It’s April 1999, and some of rock’s biggest and most respected names have banded together to record songs as part of a benefit album for one of American music’s more obscure figures. It’s an impressive line-up: Robert Plant, Tom Waits, Beck, Mark Lanegan and Greg Dulli. All are paying tribute to a man whose last meaningful music was made 30 years ago but whose legacy still burns bright.
But there’s another reason they are taking part in this homage. For the past three decades the man in question has been in declining physical and mental health, living on the streets or in care. Most recently he’s been holed up in a trailer in San Jose, California, surviving largely on a diet of anti-psychotic drugs.
