Saturday 25 August 2012

Scott McKenzie again

My old friend, the Sage of Tiverton, surprised me with the sad news that Scott McKenzie died last week. As my birthday post from his 70th attracted a ridiculous number of hits for no obvious reasons, I'll repost it. Poor Scott died of Guillaine-Barre syndrome. There's an obit here.
  I like the image of Scott walking around barefoot in Joshua Tree, talking to plants. Pretty standard behaviour in Joshua Tree, I imagine. Scott also used to talk to, and hang around with, that self-destructive genius Gram Parsons, with whom he wrote songs (never recorded), doodled on the guitar and got drunk.
 In his later years, McKenzie wrote this rather lovely sketch of himself: 'Reclusive septuagenarian. I live with a 15 year old cat named Spider in Silverlake, which is in Los Angeles. I spend lots of time on the internet, mainly researching all sorts of things - I can't recall how I spent my time before Google. I was a professional singer for years, had a 1967 hit called "If You're Going to San Francisco, Be Sure to Wear Some Flowers in Your Hair". I sang at The Monterey Pop Festival. I've lived In New York City; Laurel Canyon; San Francisco; Virginia Beach. I cherish my friends, many of whom have passed on. This trend shows no signs of abating.'

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