Confessions of a Glorified Sideman

The Queen and her Sir Lancelot

My first encounter with Etta James was in 1980 at the Blue Lagoon Saloon Night­club in Marina Del Rey, Cal­i­for­nia. I can’t remem­ber if it was Etta’s gig or if she was just sit­ting in. Brian, her gui­tarist and musi­cal direc­tor at the time and later with Paul McCart­ney, was on stage and had called Etta up out of the crowd to do a song.

I hap­pened to be sit­ting at a table close to the stage and as Etta made an attempt to get on the three-foot high stage from the front it quickly became obvi­ous that she was not going to make it up. Etta teetered on the edge of the stage, while Brian, with his gui­tar still around his neck, was try­ing valiantly to pull Etta up…without much suc­cess. Quickly apprais­ing the sit­u­a­tion, I darted to the stage to assist and soon found myself in the awk­ward posi­tion of push­ing on Etta’s ample bot­tom. Another gen­tle­man joined me, thank God. Brian and I weren’t mak­ing much head­way alone and together we man­aged to get Etta safely on stage. The crowd roared.I will never for­get Etta’s smile of thanks and that naughty lit­tle wink she gave me for hav­ing got­ten so famil­iar in such a short time, and in pub­lic. Lit­tle did I know then how much I would learn, many years later, about that wink and how much more inti­mate we would become.

My sec­ond encounter with Miss Etta was at a blues club in River­side, Cal­i­for­nia around 1996 where I was fronting a band with gui­tarist extra­or­di­naire Josh Sklair. Josh was at the time and con­tin­ued to be, her long­time musi­cal direc­tor and band leader with Etta’s two sons, Donto (drums) and Sumetto (bass). Josh had told me Etta was look­ing for a new sax player and that she might show up and do a cou­ple of songs with us but not to hold my breath.

Well, Etta did show up with com­mo­tion and fan­fare. She had a well-deserved run of good luck and record sales at the time, not to men­tion the use of her songs in major national com­mer­cials. Con­se­quently, she was rec­og­nized with all the trap­pings. She was mov­ing around at the time with the aid of an elec­tric scooter. She had become quite heavy and it was tak­ing a toll on her knees. Even though she could stand and walk she pre­ferred to per­form while sit­ting on her cus­tom made, “throne”. I watched in awe as her han­dlers, and there were many, pre­pared the stage for the Queen to arrive. We did a set or two so Etta had a chance to see me do my thing. When she arrived on stage she never looked at me until she wanted me to play a solo and then she looked me up and down. I now under­stand the phrase, “she undressed me with her eyes.” We played Randy New­mans’ You Can Leave Your Hat On, and she tore the place up. And just like that she decided it was enough and she was gone. I had no idea if I had passed the audi­tion or not and though it wasn’t offi­cial I was def­i­nitely being checked out.

A month or so later Josh called me and said I had received the nod for the sax chair and gave me a tape and some horn charts. The first gig was an out door sum­mer fes­ti­val gig in the park­ing lot of a big hotel in San Bernandino, Cal­i­for­nia. There were no music stands and the wind was howl­ing. I was doing my best to read the charts and make sure they didn’t blow away. I thought I was just fuck­ing up and blow­ing the gig when the trum­pet player, Ron­nie Butta­fu­colli, growled at me “fuck the charts, just blow.” I loved him for that since that is one of my strengths: my EARS!

I made it through that gig and began learn­ing the ropes of the Etta James Roots Band, and the all-important peck­ing order. I must be hon­est; I was unpre­pared for the real­i­ties of play­ing in a big band that had been together for quite some time. Solos were sel­dom given out and once a player had one he would covet it till King­dom Come. Com­ing from sit­u­a­tions such as Rod Stewart’s band and the Eury­th­mics where I had been a fea­tured soloist with plenty of solos through the course of a con­cert. The great ses­sion gui­tarist Michael Thomp­son, a good friend of Josh’s and a fan of my har­mon­ica play­ing once told him after see­ing a show, “you’ve got the Mis­sion­ary Man… One of the best harp play­ers in the world and he doesn’t play one solo or any harp at all in a two hour show! What’s up with that?” I have always been grate­ful and appre­ci­ated Michael’s kind words but they had lit­tle effect in Etta’s world. In fair­ness to Josh, it just wasn’t his call. It was Etta’s and rightly so.

