Here's something you might be interested in.
"I just want to point something out to you right here." Coe Lewis sets a smallish white box on the table at Einstein's and opens it to reveal: a pocket harmonica with set of pinkish lip prints.
"That's my lipstick," she says, "where my spit swapped with Robert Plant's."
And then there is the man's actual signature, an R and a P, which looks to me like two felt-penned circles.
I desperately want to touch the harmonica. I want to lift the thing out of its box, and I want to honk a few notes on it. I am a bit saddened by Lewis' lack of offer to do same, for I am a true rock star gear junkie.
In years past I have posed with Pat Travers' Gibson Les Paul double-cut. Ditto Tony Iommi and Ritchie Blackmore axes. I've sniffed the hallowed air inside of the Who's road cases, twittled the knobs on Carlos Santana's and Robin Trower's amplifiers.
Once, I was allowed to actually play one of Jimi Hendrix's inventory of Strats. No, not the Woodstock White or the Black Beauty. It was a plain 'burst he'd only written and jammed with, but believe me, the thrill was borderline insane.
But the Plant-Lewis harmonica stays in the box. Talk turns instead to DNA and laboratory baby jokes. We stop and wonder for a moment whether there is enough genetic material in the harp to clone a second Robert Plant.
As it turns out the harmonica was a Christmas gift to Lewis from her KGB FM morning show partner, Bob Buchmann.
"So basically, I'm thinking about what to get Coe for Christmas," Bob says. "I'm sitting in my office, remembering that I've got this harmonica in a box somewhere."
"I do have a little crush on Robert Plant," Lewis says.
"So I think," Buchmann says, "why not give her that?"
The back story of how that harp came to be, explains Buchmann, is that six or so years ago Robert Plant used an East Coast radio station Buchmann worked at as an interview hub. In other words, Plant sat in one studio and was telephone-interviewed all over the country.
"He came on my show, and he sang happy birthday, and he played this harp."
And, he autographed it. The harmonica was packed away, forgotten, and remained sealed in its box until it was gifted to Lewis.
Coe Lewis has worked on-air at KGB FM for a couple of decades. An American child of hotel-industry parents, she grew up in Ethiopia, Spain, Lebanon, and Belgium. Somehow, she got the hard rock bug while overseas. "Tapes and records were my friends."
Buchmann comes from Brooklyn. He worked Long Island rock radio, then graduated to a station in Manhattan before landing up in Los Angeles, then San Diego.
But the question remains: can Lewis play harmonica? And if so, will she? I'll never know. She puts the Plant harp back in her handbag and darts out for another appointment before I get the chance to ask.
http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2013/jan/17/38556/
http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2013/jan/17/38563/
"I just want to point something out to you right here." Coe Lewis sets a smallish white box on the table at Einstein's and opens it to reveal: a pocket harmonica with set of pinkish lip prints.
"That's my lipstick," she says, "where my spit swapped with Robert Plant's."
And then there is the man's actual signature, an R and a P, which looks to me like two felt-penned circles.
I desperately want to touch the harmonica. I want to lift the thing out of its box, and I want to honk a few notes on it. I am a bit saddened by Lewis' lack of offer to do same, for I am a true rock star gear junkie.
In years past I have posed with Pat Travers' Gibson Les Paul double-cut. Ditto Tony Iommi and Ritchie Blackmore axes. I've sniffed the hallowed air inside of the Who's road cases, twittled the knobs on Carlos Santana's and Robin Trower's amplifiers.
Once, I was allowed to actually play one of Jimi Hendrix's inventory of Strats. No, not the Woodstock White or the Black Beauty. It was a plain 'burst he'd only written and jammed with, but believe me, the thrill was borderline insane.
But the Plant-Lewis harmonica stays in the box. Talk turns instead to DNA and laboratory baby jokes. We stop and wonder for a moment whether there is enough genetic material in the harp to clone a second Robert Plant.
As it turns out the harmonica was a Christmas gift to Lewis from her KGB FM morning show partner, Bob Buchmann.
"So basically, I'm thinking about what to get Coe for Christmas," Bob says. "I'm sitting in my office, remembering that I've got this harmonica in a box somewhere."
"I do have a little crush on Robert Plant," Lewis says.
"So I think," Buchmann says, "why not give her that?"
The back story of how that harp came to be, explains Buchmann, is that six or so years ago Robert Plant used an East Coast radio station Buchmann worked at as an interview hub. In other words, Plant sat in one studio and was telephone-interviewed all over the country.
"He came on my show, and he sang happy birthday, and he played this harp."
And, he autographed it. The harmonica was packed away, forgotten, and remained sealed in its box until it was gifted to Lewis.
Coe Lewis has worked on-air at KGB FM for a couple of decades. An American child of hotel-industry parents, she grew up in Ethiopia, Spain, Lebanon, and Belgium. Somehow, she got the hard rock bug while overseas. "Tapes and records were my friends."
Buchmann comes from Brooklyn. He worked Long Island rock radio, then graduated to a station in Manhattan before landing up in Los Angeles, then San Diego.
But the question remains: can Lewis play harmonica? And if so, will she? I'll never know. She puts the Plant harp back in her handbag and darts out for another appointment before I get the chance to ask.
http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2013/jan/17/38556/
http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2013/jan/17/38563/