Smokin' & Cryin'

Overture

On October 4, 1972 , Cobalt Records, Inc. released Smokin’ & Cryin’ , the second studio effort by Smoky Topaz. The double album needed no promotion from the label. It saturated radio airwaves and flew off record store shelves across the USA, Canada, and Europe throughout the remainder of 1972 and all of 1973. It would cling to the Billboard 200 album chart for two decades.

The band, a phenomenal live act that sold out shows at increasingly larger venues throughout their brief career, never toured in support of the album.

Snatches of tense conversations fell between the tracks of this superb collection of unforgettable rock riffs and bluesy ballads. Captured by microphones hidden in the antebellum mansion where Smoky Topaz recorded the album, the candid snippets hinted at the group’s complex interpersonal relationships and frustrations with the label.

Under normal circumstances, this may have piqued some curiosity. But six weeks before the album’s release, lead vocalist Robin Chelsea had gone missing in the Atlantic Ocean. Ten days after the release, authorities declared him legally dead.

The circumstances surrounding his death remained shrouded in mystery. His body was never recovered. He was four months shy of his eighteenth birthday. The Chelsea family buried his beloved 1961 Les Paul Custom at Elm Lawn Cemetery in their hometown of Bay City, Michigan.

More than four decades later, the real story behind the mysterious Smokin’ & Cryin’ can finally be told. This is possible thanks to the Holtzapple family, Perry and Jesse Stoddard, Daniel Waverly, Leonard K. Janes, The Odette Foundation, Davy Veers, and the 18th Judicial Circuit Court. Several media outlets allowed the use of their articles, interviews, reviews, and transcripts to round out the story.

This tale would not exist without the generous spirit of Kimberly Dill-Skinner, who shared Robin’s handwritten memoirs, as well as recollections of her own. Her involvement was vital to producing an accurate recounting of the stunning rise and fall of Smoky Topaz.

Most importantly, she encouraged bold poetic license in crafting the narrative from Robin’s point of view.

UNCOOL UTOPIA

No fans, no gigs, no reputation

Keep that sass to yourself, low expectation

Uncool utopia

1

Purple Heart

All I was searching for in Dad’s dresser drawer was loose change to take to the barbershop. Why should I spend my lawn-mowing money when a punishment haircut was the last thing I wanted?

Instead, I found a consent for enlistment form postdated for my sixteenth birthday. Even with parental approval, I’d have to be 17 to enlist. Along with the form was my birth certificate, now altered to make it look like I’d been born in 1953 instead of ’54. He planned to ship me off to Vietnam when I turned sixteen, in just five months.

Dad and Bev, my stepmother, had been fighting ever since her son Arthur returned from the war. She wanted him to stay at our house, but dad argued my older stepbrother was a bad influence on me and Lisa because he smoked too much, drank, did drugs, swore nonstop, consorted with married women, wore his hair too long and played electric guitar. Never mind that he’d been awarded a Purple Heart medal.

When I’d sided with Bev, Dad grounded me and demanded I get a brush cut. And with my hair grown out past my collar, too.

The tires of Dad’s Impala crunched on our gravel driveway and I hurried to stuff the enlistment papers into my back pocket. That’s when I spotted something with no business in Dad’s drawer: the only pair of earrings my mother had ever worn. They should have been buried with her. She’d had them on in the casket. Yet here they lay jumbled with his cufflinks, tie tacks, and the ugly class ring he wore to impress people.

I cradled the small, golden brown gemstones in my palm. Smoky topaz. She’d once told me she chose them because they matched the color of our eyes. The day she got her ears pierced Dad flew into a rage, saying she’d mutilated his property. My mother refused to take them out. She knew he was cheating with Bev from across the street. Those earrings were her declaration of independence. And now they would be mine.

I stuffed them in my pocket and slammed the drawer shut. No way was I getting a stupid brush cut. I didn’t care if Dad grounded me forever.

What do you think you’re doing? Dad loomed in the doorway.

Downstairs, the phone rang.

I told you, get that shaggy mop taken care of, he said. You’re turning into a goddamn reprobate like your stepbrother.

Bev called to me from the kitchen, Robin? Telephone.

Grabbing the excuse to get away from Dad, I pounded down the steps, rounded the corner and snatched the receiver from my stepmother.

I told him you can’t go over there tonight, she said. We’re having dinner at the Elks Club, your father and I, and we need you to stay here and babysit Lisa.

