Janis Joplin

Janis Lyn Joplin

(born Jan. 19, 1943, Port Arthur, Texas, U.S.died Oct. 4, 1970, Los Angeles, Calif.) U.S. rock and blues singer. Born to a middle-class family, she ran away from home at age 17 and began singing in Austin, Texas, and later in Los Angeles. She joined the band Big Brother and the Holding Company in San Francisco in 1966 and soon became famous for her raw, powerful, emotional blues style. The album Cheap Thrills (1968) contains some of her best-known recordings. After leaving the band, she continued to record hit songs, including Me and Bobby McGee. She died from an overdose of heroin at age 27.

For more information on Janis Lyn Joplin, visit Britannica.com.

Janis Joplin

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Janis Joplin (1943 - 1970) was one of the most popular and influential female singers to emerge from the West Coast "counterculture" that thrived in the mid- to late-1960s. Her compelling stage and recording persona effectively transcended any regional boundaries. Her trademark raucous performing presence, combined with the raw emotion conveyed in her bluesy singing style and her unconventional but trend-setting and highly personal taste in fashion, captivated a national audience who sensed both her toughness and vulnerability and, in turn, embraced her without condition. Joplin, who was given to emotional excess and susceptible to unhealthy indulgence, passed away at the height of her fame.

Joplin, the future blues and rock song stylist, voiced her first full-throated, attention-demanding shriek on January 19, 1943. The first child of Seth and Dorothy Joplin, she was raised in Port Arthur, Texas, a small oil-industry town located on the Gulf Coast, fifteen miles from Louisiana.

At the time, Port Arthur was a conventional middle-class community, where many residents worked for oil companies. Her family enjoyed middle-income comforts. Her father was a canning factory worker (and later a Texaco employee) and her mother was a registrar at Port Arthur College, a business school.

In retrospect, its easy to see how such an environment would prove stifling to someone of Joplin's sensitivities and sensibilities, but her early life gave little indication of the unconventional, hard-living, hard-working performer she'd later become. She got along well with her parents and younger siblings, Michael and Laura. Joplin did demonstrate artistic interests as a child, and her parents encouraged these inclinations. Still, her life pretty much conformed to Port Arthur standards. She earned good grades, regularly attended church and displayed her artwork at the local library. But things started to change when she began high school.

Troubled Adolescence

As it is with many young students, high school proved a painful period for Joplin. Afflicted with severe acne and a weight problem, she suffered the humiliations of peer-group torment and rejection. Understandably, Joplin was greatly hurt and, at first, she responded by becoming somewhat of a loner. However, she soon adapted more extroverted responses to her ostracization: she began wearing wild clothes, affected vulgar language and, in general, cultivated a reputation as a rebel.

Further, her artistic interests took a bohemian turn, and she started listening to folk and blues records - not exactly the kind of music appreciated by fellow Port Arthur teenagers during the late 1950s. Her favorite artists were Odetta, Leadbelly and Bessie Smith. Joplin sung along to the artists' recordings, developing what would later become her signa ture vocal style.

A typical non-conformist, Joplin rejected traditional roles and expected behavior, and fell in with a group of like-minded, rebellious peers. While rejecting social norms of her community, she embraced causes such as equal rights and identified strongly with what was then termed the "beatnik" culture. Her interests included poetry and music, particularly jazz and blues. As is often the case with individuals who march to the cadences of a different drummer, however, Joplin often was overwhelmed by a sense of alienation and she suffered bouts of depression - feelings that she'd battle throughout her relatively short life.

The Runaway

After Janis graduated from high school in May, 1960, she enrolled at Lamar College in Beaumont, Texas. She lasted two semesters before she turned her face to the wind and answered the call of the open road. When she was only seventeen years old, she left home - or, as some more specifically define it, she "ran away" - at first working in country and western clubs in various Texas towns and cities. Eventually, she made her way to southern California. Though it was only the early 1960s, Joplin essentially adopted the "hippie" lifestyle, dropping in and out of colleges, working at odd jobs, and even living in a commune.

During her meanderings and wanderings, Joplin made friends with a man named Chet Helms, who later would have an enormous impact on her career direction. In January 1963, Helms talked Joplin into going with him to San Francisco.

During this period in her life, she sang in coffee houses in the North Beach area, and she also began experimenting with various drugs, and developed a fondness for alcohol. Experimentation led to an addiction to amphetamine, which, most likely was partially driven by poor self image fostered by what she felt was an ongoing weight problem.

Returned Home to Recover

By 1965, her lifestyle had taken its toll, and Joplin returned to Port Arthur. Reportedly, she only weighed 88 pounds. Back home, Joplin worked on restoring her physical and emotional health. She stayed sober, ate well, and toned down her appearance. She even stopped singing for a short while, as she felt it reinforced an excessive lifestyle.

With weight regained, and feeling emotionally stronger, she enrolled at the University of Texas in Austin, where she studied art. At first, she felt at home. In college, where she mixed in with a diverse population of students, she found kindred spirits among the academic bohemians who shared her artistic interests and social experiences. She became involved in the local folk scene, and she continued her dalliance with drugs and alcohol, developing a reputation as an enthusiastic drinker who could keep up with the boys. This helped to differentiate her from fellow students and underscored her sense of alienation.

Soon, she was subjected to the same kind of hurts she experienced in high school, only this time there was a far more cruel edge. The torments reached a height when fraternity members sought to have her recognized as the "ugliest man on campus," a highly visible campaign carried out in the college newspaper.

Music provided a solace, and Joplin sang and played autoharp with the Waller Creek Boys, a trio from Austin. While performing with the Wallers, Joplin began to truly develop the harsh but alluring vocal style that gained her fame. The small lineup included R. Powell St. John, who wrote songs for a rock and roll band called the 13th Floor Elevators, a Texas group whose primitive garage-band style engendered a cult following through the years. In the spring of 1966, the group asked Joplin to become a member, and she seriously considered the offer. But she was diverted from this course when Helms got back in touch with her, encouraging her to return to San Francisco. There was a band called Big Brother and the Holding Company, he told her, and they needed a female singer.

Joined Big Brother and the Holding Company

Actually, Helms was the manager for the group. Since Joplin had last seen him, Helms had become a major player in the burgeoning San Francisco music scene. He was part of an urban hippie commune called the Family Dog, and he owned the Avalon Ballroom, a popular entertainment venue that hosted rock concerts and "psychedelic dances."

In June 1966, following Helm's advice, Joplin returned to San Francisco. By this time, the city had become a counter-cultural Mecca. The beatnik/bohemian scene of the late 1950s and early 1960s had evolved into the so-called "hippie scene." In this trend-setting hub, "flower children" promoted "love, peace and understanding" while flaunting alternative lifestyle choices and a spiritual awakening fueled by the drug LSD, and music had become a central preoccupation.

First as a band calling itself the Warlocks, the Grateful Dead were at the vanguard of what would soon be termed the "San Francisco sound," and they were followed by other bands poised for stardom including Country Joe and the Fish, Jefferson Airplane and Quicksilver Messenger Service. With the addition of Janis Joplin, Big Brother and the Holding Company would soon join that West Coast pantheon.

Before Joplin, Big Brother developed a strong following as the house band at Helm's Avalon Ballroom. Like other local bands, the group's performances often ventured off into extended instrumental improvisations that the media would tag as "psychedelic music." Personnel included guitarist and vocalist Sam Andrew, guitarist James Gurley, bassist Peter Albin and drummer David Getz.

Joplin agreed to join the band, and she immediately felt at home, both in the city and with her new professional situation. Even though she had no experience working with a rock band, her vocal style proved a highly appropriate complement to Big Brother's loose and loud style. After its debut on June 10, 1966, at the Avalon, the new-version Big Brother became an immediate hit on a local level.

Afterward, the band hit the road and pretty much worked continuously. Only two months later, after performing at a club in Chicago, Joplin and her band mates were asked to sign a recording contract with Mainstream Records, a small, independent company. Gratified and encouraged, the group immediately went into the studio, putting together its first album. However, the deal turned out to be a fiasco. Andrew told Rolling Stone that it was a "disaster."

"We were naïve kids," Andrew recalled. "The club was burning us and here was this cat saying come on down to the recording studio tomorrow, sign up and let's go to the lawyer and make sure it's all cool…."

But it wasn't "cool." The sessions were rushed and under-financed, and Mainstream delayed the album's release for almost a year. In addition, the company, and the lawyer, was out to exploit the band rather than nurture the relationship. "We asked [the lawyer] for $1,000, and he said no," Andrew recalled in Rolling Stone in 1970. "We said 500? He said no. Well, can we have plane fare home? He said not one penny … we got back and it was a good time in San Francisco, small gigs…."

Stole the Spotlight at Monterey

Big Brother kept performing throughout California, providing itself with the exposure that translated into an ever-increasing and adoring audience. Their hard work and growing reputation earned them an invitation to perform at what would turn out to be a historic event: the Monterey International Pop Festival of 1967.

This seminal event in rock music history, which predated later music festivals such as Woodstock (where Joplin also appeared), was organized by music executive Lou Adler and musician John Phillips (founder of the Mamas and the Papas). It was designed as sort of an alternative to the popular and ongoing Monterey Jazz Festival, as a means to spotlight rock music, which was just beginning to be perceived as a major cultural force.

The festival, held in Monterey, California on June 16-18, 1967, at the beginning of what became known as the "Summer of Love," included the some of the best known names in the pop and rock music scene such as the Mamas and The Papas, the Association, The Who, the Byrds, Paul Butterfield Blues Band, Scott McKenzie, Canned Heat, Buffalo Springfield, Johnny Rivers, Electric Flag (with legendary guitarist Michael Bloomfield), Eric Burdon and the Animals, and Simon and Garfunkel. The up-and-coming San Francisco bands featured included Jefferson Airplane, Country Joe and The Fish, The Grateful Dead, the Steve Miller Band, Quicksilver Messenger Service and Moby Grape. Moreover, reflecting the increasing diversity of popular music styles, the eclectic lineup also included Lou Rawls, Otis Redding, Booker T. and The MGs with The Mar-Keys, Hugh Masakela, Laura Nyro, and Indian sitarist Ravi Shankar.

Despite the strong lineup, the festival proved to be the breakout occasion for what would become two major entities in rock music. Rising far above the rest of the big-name talent were the Jimi Hendrix Experience and Big Brother and The Holding Company. Indeed, today, along with Otis Redding, the names most closely associated with the Monterey festival are Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin.

