortunately, she spent her senior year alone without the comfort of protective group. The school hated her. They would call her a nigger lover, throw pennies at her in the hall, spit on her, and destroy her artwork. Her escape – music and alcohol. She loved singing, especially anything with a blues beat. Bessie Smith was her personal role model and source of inspiration. She spent hours listening to Bessie and imitating her. Odessa was another personal favourite of Janiss. Janis memorised not only words but also Odes style of delivery.

Yet, even though her voice was powerful and moving, she was too scared to sing in front of an audience. Aside from music, alcohol and drinking ruled her life. She would go across the Texas-Louisiana border to go to the local Cajun bars and drink as much as she could. She showed up to graduation drunk (Amburn 29). Enrolling at Lamar University in mid-July 1960, she proceeded to scandalise the campus (Amburn 30). Lamar was exactly like Port Arthur. No one liked her and in fall of 1960 she dropped out and ran away to Houston. She drowned her insecurities in heavy drinking and soon it led to a breakdown.

She was in and out of Port Arthur until the summer of 1961 and then enrolled in Port Arthur College. Janis dropped out of Port Arthur College four months later and, with her parents blessing and money, went to Los Angeles. She soon found her way to Venice, the once-great beatnik town, but found the beatniks had moved on and Venice was growing decrepit. Highly disappointed, she went back to Texas and during the Christmas holiday of 1961, she made her first debut as a singer at a club in Beaumont with Jimmy Simmons (a friend of Jim Langdon) accompanying on guitar (Amburn 33).

Janis was working as a waitress at a bowling alley restaurant when Tommy Stropher, a caterer, invited her to come to Austin. Austin was the hometown of the University of Texas and also the only Texas town on the beatnik map. Once there, she met Powell St. John, a short, sinewy harmonica player; Lanny Wiggins, who knew all the song by the Weavers and Woodie Guthrie; and Travis Rivers, an intellectual who looked like a lumberjack (Amburn 36). She enrolled at the university as an art major for the summer and fall semesters of 1962 and quickly made an impression on nearly all the students. Janis obviously made some wrong impressions on some of the fraternities, since they voted her Ugliest Man on Campus. ) She wore all black, went barefoot when she wanted, wore Levis to class, and carried her Autoharp with her everywhere just in case inspiration hit. Powell and Lanny Wiggins invited her to join their band, the Waller Creek Boys. They performed at a filling station-turned club called Threadgills where she sang for her beer money. It was at Threadgills that Janis met the man who would change her life – Chet Helms.

Chet Helms was a tall beatnik poet who had been hitchhiking across the country and knew everything about the folk scene from San Francisco to Cambridge (Amburn 42). When he told Janis that he needed someone to help him get rides, she was ready to go (qtd. in Amburn 43). She dropped out of college the next day and she and Chet hitchhiked all the way to San Francisco. She sang in bars to support herself, but most times she was broke and hungry. She would frequent a bar in North Beach called The Anxious Asp, a favourite lesbian hangout, and connected with a young African-American woman whom she would continue to see off and on.

After six or so weeks in San Francisco, Janis and Chet went their separate ways. One reason was that she was spending more and more time with her lesbian friends and that she moved in with a girlfriend. At this point she was addicted to methamphetamine (known to most as speed), which was still legal, and shot it intravenously. She met a waitress at the Coffee Gallery named Sunshine and formed a relationship that would last for the rest of her life. Her sex life was not exclusively limited to women or to men. This was the era of free love.

Sex with anyone and everyone was the rule. Janis, in addition to speed and alcohol, had started other drugs – mainly heroin and marijuana – and finally hit bottom in 1965. Her weight had dropped to eighty-five pounds and she was like a vegetable (Biography 2). Even singing didnt matter to her. Her friends saved up money and bought her a ticket back to Port Arthur. Janis went back home and tried to live the life of the upright, polite Texas woman, but most of the time she was just depressed. She had even tried to quit drinking. Singing was her only salvation (Biography 2).

While singing in College Station (home of Texas A&M) one evening, a man approached and told Janis that someone was looking for her to join their band. He told her (only after sleeping with her) the man looking for her was Travis Rivers and she rushed out to find him (Amburn 65). When she did find Travis, he informed her that Chet Helms was the one looking for her. Reluctantly, she agreed to go back to San Francisco. On May 30, 1966, she left with Travis and another friend for San Francisco. She arrived on June 4, 1966 just when things were beginning at the corners of Haight and Ashbury.

This current produced some very energetic, and creative music, and it brought about the abuse of some very powerful drugs (Biography 2). Chet Helms was managing a local band, Big Brother and the Holding Company, and was looking for a female singer to complete the band. Janis was exactly what he wanted. After auditioning for Big Brother (a formality), Janis realised this was exactly what she wanted. The backup of the drums, electric guitars, and bass creeped into her bones and suddenly she was set free, as if by an IV dope rush.

Shed never sung or moved her body with such abandon before (Amburn 73). Janis made a huge impact on the San Francisco music circuit. With Janis singing, Big Brother (guitarists James Gurley and Sam Andrew, bassist Peter Albin and drummer Dave Getz) rose to become one of the top three bands in San Francisco, along with The Grateful Dead and Jefferson Airplane. Janis was, at this time, drinking heavily to overcome her drug addictions, but ended up turning back to drugs. In July 1966, the group and their significant others moved to Lagunitas, a sixties Utopian commune that used to be a logging camp.

