Jeff Buckley
You and I

Mary Ivette Guibert was born on February 20, 1948, in Panama.

I like an old black and white photo of her. It’s October 23, '65, Mary is only 17 years old, smiling beneath the veil of her virginal bridal gown. Mary is beautiful, she looks happy as she cuts the cake and Tim is there, next to her. But he is stiff, embarrassed, his curls straightened and plastered with gel, a dark suit - whose discomfort is apparent - and a gaze that pierces, indecipherable, seeming to look elsewhere.

Sometimes I remember to look at the stars (unfortunately, increasingly rarely) and when I do, I always search for asteroid b 612. When I find it, I squint until I see a little boy with a mass of blond hair talking to his flower. Sometimes near that blond hair, I glimpse another mass of curly, tousled, dark brown hair; then I know the Star Navigator has stopped by to greet the Blonde Child, and I hear them talk about baobabs and foxes and mermaids.

Mary must have looked at the sky many times too, but she could never have seen the Star Navigator, because she - unlike me - knows well that Tim disappeared into a Black Hole, and she also knows that the Star Navigator had that Black Hole inside his heart.

Tim ran away just two years after that photo, beginning a journey that would end, at least on this plane of reality, in Santa Monica on June 29, '75.

He was only 28 years old.

But Einstein explained to us, though we struggle to understand, that Space and Time are curved. So, it can be explained how it was possible for that Black Hole to let something out, and that something took the form of Jeff.

That something was stirring inside that body and took the shape of a voice. When did Mary notice it? I believe she was more concerned with keeping that boy away from the Stars. But now with them was Ron, and Ron loved the earth, the rocks: the rock.

It was Ron who gifted Scotty (that’s what Jeff wanted to be called) his first album, a Led Zeppelin record.

Then Ron left them for another woman, in '73, but he also left Mary with another son – Corey James – and Jeff with a love for rock music.

And that love became a fire. The fire of a passion that generated "Grace" and the "live at Sin-é." Mary was not afraid of that fire: she knew Jeff did not have a Black Hole in his heart.

Why am I talking about Mary?

Because I can't think of anyone else who has lost so much because of the Gods of Music and has never recorded an album, nor played in public (although she played the cello as a girl) and, therefore, I cannot help but forgive her for everything. That's why I can't judge harshly the operation that led to the publication of this "You and I," even though I hate discographic necrophilia.

Inside there are ten tracks that emerged from who knows where, so far unpublished, a couple of demos from “Grace” and the rest covers: Dylan, the Smiths, Led Zeppelin, Sly and the Family Stone, Louis Jordan (a "Don't Let the Sun Catch You Cryin'," made famous by Gerry and the Pacemakers), Jevetta Steele (an extraordinary "Calling You"), a standard (Poor Boy Long Way From Home).

Only voice – that voice! – and guitar.

What is this stuff for? What does it add or take away from Jeff’s story? Nothing. We will never know if Jeff could have realized all the premises glimpsed in "Grace," if that splendid epiphany would have been followed by the masterpiece that that name carried within itself. Because "Grace" was only the beginning, the intuition of a possibility that would have to be realized once Jeff had freed himself from the ghost of Tim. That's why I prefer to listen to the live album. That little gem where – at times – I hear him free, like when he sings a chilling "The Way Young Lovers Do."

But there remains to speak of the water. Because the Greeks were right: the elements are four – air (the stars), earth (the rock), fire (the passion) and water. And in this story – unfortunately – water is also involved.

It's hot in May, with windows open, breathing in the air that, not yet sultry, carries the scent of flowers. It's hot on the evening of May 29, 1997, along the banks of the Wolf River, just outside Memphis, so hot that Jeff feels like taking a swim; those who were with him say that as he swam, he was singing an old Led Zeppelin song.

He was 31 years old, three more than the Star Navigator.

When I ask myself why I spent money to procure this "You and I," just as I spent on the live records at the Olympia or the Bataclan, and even on "Sketches for My Sweetheart the Drunk," whose stench of death practically prevents me from listening to it, when I ask myself this question I think of Mary on the evening of May 29, 1997.

Mary is still beautiful - in 1997 she was 49 - she looks out the window, not worried: Scotty (that’s how Jeff wanted to be called by those close to him) will call sooner or later. He’s in Memphis to record, but he doesn’t have a Black Hole in his heart, there’s no reason to worry.

Mary lights a cigarette, she’ll wait a little longer, then she’ll go to sleep.