R.I.P. Paul Hester

I’d always wanted to come to Melbourne, ever since I was a kid. I loved Split Enz, new wave wonder from down under, lads who wore commedia dell’arte costumes and sang deceptively poppy songs about obsession, anger, paranoia and the world’s tallest woman. Split Enz broke up, but not before I got to see them on the seminal rock show, Solid Gold. They sang “I Got You,” a delicious and vicious anthem for jealous boyfriends all over. Neil Finn wore a lime green sharkskin suit, cut to perfection on his lean frame, and I remember swooning over his sonorous voice and aquiline nose. I thought I never saw such a handsome boy, and such an inaccessible one, who was not only a rock star but also lived at the end of the world in a mythical city called Melbourne. This was where Neil Finn founded his new band “Crowded House,” which would soon become legend.
I bought the first Crowded House album on vinyl. Back then, records were such a big, satisfying purchase. First you would tear open the plastic from outside the record, a kind of amniotic sac that held in the very distinctive vinyl smell, a faint whiff of sweetly burnt chemicals and anticipation. Album covers gave us the space to dream about the rock star. You could look to the artwork for meaning and solace. The liner notes on the inner sleeve were like a Koranic script, and I scanned the words for meaning like a devout imam. Neil Finn always wrote devastatingly beautiful lyrics along with haunting melodies that were elusive yet unforgettable. His songs comprise a good portion of the soundtrack of my youth. I listen to them now and I am a young woman again, traveling the world, looking for myself.

I waited outside the sound check at the Warfield Theatre, sometime in the 80s, during Crowded House’s second brief tour to the US. The popular Wolfgang’s, where they played their last time through, had burned down. The Warfield was larger and far more prestigious, and they filled the place with new fans and old alike. I met Nick Seymour, talented bass player and painter, responsible for all the album cover art for the band. The first self titled album had a stylized representation of each band member on the cover, with Neil and Nick in the foreground, and Paul Hester, the gangster prankster drummer flying above on a great pair of wings. It is sadly ironic now, but then it was just beautiful, as they were.

Nick wasn’t very nice, but then why should he be? He was being accosted by an army of misfit girls, just trying to maneuver his way around the strange hills and alleys of San Francisco. He had no real obligation to friendliness, but it taught me an important lesson – to be unfailingly gracious to people who come meet you at shows, because thoughtlessly unkind words thrown off during a moment’s frustration can wound with an indelible permanence. When people think the world of you, be careful with them. It’s the least you can do, for the price of the ticket and their appreciation. Nick’s brusqueness prevented me from attempting to meet Neil for many years. I didn’t want to take the chance that he might be anything other than the deity I had created in my mind. Plus, it didn’t matter, because the music was the thing, and their shows were always phenomenal.

I remember they did a free show in Golden Gate Park, and they were so great and the audience loved them so much they were chasing the limousine down, which I had seen in movies but never in real life. Paul was sticking his head, then his feet out the sunroof, flipping like a seal, and fans blocked the exits and jumped all over the car. I can’t count how many times I went to see them over the years. More than any other band, I know that. I also saw them in their many configurations. As Crowded House, Neil with his brother Tim Finn, who was the founding member of Split Enz and later joined his brother’s band, Tim alone, Tim’s side project ALT, Neil alone, over and over and over again all over the world, from San Francisco to Edinburgh.

I finally met Neil at Largo, after an unannounced show with Jon Brion. I was introduced to him by Grant Phillips’ wife, and I don’t really know how I managed it, but I remember being exceedingly nervous and trying to get away. Neil was very nice but I am sure I was totally incomprehensible. A quarter of a century of suppressed devotion burst forth like a shaken up magnum of champagne, and I fizzed all over him with overwrought complements and my own cds. He’s played Largo many times over the last few years, always unannounced, which brought crowds of people waiting outside the venue from morning until night. How they managed to find out he was there always baffled me. I was fortunate enough to be friendly with the owner, the dear Flanagan, and got tipped off to the secret shows well in advance. Neil Finn and I are also label mates, which is a testament to Nettwerk’s marvelously good taste, and so I even finagled an advance copy of “Everyone is Here,” The Finn Bros. stellar new album.

I was excited to go to Melbourne, because I had read that Paul Hester still lived there. While the band had broken up, and the members spread all over the world, Paul stayed in the beautiful seaside metropolis, as I probably would have done myself. Melbourne, with its foggy marina and multitudes of Italian bakeries feels like a modern Bethlehem to me, not only because of its mythical musical legacy but also because it looks a lot like San Francisco, my hometown. On my pilgrimage, I discovered that Paul Hester had committed suicide some time before. He’d been plagued with depression for a number of years, and finally, when the clouds would no longer lift, he took his own life. Learning this as late as I had, I felt like I had betrayed my own fan-ness. How could I claim I was a die-hard when I didn’t even know this?

Still, the news struck my heart like a poisoned dart. Grief is a terrible cold ice pick of an emotion. It chills your insides, chipping the beloved away from you forever. The worst is when the death is untimely, because even though it shouldn’t have been that way, it remained unstoppable. Days go by and more of the untimely unstoppable happen. Having survived a tragedy makes your awareness of others’ more acute. Your pain becomes another snowflake in the vast Antarctica of loss. I absolutely understand suicide, because I have only just barely survived years of dark nights myself. I get why anyone would want to end it, but that doesn’t make it any less devastating when someone does. Paul Hester just looked to me to be someone who didn’t have that kind of sadness, perhaps because I loved the band so much. In a way, we dehumanize those we idolize. They, for all their talent and beauty, seem to be beyond the daily drudgery of the difficult nature of life on earth. But they aren’t, and in ways might be even more vulnerable.

My deepest sympathies to Paul Hester’s family and friends, even though this is much too late in coming. My love to Neil Finn, not only for many years of incomparable music, but also for opening up his home to Paul’s orphaned dog, Lozzie. Goodbye to Paul. I hope things are better, wherever you are. And I am grateful that the music lives on, to make the treacherous journey of life more endurable for the rest of us.