April 29th will mark the 10th anniversary of the passing of one of my most ecentric and eclectic friends I ever made in the city of Los Angeles and that friend was the world famous supposedly accused ‘drug dealer‘ and songwriter Harry Perzigian – ‘world famous’ for all the wrong reasons by both Carroll O’Connor and his substance abuse addled son, Hugh O’Connor, of whom Harry was falsely accused of being a accomplice in the death of, with the public little knowing that Hugh was a drug dealer on the side himself.
I always tell people who keep badgering me to this day about why I was friends with a person of such ilk and ill respute when I’m such a non believer in experimenting with substances myself (back in 1992, I even lived amongst heroin users in Ocean Beach, California and had not ventured to partake in their addiction- I even lost a good friend and former roommate down there who overdosed on shooting up black tar). I guess I can chalk it up to having a desire to be constanly surrounded by creative people no matter how far out of their heads they seem to travel. Also what Harry and I had in common was that we also both dated or had troubled relationships with porn actresses.
I’d like to go over a few things I never got around to saying in my previous blog entries in the afterlife series of Harry Perzigian:
Harry, during his life had many dalliances with 5150s that landed him in the hospital. In the couple of years before he took the plunge over the edge, me and his then girlfriend, Melinda, along with his sisters and brother had to sign him out of Santa Monica’s St. John Hospital. Upon release, he may have joked with the hospital staff about his forced 72 hour holds, but as soon as we got him home in Brentwood, his somewhat pleasant demeanor would take on a difficult dark side as it was apparrent he was ungrateful in our efforts to give him whatever help he needed when he went off on these benders – to be shortly followed by interrogations and thrashings of our ‘worthless‘ lives to find out who the culprit was on who ratted him out to 911. The motto at this time of Harry’s life was ‘ I do this every fucking year, and I do it because I’m looking for new ways to spark my creativity – IT’S WHAT EVERY ARTIST DOES!! so none of you EVER fucking call the cops again or I’ll never speak to ANY OF you again!!‘ GOT IT??
However none of us ever fessed up on who dialed 911. One such 5150 incident had me quit whatever I was doing in Anaheim at a WonderCon to rush by his girlfriend’s side. It was a 2 plus hour trip via LA Metro from Disneyland to Brentwood. Not a fun way to spend a Sunday afternoon.
Ten years have passed. Life is better for me. I have more money in the bank than Harry ever did when he passed. I have a more awesome stereo system than Harry had set up in his living room. I’ve been steadily employed at the same job for eight years. I have a pension and money in a 401K to leave to my nieces in case I get a emergency call to astral plane over to the other side myself. And my doctor visit co-pays are only 10 bucks. I have not been in touch with any of Harry’s fellow family members or friends in the months leading after Harry’s passing but I do hear from an ex-girlfriend of Harry’s from time to time, as well as his daughter out in Australia- and I’ve even gotten some inquiries from friends he’s lost touch with over the years such as this old bandmate of his by the name of Aaron:
Hi Cary. I was in a band with John Purdell and Harry Perzigian a million years ago. I heard he passed, but can’t find any confirmation or details. If you can, would you let me know the skinny by email (I don’t really check Facebook). Thanks.
Hey Arron,
Thanks for contacting me via facebook. For a brief period I was Harry’s roommate in his Brentwood condo in 2009 between transitioning from one place in Van Nuys to another in Sherman Oaks, but since his parrot Duncan was bought in Van Nuys around the corner from my place, he kept in contact with me and let me take care of it while he would take off on trips, so he entrusted me with a key to his place. Anyway in his late fifties he got into a real mess with alcohol and methadone and I found him one Friday afternoon going into a coma. He really did some internal damage to himself and he was pulled off life support on April 29 2014.