Originally, Big Brother was slated for only one appearance, during the festival's afternoon show. However, Joplin's performance so electrified the audience that festival organizers quickly made a spot for the group in the evening show. Joplin's star-making performance was recorded for posterity by filmmaker D. A. Pennebaker (who previously made the Bob Dylan documentary Don't Look Back, and it appears in his film of the festival called Monterey Pop.

Response to Joplin and the group was so great, and word-of-mouth enthusiasm spread so fast and far, that Mainstream records felt commercially compelled to release the group's album. On initial release, the album was a moderate national hit, and today it is considered an essential classic by rock album connoisseurs.

More importantly, though, Big Brother and the Holding Company - and especially Janis Joplin - had caught the attention of the major record labels. Famed music business manager Albert Grossman, whose clients included Dylan, signed the band to a management deal and secured Big Brother a recording contract with Columbia Records.

Recorded "Cheap Thrills"

By late 1967 and early 1968, Big Brother had developed into a major performing act across the country. In the winter of 1968, the group toured the East Coast for the first time and, on February 18, they made their first-ever New York City appearance, garnering rave reviews in the area's influential alternative press.

The rest of the country was now getting an up-close look at Joplin's unique presence and style, and she became their "Janis." In performance, characteristically foot-stomping her way across a stage, Joplin was a swirl of colors and physical movement. With psychedelic stage lights high-lighting her tossed and wild red hair, feather boas flowing about her flailing arms and writhing body, streaming sweat glistening on her face like copious tears as she belted the blues, swigging openly and unapologetically from the bottles of Southern Comfort that accompanied her both onstage and off - Joplin was harnessed lighting unleashed inside a concert hall. She was at once uncontrolled, physically dirty, foulmouthed, yet endearing and inspirational, not to mention sensual and sexy. Audiences had never seen anything like her before, and they were easily seduced.

In the March and April of 1968 the group was hard at work on its second album, at that point tentatively titled Dope, Sex, and Cheap Thrills. When the record was released in August, the provocative title was shortened to just Cheap Thrills, and the band's live billing was now "Janis Joplin with Big Brother and the Holding Company," which indicated the shifting status within the band. Joplin's stature was outdistancing the rest of the members'. People even began referring to the group as Janis and the band.

During the late summer and early fall, the album's single "Piece of My Heart" became a huge radio hit. The album itself reached the top of the Billboard chart on October 12, 1968, and proved the artistic equal of other major albums released in the very same period. Cheap Thrills held its own against late-summer/fall releases that included The Beatles' White Album, The Band's Music From Big Pink, Jimi Hendrix's Electric Ladyland and Cream's Wheels of Fire.

Big Brother Breakup

With success came the usual pressures that would sink many a rock and roll band: ego conflicts, hurt feelings and the increased drug and alcohol use that often accompanied increased income. Joplin, with her fragile emotional state, was particularly susceptible to the entrapments of stardom. She reportedly used liquor and heroin to help ease the pain of a loneliness that never seemed to go away, even before an audience of adoring fans.

Eventually, and predictably, the band broke up. Big Brother, with Joplin, made its final appearances together in December 1968, even as Cheap Thrills remained at the top of the charts and national audiences were just getting to know the group. The drink and the drugs began affecting both the performing and personal relationships. More significantly, however, the personal dynamics within the band were similar to those within a relationship or marriage that nears its end when one partner achieves greater success than the other. There was a widening gulf between Joplin and the rest of Big Brother. Albin recalled for Rolling Stone what is was like: "The kind of performance she would put out would be a different trip than the band's. I'd say it was a star trip, where she related to the audience like she was the only one on the stage, and not relating to us at all."

But to many observers, it did not appear that Joplin was on a ego trip. Rather, she simply outgrew the group. Big Brother was considered a good band that became a great band with Janis Joplin. The prevailing opinion became that the band was sloppy and informal, and Joplin was way out of its class.

Joplin's Kozmic Blues

Soon, Joplin and Andrew formed a new band, one with a horn section that would add a necessary element to Joplin's vocal style and song choices. The band became known as Janis Joplin and Her Kozmic Blues Band, and she took it on the road for her one and only European tour. Throughout 1969, the band played with Joplin in her appearances at major rock festivals including the Newport '69 Pop Festival, the Atlanta Pop Festival, and Woodstock.

In October 1969, Joplin released the album I Got Dem Ol' Kozmic Blues Again, Mama!, which earned gold-record status. But the band only remained together for about a year.

Going Full-tilt Toward Tragedy

In 1970, on April 4, Janis performed with Big Brother and the Holding Company for a reunion concert in San Francisco, but she was in the process of forming a new band that would be called the Full Tilt Boogie Band. The new lineup went into the studio to record Joplin's last album called Pearl, the singer's nickname adopted by her closest friends. At this point, everything seemed to be going well for Joplin. The new band demonstrated more professionalism, and Joplin herself had appeared to quit using drugs. In addition, with the new band, she felt she finally landed on a sound that best reflected her vocal style.

She was never able to completely free herself from the lure of drugs, though, or her continuing affection for alcohol, and this resulted in her sudden death from an accidental overdose in a Hollywood motel in October 1970.

According to reports, Joplin's body was found in the Landmark Hotel on October 4, 1970. Apparently, the death followed a night of drinking and drug use. The condition of her body and her state of dress generated a great deal of speculation. She was found wearing only underwear, and her body was wedged between the bed and night stand. There were fresh needle marks in her arm, her lip and nose were bloodied, and $4.50 in bills and change were clenched in one fist.

Much was also made of that fact that Joplin had created a will shortly before she died. But signing a will is typically a legal move that someone decides to make when things are going well - and, indeed, things were going well for Joplin. She appeared on the verge of greater success, she had found a set of musicians who seemed in sync with her artistic ambitions, she had bought a house, and, reportedly, she was in a healthy and loving relationship.

But the actual circumstances of her death were more sordid than sensational. The scenario that was eventually pieced together from evidence indicated that Joplin, who was staying in the motel while recording the Pearl album, had indulged in alcohol and heroin, then went out to get change for cigarettes. She arrived back in her room around one o'clock in the morning, and partially undressed she suddenly lurched forward, in a drug-and-alcohol-induced spasm, striking her face on the nightstand.

Joplin's body was found hours after she died, making it a sad and lonely death, all the more perplexing because of the affection she easily attracted both from her listening audience, fellow professionals, family and close friends. She was just 27 years old. She was cremated and her ashes were scattered off the California coast.

The Pearl album was released posthumously several months later, becoming one of the best-selling albums of 1971. It held the number-one spot on the Billboard charts for nine weeks. The single released from the album, "Me and Bobby McGee," also reached number one. But more than that song, or the equally popular "Mercedes Benz," the highpoint of the essentially unfinished album was "Cry Baby," Joplin's stunning interpretation of the soul song originally performed by Garnett Mims and the Enchanters in 1963. It provided an appropriate coda, both to a professional career waiting to realize its full potential and to a sad life of a much beloved performer.

Books

Graham, B., R. Greenfield, Bill Graham Presents: My Life Inside of Rock and Out, Doubleday, 1992.

Contemporary Musicians, Volume 3, Gale Research 1990.

Stokes, G.; K. Tucker, E. Ward, Rock of Ages: The Rolling Stone History of Rock and Roll, Rolling Stone Press, 1986.

Periodicals

Rolling Stone, October 29, 1970; November 12, 1970.

Washington Post, May 5, 1998.

Online

"Janis Joplin Biography," Official Janis, http://www.officialjanis.com/bio.html (December 30, 2005).

Columbia Encyclopedia:

Janis Joplin

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Joplin, Janis (jŏp'lĭn), 1943-70, American blues-rock singer, b. Port Arthur, Tex. After dropping out of college (1963) and singing folk rock in Texas clubs, she moved (1966) to San Francisco and became lead vocalist of the rock band Big Brother and the Holding Company. The following year the group performed at the Monterey Pop Festival, where the raw intensity of Joplin's voice and stage presence astonished the audience. The band's first major album, Cheap Thrills (1968), which included her iconic performance of "Piece of My Heart," catapulted Joplin to stardom. She left Big Brother in 1968, putting together her own backup group, the Kozmic Blues Band, and scoring a success with a 1969 album. By this time, Joplin was almost as well known for her flamboyant swigging of Southern Comfort, rumored drug use, and unconventional lifestyle as for her gritty, fierce, and sexually charged vocals. She had nearly completed the album Pearl (her nickname) when she died of a heroin overdose. Released in 1971, the record contained such classics as "Mercedes Benz" and "Me and Bobby McGee," her only No. 1 hit. Joplin was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995.

Bibliography

See memoir by her sister, L. Joplin (1992); biographies by D. Dalton (1971), M. Friedman (rev. ed. 1992, repr. 1999), and A. Echols (1999).

Quotes By:

Janis Joplin

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Quotes:

"On stage I make love to twenty five thousand people; and then I go home alone."

"Don't compromise yourself. You are all you've got."

Gale Musician Profiles:

Janis Joplin

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For The Record...

Born January 19, 1943, in Port Arthur, Tex.; died October 3, 1970, in Hollywood, Calif.; father was a canning factory worker, and mother was a registrar at a business college. Education: Attended various colleges for short periods during the 1960s.

Sang in various small clubs in Texas and California, c 1960-66; vocalist for Big Brother and the Holding Company, 1966-68, 1970; solo recording artist and concert performer, 1968-70.

Awards: One gold album with Big Brother and the Holding Company for Cheap Thrills; two gold albums as a solo artist forI Got Dem Ol’ Kozmic Blues Again Mama and Pearl.

Addresses: Record company—Columbia/CBS Records, 51 W. 52nd St., New York, N.Y. 10019.

Singer, songwriter

Janis Joplin, one of the most influential women singers of the late 1960s, first came to the attention of rock fans as the vocalist for the San Francisco, California-based band, Big Brother and the Holding Company. Compared to music greats like blues artist Bessie Smith and soul singer Aretha Franklin, most critics agree that she was the main reason for the group’s success with songs like "Piece of My Heart" and "Summertime." Renowned for her performance at the 1967 Monterey Pop Festival, and later for her solo appearance at the Woodstock festival in 1969, Joplin nevertheless failed to achieve a chart-topping single until her rendition of country composer Kris Kristofferson’s "Me and Bobby McGee" was released posthumously in 1971.

Joplin was born January 19, 1943, in Port Arthur, Texas. Though her family was middle-class, as a teenager she showed signs of the unconventional woman she would become. She was something of a loner, and, unlike her siblings and neighborhood peers, she listened to folk and blues music. Joplin’s favorite artists included Odetta, Leadbelly, and Bessie Smith, and she was greatly influenced by them in her own vocal style. By the time she was seventeen, she had decided to become a singer, and she left home.

