When I was living in Boston (in what seems like the 1920s) I came across a record album — vinyl — stacked up at Strawberries Records.
It was really 1977, and Garland Jeffreys’ “Ghost Writer” was the cult album of the year. His song, “Wild in the Streets,” was an FM staple. The other tracks all went into rotation. A&M Records did several more albums with Jeffreys and he became an East Coast favorite. He hit a new high in 1979 with a radio favorite called “Matador.”
By the time Jeffreys moved to Epic Records in the 1980s he had a big following but it was hard to get radio play. Was he R&B? Rock? Reggae? He defied categorization. Punk and new wave were way in by then, but Jeffreys — a small roundish brown man — didn’t have a mullet and wasn’t a teenager.
Nevertheless, great albums poured out of him including “Don’t Call Me Buckwheat,” “American Boy and Girl,” and “Wildlife Dictionary.”
And then for a while there was silence. When I produced a Phoebe Snow show at the original Cutting Room in 2001, there was Garland all of a sudden out of nowhere. (Phoebe had recorded a track with him in the 70s.)
Then well into the 2000s came of “The King of Inbetween.” A stunning collection, “King” was the first of three or four albums that solidified his place in rock and roll history. One of his best songs, “I’m Alive,” was thrilling declaration of survival. But what his category?
Along the way, he’d picked up admirers. Lou Reed went to college with Garland at Syracuse University and they were close til Lou left this world. Bruce Springsteen fell in love with him. Guys like Elvis Costello and Graham Parker, who’d also exploded in 1977, were ardent. None other than Petula Clark danced up the aisle at a High Line show. But they had radio niches. Garland didn’t, so he just kept gigging and building up massive loyal audiences.
A new documentary, directed and produced by his tenacious wife Claire, is now playing on Amazon and YouTube and other platforms after a nice indie film theatrical run. It’s called “The King of Inbetween” and it comes in the nick of time. About 5 years ago, Garland was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s.
WTF? This gregarious storyteller, with an incredible memory for details of his childhood and New York in a gritty time before Yuppies and Wall Street bros, gifted with gab and catchy melodies, was going to be silenced? Not so fast. He kept singing and gigging without telling anyone for as long as he could, eventually being swallowed by this pernicious disease.
“The King of Inbetween” is a love letter from Claire to Garland. But it’s also the story of an outsized artist who didn’t win Grammys or get on the cover of People magazine. It’s about a mixed race poet from Brooklyn with the musical chops of everyone from the Rolling Stones to Goffin and King, who couldn’t bend to any genre. He created his own. If you’re a new fan, songs like “New York Skyline” will make you cry, and “Coney Island Winter” will evoke a whole movie that has not been made.
Mostly, the movie will make you fall in love with Garland’s personal brand of rock, reggae, & R&B in ways you did not imagine possible. And what’s better than discovering great music long after you thought the ship had sailed? Stream “The King of Inbetween,” see it a film festival, get his records. He’s one of a kind, the best kind.
PS Garland is still alive. But Alzheimer’s has taken its toll. He doesn’t know how well the movie has done, and hasn’t read all the glowing reviews. On Rotten Tomatoes, the audience meter is at 100%. For a good reason.
