. . . then I cried for a hero . . .
J ust Say No! was never thought out as a business proposition initially, but after the Midnights' performance at the awards show that night, everyone wanted a copy of the song to play on their local radio stations, which led to record stores wanting copies to sell to their customer base. I hadn't even decided on a label for the song yet. I was just trying to produce it for John and have it performed where he could see the impact that he still had on people through his music.
I did plenty of interviews for a change, though. Since I didn't really want reporters trying to bombard John at the Maryland Adult Well House, I agreed to more than half of the stories and interviews that I was asked to do.
I was mainly telling them that the song represented all of the things that we struggle with as young people on a day-to-day basis in America. There were just so many things going on in America to get caught up in in the new millennium that it took extra discipline to make the right decisions sometimes. And even though a lot of people didn't want to hear the preaching, we all needed more help to do what's right.
I also had to defuse an argument about Just Say No! not being a “traditional gospel” song. I mean, just because the song had a little more pizzazz and swing to it than gospel folks were used to, that didn't change what it was. We were trying to attract a young, secular audience to the song. I thought that people had gotten past that traditional gospel bag after Kirk Franklin's music, but I guess they hadn't.
Some reporters asked about the breakup that John and I had a few years back, and I just responded that people have to grow apart sometimes in order to grow together.
I said, “I think John and I needed space from each other to grow.”
I was told, however, that it looked as if I was the only who had benefited from our breakup. My new career and personal life as a producer were on the way up, and John's career and personal life were on the way down. I resented that, and that insinuation made me want to stop doing the interviews. They didn't know how much I loved John. They didn't know how hard I was working on his behalf, when I could have been doing my own stuff.
Tony added his usual cynical view on it. He said, “Man, Nancy Reagan came out with that ‘Just say no’ to drugs campaign back in the eighties, but people still gon' do what they want to do in America, man. I mean, at least she said something about it. And now we make a positive song about the struggle to do the right thing, and all they want to do is argue about whether it's real gospel or not, and why y'all broke up in the first place.”
He shook his head at me and said, “That's why I just do the music, man, and let people take it how they gon' take it. That's all you can really do, Darin. Because they're gonna do what they want to do with it regardless.”
It was Wednesday, March 21, 2001, and I was in bed with my wife. It had been a long week and a long day.
Chelsea said, “So, you have your plane tickets all ready to fly back up there to see John tomorrow?”
I said, “Yeah.” I was leaving out for BWI airport the next morning.
Chelsea nodded and said, “We all want to go with you next time,” and put my hand on her pregnant belly. She added, “We might have a surprise for him.”
I said, “He already knows that you're pregnant. I told him that.”
“Did you tell him what the name is?”
I frowned at her. I said, “We don't have no name yet. Or do we ? You picked one out?”
She said, “No, not yet. I still don't know the sex. But I've been thinking about it.”
I said, “And you've been thinking about it without me?”
Chelsea smiled and said, “I'm always thinking.”
Before I could say another word about it the telephone rang. It was my mother again, and she was crying. Again.
She said, “Oh, Darin !”
I asked her, “What is it, Mom? What's going on now?”
On instincts, Chelsea turned the TV on in our bedroom. We didn't watch TV much because most of the programs the networks aired weren't desirable to us. So I watched mostly sports events, and my wife watched the news, the weather, and special programs.
My mother said, “It's John. They say he was hit out there in the street.” She was still piecing the information together as she spoke.
Chelsea had the story on the local news channel as my mother spoke about it. They were reporting an accident just a few miles outside the Maryland Adult Well House with a cargo truck.
I sat up to pay attention to my mother while watching the story unfold on the television.
My mother shouted, “How did they let him get out?!” She was all hysterical.
I was trying to block her out and concentrate on the news report for a minute to get more facts. The reporters were saying that John had apparently made an escape from the Maryland Adult Well House with guards in pursuit, who were not able to catch him before he ran right into the lane of a fast approaching truck.
My mother wailed, “OH, MY GOD! THAT BOY . . .”
I could hear my father in the background trying to calm her down.
Chelsea said, “Well, why didn't they try to shoot him in the leg or something?”
I was still trying to get more facts. Then they finally made the announcement: “John Williams was pronounced dead at the Montgomery County Hospital in Maryland tonight at nine-oh-eightP.M.”