At first Joplin found work in country and western clubs in Houston and other Texas cities. Gradually she formed the goal of saving enough money from her gigs for bus fare to California, and after a few years she accomplished this and arrived on the Pacific coast. Joplin enrolled in several different colleges while singing folk songs for little money, but her attempts at continuing her education never lasted long. She also tried living in various communes, and eventually settled in San Francisco for a few years.

Ironically, a disheartened Joplin went back to Texas in early 1966, right before a friend of hers, Chet Helms, became manager of a new rock group called Big Brother and the Holding Company. The band needed a female vocalist, and Helms thought of Joplin. He contacted her and convinced her to return to San Francisco. Though Joplin had not had much previous experience singing rock music, the combination of her gravelly, bluesy voice with Big Brother’s hard rock sound was a success. The group quickly became popular in the San Francisco area, and by the time the Monterey International Pop Festival took place in 1967 in Monterey, California, Big Brother and the Holding Company were a featured attraction. Joplin’s performances at this festival and at Woodstock in 1969 are considered by many specialists in the music of the late 1960s to have been classic moments in the history of rock. As Geoffrey Stokes reported in his portion of the book Rock of Ages:

The Rolling Stone History of Rock and Roll, at Monterey, "Janis Joplin walked away with an afternoon blues show."

Big Brother’s triumph at Monterey gained them a recording contract with Mainstream, a small label, with whom they released their debut album, Big Brother and the Holding Company. Also, Joplin and the rest of the band were in demand on a national scale; they toured many areas of the United States and Canada, including New York City. Increasingly, Joplin was the member of Big Brother who was singled out for critical acclaim; for instance, a Village Voice reviewer lauded one of her concert performances thus: "She sure projects.…She jumps and runs and pounces, vibrating the audience with solid sound. The range of her earthy dynamic voice seems almost without limits." With critiques like that, it is not surprising that Joplin left Big Brother to go solo in 1968, soon after the group recorded their second album, Cheap Thrills, for Columbia.

The first group of musicians Joplin recruited to back up her solo career was dubbed the Kozmic Blues Band; with them she released her first album on Columbia, I Got Dem 01’ Kozmic Blues Again Mama. Though it contained no overwhelmingly successful single, Kozmic Blues went gold, and Joplin’s popularity as a concert performer continued. After a brief reappearance with Big Brother and the Holding Company in early 1970, she formed yet another back up group, the Full-Tilt Boogie Band. They played on Joplin’s last album, 1970’s Pearl (the nickname the singer’s closest friends called her). Besides her acclaimed version of Kristofferson’s "Me and Bobby McGee," Pearl included cuts like "Get It While You Can"—which she considered one of her theme songs, "Cry Baby," and the humorous "Mercedes Benz," a song she composed herself.

But before Pearl could be released, what Stokes called "a drug she’d had an on-and-off affair with for most of her performing life" brought about Joplin’s death. On October 4, 1970, the singer’s body was found in the Landmark Motor Hotel in Hollywood, California. Joplin had died the day before from an overdose of heroin. She was cremated and her ashes were scattered off the California coast.

Selected discography

LPs
(With Big Brother and the Holding Company) Big Brother and the Holding Company (includes "Women Is Losers" and "Down on Me"), Mainstream, 1967.
(With Big Brother and the Holding Company) Cheap Thrills (includes "Piece of My Heart," "Ball and Chain," "Turtle Blues," and "Summertime"), Columbia, 1968.
I Got Dem Ol’ Kozmic Blues Again Mama, Columbia, 1969.
Pearl (includes "Me and Bobby McGee," "Get It While You Can," "Cry Baby," and "Mercedes Benz"), Columbia, 1971.

Sources
Books
Dalton, David, Piece of My Heart: The Life, Times, and Legend of Janis Joplin, St. Martin’s, 1986.
Friedman, Myra, Buried Alive: The Biography of Janis Joplin, Morrow, 1973.
Ward, Ed, Geoffrey Stokes, and Ken Tucker, Rock of Ages: The Rolling Stone History of Rock and Roll, Summit Books, 1986.

Periodicals
Texas Monthly, March 1988.

AMG AllMusic Guide: Pop Artists:

Janis Joplin

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Genres: Rock

Biography

The greatest white female rock singer of the 1960s, Janis Joplin was also a great blues singer, making her material her own with her wailing, raspy, supercharged emotional delivery. First rising to stardom as the frontwoman for San Francisco psychedelic band Big Brother & the Holding Company, she left the group in the late '60s for a brief and uneven (though commercially successful) career as a solo artist. Although she wasn't always supplied with the best material or most sympathetic musicians, her best recordings, with both Big Brother and on her own, are some of the most exciting performances of her era. She also did much to redefine the role of women in rock with her assertive, sexually forthright persona and raunchy, electrifying on-stage presence.

Joplin was raised in the small town of Port Arthur, TX, and much of her subsequent personal difficulties and unhappiness has been attributed to her inability to fit in with the expectations of the conservative community. She'd been singing blues and folk music since her teens, playing on occasion in the mid-'60s with future Jefferson Airplane guitarist Jorma Kaukonen. There are a few live pre-Big Brother recordings (not issued until after her death), reflecting the inspiration of early blues singers like Bessie Smith, that demonstrate she was well on her way to developing a personal style before hooking up with the band. She had already been to California before moving there permanently in 1966, when she joined a struggling early San Francisco psychedelic group, Big Brother & the Holding Company. Although their loose, occasionally sloppy brand of bluesy psychedelia had some charm, there can be no doubt that Joplin -- who initially didn't even sing lead on all of the material -- was primarily responsible for lifting them out of the ranks of the ordinary. She made them a hit at the 1967 Monterey Pop Festival, where her stunning version of "Ball and Chain" (perhaps her very best performance) was captured on film. After a debut on the Mainstream label, Big Brother signed a management deal with Albert Grossman and moved on to Columbia. Their second album, Cheap Thrills, topped the charts in 1968, but Joplin left the band shortly afterward, enticed by the prospects of stardom as a solo act.

Joplin's first album, I Got Dem Ol' Kozmic Blues Again Mama!, was recorded with the Kozmic Blues Band, a unit that included horns and retained just one of the musicians that had played with her in Big Brother (guitarist Sam Andrew). Although it was a hit, it wasn't her best work; the new band, though more polished musically, was not nearly as sympathetic accompanists as Big Brother, purveying a soul-rock groove that could sound forced. That's not to say it was totally unsuccessful, boasting one of her signature tunes in "Try (Just a Little Bit Harder)."

For years, Joplin's life had been a roller coaster of drug addiction, alcoholism, and volatile personal relationships, documented in several biographies. Musically, however, things were on the upswing shortly before her death, as she assembled a better, more versatile backing outfit, the Full Tilt Boogie Band, for her final album, Pearl (ably produced by Paul Rothchild). Joplin was sometimes criticized for screeching at the expense of subtlety, but Pearl was solid evidence of her growth as a mature, diverse stylist who could handle blues, soul, and folk-rock. "Mercedes Benz," "Get It While You Can," and Kris Kristofferson's "Me and Bobby McGee" are some of her very best tracks. Tragically, she died before the album's release, overdosing on heroin in a Hollywood hotel in October 1970. "Me and Bobby McGee" became a posthumous number one single in 1971, and thus the song with which she is most frequently identified. ~ Richie Unterberger, Rovi

Wikipedia on Answers.com:

Janis Joplin

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Janis Joplin

Background information
Birth name	Janis Lyn Joplin
Also known as	Pearl Mary Jane
Born	(1943-01-19)January 19, 1943 Port Arthur, Texas, United States
Died	October 4, 1970(1970-10-04) (aged 27) Los Angeles, California, United States
Genres	Blues rock, soul, psychedelic rock, acid rock, country, folk, hard rock, jazz blues
Occupations	Singer, songwriter
Instruments	Vocals, guitar, auto-harp, harmonica, piano, percussion
Years active	1962–1970
Labels	Columbia
Associated acts	Big Brother and the Holding Company Kozmic Blues Band Full Tilt Boogie Band Grateful Dead

Janis Lyn Joplin (January 19, 1943 – October 4, 1970) was an American singer and songwriter from Port Arthur, Texas. As a youth Joplin was ridiculed by her fellow students due to her unconventional appearance and personal beliefs. She later sang about her experience at school through her song "Ego Rock". Early in her life, Joplin cultivated a rebellious and unconventional lifestyle, becoming a beatnik poet. She began her singing career as a folk and blues singer in San Francisco, playing clubs and bars with her guitar and auto-harp.

Joplin first rose to prominence in the late 1960s as the lead singer of the psychedelic-acid rock band Big Brother and the Holding Company, and later as a solo artist with her more soulful and bluesy backing groups, The Kozmic Blues Band and The Full Tilt Boogie Band. She was one of the more popular acts at the Monterey Pop Festival and later became one of the major attractions to the Woodstock festival and the Festival Express train tour.

Janis Joplin only charted five singles in her life but her hits and other popular songs from throughout her short four year career include "Down On Me", "Bye, Bye Baby", "Coo Coo", "Summertime", "Piece of My Heart", "Turtle Blues", "Ball 'n' Chain", "Try (Just A Little Bit Harder)", "Maybe", "To Love Somebody", "Kozmic Blues", "Work Me, Lord", "Move Over", "Cry Baby", "A Woman Left Lonely" "Get It While You Can", "My Baby", "Trust Me", "Mercedes Benz", "One Night Stand", "Raise Your Hand" and her only number one hit, "Me and Bobby McGee".

Joplin was well known for her performing abilities and her fans referred to her stage presence as electric. At the height of her career, she was known as "The Queen of Rock and Roll" as well as "The Queen of Psychedelic Soul" and became known as Pearl amongst her friends. She was also a painter, dancer and music arranger.

Rolling Stone magazine ranked Joplin number 46 on its list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time in 2004,^[1] and number 28 on its 2008 list of 100 Greatest Singers of All Time.^[2]

Early life: 1943–1961

Janis Joplin was born in Port Arthur, Texas, on (1943-01-19)January 19, 1943,^[3] to Dorothy (née East) Joplin (1913–1998), a registrar at a business college, and her husband, Seth Joplin (1910–1987), an engineer at Texaco. She had two younger siblings, Michael and Laura. The family attended the Church of Christ.^[4] The Joplins felt that Janis always needed more attention than their other children, with her mother stating, "She was unhappy and unsatisfied without [receiving a lot of attention]. The normal rapport wasn't adequate."^[5]

As a teenager, she befriended a group of outcasts, one of whom had albums by African-American blues artists Bessie Smith, Ma Rainey and Lead Belly, whom Joplin later credited with influencing her decision to become a singer.^[6] She began singing in the local choir and expanded her listening to blues singers such as Odetta, Billie Holiday and Big Mama Thornton.

