age 2 THE BATTALION
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 2, 1975
Neil Young pays
friends tribute
By JOHN VANORE
, Reviewer
( Neil Young. What’s the first thing that pops
to your mind when you hear that name?
’ Most likely, though, the image of Neil Young,
Jo performer extraordinaire, comes to mind,
i le same artist who sculpted such masterpieces
i “After the Gold Rush,” “Everybody Knows
j lis Is Nowhere,” and “Harvest.”
, The last album was recorded with the
ashville Stray Gators, but the renowned Crazy
orse played back-up on the other two.
i The extremely saccharine sound of “Harvest”
i 'ew poor responses from critics who saw Young
,■ becoming a commercially-oriented recording
,| ar. Since then, he has reverted to “. . . expres-
ng what’s on his mind . . as he said in a
3 ' oiling Stone interview.
'< “Time Fades Away,” the follow-up to “Har-
;st,” and "On the Beach” were marked by in-
I nse depression. Desolation, with all its ramifi-
, tions, would best describe “On the Beach.”
, “Beach’s” despondence and a lack of musical
i oficiency were the easier problems to solve in
' eparation for another release.
; For “Tonight’s the Night,” Young has returned
( recording with Crazy Horse, minus Danny
] Tiitten, who died last year of a drug overdose.
,j “Tonight’s the Night” is a musical obituary, or,
\ Young’s own words, “. . . an OD letter,”
ayed in memoriam for Whitten, formerly Crazy
;! orse’s lead guitarist, and Bruce Berry. Berry,
• ( ho also died of an overdose, was a longtime
age hand for Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young,
id was very close to Young.
'• Young’s departure from the pretty melodies of
larvest” and its predecessors reaches its apogee
II sre. There is no joy to this music. Young is
: i tally immersed in his two friends’ deaths; and
t| s music with its ragged edges of despair and
•, isolation reflects this state of mind.
“Tonight’s the Night,” in its opening version,
I peats those fateful words — “Tonight’s the
I ght . . .,” as though it were some sort of omin-
| is warning. It’s the story of Berry, who, as
f >ung so bluntly puts it, OD’d “. . . out on the
, ainline.”
For almost two years, “Tonight’s the Night”
I as an unfinished project with only nine songs
completed, until Young s manager Elliot Roberts
came through with three older songs on tape that
related to the rest of the album. “Borrowed
Time” and “Come on Baby Let’s Go Downtown
were two.
Young accompanies himself on piano and harp
on “Borrowed Time. ” He somberly tells how he’s
singing a borrowed tune “. . . alone in this empty
room, too wasted to write my own.”
Ultimately the most haunting song is “Come
on Baby Let’s Go Downtown,” which was re
corded at the Fillmore East four years ago. It
features Young and the original Crazy Horse,
with Whitten singing and playing lead guitar.
Whitten and Young are locked in a guitar duel
which causes each to strive for perfection.
Side Two shines because of instrumental per
formances and more. “Roll Another Number,”
with its harmonies, fits into the sweet mold of
“Harvest”; but “Lookout Joe,” featuring some
excellent guitar, is down-right ominous.
True culmination of the depressive air of “To
night’s the Night” strikes with “Tired Eyes.’’The
lyrics tell rather bluntly of how “Well, he shot
four men in a cocaine deal/He left ’em lyin’ in an
open field/Full of old cars with bullet holes in the
mirrors.”
The lyrics and mood of “Tired Eyes” recall
some of Young’s more morbid moments, espe
cially in “Ohio. ” The four casualties in the dope
deal are a direct outgrowth of the “Four dead in
Ohio, ” in the tale of Kent State. “Tired Eyes” is
the net result of the proceeding ten songs build
ing in intensity to near-panic. The song relates
strongly to the overall death/drugs/disaster as
pect of the album.
The second version of “Tonight’s the Night”
concludes Side Two, and the listener feels be’s
gone full circle in Young’s musical odyssey. This
version is more disjointed, unarranged and desp
erate than the first. Young sums his emotions
when he sings, in a quavering voice, of how he
heard of Bruce Berry’s death. “ ’cause people let
me tell you, it sent a chill up and down my spine
“Tonight’s the Night,” as an album, is a fitting
musical obitary to two close friends. It contains
some of his best music to date.
Thanks Ernie, (Musicland) for providing the
album used for this review.
