“A Look at the New Book from Herb Bermann, Don’s Co-Writer
on Safe As Milk”
It’s not that long ago that many people
thought that Herb Bermann was just another myth created by Don Van Vliet.
Although he shared writing credits on eight songs on the Safe As Milk album, and, much later, one on Shiny Beast, he seemed to have disappeared off the radar. But the
Radar Station kept looking for him….
You can read about my and Derek
Laskie’s search here. We were certain he was out there and Derek
eventually managed to secure an exclusive interview with him for the Radar
Station (read interview). Herb is proud of his work with Don, apart from
being annoyed at not getting writing credits on some of the Strictly Personal songs, but he’s not
bothered about shouting about it from the rooftops.
Some time in 2014 an interesting item
turned up on eBay. One of many items that have appeared for sale from Herb
Cohen’s estate. (Herb Cohen was Frank Zappa’s and Don Van Vliet’s manager for a
time… it’s their acrimonious falling out that delayed the release of Bat Chain Puller for over 35 years).
This particular eBay item was a collection of original song lyrics from Safe As Milk. Unfortunately the Radar
Station couldn’t afford to buy them and secure them for Beefheart fans. However
Derek alerted Herb to the sale of his manuscript. It was clear to Derek that
this was a copy of the document he had quoted from during their interview. In
the exchange which followed he suggested that Brass Tacks publish a facsimile
edition of the manuscript.
And thanks to Pablo Capra at Brass
Tacks Press here we have that facsimile plus other fascinating bits and pieces.
The Mystery Man from the Magic Band
The Mystery Man from the Magic Band
Publisher: Brass Tacks Press, Los
Angeles
Published: June 2015
First Edition of 100 signed / numbered
copies
ISBN: 978-0-9820140-1-1
Price: $25.00
“Notes”
From Brass Tacks Press publicity:
Herb
Bermann was credited as co-writing eight of the songs on Captain Beefheart and
His Magic Band’s debut album Safe As Milk
(1967); it would have been a completely different record without him.
Yet
Bermann kept silent about Captain Beefheart for almost 50 years—so silent that
some people said that Captain Beefheart had invented him. Now Bermann shares
his story!
Fans
will be charmed by Bermann’s descriptions of how his songs came to be written.
They may also be surprised to learn just which songs he says he wrote. Included
is a facsimile reproduction of his original lyric sheets, with dozens more
songs that were never produced.
Bermann’s
story reveals previously unpublished information about the early work of
Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band, Neil Young and Steven Spielberg. It also
introduces us to an artist whose work and influence have been generally
overlooked.
“Review”
by Steve Froy
The centrepiece of the book is the
facsimile of the 64 typewritten lyric sheets of songs composed by Don Van Vliet
with Herb Bermann, plus some only written by Bermann. This is great stuff! To
finally see the actual lyrics Don would have used for the songs on Safe As Milk, and to find out what some
of the more difficult to hear words are at long last.
What’s more there are a few surprises.
It seems Bermann was involved with four
of the songs that appeared on Strictly
Personal as Van Vliet-only credits. One of the extra items pictured in the
book is a letter from Bob Krasnow informing Herb Bermann that he needs to get a
letter signed from Don if he wants to get the writing credits changed.
More exciting are the lyrics for three
of the songs that only exist as instrumentals on the Plain Brown Wrapper sessions—“Flower Pot,” “Moody Liz” and “Dirty
Blue Jean.” Here’s a project begging for the Magic Band reunion to take on.
Wouldn’t it be something if they could perform these three songs with lyrics!
The “Dirty Blue Jean” lyrics are completely different to all the other later
versions apart from one line— “don’t cha wish y’ nevah met dirty blue jean”.
There are two pages of “End Notes” by
Herb Bermann which offer a bit more detail about the songs and its origins.
There’s some fascinating details here but I was hoping there would have been
more than this relatively brief commentary which only touches on some of the
songs.
All the songs are copyright 1966 which
is the year Don and Herb met. It seems some of the songs/poems were already
finished by the time of the meeting and it’s not clear what, or indeed, how
much input Don had to the lyrics. Don was obviously very interested in
Bermann’s work and, I’m sure, saw it as something he could build on and use to
create his own style. Before they met Don’s use of words in his songs was
fairly conventional. However, all that was to change and I think it was
Bermann’s way of writing that kick-started the development in Don’s own songwriting.
Bermann’s poems are lean and sparse with concentrated meaning, use of
repetition, little or no punctuation and much use of the colloquial—“t’”
instead of “the,” “mah” instead of “my,” “cain’t” instead of “can’t,” “nevah”
instead of “never” etc. Don was to take this, develop it and take it to places
nobody had been before. I’d like to speculate that “Abba Zaba” and “Beatle Bones
and Smokin’ Stones” were early examples of Don using the “Bermann method.”
Fans often wondered why Herb Bermann
didn’t appear again after Safe As Milk.
I think it’s fairly obvious now. Don took what he needed. Through Herb he
managed to find a way to his own unique songwriting style and once he’d found
that he didn’t need the poet anymore. But there’s no denying Herb Bermann seems
to have been an important influence on Don.
John French has written a short
introduction to the book and the content is rounded off with an edited version
of Derek Laskie’s excellent 2003 interview with Herb that appeared here on the
Radar Station. Illustrated throughout with a number of photographs from Herb’s
career—none of Don or the Magic Band unfortunately—this is a well designed,
good looking large format paperback.
This first edition is limited to just
100 copies, all signed and numbered by Herb Bermann.
Currently only available from the
publisher.
Definitely worth getting if you’re a
fan.
