He had emerged in New York City's avant-garde club scene in the 1990s as one of the most remarkable musical artists of his generation, acclaimed by audiences, critics, and fellow musicians alike. His first commercial recording, the four-song EP Live At Sin-é, was released in December 1993 on Columbia Records. The EP captured Buckley, accompanying himself on electric guitar, in a tiny coffeehouse in New York's East Village, the neighbourhood he'd made his home.
Buckley made his public singing début at a tribute concert for his father called "Greetings from Tim Buckley". The event, produced by show business veteran Hal Willner, was held at St. Ann's Church in Brooklyn on 26 April 1991.
By the time of the EP's release during the fall of 1993, Buckley had already entered the studio with Mick Grondahl (bass), Matt Johnson (drummer), and producer Andy Wallace and recorded seven original songs (including "Grace" and "Last Goodbye") and three covers (among them Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah", Benjamin Britten's "Corpus Christi Carol") that comprised his debut album Grace. Guitarist Michael Tighe became a permanent member of Jeff Buckley's ensemble and went on to co-write and perform on Grace's "So Real" just prior to the release of the album.
In early 1994, not long after Live At Sin-é appeared in stores, Jeff Buckley toured clubs, lounges, and coffeehouses in North America as a solo artist from January 15th to March 5th as well as in Europe from March 11th to 22th. Following extensive rehearsals in April to May of 1994, Buckley's "Peyote Radio Theatre Tour" found him on the road with his band from June 2nd to August 16th. His full-length full-band album, Grace, was released in the United States on August 23rd, 1994, the same day Buckley and band kicked off a European tour in Dublin, Ireland; the 1994 European Tour ran through September 22nd, with Buckley and band performing at the CMJ convention at New York's Supper Club on September 24. The group headed back into America's clublands for a Fall Tour lasting from October 19th until December 18th.
On New Year's Eve 1994-95, Buckley returned to Sin-é to perform a solo set; on New Year's Day, he read an original poem at the annual St. Mark's Church Marathon Poetry Reading. Two weeks later, he and his band were back in Europe for gigs in Dublin, Bristol, and London before launching an extensive tour of Japan, France, Germany, Italy, Holland, Belgium, and the United Kingdom which lasted from January 29th to March 5th. On April 13th 1995, it was announced that Jeff Buckley's Grace had earned him France's prestigious "Gran Prix International Du Disque -- Academie Charles CROS -- 1995"; an award given by a jury of producers, journalists, the president of France Culture, and music industry professionals, it had previously been given to Edith Piaf, Jacques Brel, Yves Montand, Georges Brassens, Bruce Springsteen, Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, and Joni Mitchell, among other musical luminaries. France also awarded Buckley a gold record certification for Grace.
From March 5th through April 20th, Buckley and his band rehearsed for an American spring tour with gigs running from April 22th until June 2nd. From June through August, Jeff and company toured the United Kingdom, France, Denmark, Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, and Switzerland. The band took off for Down Under to play six Australian shows between August 28th and September 6th, 1995. In November 1995, Buckley played two unannounced solo shows at Sin-é. He performed songs including the new "Woke Up In A Strange Place" on Vin Scelsa's "Idiot's Delight" show on WXRK-FM on December 17 and celebrated New Year's Eve 1995-96 with performances at New York's Mercury Lounge and Sin-é.
Jeff Buckley and his touring ensemble went back to Australia, where Grace had earned a gold record certification, for the "Hard Luck Tour," which ran from February 9th to March 1st of 1996. Drummer Matt Johnson left the group after the final Australian show. The posthumous album Mystery White Boy brings together some of the high points from Jeff's 1995-1996 live performances. The DVD/home video release Live In Chicago documents, in its entirety, Jeff's concert at The Cabaret Metro in Chicago on May 13th, 1995.
In May of '96, Jeff played four gigs as a bass player with Mind Science of the Mind, a side-project of Buckley's friend, Nathan Larson of Shudder To Think. In September Buckley played another unannounced solo gig at his old favorite haunt Sin-é. December of 1996 found Jeff Buckley embarking on his "phantom solo tour"; designed to experiment with new songs in a live setting (as in his Sin-é days), these unannounced solo gigs throughout the Northeast U.S. were played under a succession of aliases: the Crackrobats, Possessed By Elves, Father Demo, Smackrobiotic, the Halfspeeds, Crit Club, Topless America, Martha & the Nicotines, and A Puppet Show Named Julio.
At midnight on February 9th, 1997, Jeff Buckley debuted his new drummer, Parker Kindred, in a show at Arlene Grocery on New York's Lower East Side. He also played a couple of solo gigs in New York during the first months of 1997: a gig at the Daydream Cafe (featuring band members Mick Grondahl and Michael Tighe as "special guests") and a solo performance February 4th as part of the Knitting Factory's 10-Year Birthday Party.