My mother wailed, “OH, MY GOD !” over the telephone.
Chelsea began to tear up and grabbed for me in bed. And me? I was just numb. I didn't know how to feel. Was it all a joke? Was I having a nightmare?
Then I thought about something John had said in my last conversation with him, from the awards show. He said, “That's good, D. Now I can rest in peace.”
His words replayed in my mind over and over again: “That's good, D. Now I can rest in peace.”
I shook my head. Everything else seemed to be spinning around me. I said, “That mother —,” and I caught myself. I couldn't believe that I let that comment slip past me! I was too happy that night at the awards to realize what he was saying. I thought he meant to get a good night's sleep, not that he was talking about resting in peace forever ! I thought he was coming out of it. I thought he was okay that night.
I had to break away from my wife in bed, and from my mother over the phone. I had to stand up and collect my thoughts for a moment.
“That's good, D. Now I can rest in peace.”
John's words were haunting me, man. Haunting me!
I gritted my teeth and screamed, “GOD—GOD—DAMMIT!”
I didn't know what else to do, man. But I didn't feel like crying. I felt angry. I was angry at John. I just knew in my heart that that accident wasn't really an accident. I wondered who else John had spoken to about dying.
Chelsea was still crying and talking to my mother over the telephone, but I needed to take a walk out of the room.
Chelsea called, “Darin? . . . DARIN?”
I just shook my head and kept walking out of the room. Like I said, I didn't feel like crying. I felt mad ! I felt cheated ! That mother . . . fucker had done it to me again, and I wanted to bring his ass back to life and kill him my damn self! All that shit for nothing! I thought to myself. He set my ass up again!
I walked down into my music office next to the garage and called Tony up on my business line.
Tony's wife answered the telephone and told him that I was calling.
She cried and said, “I'm so sorry to hear about John. How's Chelsea taking it?”
I mumbled, “She's all right. Everybody's hurtin', you know.”
Tony came on the line and said, “Man, out of all the different ways to go out in this world, that motherfucker gets hit by a damn truck. A damn truck, Darin!”
I asked Tony one time, “Did John ever talk to you about dying or committin' suicide, man?” I didn't have time for a conversation about it. I just wanted my answer.
Tony paused. He said, “Man, we all knew that John was dying. You knew it, too. It was like that boy was dying of a broken heart, man, with all them damn girls he had. I mean, he still felt alone for some damn reason. Even when he was with Tangela . . . I can't call it, man. That boy was just . . . Man, I can't call it. I mean . . .”
Tony went speechless on me, and I didn't really have much to say that night. I didn't have words for anyone. In fact, I just felt like staying in my office and ignoring everything. And I did. I took the phone off the hook, and ignored my pager, my wife, and my kids. I'm not saying that it was right, but that was just how I felt. I didn't want to be bothered. I had been bothered enough by John's life. And I just needed some time alone in his death.
When I talked to Dr. Benjamin at the Maryland Adult Well House, he was taking a lot of flak, and he expected me to join in with the bandwagon of accusers who held him and the facility responsible. But I knew better than that. Where there was a will, there was a way. John had great willpower when he focused. He could do anything he put his mind to. He had focused on his death . . . and he had done it.
At the funeral that next Wednesday, March 28, I still hadn't shed a tear. I didn't have it in me anymore to cry for John. I was all cried out. I had been crying for that boy for years. But there were thousands of people there at the funeral who did have more tears for John, enough to fill a swimming pool. Some fans had come long ways to see his remains, and our Christ Universal Baptist Church became a long line of people flowing in and out and breaking into tears over John's peaceful face.
When I got a chance to view the body with Tony and the rest of the close family, I was honestly tripping. I mean, I didn't show it, but I kept thinking that John was going to smile, or wink at me, or say something: “I set it up good, didn't I, D? Go 'head and admit it, man. Go 'head and admit it.”
But it never happened. It was just unreal. I kept thinking to myself, Is this really real? Is my boy gone? Or am I dreaming this all up?
Just like John had promised before the awards show, he had gotten a clean haircut and a shave, with his long sideburns neatly trimmed. His mom had him dressed in an all-white tuxedo, so his penny brown face and hands stood out and looked real calm in the white casket. In the accident, John had suffered a crushed rib cage and two punctured lungs, as if he stuck his chest out to take the hit. And the boy didn't have a big chest to begin with. But I had to move on, man. He wasn't getting back up. And he wasn't going to speak to me.