After months of practice at the commune, Big Brother signed with Mainstream Records and cut their first album, Big Brother and the Holding Company (Pearl 1). For Christmas 1966, Big Brother threw a huge party at Lagunitas to celebrate their success. They cooked up a mess of food, bought a few cases of cheap wine, and rolled a hundred joints from a big pile of grass that had been found growing in Nebraska (qtd. in Amburn 105). The Grateful Dead and Quicksilver Messenger were two of the bands in attendance.

The one performance that launched Big Brother and Janis in national recognition was the Monterey Pop Festival held in June 1967. And all things considered, it probably marked the high point of her career. She was at her optimal at Monterey Pop, giving everything she could through her singing and moving. After their success at Monterey, Big Brother broke from Mainstream Records, signed a management deal with Albert Grossman, and moved on to Columbia Records. From this point, Janis started her spiral toward the end. She began using heroin to counteract the methamphetamine and her already erratic emotions.

Around Christmas 1967, Janis discovered she was pregnant, and since her sex life encompassed many people, there are various theories pertaining to the father (Amburn 156). In January 1968, Janis celebrated her twenty-fifth birthday by getting a Mexican abortion. After the fact, she wished shed never done it. The band travelled to New York City in February 1968 to record their next album, Cheap Thrills, which was actually supposed to be titled Sex, Dope and Cheap Thrills. By this time, the band had realised that Albert and Columbia was only interested in Janis and was going to drop them.

There were major conflicts within the band and its a wonder Big Brother and Janis actually finished the LP. Heroin was becoming a bigger problem for Janis. She was shooting up as many as three times a day, but not necessarily every day. Between July 1968 and December 1969, she would have six overdoses (Amburn 175). Cheap Thrills was shipped in August 1968 and shot directly to number one on the best-seller charts and held that position for eight weeks. Soon after the release of Cheap Thrills, Janis announced she was leaving Big Brother to pursue a solo career.

Out of the four members of Big Brother, she asked only Sam Andrews (who was also hooked on heroin) to stay on with her. Sam regretted having joined the new band, the Kozmic Blues Band. No longer an equal partner… he faced a gross cut in salary as well as in prestige, and he would never adjust to his diminished status (Amburn 189). Also, with the new band, Janis lost the great sound that she had with Big Brother. Their first performance was a bust. For the first time in years, Janis received no applause, no encores. The Kozmic Blues Band never achieved the sound Janis wanted or needed.

Janis didnt really seem to care. Her alcoholism and drug addictions were beginning to affect her body and mind (Pearl 2). Doctors told her to slow down and take a vacation, yet she never did. In April, she began her European tour. While in London, she threw a party in her hotel suite after her concert. Someone brought a bunch of heroin and Sam Andrews ended up overdosing. Not too much later, Sam was fired from the band for reasons not known. In August 1969, Janis performed at Woodstock. Before her set, she entered a Portosan and cooked up a booster shot of heroin.

On her way to the stage, she alternated slugs of vodka and tequila until she was so loaded that the only way she could make it to the stage… was with three people supporting her and then literally shoving her to the microphone. To Wavy Gravy, Woodstock MC and co-ordinator of the freak-out tents, it was Janis who awakened the famous Woodtstock spirit with her simple announcement: If you have some food left, share it with your brother and sister – the person on your left and the person on your right (Amburn 225-226). She released I Got Dem Ol Kozmic Blues Again Mama! n October 1969 to mediocre reviews. In December 1969, Albert sent Janis to a physician to try to help. He put her on methadone, but did little to help the reason for her drug use – low self-esteem. Janis stayed clean for only two months, but to make up for the absence of drugs, she drank more. Since the Kozmic Blues Band had never worked out, Janis let them go at the beginning of 1970. Her next band, the Full Tilt Boogie Band, would be the ones to back Janis up on her next album, Pearl. They were professional musicians, and none of them tried to compete with her for control.

Her life had finally seemed to be getting under control. She started to kick her heroin habit, shed found a great band, and she was even talking about getting married to Seth Morgan (Pearl 2). In September 1970, Janis checked into the Landmark Motor Hotel in LA to work on her new album (Amburn 288). Unfortunately, while staying at the Landmark, Janis was thrust back into the sleaze of the drug world and started her heroin habit again. She knew she was in trouble and asked her fianc to help, but since he was and alcoholic and an addict himself, he laughed in her face.

On October 3, 1970, Janis connection dropped off enough heroin to kill a regiment (Amburn 297). The estimates of the purity of the heroin range from 50 to 80 percent. The dealer had no idea of the purity of this shipment and sold it without checking. She injected a small amount before going to the recording studio that day. It turned out to be a great day. Janis was really excited about Pearl and was looking forward to the next album. Around 1:00 AM, the Landmarks manager saw her coming back to her room alone. In her room, she cooked up a large amount of colossal calm (Amburn 298).

After shooting up, she went out to the lobby for cigarettes, talked to the manager for over a quarter of an hour then said good night and went back to her room. She had just got done stripping down to her blouse and underwear when, quick as a shotgun blast to the head, death hit her (Amburn 299). When Janis didnt show up for the recording session, her band members started to worry. She was too professional to miss a rehearsal. They found her dead at 7:30 PM October 4, 1970 – eighteen hours after she had died (Amburn 299). Pearl was released posthumously and soared to number one.

The albums hit single, Me and Bobby McGee, went to number one on the charts, also. Had Janis lived to collect Pearl royalties, she would have been a millionaire by 1971. In her short life, Janis accomplished so much. She gave women a new position in the history of rock and was the ultimate image of the sixties – wild, carefree, spirited. She opened her soul, ripped out all her emotions, handed them to the listener in hopes the listener would love her back and give her that little bit of attention she so desperately wanted.

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