But other than that, not much else. I’m happy to hear that the incessant trolling has died down to a dull roar, but I’m unhappy, that more than 90% of people who come to read this blog read nothing but what I have to say on the whole Harry Perzigian/Hugh O’Connor/Carroll O’Connor triumvirate of tragedy rather than the current cornucopia of beneficial posts about donations I make to The Hero Initiative – a organization dedicated to the well being and health of comic book writers and artists for every Free Comic Book Day, my recent involvement with the WGA/SAG-AFTRA strikes, the progressive rock album reviews or what I have to say about the entertainment industry. I rather I have people read that stuff. I don’t understand the logic of why people would want to read the same things over and over and over again to ad nauseam. THAT’S WHY I DECIDED that all these blog entries are going away DISNEY VAULT style for a while by the end of this year (with the exception of this one – I’ll leave this one up for a while longer), so I can concentrate on building this blog to be a creative receptacle for my upcoming comic strip shared adventure universe with the working title of “EarthMasters“.
I feel the original intent of what I make this blog to has been abandoned – like this way this poor piano is feeling below. The only boost this blog get these days is when I announce the announcement that a new blog has been posted to all my FB gals and pals – WHENEVER it has something to do with entertainment labor unrest. They are the only new entries that are racking up the stats.
Where all good Harry Perzigian’s pianos go to die. Homeless and panhandling for much needed spare parts and a tune up.
Here’s another thing I’d like to get off my chest concerning that day I stumbled upon him in a coma. It was the fault of the guy who moved in after me for the reason why Harry slipped into a coma. Randy called me on a Friday mid-morning telling me he had enough of Harry’s destructive shenanigans around the house (and let alone, Randy and Harry taking a sledgehammer to this beautiful out of tune baby grand piano in the living room – and it was that same piano that ex-Toto singer Bobby Kimball and Harry wrote songs for Bobby’s solo album Rise Up. Pieces were just left to linquish in the living room) such as falling out of his bed resulting in landing with heavy thuds on the floor, smashing guitars, and letting his parrot Duncan loose to take shits in places inimaginable. The condo was a fucking wreck and Randy wasn’t having it anymore. So he calls me up and tells me to take care of it or Harry’s not to going to live. I told him to call a goddamn ambulance, but Randy flat outs refuses and heads out to his girlfriend’s place in Universal City. Harry’s condo is an fucking hour’s bus ride from Casa de la Coatney, maybe more – and I’ve got to switch over to a Santa Monica area bus whenever I get to the Angelano Hotel (legendary landmark for a lot of Hollywood elitists and a great place to take a dive, if you ever get the urge to jump to your death when you run out of sleeping pills – since the place is in the shape of a giant pillbox) to get to Barrington Avenue. That bus line has long since been discontinued and that would’ve taken me an extra 20 minute walk if the bus line didn’t exist then.
One thing I didn’t confess to, when I reached Harry’s apartment and I saw how ill responsive he was and barely breathing, my first instinct reaction was NOT TO TOUCH HIM WITHOUT ANY KIND OF PROTECTIVE GEAR. I told him, even if he couldn’t hear me ‘I’ll be right back‘ and I walked out and went immediately to the nearest CVS to buy protective rubber gloves (because I was really fearful I was going to catch some serious bacterial blowback) and some electrolytes in some vain hope to get him speaking coherently again. When I got back and see it wasn’t working, then I had no choice but to call 911. It just fumes me to this day that Randy could not take the reins on this and unloaded the responsibilty on to me. And this freaking clown, who was constantly broke and had jammed Harry out of thousands of dollars to start in a shitty investment to start up a weed farm got to reap the spoils – Harry’s sister ended up signing over the condo to him. The first thing this jerk-off did the day one after HARRY died was take down Harry’s 65 plus inch TV off the wall and hook it up in his room and said nonchalantly to me as he was heaving it to his bedroom ‘well, time for me to upgrade‘. Fucking cocksucker.