Tangela walked up and did her crying, and I felt her. She had carried John's seed.
Then Sister Williams stood there and started crying. But I didn't have many words for her. What positive comments could I have made to her? To be honest about it, I had been doing most of the work to try and keep John out of trouble over the years, not her. She hadn't helped that boy a bit with all of her damnation. It had only made his situation worse in my view. Sister Williams needed to check herself out. But since I still had my respect for her, I just decided to keep the peace.
I did hear her comments, though, and she sounded defensive in her tears.
She was saying things like, “I did the best that I could do in this world with what the Lord gave me. Everybody wants you measuring up to something. I measure up! I'm a good, God-fearing woman!”
I was concerned for her welfare. I had come to terms with Sister Williams being manic-depressive just like her son was. Like Dr. Benjamin had told me, it was hereditary. I wondered if Sister Williams had thought of suicide herself on occasion.
The big surprise came when Reverend Joseph Stark showed up with his entire “legitimate family” in tow and said a long, holding-hands prayer over John's body.
Chelsea and I just looked at each other with our own family from the front pews.
Sister Williams snapped out in the middle of church and said, “It's a little-too LATE for that, JOSEPH! IT'S TOO LATE FOR THAT!”
Her family from Atlanta had to restrain her as Reverend Stark made his way back up the aisle with his family.
I looked at Chelsea again and said, “I can't even believe she said that.”
Tangela and Tony couldn't believe it either. They were right there with us. And they both knew how John's mother had been. So I had to restrain Tangela.
Tangela broke down and started saying, “She don't even know her son. She don't even know him! Damn hypocrite!”
I mean, the whole funeral was a big emotional circus. But I continued to hold my peace in there like a bystander. I just couldn't wait to get the thing over with. Every step of it was torture, all the way up to lowering John's body into the ground.
Sister Williams started hollering, “OH, TAKE ME WITH YOU! TAKE ME WITH YOU! OH, LORD, JESUS! ” and they had to restrain her again.
I don't even want to get into how many different outbursts went on. It was just embarrassing. I felt that if anyone needed to act crazy there, it was me. Outside of maybe Tangela, no one there had been closer to John than I was. And I still hadn't shed a tear.
“Darin, are you okay, baby?” Chelsea asked me in the car on the way back to the house. She had her hand on my knee.
I took a deep breath and nodded to her. I said, “Yeah. This has just been another long day.” I felt like I was forty years old already. I hadn't even turned twenty-seven yet.
Shortly after the funeral, John's new lawyer contacted me and his few loved ones to be present at the reading of the will, including Tony and Tangela. I didn't even want to be a part of that, and a whole lot of money was at stake. Several millions!
John had still not had a chance to spend as much money as other highpriced entertainers were spending. He was still pretty simplistic about his monetary needs. But I told Chelsea that I didn't want to be involved in the reading of the will.
She said, “No sir, no sir ! You have to be involved. Nobody knows more about John's business estate than you do. Not even Tangela. I mean, you helped to build most of it.”
I shook my head and said, “I'm not concerned about that, Chelsea, and I'm not going. And that's final.”
I had to put my foot down about it. Enough was enough.
I contacted the lawyer and told him that I didn't want to attend the reading, and that I was not really interested in John's estate. The lawyer was a laid-back brother from Alexandria, Virginia.
He said, “I understand that this is an emotional time for you, Mr. Harmon, but I think you do need to be a part of this.”
He sounded like he was giving me inside information. I didn't know what to say to him. I didn't know if I could turn down a will statement or not. Was it legally binding? Could I sign my share over to someone else? I had to think it all through.
Before I got a chance to decide on it, I received a package at the studio in Charlotte. It was signed “from John Loverboy Williams,” with his Maryland address on it.
I opened the package out of curiosity. I found several digital master recording tapes and high-bias audiotapes inside with no letter. I was on my way back to the house at the moment, so I took the tapes with me.
