Bo's Toes

Bo's Toes

When I was a boy an old man was a man that had reached the end of all useful service by 60 and was permitted to hang around, whether he wanted to or not, until his demise made room for the next old man in line to take his place on the park bench.

Forty years later, when I read that Bo Diddley was coming to town, I decided then and there and then that I'd set aside my distaste for nightclubs and go to see him. I could not believe he was still alive, much less still performing. Filed in my mental archives under  rock and roll, singer,blues, guitar, legend, his famous "da-da-da-da-da-dada"  power chord  riff was the first one that I learned.

Flash back. 1960's. It was an ideal song to learn rock and roll with. The whole song "Hey Bo Diddley" consisted of a few simple rhymes chanted behind the same "da-da-da-da-dada" guitar chord over and over ad-infinitum, or nausea, whatever your taste in music leaned to.The brilliant part about that background rhythm guitar was that it simultaneously provided it's own rhythm and music! The guitarist didn't even have to sing. Just playing the immediately recognizable musical rhythm was enough to prove to his peers that he could play rock and roll. Not to mention that the whole song had but 1, count 'em, one chord in it! I didn't care about the lyrics really, to me they bordered on the metaphysical and didn't make a whit of sense, at least the words I could clearly discern. What grabbed me was the immediate idea that if I could learn just this one song comprised of one chord played in one certain way, I would be, in fact, playing a real rock and roll song. A song that was on the charts even as I played it in case someone needed proof.

I began to learn it by buying the 45 rpm record then slowing it down to 33 and a 1/3 so that I could hear every nuance of the refrain in slomo. Even below the speed limit, the rhythm was a bit tricky to sustain. After a hundred or so tries, I got it down and put on my first performance in front of the full length mirror in my bedroom to a standing room only arena of myself.  The crowd went wild.

My next gig was playing for my older brother after he came in later that night. He came stumbling up the stairs, a little drunk. I invited him, urgently, to sit on the edge of my bed and sputtered "Johnlistentothis" all in the same breath. He sat down. I plugged in the amp, turned it way up as per rock and roll 101, then had  at it. My brother was very impressed, judging by the smile on his face, but after the 8th or 9th  minute of hearing the same "da-da-da-da-da-dada" he got up suddenly and motioned me to stop playing with a  frantic movement of both outstretched arms.

Bent at the elbows and, fingers flared, his hands crossed each other in a rapid sideways motion. He looked like that  the guy on the flight deck of a carrier trying to get an oncoming jet plane to slow it down a tad."Man, that's cool!" he exclaimed with a bright smile. Before older brother's rare compliment could fully register in me, he blurted out "but where's the words?". The last question ended with a lingering series of question marks that echoed into infinity and took the compliment with it. I went on to explain in indignat small words, that in rock and roll bands they often have separate people do separate things, like one guy will play drums, the other sing, the other play guitar and so forth. Then I made sure to point out that I, in this live performance, would be the guy who played the guitar on that particular hit record. I was hoping that with sufficient explanation the genius of my playing might not be lost to him. "Ahh....cool... See you in the morning" he said, raising himself up from the edge of mine and heading for his own.

Fast forward. 2004. Stop. I'm sitting at a table designed for one with my party of four in a dark nightclub. I made sure when the maitre d' seated us facing the small stage. We ordered drinks. All around me were people like myself were seated, middle aged and older devotees of one of the legends of  rock and roll, who despite having only a handful of hit records to his credit,  lives on in the part of our brain that remembers first things. On the stage above was a simple armchair lit from above, a testament to Bo's greatness, positioned at the front center. To the left of the chair was Bo's square guitar, equally as famous as himself. He was coming. The rest of the stage was littered with the basic tools of rock and roll. Drums, guitars and amplifiers.The before show stall to sell at least one eight dollar glass of liquor more to each patron before the show began was beginning to have an effect on the crowd. The polite murmuring's filling the club prior to taking our seat had turned into a loud jumble of conversation punctured with an occasional outburst of laughter. Alcohol was opening mouths and turning the volume up. By now, the only way to have a conversation with the people at your table was to shout above the din. Doing so forced others to shout louder. The noise was rising exponentially. The drinks finally arrived. I handed the waitress her money and waved "no change" preferring that over a shouting match between her and I as to how much I actually owe.

Suddenly, at 7 o'clock sharp, the lights went down, and the band came out and manned their instruments, a league of jet fighters jumping into f-15's and preparing for take off. The faithful wingmen were a testament to political correctness- an Asian male keyboardist, a black male drummer, a young white  male guitarist and a middle aged white lady playing, of all things, the bass guitar. Now the loud talk soup that filled the club was replaced by loud clapping, shouts and whistles. He is here.

Smiling confidently at each other, the band immediately started playing some peppy little warm up piece, musical foreplay, fraught with promise of what was to come. After this they went into the opening bars of Bo's signature song, the  unforgettable "Bo Diddleys A Gun Slinger". The crowd clapped hard, and roared their approval, screamed even louder. He really was here. At precisely the apex of the crowd's screaming desire for Bo, the Asian keyboardist leaned over the keys and shouted into to the microphone.
"LADIES AND GENTLEMAN....
THE ONE....
THE ONLY...
BO... O... O...O
DIDDLEY"!!!

The noise from below erupted into even louder cheers and whistles.

Bo Diddley, now an old man, walked slowly from the curtain behind the stage and made his way forward to his throne, supported by a cane on the right side and a male escort on his left.  Below the stage, the crowd took to their feet simultaneously, still clapping and cheering and whistling wildly. Bo sat down with a slow cautious arthritic grace into the chair on the stage. In the manner befitting a king he took his time getting coimfortable, then he reached for his guitar and placed on his lap, his left hand dangling loosely over it, surveying his admirers below. After a few modest thank yous he started to sing in the rough primal voice that is the exclusive territory of black blues singers. A voice with no  boundaries, no caution, no rules. Dangerous. Unapologetic.

The timbre of his voice had aged along with the rest of him, yet the youthful arrogance within of it remained as raw and unfettered as I had first heard it. Here was a man than somehow managed to vocalize what people of any color cannot not express with carefully thought out words. The inside of the inside of the  pain and joy inside us can only be expressed indirectly and music is the best vehicle for that. The blues happen to be one of the most available carriers. That's why blues singers are revered. They bring us there safely. And back. I had hoped to hear some pretty adroit blues guitar work from him. Instead he played like he sang. Any technically coherent music was to be supplied by the lesser mortals behind him. The band provided the energy that enabled our mutual trance, he was our guide. Any regard for the rules of playing guitar had the same importance as the rules of singing for Bo Diddley. Their were no rules for him. If the band played in the key of e, then he would allow that but not defer to them, striking any damn string anywhere anytime. He was 73 now, an old man and he knew it and was proud of it and had no interest in competitive guitar playing. Undemanding, he allowed his fingers to play at their own will and whim, oblivious to the connection between him and them. He could play like he sang, age had insured that.

The first act was over. Bo took the microphone in hand and introduced everyone associated with the band, then introduced his relatives sitting in the audience. He asked his daughter to stand up, then quipped off handedly that she had come with him to make sure that he didn't indulge  in any more sweets, seeing that he had just lost two toes to diabetes.  His hobble to the stage hadn't been a contrivance to exploit his age and garner sympathy from the audience after all. He was just an old man  that was still in possession of his greatest gift and, perhaps seeing the end near, had probably decided to revisit his friends, his fans, one more  time. I'm glad he did. Thanks to Bo's Toes, I am more determined than ever to resist the benevolent dismissal that society still gives older citizens.