Primarily a painter while still in school, she first began singing blues and folk music with friends. While at Thomas Jefferson High School, she stated that she was mostly shunned.^[6] Joplin was quoted as saying, "I was a misfit. I read, I painted, I didn't hate niggers."^[5] As a teen, she became overweight and her skin broke out so badly she was left with deep scars which required dermabrasion.^[5]^[7]^[8] Other kids at high school would routinely taunt her and call her names like "pig," "freak" or "creep."^[5] Among her classmates were G. W. Bailey and Jimmy Johnson.

Joplin graduated from high school in 1960 and attended Lamar State College of Technology in Beaumont, Texas, during the summer^[7] and later the University of Texas at Austin, though she did not complete her studies.^[9] The campus newspaper The Daily Texan ran a profile of her in the issue dated July 27, 1962, headlined "She Dares To Be Different."^[9] The article began, "She goes barefooted when she feels like it, wears Levi's to class because they're more comfortable, and carries her Autoharp with her everywhere she goes so that in case she gets the urge to break into song it will be handy. Her name is Janis Joplin."^[9]

Singing career: 1962-1965

Joplin's house at 122 Lyon Street in Haight-Ashbury in San Francisco, California. She lived there in the 1960s with her boyfriend Country Joe McDonald.^[10]

Cultivating a rebellious manner, Joplin styled herself in part after her female blues heroines and, in part, after the Beat poets. Her first song recorded on tape, at the home of a fellow student in December 1962, was "What Good Can Drinkin' Do".^[11] She left Texas for San Francisco ("just to get away from Texas," she said, "because my head was in a much different place"^[12]) in January 1963, living in North Beach and later Haight-Ashbury. In 1964, Joplin and future Jefferson Airplane guitarist Jorma Kaukonen recorded a number of blues standards, further accompanied by Margareta Kaukonen on typewriter (as a percussion instrument). This session included seven tracks: "Typewriter Talk", "Trouble In Mind", "Kansas City Blues", "Hesitation Blues", "Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out", "Daddy, Daddy, Daddy" and "Long Black Train Blues", and was later released as the bootleg album The Typewriter Tape.

Around this time, her drug use increased, and she acquired a reputation as a "speed freak" and occasional heroin use.^[3]^[6]^[7] She also used other psychoactive drugs and was a heavy drinker throughout her career; her favorite beverage was Southern Comfort.

In early 1965, Joplin's friends, noticing the physical effects of her amphetamine habit (she was described as "skeletal"^[6] and "emaciated"^[3]), persuaded her to return to Port Arthur, Texas. In May 1965, Joplin's friends threw her a bus-fare party so she could return home.^[3] Back in Port Arthur, she changed her lifestyle. She avoided drugs and alcohol, began wearing relatively modest dresses, adopted a beehive hairdo, and enrolled as a sociology major at Lamar University in nearby Beaumont, Texas. During her year at Lamar University, she commuted to Austin to perform solo, accompanying herself on guitar. One of her performances was reviewed in the Austin American-Statesman. Joplin became engaged to a man who visited her, wearing a blue serge suit, to ask her father for her hand in marriage, but the man terminated plans for the marriage soon afterwards.^[8]

Just prior to joining Big Brother and the Holding Company, Joplin recorded seven studio tracks in 1965. Among the songs she recorded was her original composition for her song "Turtle Blues" and an alternate version of "Cod'ine" by Buffy Sainte-Marie. These tracks were later issued as a new album in 1995 titled This is Janis Joplin 1965 by James Gurley.

Big Brother and the Holding Company: 1966–1968

Main article: Big Brother and the Holding Company

Joplin with Big Brother and the Holding Company, circa 1966 – 1967.

In 1966, Joplin's bluesy vocal style attracted the attention of the psychedelic rock band Big Brother and the Holding Company, a band that had gained some renown among the nascent hippie community in Haight-Ashbury. She was recruited to join the group by Chet Helms, a promoter who had known her in Texas and who at the time was managing Big Brother. Helms brought her back to San Francisco and Joplin joined Big Brother on June 4, 1966.^[13] Her first public performance with them was at the Avalon Ballroom in San Francisco. In June, she was photographed at an outdoor concert that celebrated the summer solstice. The image, which was later published in two books by David Dalton, shows her before she relapsed into drugs. Due to persistent persuading by keyboardist and close friend Stephen Ryder, Joplin avoided drug use for several weeks, enjoining bandmate Dave Getz to promise that using needles would not be allowed in their rehearsal space or in her apartment or in the homes of her bandmates whom she visited.^[8] When a visitor injected drugs in front of Joplin and Getz, Joplin angrily reminded Getz that he had broken his promise.^[8] A San Francisco concert from that summer was recorded and released in the 1984 album Cheaper Thrills. In July, all five bandmates and guitarist James Gurley's wife Nancy moved to a house in Lagunitas, California, where they lived communally. They often partied with the Grateful Dead, who lived less than two miles away.

On August 23, 1966,^[14] during a four week engagement in Chicago, the group signed a deal with independent label Mainstream Records.^[15] Joplin relapsed into drinking when she and her bandmates (except for Peter Albin) joined some "alcoholic hipsters," as Joplin biographer Ellis Amburn described them, in Chicago. The band recorded tracks in a Chicago recording studio, but the label owner Bob Shad refused to pay their airfare back to San Francisco.^[6] Shortly after four of the five musicians drove from Chicago to Northern California with very little money (Albin traveled by plane), they returned to Lagunitas. It was there that Joplin relapsed into intravenous drug use. Nancy Gurley was an enabler.^[6] Three years later, Joplin, by then using a different band, was informed of Gurley's death from an overdose.^[6]

The Mantra-Rock Dance promotional poster featuring Big Brother and the Holding Company.

One of Joplin's earliest major performances in 1967 was the Mantra-Rock Dance, a musical event held on January 29 at the Avalon Ballroom by the San Francisco Hare Krishna temple. Janis Joplin and Big Brother performed there along with the Hare Krishna founder Bhaktivedanta Swami, Allen Ginsberg, Moby Grape, and Grateful Dead, donating proceeds to the Krishna temple.^[16]^[17]^[18]

In early 1967, Joplin met Country Joe McDonald of the group Country Joe and the Fish. The pair lived together as a couple for a few months.^[3]^[15] Joplin and Big Brother began playing clubs in San Francisco, at the Fillmore West, Winterland and the Avalon Ballroom. They also played at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, as well as in Seattle, Washington and Vancouver, British Columbia, the Psychedelic Supermarket in Boston, Massachusetts, and the Golden Bear Club in Huntington Beach, California.^[15]

Monterey and breakthrough

The band's debut studio album, Big Brother and the Holding Company, was released by Columbia Records in August 1967, shortly after the group's breakthrough appearance in June at the Monterey Pop Festival.^[12] The debut album spawned four minor hits with the singles "Down on Me", a traditional song arranged by Joplin, "Bye Bye Baby," "Call On Me" and "Coo Coo," all of which Joplin sang lead vocals on.

Two songs from the second of Big Brother's two sets at Monterey were filmed. "Combination of the Two" and a version of Big Mama Thornton's "Ball 'n' Chain" appear in the DVD box set of D. A. Pennebaker's documentary Monterey Pop released by The Criterion Collection. The film captured Cass Elliot, of The Mamas & the Papas, seated in the audience silently mouthing "Wow! That's really heavy!" during Joplin's performance of "Ball and Chain".^[6] Only "Ball and Chain" was included in the film that was released to theaters nationwide in 1969 and shown on television in the 1970s. Those who did not attend Monterey Pop saw the band's performance of "Combination of the Two" for the first time in 2002 when The Criterion Collection released the box set.

After switching managers from Chet Helms to Julius Karpen in 1966, the group signed with top artist manager Albert Grossman, whom they met for the first time at Monterey Pop. For the remainder of 1967, Big Brother performed mainly in California. On February 16, 1968,^[19] the group began its first East Coast tour in Philadelphia, and the following day gave their first performance in New York City at the Anderson Theater.^[3]^[6] On April 7, 1968, the last day of their East Coast tour, Joplin and Big Brother performed with Jimi Hendrix, Buddy Guy, Joni Mitchell, Richie Havens, Paul Butterfield, and Elvin Bishop at the "Wake for Martin Luther King, Jr." concert in New York.

Live at Winterland '68, recorded at the Winterland Ballroom on April 12 and 13, 1968, features Joplin and Big Brother and the Holding Company at the height of their mutual career working through a selection of tracks from their albums. A recording became available to the public for the first time in 1998 when Sony Music Entertainment released the compact disc. One month later, Live at the Carousel Ballroom 1968, was recorded by Owsley Stanley.

In early 1968, Joplin and Big Brother made their nationwide television debut on The Dick Cavett Show, an ABC daytime variety show hosted by Dick Cavett. Shortly thereafter, network employees wiped the videotape. Over the next two years, she made three appearances on the primetime Cavett program, and all were preserved. By 1968, the band was being billed as "Janis Joplin and Big Brother and the Holding Company",^[15] and the media coverage given to Joplin generated resentment within the band.^[15] The other members of Big Brother thought that Joplin was on a "star trip," while others were telling Joplin that Big Brother was a terrible band and that she ought to dump them.^[15]

Time magazine called Joplin "probably the most powerful singer to emerge from the white rock movement," and Richard Goldstein wrote for the May 1968 issue of Vogue magazine that Joplin was "the most staggering leading woman in rock... she slinks like tar, scowls like war... clutching the knees of a final stanza, begging it not to leave... Janis Joplin can sing the chic off any listener."^[5]

Cheap Thrills

Big Brother and the Holding Company's Cheap Thrills album.