The only things I took of Harry’s was a coffee maker and a Crosby multi-purpose record player, so I could make copies of Harry’s cassette demos onto compact disc (plus I borrowed a few albums from Harry’s LP collection that I personally loved and made copies of too, but I put those back- and not sold them off like some disgruntled family member once accused me of doing) of which some got passed out to those who went to Harry’s memorial service. Both of those items were granted to me by Melinda since she was the one who originally bought them for Harry.
And speaking of those demos – three of the songs that I downloaded onto that disc were co-written by legendary King Crimson and Asia bassist John Wetton, along with Curt Cuomo (who went on to write for Kiss). They were “Sex, Power and Money“, “Back in Your Lovin’ Arms” and “I Can’t Tell You Why“. A fourth song “Every Inch of The Way” may have started with Harry’s involvement, but the co-writing credit eventually went to Curt’s wife, Lori. Those songs were a bit of a surprise to some, as some people didn’t know that these three teamed up to write these songs. Guitars were supplied by Brian Young, whom I’ve also known for years, having worked with his wife Nancy at a mortage lending company in Woodland Hills. Brian went on to work for David Lee Roth after his was discovered by Roth himself playing in a Van Halen tribute band. Why some of these songs didn’t get to see the light of the day could’ve been attributed to Harry’s legal problems shortly after these songs were demoed during the early 1990s.
Another hypothetical reason on why these songs were never publicily released as they were written when Wetton was on a very long sabbatical from Asia ( During Wetton’s absence, Asia keyboard player Geoff Downes hooked up with another singer- songwriter by the name of John Payne and they went on to release 9 studio albums under the Asia banner, including 2 albums of working demos, an instrumental album and re-recorded versions of Wetton and Downes Asia collaborations as sung by Payne while Wetton was full time devoting himself to a solo career. John came to LA to recruit a few Los Angeles area songwriters including actor/musician David Cassidy and his wife Sue Shifrin in addition to Harry and Curt to build up a inventory. Also the possibility could have existed that in case there was going to be a follow up to Asia’s 1990 half ass, half reunion in the bag “Now and Then” album- which featured contributions from other writers other than the band member themselves. Only David and Sue’s songs ever made the cut of appearing on any of John’s actual solo albums, after their debut premiere on that Asia album with “Prayin’ For A Miracle”. One was “Second Best” on 2001’s “Sinister”, and Sue co-wrote a song with John on “Nothing’s Going To Stand In Our Way” for John’s follow up effort, 2002’s Rock of Faith. It wasn’t until 2009, when Downes and Wetton were reuniting as a duo called Icon, did Curt and Harry’s song, “Sex, Power and Money” made an appearance on their third album.
To this day, I have not been able to locate a copy of this album, and when I gave up the search, I did not find out that this song co-written by Harry was on the list of tracks until after he had passed. I don’t think he EVEN knew of its’ existence while he was alive. As I mentioned in a previous blog, I’m sure if Harry knew of this album’s release five years prior to his passing, it would’ve inspired confidence in him to continue on. Before Harry shifted off the mortal coil, he was trying to get together with this producer, a old time associate of his whose name I’ve long forgotten, who had worked with Kansas and their former lead singer Steve Walsh on his only two solo albums. Harry wanted to form a folk ballad duo with his niece, so he recorded a few demos including one, called “Melinda” (natch- you gotta have the girlfriend song) that was recorded at Casa de la Coatney’s roommate’s bedroom using Protools. I tried to add some Mike Pinder/Moody Blues (R.I.P. at the age of 83) type of Mellotron flute sound to it, but Harry wasn’t having it. He drove the demos to the producer’s house up in Santa Clarita and I think HE wasn’t having any of it. And that was the beginning of the end for Harry’s will to forge on.
Or maybe Harry did know and he never told me of it. During the time that I stayed with him, he could’ve known about it and brought out that “Back In Your Lovin’ Arms Again” cassette to play for me on his living room stereo (of which I’ve since modeled mine after) to maybe remind himself that perhaps this was the better song. He let me listen to up to a minute of it before taking it out and putting it back into the case and I didn’t to hear the entire version until after he passed.
