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Ronee Blakley painted by Don Bachardy, 1995.

#Ronee Blakley #don bachardy #1990s #art

“Ronee Blakley, looking like a cross between Greta Garbo and a Midwest prostitute, sat at the piano every night singing a long sad song with a heartbreak chorus which repeated over and over like a wolf's howl. Her lips were pooched out like Marilyn Monroe's, as though waiting for someone to poke a straw into the little round hole and offer her a milkshake. I told her I'd give her a hundred dollars if I ever caught her with her mouth shut.”

Joan Baez in her memoir, “And a Voice to Sing With,” 1987:

#ronee blakley #joan baez #rolling Thunder revue #Renaldo and Clara #1970s

Roundly dismissed on its release by Leonard Cohen, his label, and the press, Death of a Ladies’ Man’s reputation has burgeoned in recent years, reassessed as a kind of magnificent mid-70s folly. “Memories,” a bitter midlife demolition of teenage symphonies to God is worth the price of admission, while Ronee Blakley sings beautifully on the opening of “True Love Leaves No Traces.”

Ronee Blakley, at this point on a career crest after her appearance in Robert Altman’s “Nashville” and on Dylan’s Rolling Thunder Revue, sang on three numbers.

“I think Joni Mitchell must have introduced us,” she says. “She said, ‘Leonard will appreciate your kind of madness!’”

“I learned so much from him. He was such a delightful man. I loved just listening to his voice, the resonance— it was rabbinical, like a Jewish cantus firmus. His voice had meaning, and then when he applied his poetry, there’s a depth that’s difficult to reach. It’s an artistry that can be admired and imitated but hardly equaled. But he wasn’t lugubrious. He had a light touch to his very serious mien. He was a meaningful person, but he carried it very lightly.”

A long time LA resident and friends with both Cohen and Phil Spector, Blakley is uniquely placed to offer insight into both men: “Phil was an eccentric man,” she acknowledges. “A great talent but he was….odd. He drank wine, he wore a hairpiece. There was a bit of an aura. For one thing, there was no way to get around his massive success and influence on music. He was such an enormous figure.”

Blakley recalls the critical dynamic between Cohen and Spector— one not of employer and employee but of two men who perceived themselves as in charge. “Phil traveled in a limo, he had two six-foot blonde twins as bodyguards,” says Blakley. “There is an aspect of Phil where he is always going to be boss. But the idea that Leonard would not be the boss is inconceivable!”

Through the winter of 1976/77, the odd couple somehow forged a productive partnership, recording eight songs in Hollywood’s Gold Star Studio.

“It took a lot of courage for Leonard to put himself in that position,” says Blakley. “He extended himself. I personally don’t remember any tension or a bad atmosphere in the recording. My lasting memory is one day I was in Canters, the deli on Fairfax, with Allen Ginsberg and Bob Dylan. I was on my way to Phil and Leonard’s session and Allen and Bob decided they wanted to tag along. That’s how they ended up on the album. Everybody was just laughing like crazy, having a good old time, pals together. We had a lot of good times. That’s just the way it was, back then.”

Text: “State of Grace” by Stephen Troussé, Uncut Magazine, March 2021.

Pictured: Ronee Blakley and Phil Spector photographed by Brad Elterman, 1978.

#Ronee Blakley #Leonard cohen #Phil Spector #death of a ladies man #1970s

During the interview with Tammy Grimes, it became clear that the actress's voice is not the only thing unusual about her means of expression. As a sort of complement to the exotic voice, she often uses esoteric imagery. Of Blakley's regal presence, she said: "It's like she's wearing a crown of opals, with a big ruby in the forehead."

Text: Robert Feldberg, The Record, November 1983.

Pictured: Ronee Blakley and Tammy Grimes in “Sunset,” by Martha Swope, 1983.

#Ronee Blakley #Tammy grimes #1980s #sunset #Broadway

"Truth is hard to handle when power is at stake," sang entertainer Ronee Blakley, her tapping, white-booted foot her only musical accompaniment.

The lyric is from her song "Go-Go Dancer," a biting, cynical view of politics and society's apathy.

Miss Blakley chose the song for her first Tallahassee appearance-- an unpublicized performance Sunday night for about 150 hardcore advocates of the Equal Rights Amendment.

She came to join efforts to help push the Equal Rights Amendment through the Florida Legislature. A crucial Senate test of the proposal is expected sometime next week.

Florida could become the 36th state to ratify the amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Three states which approved it later rescinded it. Thirty-eight states must approve the measure in order for it to become part of the Constitution.

Supporters say they have enough votes in both the Senate and House to ratify the amendment, but they fear a move to fill the measure in the Senate Rules Committee.

Power and money is part of what the ERA is all about, according to Ronee Blakley.