Buckley and his band had recorded intermittently — with Tom Verlaine as producer — during Summer/Fall 1996 and early winter 1997 in New York and in February 1997 in Memphis. After the conclusion of those sessions, Jeff sent the band back to New York while, during March and April 1997, he remained in Memphis and continued to craft his work-in-progress, making various four-track home recordings of songs to present to his bandmates. Some of these were revisions of the songs recorded with Verlaine, some were brand new compositions, and some were surprising cover versions. The new lineup debuted Buckley's new songs at Barrister's in Memphis on February 12th and 13th. Beginning March 31st, Jeff began a series of regularly scheduled Monday night solo performances at Barrister's. His last show there was on Monday, May 26th, 1997.
Buckley passed away in a drowning accident in the Wolf River, a tributary of the Mississippi River, on May 29th, 1997. The night Buckley died, he was on his way to meet his band to begin three weeks of rehearsals for My Sweetheart, the Drunk; producer Andy Wallace, who'd helmed the boards on Grace, was to join them in Memphis in late June to record his new album.
In addition to his Columbia Records releases, Live At Sin-é and Grace, Jeff Buckley has appeared as a guest artist on several other recordings. He can be heard singing "Jolly Street," a track on the Jazz Passengers 1994 album In Love. He contributed tenor vocals to "Taipan" and "D. Popylepis," two recordings on John Zorn's Cobra Live At The Knitting Factory (1995). On Rebecca Moore's Admiral Charcoal's Song, Buckley plays electric six-string bass on "If You Please Me," "Outdoor Elevator," and "Needle Men" (on which he also plays drums). He both plays guitar and sings backup vocals on Brenda Kahn's "Faith Salons," a key track on her Destination Anywhere album (released 1996). Patti Smith's critically acclaimed Gone Again album features Buckley adding "voice" to the song "Beneath the Southern Cross" and "essrage" (a small fretless Indian stringed instrument) to "Fireflies." On Kerouac: Kicks Joy Darkness, a various artists' spoken word tribute to beat poet Jack Kerouac, Jeff Buckley performed on "Angel Mine"; Jeff plays guitar, sitar, and mouth sax (adding words at the poem's conclusion) on the track. Buckley can be heard reading Edgar Allan Poe's "Ulallume - A Ballad," on Closed on Account of Rabies: Poems and Tales of Edgar Allan Poe (disc 2: The Devil's Brew) (Poems & Tales by Edgar Allan Poe) on Mouth Almighty/Mercury Records. He sang "I Want Someone Badly" (Epic) for Shudder To Think's soundtrack to First Love, Last Rites. Sandy Bell, a friend of Buckley's during his L.A. days, released the resurrected track "Hollywould" in 2000, which she co-wrote and recorded with Buckley.
An ardent enthusiast for a myriad of musical forms, Jeff Buckley was an early champion among young American musicians for the work of Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, the world's foremost Qawwali (the music of the Sufis) singer. Buckley conducted an extensive interview with Nusrat in Interview magazine (January 1996) and wrote the liner notes Nusrat's The Supreme Collection album, released on Mercator/Caroline records in August 1997. On May 9th, 2000, Columbia Records released Mystery White Boy, an album of live performances, and Live In Chicago, a full-length concert (available on DVD or VHS) recorded live at The Cabaret Metro in Chicago on May 13, 1995, in the middle of Jeff's "Mystery White Boy" tour.
Following the release of Grace on August 23rd, 1994, Jeff and his group spent much of 1994-1996 performing around the world on the Unknown, Mystery White Boy, and Hard Luck tours. Mystery White Boy brings together, for the first time, some of the high points of those shows. Produced by Michael Tighe (guitarist for Jeff's band throughout their international touring and the recording of Grace) and Mary Guibert (Jeff's mother) and Mystery White Boy provides an evocative cross-section of Jeff's repertoire: previously-unreleased Buckley compositions, electrifying live interpretations of songs from Grace, and obscure and marvelous cover choices. The recordings heard on Mystery White Boy have been hand-picked from scores of concert tapes by Mary Guibert and the members of Jeff's band who played such a large role in helping Jeff realize his musical vision.
According to Mary, the tracks on Mystery White Boy are "the individual performances that represented transcendent moments from each of the concerts we'd identified as being in the 'overall outstanding' category."
"It was obvious which performances were contenders for the record," concurs Michael Tighe, "and in some cases a performance would be so supreme and unpredictable that I knew it had to be brought to the public."
The posthumous album Sketches For My Sweetheart The Drunk was released in 1998 and included songs Buckley was working on while in Memphis for his upcoming release.
Tribute songs:
PJ Harvey - Memphis
Rufus Wainwright- Memphis Skyline
Mark Eitzel - To the Sea
Zita Swoon - Song for a Dead Singer
Amy Correia - Blind River Boy
Duncan Sheik - A Body Goes Down
Chris Cornell - Wave Goodbye
Katatonia - Nightmares by the Sea
Willie Nile - On the Road to Calvary
Rachael Sage - Grace
Aimee Mann - Just Like Anyone
Cocteau Twins - Rilkean Heart
Jim Major - Angels Fall (Song for Jeff Buckley)
A film about Buckley's life, a biopic called "Mystery White Boy", is currently in pre-production. Actors have not yet been cast, according to IMDB.