For her first major studio recording, Janis played a major role in the arrangement and production of the recordings that would become Big Brother and the Holding Company's second album, Cheap Thrills. During the recording, Joplin was said to be the first person to enter the studio and the last person to leave. Footage of Joplin and the band in the studio shows Joplin in great form and taking charge during the recording for "Summertime". The album featured a cover design by counterculture cartoonist Robert Crumb. Although Cheap Thrills sounded as if it consisted of concert recordings, like on "Combination of the Two" and "I Need a Man to Love", only "Ball and Chain" was actually recorded in front of a paying audience; the rest of the tracks were studio recordings.^[3] The album had a raw quality, including the sound of a cocktail glass breaking and the broken shards being swept away during the song "Turtle Blues". Cheap Thrills produced very popular hits with "Piece of My Heart" and "Summertime". Together with the premiere of the documentary film Monterey Pop at New York's Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts on December 26, 1968,^[20] the album launched Joplin's successful, albeit short, musical career.^[21]

Cheap Thrills reached No. 1 on the Billboard 200 album chart eight weeks after its release, remaining for eight (nonconsecutive) weeks.^[21] The album was certified gold at release and sold over a million copies in the first month of its release.^[8]^[15] The lead single from the album, "Piece of My Heart", reached No. 12 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the fall of 1968.^[22]

The band made another East Coast tour during July–August 1968, performing at the Columbia Records convention in Puerto Rico and the Newport Folk Festival. After returning to San Francisco for two hometown shows at the Palace of Fine Arts Festival on August 31 and September 1, Joplin announced that she would be leaving Big Brother. On September 14, 1968, culminating a three-night final gig together at Fillmore West, fans thronged to honor and exult in the last official night of Janis Joplin with Big Brother and the Holding Company. The lead-in groups for this night were Chicago (then still called Chicago Transit Authority) and Santana. Janis gave one last performance with Big Brother at a Family Dog benefit on December 1, 1968.^[3]^[6]

Solo career: 1969–1970

Kozmic Blues Band

After splitting from Big Brother and the Holding Company, Joplin formed a new backup group, the Kozmic Blues Band, composed of session musicians as well as Big Brother and the Holding Company guitarist Sam Andrew and future Full Tilt Boogie Band bassist Brad Campbell. The band was influenced by the Stax-Volt rhythm and blues (R&B) bands of the 1960s, as exemplified by Otis Redding and the Bar-Kays.^[3]^[6]^[8] The Stax-Volt R&B sound was typified by the use of horns and had a more bluesy, funky, soul, pop-oriented sound than most of the hard-rock psychedelic bands of the period.

By early 1969, Joplin was allegedly shooting at least $200 worth of heroin per day,^[7] although efforts were made to keep her clean during the recording of I Got Dem Ol' Kozmic Blues Again Mama!. Gabriel Mekler, who produced the Kozmic Blues, told publicist-turned-biographer Myra Friedman after Joplin's death that the singer had lived in his house during the June 1969 recording sessions at his insistence so he could keep her away from drugs and her drug-using friends.^[8]

Joplin's performance with The Kozmic Blues Band in Frankfurt was released in cinemas around this time. The film shows Joplin arriving in Frankfurt by plane and also includes her interviews from the Royal Albert Hall and on a bus. Most of the performances from this concert were later used in the 1975 film Janis: The Way She Was and is considered one of her best with the Kozmic Blues Band. No security was used so by the end of the concert the stage was so packed with people the band could not see each other. Another film was released of the band's performance in Stockholm featuring Joplin's interpretation of Summertime.

The Kozmic Blues Band performed on many television shows with Joplin. On the Tom Jones television show, they performed "Little Girl Blue" and "Raise Your Hand", the latter with Jones singing a duet with Joplin. On one episode of The Dick Cavett Show, they performed "Try (Just A Little Bit Harder)" as well as "To Love Somebody". As Cavett interviewed Joplin, she admitted that she had a terrible time touring in Europe, claiming that audiences there are very uptight and don't get down. She also revealed that she was a big fan of the then unknown Tina Turner, saying that she was an incredible singer, dancer and show woman. Joplin and Turner also performed together on at least one occasion at Madison Square Garden.

I Got Dem Ol' Kozmic Blues Again Mama!

The Kozmic Blues album, released in September 1969, was certified gold later that year, but did not match the success of Cheap Thrills.^[21] Reviews of the new group were mixed. However, the recording quality and engineering of the record as well as the musicianship were considered superior to her previous releases and some music critics argued that the band was working in a much more constructive way to support Janis' sensational vocal talents. Janis wanted a horn section similar to Chicago Transit Authority (band) and her voice had the dynamic qualities and range to not be overpowered by the brighter horn sound. Some music critics, including Ralph J. Gleason of the San Francisco Chronicle, were negative. Gleason wrote that the new band was a "drag" and that Joplin should "scrap" her new band and "go right back to being a member of Big Brother...(if they'll have her)."^[3] Other reviewers, such as reporter Carl Bernstein of the Washington Post generally ignored the band's flaws and devoted entire articles to celebrating the singer's magic. In general the press concentrated more on her leaving Big Brother rather than the qualities of the new recording.

Columbia released "Kozmic Blues" as a single, which peaked at #41 on the Billboard Hot 100, and a live rendition of Raise Your Hand was released and became a top ten hit. Containing other hits like Try (Just a Little Bit Harder), To Love Somebody and Little Girl Blue, I Got Dem Ol' Kozmic Blues Again Mama! reached No. 5 on the Billboard 200 weeks after its release.

Joplin performs with Tom Jones on his television show in late 1969.

Woodstock

Joplin and the Kozmic Blues Band toured North America and Europe throughout 1969, appearing at Woodstock in the late hours of Saturday, August 16. She performed until the early morning hours of Sunday, August 17. Her friend Peggy Caserta claimed in a 1973 book that she encouraged Joplin to perform at the festival. Joplin informed her band that they would be performing at the concert as if it were just another gig. When she and the band were flown in by helicopter with Joan Baez from a nearby motel to the festival site and Joplin saw the enormous crowd she instantly became incredibly nervous and giddy. The documentary film of the festival that was released to theaters the following year includes, on the left side of a split screen, 37 seconds of footage of Joplin and Caserta walking toward her dressing room tent.^[23] By most accounts, Woodstock was not a happy affair for Joplin.^[3]^[6]^[7]

Faced with a ten hour wait after arriving at the backstage area, she shot heroin^[6]^[7] with Caserta and was drinking alcohol, so by the time she hit the stage, she was "three sheets to the wind."^[3] On stage her voice became slightly hoarse and wheezy and she found it hard to dance. Throughout her performance she frequently spoke to the crowd. She pulled through, however, and the audience was so pleased they cheered her on for an encore, to which she replied and sang Ball and Chain. Her performances of Kozmic Blues and Work Me, Lord at Woodstock are notable, though her voice breaks while she sings.

Joplin was ultimately unhappy with her performance and blamed Caserta. Her singing was not included in the documentary film or the soundtrack, Woodstock: Music from the Original Soundtrack and More, although the 25th anniversary director's cut of Woodstock includes her performance of "Work Me, Lord". Joplin however remained at Woodstock for the rest of the festival.

Laura Joplin said in an interview that Janis went straight home to Port Arthur following Woodstock. She was incredibly vibrant and happy after coming home and really loved the festival.

Madison Square Garden

In addition to Woodstock, Joplin also had problems at Madison Square Garden in 1969. Biographer Myra Friedman claimed to have witnessed a duet Joplin sang with Tina Turner during a concert by The Rolling Stones at the Garden on Thanksgiving Day. Friedman described Joplin during this performance as "so stoned, so out of control, that she could have been an institutionalized psychotic rent with mania."^[8]

During a Garden concert where she got solo billing on December 19, some observers believed she tried to incite the audience to riot.^[8] For part of this concert she was joined onstage by special guests Johnny Winter and Paul Butterfield.

Joplin told rock journalist David Dalton, the audience watched and listened to "every note [she sang] with 'Is she gonna make it?' in their eyes."^[15] In her interview with Dalton she added that she felt most comfortable performing at small, cheap venues in San Francisco that were associated with the counterculture. At the time of this June 1970 interview she already had performed in the Bay Area for what turned out to be the last time.

Sam Andrew, the lead guitarist who had left Big Brother with Joplin in December 1968 to form her back-up band, quit in late summer 1969 and returned to Big Brother without her. At the end of the year, the Kozmic Blues Band broke up. Their final gig with Joplin was at Madison Square Garden in New York City on the night of December 19–20, 1969.^[3]^[15]

Full Tilt Boogie Band

In February 1970, Joplin traveled to Brazil, where she stopped her drug and alcohol use. She was accompanied on vacation there by her friend Linda Gravenites, who had designed the singer's stage costumes from 1967 to 1969. Joplin was romanced by a fellow American tourist named David (George) Niehaus, who was traveling around the world. A Joplin biography written by her sister Laura said, "David was an upper-middle-class Cincinnati kid who had studied communications at Notre Dame. ... [and] had joined the Peace Corps after college and worked in a small village in Turkey. ... He tried law school, but when he met Janis he was taking time off."^[24] Niehaus and Joplin were photographed by the press at Rio Carnival in Rio de Janeiro.^[15] Gravenites also took color photographs of the two during their Brazilian vacation. According to Joplin biographer Ellis Amburn, in Gravenites' snapshots they "look like a carefree, happy, healthy young couple having a tremendously good time."^[6] Rolling Stone magazine interviewed Joplin during an international phone call, quoting her, "I'm going into the jungle with a big bear of a beatnik named David Niehaus. I finally remembered I don't have to be on stage twelve months a year. I've decided to go and dig some other jungles for a couple of weeks."^[6] Amburn added in 1992, "Janis was trying to kick heroin in Brazil, and one of the nicest things about George was that he wasn't into drugs."^[6]

Joplin began using heroin again when she returned to the United States. Her relationship with Niehaus soon ended because of his witnessing her shooting drugs at her new home in Larkspur, California, her romantic relationship with Peggy Caserta, who also was an intravenous addict, and her refusal to take some time off work and travel the world with him.^[6]^[25] Around this time she formed her new band, the Full Tilt Boogie Band.^[3]^[6]^[8] The band was composed mostly of young Canadian musicians and featured an organ, but no horn section. Joplin took a more active role in putting together the Full Tilt Boogie Band than she did with her prior group. She was quoted as saying, "It's my band. Finally it's my band!"^[3]

The Full Tilt Boogie Band began touring in May 1970. Joplin remained quite happy with her new group, which received mostly positive feedback from both her fans and the critics.^[3] Prior to beginning a summer tour with Full Tilt Boogie, she performed in a reunion with Big Brother at the Fillmore West in San Francisco on April 4, 1970. Recordings from this concert were included in an in-concert album released posthumously in 1972. She again appeared with Big Brother on April 12 at Winterland where she and Big Brother were reported to be in excellent form.^[6] It was around this time that Joplin began wearing multi-coloured feather boas in her hair. By the time she began touring with Full Tilt Boogie, Joplin told people she was drug-free, but her drinking increased.^[6]

Festival Express

From June 28 to July 4, 1970, Joplin and Full Tilt Boogie joined the all-star Festival Express train tour through Canada, performing alongside Buddy Guy, Rick Danko and The Band, Ten Years After, Grateful Dead, Delaney and Bonnie, Eric Andersen, and Ian & Sylvia.^[6] They played concerts in Toronto, Winnipeg and Calgary.^[6]^[15] Janis jammed with the other performers on the train and her performances on this tour are considered to be among her greatest.

