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[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”intro-text” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_orientation=”center” custom_padding=”||0px|||” locked=”off” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n
The big voice and bigger soul of the Mamas & The Papas, Cass Elliot<\/strong> heralded the Aquarian Age and called Crosby, Stills & Nash into being. Heroin, Manson and Vegas would help break her heart, but friends and bandmates will never forget the way she made the \u201960s swing. \u201cShe was like Gertrude Stein in Paris in the 1900s,\u201d they tell Mark Paytress.<\/strong><\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/10\/gettyimages_85348458_2048x2048.jpg” title_text=”Photo of Cass ELLIOT and Mama CASS” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text module_class=”image-gallery-caption” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font=”|300|||||||” text_font_size=”16px” text_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”-10px||||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Cass Elliot in her element, onstage in Australia<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”text-with-dropcap” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n APRIL 27, 1966: THE MAMAS & THE PAPAS are working in Western Recorders Studios on Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles. Fresh from a reception for The Hollies, Graham Nash has crashed the session. Quietly, he fancies his chances with Michelle Phillips, but the archetypal Californian blonde is overdubbing vocals with her songwriting husband John Phillips and Denny Doherty, the group\u2019s mellifluous tenor. Instead, Nash ventures outside and strikes up a conversation with the woman the world was just getting to know as Mama Cass.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]\u201cShe had a huge crush on John Lennon,\u201d Nash recalls, so she asked the Englishman what the Beatle might think of her music. \u201cHe\u2019d probably put you down,\u201d Nash replied candidly. Cass was crestfallen. \u201cWithin 15 minutes of meeting, she was in tears,\u201d Nash says. \u201cThat upset me greatly.\u201d[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Next morning, the Hollies man met with a different Cass Elliot. \u201cShe knew she could really sing,\u201d says Nash, \u201cthat The Mamas & The Papas were already very popular. She knew all that.\u201d In her convertible Porsche, Elliot pulled up at Byrds guitarist David Crosby\u2019s place where Nash duly had his mind blown with the first joint he\u2019d had in his life. For Elliot, Nash and the new rebel folk rock crowd, California dreaming was becoming a reality. <\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/10\/gettyimages_145824686_2048x2048.jpg” title_text=”The Big Three” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text module_class=”image-gallery-caption” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font=”|300|||||||” text_font_size=”16px” text_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”-10px||||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n BOSTON – 1963: The Big Three (L-R Tim Rose, Cass Elliot and James Hendricks) perform at Boston University.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”text-with-dropcap” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n YEARS BEFORE FLEETWOOD MAC and Abba, The Mamas & The Papas sang away hardship, heartache and all that interminable bed-hopping with a string of hopeful, harmony-driven, exquisitely arranged hits. Yet there was always something quirky about these midwives to the late-\u201960s love-in. \u201cI think there were things about the group physically that startled people,\u201d Cass Elliot reflected when it was all over. \u201cAs scruffy as could be,\u201d said Lou Adler, their manager and label boss.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Naturally, Elliot won most plaudits. Geoffrey Cannon in The Listener swooned over her \u201cmagnificent soaring power [that] makes Aretha Franklin sound like a schoolgirl\u201d. After she sat for two Andy Warhol \u2018Screen Tests\u2019, the pop artist declared her \u201cThe New Beauty\u201d. And at the height of flower power, Cass posed naked and proud on a bed of daisies for Cheetah magazine, a centrefold with her favourite butterfly motif tattooed on her ass. \u201cSuccess was a real boost to her self-esteem,\u201d says John Sebastian, Lovin\u2019 Spoonful frontman and close friend of pop\u2019s grandest voluptuary. \u201cShe got letters that would make you cry, little fat Jewish girls saying, \u2018You changed everything for me.\u2019 And Cass was the kind of person who\u2019d write back.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Everyone looked towards Cass Elliot. At the height of The Mamas & The Papas\u2019 fame, in October 1966, the quartet rolled into her native Baltimore for a couple of shows. Elliot stayed with the Eventoffs, whose singing teacher mother Ethel had \u201cwarmed up Cass\u2019s pipes\u201d a decade earlier. \u201cIn the morning,\u201d says son Nisan, \u201cCass threw me the keys to her Aston Martin and said, \u2018Take me to a deli.\u2019 We walked in and the whole place stopped. Cass wore a big hat and sunglasses, but you couldn\u2019t disguise her.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Anonymity didn\u2019t come easy to Elliot, the young drama student with the big voice. \u201cI was house act in a folk club called The Crooked Ear in Omaha,\u201d says Jim Hendricks, \u201cand she would sit in the front row and flirt with me. You know, make little faces. She was kinda cute.\u201d It worked. Soon afterwards, Hendricks was heading to the East Coast to join Elliot and Tim Rose in The Big 3. It was spring \u201963 and they were chasing the Peter, Paul & Mary market.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n \u201cCass was more a commercial folk singer,\u201d says Sebastian, \u201cbut with this powerful body projecting this voice.\u201d The memory of one song, Young Girl\u2019s Lament, still gives him chills. \u201c\u2018My body is ruined\/They\u2019ve left me to die.\u2019 Holy shit, that was rough to sing.