I was dumbstruck when he told me that he had co-written a song with John Wetton, I mean give credit where credit’s due – Harry also wrote songs paired up with Bobby Kimball, Fiona Apple, Quiet Riot, Vixen, and Pretty Boy Floyd – but John Wetton?? Why, that’s prog rock royalty!!
Then, come to think of it, – this was 2009. This Icon 3 album was released during the time I lived with him. It must have showed up in his royalties statements that he still received from Warner Chappell Music Publishing at some point.
Cut to the Covid years when this letter somehow snuck into my Facebook Messenger spam folder and I didn’t get around to see for almost three years after it was sent (long after COVID was nipped in the bag). I suppose that what’s I deserve for reaching the friend limit of 5000 and turning down requests left and right.
One such request landed in said folder was left unchecked by a Rick Nelson.
Hi Cary… tried to do a friend request but you’re all filled up. 
I was a very close friend of John Wetton since about ’92 and I maintain his archive (along with Asia) QEDG Management. Do you have the demos of Harry Perzigian / Wetton ? I’d love to add them to archive… After JW died, I received some unfinished JW stuff from Jim Peterik and Jim Vallance… it would be nice to archive the demos from Harry,
separate note: do you have any means of tracking down the Asia Alpha multitracks? We recently were trying to find them for a potential remix project… but last I heard they were missing 2 reels and things went silent…
I only ask as I see you’re with Universal Anyway… hope you’re doing okay with the Covid BS…. have had enuf!
Pic above: Back cover to homemade CD I made of Harry’s demos that were sent to family and friends at his memorial. Cover was designed by my then teen-age niece, Olivia based on a photo of a painting that was hanging on Harry’s wall.
Nonetheless – I would be interested in hearing those backing tracks myself. If I remember my first Asia concert in 1982 in support of their debut album, they did perform “Midnight Sun” and “The Smile Has Left Your Eyes” off of Alpha– I would love to have heard the demos of both songs when they were first in development. I remember the latter simply being a ballad worked out between Wetton and Downes on stage for that tour – instead of the symphonic rock out version that eventually made the cut on “Alpha“.
Once I read a news report through Prog Magazine or some other online source that this project was legit and I read the extensive track listing, I finally got around to answering Rick’s message:
COATNEY: Hey Rick, I saw you located two of the three demos that I have in my possession of John Wetton’s collaboration with Harry Perzigian that are listed on one of the bonus discs for your forthcoming 8 disc collection on John Wetton, Two songs “Back in Your Loving Arms Again” and “Sex, Power, Money” – the latter of which I heard managed to turn up on the Wetton/Downes Icon III album – the only album of the three albums I cannot find for some reason (and someone who owns a copy told me that Harry’s name was listed under special thanks). Too bad, he never lived to know that the song actually found a home. I don’t know what the title of the third song is, but if I harbor a guess, you probably got in contact with Curtis Cuomo, who was Harry’s writing partner on some of those songs. I think Harry told me Curtis co-wrote those songs with him and Wetton. You might want to try to hunt him down and see if he has the master demos? He used to run a studio in Woodland Hills called Woodland Ranch which may or may not be still operational. As far as we know, he may be siting on other tracks. Anyway, good luck with this project and I’ll probably be ordering one for myself. I worked in the country music section @ Universal Music, going back ten years now, so I wouldn’t have had access to those files – BUT I can tell you, THAT the one day when the XXX album was released, we had a few promo copies to give away – but ONLY if you could answer 5 correct questions out of 7 in a ASIA trivia contest – and I was the one who submitted in the questions. Only 1 employee got all the answers correct and got a copy of the album. Since I already had the album, I won a copy of a Steven Wilson dvd or something instead.
NELSON: ‘Every Inch of The Way’ is the other track with Lori Cuomo.