Joplin convinced The Band, who originally did not want to perform, to come telling them it was going to be a great party.

Joplin headlined the festival on all three nights. At the last stop in Calgary, Janis took to the stage with Jerry Garcia while her band was tuning up. She told the audience how great the tour was and presented the organisers with a case of Tequila. She then burst into a two hour set, starting with Tell Mama. Throughout this performance, Janis went into several banters where she spoke about her failed love life. She finished the night with long versions pf Get It While You Can and Ball and Chain.

Footage of her performance of the song Tell Mama in Calgary became an MTV video in the early 1980s and the sound was included on the 1982 Farewell Song album. The audio of other Festival Express performances was included on that 1972 Joplin In Concert album. Video of the performances was included on the Festival Express DVD. Her full performances of Festival Express exist and have been released on bootlegs but all footage has yet to be released. In the Tell Mama video shown on MTV in the 1980s, Joplin wore a psychedelically colored loose-fitting costume and feathers in her hair. This was her standard stage costume in the spring and summer of 1970. She chose the new costumes after her friend and designer, Linda Gravenites (whom Joplin had praised in the May 1968 issue of Vogue), cut ties with Joplin shortly after their return from Brazil, due largely to Joplin's continued use of heroin.^[3]^[6]

During the Festival Express tour, Joplin was accompanied by Rolling Stone writer David Dalton, who later wrote several articles and a book on Joplin. She told Dalton:

I'm a victim of my own insides. There was a time when I wanted to know everything ... It used to make me very unhappy, all that feeling. I just didn't know what to do with it. But now I've learned to make that feeling work for me. I'm full of emotion and I want a release, and if you're on stage and if it's really working and you've got the audience with you, it's a oneness you feel.^[15]

Pearl

Main article: Pearl (album)

Among her last public appearances were two broadcasts of The Dick Cavett Show. In a June 25, 1970, appearance, she announced that she would attend her ten-year high-school class reunion. When asked if she had been popular in school, she admitted that when in high school, her schoolmates "laughed me out of class, out of town and out of the state."^[26] In the August 3, 1970, Cavett broadcast, Joplin referred to her upcoming performance at the Festival for Peace to be held at Shea Stadium in Queens, New York, on August 6, 1970.

Joplin attended the reunion on August 14, accompanied by fellow musician and friend Bob Neuwirth, road manager John Cooke, and her sister Laura, but it reportedly proved to be an unhappy experience for her.^[27] Joplin held a press conference in Port Arthur during her reunion visit. Interviewed by Rolling Stone journalist Chet Flippo, she was reported to wear enough jewelry for a "Babylonian whore."^[6] When asked by a reporter during the reunion if Joplin entertained at Thomas Jefferson High School when she was a student there, Joplin replied, "Only when I walked down the aisles."^[3]^[3]^[5] Joplin denigrated Port Arthur and the people who'd humiliated her a decade earlier in high school.^[3]

Joplin's last public performance, with the Full Tilt Boogie Band, took place on August 12, 1970, at the Harvard Stadium in Boston, Massachusetts. A positive review appeared on the front page of The Harvard Crimson newspaper despite the facts that Full Tilt Boogie performed with makeshift sound amplifiers after their regular equipment was stolen in Boston.^[8]

During late August, September and early October 1970, Joplin and her band rehearsed and recorded a new album in Los Angeles with producer Paul A. Rothchild, who had produced recordings for The Doors. Although Joplin died before all the tracks were fully completed, there was still enough usable material to compile a long-playing record.

The result of the sessions was the posthumously released Pearl (1971). It became the biggest selling album of her career^[21] and featured her biggest hit single, a cover of Kris Kristofferson's Me and Bobby McGee. Kristofferson had been Joplin's lover in the spring of 1970.^[28] The opening track Move Over was written by Joplin, reflecting the way that she felt men treated women in relationships. Also included was the social commentary of the a cappella Mercedes Benz, written by Joplin, Bob Neuwirth and beat poet Michael McClure. The track on the album features the first and only take that Joplin recorded. The track Buried Alive In The Blues, to which Joplin had been scheduled to add her vocals on the day she was found dead, was included as an instrumental. In 2003, Pearl was ranked No. 122 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.

Joplin checked into the Landmark Motor Hotel on August 24, 1970,^[29] which was located in Hollywood Heights near Sunset Sound Recorders^[6] where she began rehearsing and recording her album. During the sessions, Joplin continued a relationship with Seth Morgan, a 21-year-old UC Berkeley student, cocaine dealer and future novelist who had visited her new home in Larkspur, California several times in July and August.^[3]^[6]^[7] She and Morgan became engaged to be married in early September^[5] even though he visited Sunset Sound Recorders for just eight of the many sessions when Joplin worked, much to her dismay.^[6] Much later Morgan told biographer Myra Friedman that as a non-musician he felt excluded while in the studio.^[8] He stayed at Joplin's Larkspur home for days at a time while Joplin stayed alone at the Landmark,^[8] although several times she visited Larkspur to be with him and to check the progress of renovations she was having done on the house.

Peggy Caserta claimed in her 1973 book Going Down With Janis that she and Joplin had decided mutually in April 1970 to stay away from each other to avoid enabling each other's drug use.^[7] Caserta, a former Delta Air Lines stewardess^[7] and owner of a clothing boutique in the Haight Ashbury,^[7] said that by September 1970 she had resorted to smuggling marijuana throughout California^[7] and she checked into the Landmark that month because it attracted drug users.^[7] Joplin learned of Caserta's presence in Los Angeles and staying at the same hotel from a heroin dealer who made deliveries to the Landmark.^[7] Joplin begged Caserta for heroin^[7] and within a few days became a regular customer of that heroin dealer.^[7]

Joplin's manager Albert Grossman and his assistant Myra Friedman had taken part in an intervention with Joplin the previous winter.^[8] While they worked at Grossman's New York office during the Pearl sessions, they knew Joplin was staying at a Los Angeles hotel but did not know it attracted drug users and dealers.^[8]

On September 26, 1970, Joplin recorded vocals for Half Moon and Cry Baby.^[30] Then Full Tilt Boogie recorded the instrumental track for Buried Alive In The Blues.^[31] The session ended with Joplin, keyboardist Richard Bell (Canadian musician) and drummer Clark Pierson making a special one-minute recording as a birthday gift to John Lennon.^[32] Joplin was among several singers who had been contacted, or whose management had been contacted, by Yoko Ono with a request for a taped greeting for Lennon's 30th birthday,^[27] which was October 9. Joplin, Bell and Pierson chose the Dale Evans composition Happy Trails. Lennon told Dick Cavett on-camera the following year that Joplin's taped greeting arrived at his home after her death.^[27]

The last recording Joplin completed was on October 1, 1970 – Mercedes Benz. On Saturday, October 3, Joplin visited Sunset Sound Recorders^[6] to listen to the instrumental track for Nick Gravenites' song Buried Alive in the Blues, which the band had recorded one week earlier.^[33] She and Paul Rothchild agreed she would record the vocal the following day.^[24]^[15] At some point on Saturday, she learned by telephone that Seth Morgan was staying at her home and using her pool table with other women he had met that day.^[8] In the studio she was heard expressing anger about this and about Morgan having broken a promise to visit her the previous night,^[8] although she also expressed joy about the progress of the sessions.^[8] She and band member Ken Pearson went from the studio to Barney's Beanery^[34] for drinks. After midnight, Joplin drove him and a male fan who tagged along to the Landmark Motor Hotel.^[8]

Death

On Sunday October 4, 1970, producer Paul A. Rothchild became concerned when Joplin failed to show up at Sunset Sound Recorders for a recording session. Full Tilt Boogie's road manager, John Cooke, drove to the Landmark Hotel. He saw Joplin's psychedelically painted Porsche 356C Cabriolet in the parking lot. Upon entering her room, he found her dead on the floor beside her bed. The official cause of death was an overdose of heroin, possibly combined with the effects of alcohol.^[8]^[35] Cooke believes that Joplin had accidentally been given heroin that was much more potent than normal, as several of her dealer's other customers also overdosed that week.^[36] Peggy Caserta and Seth Morgan had both stood Joplin up the Friday immediately prior to her death, October 2, and according to the book Going Down With Janis, Joplin was saddened that neither of her friends visited her at the Landmark Motor Hotel as they had promised to.^[6]^[7]

Joplin was cremated in the Pierce Brothers Westwood Village Mortuary in Los Angeles; her ashes were scattered from a plane into the Pacific Ocean and along Stinson Beach. The only funeral service was a private affair held at Pierce Brothers and attended by Joplin's parents and maternal aunt.^[24]

Joplin's will funded $1,500 to throw a wake party in the event of her demise. The party, which took place October 26, 1970, at the Lion's Share, located in San Anselmo, California, was attended by Joplin's sister Laura, fiancé, Seth Morgan and close friends, including tattoo artist Lyle Tuttle, Bob Gordon, and road manager John Cooke.

Legacy

Joplin's Porsche 356C in "Summer of Love – Art of the Psychedelic Era" (Whitney Museum, New York).

Joplin's death in October 1970 at the age of 27 stunned her fans and shocked the music world, especially when coupled with the death just sixteen days earlier of another rock icon, Jimi Hendrix. Music historian Tom Moon wrote that Joplin had "a devastatingly original voice." Music columnist Jon Pareles of the New York Times wrote that Joplin as an artist was "overpowering and deeply vulnerable." Author Megan Terry claimed that Joplin was the female version of Elvis Presley in her ability to captivate an audience.^[37]

In 1973, a book about Joplin by her publicist Myra Friedman was excerpted in many newspapers. At the same time, Going Down With Janis by Peggy Caserta attracted a lot of attention with its opening line, which referred to her performing a sex act with Joplin while they were high on heroin in September 1970. Joplin's bandmate Sam Andrew would later describe Caserta as "halfway between a groupie and a friend."^[6] According to an early 1990s statement by a close friend of Caserta and Joplin, Caserta's book angered the Los Angeles heroin dealer she described (including the make and model of his car) in detail to her readers. According to Ellis Amburn, in 1973 a "carful of dope dealers" visited a Los Angeles lesbian bar Caserta had been frequenting since Joplin was alive.^[6] Amburn quoted Caserta's friend Kim Chappell, who was in the alley behind the bar: "I was stabbed because, when Peggy's book came out, her dealer, the same one who'd given Janis her last fix, didn't like it that he was referred to and was out to get Peggy. He couldn't find her, so he went for her lover. When they realized who I was, they felt that my death would also hit Peggy, and so they stabbed me."^[6] Despite being "stabbed three times in the chest, puncturing both lungs," Chappell eventually recovered.^[6]

According to biographers Alice Echols and Myra Friedman, Peggy Caserta was one of many friends of Joplin who did not become clean and sober until a very long time after the singer's death, while others died from overdoses.^[3]^[8] Caserta survived "a near-fatal OD in December 1995," wrote Echols.^[3] In 2000, Caserta appeared on-camera for a segment about Joplin on 20/20 (US television series).^[38]

Joplin, along with Grace Slick of the Jefferson Airplane, opened opportunities into the rock music business for future female singers.^[37] Stevie Nicks commented that after seeing Joplin perform, "I knew that a little bit of my destiny had changed. I would search to find that connection that I had seen between Janis and her audience. In a blink of an eye she changed my life."^[37]^[39]

Joplin's body art, with a wristlet and a small heart on her left breast, by the San Francisco tattoo artist Lyle Tuttle, was an early moment in the popular culture's acceptance of tattoos as art.^[40] Another trademark was her flamboyant hair styles, often including colored streaks and accessories such as scarves, beads and feathers. When in New York City, Joplin, often in the company of actor Michael Pollard, frequented Limbo on St. Marks Place. The performer, well known to the store's employees, made a practice of putting aside vintage and other one-of-a-kind garments she favored on stage and off.