I asked myself in the car, Now, do I want to do this to myself again? I assumed that John had recorded some new songs that I hadn't heard yet, and he had set it up for me to have them, particularly with my new producer status. I wondered if his lawyer had sent them to me on the sly, but the postage stamp on the package was from Maryland, and it had John's zip code on it. Maybe he had given the package to a neighbor to mail off after his death, I don't know. I mean, John wasn't still alive, was he? We had just buried him.
The thought of John faking me out again made me want to listen to the new tape just to find out what was going on.
I slid in the first tape, marked “Loverboys,” in plural, in my car system, and gave it a listen.
I turned the car system up nice and loud. John's voice came pouring out and rising up the scales with a cover of Sam Cooke's classic, You Send Me:
The first thing I thought was, Man, John is working them scales ! That was something contemporary singers didn't seem to care for, or couldn't do, go up and up and up off of the just one breath. And it was nice to see John go back to the roots of real crooning.
On the second song, the bass line rushed out at me, followed by the opening line:
I said, “Oh, sweat, John's singing Marvin Gaye, too!” John had never covered anyone's song from what I knew of, not even in practice. He always wanted to sing his own stuff. But there he was, singing Sam Cooke's You Send Me, followed by Marvin Gaye's Distant Lover, and he was killing both of them with a full band and Tony's drums backing him up!
Man, I had to pull my car over and stop to listen to it. And John wasn't finished yet. As soon as the Marvin Gaye cover faded out, he came back with a cover of Hey Love, from the Delfonics:
Not only was he singing it, but John was outdoing the original song, and Hey Love was another classic ! I sat there and started shaking my head with a smile. The boy had me with the music again. What could I say?
After the Delfonics cover, John went after James Brown, This Is a Man's World, going scream for scream, while adapting his own lyrics:
After that, he went right into Bill Withers's Ain't No Sunshine:
Then he covered Philadelphia International Records hits with the O'Jays' Forever Mine, and Teddy Pendergrass's Love T.K.O. I mean, the boy was on a roll with the hits! I started wondering when he had done it all. Tony had to know about it, too, because he was there on the drums, but I wanted to hear the whole tape before I called him up about it.
The next thing I knew, I was listening to that sultry opening line from Smokey Robinson's song Ooh, Baby, Baby that was made classic in the party scene from the movie Cooley High:
I had never heard John sing falsetto in his life, but there he was doing it Smokey Robinson style:
I broke out laughing like a lunatic, parked on the side of the road. I said, “This boy has lost his damn mind!” as if he was still alive with us. And he was ! He was alive in his love for the music.
He covered Al Green's midtempo classic, I'm So Tired of Being Alone, and then Norman Conners's beautiful hit You Are My Starship. And no way in the world was I ready for him to do a duet with Atlanta's Monica, covering Rick James and Teena Marie's Fire and Desire. No way was I ready for that! Monica held her water to John, too, singing her heart out:
The last song on John's tape of covers was Lenny Williams's long and dramatic 'Cause I Love You, which was a perfect match for John, singing it his way. John sang it with less crying and more sensuality that made the song feel more as if he was reminiscing on lovemaking than losing love:
The song made me think back to John's early days with Tangela.
I finally drove home and tracked Tony down on his cell phone. I asked him about the cover songs and he just started laughing.
He said, “Yeah, man, John was trippin' off that shit. He had the Rhino CDs and some other old-school shit.”
I asked Tony, “How long did it take y'all to record all that?” I was feeling energized again and out of my glum mood. Good music was something else ! It could change your whole state of mind around!
Tony said, “I wasn't on all them songs, man. John was doing that shit for months. And he was paying musicians like ten G's a song to play for him in real time. And I kept asking him what he was gonna use it for, you know? But he kept talking about, ‘This is for my personal collection, man. This is for my personal collection.’
“So, you know, I told him, ‘I don't need the money, man. You call me when you ready to do your own songs.’ And then he started doing all this old black-and-blue soul shit. And some of them were hittin', you know? But after a while, I said, ‘John, nobody wanna listen to a whole album of this sad shit, man. Throw some real jams up in there.’”
I listened to Tony and said, “Black-and-blue soul, hunh? That sounds all right.”
I don't know, it just had a ring to it. Black-and-blue soul.
Tony said, “Yeah, it's all in there. He was recording all kinds of stuff, but he didn't want to put it out. And I said, ‘Man, you gon' get like Prince with a whole lot of shit that you can't use if you don't put another album out soon.’ I mean, you know how fast songs can get old sometimes, D. You gotta throw 'em out there in the time that's hot.”
