© Bucks Burnett

Ronnie Lane: Small Face, Big Path

By Bucks Burnett

I always knew there was something special about Ronnie Lane. Before I ever heard the Faces (the Small Faces were a bit before my time) I would see pictures of them in Circus and Creem, the rock magazines of my youth, and my eyes would always gravitate toward Ronnie. He looked like a human elf, and I could just tell he was a cool guy. And just as I was finally becoming a Faces fan, he announced he was leaving the band. Tired of the rock and roll lifestyle. Coverage of Ronnie's Lane's solo career in the States was rather microcosmic. I found a used Lane LP in the mid '70's, loved it, and began tracking them down, always as imports, with the exception of the extraordinary soundtrack he did with Ron Wood, Mahoney's Last Stand. This album is irritatingly good, with guest appearances by Pete Townshend and Ian McLagan. But don't settle for the already out of print CD (heavily bastardized with inferior bonus tracks and a new running order) -- seek out the original LP on Atco and you've got 40 minutes of English bliss.

Other than his Faces recordings, large or Small, Ronnie will always be best known for the cult classic album he recorded in 1977 with Pete Townshend, Rough Mix. With rockers like "Cat Melody" (Lane) and the title track, and achingly gorgeous ballads such as "Street in the City" (Townshend) and "Annie" (Lane), this album gives lessons in magnificence. Produced by Glynn Johns, with guests Eric Clapton and Charlie Watts, it is simply a flawless masterpiece, evidence of the refined genius of English rock stars fueled on friendship and Guinness. Please note that the newly remastered version has superior sound but is burdened with three bonus tracks, which are subpar.

Rough Mix is one of those special albums that is only a household name for those that have it in their homes. I have simply never met a rock fan who owns that album and does not count it in their Top Twenty. It has sold well but not great over the past 30 years, but it is still in print, and the Dual Disc version issued last year has some good Townshend interviews. They say you can't buy friendship but for $15, Rough Mix will never let you down. Ronnie recorded several other solo albums, which were never released in America but worth seeking out online, especially his last, See Me, which features "Barcelona," a song co-written and performed with Eric Clapton. There is finally a domestic best of album, Just For A Moment, available on the small Lane Signature Sounds label, which contains some of his best songs.

If you like a good tragedy, Lane is your man. By the time of Rough Mix's release, he was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis. His famous Mobile Recording Unit (see Sticky Fingers and Physical Graffiti) had been destroyed by vandals, and his albums were out of print, his publishing rights from the Small Faces days swindled away. He soldiered on, recording rootsy folk music, and even toured with an actual rock and roll circus, The Passing Show. As his health and finances dwindled, the early 80's found him back in the spotlight, thanks to supportive friends like Jimmy Page, Jeff Beck and Eric Clapton, who banded together for a series of benefit concerts in the U.K. and U. S. in 1983. Even this windfall was not to be; by 1986 his ARMS charity foundation had been shuttered by the Texas Attorney General, amid charges by Lane that the foundation's chairperson, a Houston lawyer named Mae Nacol, had mismanaged nearly a million dollars raised by the tour. The case was settled out of court, and Ronnie moved from Houston, where he had settled in 1984, to the friendlier vibe of Austin, where he lived until 1992. For the last few months of his Austin residency, Lane was one of two Faces living in the Austin area, as his best mate Ian McLagan, keyboardist from the Faces, moved there as well.

The Texas heat had always been debilitating for Ronnie, so he and his wife Susan moved to Trinidad, Colorado, where he lived for five more years in a state of declining health until his passing on June 4, 1997. Critics love to complain about how overlooked Richard Thompson has remained, but compared to Ronnie, he's bigger than Elvis. Ronnie Lane simply never got his due. His life and career are superbly chronicled in the 2006 DVD The Passing Show; seek it out and learn about a musician who never compromised because he had never heard of compromise.

Most people agree that Ronnie's life and career warrant lamentation, but not me. I made it a point to meet him on the ARMS tour in '83, and we became fast friends. I served as his live-in butler and personal assistant in 1985, and counted him as a brother and best friend for the rest of his days. Even in his worst times, and there were many, Ronnie maintained a razor sharp sense of sarcasm and irony that would shame most professional comedians. He was unbelievably and relentlessly funny, to the point of infuriation. Thank god I filmed him in '92, in his kitchen, sparring on Christianity, Rod Stewart, and the Two Virgins album by John and Yoko. In this ten minutes of footage, he comes across as the lost member of Monty Python.

But he was more than funny. He was, without a doubt, the most spiritual person I have ever known. Like Townsend, he followed Meher Baba for awhile, but also loved the teachings of Christ sans the religion. Ronnie Lane was his own religion. I spent hundreds of hours with him, and he simply put off a fantastic vibe I have never witnessed anywhere else. By the time I was living with him, all the best times were behind him, but he was still hellbent on leading a full life. I counted him through a hundred sit-ups every morning, and kissed him on the forehead every night. During the day we would laugh our heads off, fight a little, go to the gym for a swim. Right up until the end, he liked to put on a good buzz, and always maintained that, disease or no disease, he was a raver from the 60's' and would smoke them faster than I could roll them. He resented being made into a poster boy for MS and good behavior, and led his life as if he were intended to enjoy it.

When I met Ronnie in '83, at the Four Seasons hotel in Dallas where the ARMS tour was residing, we did an interview up in his room after a nice lunch with Bill Wyman and Jeff Beck, and I presented him with an American flag and thanked him for the British invasion of the Sixties, and the one he was embarking on that week with his friends. He was, after all, a visiting dignitary. I told him I'd always wanted to meet Charlie Watts, who was drumming on the tour. "He's right next door, tell 'im I sent ya." I knocked on Charlie's door, nervous, and waited. After a couple of minutes, the door cracked open and a very sleepy Charlie Watts welcomed me in for a chat. I declined, as he was still half asleep and totally nude. After all, it was only 5 p.m. In '85 while serving as his butler, I opened our apartment door and in walked Jimmy Page, who wanted a vodka tonic. Disappointed that I had never mixed a drink, he patiently explained the recipe. "You find a glass, add some ice, and some vodka, and some tonic, I suppose!" I must've gotten it right, because we're still friends today.

Before he died, Ronnie lived to see the restitution of his Small Faces royalties, thanks to the tireless efforts of his old band mate, Small Faces drummer Kenney Jones and a team of lawyers. And for well over ten years, any young Brit band worth its salt counts the Small Faces as the gods they were and are. While living in Austin, Ronnie was championed by all the local greats, including Joe Ely and Alejandro Escovedo. He spent his last years enjoying the cool mountain air of Colorado. A letter from President Ronald Reagan still hangs in the house where Ronnie died. I know it's there because I'm the one who wrote Reagan in '83 after the ARMS tour and told him he could stop bashing rock and rollers, ‘because here's a bunch of Brits who just raised a million bucks to fight MS.' One Ronnie wrote the other to say thanks. The other Ronnie promptly snorted a line of coke off the letter. He told me himself.

There was probably more wrong with Ronnie's life than right, but you'd never know it if you were one of the ones lucky enough to be hanging out with him. Right up until the end, he remained fiercely sarcastic, perhaps his greatest trait. He did what few of us ever manage to do. He found a way, through the good times and the bad, to stay close to what really matters, and managed to enjoy his life even when it was acting like death. I can assure you, as someone who knew him quite well, there was nothing tragic about Ronnie Lane, even though one must use the term when discussing his history. Wanna have some fun while improving your life? Buy a copy of Rough Mix and turn yourself on. Watch the DVD of The Passing Show and meet the best friend you never had.