Remembering Andy                            

Celestial Stardog

                                                      Minstrel of Light and Soul

Untold Story

Eagles as in Dallas

Lines form on my face and hands,
lines form from the ups and downs
I'm in the middle without any plans,
I'm a boy and I'm a man
I'm eighteen and I don't know what I want,
eighteen I just don't know what I want
Eighteen, I gotta get away,
I gotta get out of this place,
I'll go runnin' in outer space oh yeah
I got a baby's brain and an old man's heart,
took eighteen years to get this far
Don't always know what I'm talkin' about,
feels like I'm livin' in the middle of doubt
ALICE COOPER
 

After I told Andy about the death of the girlfriend - I went on to tell him about the light side of the moon. I felt there was two sides to every coin. On one side - I was full of pain and misery - but on the other side - I was full of joy and harmony. It was the way of the world as far as my mind was concerned at the time. When Samantha died - I was kicked inside swift and hard. It brought me to my knees and I was in constant meditation or prayer concerning her welfare and well being. I couldn't stop loving her -- no matter what the world told me. I had no room in my life for any other woman. Samantha was still a big part of my internal life and mind. She visited me constantly in dreams. That is how I dealt with the inner and outer pain. She would comfort me and tell me secrets concerning the mysteries of life and love. I told Andy that in order to deal with the madness of the Dark side of the moon -- I would travel to the Light side of the Moon in my dreams. Memories of that travel would keep me sane during my walk through life. Many people told me I was insane for believing in unseen elements contained in my visionary dreams at night. They would tell me that dreaming was a part of imagination and NOT real. I would tell them to kiss my ass and go to hell. Hope of her being alive and well in my dreams kept me strong in my mental mind. It gave me hope that one day -- I would see her heart and soul again. Seems like I was always living in a world of doubt. The madness of the Dark side of the Moon. Doubt.

Eagles Concert (Singin' in the Dark)

When Samantha died, I was only 20 years old. My favorite song at that time in my life was the song by Alice. The day Samantha died -- she came to me in spirit. It was sudden and unexpected. It was a vivid apparition of light. She spoke to me inwardly at length concerning her passing from the physical plane. The first month - I could call her at will and her voice would come to me silently within. I told people about my inner connection to her spirit - and their doubt set into my own doubt. They all thought I was making it up in my mind to comfort the reality of her loss. The reality was -- she was still very much alive to me, just not in a physical body anymore. I didn't understand it. I would have preferred her to be in a physical body again. Her spirit would try and explain the situation to me, but my mind was still full of grief. I didn't like the idea of being in love with a ghost. A ghost without a physical body. How the hell was she going to play guitar on stage with out a physical body. I knew enough to know -- people were not going to buy tickets for an invisible ghost jaming on stage. (Sort of like the King with no clothes.) She was always invisible to the sight and sound of others. Which did make me look a bit insane at times.

The moment I had met Samantha - I had it in my mind, I was going to ask her to marry me. In my mind - I was never going to take no for an answer. There was no doubt that she was the woman of my dreams and the one I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. We had concluded that one day we would be sitting in our rocking chairs together - looking back on all the wonderful memories we shared. That is what killed me inside my mind. There would be no life full of wonderful memories to share with her in our old age and beyond. I felt that was stolen from her as well as from me. Her spirit was telling me otherwise. I was confused. She sent me to an Eagles concert and told me events would pass that would help me understand mentally the concept of us sharing memories together in the end.  

Start in the morning and get the job done
Take care of bus'ness and we have some fun
All night long, all night long
We like a long neck and a good old song
Turn it up and then we sing along
Sing along
We're all stayin' up all night long

