Tuesday - May 03, 2005

Flashback !

Steel’s stories that he has posted here and on his own blog site have entertained me greatly. So has Stan and his stories from Austin and the music stars he sees regularly. Then, a few days ago somebody mentioned here on the blog that they remembered Steppenwolf and how great the band was. Well, the Ol’ Skipper has a story for you ....

Fire up the Wayback Machine and let’s go back to November 16, 1968:

Several important forces of nature came together at the Orange Bowl stadium in Miami, FL on that date. Yours truly (that would be me, matey) was a sophomore at the University Of Alabama, majoring in Music and doing my damndest to keep my grades up to avoid having to join my father in Vietnam. Dad was an aircraft mechanic in the USAF and, at that point in time, was a Sr. M/Sgt doing his first tour in Vietnam (out of a total of three before he retired in 1971 after 30 years in the US Army Air Corps and the US Air Force).

Since I was majoring in Music, it was more or less expected of me that I march in the world famous University Of Alabama Million Dollar Band, which at that time was under the direction of Colonel Carlton K. Butler. Col. Butler was the band’s equivalent of Bear Bryant, who was in his second decade of coaching at Alabama, while Colonel Butler had been around since the Civil War (according to rumor).

Back in those days, the TV networks used to show the university bands during halftime and every university’s band director worked the band members ot death to come up with all kinds of new and flashy gimmicks, music and formations. Nowadays, all you folks get is Janet Jackson’s breast. What a come down.

Anyway, Colonel Butler had us out on the practice field until midnight or later the week before the Miami game because we had been told the game would be televised. We marched in the cold and rain until our feet hurt and half of us were sick by the time we boarded the buses Friday afternoon for the ride from Tuscaloosa to Miami. We got into Miami late that night and found ourselves in hot, muggy 80 degree heat. Needless to say almost all of us crashed out immediately. Except a few of us, including myself and a cute little brown-haired, sexy, female saxophone player. We walked all over the beaches, played in the surf and dragged back into the hotel about sunrise. Only to have to get a rude awakening about four hours later and ordered to get on the buses to head for a practice field for more drills.

The day passed in mind-numbing repetitions and Colonel Butler screaming his head off at us. He had decided that we would definitely not embaress him on national TV and would perform a halftime show that would knock everyone’s socks off. You see, Colonel Butler had a brainstorm. Not a little drizzle, or a light misting but a genuine “frog-strangler” or a “gully-washer” as they are sometimes called. Here’s the surprise he had planned. He divided the band up into four “blocks” of about 80 or 90 each. The full Million Dollar Band back in those days consisted of over 300 members - and NO MAJORETTES because Colonel Butler insisted that we were musicians and we didn’t need half-nekkid floozies to attract attention, as he put it. The University Of Alabama never did get majorettes until the late 1970’s, long after Colonel Butler retired. Anyway, I digress. Colonel Butler’s plan was to have each “block” rehearse our individual positions when we formed all the numbers from zero to nine, thereby having four “blocks” that could give any combination of numbers. The plan was for us to be given signals at halftime by Colonel Butler so that we would go out on the field and form up in formations giving the score, the time and the temperature. It was a brilliant concept but hell on the band. In addition to memorizing all or our music (Colonel Butler wouldn’t allow us to take sheet music in mounts on our instruments onto the field during any halftime show - the man was a monster, I tells ya), we also had to memorize several possible combinations of formations and not know which one we would use until right before going onstage.

Finally, around 5:00pm we were told to get suited up, clean up our instruments and get ready to rumble. Colonel Butler gave us the normal pep talk and we loaded up onto the buses and headed for the Orange Bowl. The rest, as they say, is history.

Notice the date above that all this occurred? Well, about halfway through the first quarter, a special announcement came over the stadium sound system. It seems the Alabama and Miami fans were about to be joined by .... the President-Elect. You guessed it .. Richard “Tricky DIck” Nixon. He had won the 1968 election only a week before the game (November 5, 1968) and had been resting at his Key Biscaine (sp) home. Good Ol’ Dick decided to get out and get some fresh air and enjoy a football game with us. There was a stirring from one of the tunnels above us and suddenly a large crowd of crew-cut, beefy looking men came pouring out and surrounded the new President who took a seat about 10 rows above us. Needless to say, we spent most of the game turning around and scoping out the new Prez. None of us had voted for him, although every one of us was over 18 - at that time, you had to be 21 to vote (but you could be drafted at the age of 18, which was my personal “bone of contention” with the establishment). Anyway, most of us supported Nixon because he had promised to end the war in Vietnam and the Dummycraps had made such asses out of themselves in Chicago only a few months before (that’s another story for another day).

Finally, as halftime approached we all started to get nervous. We were going to be performing for the President Of The United States. What a rush! Unfortunately, right before we got up to go on the field Colonel Butler gave us some bad news. It seems we had been asked to cut a few minutes off of our halftime show because the City Of Miami had arranged a special entertainment for the President at the halftime. So we had to cut the fancy time & temperature stuff and hustle off the field a few minutes faster than normal. Then came the big surprise ....

The stadium lights dimmed, except for a platform mounted above the end zone opposite the scoreboard where bright floodlights were shining. Everyone turned to stare and wait .... then the announcer introduced the “special entertainment” for the evening .... Steppenwolf, performing live for all the fans. Yessir, the band was up there on that little platform and immediately fired up “Born To Be Wild”. We started dancing. That was the coolest moment of my life at that point.

As I said, the rest is history. I came back from Miami and wound up in the university hospital with double pneumonia and a diagnosis of bronchial asthma that eventually kept me out of Vietnam. I married that little saxophone player the following summer and we eventually had two sons before getting divorced in 1981. Richard Nixon won re-election in 1972 and was chased out of Washington after Watergate by a dumbass bunch of Dummycraps. Colonel Butler retired in 1971. Alabama beat Miami that night 14-6 and went on to a 8-3-0 season, losing to Missouri in the Gator Bowl on New Years Day. And Steppenwolf? Well, I still have all their albums .... vinyl .... 33 1/3 .... GOD DAMN THE PUSHER MAN!

Posted by The Skipper     on 05/03/2005 at 03:22 PM   
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It's been a long strange trip without you Skipper, but thanks for pointing us in the right direction and giving us a swift kick in the behind to get us going. Keep lookin' down on us, will ya? Thanks.

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