Of all the musicians of the 1960s, no one embodied the tumultuous and sometimes self-destructive spirit of the time as much as Janis Lyn Joplin. She was born the oldest of three children in Port Arthur, Texas, a dirty coastal town on the Louisiana border. When Janis was young, her mother won a singing scholarship, but she turned it down for an administrative job at a local college. Her father encouraged Janis to read as many books as possible. Janis Joplin’s sensitivity and love for the written word developed from this support. However, being well-read and sensitive was not a trait that would make a young girl feel comfortable in a dreary working-class town like Port Arthur.
She quickly felt out of place. As a teenager, Janis Joplin struggled with a host of debilitating insecurities, fueled by her chubby appearance, acne-plagued skin, and bushy, untamed hair. The almost inevitable consequence: unpopularity among her classmates and all children her age. She chose the path of offense. Harsh language, harsh gestures, plus alcohol and cigarettes. She had success with older boys, but the divisions among her peers only became more hardened. Janis Joplin was looking for acceptance.
Out into the world
Although she initially did not enjoy singing in public, she joined the local church choir while still at school. In addition to music and literature, Janis Joplin cultivated a strong passion for painting from an early age. After graduating from Thomas Jefferson High School in 1960, she enrolled in art studies at Lamar College in Beaumont, Texas. Janis often traveled to nearby Louisiana to hear blues cover bands. She also listened to musicians such as Leadbelly, Bessie Smith, Odetta and Big Mama Thornton. It was these blues and folk artists who prepared the fertile ground into which Janis’ roots would eventually penetrate.
By 1961, Janis was becoming restless and left college. She explored the music scenes in Los Angeles and Houston before finally moving back to Texas in 1962, settling in the capital and music mecca of Austin. Janis enrolled at the University of Texas and occasionally performed in small bars and restaurants. Although she did not graduate from the University of Texas, she lived there in a building commonly referred to as “The Ghetto.” It was an abandoned army barracks from the Second World War, where sooner or later the university’s outsiders found themselves – for a rent of 40 dollars a month.
California Dreaming
While in Austin, Janis eventually met Chet Helms, whom she followed to San Francisco. In 1963, the North Beach neighborhood was considered the West Coast’s answer to New York City’s Greenwich Village. Janis Joplin sang again in bars and coffeehouses, often accompanied by her autoharp, an American version of the zither often used in bluegrass and country music. However, she didn’t just do it for the fun of it. On the one hand, Janis wasn’t financially blessed anyway, and on the other hand, she had to ensure that her increasing fascination with drugs was financed. In 1964 her musical career had stalled and drug use was in full swing. She started taking methedrine and often drank 80 percent alcohol. Janis was unable to handle this lifestyle. Hoping to overcome her growing addiction, she moved back to Port Arthur.
Helms, now a busy music promoter, didn’t wait long and brought Janis back to San Francisco after a short time. There he introduced her to the band Big Brother an the Holding Company, with whose members and followers she lived from then on in a rented summer house in Haight Ashbury. They worked on their show together and played their first live shows in the area. Word quickly spread about their quality, so Big Brother and the Holding Company became the house band at the Avalon Theater. Just as quickly, Janis fell back into her old habits. Drugs and alcohol were an integral part of her everyday life.
Monterey
In August 1967, Janis Joplin’s final rise as a musician began. It was the summer of the Monterey Pop Festival. Janis, dressed in a velvet outfit and draped from head to toe in pearl necklaces, wowed the crowd with her sexually charged rendition of “Ball and Chain.” The legend of Janis Joplin was born. With the attention, the fees increased. Ultimately, Janis and her band separated from Chet Helms and appointed Albert Grossmann, one of the leading players in the music business of the time, as the new manager of Big Brother and the Holding Company. From a financial perspective, this was certainly a smart move. Grossmann arranged a lucrative record deal with CBS/Columbia Records, which released the band’s debut album. The record sold well, but Janis was not satisfied – especially because of the bad reviews the band received in the press.
After only two albums with Big Brother and the Holding Company (“Cheap Thrills” was released in 1968 and sold significantly better than its predecessor), Janis Joplin left the band and founded the Kozmic Blues Band. Together they recorded the album “I Got Dem Ol’ Kozmic Blues Again Mama,” which included the hit “Try (Just a Little Bit Harder).” During the band’s short existence, they played, among other things, at the Woodstock Festival in 1969 and the only Germany concert in the Jahrhunderthalle in Frankfurt on April 12th of the same year.
Demons
Despite the fame she had gained, Janis’ insecurities could not be suppressed. Her two old acquaintances helped: drugs and alcohol. Whiskey and heroin were her substances of choice. Meanwhile, Janis Joplin was consuming $200 worth of heroin per day, in addition to amphetamines and barbiturates. To make matters worse, she also became infected with the sexually transmitted disease gonorrhea, better known as gonorrhea. Janis repeatedly resorted to methadone to overcome her heroin addiction – without achieving the desired effect.
At the beginning of the 1970s, Janis suffered from the effects of drug abuse, gonorrhea and alcoholism. She formed a new band, Full Tilt Boogie, with the hopes of rekindling her previous success. They harmonized perfectly and began recording the songs for the planned album “Pearl” in Los Angeles in September 1970. The sessions took place at the legendary Sunset Sound Studios under the direction of Paul Rothchild, best known for his work with The Doors. They played their last public concert a few weeks earlier in Cambridge, Massachusetts in front of 40,000 fans.
Death at the Landmark Hotel
While recording “Pearl,” Janis Joplin checked into the Landmark Hotel in Hollywood. On October 3, 1970, the sessions were almost completed, with Janis contributing in many areas and often holding the reins beyond her role as a singer. She was the boss. That day she drove to Sunset Sound Studios once again to listen to the already recorded instrumental version of “Buried Alive in the Blues”. Her vocal recordings were scheduled for the following day. It should never come to that. On the evening of October 3rd, she had a few drinks at Barney’s Beanery bar on Santa Monica Boulevard, then returned to the Landmark Hotel and repeatedly used heroin.
On October 4th, Paul Rothchild was surprised that Janis didn’t show up at the studio at the agreed time. Worried, he tried to call her at the hotel, but she didn’t pick up the phone. John Cooke, Full Tilt Boogie’s tour manager, headed to the Landmark Hotel to check on Janis. Her psychedelic-painted Porsche was parked in front of the building when Cooke pulled into the driveway. A few minutes later, the fears were confirmed: Janis Joplin was found dead in room 105. She was lying next to her bed, from which she had fallen unconscious. The medical examiner Thomas Naguchi determined the cause of death to be acute morphine poisoning, caused by a heroin overdose. Jimi Hendrix had died just two weeks earlier.
A fatal mistake
Janis’ dealer was known for being extremely cautious. He employed his own chemist to measure the purity of his goods. However, on that fateful weekend in October 1970, that chemist was out of town. Rather than miss out on the weekend’s tempting profits, the drug dealer delivered the heroin himself. Due to his lack of knowledge, he ended up with a result that was significantly stronger than the usual delivery. Too strong for many of his customers. In addition to Janis Joplin, seven other of his clients reportedly died of overdoses this weekend.
A farewell party
In accordance with her will, Janis’ body was cremated at the Pierce Brother Westwood Village Crematorium. Her ashes were scattered by close friends and family along Northern California’s Pacific Coast near Stinson Beach. Another of her final wishes was also granted: she arranged for $2,500 to be set aside for her own wake, with entertainment provided by The Grateful Dead and other artists. The celebration took place at Lion’s Share in San Anselmo. The invitations, sent out to around 200 special guests, read: “Drinks are on Pearl.”