When the stranger on the train is Dylan’s pal

OH Lord, Won’t You Buy Me A Mercedes Benz.’ Even if you’ve never head of Janis Joplin, you will definitely know this line from one of her songs. She was a rock singer, who has been named as the 28th greatest singer of all time. But like so many rock icons, her career went from triumph to tragedy and she died of a heroin overdose in her hotel room joining the number of rock stars who chillingly died at 27.

I was watching a documentary on Janis the other night and suddenly my eye was drawn to a figure in the murky background. It was her personal manager Albert Grossman.

But let’s spool back a bit first. In 1981 I was flying to Cannes to the Midem Festival of music, a place where record companies, song publishers, merchandisers and hucksters from all quarters gathered to tell each other lies.

I was carrying 50 cassettes in a custom-made case and just as I ascended the steps to the plane, my swish case burst open dramatically and disgorged my 50 song demos all over the tarmac.

Flustered, I gathered up my cassettes and boarded the plane. I plonked myself in a seat beside a big bear of a man, in a lumberjack shirt. It looked like he was wearing three waistcoats and he was sporting a saddle bag, the precursor of the man bag. He had a craggy face and his hair was a grey mane that swept back over his forehead and ended in a loose ponytail.

When I gathered my composure I guessed he was going to the same festival as myself. I said to him: ‘You look like a very interesting man. Do you mind if I enquire what do you do?’

He responded: ‘My name is Albert Grossman and I have a studio and a label in Bearsville in upstate New York.’

We talked about my scattered demos and the festival, but it wasn’t until I reached my hotel and mentioned his name to a companion that I learned that my new friend, Albert, was a legend.

He famously managed Bob Dylan from 1962 to 1971, pictured above to the singer’s right, and is credited with inspiring the Sixties US folk music revival. He signed Janis Joplin after she crashed her way into the American consciousness at the Monterey Festival.

Janis was a charismatic rock singer and writer, with a penchant for the blues. Her voice could strip paint and she presented a hippyish demeanour, in keeping with the times.

Shortly after her breakthrough at Monterey, Janis left her band, Big Brother And The Holding Company and went solo. But unfortunately nobody was really wise to the deleterious effects of drugs, which were assumed to be an acceptable part of that counter-culture.

Having gone through her whiskey and weed phase, Janis eventually became a slave to heroin, albeit a fact which she kept hidden.

ALBERT failed to notice the seriousness of her addiction. He was too busy with a long list of clients, including Tod Rundgren, The Band, Peter Paul And Mary, Odetta and of course Bob Dylan.

The only thing Albert and Bob had in common is that they were both Jewish and their acrimonious parting was still reverberating in the legal system, long into the early 80s.

Albert was reputed to be a tough negotiator, whose technique was to stare at the other party, in complete silence, until they cracked and began to burble.

Albert Grossman died of a heart attack while flying on Concorde from New York in 1986. He was 59

PS: On the third night in Cannes I was burgled and the thief stole my remaining tapes and to this very day he may be playing these crazy songs by the unknown songwriter down in St Tropez and saying to himself, whoever he is, ‘this guy is a cool songwriter.’