John Spears died a few Saturdays back. He had various handles: “John Costin Vincent Spears,” “JCVS,” or, more often than not, simply “Spears.” I knew him well and yet could probably count on one hand the number of times I called him John. There were other less formal tags, some but not all applied by me: “Spud,” “Mo” (short for ‘Mo Cheeks’ from his College of Marin hoops buddies),“George Clooney,” (not quite, but almost a Cockney slang offshoot) and “Herbert Viola” come to mind to name but a few. Spears was a character in multiple senses. His personal attributes were unique and distinguishing. I regretted not having written more about him in the immediate aftermath of the sad news. But then I came across some old drawing pads with hundreds of depictions, sketches, and panel cartoons all featuring Spears as the main player.
Spears in: “What The World Owes Me.”
Spears in: “Edgy Runt.”
Spears in: “Life With Ellis.”
They were not always flattering and sometimes his initial response would be annoyance. But then he’d scrunch his face down close to the page with his thick, prescription lenses and exclaim “Oh MAN. QUITE good. QUITE good ..” Spears, while of average stature, had an outsized ego. But he also possessed the most unique of personal attributes: that which allows one to put self-image aside and be objective when presented with a successful creative effort. He knew that being interesting enough to be satirized eclipsed the sting of said satirization.
The first time I hung out with Spears was shortly after starting as the truck driver at Monaco Labs back in the mid ‘80’s. I was fat and keeping to myself having dropped out of college following an uneventful if psychologically damaging two years in southern California. I had two tickets to a Warriors basketball game and this was back when we got near front-row seats from my dad’s connection to ownership. “Ask John Spears,” Dad advised. “He won’t say no.” He was right and when I repeated these words to Spears in my spot-on impersonation of the old man, he broke into genuine laughter. Nobody short of my brother was ever as keyed-in to such things. It’s rare to meet someone who “gets it” after years of knowing you. It’s another to come across someone who is in that groove from the get-go. Whatever my ‘it’ is, Spears both tolerated and got it.
Spears was an artist. It’s a word I don’t care for, right up there with ‘lover’ and ‘gutted.’ But it applied to him. I’ve known those who could draw and paint far better; those whose guitar skills surpassed his own. But many in that category give up. Ego and ambition crush output and lack of recognition kills the deal. Spears did it because it was in him, because he had to. Most of his attempts at painting were seen by few outside of me. I have one of them framed on the wall up at Tahoe. His style was crude and earthy, pencil strokes pressed into the page. He played guitar in similar fashion, often out of tune and with a heavy hand. Yet he knew music theory far better than me and was better read. I wish I could have combined his instincts with my own. The most I ever retained was his mnemonic device for tuning guitar strings: “Every Able Dwarf Gains By Effort.” This is what I kept from a guy both knowledgeable and often out of tune.
He had a similar influence on my musical tastes. I was familiar with The Kinks before meeting Spears but he clued me in to their Muswell Hillbillies album in a big way. Ray Davies (“the limpest wrist in the business” according to John) had a sensibility that fit the boy. From “Have A Cuppa Tea” :
Tea in the morning, tea in the evening, tea at supper time
Tea when it’s raining, tea when it’s snowing
Tea when the weather’s fine
Tea as a mid-day stimulant
Tea with your afternoon tea
For any old ailment or disease
For Christ sake have a cuppa tea
Spears had spent time in the U.K. as a military brat and moved all over the States, too. His education was rooted in experience. His occasionally antisocial instincts didn’t change the fact that he could relate to many.
I hadn’t seen him for a long stretch going back to when I first moved to New York in 2003. We spoke once on the phone, he in Oregon and I in Brooklyn, in 2008. And then another sixteen years came and went before we picked up the conversation again just last year. He was living in Lompoc, California with his brother Alan.
Me: “Spears .. Rick Monaco here.”
Spears: “Duuuude.”
He asked about the people who had died in between and I did another spot-on if somewhat exaggerated impression of my parents’ respective last words. Again, spontaneous laughter like driving to the Warriors game in ‘86. We also spoke, briefly, about getting older and dying. He was quite matter of fact, even pleasant, concerning the idea. And we made vague plans that I would drive down to see him. Predictably, this was the thought going through my head the same day I got the news of his death from his brother Jay: “I’ve got to get in my truck and get down there to see Spears.” But this sort of thing is typical and ordinary and Spears was not. Jay told me that John was up early in the morning, feeding the cat, when he was struck with an aneurysm. The ambulance driver reckoned he was likely gone before he hit the kitchen floor. This is where I’d typically try and wrap up a blog post with some kind of pithy observation but I think I’ll just leave this one here. I hope Spears would approve.