Latest / DISGRACELAND / Chet Baker: Heroin, Romance, Missing Teeth and the James Dean of Jazz

Transcript

Chet Baker: Heroin, Romance, Missing Teeth and the James Dean of Jazz · DISGRACELAND

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Disgraceland as a production of double Elvis. Heads Up, guys.
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: In this episode, there's a lot of talk of the
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: mid century concept of cool, as well as about heroin.
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: It should go without saying that there is nothing in
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: this episode that is an endorsement of that drug, any
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: drug for that matter. But you're smart enough to know
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: that already. All right, let's get into it. The stories
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: about jazz musician Chet Baker are truly insane. He was
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: a natural, gifted musician with a mile long rap sheet.
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: He was worshiped by beautiful movie stars and both loved
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: and loathed by serious jazz contemporaries. He was heavily addicted
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: to heroin and made heavily addictive music. Chet Baker, with
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: his overtly romantic style of playing and singing, coupled with
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: his matinee idol good looks, was called the James Dean
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: of jazz. He was also called many other things, gifted, junkie, angel, scammer, cool, stupid, charming, abusive, beautiful,
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: in a rat. He was indeed all of these things,
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: and he did, of course make great music. And that
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: music I played for you at the top of the
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: show that wasn't great music. That was a preset loop
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: for my melotron called Second Story Swing MK. One. I
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: played you that loop because I can't afford the rights
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: to Wishing Well by Terrence Trent Darby. And why would
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: I play you that specific slice of hard Line Cheese?
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: Could I afford it? Because that was the number one
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: song in America on May thirteen, nineteen eighty eight, And
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: that was the day Chet Baker lost his life, creating
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: one of the most enduring mysteries in music. The cause
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: of his death. On this episode hard Bop heroin Hard
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: Line Cheese, the James Dean of Jazz in getting lost
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: with Chet Baker.
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: I'm Jake Brennan, and this this disgraceland.
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: The smack to the mouth stung, but he said nothing.
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: His mother looked on in horror, but she said nothing.
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: His father, who gave him the crack, said nothing as well.
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: Nobody said anything. They were too busy trying to keep
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: it cool. The house was a powder keg of suppressed tension.
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: The tension was always there, just like those Oklahoma clouds.
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: They never seemed to pass. Even when the sun fought
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: its way through, the clouds hung around, ensuring that the
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: sky would never be more than just almost who. The
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: humiliation would never fully pass either, even as an adult,
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: even in success, even with the adoration of jazz lovers
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: up and down the West Coast, whenever anything good would
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: happen to him, there was that familiar pull in the
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: back of his mind. It blasted into his conscience like
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: hard bot demanding to be heard. It said, remember me,
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: pretty boy, I'm here to remind you that you ain't shit,
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: You ain't cool, you ain't never been cool, and you
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: ain't never gonna be cool. You're gonna be just like
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: your daddy, some javass half a musician who can't find work,
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: who nobody ever heard of. When Downbeat magazine, the paper
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: of record for jazz aficionados, named him check Baker Trumpeter
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: of the Year two years running back in nineteen fifty
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: four and fifty five, there was no joy he beat
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: out Miles Davis. He knew what that meant, resentment and anger.
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: There's something he couldn't control. The color of his skin white,
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: so very unhipp When he met Miles, he told him
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: straight up that he wanted to write him a letter
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: apologizing for winning the award, because he knew he wasn't
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: better than Miles. Miles said, you got about fifteen other
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: letters to write before you get to me. The sting
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: of the rejection from the hippus musician on the planet
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: was the same, if not worse, than the sting of
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: the beatings he took from his old man. Like Miles,
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: the old man was not short on resentment and anger.
