Resting after having a much dreaded and overly delayed colonoscopy. I’m okay, nothing life-altering happened during my 30 minute Propofol nap—which is my biggest fear about the procedure: coming back to consciousness and being told that life as I know it is going to be very different. As in oncologists and surgeries and all that stuff. Colostomy bags.
People deal with it. Maybe some of you have done so. People get through it or they don’t, and I’m not immune to any of the outcomes that lurk in the shadows, swatting at us like the nuisances we are. But that particular outcome missed me this time, and I’m grateful to buzz around another day, intact.
Um, tomorrow/today not sure when I’m sending this dispatch out…I’ll be pretending to be a royalist or a monarchist or whatever the term is…and attending a coronation ceremony for King Charles. And the reason is…because the British Embassy is also hosting citizenship ceremonies same place/same time, and I was invited. After this weekend I’ll officially be both a US and a UK citizen. I’m thrilled and only wish my mom could be here for this. I think of it as honoring her and I think of it as huge gift from her and I hope she knows I’m getting it.
So…that show I got to do last weekend in LA left so many people high and happy, it’s worth writing about.
Backstory: The gig was Glen Matlock’s, the original Sex Pistols bassist and songwriter who has stealthily kept a distinguished music career going for decades. He has a new record out and put together a band to announce it’s release. The Roxy—great venue—was booked, and a suitable band of experienced players put together. This was all managed in the days off between a run of Blondie shows—Glen plays bass for Blondie now, and he had also recruited Clem on drums, alongside former Guns n Roses’ Gilby Clarke and Steve Fishman who has played with just about every cool musician on the planet.
Billed as “Glen Matlock and Friends” it was mentioned to me that he’d inquired if I might be interested in coming up for a song. Answer: yes. Very much yes.
Here’s one thing that makes me want to show up: It took until my 60’s to have the courage to take on jobs or appearances as me—Kathy Valentine, on my own—and I’m making up for lost time. There have been countless opportunities I turned down over the years, when I was younger, in one prime or another. I was afraid, and didn’t think that was my thing—after all I didn’t want to be a front person. I’m just a band member, it’s all I’d ever wanted to be, as it were. If an invitation to do this or that came my way, I’d nearly always turn it down or ask instead if my band could do it—whatever non-Go-Gos band I had going. Not surprisingly, the offers became fewer and farther between.
Then, in the twisted logic of someone who hasn’t figured shit out yet, I got the notion in my head that interest in me was limited to me being in a band—a constraint that I’d built around myself and perpetuated for years. Sheesh.
I’m enjoying both the irony of it happening now, and the message it sends to my coming-of-aging peers: it’s possible to grow, and change and be courageous about things that once seemed unattainable, or even terrifying. All of this can happen as you are aging. That paradigm of retirement years, mid-sixties, slowing down—it’s not relevant to everyone, don’t need to take that path if you still have a longing to be, to do more.
I regret that I didn’t get here sooner. I wonder, what if? What might I have done? But then I think it all seems right somehow. I think I’m the best me I’ve ever been, so what better time to trot her out for appearances? I’ve done more Kathy Valentine appearances in my 60’s than in my entire four decades of having a music career.
The morning after, I got the candy-apple-red Challenger back to the airport where they found a dent in it. Must have happened in the Roxy parking lot. That car was a tank, with a terrible blind spot and impossible back seats. But you may recall, I was looking for a positive spin to having to drive this monster around—I found it: I figured it was very unlikely someone would hit me because they “didn’t see me coming.” There’s no way you couldn’t see me coming in this car.
Had a flight home and a same day rehearsal with Zach for our “Chance to Rock” fundraiser.
We are pictured with Cam, the kid between us, one of the kids benefiting from free music lessons through this program. Cam played “Hey Joe”-his first time to have an audience. I hope he has lots more though his life. He and his siblings were adopted by their foster parents last November and his mama testified as to how much the program was helping with those kid’s trauma. I was really proud to be a part of this and committed to a KV Scholarship Fund. It costs $3000 to give a kid in foster care a year of music lessons. You can contribute to my fund or the program directly right here!
This song, “Ride Captain, Ride” was a big radio hit when I was a kid, 11 years old, right before things got bad before they got good again. It brings me back, drapes me in melancholy remembering my childhood, the songs on the radio, the way I felt, the things I wanted and needed and it all starts to be a bit much, so I focus on the production.
Check it out, it's flawless, so clean. How it builds, how clear and defined, but each element sounds so full. It’s hard to make something sound clean and full. Clean is often thin, without body. This was produced by Richie Podolor who I had the pleasure of meeting in LA in the early days a few times, thanks to my friend Saul—Richie was producing Phil Seymour. He had a cool studio with an actual echo chamber room. I didn’t know at the time when I met him he’d produced this song, but I knew he’d done a bunch of other huge hits from those same years, “Born to be Wild” “Mama Told Me Not to Come.” I also didn’t know he was born on the same day as me, Jan 7. He died a year ago and I wish I’d told him how much those records he made were a part of my growing up. I wish I’d paid more attention to knowing him. I had no idea I’d remember him so much and not sure why—it’s like a 44 year long delayed big impression.
The rest is for paid subscribers if they want to read more about the Roxy show last week. For everyone else, thank you for reading, and I’ll send the next one on Mother’s Day. My first without my mom.
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