The unbelievable true story of forgotten folk artist Judee Sill
Some of the greatest voices in folk remain the most underappreciated, with many, particularly female, going unnoticed or failing to achieve success until decades later. Names such as Connie Converse, Sibylle Baier, Vashti Bunyan and Linda Perhacs form the canon of forgotten female folk artists who have since been rediscovered and garnered a cult following.
Then there was Judee Sill, who, more than the others, came close to achieving success, yet she was unlucky, fading into obscurity before her premature death in 1979. While some enjoyed her music during the following years, it wasn’t until the 2000s that Sill was recognised as one of the ’70s most vital folk voices, unfairly neglected despite her brilliance.
Born in 1944, Sill had a problematic childhood, marred by abuse and a chaotic home life. Following her father’s death, Sill’s mother married the animator Kenneth Muse, who would cause constant altercations. She told Rolling Stone, “I always had scars on my knuckles. We had such violent fights at our house that the police and newspapermen would come.”
It didn’t take long for Sill to exhibit destructive behaviour, committing armed robberies as a teenager, which led to her stint at reform school. She explained, “I was very numb. I didn’t care one way or the other. That’s why I was doing those robberies, I guess — because my heart was reachin’ out, tryin’ to get me to care about somethin’.”
After marrying Bob Harris, she found herself involved in further illegal activity as a means to fund the pair’s intense heroin addiction, including prostitution. She recalled, “To raise the money for junk, we both pulled various scams, connivin’ and schemin’ and lyin’ and trickin’ people out of their money. Pretty soon, I realized that I could come up with more money by myself, so I went out on my own and started hookin’, among other things.”
Sill added, “Well, that went on for three years. At one point, I lived with a smack dealer, and I was shootin’ up 15 to 20 bags a day. We lived down on Central Avenue in downtown LA, and that was really gettin’ down in the pits, see.” Eventually, she ended up in prison, where she learned about the death of her beloved brother, Dennis. During her time behind bars, she grieved for one of her only surviving immediate relatives and experienced intense drug withdrawal, leaving her incredibly low.
Following her release, Sill knew music was the only way forward. She began writing songs and performing gigs. She met The Turtles’ Jim Pons during this time, who was impressed by her song ‘Lady-O’, subsequently covering the track with his band in 1969.
Sill’s life was far from conventional, and she ended up living in a Cadillac. “I had one set of clothes and a toothbrush, and that was it, but I felt good, you know? Not to be a fucked-up junkie anymore. Also, I got into readin’ real deep books, books about religion and the occult. And I could see that I was gonna have to write songs that were about those things, you know?”
During this period, she performed some of her music as the opening act for folk heavyweights like David Crosby and Graham Nash. Her self-titled debut album was released in 1971 following her signing to David Geffen’s Asylum label. Her most well-known song appeared on the album, ‘Jesus Was A Cross Maker’, inspired by an affair with J.D Souther, calling it the “best thing I’d ever written.” Many artists have covered the song, from The Hollies to Cass Elliot, yet no version conveys the authenticity of Sill’s original.
Unfortunately for Sill, commercial success was nowhere to be seen, partly because she often refused to perform live unless she was the headline act. She felt uncomfortable opening for rock bands, believing that audiences were not interested in watching her sing with her acoustic guitar. Her second album, Heart Food, was similarly unsuccessful in terms of sales, although critics received it positively.
The record exemplifies Sill’s preoccupation with religious imagery, with the closing track ‘The Donor’, a rapturous display of harmonies which the singer wrote in the hopes of “musically induc[ing] God into giving us all a break, cause I was getting a little fed up by this point,” she told the BBC.
Disillusioned by her lack of success, Sill gave up on music and fell back into drug addiction. She died in 1979 from a drug overdose that was potentially suicide, although it has never been officially confirmed. It wasn’t until 2005 that a collection of demos, Dreams Come True, emerged, mixed by Jim O’Rourke, which led to further posthumous recognition.
Sill’s life was far from easy, yet out of the turbulence, she created some of the greatest folk records of the ’70s. Listen to ‘The Donor’ below.