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: The drugs helped heroin grass whatever pills he could get,
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: but mainly heroin the drug. Shooting it, scoring it. It
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: occupied every waking moment he wasn't on stage, and in
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: nineteen sixty six, the stage wasn't bringing in the bread
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: like it was back in the mid fifties in Los
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: Angeles and New York. His reputation as a serious jazz
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: man was eclipsed by his reputation as a dangerous drug addict,
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: and so road work was necessary. Scoring depended entirely on
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: what city you were. In this city, wherever the fuck
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: USA was not hip. He needed to come up with
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: a new plan to catch a thief with carry Grant,
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: the Hitchcock movie Grant clad head to toe and black night,
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: crawling throughout the Italian Riviera, in and out of unsuspecting socialites, windows,
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: robbing them of their jewelry and cash. Chet thought he
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: could have been cast as the thief over Grant. He
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: knew Italy like the back of his hand, and he
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: would have been able to do his own stunts. He
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: was a righteous second story man. Next to blowing trumpet
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: and crooning, Scamming people was one of his greatest talents,
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: particularly breaking and entering above the ground floor on the
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: crimespree he and his bassis Bob Whitlock, had embarked upon
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: was necessary. Without junk, they would be rendered useless, bedridden
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: with violent withdrawals, and unable to perform, which was the
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: whole point of being on the road in the first place.
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: Put in work, make the bread, except all the bread
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: went toward Heroin, and when it ran out, there were
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: no options. Chet's habit was extreme, to say the least.
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: He'd have to improvise es. Whitlock looked on in amazement
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: as the great Chet Baker scaled the fire escape. He
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: then hemmed his body tight to the side of the
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: Optolan home on the second story and carefully placed each
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: foot on the ledge of the home's massive window nearest
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: the fire escape. He popped the lock, lifted the glass,
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: pushed his wiry body through and was in and out
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: with the valuables in no time. They'd cool their jets
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: at an all night diner and wait for the pawn
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: shop to open. When second story work wasn't an option
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: ie they couldn't wait on the sun to come up
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: and the pawn shops to open and the dealers to
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: wake up, they'd work their drug store scam. Chet had
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: it down pat, all that acting over in Italy had
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: paid off. First he'd prick his finger and draw blood
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: into a tiny vial, and then he'd hit the local
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: pharmacists up with his plate ge, Doc, I don't know,
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: hurts when I move, and my gut hurts when I
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: pee too. Maybe it's a kidney stone, I don't know,
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: and the pharmacists would have check, give a urine sample.
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: Chet would drop a couple specks of his own blood
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: from the vial into the urine, and voila, a diala
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: did prescription and a passable substitute for heroin. The scam
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: didn't end there. While Chet was performing his little one
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: act on the good doctor, Whitlock would sidle up to
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: the counter, all nonchalant and work his charm on the
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: nurse and if shoe was easily flattered, which was usually
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: the case, he would manage to get his sweaty paw
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: on the doc's prescription pad, and from there it was
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: off to the races. But it wasn't always about the
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: drugs in the beginning. It was about the music. Chet
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: Baker was a lot of things. Stupid might have been
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: one of them. It was little thought that went into
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: his playing. When people who knew him as a man
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: and as a musician speak of him, they almost always
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: reference his natural talent. The music seemed to flow right
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: through him, often at lightning speed and n tight, perfectly natural,
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: impeccably timed phrases. It was a style that other jazz
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: trumpeters practiced rigorously to achieve, but none of them ever
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: saw Chet practice. He'd just show up and blow. He cared,
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: but not enough to rehearse, or so it seemed, and
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: this detachment, along with his natural talent and striking good looks,
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: lent an air of cool to chet Baker's persona that
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: wasn't previously seen or heard in any musician anywhere in
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: any genre. In the nineteen forties and fifties, for jazz musicians,
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: and fans, particularly those being swept up in the thrill
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: of a new type of jazz called bebop, being vanguarded
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: by the great jazz musicians Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, and
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: the aforementioned Miles Davis. The concept of cool meant you
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: were different, You were apart from the rest of society.
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: Cool was a way of life. Cool, it was said,
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: meant that you get done in a sentence what somebody
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: else would get done in a paragraph. Coole was an
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: economy of effort in life and in ones playing. Miles
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: Davis was cool. Cool was ice, Cool was intellectual. Cool
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: was black. But Chet Baker was warm, those soft eyes
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: and romantic melodies. Chet was a lot of things, and
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: intellectual was not one of them. And Chet was white.