Arthur was on the line. Since his return from Vietnam, I’d seen him only twice. He was a terrific guitar player. While he was gone, I’d taught myself to play and written a bunch of songs. It took the dull ache out of his absence. My hip stepbrother was the one good thing that came out of Dad’s affair, the divorce, and his remarriage.

Just listen for a second, Arthur said. A few of us are getting together to jam tonight at Deuce’s pad. Come on up. You can sing for us. Or bring the Gibson. Or both.

But—

"My mom already said you have to babysit. It’s cool with me if Lisa tags along. Just don’t let our parents find out. Now, tell me Sorry, I can’t make it."

I really want to but I have to watch Lisa.

Perfect. All right, baby bro. See you around 8 o’clock.

Sure, man. We’ll get together some other time.

SECTION VIII - PARENTAL/GUARDIAN CONSENT FOR ENLISTMENT

40. PARENT/GUARDIAN STATEMENT(S) (Line out portions not applicable) a. I/we certify that (Enter name of applicant) Robin James Chelsea has no legal guardian other than me/us and I/we consent to his/her enlistment in the United States (Enter Branch of Service) Army.

I/we acknowledge/understand that he/she may be required upon order to serve in combat or other hazardous situations. I/we certify that no promises of any kind have been made to me/us concerning assignment to duty, training, or promotion during his/her enlistment as an inducement to me/us to sign this consent.

Parent or Legal Guardian: Vernon R. Chelsea

Witness: Beverly Ann Chelsea

Date: December 6, 1970

AT SUNSET, I PEDALED my bike across the Third Street Bridge to Deuce Fitch’s pad, Lisa balanced on the handlebars. Fearsome drums and searing guitar poured from the windows above the pharmacy, echoing off the brick buildings along Midland Street. Arthur’s band in high school had been tight, but this was something else. While I propped my Schwinn against a parking sign, Lisa danced barefoot on the sidewalk to Susie Q in her flowered baby doll pajamas.

I gave her a piggyback ride up the long staircase, her sticky arms around my throat.

Deuce’s apartment had more P.A. equipment than furniture. The tall windows were flung open with their moth-eaten blanket curtains shoved aside. Lisa wasted no time knocking the empty beer cans off the windowsill to make a stage and reenact an episode of I Dream of Jeannie with her Kiddle dolls.

I’d never jammed with a group before. Arthur had borrowed a cheap electric guitar after scouring the local pawn shops for his old Les Paul sunburst, which my dad had pawned, and coming up empty-handed. The drummer, a small, cheerful guy called Waverly, brought along only a few pieces of his drum kit. The bass player never showed up. I didn’t have the J200 with me, so I just sang. Singing was my bag, what the kids at Central High knew me for: belting out songs in the hallways between classes, embarrassing my locker partner, ticking off the teachers, making the girls roll their eyes.

Arthur set his guitar aside. We sound half-baked. He sat on the floor and Lisa plunked herself onto his lap. They shared the same serious eyes and square jawlines. Lisa had Bev’s dark hair, while Arthur’s was dishwater blond, grazing his broad shoulders.

There’s what we ought to call our group, Deuce said. Built like a bulldog, he’d moved amps here and there and fiddled with the knobs on a soundboard. Like any of it mattered with no one except Lisa and random passersby on the street below to hear us.

I dig it, Waverly said. Half Baked. The Half-Baked Band.

Holtzapple and the Half Baked. Holtzapple Upside Down Cake, Deuce said.

No way. Forget putting my name on it. That’s not my trip. Arthur cracked open a can of beer. Anyway, I’m sick of food names. Vanilla Fudge, Hot Tuna, Cream. I’m not fussing over a name when we haven’t even landed our bass player.

Perry will come through, you’ll see, Waverly said.

You don’t know Perry, Arthur said.

Sweet Studio Perry. Deuce rubbed the back of his own neck. I’ll land him. Trust me.

I didn’t butt in about a band name or Perry, whoever he was. Eleventh grade started in a few weeks, and Arthur was good enough to get anyone to sing for him. He was being nice by inviting me to do it. I stuffed my hands into the pockets of my cutoffs. An earring poked my fingertip. Hey, anyone know where I could get my ear pierced? I pulled out the earrings to show them.

Weren’t those Caroline’s? Arthur asked.

Yep.

So, the funeral director gave them to you?

I decided not to complicate things by letting Arthur in on the fact I’d stolen them from my dad. Sort of. I want to do both of them in one ear.

Groovy, Arthur said.

