Less Is More is my Holiday mantra this year and true to form I’ve released a Christmas single – “This Christmas I Want Less” – continuing a tradition I began four or five years ago. Some December I’ll lump them all together in an album: Noels from Murphyland. Here’s a sample of the lyrics:
“Well no more clothes or sneakers
Or high-tech gadgetry
No cool designer shades
Waiting underneath my tree
I got enough of more …
It’s all good but it’s not best…”
Listen to “This Christmas I Want Less” on Spotify.
In that economical spirit, lately I’ve been clearing out my closets of unneeded, unworn and unfashionable clothing (even got rid of the Frank Sinatra like shiny grey suit I wore when I received the “Medaille de Paris” from the mayor some years back) and also said goodbye to a pair of high heeled pointy Beatle Boots that I stomped around on stage with for years. I remember buying my original pair of this iconic footwear in 1964 at the trendy Thom McAnn shoe store located in Roosevelt Field in my hometown of Garden City maybe six months after the Beatles made their US television debut on The Ed Sullivan Show which was an epiphany for every rock ‘n roll guitar hopeful of my generation. Now I’ve always wondered how they managed to start selling Beatles gear so soon after that show swept a wave of Beatlemania across America? Some merchandising visionaries must have seen the changing of the guard …
When it comes to precious clothing that I’ve parted ways with over the years, I do admit that I regret saying goodbye to the Aqua Yak coat that I bought at Saks Fifth Avenue in NYC in the Revillon boutique after securing my RCA Records contract in 1975 with a generous advance – almost ten years after I started dressing to suit my musical passions with those original Beatles Boots – in my opinion, this coat of many colors was surely my second most iconic accouterment:
That psychedelic coat and I parted ways just before I moved to Paris in 1989 and donated it to the Salvation Army who once upon a time use to run thrift shops all over the world before vintage became a fashion statement unto itself. I do hope it found its way to the back of some Bowery inebriate swigging rotgut rye near the door of CBGBs.
Surely my number one most iconic garment, again made in France, was the splendid white suit that I wore on the cover of Aquashow 50 years ago and will forever be associated with my early Gatsby years, I recently donated it to the “Long Island Music Hall of Fame Museum” located in Stony Brook.
They’re currently doing an expo dedicated to the career of my homeboy buddy Billy Joel (who inducted me into the LIMHOF) so if you find yourself due east of New York City check it out.
To set the record straight, it was not Robert Redford’s magnificent portrayed of Jay Gatsby in the 1974 film that inspired me to sport that angelic suit (Aquashow actually was released before The Great Gatsby film he starred in); if anyone, it was the late great pioneer of new journalism, the one and only Tom Wolfe, whose 1965 book The Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby changed my cultural life in ways that I still don’t understand and who made white suits famous long before John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever. I was fortunate to have the incongruous opportunity to actually meet Tom in a gym on Manhattan’s upper east side of all places, some years before he died, when I was working out as was he. I gathered up the nerve to approach him by introducing myself based upon the thin pretext that we both had contributed fiction to Rolling Stone and therefore, of course, we should know each other. He could have so easily blown me off with a brief hello but he was charming, gracious in his indomitable southern way (he was from Virginia) and, of course, articulate beyond belief. He even took a break from his running machine (I think he was recovering from a heart attack) while we chatted. His jogging outfit was … white!
We’re coming to the end of 2023, a year which marked 50 years on the road for me and we celebrated that personal milestone with memorable concerts in both Paris and Barcelona. I sincerely thank all the fans who came out to those shows and have supported me and my music for all these years. I wouldn’t be here without you and as I always say, after my family, you are my greatest treasure. So this holiday, I’m staying put and planting my feet (and Christmas tree) in Paris, gathering up energy for all the songwriting, recording and shows I hope to do in 2024 and reminisce on all that’s gone down this fine, fine, superfine year of 2023. I’m humbled to say the least. Thank you.
photo by Muriel Delepont