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: Yet Chet was still somehow cool. Charlie Parker said so,
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: and Charlie Parker knew from cool. He, along with Dizzy,
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: Miles Trummer, Max Roach, and pianist Bud Powell, were among
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: a handful of musicians on the East Coast who were
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: literally revolutionizing music, taking swing music and pop standards and
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: ripping them inside out, preserving little of the original compositions.
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: These players would demolish the song's melodies, using going the
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: chord progressions as their road forward, upon which they would
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: blaze manic, furious improvisational melodies and solos and bebop horn
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: players blue hard. The Great Louis Armstrong, the father of jazz,
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: had no idea what he was listening to when you
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: first heard it, few others did either. Only those who
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: were cool got it. It was a badge of honor,
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: a sign that you were cool if you were into
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: bebop shooting. Heroin further cemented your staff. Bebop musicians, Charlie
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: Parker especially, were largely hardcore savage junkies. Heroin took one's
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: disaffected attitude toward life, towards society, toward everything, and rooted
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: it into something real and dangerous. Nothing signaled to the
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: straight world, your hipness, your otherness, more than your Heroin habit.
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: It blocked out the harshness of white conformists post World
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: War two America and heightened the only part of the
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: day that mattered, the only part of the day that
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: you weren't high on narcotics when you were on stage,
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: tearing apart tradition on the icy cool wings of improvisation
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: in the early fifties, the only thing cooler than being
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: into bebop and being on heroin was being black. Chet
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: Baker did not play bebop. He played straight. Chet Baker
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: was not on heroin. His drug at the time was reefer,
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: and he was again obviously not black. He wasn't even
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: from the East Coast. He was from the not very
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: beebop West Coast. Yet that didn't stop Charlie Parker from
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: hiring Chet Baker on a West Coast stint in nineteen
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: fifty two. Such was Chet's immense natural talent and disaffected
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: cool charisma. After Parker's engagement had run its course, during
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: which Chet further proved himself to his hero by personally
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: scoring dope form on a regular basis, Parker called Dizzy
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: Gillespie back in New York. His message was short and
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: to the point, you better look out. There's a little
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: white cat out of here who's going to eat you up.
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: Chet Baker stood on stage and the rest of the
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: quartet eased into the ballads intro. Chet's head was down,
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: chin pressed to the top of his chest, trumpet hanging
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: off to his right, waiting not for a cue but
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: with that feeling. When it came, he lifted his head
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: and positioned his lips to the end of the microphone,
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: so close they touched. He clinched his eyes together hard,
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: locked out the rest of the band, the audience, starlet's
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: boppers and hobbers among them, and the muscles in his
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: face tightened while he listened for the right note. It
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: was there, then it was gone, lost stone Still, he
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: waited for the core progression to loop back around, for
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: another opportunity to ease into the romance afforded by what
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: was one of his favorite melodies. When it came, he
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: opened his mouth to sing in a whisper so vulnerable
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: it stunned the audience into silence or fear of what
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: any unintended distraction on their part might do to the
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: beautiful and wounded artist on stage. His trumpet playing may
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: have been natural, but his voice was much affected, though
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: in such a way that it seemed, of course natural.
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: Check Baker knew what he was doing as a horn
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: He knew about controlling pitch, so as a singer, he
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: was able to manipulate the pitch of his own voice,
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: a concept that likely never occurred to traditional singers. It
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: was subversive a sensibility owe to his love of bebop,
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: a genre he admired but seldom played, opting for a
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: more traditional style of jazz that suited his natural talent
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: and well laziness. But when it came to singing, Check
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: would consciously manipulate the pitch of the melody he was singing,
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: causing his vocal line to be, as he would later say,
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: under the center of tonality, the squares. It sounded wrong
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: to those with ears, however, it sounded entirely unique and
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: created a beautiful sense of intense vulnerability. Chef Baker whispered
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: his vocals softly and intentionally, and the result was such
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: that you felt as though he was singing to you,
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: and only to you. You were alone together. Chet Baker's
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: vulnerability is such that it makes you feel vulnerable more
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: than any other musician. Check Baker when he's on sends
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: you reeling. His music creates a sense of wooziness, an
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: emotional vertigo where you lose yourself in the spell of Chet.
