Ornoth

With everything else that’s going on, I figured I’d kill some time with a more spontaneous, stream of consciousness post.

It’s purely conjecture, but one of the things I think people enjoy about my blog is when I relate stories about experiences that might be a little uncommon. And since most of my friends and readers are younger than I, one way to do that is to talk about when I was young. Here’s one such story.

I suppose everybody can probably identify with the experience of hearing a particular song for the first time and knowing that from that point forward, everything would be different. I have been fortunate to live through several such episodes, but one that happened back in middle school in the early 1970s has always stuck with me.

Imagine, if you will, a time long before music used computers and digital signal processors. Beyond that, imagine a time before synth-pop, before synthesizers had even been invented. A time when “keyboards” meant only one of two things: a piano or a harpsichord.

It was a time when music was looking for a new direction. Led by the Beatles, the protest music of the 1960s had given way to a muddy, directionless jumble of drug-addled metal, drug-addled glam, and inane balladic mainstream pap like “Hey Jude” and “Let It Be”. Even the Beatles lost their vision, gave up, and went off in separate directions, seeking the elusive new sound that would appeal to an increasingly disaffected audience.

That’s what music was like in the 70s, when I was in grammar school: Elton John against Black Sabbath. ABBA versus Alice Cooper. Hall & Oates and Kiss. The BeeGees and Judas Priest.

It was in that environment that I went off to school one morning and got pulled aside by Burd, one of the class delinquents. He was playing a recording for a group of kids: Edgar Winter Group’s “Frankenstein”.

It was heavy. Ridiculously massive guitar hooks, topped by a funky sax solo as well as a call-and-response drum solo. It was crazy heavy, but melodic, upbeat, and emotional. But featured on top of it all was this strange new wonky sound I’d never heard used this way before: the synth.

The frontman—albino musical prodigy Edgar Winter—penned the track to specifically highlight the potential of the synthesizer as the lead instrument in a composition, a role it had never previously been used for. He was the first person to strap a synth around his neck for use on stage, which would eventually lead to the development of the keytar.

As soon as I heard “Frankenstein”, I knew music had changed. The synth was so different and so plastic, at one time being an incredibly flexible artistic tool, but also capturing the increasingly sterile, dehumanized nature of life in America. The fact that I’m writing about that song today—more than forty years later—is an indicator for how powerfully it affected me.

Within a few short years, artists around the globe picked up the synth: Kraftwerk, OMD, Gary Numan, Brian Eno, the Cars, Ultravox, Devo, and of course the Buggles. By the end of the 70s, the synthesizer had done what the Beatles couldn’t. It had finally given music a new identity: New Wave synth-pop; a new medium: the music video; and a new channel: MTV.

I might not have foreseen all that hanging around before class that morning, but I knew that song represented a major change in the musical landscape. And I wanted more. Thankfully, lots of people felt similarly, and the synth became the signature instrument of the 80s.

Listening to “Frankenstein” today, I’m just as moved as I was as a child. Sure, camp has accreted on the outfits, the hair, and the symphonic style of the 1970s. But the composition and execution still retain most of their original energy and power.

If it doesn’t seem quite that impressive to you today, that’s probably because musicians have been following in Edgar Winter’s footsteps for the past forty years. But trust me, back then, this was fresh, innovative, and unlike anything we’d ever heard before.

So that’s one of the things I remember…

One of the things Americans rarely think about is history. Very few of us have any sense of what has gone on in our town, our neighborhood, perhaps even our building. In that sense, we Bostonians have a bit of an advantage, since Boston is a very small area with a long and rich historical heritage (for America, at least). Walk the streets of Boston and on virtually every block you’ll come across a building that has some noteworthy story associated with it.

I happened to buy a unit in one of Boston’s most noteworthy buildings. The initial Hotel Vendome was designed and built by William G. Preston in 1871 in Boston’s newly-filled Back Bay neighborhood, then greatly expanded in 1881. It is the finest example of the French Second Empire style in Boston, and located on the broad Parisien boulevard of Commonwealth Avenue. In 1882, it was the first public building in Boston to be furnished with electric lights. It was the site of many prominent social functions, and the guest register included stays by Ulysses S. Grant, President Grover Cleveland, P.T. Barnum, Mark Twain, Oscar Wilde, Sarah Bernhardt, and John Singer Sargent. In 1903 the visiting team— the Pittsburgh Pirates, led by Honus Wagner—stayed at the Vendome during the first World Series ever held. In a bit of synchornicity, both my mother’s and her sister’s graduating classes from nursing school held parties in the Vendome during World War II.

But that’s all nothing compared to the fire: the worst firefighting tragedy in Boston history, one of the twelve worst in all of U.S. history, getting an entire chapter in Stephanie Schorow’s “Boston on Fire: A History of Fires and Firefighting in Boston” which I recently read.

It happened on Saturday June 17, 1972—the day before Father’s Day—while the Vendome was undergoing a major renovation. The fire broke out in the upper stories, and eventually sixteen engine companies, five ladder companies, two aerial towers, and a rescue company fought the blaze. The fire was under control, and fresh firefighters were conducting mop-up operations when an overloaded beam under the second floor gave way and the entire southeast corner of the five-story building came down, killing nine firefighters, injuring eight more, and destroying a ladder truck. Two of the twenty-five orphaned offspring would go on to become firefighters.

Twenty-five years later, a memorial to the firefighters who lost their lives was dedicated on the Commonwealth Avenue mall. A long, low arc of black granite describes the events and gives the names of the men who were lost. A fireman’s helmet and coat are casually draped over the stone, but forged in bronze. Every year a brief ceremony of observance is held.

As a resident of such a building, it’s hard to forget its history. I live on that same southeast corner, surely within inches of the 40 by 45-foot section that collapsed. I live on the second floor, surely within inches of the resulting pile of debris, which was noted both as 26 feet and two stories deep. I live within inches of the place where eight men died.

Knowing that you are living in the middle of the site of such an infamous tragedy would probably be enough to freak a lot of people out. It doesn’t bother me, really. After all, I’m proud to live in a building with such historical significance. But there’s another reason why it doesn’t bug me: it’s because even though I wasn’t here way back in ’72, I still remember and honor those men, and I view my presence here not merely as just some place to live. I consider myself something of a steward of this very important landmark, and want to do my part to see that it is kept for future generations, and not forgotten in our uniquely American ignorance of who and what have come before us.

For more information and photographs about the Vendome fire and memorial, go here or here, or read “Boston on Fire”.