Page 29 - 200704 - The 'X' Chronicles Newspaper - April 2007

Rock Legend Mike Pinera 29 29 Rock Legend Mike Pinera THE CAPTAIN RIDES THE CAPTAIN RIDES "The producer came in and said, 'Do you the morning an unexpected call came. It was the rock group Chicago, who were good friends of AGAIN have any more songs, because if you don't, this his inviting him into the band. It seems the AGAIN is your last day in the studio, I've got Steppenwolf and Three dog Night out there original guitar player had a coke-related waiting for studio time" Pinera says. "So I said, accident and was killed. (Continued from Page 28) 'Oh, I have a song,' which I didn't have exactly. Mike went to the audition and says he (Continued from Page 28) So I went into the bathroom, and I shut the door, barely passed because he was so high it made Pinera, heavyset as a teen and not part of and I just meditated. I calmed my mind, and I his playing stiff.. He passed up that job and the in crowd at Wilson Junior High, found his started hearing music. I went out and sat at the instead joined Alice Cooper in 1979. But he popularity soaring now in school. "The guys piano, which was a Rhodes Model No. 73, continued to indulge, later even trying free- who used to flick pie in my face at lunch were which had 73 keys. So I say, 'Okay, I need a first basing. suddenly asking if I could get them into the Star word.' And what came into my head was 73. I His wife Valerie, whom he had met Spectaculars," he says. "I'd look at them and liked the rhythm, and I went, '73 men sailed in, while in The Butterfly, divorced him, hoping it say, 'Gee, sorry, I can't.' " Sometimes when the from the San Francisco Bay. . . . The song sort would make him stop his habit. He formed a school bullies would ask me to sneak them into of just wrote itself from there." trio, tried going solo, but things were spiraling the biggest nightclubs in town where I was The keyboard player Frank Konte downward. playing at, I would almost slip and tell them the clinked out a melody for the chorus, and Pinera "I was partying on my nights off and real truth "if I did that you would see your dad added the lyrics to "Ride, captain, ride, upon getting thrown out of nightclubs, and I blew all in there without your mom, making a fool of your mystery ship. . . ." and the rest is rock of my money on cocaine," he says. It is a himself with his underage date." But I would history. The song reached No. 1 in 1970. cunning, baffling, powerful disease of bite my tongue and just say 'maybe when you Pinera says he eventually left Blues addiction. "Finally, I found myself crawling grow up, you're underage.' Image to get away from the band's entourage around on the rugs, looking for little pebbles of While at Jefferson and Tampa Catholic which was encouraging increasing drug use - coke I had spilled. High, Pinera moved up from Tampa clubs and not that it helped him keep away from drugs in It was pathetic - the lowest , the sickest, began taking gigs around the state. His parents the end. He signed on with Iron Butterfly, and, I'd ever been, and I realized it. I had tried to stop worried but didn't stop him as he drove off in his gradually, living in the fast lane of L.A. and on my own, but like most of us, I couldn't. So I 1966 Comet Cyclone for joints in Orlando, Miami Beach caught up with him. did the only thing I thought could work: go to Ocala or Jacksonville. But he says he will He got seriously hooked on cocaine - Alcoholics Anonymous meetings and Cocaine always remember that no matter how late he even dealing directly once with mobsters, he Anonymous meetings. would get home his dad would be up with the says. "First I was told it was not addicting that it I started attending AA and C A regularly, lights on waiting for him. Not to scold him but came from the coca leaf like coca cola. You'd and thanks to some help from above I went into to make sure he was alright. By now, the see it everywhere, at Hollywood parties, the motion picture industry's recovery home for Impalas were history, and Pinera fronted his backstage, people I had admired were offering it two-weeks. Lots of well-known musicians and new band, Mike and the Motions. He wrote to me. One day, a old friend of mine I had not film stars were there and getting well too. I more songs and scored a regional hit in North seen for quite a while said he would give me figured with all the money they have they could Florida with his tune Can't You Believe in some to take home but I'd have to pay for it go anywhere. But they were here at these free Forever? ASAP. I asked how much it was and was told 'it meetings helping themselves and those around After a brief fling playing gigs in Reno costs twenty five an ounce.' I thought that's not them. Because the program works. and Las Vegas, Pinera returned to Tampa and bad, an ounce of grass is thirty and this twenty There's a funny line in the movie The formed a new group, Blues Image, which five dollar stuff is stronger. Player where Tim Robbins is hurrying to get played more edgy underground British rock I stayed up all night snorting the coke. In dressed and his girlfriend asks where is he tunes by the Yardbirds and Cream, instead of the morning I got a call from the guy telling me going. He says he is off to A.A. She remarks "oh fluff pop covers most other bands were playing. he wanted the cash right away. So I went over to I didn't know you had a drinking problem." He His musical signature: his feedback pay him at his hotel where he and all these old yells back "I don't, that's where I go to make all guitar and having two drummers pounding guys were sitting around a conference table. my movie deals." away in unison, just like the band James Brown They all had bodyguards with guns but I was used to bring to the armory shows. "We played way too stoned to notice. After I was introduced (Continues of Page 30) the B side of Spencer Davis' Gimme Some to these gentlemen whose names sounded Lovin' - this bluesy song called Don't Want You familiar I thought, but didn't know from where, No More," he says. "One night, we're packing the guy put his hand out for the money. I this club in Tampa called Dinos, and Dickey reached in my wallet and pulled out twenty five Betts and Duane and Greg Allman walk in. bucks and gave it to him. He stared at me not Duane says, 'How come you guys have two saying a word for a minute, just turning red drummers?' I told him about watching James while the guys in the room are all laughing and Brown at the armory. And he said, what's this saying 'you believe this guy, twenty five bucks song you were doing? And I told him it was what a sense of humour!' Spencer Davis' B side. He yells at me "twenty five hundred "Well, a few months later, I saw that the dollars Mike not twenty five!" I was shocked Allman Brothers had formed from Allman Joy, and reminded him that grass was thirty and that and their signature song was Don't Want You No he had said this was twenty five. When he More with 2 drummers and feedback guitar." realized I wasn't joking just clearly confused he Blues Image went on to its own share of started laughing too and said something like 'if I acclaim. The act moved to Miami Beach, where didn't like you so much Mike, I'd make you go 19 year old Pinera and Company, with wealthy away.' I told him there was no problem I was suntan company owners The Collier Brothers, leaving anyway and the room laughed even opened and ran their own non-alcoholic theatre harder. He then told his bodyguard to drive me Thee Image. He began booking, playing and to the bank to get the rest of the money and jamming with acts from Jimi Hendrix to the jokingly added if I didn't have it to make me Doors to the Grateful Dead. The group moved disappear. That's when I started laughing and to L.A. landed a deal with Atlantic Records and told him I didn't have twenty five hundred cut an album of mostly original blues songs, but dollars in my account." sales were weak. Just as the band was finishing He hocked his best guitar "to pay for the its second album, the label threatened to dump blow." In 1979 thinking he had a few days off to the act if it couldn't produce a hit single. party he got high and had stayed up all night. In