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: It's everything about him, his voice, his playing, his vulnerability,
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: his addiction, his myth. It detaches you. Chet sings that
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: old saloon song. Everything happens to me, and you're naked,
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: untethered from your resolve, and in need of a good cry,
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: or at the very least, the warm embrace of a beautiful,
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: understanding Italian lover, you know, like Chet. At least that's
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: how Marilyn Monroe felt, and Jane Russell and even Jane's friend,
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: Professional Hard asked Robert Mitcham, and they were all in
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: the audience on that night. Mitcham knew about bad luck
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: his life experience to that point. A fourteen year old
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: runaway turned shoe salesman turned Hollywood star, Tinseltown's first real
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: life bad boy both on and off screen, Tall, dark Hanson, brooding,
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: often drunk, arrested and shipped off to World War II
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: his punishment, only to return to a reefer bust in
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: nineteen forty eight. Mitcham was not your friendly neighborhood banker.
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: He was not Jimmy Stewart. Bob. Mitcham was a real
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: life anti hero who could easily pick up the bird
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: and Chet Baker was putting down. And this despite the
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: fact that Mitcham was Hollywood's masculine archetype, handsome and strong
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: with a deep baritone, and Chet Baker was the opposite,
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: pretty and sensitive with a tenor singing voice far more
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: James Dean than John Wayne. Didn't matter. Chet Baker's playing
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: his image, the rumors of his notorious drug habit, the
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: growing myth of his cool, all that subversiveness. Bob Mitcham
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: was hooked, and Jane Russell, like Bob and Marilyn Monroe,
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: would listen to anything Jane said. So they, along with
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: a club full of Hollywood elite, all wound up at
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: the Hague Nightclub one night in April of nineteen fifty three.
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: So too to Detective John Edward O'Grady, scourge of hoppers, Bobsters,
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: and jazz heads throughout Los Angeles. Dangerous musician and celebrity
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: drug addicts like Robert Mitcham and Chet Baker were public
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: enemy number one for O'Grady, leader of the LAPD Narcotics Squad,
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: who pledged that the quote dream of his life was
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: quote protecting society against the creeping menace of drugs. To O'Grady,
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: being a narcotics detective wasn't a job, it was a crusade.
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: He cast himself into his own starring role as savior
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: to the goods, straight hardworking people of nineteen fifties Los Angeles.
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: He wore his crew cut high and tight. He wore
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: his dark sunglasses inside and out, and he wore his
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: pearl handled revolver proudly on his hip as he patrolled
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: Hollywood Boulevard, calling himself the ball busting Sergeant O'Grady, the
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: big time big oh daddy, oh, the most feared cop
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: in the city, the meanest motherfucker on the fourth scourge
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: of the drug scourge, and he hated Chet Baker as
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: much as he hated Bob Mitchell. He trailed Mitcham to
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: the Hague and that Baker was playing as part of
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: the fashionably hip Jerry Mulligan quartet as a bonus two
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: for one special, one reafer Head and one Junco and
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: one night if Oh Brady was lucky. He and his
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: men positioned themselves as inconspicuously as they could within the crowd,
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: which is to say, not very conspicuously at all, given
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: their square haircuts, white socks, and black shoes. But it
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: didn't matter. Oh Grady had a devious play. With the
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: band distracted on stage, he dispatched some of his squad
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: to Jerry Mulligan's house, where they entered without a warrant
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: and intimidated Mulligan's and Baker's girlfriends into giving up whatever
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: oodical drugs they had, which was marijuana, which at the
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: time in California carried a stiff prison sentence. Oh grady's
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: man brought the girls back to the Hague, and after
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: the set, they wrangled them and their musician boyfriends into
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: the back room office to grill them on where they
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: kept their stash. Chet Baker played it cool. Jerry Mulligan,
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: perhaps in the throes of a heroine Jones, broke down crying.