The concert was in Dallas at the Cotton Bowl. The Eagles, Cheap Trick, Foreigner, April Wine, Sammy Hagar, Christopher Cross, and Savvy. The summer of 1980. Near the end of the Eagles set - it was around midnight. They announced that the authorities had threatened to terminate the show at midnight by shuting down the electricity. The Eagles said they were not satisfied they had given their all in the performance and was ready to keep on rocking and rolling. They said that if the lights went out - that the audience was to keep on rocking with them by singing along. The Eagles promised they were not going any where and would be up on stage playing along with the audience. The lights went out around midnight and the whole crowd was immersed into darkness. I lost sight of the band on stage. Lighters started flicking and the audience lit up in the darkness as we all started singing along to the song. "All night Long." About 5 minutes or so later - we were still singing when the lights came back on. We didn't miss a beat. The Eagles and the audience had been in sync the whole time. Just as they had promised - they had been up on stage the whole time jamming along with us. It was a marvelous sight and feeling. This is what Samantha had been telling me in dreams. Even though I was without sight of her - she was still jamming with me in my heart. She promised me that the day would come = when she would be back in my sight again -- and we would look on all the wonderful tunes we had shared together in our hearts. The darkness was temporary and would never separate us from our love together, or the tunes it brought us with the harmony of its magical beat. When ever I got to the end of my trail in this world -- I would be able to look back and see that she had been with me the whole time -- in spirit. Before the Eagles made that clear to my mind -- that had been hard for my mental mind to digest.

People were telling me to go on with my life and find another woman. (There are plenty of fishes in the sea. Just find another one.) I don't know where other people got there idea's from. I didn't fall in love with a woman as much as I feel in love with another heart. My counterpart was not in the flesh as much as it was in the spirit. I fell in love with a spirit -- not a woman's body. Not a woman's mind. Just because someone else had a woman's body and mind - how could I ever fool myself and look past the most essential part and component in love. The heart and soul of the counterpart. Doubt played havoc on my mind, as well as the idea's of others. I needed an experience with her spirit that would manifest itself outward to help combat the doubt. Much like the rock and roll experience with the Eagles.

DKing © Copyright  2006-2007 - All rights reserved

Remembering Andy

Andrew Wood (January 8, 1966
– March 19, 1990) was the lead singer of the band Mother Love Bone and earlier of Malfunkshun. He died of a heroin overdose coupled with a cerebral hemorrhage just before the release of Mother Love Bone's debut album Apple. He lived on Bainbridge Island in Washington State for the majority of his youth, forming Malfunkshun as a teenager. The only released material during Malfunkshun's existence was on the compilation, Deep Six (C/Z Records).

As a musician, his trademarks were his exuberant on-stage personality, glittery, outlandish clothes and whimsical, unabashedly dreamy lyrics which he sang in a tenor heavily reminiscent of Led Zeppelin frontman Robert Plant. In the 1996 movie Hype!, Seattle engineer Jack Endino called Wood "the only stand-up comedian frontman in Seattle", a reference to Wood's playful style of interacting with Mother Love Bone fans.

Fellow band members Stone Gossard and Jeff Ament of Mother Love Bone went on to form Pearl Jam, and Malfunkshun drummer Regan Hagar later appeared in Satchel and Brad with Shawn Smith. Stone Gossard is also a concurrent member of Brad. Shawn Smith has a guest appearance on the album "Your Ice Cream's Dirty" by Devilhead, featuring Wood's brothers Brian and Kevin Wood.

In the year following Andrew Wood's death his former companions Stone Gossard and Jeff Ament, together with Chris Cornell and Matt Cameron from Soundgarden formed the tribute-band Temple of the Dog. The name was taken from one of Wood's lyrics and the songs bore the street-rock flavor of Mother Love Bone's music. Ament and Gossard also included the other two members from their newly born band, Mookie Blaylock (to be Pearl Jam). These members were Mike McCready, who played solo guitar for Temple of the Dog, and Eddie Vedder who sang in the song "Hunger Strike" together with Cornell.

Several years after Wood's death, Gossard released Return to Olympus, a compilation of demos recorded by Wood and Malfunkshun.

The Alice in Chains album Facelift and song Would? are dedicated to Andrew Wood. The Candlebox song "Far Behind" written by Kevin Martin is about Andrew Wood.

In 2005, Director Scot Barbour completed production on the documentary, MALFUNKSHUN - The Andrew Wood Story (Sony), premiering at the Seattle International Film Festival, winning BEST DOCUMENTARY at the FAIF Film Festival in Hollywood, CA.

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Remembering Kurt

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