Fred Neil: 1936 to 2001
by Eliot Wilder

The Other Side of Fred Neil

Would you like to know a secret
Just between you and me
I don't know where I'm going next
I don't know where I'm gonna be
-From "The Other Side of This Life"

Seminal Greenwich Village folk singer Fred Neil, who died recently at age 64 of apparent cancer-related causes at his Florida home, was known almost as much for being a legendary recluse as he was for being a legendary songwriter. Although his classic tune "Everybody's Talkin'," covered by Harry Nilsson for the film "Midnight Cowboy," was a tremendous mainstream hit, Neil spent most of his life in obscurity – which only upraised the mystery that enveloped him.

"Fred was mysterious; his background was sketchy," Lovin' Spoonful's John Sebastian once wrote of Neil. Sebastian was only one among the many influenced by Neil. Others include the members of the original Jefferson Airplane, Stephen Stills, Richie Havens and even Bob Dylan. "He taught me a sizable chunk of what music was about," said David Crosby, "and even more about the whys and wherefores of being a musician."

With all these heavyweight supporters it seems nearly impossible to believe that Neil wouldn't have become better known. But none of the four albums he released in the late 1960s and early '70s ever troubled the charts, which may have precipitated his decision to withdraw from the public eye. "[His retreat] was rightfully deserved," said Jefferson Airplane's Paul Kantner. "He was treated rather brutally by the music business, and he was a gentle soul."

Unlike fellow folkie Tim Hardin, who burnt out in a blaze of drugs and self-destruction, Neil chose to quietly turn his back on the music industry. "Fred went in until the water was up to his neck," friend Michael Mann said, "and then he got out."

With a style that leaned as much on blues and jazz traditions as it did on folk and psychedelia and a voice that Sebastian called a "honey-laden baritone with the Southern lilt," mercurial Neil embodied all that was new and exciting about the thriving folk movement in the early '60s. "Fred was the real folk rock ... not the commercial version," Sebastian said.

Although Neil's idiosyncratic body of work is small and sporadic it is also quite distinctive. Thankfully, in recent years, many of his recordings have become available on CD. The recent double-disc set "The Many Sides of Fred Neil" compiles much of what has made him one of the definitive artists of his generation.

Still, his songs were made famous by other artists, including Roy Orbison's take on "Candy Man," the Jefferson Airplane's cover of "The Other Side of This Life" and Tim Buckley's version of "The Dolphins." The latter tune, with its transcendent melody, addressed Neil's deep-felt concerns for the mammals. According to friend Kathleen Brooks, "His main interest was with the Dolphin Project," a nonprofit dolphin-rescue organization Neil founded with marine biologist Richard O'Barry in 1970.

Treating both animals and people with respect and living a life of honesty and quiet dignity are what has made him an enduring character and also what impressed his peers the most. "He sort of showed how to be a dignified white boy playing music and not have to play black," Kantner said. "He was very cool just being Freddy."

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