Tommy Chong: Almost smoking with The Beatles

From one corner of the room, a scratchy record plays, “Yellow Submarine” by The Beatles.

As a wrinkled paper fiddles between his pointer finger and thumb, going to light his match with the other hand. Heat rises, and a glistening flicker hovers over the joint in his mouth.

With a crackle and pop, the wrinkled end comes into an even burn. Now half-smoked, a smiling one puff, two puff, pass (everyone knows the rules) Tommy Chong exhales, as he offers John Lennon what he called, “A stinky joint”. Lennon declined due to his immigration status at the time, said Chong.

“I got high with Ringo Starr and he was on the wagon, so he never smoked either, but I stood next to him and smoked my joint,” Chong said. “I also got high with George, and George and I became pretty good friends.” 

While still trying to get his shit together, said Chong.

An 82-year-old at the top of his game, that dude who brought you “Up in Smoke”, and some guy peaking over “The Shades” enter; not all at the same time but, simultaneously, almost as if it was “Ordained”. 

Yo is that Tommy Chong?

It’s May 1939, and “The National Film Act” was just created. Smoke fills the sky and homes in Canada. The United States three years away from a Second World War and a small child lays face up towards the wooden ceiling of an Alberta home. 

A mixed aroma of spirits and cigar smoke spew from a solider, as he rests his hands on the surface in front of him. Leaning over noticing, small eyes growing in fear, as noise spills out, louder and louder it gains. Tearing through the “drunken soldiers” ears, looking down, a piece of ash lays on the smooth skin of a screaming baby Tommy Chong.

Growing up in Canada, Chong’s family moved to Halifax to be with his father. At that time, Chong’s father was a part of the Royal Artillery during the height of World War II. They moved back to British Columbia to be with relatives, after his father was sent off, said Chong.

With Chong’s father away, his mother then fell sick to tuberculosis and was placed in a sanitarium. He called themselves, “Nomads” at this point.

“Myself and my younger sister and older brother were put in a home, called the salvation army home in Calgary and we stayed there for a couple of years,” Chong said. “We got reunited with my mom and dad when I was about 5 or 6 years old.”

At the age of 8, Chong started playing guitar in a house band till he was 15 years old. Music, he said is his first love, and learning to back up musicians played a part in the development of “Cheech and Chong” (but let’s not get carried away just yet).

“We played all night, three, four sets a night and at that age, I got my early training,” Chong said. “That was always my genius, was being able to back up people.”

Now it’s 1956, a bass player from a jazz group heads down to Los Angeles. Bringing back with him, a Lenny Bruce record and marijuana cigarette, graciously handing it over to a 16-year-old Chong. He said that’s when he wanted to become a blues musician.

“It changed my life, it really did, I ended up, I think the next Monday I went there and quit school,” Chong said. “and I said, ‘Fuck it, I can’t do this I want to be a blues musician, I might as well get off the streets now,’ and so I did.”

This guy peeking over “The Shades” enters.    

Fresh off a tightly rolled California joint, Chong knew music could be his career. After dropping out of grade 11, he joined a band called “The Shades”, a play on words of the group’s diversity. The band went on to introduce the blues to Canada, said Chong. 

“We had a Canadian or Native Indian, named Dick Bird, and then there was Tommy Melton, a black Canadian, ex-slave descendant,” Chong said. “And then me, I was like in-between, half white, half Chinese, so we called ourselves “The Shades” because we were all different colors.”

Shortly after getting kicked out of Calgary. They fluttered back and forth from, Vancouver to the U.S. trying to land gigs. On a trip to the states, the group ran into someone who could take them over the shades, said Chong.

“When we were down in the states, we met a singer called, Bobby Taylor, who was a legend, even back then,” said Chong.

The group formed and became, “Bobby Taylor and The Vancouver’s”, writing the song, “Does Your Mama Know About Me?”. One of the first protest songs about dealing with racial inequality, said Chong. Which was co-written by Chong and eventually brought them to being discovered by “Motown”. 

The group claims responsibility for a shift in the culture of music, said Chong.

“It was “Bobby Taylor and The Vancouver’s” that pushed them into that line of entertainment,” said Chong.

As he hung out with the jazz musicians on “Motown”, that’s when he expanded on comedy. Placing credit of “all of his spiritual growth,” towards the jazz musicians, said Chong. 

“The one common denominator, in the ghetto, on the Chilton circuit, there was mostly laughter,” Chong said. “When you’re a minority race, you find humor in everything because you can’t be aggressive, you can’t fight.”

Playing with, “Stevie Wonder” and the “Temptations” on Motown’s Chilton circuit he had a wakeup call, said Chong. After accidentally getting fired from “Motown”, he was inspired to go off and do something on his own, said Chong.

“I found out that I could do comedy better than I could do music,” said Chong.

That Dude who brought you “Up In Smoke” enters.

Chong was given a club in Canada, (for free), he made a successful spot in, which then brought him another (free) club, said Chong.

This was going to be a different club, he said. Chong wanted to bring in musicians, actresses, and comedians to perform. 

Well okay, Chong said, those actresses were first strippers but, that didn’t stop them from creating a performance (Applause, Claps, and Onomatopoeias; stuff like that).

“We turned a money-making strip club into a money-losing improve theater,” said Chong. “The thing is, you didn’t have to pay actresses as much as you had to pay strippers.”

Cheech and Chong were fired from running the improve joint, after some financial losses.

“My brother literally fired us, and Cheech and I still wanted to keep doing it,” said Chong. “We joined up and became ‘Cheech and Chong’.”

Developing multiple skits from that comedy club, the relationship’s impact made the duo on the verge of icons in music, movies, and culture.

Writing and directing their first movie, “Up in Smoke” this led them to being the poster boys for Marijuana, said Chong. That never being their intentions, the country still hadn’t fully adapted to the culture at the time.

“Cheech and Chong” started to become activists for the stony community.

The group gained recognition not only from the comedic side of their movie but also through the music.

The soundtrack of “Up in Smoke” a 16 piece, full of Cheech and Chong, with some features won a Grammy in 1978. Making them become the laughing stock of comedy, in a good way. The groups name being dropped in tracks by all artists of the era, from Dr. Dre’s, “Keep Their Heads Ringin’” in ‘95, to Amy Winehouse’s, “You Know I’m No Good”.

Chong calls their relationship, “Ordained,” and “Written in the stars,”. The two eventually went their separate ways, both taking other roles and normal things, said Chong.

After they were split up by Hollywood, he tried to do a low budget movie, but claims he’s not very good at business and it ended up losing money.

Now hitting the fast- forward a- bit.

Casually skipping his appearances in “That 70’s Show” (ohhh he’s that guy). Scrubbing the part where he got into it with the Attorney General “Operation Pipe Dreams”, which led him to being locked up with Jordan Belfort.

We find ourselves here, it’s 2019.

An 82-year-old at the top of his game enters.

    From the other end of the camera, he flaunts his bag of “free weed”.

While we talked about what’s next for him, mentioning an upcoming “Cheech and Chong” tour. Preparing for “The First Farwell Tour” he laughs, saying there will probably be more than one.

Rolling back the time, reminiscing on old memories and sharing events from his life.

I asked, ‘Have you achieved and experienced everything, that you set out for in life?’.

Leaning back in his chair, he pauses for a moment, responding.

   “Well no,” said Chong. 

Slowly grinning, he goes on to explain the intro of this article.

Source: Tommy Chong

MUSIC