Where Are They Buried? (72 page)

The national press eventually took notice, and stories about the Wolfman surfaced in major newspapers and magazines. Todd Rundgren and the Guess Who wrote chart-making songs about him, and his popularity skyrocketed. But the questions lingered:
Who is Wolfman Jack? Where does he come from? What does he look like (is he black or white)?
Only Bob Smith and a few others knew the answers, and they weren’t talking.

Finally, though, the cloak was lifted in 1973 when George Lucas, remembering Wolfman from his own youth, wrote him into the screenplay that became his hit film,
American Graffiti
. When
American Graffiti
was released, Wolfman Jack was already firmly enshrined as a part of rock history. But his star certainly shone brighter afterward, and the film transformed him into a media superstar. Wolfman Jack became one of rock and roll’s premier spokesmen, engaging in countless personal and television appearances, and even hosting his own television show,
The Midnight Special
.

At 57, Wolfman Jack died of a heart attack and, believe it or not, was buried in the yard of his home in Belvidere, North Carolina.

GRAVE DIRECTIONS:
Belvidere is right in the middle of nowhere. It doesn’t appear on some North Carolina maps, but is about fifteen miles west of Elizabeth City and halfway between Albemarle Sound and the Virginia border. If you follow Route 37 north from Route 17, you’ll come upon Layden’s Supermarket after about nine miles, and that’s more or less the town of Belvidere. Follow Route 37 another half-mile north and Wolfman’s former residence is on the right. It’s easy to determine which house is his—it’s the only one with a gravestone in the side yard, and the marker is visible from the road.

As this is private property and a private residence, use discretion if you visit the site.

NOVEMBER 11, 1920 – FEBRUARY 8, 1973

For 30 years, Max Yasgur basked in anonymity as the operator of Yasgur Farms, a wholesale milk business in upstate New York. But in 1969, the Yasgur name leapt overnight to international prominence when Max leased his farmland to a music promoter and the sleepy community of Bethel, New York, was transformed into the site of the world’s largest rock festival—Woodstock.

Woodstock is now legendary. Some 500,000 people attended the three-day festival that celebrated peace, love, and, above all, music. But in the eyes of some Bethel residents, the long August weekend was nothing more than an orgy of psychedelic experimentation and group sex played out under the umbrella of loud, god-awful music. They were furious that longhaired, flower children overran their bucolic village, used recreational drugs in the streets, trampled their crops, and brought about enormous traffic jams.

After the event, Max was both blessed and scorned. Masses of thankful hippies applauded his generosity, while neighbors who had previously been his friends rebuked him. Seeking to clear the air between the generations, Max appeared on radio and television and eventually most of the townspeople came around to forgiving him, mindful that he’d probably done more good for the town than harm.

Tragically, not even four years after the festival that made his farm famous, Max died of a heart attack at 52.

He was buried at the Ahavath Israel section of Liberty Street Cemetery in Monticello, New York.

CEMETERY DIRECTIONS:
Take Exit 105A off of Route 17 and follow Route 42 South for a quarter-mile. Turn left onto Thompsonville Road and then, at the next intersection, turn left onto Rock Ridge Drive. Pass back over Route 17 and turn right at the stop sign. After a short distance there will be a series of small cemeteries on the right. Turn right at the third driveway—the one at telephone pole #26-A—and stop halfway before its end.

GRAVE DIRECTIONS:
Climb over the three-rail fence on your left and Max’s marker is in the third row of stones.

If you’d like to visit the site of either the 1969 or 1994 Woodstock Festivals while you’re in the area, directions follow. (The 1999 event, wherein angry concert-goers lit bonfires, looted vendors, and assaulted women, is probably best forgotten.)

DIRECTIONS TO SITE OF 1969 WOODSTOCK:
None of the Woodstock concerts actually took place in the town of Woodstock. To get to the 1969 site in Bethel, exit Route 17 at Exit 104 and follow Route 17B west for just over ten miles. Turn right onto Hurd Road and follow it for a mile to its intersection with West Shore Road. On the right-hand corner of this intersection is a large stone marker commemorating the original site.

DIRECTIONS TO SITE OF 1994 WOODSTOCK:
The 1994 Woodstock concert took place in Saugerties, New York—some 50 miles east of Bethel. At the intersection of Routes 32 and 212, across from the I-87 southbound toll plaza, is a dirt road, Augusta Savage Road. The 1994 soiree took place in the fields on both sides of this road, and the abandoned water and wash stations that dot the fields are the only clue to these hills’ place in rock history.

DECEMBER 21, 1940 – DECEMBER 4, 1993

Frank Zappa was one of rock’s most committed iconoclasts, blazing new trails in rock music. But Frank was too ambitious to stay within the relative confines of rock, and in his lifetime he embraced everything from doo-wop and heavy metal to big band and orchestral music. Whenever a new pop fad surfaced, he could be counted on to address the craze with a trademark sardonic response. Frank’s songs were characterized by bizarre lyrics, and the musical directions he chose turned out to be almost unlistenable at times. But that wasn’t really the point. His objective was to push the envelope into the recesses of every musical region, to find out what lay over the horizon, to let the chips fall where they may.