COATNEY: Yeah, that sounds right. But anyway, these demos were of poor quality and they were burned unto disc from a warp sounding cassette. I only made copies for people who attended Harry’s memorial service. The demo version I have of “Money, Sex and Power” doesn’t even have John Wetton singing on it in its’ rough raw stage. Could’ve been Harry himself singing it for all I know.
NELSON: I located it in John’s cassette collection eventually. I fixed them up as best as possible, speed corrected, and mastered so they sound good and all should be properly credited.
COATNEY: Thanks. And if I find out any more info on anything that could help you with future collections, I’ll keep you appraised.
Then the Crosby machine crapped out on me several months later (it tried to eat a Van Der Graff Generator CD that I had just bought and I wasn’t having it) so I took a hammer to that infernal wretched machine and smashed it to bits, just to salvage the CD because that brand new CD was part of a $45 four disc set complete with a DVD 5.1 mix. I admit it was a hypocritical move on my part, but those Crosby units? They’re not built to last.
Regardless, I wished Rick luck with the project, I didn’t actually think he could pull it off, but sure enough it got solicited by Burning Shed records out in the UK and my local record store, Freakbeat Records here in Sherman Oaks said that the product was available for order. So to save cost on shipping, I elected the local record store choice.
‘But it’s going to cost you!”, Freakbeat staff warned me. Yeah, it did – nearly $120 big ones. But upon first examination of the product, it certainly was worth it. Look at the pic below, I still keep the cellophane wrapping on the slipcase that the book and the eight discs come in.
Big set, big money. This set includes the six solo albums that John Wetton released throughout his lifetime. 1980’s Caught in The Crossfire was released shortly after U.K disbanded and before Asia was formed. It was a album I used to have back in high school and hadn’t heard it since I left Parsippany, NJ. 1994 saw the release of Battle Lines which was recorded in Canoga Park after he completed his personal star search for songs and demos. 1997’s ArkAngel was aided and abetted by Steve Hackett and Robert Fripp with some of the material premiering during the only time I ever saw John Wetton perform solo (when IQ’s Martin Orford was his personal right hand keyboardist) at the Los Angeles Prog Fest. 2001’s Welcome To Heaven (a.k.a. Sinister through the Giant Electric Pea label saw Martin Orford assume the part time roles of both keyboardist and record label distributor with other special guest stars sprinkled throughout from Orford’s band mates at Jadis. Member of Arena and Threshold (Clive Nolan, John Mitchell and Karl Groom) were largely responsible for the release of 2003’s Rock of Ages and lastly, ex-band members of progressive rock bands past: Geoff Downes, Steve Hackett, Eddie Jobson (Happy 69th Eddie!), Tony Kaye, Steve Morse all under the guidence of Yes’ Billy Sherwood helped out a great deal to set free 2011’s Raised in Captivity out of captivity. All the solo albums are now brilliantly remastered by Maor Appelbaum in the fine tuning and disc cutting department – which also includes bonus tracks tacked on to the end of the original albums. Every disc is like a repolished gem with something brand new to discover.
The most comprehensive package that covers every facet of John’s solo works and stuff you never knew existed. Listening through the two rarities disc in addition to the six solo albums , you’ll discover the man had so many moving parts going on with band ideas in addition to his usual King Crimson, Uriah Heep, Asia and Family appearances, including collaborations with Greg Lake and Mike Oldfield (Wings Of An Angel), Ringo Starr (Real World – billed as John and Ringo), Steve Hackett and Rick Nelson – the man who produced this glorious package (AD 2023), Giorgio Moroder on three songs (Winner Takes It All, Mind Over Matter and Gypsy Soul) and a real knock out version of The Boys From Diamond City – which also was recorded by future singer/collaborator John Payne for use on one of the Archiva albums.
Tracks 8, 9, and 11 are co-written by Harry Perzigian, more than thirty years in the making and finally released to the general public for the first time.
