Features

Leslie West: The Show Must Go On

Leslie West’s debut solo album, Mountain —produced by Pappalardi and released in 1969 on the Windfall label (owned by Pappalardi and his business partner)—soon led to the formation of the same-named group, with drummer N.D. Smart and keyboardist Steve Knight filling out the lineup. Brand new and still finding its direction, Mountain appeared in front of 400,000 during prime time at Woodstock.

“We got to go on at a great time because Jimi Hendrix’s agent was our agent,” says West. “So he must have said, ‘If you want Hendrix, you have to take this other group, Mountain.’ We were on just before it got dark, after the Grateful Dead and before Creedence. Creedence came on, hit after hit after hit. I said, ‘How many freakin’ hits can a group have?’ Then The Who came on and did Tommy and then Sly came on.”

Unfortunately for them, Mountain did not appear in the smash concert film of the event—their footage was somehow lost (a couple of tracks were later recovered) although some speculate that the real reason is because the group’s then-manager turned down whatever financial offer was made. Nonetheless, Mountain, with Corky Laing now on drums, took off in 1970 with the release of their first proper group album, Climbing!

By that time, people were recognizing West as a new guitar star, one with a meaty, instantly-identifiable sound that was based in the blues but different from what the other rock guitar heroes of the day were presenting.

“I wanted to have the greatest, biggest tone and I wanted vibrato, like somebody who plays violin in a hundred-piece orchestra,” he says. “It took me a while to get to the point where I said, ‘Yeah, that’s the sound I want to get every night.’”

That sound is very much in place in the leadoff track on Climbing!, the song that would become most closely associated with Mountain, “Mississippi Queen.” West remembers how it came about: “Corky came to my apartment in Manhattan,” he recalls. “He said, ‘Look, I have this lyric, “Mississippi Queen.” He had been in Nantucket, [Mass.] playing this bar and the power went out. He was playing the drums and shouting the words ‘Mississippi Queen, do you know what I mean?’ I started fooling around with the guitar in the apartment and I came up with this riff. We went really quickly into the studio and Felix told him to count it off and he counted it off with a cowbell. We left it in there.”

Jimi Hendrix, hearing it for the first time at New York’s Electric Lady Studio, where they recorded it, gave it his blessing: “That’s some riff, man,” he told West.

By 1972, Mountain was over, and although they would reunite in 1974 and then again on a number of occasions, West—along with all fans of rock—was shocked to learn of Pappalardi’s death in 1983; his wife shot him in what she claimed was an accident during a gun lesson.

West and Laing have remained on-again-off-again musical partners, and have recorded together as recently as 2007, when Mountain released Masters of War, a set of Dylan covers. West has remained prolific throughout the decades as a solo artist as well, recording and performing live regularly. He’s influenced not only fellow rock guitarists, but also, as it turns out, several top rappers: Jay-Z, Kanye West and Common have sampled “Long Red,” a song that appeared on that maiden 1969 solo album. “That’s the greatest thing,” says the guitarist. “It’s got a fucking hip-hop beat.”

Despite his fabled past and his recent physical challenges, Leslie West prefers to keep his gaze on the future. “We announced a tour with me, Uli Jon Roth and Michael Schenker. I might not be able to walk onstage but I can certainly ride this electric wheelchair. Somehow, I’ll be playing the guitar.”

Sorry, Mr. West, but we are going to have to call you legend.