Leonard Cohen's 1974 song "Chelsea Hotel #2" is about Joplin.^[41] Likewise, lyricist Robert Hunter has commented that Jerry Garcia's "Birdsong" from his first solo album, Garcia, is about Joplin and the end of her suffering through death.^[42]^[43] Mimi Farina's composition "In the Quiet Morning", most famously covered by Joan Baez on her 1972 Come from the Shadows album, was a tribute to Joplin.^[44] Another notable song sung by Joan Baez, Children Of The Eighties mentions Joplin.

At the 1976 Montreux Jazz Festival, Nina Simone, who Janis admired greatly, commented on Joplin:

You know I made thirty-five albums, they bootlegged seventy. Oh, everybody took a chunk of me. And yesterday I went to see Janis Joplin's film here. And what distressed me the most, and I started to write a song about it, but I decided you weren't worthy. Because I figured that most of you are here for the festival. Anyway the point is it pained me to see how hard she worked. Because she got hooked into a thing, and it wasn't on drugs. She got hooked into a feeling and she played to corpses.

Simone also included Joplin in her song Stars and opened this act with a rendition of Little Girl Blue.

The 1979 film The Rose was loosely based on Joplin's life. Originally titled Pearl, after Joplin's nickname, and the title of her last album, it was fictionalized after her family declined to allow the producers the rights to her story.^[45]^[46] Bette Midler earned a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance.

In 1988, the Janis Joplin Memorial, with an original bronze, multi-image sculpture of Joplin by Douglas Clark, was dedicated in Port Arthur, Texas.^[47]

In 1992, the first major biography of Janis in two decades, Love, Janis, authored by her younger sister, Laura Joplin, was published. In an interview, Laura stated that Janis enjoyed being on the Dick Cavett Show and that Janis while growing up in Texas had difficulties with some people at school, but not the entire school. Laura stated that Janis was really enthusiastic after performing at Woodstock in 1969.^[48]

Joplin was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995, and was given a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2005. In November 2009, the Hall of Fame and museum honored her as part of its annual American Music Masters Series.^[49] Among the artifacts at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Museum Exhibition are Joplin's scarf and necklaces, her 1965 Porsche 356 Cabriolet with psychedelically designed painting, and a sheet of LSD blotting paper designed by Robert Crumb, designer of the Cheap Thrills cover.^[50] She was the honoree at the Rock Hall's American Music Master concert and lecture series for 2009.^[51]

In the late 1990s, the musical play Love, Janis was created with input from Janis's younger sister Laura plus Big Brother guitarist Sam Andrew, with an aim to take it to Off Broadway. Opening in the summer of 2001 and scheduled for only a few weeks of performances, the show won acclaim and packed houses and was held over several times, the demanding role of the singing Janis attracting rock vocalists from relative unknowns to pop stars Laura Branigan and Beth Hart. A national tour followed.^{[citation needed]}

There have been many attempts at making a film about Joplin. On June 13, 2010, producer Wyck Godfrey said Amy Adams starred in director Fernando Meirelles' biographical drama,^[52] titled Janis Joplin: Get It While You Can.^[45] Previous attempts have included Piece Of My Heart, which was to star Renée Zellweger or Brittany Murphy; The Gospel According To Janis, with director Penelope Spheeris and starring either Zooey Deschanel or P!nk; and an untitled film thought to be an adaptation of Laura Joplin's Off-Broadway play about her sister, with the show's star, Laura Theodore, attached.^[45]

Influence

Joplin had a profound influence on many singers. Florence Welch of Florence and The Machine spoke of Joplin's impact on her own musical prowess in an interview for Why Music Matters in a commercial against piracy:

I learnt about Janis from an anthology of female blues singers. Janis was a fascinating character who bridged the gap between psychedelic blues and soul scenes. She was so vulnerable, self-conscious and full of suffering. She tore herself apart yet on stage she was totally different. She was so unrestrained, so free, so raw and she wasn't afraid to wail. Her connection with the audience was really important. It seems to me the suffering and intensity of her performance go hand in hand. There was always a sense of longing, of searching for something. I think she really sums up the idea that soul is about putting your pain into something beautiful.

^{[citation needed]}

Discography

Janis Joplin recorded four fully conceived studio albums in her career. Her first two albums were recorded with and fully credited to Big Brother and the Holding Company and the later two being solo albums. Previously unreleased studio and live material were added to these albums tracklistings and also released on the compilation Farewell Song in 1982. Joplins early performances from when she was a folk-blues singer have been released on several well received compilations through the years, one such compilation is the nine disc Blow All My Blues Away. In 2012 The Pearl Sessions were released giving an insight into her creative process.

As a popular psychedelic act of the late 1960's, many of Joplin's live concerts with Big Brother were professionally recorded and have been released on albums like Live at Winterland '68 and Live at the Carousel Ballroom 1968.

Though most of her concerts were recorded during her solo career, few have been officially released, resulting in being heavily bootlegged.^{[citation needed]}

Big Brother and the Holding Company

Title	Release date	Label	Notes
Big Brother and the Holding Company	1967	Mainstream Records
Big Brother and the Holding Company	1967?	Columbia	Contains 2 extra single tracks
Big Brother and the Holding Company	1967, CD 1999	Columbia Legacy CK66425	Contains 2 extra single tracks
Cheap Thrills	1968	Columbia	2x Multi-Platinum Recording Industry Association of America
Cheap Thrills	1968, CD 1999	Legacy CK65784	Contains 4 extra tracks
Live at Winterland '68	1998	Columbia Legacy	ASIN: B000007TSP
Live at the Carousel Ballroom 1968	2012	Legacy Recordings

Kozmic Blues Band

Title	Release date	Label	Notes
I Got Dem Ol' Kozmic Blues Again Mama!	1969	Columbia	Platinum RIAA
I Got Dem Ol' Kozmic Blues Again Mama!	1969, CD 1999	Legacy CK65785	Contains 3 extra tracks
Live in Amsterdam
The Woodstock Experience	2009	Legacy Recordings

Full Tilt Boogie Band

Title	Release date	Label	Notes
Pearl	1971	Columbia	posthumous, 4x Multi-Platinum RIAA
Pearl	1971, CD unknown date	Columbia CD64188
Live in Honolulu	1975
Wicked Woman (Janis Joplin album)	1976
Pearl	1971, CD 1999	Legacy CK65786	Contains 4 extra tracks
Pearl	1971, 2CD 2005	Legacy COL 515134 2	CD1 – 6 other extra tracks CD2 – full selection from The Festival Express Tour, 3 venues
The Pearl Sessions	2012	Legacy Recordings

Big Brother & the Holding Company / Full Tilt Boogie

Title	Release date	Label	Notes
In Concert	1972	Legacy CK65786	ASIN: B0000024Y7

Later collections

Title	Release date	Label	Notes
The Typewriter Tape 1964
Janis Joplin's Greatest Hits	1973	Columbia	ASIN B00000K2W1, 7x Multi-Platinum RIAA
Janis	1975	CBS	2 discs, Gold RIAA
Anthology	1980		2 discs
Farewell Song	1983	Columbia Records	ASIN: B000W44S8E
Cheaper Thrills	1984	Fan Club	ASIN: B000LYA9X8
Janis	1993	Columbia Legacy	3 discs – ASIN: B00000286P
18 Essential Songs	1995	Columbia Legacy	ASIN: B000002B1A, Gold RIAA
The Collection	1995	3 Discs	ASIN: B000BM6ATW
Live at Woodstock: August 19, 1969	1999
Box of Pearls	1999	Sony Legacy	5 Discs – ASIN: B0009YNSK6
Super Hits	2000	Sony	ASIN: B00004T1E6
Love, Janis	2001	Sony	ASIN: B00005EBIN
Essential Janis Joplin	2003	Sony	ASIN: B00007MB6Y
Very Best of Janis Joplin	2007	Import	ASIN: B000026A35

Filmography

Monterey Pop (1968)
Petulia (1968)
Janis Joplin Live in Frankfurt (1969)
Janis: The Way She Was (1974)
Comin’ Home (1988)
Woodstock - The Lost Performances (1991)
Woodstock: 3 Days of Peace & Music (Director’s Cut) (1994)
Festival Express (2003)
Nine Hundred Nights (2004)
The Dick Cavett Show: Rock Icons (2005) Shout
Rockin' at the Red Dog: The Dawn of Psychedelic Rock (2005)
This is Tom Jones (2007) 1969 appearance on TV show
Woodstock: 3 Days of Peace & Music (Director’s Cut) 40th Anniversary Edition (2009)
Janis Joplin with Big Brother: Ball and Chain (DVD) Charly (2009)