Miss Blakley believes it was money, cash to finance a last-minute letter-writing campaign, which helped defeat the ERA in her home-state of Idaho.

"Rights don't cease because laws are made by men who police the earth with wealth," she said in a speech delivered standing on a chair in the middle of a Capitol Inn dining room.

Despite arguments from opponents that other laws guarantee equal rights, Miss Blakley said the ERA is needed "so the Supreme Court can cite it in making its decisions."

The singer, who grabbed stardom with her portrayal of a country and western performer in the film "Nashville," is one of a vanguard of film stars who have trooped to Florida recently to campaign for the ERA.

Miss Blakley bears no resemblance to the bouffant-coiffed star she played in "Nashville." At 30, she has a childlike appeal, a vulnerability that softens the cynicism of her songs.

The trip to Tallahassee is the first Miss Blakley has made as a spokeswoman for the ERA. But the amendment to prohibit sex discrimination is one of a long list of causes she has supported.

In the past, she's lent her support to labor leader Cesar Chavez and to Tom Hayden, husband of screen star Jane Fonda. He recently ran for the U.S. Senate from California.

"I'm pretty careful about what I do. I think I have credibility," she said, brushing her brunette bangs back from her forehead.

She rallied to the pro-ERA cause when the amendment failed to win ratification in Idaho. "Maybe I could have helped if I had gone out there," she said.

One of her goals and that of other celebrities now on the ERA hustings is to counteract the "scare stories" being circulated by anti-ERA forces.

"People are upset by hearing stories of how their daughters will be bleeding in the trenches if it's passed," Miss Blakley said.

Even if the draft were reinstated, Miss Blakley said she believes women who did not want to fight would be able to gain exemptions from service.

And, she said, "Women can function behind a weapon if they wish to. There's no reason women shouldn't take up arms if they want to."

There are also efforts to discredit the amendment on grounds it will weaken the male's traditional role-- what Miss Blakley refers to as the "castration" rumors. "The brave and sensitive man is the one who supports this amendment," she said.

Pat Harbolt, Tallahassee Democrat, April 1977.

#Ronee Blakley #1970s

It is mainly in its music, its lovely music and its unselfconsciously absurd music, that "Nashville" truly comes alive. The songs, as you've probably heard, aren't "authentic." That is, they aren't real Country and Western, which may be an advantage. They were mostly written for the movie, and written by the performers-- like Karen Black, Keith Carradine, Henry Gibson-- who sing them.

The result is a different kind of authenticity, a collaborative sincerity not quite like anything else I've experienced at the movies. Some of the songs are very good. Ronee Blakley's songs are better than that, and her performances of them-- as if she were discovering the musical line as she sang-- rank among the most privileged moments I have ever seen on film.

Roger Greenspun, Penthouse Magazine, September 1975.

#Ronee Blakley #1970s #Nashville #Robert Altman

The very political Ronee Blakley has performed many benefit concerts-- for Jerry Brown (in the 1976 presidential primary), against nuclear power, for Mexican noncitizens in the southwest, against economic oppression and for gay and women's rights.

"I've always felt very strongly that people have the right to be free, and that anything that anybody does to inhibit that is wrong. We can't inhibit the growth of human understanding, and we have to move away from being so trapped in our bodies, so isolated.”

This attitude is one of the many reasons Blakley has attracted a large women's following. "It's probably also because I've been on my own for a long time. And because the words of my songs-- like Nobody's Bride, She Lays It On The Line, and many others-- say something women relate to. And because I love women. I'm a believer. And I think we've got to stand up and fight!"

Blakley sees herself as a bit more ornery than most women. "I may have been more hostile than other women," she says. "I'm not sure." She pauses. "I just get angry! Angry at, you know, oppression. Don't want no-o-o-body in charge of me. Don't want no boss man. No boss man, thank you!"

Susan Wilson, The Boston Globe, January 1980.

#Ronee Blakley #1980s

Terry had just returned from Sausalito, where she'd been making an album. She had to spend an extra week there because she hated the mix the producer had lazily produced, and so she had to mix it herself.

"Do you know how to do that?" I wondered. When you make a record, all the different instruments play separately on separate tapes called "tracks." At the end, these tracks are mixed so that the bass guitar isn't too loud and the vocals are clear. This is done on a horrible panel with dials, buttons, knobs, and red lights. I just couldn't imagine Terry mixing.

"How did you learn how to mix?"

"I learned because I had to," she said grimly. "This whole damn album has been like pulling teeth. Every time I try and get them to do something, I have to throw a fit to have it be right. They were even going to pick my songs."

Text: Eve Babitz on Ronee Blakley (alias Terry Finch) in “Slow Days, Fast Company,” 1977.

Pictured: Ronee Blakley in the Muscle Shoals recording studio, 1975.

