Straight Life - Art Pepper [261]
I have to say that there was one time that amazed me. Art went to New York or something. Came back. And he looked like he was gonna die. He played at Donte's one night, and he looked like he was sixty years old. Then he played at Donte's about three weeks, a month later, and he looked fifteen years younger than he was. His skin was beautiful. I was amazed. Amazed. I asked him, I says, "What did you do?" "Awwww," he says, "Laurie wouldn't let me out of the house."
I think Art still has the same main problem in his life. He can't accept success. Everytime success starts comin' his way, he starts his destructive behaviour. He just cannot seem to function with things going his way. Things start getting good he puts it in the toilet. I don't think he consciously wants to do that. It's just that he feels a lot of pressure under those circumstances, whatever it is in his psyche that makes him go crazy. He'll start doing well, and people'll start respecting him, and he'll start almost living down this terrible reputation he's had for, what, thirty-five years: big monstrous doper, outta control. He starts to get some success, and then he'll be going around Donte's and the other clubs that he's working asking people if they've got any coke to sell, any dope. He starts doing that number and man, the next thing I hear is, "Art's up to his old stuff again, isn't he?" Or, "That poor guy, man, can't ever get himself straightened out." And that's what I hear. From the other guys.
WE CAME back to L. A. Laurie did what she could, but I was completely out of control. She gave up on me. I was hanging out with the guy I knew from Quentin and with some other guys who lived out in Venice who dealt coke and played music. I'd jam with them, and they'd give me coke. Every minute of the day was spent in getting money, driving to score, and getting loaded. I pawned my horns. I'd sworn I would never do that again.
One day-I don't even know what happened-I'd been up all night, playing out of town, and I drove into town to get my methadone. Then I went to a friend's house and shot some coke and fixed some heroin, and the methadone on top of that, and the no sleep ... I was driving my beautiful new car. In 1976, Les advanced us the money to buy this brand-new red Olds Cutlass Supreme Brougham with all the extras. I decided to turn left. To this day, I have no idea where I was going. I pulled into the left turn lane going too fast, and by the time I saw the cars stopped in front of me, waiting to turn, it was too late. I crashed into them. My head almost went through the windshield. The other people were injured slightly. I got out of the car and looked at this wreck. I was having memory lapses. I thought, "Boy, somebody sure got wiped out." I was walking around among all this glass. An ambulance came and the police, and the next thing I knew I was in a car going to jail.
I spent a week in jail. As it worked out, it cost us fifteen hundred dollars for the lawyer, a fine of about four hundred dollars and three more weekends in jail. One of the things that saved me was a contract I had for another tour of Japan. I think that impressed the judge or the D.A. Since I was on the methadone program, there was no point in putting me on probation. The methadone program can be very strict. I got thirtysix months summary probation.
In April of 1978, I toured Japan for nineteen days with my own group. We did eighteen concerts. It was really hard, and I had very little energy, because I wasn't using coke anymore. I was depressed and tired, but the audiences were wonderful. We played to packed houses. After the concerts, the fans would line up; they had all my albums, and they wanted my