Thin walls in a Back Bay flophouse...

…was my introduction to The Blues – the first album was a scratchy old ‘Sippy Wallace thing, the year was 1962; no sooner had that album played than my heard-but-unseen-neighbor on the other side of the wall topped it off with some Muddy Waters and James Cotton…but this is unknown to me then…I’m an expatriate Vermonter it’s true - but through the lath, the plaster and the wallpaper, this ole country boy living in the Back Bay, was hooked, Dude; I liked what I heard so I went to tap on the door next door…

…a giant answered my timid knock, a giant by the name of William Henry Robinson Jr., a black dude narrow at the hip, long of leg, a little older than me, my 19 to his 27 – who I had to look up at in reality and later figuratively as I came to know Henry Robinson, guide to the nether world, a blues sideman blowin’ harp at The Palace, The Palace an incubator of crime in the cradle of liberty - Boston, and dangerous to the max, the only place to be in those halcyon days of my errant youth…

…Henry, a fringe underworld character who looked like he just stepped out of a GQ cover, dressed to the nines he always was, impeccably so, no zoot suits or polyester, o no, not Henry, we’re talking Brooks Brothers, Back Bay…real clothes…o how I loved going in there and seeing the fine threads I could never afford…I mean we are talking glad rags Dude!

There I was, barely fledged and spreading my wings in Brooks Brothers, hanging with (and onto the cashmere coattails of...) rich people. Rich people smell different and don’t think they don’t…course flip side of that is poor people smell different too – we, poor people, smell of patchouli and incense, dope and beer, not to mention missing a shower now and then, same clothes for a friggin' week...while the rich, flitting from Jacuzzi to spa to bath, and closet to closet seeking out their Prada bags and Guido Nazzo shoes, give off an aura of wealth; poor, the stench of poverty…but stay, where was I …o yeah The Palace with Henry…Dude I’m telling you the music was so fine, the girls were so pretty and I was so young and foolish…I had no idea what I was getting into…