Do you have a potato lying around here somewhere? Waverly asked Deuce. And ice cubes? Sewing needle?

Deuce scoffed. What do I look like? Suzy Homemaker? Still, he managed to find a safety pin, an apple, and a freezer-burned carton of spinach.

Waverly used the spinach box to numb my earlobe, sterilized the safety pin with vodka, held the apple behind my ear and shoved the pin through my flesh with an audible pop. I yelped. Chills swooshed over the left side of my body. The second piercing hurt worse because I knew what was coming. My eyes watered. Lisa jumped on Waverly’s back to pull him away from me. Arthur scooped her up and carried her off so Waverly could finish.

I sang my heart out to distract from my throbbing earlobe. Sometime after midnight, I biked home shirtless with my ear bleeding. Lisa, riding the handlebars, wore my T-shirt over her pajamas to keep warm. I stopped on the bridge and shredded the enlistment documents and altered birth certificate, letting the pieces drift away on the Saginaw River current.

I made Lisa swear not to tell anyone where we’d been.

Shit man. Ear poke, she said. I not tell.

GET STUDIO PERRY TO JOIN

Offer bigger share of group earnings

Bow down to his superior musicianship

Buy him a B3 (soon as we can)

Convince him of our potential & discretion

Need a miracle

Undated personal note, courtesy of the Holtzapple Family

2

Sweet Pea

Lisa woke me up in the juniper bushes in front of our house, squatting next to me in a sunsuit printed with ducklings. Robin hurt the boo-boo? She touched my ear with one finger.

I flinched and put my hands to my swollen face. I found a gash on my cheek, my scalp bald, and worst of all, my mother’s earrings missing. My double-pierced earlobe dripped blood.

Owies, Lisa said.

I’m fine, toots. No big deal.

She stuck out her chin and wiggled it back and forth, the same expression Arthur made when he didn’t believe something. Lisa still bought into the Easter Bunny, but she saw right through me faking like it didn’t hurt.

What had happened after I’d got home from Deuce’s was hazy. Lisa had wandered into the hall in the middle of the night, begging for a glass of water. I overheard her tattling on me to Bev, chirping about riding my handlebars to Shit Man’s house. She didn’t understand the apartment was Deuce Fitch’s, or that Arthur was crashing there because Vern wouldn’t let him stay at home, or that his name wasn’t Shit Man, he just said it a lot.

Never trust a kid who dips American cheese sandwiches into her Nesquik.

Moments later, Dad barged into my room with a straight razor. I couldn’t let him shave my head without a fight. Spotting my earrings, he pounced. He put me in a headlock, tore them out, and wrestled me to the floor. I refused to cry while he pinned my shoulders with his knees and shaved me bald.

Bev finally pulled him off me and I jumped from my bedroom window. The junipers broke my fall, and I thudded into the dirt behind them. Shaken, confused, with nowhere to go, I’d crouched there and rubbed my tender shoulders. Dad yelled at Bev and stormed around the house, then the yard, too blinded by rage to find me. At some point, he went back inside.

What hurt most was Lisa quavering my name between sobs.

Exhausted, I’d conked out.

I sat up, dusted off the dry juniper needles and asked Lisa what her mommy was doing.

"Watching Price is Right, she said, with w’s where her r’s should be. Come on down! She handed me one of her Liddle Kiddle dolls. Pea-Pea. I give you."

Two inches tall, Sweet Pea had pinkish hair, green eyes, and a hat made of an overturned sweet pea blossom. Her head was double the size of her body. A vague scent of cheap, flowery perfume clung to her.

No, no, toots. This is your toy.

She pointed out of the bushes to the lawn scattered with pieces of wood. With a sick, sinking sensation I realized it was Arthur’s acoustic guitar, the one he’d asked me to keep safe while he was in Vietnam. The familiar old instrument I’d learned on. I’d given Dad the perfect excuse to smash it. Defeated, I flopped back onto the ground.

Daddy is sorry, Lisa said. In her own small way, she gave me her favorite Kiddle to make it up to me, repeating the words she’d heard Bev say in the predictable lulls that followed our father’s rampages. Daddy is sorry had been Lisa’s first complete sentence, sometime before her second birthday.

I stuffed the doll into my pocket. I promise I’ll take good care of her. Hey, can you go up to my room and grab my shoes?

After a few minutes she returned, stumbling in my red Pro-Keds, her fist pressed against her chest. She stepped solemnly out of the shoes.

Thanks, toots. What you got there? Another Kiddle?