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: O'Grady noticed the track marks on his arms. He and
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: his men drove the musicians and their girls back to
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: Mulligan's for a proper search, again without a war weren't
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: and scared Mulligan into giving up his works and his
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: heroin stash, and they were all busted. The following day,
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: the headline from the Los Angeles Mirror screened hot Lips,
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: Bobster eight and two wives jailed naw Dope. The headline
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: and article were accompanied by a photo of Chet Baker,
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: who of course looked undeniably cool. We'll be right back
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: after this word were were Chet skated from the bust.
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: It was Jerry Mulligan's dope. After all, Jerry went to jail.
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: Chet felt invincible. He was the great Chet Baker, the
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: coolest stadio, so cool that Hollywood opened its arms for real.
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: Chet made his acting debut in the war film Hell's Horizon.
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: Then he was offered a movie studio contract. The idea
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: was he'd be the next Sinatra by way of James Dean,
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: the James Dean of Jazz Baby, a new type of
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: screen star. But Chet declined movie stars were decidedly uncool
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: compared to jazz musicians. He continued to blow for his bread.
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: After filming for Hell's Horizon wrapped, Chet hit the road
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: Carnegie Hall in New York with Dave Brubeck. The staunch
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: East Coast jazz critics bucked movie star Jasmine didn't play.
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: Chet bang more dope into his arm. In Boston, Chet
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: allowed a young jazz pianist, Dick Twardzik, to sit in
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: with him, and afterward Chet Baker would never be the same.
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: Dick Twardzik's playing seemed to embody well everything. It was
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: steeped and classical, yet unafraid to flirt with the avant garde,
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: and his approach to harmony was unmatched. Emotionally, it was
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: deep and cutting, and his playing incredibly soulful. He achieved
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: a trance like state on stage. His whole vibe as
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: a musician as a man, smacked of euphoria. Chet Baker
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: was in love Dick Twardzik was everything he was not.
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: Chet soft, his music was as he was approachable. Dick
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: was hard, mysterious and egon shield portrait come to life
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: sprung from the cafes of Paris in their twenties, a
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: long way from Chet's Oklahoma. Chet was a simple melodist,
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: Dick a complex harmonist. Immediately Chet loved playing with him.
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: Dick was going to forever change the face of jazz.
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: Everyone knew it, and it lent an extra air of
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: cool to chet Baker. Chet was hip squared with Dick.
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: On stage with him and off stage, Chet vibed all
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: over Dick's personality. Dick compensated for Chest's shortcomings. He fulfilled
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: something in Chet. Those who knew Chet Baker best his
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: longtime girlfriend later in life, Ruth young Swear, Dick roused
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: Chet's late and homosexual feelings and of course, Dick shared
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: Chet's fascination with Heroin. The euphoric highs Dick achieved with
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: his playing seemed to Chet to only be possible through junk. Together,
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: the two collided into their own kind of lost chord
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: Heroin harmony. The stint in Boston only lasted a matter
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: of days, but Chet, felt he had made a friend
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: for life, left Dick behind and continued his tour. Dick
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: remarkably got clean, completing rehab and kicking junk altogether. But
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: before the year would end, Chef Baker came calling with
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: an offer for Dick to join his band on a
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: tour of Europe. Dick accepted. Nick's girlfriend knew in her
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: gut that it would be the last time she would
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: see him alive. She was right. It took literally minutes
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: upon his departure with Chat and the rest of his band,
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: for Dick to come to that old habit. In no time,
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: he was hooked again. On the night of October twentieth,
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: nineteen fifty five, in Paris, Dick Twardzik played his last
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: gig with Chet Baker, the last gig of his life.
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: He returned to his hotel room, locked his door and
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: proceeded to jack a gluttonous amount of junk into his arm.
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: When they broke down the door and found him the
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: next morning, the needle was still sticking out of his arm.
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: He was twenty four years old, dead and blew. Chet
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: was in shock. Those who knew Dick, including members of
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: Chet's band at the time, were angry. Chet's then drummer
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: Peter Littman, had his own version of what happened, and
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: it involved Check going back to Dick's hotel room, with
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: him shooting up and bailing in a panic. After Dick
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: began to ode. Concerned about more bad press and is
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: already dwindling career opportunities, Chet Baker Littman alleged ran out
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: on a dying friend. Chet's reputation took a massive hit.
