Torment Saint: The Life of Elliott Smith Read Online Free Page B

dignity. It was also simply the right thing to do, the kind thing. What Smith did not have, at least so far as I have been able to discover, was enemies. He was hard to dislike, impossible to hate, even though, like anyone, he could be judgmental, petty, or condescending at times, even downright mean. The strongest impulse anyone felt around him was protection, chiefly because he wasn’t very good at protecting himself.
    An incident from winter 2003 is revealing. It illustrates several elements of Elliott’s personality simultaneously—his vulnerability, his openness, his self-consciousness, even his need to tell the truth. Elliott was performing at the Henry Fonda Theater for two nights, January 31 and February 1. At the end of the song “Pretty (Ugly Before),” someone in the audience called out, “Get a backbone.” It was a very strange moment, a rare expression of distaste, especially in the setting of a concert filled with fervid fans. According to two different people I spoke with who were at the gig and deeply in the know, the person delivering the insult was Valerie Deerin, they allege, a recent ex-girlfriend. These same two people do not believe Elliott himself was aware Deerin made the comment; it came amid the usual between-song crowd noise. At any rate, what’s interesting is Elliott’s reaction, which is complex and multidimensional. “Get a what?” he asks. “A backbone?” He goes on, “Get a backbone, what the fuck? … I could tell you a dream I had last night, otherwise I can’t be more fucking for real. I mean, honestly. Get a backbone? Okay. I’ll try.”
    Shock and anger turn to obligingness. He says he’ll try. Then he apologizes: “I’m not trying to pick on you. Maybe I didn’t understand what you were saying. Whatever. I’ve been playing a lot of dark songs tonight, so I’m sorry … Don’t get bummed out. They’re just songs.” 25
    The next night, at the conclusion of “Stickman,” another self-denigrating number implying some amount of spinelessness, Elliott—this time awareof the fact that Deerin had probably shouted the remark—revisits the incident. “Someone bringing up my backbone tonight? It’s here, behind me.” Several crowd members shout, “What?”
    “I don’t know. Last night someone said to get a backbone … I’m pretty odd playing as it is. I don’t know. My answer was, I’ll try.” Not in any way singling out Deerin, which would have been uncharacteristic, Elliott says, “It’s like, people think …
some
people … they need to take you down because they think you think you’re better, like that you’re some kind of hot shit, to take you down, and that’s just bullshit. Fair enough? That was my little tirade tonight.” 26
    Not a very major tirade, as it happens. It’s remarkable—Elliott does not tell the person to fuck off. He doesn’t ignore the person either, the easiest response of all. Instead he confirms his honesty. He can’t possibly get any more real, any more vulnerable. He vows to try, to grow one, to get stronger, in effect agreeing with the insult’s sentiment. Then he says he’s sorry, and the next night makes a point of announcing that he does not think he’s hot shit, he does not think he’s any better than anyone else.
    All this was in a peculiar musical context; Elliott was performing, in a position of vulnerability, and the catcall arrived out of the blue, utterly unexpectedly. But it would be a mistake to imagine Elliott as timid, unable to access anger. Over the years he did get into a number of fights, even during middle school in Texas. He never initiated these scenes. In every case he was standing up for a person who was being insulted or mistreated. One such episode occurred in a bar in Brooklyn. A friend or girl was involved; a group of guys were trash-talking. Elliott took a stand and, as a friend describes it, “got the shit beat out of him.” 27 At one point during the tumult a bottle was broken;