i first met jim at a pop/rock festival on May 18, 1968. There was this guy in a corduroy jacket with a hat on and [what] looked like a three-day growth of beard. He was pretty aggressive, giving people shit and marching around with five cameras around his neck. And, at some point, some fraternity guy had pissed him off, so Jim pulls a knife on him and the [guy] almost shits his pants. . . . I said, “Hey man, is that knife real?” And Jim turns to me and puts the knife up under my throat, and he goes, “Yes, motherfucker, it’s real,” and then reaches back into his waistband and pulls out a gun and says, “And so is this.” And I said, “Hey man, who brings a gun and a knife to a rock concert?” He said, “I do.” I said, “Who are you?” He said, “I’m Jim Marshall, motherfucker. Who the fuck are you?” And we have been friends ever since!

MICHAEL ZAGARIS

JIM MARSHALL, early 1970s