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: A metronome even hinting in its pages that Chet was
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: somehow responsible. Dick's parents wrote Check countless letters blaming him
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: for their son's death. Chet Baker was ravaged with gilt
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: and for his part, had no real answers as to
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: what actually happened that night. Unbelievably, he claimed, among other things,
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: that he was actually clean at the time and had
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: no awareness of Dick's habit. Chet gave numerous accounts to
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: different people over the years, each eventually arriving or hinting
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: at Chet somehow being the victim. Chet Baker forever cast
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: is the lost Lovable Lows were in his own saloon song,
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: regardless of who was to blame. Loss Crushed, chet Baker
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: returned to America to fine work, to New York City,
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: the heroin capital of the world, and there was little
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: work for him upon his return. And the only people
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: who cared about chet Baker's arrival in New York City
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: were the drug dealers at the Five Spot nightclub, Dirty Nick,
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: Johnny E Slim and Ray with the blonde hair Serious
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: Bee Bop heads were preoccupied downtown with Miles Davis, who
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: just released his incredible album Miles Ahead, as well as
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: with the now legendary East Village Live residency of Thelonious
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: Monk and John Coltrane. They could care less about some
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: white West Coast trumpeter who made more headlines with his
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: drug use than he made heads turn with anything resembling innovation.
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: Chet skulped and the Shadows hustled dope on money borrowed
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: from friends there took it on the arm from the
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: dealers when the goodwill of the five spot would dry
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: out Hanson's drug store on fifty first and seventh to score,
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: and that is only if he could pride the attention
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: of the dealers away from comedian Lenny Bruce, who'd set
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: up shop in the back his own private clubhouse a
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: drug store. Lenny Bruce may have been ahead of his time,
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: but a sense of place was beyond brilliant. For Chet
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: Baker not so much. It was another heroin bust, and
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: then another Baker to satisfy the judge committed to cleaning
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: up in a legendary rehab facility in Lexington, Kentucky, who
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: made good on his promise move right back to New York,
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: settled in with a prostitute friend named Pixie in her
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: Streethouseler roommate, and quickly ut back on the horse again. Remarkably,
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: with his reputation in near tatters, some of the greatest
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: jazz men of the era agreed to a recording session
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: with Chet, the great pianist Bill Evans and incredible guitarist
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: Kenny Burrell among them. Chet was something approaching professional in
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: the face of these modern day giants, and he delivered
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: creating one of his best studio albums, nineteen fifty nine's Chet,
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: But the creative success was unsatisfying his demons, be they
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: driven by the guilt and shame of Dick Twardzi's death,
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: the rejection he felt from the hardcore bebop set, the
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: sting of his father's abuse, or just his own reckless detachment.
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: We're going to get the better of him, and chet
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: Baker was determined to lose himself. Nineteen fifty nine, one
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: hundred and sixteenth in Lennox, Harlem. The spot the cop.
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: The junkies knew it, the dealers knew it, and the
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: cops knew it too. They also knew that if you
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: were white, stayed far away from this corner in Harlem.
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: Chet Baker apparently didn't know this, or didn't care, or
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: was too stupid to understand. Either way, he was an
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: easy mark and he was busted while on baile. He
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: went back uptown to Harlem to score, and of course
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: he was busted again just two weeks later. Rehab, this
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: time would be received only at Riker's Island, East River, Detox.
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: Welcome to hell Shipbird Chet cleaned up. He had to
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: in order to survive, kicked, worked out, got himself back
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: into shape, and because of his physical attractiveness, he did
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: what was necessary to survive in a racially divided nineteen
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: fifties prison. Chet Baker, in order to avoid the notorious
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: Riker's booty bandits, the rapists who congregated in the prison showers,
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: where so much forced sex took place that the stank
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: of seamen was constant, moved into a black and mad's cell,
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: a much larger black in me. Chet then began hanging
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: out exclusively with black and mates. One inmate later recalled
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: that Chet would hang in the yard and stretch out
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: for some sun, laying his head in his roommate's lap,
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: staring lovingly up into his eyes. Chet's friend Jack Simpson
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: recalled that upon release, Chet remarked that his roommate protected him,
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: loved him, and they quote he would have fucking died
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: for me. Chet Baker survived Rikers, but now free, the
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: question was would he survive himself. After prison, chet Baker
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: abandoned America, perhaps sensing it was about to abandon him.
