judd

I just got home from seeing Elliot Smith on the second night show. I was completely shocked. I had never seen anything like that. I'm not sure if it was just tonight or all of his shows, but I never see even people on the street as disoriented and fucked up as he was tonight. He acted like a recovering stroke victim. He couldn't communicate anything coherently, grumbling something in the microphone. Everyone was so silent trying to figure out what he was saying, and then he'd look around, look at the microphone, look around, look back at the microphone "ok, nevermind". "I... I'm... I... just I'm trying... I think that um... you know... ok we'll play." His hands were shaking, I think even his voice betrayed him. He would mess up some chord in the song, then stop and look helplessly at the mic, "sorry". Another song ended ubruptly when he forgot a line and he said "sorry, that last line tripped me out." I've never seen something so embarrassing to watch. I felt bad for him. I've never seen him play before, but I'm a very big fan of him and his music always came across to me as intelligent and from someone very alert and in control of song structure and melody. His sense of melody and songwriting is genius. I've seen him speek once on VH1, and he seemed very intelligent. The whole night tonight he couldn't form even one coherent sentance. I don't know how much heroin he must have taken before he came on stage, but if I was his manager I'd lock him in a room all day without the drug until he goes on stage. It was awful to see him like that. Someone needs to help this guy.