Jackson Browne, ‘The Barricades of Heaven’

This earworm began when I saw a post from the Martin Guitar Facebook page: “Who first made you want a Martin?”

I’m pretty sure I first decided I must have a Martin D-1 guitar after reading somewhere (maybe in the Rich Wiseman’s biography of Jackson Browne?) that Browne played a Martin D-1 in his very early days.

Over at MusicPlayer.com, there’s a feature about Solo Acoustic, Vol. 1 [since deleted]. In it, Paul Dieter explains that the 2005 live album was culled from more than 100 shows, and that some of the songs are edited together from two or three different nights.

Also in the story, Jackson Browne discusses the various guitars he uses, including the 1930s Gibson Roy Smeck model upon which his own signature guitar is based. He says the guitar’s “neck is like the deck of an aircraft carrier … really wide.” It’s scaled like a classical guitar, with only a 12-fret neck, but the body is much bigger than a classical, and so the sound is too.

Running down around the towns along the shore
When I was sixteen and on my own
No, I couldn’t tell you what the hell those brakes were for
I was just trying to hear my song

That verse (altered in the Glastonbury performance) also names “the Paradox, the Bear, the Rouge et Noir” — bars which were landmarks of Orange County, California nightlife, as recalled in Jim Washburn’s story for the June 2008 issue of Orange County’s Riviera magazine, “The Radar Nightlife” (link is to a PDF copy at Greg Topper‘s website).

Michael robbed a liquor store in some god-forsaken mall
Must have crossed some kind of line in his head
He stopped to shoot a goddamn bottle off the wall
And in that moment, he turned, he was dead

The song’s chorus — a repeated flourish of C – G – D chords — features two enigmatic lines:

Better bring your own redemption when you come
To the barricades of heaven where I’m from

‘Barricades of heaven’ meaning

“Barricades of heaven” is such a paradoxical phrase. Quoted in a 2005 KGSR (Austin, Texas) interview, Browne mostly prefers to leave its ambiguity open to the listener’s interpretation. But in Harold Lepidus’s January story on a mysterious 1966 Bob Dylan show at Riverside College, Lepidus prods filmmaker Sandi Bachom, who attended that performance by Dylan and The Hawks (later The Band):

Bachom remembered that she saw the electric Dylan show “at Riverside College, in Orange County. That’s ‘The Barricades Of Heaven’ Jackson (Browne) sang about.”

She knows this because she was hanging around with Browne at the time:

“I’m pretty sure our friend Jackson was with us but I’m not sure…..Hey, it was the 60s after all! ..Jackson and I were friends in California, so we probably went to the show. He was so influenced by Dylan. He idolized him. I have a picture he signed some place, he wrote on the back, ‘Sandi babe . . . motor highways . .something . . ‘ . . .very Dylanesque . . He signed it ‘Jack.’ We called him ‘Jackie’ in those days.”

I’m not sure this makes the phrase “barricades of heaven” any clearer (and both Riverside City College and the University of California, Riverside are located in Riverside County, not Orange County), but it’s interesting to have a few more fragments from that time and place.

Taking it at face value, “barricades” would be a barrier or obstacle, often associated with revolution.

So is Jackson Browne in some sort of paradise, throwing up barriers to keep out those threatening it — or is he approaching heaven, but obstructed by these barricades?

If it’s the latter, Browne’s “barricades” might be an example of the “threshold” identified throughout mythology by Joseph Campbell. Going back to Adam and Eve’s expulsion from Eden, there is always an obstacle and/or guardian blocking our path to fulfillment. “Bring your own redemption” could be interpreted as advice to seek your right of entry within yourself.

Here’s a similar interpretation from Dane Snyder:

Bring your own beliefs and definition of who you are with you to wherever you are going/go in life; do not let others define your identity for you. Be true and honest to yourself about your values and what carries meaning for you. In the end, it will be enough.

The first of about ten Jackson Browne concerts I have attended was in 1978 at Northwestern University’s McGaw Hall — April 9th, to be exact. I was 17 at the time.

Of all the times that I’ve been burned, by now you’d think I’d learn
That it’s who you look like, not who you are.

“Jackson Browne,” he chuckled after that.

I don’t know about bringing your own redemption, but I do know you have to have your own ticket in your hand. Sadly, my friend Ernie forgot his ticket at home. He spent that concert alternately sitting in our friend Dave’s AMC Gremlin, and roaming the chilly streets of Evanston, Illinois until the show was over.