David Blue: Remembering Singer-Songwriter Who Befriended Dylan, Joni
Physically, he was certainly set apart from many of them. Tall, curly haired, broad-shouldered, with expressive eyes that gave him the look of a silent-film star, Blue had a rugged leading-man charisma — a sad-eyed cowboy of the lowlands. No wonder that when he decided to pursue an acting career, he was cast in everything from a Wim Wenders film to one of the leading daytime soap operas.
After dropping out of high school, he continued a family tradition on his mother’s side and signed up for the Merchant Marines, which didn’t work out. Quoting the official paperwork, he later told Nesya he was thrown out for his “inability to adjust to a military way of life.” He moved to Greenwich Village around 1960 with the dream of being an actor.
For much of his subsequent career, he would be David Blue. “He assumed the character,” says Gorson. “He was better dressed than most people. He would lean more toward what was happening on [London’s] Carnaby Street than in the Village.” It was one of many mysteries about Blue; Gorson never had the sense his client lived anywhere, since he seemed to be crashing with friends all the time.
When Geffen started his own label, Asylum, he launched it with three albums in early 1972: debuts by Browne and singer-songwriter Judee Sill, along with Blue’s fourth,placed him in the gloriously bleak mode of Leonard Cohen and Townes Van Zandt, and Blue’s singing exhibited a new, sullen depth.
By then Blue had the accoutrements of fame — famous friends , a house in Laurel Canyon, and a steady stream of girlfriends he would bring by the Geffen-Roberts office. He was seen at all the fashionable events, from a launch party for Mitchell’sto a 1975 bash thrown by Paul and Linda McCartney on the Queen Mary, where Blue hobnobbed with Dylan, George Harrison, Cher, Linda Ronstadt, the Jackson 5, and many more.
Leonard Cohen, David Blue , Devo, and Martine Getty backstage at the Starwood in Los Angeles, Calfornia, 1978.Blue’s house in Laurel Canyon eventually gave way to an apartment in the increasingly run-down Montecito Apartments in Hollywood, home to actors both well-known and struggling. Marc Eliot, who had met Blue in the early-Sixties Village days, had also relocated to L.A., and he would regularly find Blue in his kitchen in the mornings, chowing down on his leftovers.
Tamblyn wasn’t familiar with Blue or his music. But Tamblyn was impressed how someone as seemingly gentle as Blue could morph on camera. “He was such a sweet guy, but he became a prick right away!” Tamblyn marvels. “I thought, ‘Wow, he’s a natural.’” Tamblyn was also taken with Blue’s dancing skills during the otherwise clumsy cast finale. “Dennis Hopper didn’t know his left foot from his right, but David learned so quick and fast,” Tamblyn says.
But Blue’s magnetism was undeniable, and he and Nesya eventually grew close. For a long period, Nesya, who was predominantly a jazz fan, had no idea Blue was a musician; he didn’t mention that aspect of his life at all. “That might have been one of the reasons he felt good with me,” she says. “I wasn’t there because, ‘Wow, he was a friend of Bob’s, man.’ I just got to know him and appreciate him on his own merits.
Blue was particularly impressed with a relocated Illinois singer-songwriter named Shawn Colvin. About 15 years before “Sunny Came Home” won Colvin Grammys for Song and Record of the Year, Blue became her mentor, attending her Bleecker Street club shows and sometimes joining her on one of those small stages. One night he stuck a cigarette in the headstock of her guitar, which ended up burning down to a nub and leaving a permanent scar on the instrument.
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