She uncurled her fingers. My mother’s smoky topaz earrings sparkled in her palm.

My baby sister was aces.

DEUCE HUNG OUT OF HIS apartment window hooting and laughing at me. Check it out, you guys. Robin got scalped! he yelled over the thunder of rock music.

I flipped him the bird. That didn’t shut him up. Neither did double birds. There weren’t enough middle fingers in the world to shut Deuce up.

He’s a drowned chipmunk. A cue ball. Let’s play billiards with Robin’s head. He guffawed at his own dumb cut downs.

Upstairs, Arthur got a load of me and stopped the music. He silenced Deuce with a glare and grabbed my arm. Shit man, shit. What the hell happened?

I shrugged him off. Chill out. I’m fine.

A guy I’d never seen before, tall, with a frizzy mop and a Rickenbacker bass, looked me up and down. Wait a second. Who is this kid?

That, Waverly said, Is our lead singer.

The bass player calmly tucked his guitar into a gig bag, collected his amp and left without another word.

What did you go and tell him that for? Deuce asked.

Well, he is, far as I’m concerned, Waverly said.

Thanks for nothing, jackass, Deuce said.

Don’t sweat it, you guys. Perry always plays hard to get. Arthur cocked his head toward the kitchen at the back of the apartment. Stairs led up to the building’s flat roof. I followed him out.

We straddled the half-wall overlooking the alley. He smoked. Said nothing.

Can I try one? I asked.

He blew a stream of smoke from the corner of his mouth. Hell no. Don’t pick up my bad Army habit. I hate these things. He crushed his cigarette against the concrete wall cap and flicked it onto the roof next door. Vern really got on your case, huh?

Duh. I scraped at the brown streaks of dried blood on my T-shirt. No big deal, man. Nothing’s broken. Hair grows back.

I’m sick of him treating you this way, baby bro. I want to kill him.

Not worth it. I tried to drag my fingers through my hair and got nothing but raw skin.

I’ll kill him, Arthur said.

It doesn’t make any difference. I’m never going back there.

Arthur squinted, seeing past my current injuries to all the ways my father had wronged us both over the years. He’s a dead man.

So, I probably shouldn’t tell you he smashed the J200 and threw it all over the front lawn.

Damn. First my Les Paul, now my acoustic. Arthur slammed his fist into his palm. Fuck him.

What’s that Waverly guy mean about a lead singer? I thought you had some other dude lined up.

Nah. You’ve got the spark. Your voice works with the sound I’m after. We want you.

You’re just saying that because—

I don’t do charity cases. Are you in or what?

I didn’t know what to say. My cuts and bruises looked like hell. School would start in a few weeks. I didn’t even own a guitar, let alone amps and stuff. My experience performing in a group was limited to a few hours the previous night.

Well?

What about the bass player? I asked.

We don’t have one yet. Obviously. He snickered.

Dad wanted to ship me off to Vietnam in a few months. Why not live it up while I still had the chance?

If you’re sure you want me, I’ll do it.

REASONS ROBIN SHOULD SING

3 (4?) octave range

Guitar playing up to snuff but < me (ha!)

Killer songwriting instincts

Chicks dig a baby face

Undated personal note, courtesy of the Holtzapple Family

ARTHUR TOOK ME OUT for lunch at the Red Lion, a downtown diner famous for its Coney dogs. I’d been sleeping on Deuce’s floor ever since the fight with Dad. Bev had dropped off a paper grocery sack full of my clothes and a cardboard box with the broken pieces of the acoustic guitar. She’d stuffed the contents of my piggy bank into an envelope, stashing it between my jeans and T-shirts. She was too good for my dad. We all were.

I had my first hangover, thanks to the guys cheering me up with too much Jack and Coke. I pushed a Coney dog around on my plate with one finger, my stomach churning. All I remembered from the night before was leaning out Deuce’s apartment window while Arthur and gorgeous Mercy Ramos argued on the sidewalk below. She’d promised to wait for him when he left for boot camp, but married Pablo, the bass player from his high school band.

I’d barfed out the window, right on Mercy. She’d started shrieking. Laughing, Deuce collapsed onto the couch. Waverly rubbed my shoulders and said tomorrow morning Arthur and I would both be glad we got this out of our systems.

If it was possible to die of shame, I’d be in a morgue. I’d had a thing for Mercy as long as I could remember even if she’d always been Arthur’s girl. Now she had a baby, and Pablo was missing in action in Vietnam.

I’m real sorry about everything, I said for the umpteenth time.

