A story about Etta James, Bonnie Raitt and the N. Hollywood Police Department

Sad news that Etta James passed away today. She really represented a place in time where blues, R&B, soul and lots of other music were moving out of the black community and being placed without the white culture that was anxious for the change to happen.

I was managing Bonnie Raitt back in the early 1980s and living alone in the Hollywood Hills. Bonnie was also not hanging out with anyone at the time so whenever she wanted to see a movie or go to a certain restaurant or hear some music, I got the call to be the designated date.

So I get a call from her that Etta James is playing at The Palamino in North Hollywood and she really wants to go. I say that’s fine and I pick her up and we head for the Palamino. Now the club is not in a very great part of the city so your best bet is to park as close as possible.

Bonnie and I go in and Etta has saved seats at the front table. She rocks through the first set just fine and invites us to spend some time with her in her trailer.

Now I suddenly remember that there is a great meat market just a few blocks away so I tell Bonnie that I’m going for a ride but I’ll meet her back at the table. I cruise on down the street and when I reach the block where I think the market is located, I slow way down to check if it is open.

Suddenly, I have a police car flashing its dome lights right behind me. I freeze behind the wheel and then I have a cop at my window.

He orders me out of the car and asks me if I have been drinking. I tell him that I have not been drinking but he wants to do a field test on me. He tells me to stand with my legs apart and my head tilted back and then orders me to touch my nose with my left middle finger. I arc my finger toward my nose and eventually feel that I have touched my cheek.

Then he drags me onto the curb and tells me to walk the crack in the sidewalk. Now my balance is not so great under the best circumstances and I am really nervous. I hit a couple of lines and then a miss a couple.

OK, he says, and tells me to put my hands behind my back. Wait a minute, what is happening here? He twists my wrist until I am buckled with pain as he handcuffs me and then I am thrown into the back of a North Hollywood Police car.

I try to explain that I had brought someone to The Palamino and she’d be looking for me to give her a ride home but they are not listening.

They walk me into the station were I see that it is absolutely jammed with Latino kids. They are stripped to the waist and gang tattoos are everywhere. I am the only Anglo in the place. I am ordered to get on my knees and put forehead against the wall. There is a constant roar of profanity around my head.

I lose track of time but I must have been there for 15 or 20 minutes when a sergeant walks into the room. He is obviously the Watch Commander and the officers listen when he talks.

He nods at me and says, “What have you got on him?” They grab me under the arms and pull me in front of the sergeant. He glares at me and pulls out a breath analyzer. “Blow into this straw and I mean hard!

I draw a breath and blow as hard as I can for long seconds. He resets the machine and orders me to do it again. I pull as much air as I can and blow into the straw until I am gasping.

He looks at the dial and he is enraged. He turns to the policemen who brought me in and he is livid.

“He blew a double zero. He blew a mother fucking double zero twice. You assholes are wasting my time. Get him the fuck out of here!”

So they send me up to the front desk but now they can’t find me a ride back to my car. But they know that their ass is in major trouble if the Watch Commander walks in and I am still there.

So they give me a ride back to my car and I burn rubber getting back to the Palamino. I walk in and I can see Bonnie sitting alone at the front table with Etta doing her second set.

As I start to sit down, Bonnie is really furious and she unloads on me. “Where the hell have you been? You were supposed to be taking care of me tonight and I have been stranded her with every ass hole in the world hitting on me.”

I was arrested, I said, and before she could launch another attack, I showed her my arms where the handcuffs had left welts and deep red grooves cutting into my wrists.

Her eyes pop wide open and she is under a full head if steam about calling a lawyer and getting the ACLU involved in this. No No No, I am trying to say. I just want to get out of here . . . period.

So we gather up out belongings and give Etta a wave that we are leaving.

I think that was the final episode of my being enlisted to be Bonnie “date du jour.”

I was doing my best but I ended up being at the wrong place at the wrong time.

This entry was posted on Saturday, January 21st, 2012 at 1:12 am. It is filed under Dick Waterman's Music Photo Blog. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.