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: He settled in Italy, where he was beloved as Angelo
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: the Angel and Trumpadioro, or the golden trumpet. Italy, with
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: its love of glamour and Grid loved Chet Baker, and
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: so too did their infamous paparazzi. It wasn't long before
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: drug officials got hipped at Chet's heroin jive and he
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: was busted again for narcotics. The trial was national news,
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: during which Chet's defense attorney presented evidence in an effort
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: to appeal to the court's pity, depicting Chet as a
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: victim of heroin, going so far as to tell the
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: story of Dick towards ex girlfriend, slapping Chet in the
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: face and accusing him of killing her boyfriend. Chet was traumatized,
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: as attorney argued, surely the court could sympathize and go
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: easy on him, and they didn't. Chet was sent to
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: prison again. He did a year and a half, and
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: by the mid sixties with something more to support than
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: a heroin addiction, namely a new baby and a wife.
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: His third Jeff Baker, returned to the States to find work.
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: He wound up again on the West Coast and was,
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: of course looking to score. All Cheff Baker wanted to
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: do was to score. It had been a rough night
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: and the gig was awful and as Jones was strong.
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: It was early morning. San Francisco was waking up. Chet
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: hit the CD hotel in the film wore to cop
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: in the hallway, he came upon the dealer. Chet gave
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: him the knowing nod and the dealer just stared at him.
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: And then, according to Chet and numerous recountings of the story,
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: five guys came up behind the dealer from the back
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: of the hall and the dealer said nothing, just walked backward.
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: Chet turned to run, and the five dudes broke into
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: a sprint out the door onto the sidewalk. One of
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: them got his hand on a Che's shoulder in mid
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: sprint and spun a Chet maintained his balance, caught a
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: fist to the grill. He swung back toward them while
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: continuing to move backward. All five guys now punching it,
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: kicking him in stride, Chet compelled them in a slow
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: motion backward ball of violence, fiss feet, fury flying from all.
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: Chet stumbled backward into a newspaper stand, grabbed it, shoved
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: it toward his attackers. One of them tripped. Chets stumbled
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: back some more into a parking meter that halted his progress.
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: He took a sharp fist to the cheek, and of
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: the opposite effect that was supposed to have, it invigorated Chet.
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: He fought back harder, faster. Another one of his attackers
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: hit the pavement from one of Chet's haymakers. Two down,
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: three to go. In the brawling forsome continued their backward progression.
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: Check continued, landing shots and defence. He stumbled into a
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: park sedan with four people inside. He climbed on top
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: of the car. His attackers swiped at his ankles. Chet
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: hot stepped around their grass, alternately stomping on their hands.
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: One attacker attempted to climb up on the back of
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: the trunk. Check booted him in the face, sending him reeling.
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: Three down two. Chet leapt to the street side of
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: the car, opened the back seat passenger side door to
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: the shock and horror of the car's passengers, and dove in,
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: screaming to the driver, whom he did not know, to
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: step on it and get him the fuck out of there.
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: The driver did no such thing. Chet pounded on the
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: back of the seat. The dude next to him reached
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: across Chet's body, opened the door and pushed Chet out
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: onto the street, where now all five of his attackers
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: had reassembled. Chet landed on the pavement on his side,
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: and the men surrounded him, and then the real beating began,
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: repeated kicks to the head, face in the body. Chet
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: was lost no idea what was happening, and the kicking stopped.