Book follows seasons
^ By DON MIDDLETON
I Battalion Staff Writer
‘I EXAS HEARTLAND: A HILL COUNTRY
EAR; Photographs by Jim Bones, Jr., text by
>hn Graves (Texas A&M University Press,
975).
Two years ago, Jim Bones, Jr., spent four sea-
j ms at Paisano, the ranch of the late J. Frank
>obie. He photographed the hill country as it
hanged from season to season, its wildlife, plants
ad their interaction with the elements.
Then noted Texas author John Graves
GOODBYE TO A RIVER, HARD SCRABBLE)
Tote down some of the history of the settlement
f the hill country, in particular Paisano and how
)obie came to own it.
1 The result is TEXAS HEARTLAND, possibly
I ae most beautiful essay about Texas to come
i long in quite a while.
S| After Dobie’s death, Paisano was bought by
I everal of his friends at the Texas Institute of
.letters and donated to the University of Texas. It
ow serves as a retreat for writers, photographers
; i nd painters who come to live for a year at Paisano
]f Vhile they work.
One of those artists who lived and worked at
the ranch on a Dobie-Paisano fellowship was Jim
Bones.
HEARTLAND is more than a collection of pic
tures. It is a story told visually. Bones has cap
tured the mood of the country as it undergoes the
transition from autumn to winter, winter to
spring, then to summer and finally completing
the cycle with the multi-colored hill country au
tumn.
Any less of an author than John Graves might
have been hesitant about writing an introduction
to the photographs of this brilliant young artist.
Maybe Graves was hesitant himself, but his brief
history of Paisano and the surrounding area blend
with the photographs perfectly, and is a tes
timony to Graves’ talent.
Bones has written his own short introduction to
the pictures, which more or less explains how he
happened to come to Paisano to live and work.
But his true accomplishment is in the photo
graphs themselves.
It took the work of an extraordinary artist to
tempt Press Director Frank Wardlaw to publish,
for the first time in 25 years, a book of 84 hill color
photographs. And it is a remarkable book.
r
Artist
comes
home
By DON MIDDLETON
Battalion Staff Writer
In 1917 a stern German father sent his 19-
year-old son to Texas A&M College to study elec
trical engineering. Had Berthold Schiwetz stuck
by his decision to have his son become an en
gineer, Texas A&M might have been robbed of
one of its most accomplished alumni — artist
E.M. “Buck” Schiwetz.
In his studio on the first floor of the old Board of
Directors’ building, Schiwetz took time out from
his work last week to talk about those and other
days.
“I was born in Cuero in DeWitt county in 1898.
We (a sister and three brothers) were brought up
in the German tradition. We learned German
before we learned English,” Schiwetz recalled.
Schiwetz flunks electrical
engineering
“When I graduated from Cuero High School, I
wanted to go to Chicago Artists’ School, but my
father said ‘No, you’re going to be an electrical
engineer, my boy.’ So I came to A&M and I
flunked every course I took, except English,”
Schiwetz laughed. “I even flunked Blacksmithing
and Manual Training — that had never been
done in the annals of A&M.”
An assistant English professor, D. B. Gofer,
took special interest in the young man’s prob
lems. It is Gofer to whom Schiwetz attributes his
successfril transition from engineering to the arts.
Gofer took the young Schiwetz to talk with
college President W. B. Bizzell about his un
pleasant situation.
“Dr. Bizzell said, “What’s wrong Mr.
Schiwetz?’ I just told him I had no use for it, I
wasn’t an electrical engineer, it was my daddy’s
instigation,” Schiwetz said. “He (Bizzell) said,
‘Well listen, I’m going to do something about
that.’ So he looked my daddy up in Cuero.
“Dr. Bizzell asked my daddy, ‘Look here, what
are you trying to do with this boy? He has the
inclination to go into the arts and you’re trying to
deny him that.’
The elder Schiwetz and Bizzell sat down and
finally came to a compromise. They decided ar
chitecture would be an acceptable blend of sci
ence and the arts for Buck Schiwetz to study.
“So I went into architecture and made nice
grades and got my B.A.,” Schiwetz continued.
“Then I stayed another year and worked on my
Master’s. I lacked four hours of getting it, but I
left and never went back to finish it.”
While Schiwetz was at A&M he was, among
other things, an unofficial mascot for the 1917.
football team.
“That’s when Dana Bible had a 270-0 season,”
the artist recalled. “He also taught English.
“I lived in Austin Hall with the team. All they
had every night was their bull sessions. So I took
over the top floor of the Bat Roost, that’s what we
called Gathright Hall, to use as my office, since I
was art director on the annual for two years.”