I would not get a harp solo for over two years but when I did… well you can bet I made the most of it. I should add that I’m a refer­ring to the live show as Etta used my harp tal­ents from the first record I did with her Life. Love and the Blues in 1996 and every record in between up to 2003 whether stu­dio or live. The song that Etta decided to fea­ture me on har­mon­ica turned out to be a real crowd pleaser. It was Jimmy Reed’s Bright Lights, Big City. Etta sang the shit out of it as with any other song I have ever had the plea­sure to hear her sing. She would have me come down off the horn sec­tion riser and play right next to her on her left at the front of the stage. We got into a great groove together imme­di­ately and we would play off each other, flirt­ing and just car­ry­ing on and hav­ing a good time. I would play a solo for a few cho­ruses and then hand it back to her by kneel­ing in front of her like Sir Lancelot while still play­ing my harp.  She would look down upon me, putting her fin­gers through my hair and say­ing naughty, sexy things with looks to the audi­ence that only Etta can pull off and the crowd just ate it up. This became a sta­ple in the Etta James Show for years, which brings me to my next lit­tle tale…

Etta was rid­ing high in those days. We were head­lin­ing many fes­ti­vals and one of my favorites was the Mon­ter­rey Blues Fes­ti­val at the Mon­terey County Fair­grounds in Cal­i­for­nia. I love this fes­ti­val for many rea­sons but one that sticks out most is the fact that the con­cert is held on the same stage and venue that Jimi Hen­drix did the now famous show where he lit his gui­tar on fire. Jimi just hap­pened to be the first con­cert I ever attended cour­tesy of my older brother Gary Zavala, may he rest in peace. I know my brother loved me but I can’t help but think he was using me to get out of the house by tak­ing me to a Jimi Hen­drix con­cert for my thir­teenth birth­day in 1968 on a school night. That con­cert def­i­nitely changed my life. Every time we went on that stage in Mon­terey I thought of Jimi.

We came on stage at a per­fect time. It was around five in the after­noon, the heat wasn’t as bad as it was cool­ing off a bit. The crowd, fif­teen thou­sand strong, had just enough to drink and heard enough of the other bands to be primed for Miss Etta James and the Roots Band Show! Etta was on fire and so was the band. The crowd was into it and every­one could tell it was going to be one of those spe­cial nights. Half way through the show I came down front with Etta to do the Jimmy Reed song. We all had to use the back­line amps pro­vided for us by the pro­mot­ers so it was always a hit or miss sit­u­a­tion on these gigs but that night I had got­ten lucky, scor­ing a dyna­mite ampli­fier for my harp. I was get­ting that big, fat, Lit­tle Wal­ter type sound I love and I was ready. My solo came around and Etta turned me loose, roar­ing, “Blow, Jimmy, blow!”

Well you do not have to tell me twice to blow a solo, espe­cially with Etta James in front of fif­teen thou­sand scream­ing fans. I ripped through a few cho­ruses and was about to hand it back to Etta but she urged me on to take another solo. I finally passed it back to her and the crowd went wild. I was soak­ing wet with sweat pour­ing off of me, kneel­ing at Queen Etta’s feet look­ing up at her. Etta, as always, was dressed to the nines, and that night was no excep­tion. She wore a black sequined evening dress that was very low cut… VERY LOW CUT. She began fondling my hair and doing her naughty shtick as usual but I noticed she was a lit­tle more…how should I say…into it. We were kind of trad­ing licks and car­ry­ing on when all of a sud­den Etta pushes the back of my head with extreme power and my face was pushed deep down into her ample bosom. UP TO MY EARS!

Keep in mind I still had my hands around my bul­let micro­phone and har­mon­ica as I descended into Etta’s HUGE TITS. So I did what any trooper would do…I kept on play­ing. Very, very sur­real though, as if I had slid into a dream. My ears were cov­ered with some of the most sto­ried, “ear­muffs”, on the planet.

Con­se­quently I was not able to hear all that well. What I did hear was the crowd roar­ing and going crazy then I noticed the smell of Etta’s per­fume and per­spi­ra­tion, which was, need I even say? A very heady brew. I tried at one point to lift my head but Etta wasn’t hav­ing any of that. Those paws were hold­ing me down like a griz­zly bear.

Accept­ing my posi­tion and sit­u­a­tion, and keep in mind I am I still play­ing my harp, I tried to make myself at home. At some point I remem­ber think­ing to myself, ”I’m play­ing in Etta James’ tits! In front of a whole lot of peo­ple!” After some time she finally let me up for air and what a look she had on her face. If you could imag­ine a com­bi­na­tion of the Cheshire cat that just ate the canary type smile with a, “whatcha you gone do mutha­fucker” look. I just smiled in a some­what drugged state (and who could blame me.) I felt like a time trav­eler who had just barely made it back from another dimen­sion with seri­ous jet lag.

I looked out at the crowd as Etta was say­ing, “Jimmy Z Jimmy Z!” over and over. I’ve been for­tu­nate in my career to receive some rous­ing ova­tions but this one stands out. Besides the usual clap­ping and yelling there seemed to be a look of awe on some of the faces at what they’d just wit­nessed. And now that I think about… com­ing back from another dimen­sion just about sums it up… kind of.

© 2010 Zavala Songs, Inc.
edited by F. Colin & R. Thorny