I hung up the phone with Tony and pulled out another one of John's tapes. This one was labeled “John Williams.” So I went to listen to that one. The first two songs, Why? and Calling Me, I had heard already. They were the diary songs of John's last years. They represented just what Tony was talking about with his black-and-blue soul comment.
John also had written a midtempo song for Big Joe called Gunshots, where he sang:
It reminded me of the blues all right, and it was funky, man. John worked it ! And I couldn't complain about the N-word too much, because people were still using it, especially down in the South. John was just being real about it.
He had another funky jam called Like Jesus, using loud hand claps and a swinging bass groove:
I mean, the song had my head bobbing and all, but I still didn't know how it would go over on an R&B album in the year 2001. Tony had a point: who would really want to listen to that? I just wasn't sure.
John stole another chapter from James Brown's book with a wild groove of temptation and indulgence called Gots ta Have It. Tony was heavy on the drums, with a driving bass line, guitar, and horn riffs backing him up, while John sang:
I laughed, man, even though the song wasn't anything to laugh about. It reminded me of a psychedelic seventies song from Jimi Hendrix or Sly and the Family Stone or something. It was just wild, man! But it surely made you want to keep listening to it over and over again, just like a good temptation was supposed to do. That John was crafty.
Of course, he had to have a few love songs in the mix, and this one song called Hold Me Down was a real baby maker. I mean, seriously !
John got into this thing, man, and started yelling and sweet-talking at the same time:
I started laughing so hard that my rib cage began to hurt. I mean, I knew exactly what he was talking about. When you have a woman with that “swe-e-e-et, sweet, sweet-sweet-sweet,” boy, you don't have to say nothing else! The lyrics were under stood!
John had a mellow blues song that even played with that third-personnarration stuff that so many stars get wrapped up into, called Blame It on the Loverboy. It was as if John Williams was not to blame for the problems. I didn't laugh at that one, though. That song opened up some old wounds of mine. I mean, it sounded like he was singing it just for me:
I wasn't laughing at that one. Not at all. And the serious mood of that song set me up for what was coming next. Tony kicked it off with the drums, followed by John's slow lyrics, an upright blues bass, a piano, soft horns, and doo-wop backup singers:
Then the music stopped for John's solo:
The bass followed John right back into the song, with the soft horns, the piano, Tony's drums, and an added touch of conga drums that John rarely used. He got into the first verse and broke things down with one of the deepest grooves that I had heard in years ! I mean, when you hear a song that got it, you know it ! And Do You Know was the ONE !
John sang:
The conga drums made you think back to the roots and souls of all black people:
The upright bass made you think of the Southern blues:
The piano and horns made you think about the days of Harlem's jazz:
Tony's drums brought it all home and kept the pace for the hip-hop generation:
And then John laced the lyrics with that vocal drug of his:
It finally hit me, man. While I listened to Do You Know? alone in my North Carolina house, my eyes started to get wet. John was SINGING TO ME, MAN ! He was singing a folk-gospel-blues song with a sixties doo-wop and hip-hop swing all wrapped up in one. That boy was plain genius !
Aw, man, I broke down and cried like a big punk. I even had snot coming out of my nose I was crying so badly. Then I started talking to myself and sounding crazy: “I'LL DO IT, MAN! I'LL PUT IT OUT! BLACK AND BLUE SOUL! I'LL DO WHATEVER YOU WANT ME TO DO, BOY! AWWW, MANNN! I MISS YOU, BOY! I MISS YOU, MANNN! ”
I don't know when Chelsea and the kids walked in on me, but they caught me crying all over the place and talking to myself like that.
Imani cried, “DADDY! DADDY!” I must have scared the life out of her.
Chelsea just grabbed on to me and held on with Darin Jr. at her side.
I said almost in a whisper, “I miss that boy, Chelsea. I just miss him, man.”
She said, “I know, baby. We all miss him. We all do! And we're gonna name our second son John L. Harmon. We're gonna name him after John. We love him, too, baby. We all love him. And we forgive him. He's a part of us now.”
She held my head up and looked into my face with her own tears falling. She said, “John brought us together, Darin. And he made us strong. And we thank him. We thank him !”