When Schiwetz left A&M, he traveled to Dal
las to serve his apprenticeship with various ar
chitectural firms.
“One thing I can say is that if I had gone to
Chicago to the regular art schools, I would have
been doing the same thing everybody does when
they start out as an illustrator. Those people come
a dime a dozen,” Schiwetz emphasized. “But
here I took architecture and it set me on the road
In this particular realm I’m in now.
“I started out in architecture doing nothing but
tracing and erasing, ” Buck remembers, “which is
the usual routine. A Bachelor of Arts will get you
a job but it won’t hold it forever. ”
While he was eking out a living as a draftsman,
Schiwetz was doing the thing he likes best in his
spare time — sketching and painting the Texas
landscape.
Traveling spirit strong
In 1926 Schiwetz and his wife Ruby went to
New York City and joined the artist colony in
Greenwich Village.
“We had a hard life in New York, we were poor
and hungry most of the time, ” Schiwetz recalled.
“But New York City was the best place to be poor
and hungry, because there were plenty of others
in the same situation, so you were never lonely.”
Then a friend of Schiwetz from A&M, Ray
Franke, asked Buck to come to Houston and go
into the advertising business with him. Together
with two other friends they formed the Franke,
Schiwetz, Wilkerson and Tips Advertising
Agency.
“I handled the art for the Humble (Refining)
account,” Schiwetz said. “I had the opportunity
to go around and work with the ranchers and
farmers, and to go to Mexico and stay on planta-
Pencil sketch of the Texas A&M University Press, formerly the Board
of Directors’ Building, done in 1974.
tions. I had all these wonderful opportunities to
absorb all this knowledge through my clientele.
Of course one nice part about it was my expense
account.”
Supervising SWC football
broadcasts
Buck also supervised the broadcasts of South
west Conference football games, working with
broadcaster Kern Tips who was also a member of
the ad agency.
MiM&rmDw
Section illustration designed by Schiwetz for the 1920 Longhorn.
"I had to run around and make sure everything
went right,” Schiwetz said of his radio clap.
“When something did go wrong, I was the one
who caught trouble.”
The wanderlust has always been strong in Buck
Schiwetz. He has travelled all his life, portraying
Texas in watercolors. But for the moment heisa
resident of the Texas A&M campus.
Schiwetz is currently at work on a portfoliool
eight paintings depicting the A&M campus in
commemoration of the school’s centennial.
His studio, first located in the office of the
Association of Former Students, was changed
when Schiwetz learned that the Board of Direc
tors’ house was scheduled to be torn down.
Buck saves Directors’ Building
“I was furious. The thought of tearing such a
fine building down just made me mad,” Schiwetz
said.
It so happens that at the same time, Frank
Wardlaw, director of the newly-formed A&M
University Press, was also looking for a place to
set up shop.
“I called Frank (a close personal friend d
Schiwetz ) up and told him to quit looking, I had
found the perfect place for his Press. It was Frank
who had convinced me to come back to A&M in
the first place,” Schiwetz said.
So now Buck Schiwetz lives and paints in the
building he saved from the clutches of progress.
“I’m so happy to be here. I was 77 years old in
August and I feel like life is just beginning. Being
around young people again is invigorating to me.
And I haven’t met anyone yet who rubbed me the
wrong way.”
If anyone did rub Buck Schiwetz the wrong
way, they might find themselves up on the had
side of another close friend of Schiwetz’.
"Randy Matson is kind of my official l>ody-
guard, he goes everywhere with me, Schiwetz
said.
Still painting at 77
Not even Buck Schiwetz is sure how long hell
be staying at A&M this time. Itinerant by nature,
he tends to snub publicity and notoriety for peace
and quiet of the Texas countryside. There, he
doesn’t have to worry about deadlines or painting
things he really doesn t care to paint.
Schiwetz just recently recovered from an at
tack of paralysis which left his right arm, the one
he paints with, immobile. In spite of that, he is
painting as well, or better than he has in his life,
although he is too modest to admit it.
At 77 years young Schiwetz is out of the adver
tising business and into the business of being
Buck Schiwetz. Not Schiwetz the nationally fam
ous artist, or Schiwetz the Texas legend—just
Buck Schiwetz.
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Members of the Student Publications Board are: Bob G. Rogers, Chairman; Dr.
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MEMBER
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Editor James Breedlove
Assistant Editor Roxie Hearn
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