References

^ "100 Greatest Artists of All Time". Rolling Stone. http://www.rollingstone.com/music/lists/100-greatest-artists-of-all-time-19691231/janis-joplin-19691231. Retrieved June 13, 2010.
^ "100 Greatest Singers of All Time". Rolling Stone. http://www.rollingstone.com/music/lists/6027/32782/33169. Retrieved June 13, 2010.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g ^h ⁱ ^j ^k ^l ^m ⁿ ^o ^p ^q ^r ^s ^t ^u ^v ^w Echols, Alice (February 15, 2000). Scars of Sweet Paradise: The Life and Times of Janis Joplin. Henry Holt and Company. ISBN 0-8050-5394-8.
^ Don Haymes in http://www.adherents.com/people/pj/Janis_Joplin.html.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g Jacobson, Laurie (October 1984). Hollywood Heartbreak: The Tragic and Mysterious Deaths of Hollywood's Most Remarkable Legends. Simon & Schuster. ISBN 0-671-49998-X.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g ^h ⁱ ^j ^k ^l ^m ⁿ ^o ^p ^q ^r ^s ^t ^u ^v ^w ^x ^y ^z ^aa ^ab ^ac ^ad ^ae ^af ^ag Amburn, Ellis (October 1992). Pearl: The Obsessions and Passions of Janis Joplin : A Biography. Time Warner. ISBN 0-446-51640-6.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g ^h ⁱ ^j ^k ^l ^m ⁿ ^o ^p Caserta, Peggy (October 1980). Going Down With Janis. Dell Publishing. ISBN 0-440-13194-4.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g ^h ⁱ ^j ^k ^l ^m ⁿ ^o ^p ^q ^r ^s ^t ^u Friedman, Myra (September 15, 1992). Buried Alive: The Biography of Janis Joplin. Crown Publishing Group. ISBN 0-517-58650-9.
^ ^a ^b ^c Hendrickson, Paul (May 5, 1998). "Janis Joplin: A Cry Cutting Through Time". Washington Post. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/style/features/joplin.htm. Retrieved May 12, 2008.
^ "haight". Classic.forgotten-ny.com. http://classic.forgotten-ny.com/NEIGHBORHOODS/haight/haight.html. Retrieved 2012-04-13.
^ Paytress, Mark (March 1994). "Janis Joplin. Mark Paytress assesses Columbia's three-CD 'Janis' retrospective". Record Collector 175: 140–141
^ ^a ^b Janis Joplin interviewed on the Pop Chronicles (1969).
^ "Janis Joplin". wolfgangsvault.com. http://www.wolfgangsvault.com/janis-joplin/. Retrieved June 13, 2010.
^ "Janis Joplin: Rock and Blues Legend". majorlycool.com. http://www.majorlycool.com/item/janis. Retrieved June 13, 2010.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g ^h ⁱ ^j ^k ^l ^m Dalton, David (August 21, 1991). Piece Of My Heart. Da Capo Press. ISBN 0-306-80446-8.
^ Bromley, David G.; Shinn, Larry D. (1989), Krishna consciousness in the West, Bucknell University Press, p. 106, ISBN 978-0-8387-5144-2, http://books.google.com/books?id=F-EuD3M2QYoC&pg=PA106
^ Chryssides, George D.; Wilkins, Margaret Z. (2006), A reader in new religious movements, Continuum International Publishing Group, p. 213, ISBN 978-0-8264-6168-1, http://books.google.com/books?id=HgFlebSZKLcC&pg=PA213
^ Joplin, Laura (1992), "Love, Janis", University of Michigan (Villard Books): p. 182, ISBN 978-0-679-41605-0, http://books.google.com/books?id=Oj4IAQAAMAAJ
^ "Big Brother in Concert". bbhc.com. http://www.bbhc.com/bbbase.html. Retrieved June 13, 2010.
^ Adler, Renata (December 27, 1968). "Screen: Upbeat Musical; 'Monterey Pop' Views the Rock Scene". The New York Times: p. 44.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d Rosen, Craig (1996). The Billboard Book of Number One Albums: The Inside Story Behind Pop Music's Blockbuster Records. ISBN 0-8230-7586-9.
^ "Big Brother & The Holding Company: Charts & Awards". Allmusic. http://www.allmusic.com/artist/big-brother-the-holding-company-p3670/charts-awards/billboard-singles. Retrieved August 10, 2011.
^ Footage of Joplin and Caserta begins at 1:44 and ends at 2:21.
^ ^a ^b ^c Joplin, Laura (August 16, 2005). Love, Janis. HarperCollins. ISBN 0-06-075522-9.
^ by GlennGarvin - [miamiherald.com] (2007-11-06). "Janis Joplin News Articles - Kozmic Blues". Janisjoplin.net. http://www.janisjoplin.net/news/83/48/Bandmate-recalls-Janis-Joplin-s-big-appetite-in-TV-doc/. Retrieved 2011-12-30.
^ "Dick Cavett TV. Interview (1970)". The Dick Cavett Show. 1970-08-03.
^ ^a ^b ^c Miller, Danny (January 19, 2007). "Happy Birthday, Janis Joplin". Huffington Post. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/danny-miller/happy-birthday-janis-jop_b_39055.html. Retrieved August 23, 2008.
^ Anthony DeCurtis, Rolling Stone, September 30, 1999
^ Los Angeles Herald Examiner October 5, 1970, front page.
^ Log of Joplin's recording sessions with dates
^ Log of Joplin's recording sessions with dates
^ Log of Joplin's recording sessions with dates
^ Log of Joplin's recording sessions with dates
^ "The Overdose Death of Janis Joplin". Findadeath.com. http://www.findadeath.com/Deceased/j/Janis%20%20Joplin/janis_joplin.htm. Retrieved 2011-12-30.
^ Richardson, Derk (April/May 1986). "Books in Brief". Mother Jones.
^ Cooke, John Byrne. Janis Joplin; A Performance Diary 1966–1970. Acid Test. p. 126. ISBN 1-888358-11-4.
^ ^a ^b ^c ""Joplin's Shooting Star" 1966–1970". http://www.pophistorydig.com/?tag=janis-joplins-death. Retrieved December 13, 2010.
^ 20/20 segment titled "Downtown" originally broadcast on the ABC network on January 13, 2000
^ "Reflections." JanisJoplin.net. Accessed November 13, 2008
^ Acord, Deb (November 10, 2006). "Who knew: Mommy has a tattoo". Portland Press Herald.
^ "Leonard Cohen on BBC Radio". webheights.net. http://www.webheights.net/speakingcohen/bbctrans.htm.
^ AllMusic.com
^ Box of Rain: Lyrics 1965–1993 by Robert Hunter, Penguin Books, 1993
^ Performed by Joan Baez in her 1972 album Come from the Shadows. Baez wrote the song Blessed Are..., from her 1971 album of the same name, as a tribute to Joplin.
^ ^a ^b ^c Elan, Priya. "Is the Janis Joplin biopic finally going to be filmed? Don't hold your breath", The Guardian, August 7, 2010. WebCitation archive.
^ Maltin, Leonard (September 24, 2002). Leonard Maltin's 2003 Movie And Video Guide. Plume. ISBN 0-452-28329-9.
^ Applebome, Peter (January 21, 1988). "PORT ARTHUR JOURNAL; Town Forgives the Past And Honors Janis Joplin". New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/1988/01/21/us/port-arthur-journal-town-forgives-the-past-and-honors-janis-joplin.html.
^ James, Gary (1992). "Gary James' Interview With Janis Joplin's Sister Laura Joplin". http://www.classicbands.com/LauraJoplinInterview.html. Retrieved September 13, 2010.
^ Cleveland Scene, August 11, 2009
^ "Janis Joplin". Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Archived from the original on May 9, 2008. http://web.archive.org/web/20080509054345/http://www.rockhall.com/exhibitfeatured/janis-joplin/. Retrieved May 12, 2008.
^ "Rock Hall to honor Janis Joplin in American Music Masters series". Cleveland.com. http://www.cleveland.com/music/index.ssf/2009/08/rock_hall_to_honor_janis_jopli.html. Retrieved September 20, 2009.
^ Yamato, Jen. "Exclusive: 'Eclipse' Producer Wyck Godfrey on 3D, 'Breaking Dawn,' and More", FearNet.com, June 13, 2010. WebCitation archive.

External links

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Janis Joplin

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v t e Janis Joplin

Studio albums	Big Brother & the Holding Company Cheap Thrills I Got Dem Ol' Kozmic Blues Again Mama! Pearl

Live albums	In Concert Live at Winterland '68 The Woodstock Experience Live at the Carousel Ballroom 1968

Bootleg albums	The Typewriter Tape

Compilations	Farewell Song Janis (1975 album) Janis (1993 album) 18 Essential Songs Janis Joplin's Greatest Hits Love, Janis The Lost Tapes' Move Over!

Songs	"Ball 'n' Chain" "Careless Love" "Cry Baby" "Flower In The Sun" "Hesitation Blues" "Kozmic Blues" "Mary Jane" "Me and Bobby McGee" "Mercedes Benz" "Move Over" "Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out" "Piece of My Heart" "See See Rider" "Silver Threads and Golden Needles" "Summertime" "To Love Somebody" "Trouble in Mind" "What Good Can Drinkin' Do" "Work Me, Lord"

Related articles	Big Brother and The Holding Company Full Tilt Boogie Band Sam Andrew Jorma Kaukonen Goldy McJohn Gabriel Mekler Michael Monarch Festival Express

Book:Janis Joplin

v t e Woodstock festival

Founders	Michael Lang John P. Roberts Joel Rosenman Artie Kornfeld

August 15, 1969	Richie Havens Sweetwater Bert Sommer Ravi Shankar Tim Hardin Melanie Safka Arlo Guthrie Joan Baez

August 16, 1969	Quill Country Joe McDonald John Sebastian Carlos Santana Keef Hartley The Incredible String Band Canned Heat Mountain Grateful Dead Creedence Clearwater Revival

August 17, 1969 August 18, 1969	Janis Joplin Sly & The Family Stone The Who Jefferson Airplane The Grease Band Joe Cocker Country Joe and the Fish Ten Years After The Band Blood, Sweat & Tears Johnny and Edgar Winter Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young Paul Butterfield Blues Band Sha Na Na Jimi Hendrix

Related	Max Yasgur List of performances and events Taking Woodstock Woodstock (film)

Persondata
Name	Joplin, Janis
Alternative names	Joplin, Janis Lyn
Short description	American musician
Date of birth	January 19, 1943
Place of birth	Port Arthur, Texas, United States
Date of death	October 4, 1970
Place of death	Los Angeles, California, United States

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Janis Joplin

Janis Lyn Joplin

Janis Joplin

Janis Joplin

Janis Joplin

Janis Joplin

Janis Joplin

Biography

Janis Joplin

Early life: 1943–1961

Singing career: 1962-1965

Big Brother and the Holding Company: 1966–1968

Monterey and breakthrough

Cheap Thrills

Solo career: 1969–1970

Kozmic Blues Band

I Got Dem Ol' Kozmic Blues Again Mama!

Woodstock

Madison Square Garden

Full Tilt Boogie Band

Festival Express

Pearl

Death

Legacy

Influence

Discography

Filmography

References

Further reading

External links