Stop. Studio Perry wasn’t your fault, and neither is she.

Studio Perry was how everyone referred to Perry Stoddard because he got a lot of studio work and wasn’t keen on joining a band—especially not one with a bald, fifteen-year-old frontman.

Arthur stuffed down two Coney dogs on top of his broken heart and asked if I was going to eat mine. I shoved my tray toward him.

I’m not worried. He used his hands when he talked, punctuating his words with swirls of smoke, a detail I’d forgotten while he was away. Waverly is hot shit, he said. We’ve got Deuce’s P.A. system. Studio Perry will come around, or we’ll find someone else. Then all we’ll need is a name.

After Vietnam, everything looked like downhill sledding to Arthur.

What’s the stone in those earrings called again? he asked. It sounded good, but now I can’t remember.

Smoky topaz.

He smiled. Picture that on a marquee.

Better than Half-Baked Holtzapple and the Whatevers, I said.

My dad whacked the plate-glass window next to our booth. I jumped. He came in and headed over to us, playing it off like he was hip, the way he always did in public.

Son, you’re making a huge mistake. I’m here to help you.

By forcing me to enlist when I turn sixteen?

Arthur’s mouth dropped open. He’s doing what? He can’t do that.

Mind your own business, Dad said. I’d like to have a word with Robin.

He led me outside, his arm around my shoulder. It would have appeared protective to anyone who didn’t know the real Vern Chelsea.

Son, I realize I was a little rough on you the other night. I should apologize. But you’re aware of everything you did. Snooping in my room. Stealing things. Refusing to get your hair cut. Sneaking out. Taking Lisa with you. The damn ear piercings. Hanging out with that reprobate stepbrother of yours and his hippie friends. I had to discipline you because it’s what a good father does. You’re my son, and I do love you. But you left me no choice but to teach you a lesson.

I stared at a gob of chewing gum on the sidewalk. My body ached from his so-called discipline and my desperate escape. I stuffed my hands into my back pockets, trying to believe him, to accept the blame. Okay.

No. It’s certainly not okay. How will you get a job with your ear pierced? And what have you done to your face?

The gash on my cheek was from his class ring. He’d worn it to the Elks Club the night he’d attacked me.

Robin, I know that you know better and I’m. . . I’m at a loss here. He lifted my chin. I want what’s best for you. You need order. A sense of purpose. Responsibility. The Army can give you that, and valuable real-world experience too.

I’m fifteen. Let me finish high school, at least. I’ve got two years left.

Some of the most successful career soldiers sign up young. It happens more often than people realize. If we wait until you’re eighteen, even seventeen, it could be too late to save you. I wouldn’t even consider this if I wasn’t sure it was the best possible thing for you. He put his hands on my shoulders. Early enlistment is a special gift that will start you down the path to the rest of your life.

If it wasn’t for the hard glint in his eye, I might have fallen for it. Vietnam, Dad. They’ll send me there and my life could end in months. Or weeks.

Defiance. This is exactly the type of problem the service will address with you. Now come on home, son. We’ll get you over to Dr. Marvin and have him see to that nick under your eye.

Waverly, the drummer, had offered to stitch the gash for me, but I’d insisted on a regular bandage.

I folded my arms across my chest. I’m not coming with you.

What are you going to do? Cast your lot with Arthur Holtzapple? He’s unstable. An emotional timebomb. Sure, he’s being friendly with you now, but he could decide you’re Viet Cong—turn on you any second. You haven’t seen his psych reports coming out of the V.A. hospital. It wasn’t just sepsis they kept him in there for all that time. He’s a few dill pickles short of a picnic.

Arthur’s fine, Dad. They gave him the Purple Heart. You’re so into the military, you should respect that. But no. To you, Arthur’s Purple Heart doesn’t even count.

Because it doesn’t.

What the hell, dad?

Watch yourself.

How can you say that enlisting will be some great gift of manhood for me, then say Vietnam made Arthur crazy?

Your mother and I—

"Beverly is not my mother. She was Arthur’s mother, and Lisa’s. Caroline is mine."

"Was yours. He snorted. Fine. I won’t indulge your petty arguments. I know you think we’re ogres, but we weren’t being cruel when we asked him not to stay at the house. We were protecting you. And Lisa. She’s a little girl. Arthur has episodes of real violence. His doctors warned us."

I shook with anger. Arthur would never hurt Lisa. Or me. Or anyone. And there was no we at all. Bev was crushed that Dad wouldn’t