Devils & Blue Dresses: My Wild Ride as a Rock and Roll Legend

space to create to my fullest potential.
    I also began a co-production with Manne Pokrant, who not only held great technical knowledge, but was a talented and creative personality in his own right. The next CD,
A Dark Caucasian Blue
, barely missed the mark but was a triumph for my writing ability as I closed in on my life-long pursuit. I was no longer thinking in terms of commercial recordings, but strangely, because Dr. Klaus insisted I be given free range to create anything I wanted, many of the songs did qualify as accessible or commercial.
    Megan and I came over together for the next CD, and we brought our puppy Poindexter, a four and a half pound Yorkie. He was very calm and relaxed, and I found that to be extremely helpful for the mind-set I needed to create.
    Another thing Megan and I marveled at was how the candy companies in Germany tried very hard to convince parents and children of modern day Germany that there was something missing from their lives that they absolutely must have. Halloween. I don’t think it has really taken hold yet, but it is such fun to see the children trying to get the hang of this free candy concept from America. Some of their costumes are very entertaining––it’s like Carnival for children, with candy instead of alcohol.
    We next began work on
The Aquitted Idiot
. Right from the beginning the ideas flowed freely and effectively. All of the players had no trouble reaching the perfection I was asking. My voice was stronger than it had ever been, and the songs and musicalarrangements were the best I had ever done. I had whatever I wanted: background singers of high quality, specialized musicians from all over Europe, and a happy spirit within the studio and the musicians. Even the saddest songs had a magical humanism and connection within each note.
    This album,
The Acquitted Idiot
, was an exploration of my faith and belief in organized religion, God and Jesus Christ, and how that all impacted my life. The musical styles flew about freely from an Otis Redding style, to rolling in the aisles gospel, to soft moving ballads and high-energy testaments. There were compliments to my Motown heritage and, as I had done on
A Dark Caucasian Blue,
I wrote and sang one or two songs in the native tongue of my beloved host country.
    In my mind I had finally, after many decades, reached my goal. I had, in arguable terms, created the best album of my career. I was relieved and proud and happy at last. No one in America would ever know about it. My time to share this great achievement with the American public had long ago passed. But what was important is the fact that I created it.
    When I returned to America I listened for the first time in decades to the radio, and then I played my CD. I knew then, if history ever had the courage to honestly judge my career-long struggle, I would finally be given the recognition I felt I deserved. I had worked so hard through all the years of artistic growth, the struggles with substance abuse, and the painful but rewarding sacrifices, to find love and simply stay above the poverty line.
    Very few historians took note of my achievement. Those who did were surprised to discover I was capable of resurrecting myself. Not in the sense that I was a commercial vehicle again, but that I had made a life-long commitment to an end and had succeeded. Those secret, below the radar reviews from men of honor and integrity in the music business, were all I needed to be happy. Fortunately, a few of my hard-core American fans were able to weigh in on the achievement and their consensus matched that of the critics.
    My world was a perfect world on the music side.
    On one short tour of Germany, Megan decided to stay home. One of the most precious gifts I was able to give her, and she freely admits this, was the ability to not work for most of the time, and to stay at home to be a live-in mother to her two sons. While I was away on the tour one drunken night in Cologne, Germany I took a woman, a stranger, to my room after the show and had sex.
    When I returned, my guilt got the better of me and I did what I thought was the right thing. I tried to be honest with my wife at all times. But I also did what the centuries old rule of conduct as set forth by men dictated I should not. The rule was “never confess.” After the confession (where I knew there would be problems), I fully expectedshe would be hurt, but I though because I confessed she would try to work it out. Instead,