Above: Credits listed in the book and a mention of Harry Perzigian in the liner notes.
And just to point out, the book itself is a fascinating read with stories behind the making of each album and some mementos and quotes from those involved in the making of the original recordings.
Hardly surprising that my long time FB friend Remastering Chief of many progressive rock projects, Maor Appelbaum was involved in the cutting room floor of this massive project.
I took time to pick Maor’s brain of what this project’s duties entailed.
COATNEY: Maor – I heard from Rick Nelson and he told me you two got involved with the John Wetton box set because you worked on a video project for a John Wetton cover band from New Jersey? Can you confirm that? Were you the one who made the decisions on where to place the bonus tracks? I only ask because I was curious on the addition of a track recorded in 1991 called “Every Inch of The Way” tacked on to the end of John’s first solo record “Caught in the Crossfire” which was originally recorded in 1980. Was that just an oversight – or was that the only room where you could place it?. Did you do any tweaks on the original recordings? Anything you can offer up for a blog I’m going to post on Monday commemorating the 10th anniversary of my friend Harry’s passing who co-wrote three of the songs on this set? Thanks.
MAOR: I had been working on this project a long time ago when the management had reached out to me about it. I worked with YES at that time. Mastered 6 albums for them ( 1 studio Heaven and Earth and 5 live albums ) I personally didn’t have any say or made any of the song sequences, titles, cuts, edits on the material coming in besides the tones that I could work on and the fade in / fade out ( mostly was already faded ) so I just did what I was told by the label that was releasing it (Primary Purpose Records – manufactuer, Cherry Red Records – distributor).
So just so you know: this project took a long time to finish and some things were changed kind of in the later stages. I only got to connect with Rick later on. Originally I was working directly with the management and then later on with the label.
Rick Nelson collaborates: Yeah Maor is a good guy. We worked pretty closely on it… and to further our working relationship he did me a favor too and mastered a song I recorded as a promo to the box set… “Forever“
Rick is referring to a John Wetton tribute band hailing from Red Bank, New Jersey who specializes in cover versions throughout John Wetton’s career. They recently got together to record this very little heard unreleased version of ‘Forever‘ written by John Wetton and Sue Shifrin. The production is pretty good and it’s a amiable effort. I can hardly believe that this video was shot in a production facility in Whippany, New Jersey of all place. As I noted to Rick, my current roommate graduated from Whippany Park High School and I spent most of my childhood in neighboring Parsippany, which is a little up the road on Route 287 leading up to The Jersey City Reservoir. Fingers crossed that they get around to covering Harry’s “Back in Your Loving Arms” someday. For more info, you can check the band’s website here.
In the meanwhile, word just came out that Geoff Downes is taking out a new incarnation of Asia out on the road for a east coast American tour with new members John Mitchell on guitar, Virgil Donati on drums and bassist/vocalist Harry Whitley – who made his debut at a John Wetton An Extraordinary Life tribute show. Harry Whitley has the full blessing of John’s widow Lisa Wetton, according to a recently issued press release through Geoff Downes’ site proclaiming that if you close your eyes, you could hardly tell the difference between John and Harry. Lisa has revealed that Wetton would have “have endorsed” the recently announced new-look Asia line-up and upcoming North American tour as “he wanted the music to live on“, and adding “the current lineup gives the music a fresh energy which I haven’t experienced since John was alive.”
I don’t know if John would quote, unquote ‘endorse‘ a certain line-up, I had heard that he wasn’t really keen about John Payne replacing him as frontman, but it’s comforting to know that she’s being a good sport about it.
And on that note, I leave you all with information on acquiring this mega collective euphoric high I experienced over last year’s holidays:
To order The eight disc John Wetton – An Extraordinary Life boxset, check out Burningshed.com.
COMING UP NEXT IN ANOTHER WEEK OR SO: The first wave of Free Comic Book Day 2024.
PPGuru 