#Ronee Blakley #eve babitz #slow days fast company #muscle shoals #1970s

"I was trying to be an artist," Ronee says. "I carried my weight in the friendship, but she was certainly way ahead of me. Whether we were meeting for dinner at Dan Tana's or running down to Palm Springs, or calling each other on the phone to play our songs, she was an artist, a pure artist: searching and open-minded and sensitive and vulnerable and tough and disciplined. Anything she did or felt went into her work."

Joni was leaving behind the confessionalism that had intensely defined Blue, For the Roses, and Court and Spark. This new album, as Stephen Holden put it, was Joni doing "social philosophy. All the characters are American stereotypes who act out socially determined rituals of power and submission in exquisitely described settings. Mitchell's eye for detail is precise and panoramic."

The lovely "Shades of Scarlett Conquering" presents (a disguised) Ronee Blakley, who just had a star turn in Robert Altman's Nashville, as a diva coquette.

"Joni was very self-involved and thin-skinned," John Guerin recalled. Joni was vulnerable in general. "There were days when she'd lose her self-confidence-- and days when she didn't feel like the prettiest girl on the block."

Text: “Girls Like Us: Carole King, Joni Mitchell, Carly Simon and the Journey of a Generation" by Sheila Weller (2008).

Pictured: Ronee Blakley, Joni Mitchell, and Eric Andersen at Dan Tana’s, 1975.

#ronee blakley #joni mitchell #1970s

Ronee Blakley is a young woman of many contradictions. As a child in Nampa, Idaho, she was the firstborn to Pa Blakley, who she says "secretly wanted to be John Wayne," and Ma Blakley, who "wanted to be Judy Garland." Consequently, Ronee was taught to hunt, fish, study ballet, play piano, and sew. Growing up, Ronee did everything she was supposed to do and everything that she wasn't.

Looking at the cover of her debut album on Elektra, "Ronee Blakley," and seeing a sensitive portrait of a young woman in reflection, leads one to expect another of the "sensitive female singers" whose saccharine styles are currently raising blood sugar levels of music executives everywhere. Misleads would be more appropriate, as I soon found out when I played the record. Ronee's lyrics are original and contemporary, giving the listener the opportunity to relate to them at his own level. Her piano ranges from honky tonk funk in "Fred Hampton," and takes on surrealist proportions in "Graduation." Her voice is a lilting drawl that, chameleon-like, can shift from pain to ironic revelation, depending on the mood of the song. One moment, she can look like a down home lady in a satin dress, hands folded, and a moment later be swilling her Country Club and laughing bawdy. She can be wearing blue jeans and worn suede boots, yet she'll smoke her Tareytons like a haughty princess. Onestage she comes on like a spirited country girl, flower behind her ear, feet stompin' on the pedals, hands gracefully in motion between notes. There's so much more to Ronee than meets the eye, which the crowd at Funky's soon found out last month when she shared the bill with Mose Allison.

I guess the key to Ronee Blakley is that whatever she's about, it's for that moment only. She can wear clothes of the past, speak of the future, but she's only responsible for the present. A friend of hers told me once, "Everytime I see Ronee, she looks like a different person." That's kind of refreshing in these times when people are forced to fit themselves into an image that is not only restricting but unreal. I guess what I'm trying to say is that Ronee has substance, but she doesn't take life so seriously that it trips up her ego. To Ronee, the "most important thing is honor... and discipline."

Without disturbing the magical transition that occurs between talented people finding a record company that signs them up, and the development of a "product," I can only present you with the information that to hear Ronee Blakley is to like her. Listening to the album is one way, but the best opportunity will be open to you November 3 and 4 when Ronee will appear with John Fahey at San Diego State's "Back Door." Drop by and let it happen.

Door Magazine, Joan Levine, October 1972.

#ronee blakley #1970s

eccentricks

In Nashville, Robert Altman’s masterpiece movie, Ronee Blakley, a brown-eyed, resolute flower of a girl, making her movie debut, sings (she composed some of the songs), writes (she wrote some of the scenes), acts a Country and Western superstar who is darkly beautiful, thin-skin vulnerable, most alive when her hot, huge public is cannibalizing her. Result: Ronee Blakley’s a star and with luck will go super, fast.

Ronee loves Idaho wild country best, sings to the locals there when she can slip away from an active musical life in L.A., cross-country music-making dates.

Ronee loves writing poetry, song lyrics, music to sing. She loves Beethoven, Bach, Joplin, Joni Mitchell, Holiday, Piaf. “Oh, do I love Piaf! I love everybody who’s tried to do anything good! When you do something good, there’s a kind of ecstasy!”

Ronee Blakley profiled in Vogue, photographed by Richard Avedon, 1975.