Mojo Pin
Jeff Buckley Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Oh-oh, ah-ah, ah-ah
Uh, uh-uh, uh, uh
Oh-oh, uh-uh
I'm lying in my bed
The blanket is warm
This body will never be safe from harm
Touch my skin to keep me whole
Oh, if only you'd come back to me
If you laid at my side
Wouldn't need no mojo pin
To keep me satisfied
Don't want to weep for you
Don't want to know
I'm blind and tortured, the white horses flow
The memories fire
The rhythms fall slow
Black beauty, I love you so
Oh, precious, precious silver and gold
And pearls in oyster's flesh
Drop down we two to serve and pray to love
Born again from the rhythm
Screaming down from heaven
Ageless, ageless, I'm there in your arms
Don't want to weep for you
I don't want to know
I'm blind and tortured, the white horses flow
The memories fire
The rhythms fall slow
Black beauty, I love you so
So, so, so
So
Oh, the welts of your scorn, my love, give me more
Send whips of opinion down my back, give me more
Well it's you I've waited my life to see
It's you I've searched so hard for
Don't want to weep for you
Don't want to know
I'm blind and tortured, the white horses flow
The memories fire
The rhythms fall slow
Black beauty, I love you so, so
Black, black, black beauty
The lyrics to Jeff Buckley's song "Mojo Pin" explore themes of longing, love, and desperation. The opening verses describe a sense of vulnerability and a desire for safety and protection. The persona longs for the touch of a lost love, invoking a sensual image of black ribbons of coal touching his skin to "keep me whole." He expresses a yearning for the return of this former love and suggests that if only they were together he wouldn't need the "mojo pin" to keep him satisfied. The lyrics then take a more introspective turn, as the persona grapples with his feelings of loss, pain and uncertainty. The white horses flow, creating a tone of melancholy and the sense that something has been lost or has passed beyond reach. The persona's love is described as a "black beauty," which creates a stark contrast between the beauty and the darkness.
The third verse introduces the image of precious metals and pearls found within an oyster, dropping the two lovers to "serve and pray to love." This contrasts with the sense of longing that has characterized the lyrics so far and brings in ideas of worship and reverence. The persona is then described as "ageless," suggesting that he is beyond time and mortal concerns. The chorus returns as a refrain, with the persona expressing his unwillingness to give in to his emotions and his pain. He describes the welts of his love's scorn as giving him "more," suggesting that he is willing to withstand any torment or torture if it means he can be with this love. Finally, the song ends on a repeated refrain of "Black beauty I love you so" emphasizing the depth and intensity of the persona's feelings.
Line by Line Meaning
I'm lying in my bed
The singer is in bed.
The blanket is warm
The blanket is providing warmth to the singer.
This body will never be safe from harm
The singer's body will always be vulnerable to harm.
Still feel your hair, black ribbons of coal
The singer remembers the feeling of the person's hair, which was black like coal.
Touch my skin to keep me whole
Physical touch is important to the singer's emotional well-being.
If only you'd come back to me
The singer desires for the person to return.
If you laid at my side
The singer wishes for the person to be physically close.
Wouldn't need no mojo pin
The singer wouldn't need a magical charm to feel satisfied if the person were present.
To keep me satisfied
The mojo pin is a substitute for the person's presence.
Don't want to weep for you, don't want to know
The singer does not want to mourn or acknowledge the person's absence.
I'm blind and tortured, the white horses flow
The singer is blinded by pain and emotion, while memories of the past haunt him.
The memories fire, the rhythms fall slow
The memories are intense and overwhelming, while time seems to pass slowly.
Black beauty I love you so
The singer is speaking to someone, calling them "black beauty" and expressing love.
Precious, precious silver and gold and pearls in oyster's flesh
The presence of the person is rare and valuable, like precious metals and pearls inside an oyster.
Drop down we two to serve and pray to love
The singer and the person are devoted to each other and to their love.
Born again from the rhythm, screaming down from heaven
Their love is rekindled through the power of the music and the intense emotions it evokes.
Ageless, ageless, I'm there in your arms
The love between the singer and the person transcends time and is eternal.
The welts of your scorn, my love, give me more
Even though the person may have caused the singer pain, he still desires them.
Send whips of opinion down my back, give me more
The singer is willing to endure pain and criticism, as long as he can be with the person.
Well it's you I've waited my life to see
The person is the one the singer has been waiting for his entire life.
It's you I've searched so hard for
The singer has actively searched for the person.
Black, black, black beauty
The singer repeats the phrase as a term of endearment for the person.
Lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group, Kobalt Music Publishing Ltd.
Written by: Jeffery Buckley, Gary Michael Lucas
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind