E.A.B.

**The King and I** is the eighth episode of *Vinyl*.

## Plot

Rebuffed by a loan officer with high-school ties to Zak (Ray Romano), a desperate Richie (Bobby Cannavale) approaches Maury (Paul Ben-Victor) about doing a deal with Galasso (Armen Garo). Devon (Olivia Wilde) and Ingrid (Birgitte Hjort Sorensen) make the scene at Max's Kansas City, where Devon impresses photographer Billy McVicar (Richard Short) with her ability to charm John Lennon into giving up his photo.

Tasked by Richie to come up with a new song, Kip (James Jagger) and the Nasty Bits get a crash course in the blues from Lester (Ato Essandoh). Andrea (Annie Parisse) fires longtime American Century employee, Hal Underwood, angering Richie. Clark (Jack Quaid) finds musical enlightenment from Jorge (Christian Navarro), his onetime mailroom nemesis.

## Trivia

* Richie Finestra is frustrated with the Nasty Bits' lack of progress and lectures them sternly on how the Stooges wrote "Real Cool Time", "Not Right", and "Little Doll" all in one day. There’s no way that Richie, whose label turned down the New York Dolls, would know the recording history of the Stooges that intimately because that wasn’t a known fact in 1973. When the Stooges were discovered by Danny Fields and signed to Elektra Records, they lied and told Elektra founder Jac Holtzman that they had plenty of material ready to record. The story is quoted in *Please Kill Me*, Legs McNeil's oral history of punk rock, published in 1996: “We only had three songs,” said Stooges guitarist Ron Asheton. “So, I went back to the hotel and in an hour came up with the riffs for "Little Doll", "Not Right", and "Real Cool Time.""
* Lester Grimes provides the Nasty Bits with more useful advice, providing a history of music through three chords, E.A.B., and showing the band how they’ve worked for Chuck Berry, Chubby Checker, Ray Charles, Mungo Jerry, Creedence Clearwater Revival, and one of his old originals to boot, "Woman Like You". “That’s the skeleton, everyone’s got one,” Lester says. “Then you add the flesh, the hair, the eyes. You do that, you got a song.”
* Max's Kansas City's features the original lineup of the Wailers playing their first U.S. shows in a four-day tour in the United States, featuring Bob Marley and Peter Tosh (Bunny Wailer refused to participate in the second leg of the tour, so he was replaced by Joe Higgs). *Burnin'* and *Catch a Fire* by the Wailers were released in 1973. Both albums played a significant role in spreading reggae's popularity beyond Jamaica and the Caribbean and introduced the genre to an international audience. Original music by the Wailers is used, with crowd noises imposed over it to make it seem like it’s a live show.
* The Wailers were the opening act for a then up-in-coming musician from New Jersey named Bruce Springsteen, recently signed to Columbia Records by John Hammond — also known as “the man who discovered Bob Dylan.” Springsteen’s first album, *Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J.*, was released in January 1973, and his second album, *The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle*, would come out in September. Despite being the headliner of the evening, Springsteen is featured very briefly in the episode.
* Also featured in the episode was country rock singer-songwriter Kinky Friedman. He along with his band, the Texas Jewboys, performed at Max's Kansas City in May of 1973.
* *Vinyl* had a penchant for bending historical accuracy. In the sixth episode *Cyclone*, the Stooges were portrayed performing at Max's, although in reality, they played there a few weeks after the Wailers/Springsteen double bill.
* John Lennon of the Beatles makes an appearance, who did hang out at Max’s and is there with then lover May Pang who he spent his time with during his legendary “Lost Weekend,” a period of about a year and a half where John and his wife Yoko Ono went through a brief separation, and she encouraged him to have an affair with Pang.
* Billy McVicar, the photographer trying to get John Lennon’s photograph, is most likely an amalgam of all of the photographers that hung out at Max’s, but probably most closely resembles Anton Perich, known for his amazing photojournalistic images from upstairs at Max’s. However, given the Lennon connection, it could also be Bob Gruen, but Gruen was already a friend of John’s at this point and would have had no problems photographing him.
* Clark Morelle has a drug-induced revelation of an Isaac Hayes track from 1969, which he was seemingly unfamiliar with, even after Hayes had already gained widespread recognition with *Shaft* in 1971 and his successful career as a songwriter at Stax Records. This raises doubts about his competence as an A&R professional. Nevertheless, he's determined to discover something that could redeem his standing.