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: One of the men told another to roll him over,
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: let me see his teeth. Chet was rolled under his back,
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: his face a bloody mess, barely conscious, his head rolled
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: to his side, his cheek on the pavement or one
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: of the attackers anchored his left legs solid into the ground,
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: pulled his right leg back and hauled off, and with
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: all the strength it could must kicked his foot straight
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: into the trumpeter's mouth, shattering his teeth. When they found
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: Chef Baker, he was passed out in a pool of
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: his own urine and vomit. His teeth were shattered. All
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: of them were so badly damaged that the ones that
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: didn't remain were required to be pulled. A trumpeter can't
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: blow his horn without his teeth. The shape of a
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: trumpeter's dental structure their ambucher accounts for part of the
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: player's delivery. Without teeth, it is near impossible to play
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: a wind instrument. Chet Baker was done, and as far
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: as the dealers in San Francisco were concerned, this was
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: a good thing. Chet was suspected of being at best
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: a scamming junkie who couldn't make do on his debts
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: or promises, and at worst a rat who was selling
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: out fellow junkies and dealers to the cops in order
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: to avoid arrest in more jail time. Whoever was behind
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: the beating of Chet Baker knew what they were doing.
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: Want to get payback on a dirty trumpet player, take
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: away his teeth. Chet spent the next three years of
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: his life pumping gas in California seven am to eleven pm,
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: the hardest work of his life, he would recall. Eventually
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: he put the sketch together to get dentures he wanted
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: back in. Dizzy Gillespie put together some work him in
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: New York City, and the rebirth of Chet Baker commenced
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: a success. In New York, he departed for Europe again,
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: where he was beloved. He supplemented his heroin habit with methadone.
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: He fell into some sort of working junkie groove. For
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: the most part, avoided the law and continued to make
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: music into the eighties, where a new generation of hipsters
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: discovered his incredible talent through a creatively fruitful collaboration with
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: Elvis Costello. Chet Baker was living in Amsterdam on the
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: second floor of the Hotel prin Hendrick. He was lost
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: in the romance of his newfound relevance and attempting, as
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: always to get lost. His heroin use was back in
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: full swing. May thirteenth, nineteen eighty eight, chet Baker walked
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: into his hotel room after his gig grabbed his works,
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: injected himself with potent Dutch heroine. Sat in the open
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: window sill of his second story room, dragged on a cigarette,
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: knotted off and tipped over into the springtime air. He
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: fell two stories and lost his life. May thirteenth, nineteen
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: eighty eight, chet Baker walked into his hotel room after
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: his gig grabbed his works, injected himself with potent Dutch heroine.
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: Sat in the open window sill of his second story room,
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: dragged on a cigarette while the dealer he'd scammed burst
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: through his door to push him out the window. He
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: fell two stories and lost his life. May thirteenth, nineteen
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: eighty eight, chet Baker lost the keys to his hotel
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: room after his gig. His works were in his room.
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: He needed to get high. He deployed his second story
• 33:52
  Speaker 1: man's skills, climbed out of his neighbor's window onto the balcony,
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: attempted to cross over onto his own balcony, and lost
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: his footing. He fell two stories and lost his life.
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: Either way, chet Baker was dead, lost finally for good. Remarkably,
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: he'd made it as long as he had to the
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: age of fifty eight. The mystery surrounding his death survives
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: as part of the myth of his cool. Nodding off
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: and falling out of the window and being shoved out
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: of the window by an angry dealer are the two
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: stories to get the most traction, but in reality, the
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: story about check clumsily losing his balance while trying to
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: scale the balcony is corroborated and likely the most plausible,
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: if not the least romantic.
• 34:38
  Speaker 3: So uncool, such a disgrace. I'm Jake Brennan, and this
• 34:46
  Speaker 3: is Disgraceland.
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: Disgraceland was created by Yours Truly and is produced in
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: partnership with Double Elvis credits for this episode can be
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: found on the show notes page at disgracelampod dot com.
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: If you're listening as a Disgraceland All Access member, thank
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: you for supporting the show. We really appreciate it, and
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: if not, you can become a member right now by
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: going to disgracelampod dot com Slash Membership. Members can listen
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: to every episode of Disgraceland AD free, Plus you'll get
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: one brand new exclusive episode every month, weekly unscripted bonus episodes,
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: special audio collections, and early access to merchandise and events.
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: Visit disgracelampod dot com Slash membership for details, rate and
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: review the show, and follow us on Instagram, TikTok, Twitter,
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: and Facebook at disgracelampod and on YouTube at YouTube dot
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: com slash at disgracelampod Rock a Roller. He then