Frank’s initial foray into music was as the drummer in his high school marching band, but that ended when he was kicked out for smoking under the bleachers while in uniform. Remarkably, Frank was able to recover from that setback, and in 1966 he and his band, the Mothers of Invention, released
Freak Out
, one of rock’s first concept albums. That record was followed up quickly with
Absolutely Free and We’re Only In It for the Money
, albums that, to
some degree, became underground anthems for 1960s counterculture. Over the next 25 years, Frank released 60 more albums and produced several films. Though he developed a substantial catalog of music, his work was uneven—some maintain his first three albums were his best—and Frank was never particularly successful from a commercial standpoint. But that never seemed to be the point anyway.

Frank managed to offend numerous political and social groups with biting, satirical, and sometimes lascivious lyrics that left little sacred. He ignored any criticism, but in 1985, when the Parents Music Resource Center recommended voluntary album content labeling, Frank became concerned that artists might be prevented from freely expressing themselves. He went to Capitol Hill to accuse a Senate committee of promoting censorship. Frank compared the proposed warning label tactics to “treating dandruff by decapitation,” and, though he seemed victorious in 1985, content labels are de rigueur today.

Frank was rewarded for his innovations by twice being rejected for induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. On the other hand, after recording two albums with Pierre Boulez and the London Symphony Orchestra, he was honored along with other avant-garde musicians at the 1992 New Music Festival in Frankfurt. Finally, clearer heads prevailed and he was inducted posthumously into the Rock and Hall of Fame in 1995.

In the spring of 1990, Frank was diagnosed with prostate cancer. He held on for almost four more years but succumbed to the disease at 52, and was buried at Westwood Memorial Park in Los Angeles.

CEMETERY DIRECTIONS:
Follow Wilshire Boulevard a half-mile east from I-405, turn right onto Glendon Avenue and the cemetery is immediately to the left. Or, you may want to park your car along Wilshire Boulevard and walk to the cemetery behind the office complex at 10850 Wilshire Blvd.

GRAVE DIRECTIONS:
From the office, walk into the central lawn area and count up eight rows to the flat, bronze marker of Charles Bassler. Frank rests in the unmarked plot above Bassler.

JANUARY 24, 1947 – SEPTEMBER 7, 2003

Warren Zevon turned to music early and as a teenager was instructed in modern classical by his Los Angeles neighbor,
Russian composer Igor Stravinsky. After high school, the budding star drove a sports car his professional-gambler father had won in a card game to New York in an attempt to make it on the folk circuit and, once that plan fizzed, he returned west and developed a Sonny & Cher-type gig called Lyme & Cybelle. But though big-time success blossomed everywhere on the burgeoning West Coast music scene, it skipped over Warren’s backyard and the dejected artist spent most of the 1970s writing jingles and working as a sessions man because the only records his own commercial attempts set was the speed in which they found their way to the clearance rack.

In 1978 Warren’s third album,
Excitable Boy
, was released and it changed his fortune overnight. The odd theme of cartoonish violence that wove through the work combined with the catchy riff and humorous tagline of “Werewolves of London” vaulted Warren to prominence as rock’s macabre jester. According to Warren, the brutality of his songs was a mask to cover his other anxieties. “Sickness and doctors, they scare me, not violence and helplessness,” he said.

On the strength of the
Excitable Boy
album, Warren toured consistently for the next two decades, fitting in especially well with New England and Rocky Mountain ski slope audiences where he became a seasonal fixture. An underlying struggle with booze affected him now and again, and more than once he lost control onstage. “I ran around like a psychotic,” he remembered at the end of his life, almost wistfully. The temptations to which he succumbed probably had a hand in his string of somewhat irregular albums, though he still managed to maintain signature irreverence with songs like “Detox Mansion” and “Things to Do in Denver When You’re Dead.” In any event, Warren’s eclectic musings kept his cult fandom satisfied and he never suffered for an audience.

During his career Warren was a frequent guest and occasional substitute bandleader on the
Late Show with David Letterman
and, in October 2002, fans tuned in for a bittersweet appearance as he was the show’s only guest of the entire hour. The occasion was that Warren had recently been diagnosed with inoperable mesothelioma cancer and this was his swansong, a last goodbye. Candid as ever, he confessed that he’d “may have made a tactical error in not going to a physician for twenty years,” and offered trademark eclectic counsel for the living too: “enjoy every sandwich.” The program reached it’s peak of poignancy when Warren performed “Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner” at Dave’s request and, after presenting him a prized guitar saying, “I want you to have this, take good care of it,” there wasn’t a dry eye in the house.

Warren spent much of his remaining time working on a final album
The Wind
, which featured an all-star cast of famous musician friends, and writing personal goodbyes to make one final point which was, in his words, “This was a nice deal: life.”

At 56, Warren was cremated and his ashes scattered in the Pacific Ocean.

AUGUST 4, 1901 – JULY 6, 1971