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”pull-quote” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” header_2_text_align=”center” header_2_text_color=”#111111″ header_2_font_size=”46px” header_2_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”pullquote-name” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” header_2_text_align=”center” header_2_font_size=”46px” header_2_line_height=”1.2em” header_3_text_align=”center” header_3_text_color=”#111111″ header_3_font_size=”38px” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”text-with-dropcap” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n ON A CHRISTMAS \u201963 BREAK from The Big 3\u2019s Village residency at The Bitter End, Elliot and Hendricks \u2013 who she\u2019d recently married so he could avoid the draft \u2013 holidayed to Toronto. There, she rekindled a friendship with folkie Denny Doherty, heard The Beatles and decided she needed both in her life. \u201cTim was getting to be a thorn in our side,\u201d says Hendricks, \u201cso Cass pushed for Denny to sing with us.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Elliot, Doherty and Hendricks, plus Doherty\u2019s guitar-playing Toronto pal, Zal Yanovsky, duly became The Mugwumps, relocating to Washington DC, where Cass had studied Speech Arts at American University. Arriving with his harp and a bag of weed, John Sebastian briefly quit the Village to join them. \u201cMan, for two weeks I was farting through silk,\u201d he says, recalling his stay in the relative luxury of Arlington Park Towers. \u201cThat\u2019s where Cass painted all over the walls while whacked on LSD.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n \u201cMe, Cass and Zal were this triumvirate,\u201d Sebastian continues. \u201cShe invited me over to watch The Beatles on Ed Sullivan and said, \u2018Ringo\u2019s gonna be there.\u2019\u201d It turned out to be \u201cthis tall, Sephardic gentleman who, if you scaled him down, did resemble Ringo in a way.\u201d Cass had a hunch Sebastian and Yanovsky were kindred spirits. She was right: the following summer, The Lovin\u2019 Spoonful broke big with Do You Believe In Magic.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Back in Mugwump world \u2013 one with its own Cass-created lingo that Sebastian still rattles off today \u2013 passions stirred. \u201cDenny was a love interest,\u201d Sebastian says, \u201cand that made things more complicated.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n By early 1965, and with The Mugwumps fading, Doherty also moved on. He joined The New Journeymen, fronted by songwriter John Phillips and his wife Michelle. Tired of the East Coast folk scene, the threesome took off for St Thomas in the Virgin Islands armed with John\u2019s American Express card, a bunch of his latest songs and some liquid acid. Elliot, now singing jazz standards in a DC bar, heard about the trip from Doherty and packed her bags immediately.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n \u201cCass took a job as a waitress out there just to be in the same room as them,\u201d says Hendricks. The trio sang to audiences including groups of US Marines stationed on the island. Elliot dispensed the food, just as she\u2019d done from her father\u2019s mobile caf\u00e9 truck back in Baltimore a decade earlier. John Phillips, quoted in Eddi Fiegel\u2019s Cass Elliot biography, said she suffered \u201cmore humiliation in a week than a human deserved in a lifetime\u201d.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n To compound Cass\u2019s mortification, Phillips had no desire to bring her into the act, claiming spuriously that her vocal range was short of a couple of notes. As if by happenstance, a metal plumbing pipe dropped by a workman knocked Cass on the head and those two notes miraculously appeared \u2013 or so the story goes. \u201cJust the kind of thing Cass would come up with!\u201d Hendricks says.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/10\/gettyimages_84998880_2048x2048.jpg” title_text=”gettyimages_84998880_2048x2048″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text module_class=”image-gallery-caption” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font=”|300|||||||” text_font_size=”16px” text_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”-10px||||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Denny Doherty, Mama Cass Elliott, Michelle Phillips and John Phillips<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”text-with-dropcap” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n MEANWHILE, HENDRICKS HAD pitched up in LA, in an apartment close to the Whisky A Go-Go. By September \u201965, first Elliot then Doherty and the Phillipses had joined him. \u201cThe Mamas & The Papas kinda formed in my apartment,\u201d he says. \u201cThey had no money. It was like a throwback to the folk days.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n What they did have was chemistry: John\u2019s songs and production ideas; Denny\u2019s choirboy tenor; Michelle\u2019s fragile, mellow voice \u2013 excelling on ballads like Dedicated To The One I Love. And Cass \u2013 the poster child for new bohemian times.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n \u201cWe clicked instantly because we were different,\u201d Elliot told Cobey Black of the Honolulu Advertiser in 1973. \u201cWe added women\u2019s voices. Our material was fresh, clean and original. But what made our music special is that it was hopeful.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n The appeal of The Mamas & The Papas was spelt out in hits \u2013 six Billboard Top 5 placings between February \u201966 and summer \u201967, California Dreamin\u2019 to Creeque Alley. A year after Graham Nash had told her to expect only scorn from John Lennon, Elliot was staying just off the King\u2019s Road in London when The Beatles paid her a visit. It was here, in the dawn hours of one Sunday in April 1967, with the windows wide open, that an acetate of Sgt. Pepper had its first semi-public airing.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Elliot and co\u2019s hymns of hope had laid the ground for the Summer of Love. But by the time they closed the Monterey Festival in June \u201967, pop\u2019s first hippy family were feeling phoney and falling apart. John and Michelle\u2019s relationship was beset by infidelity. Denny had wooed Michelle but denied Cass. Moreover, Cass had given birth to daughter Owen in April 26, 1967 \u2013 the fruit of a one-night-stand.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n \u201cHis name was Chuck Day,\u201d says Owen Elliot-Kugell, who only discovered her father\u2019s identity in 1987. He had played guitar on early Mamas & Papas recordings and, as a Johnny Rivers regular, knocked out the classic Secret Agent Man riff.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n The Mamas & The Papas finally collapsed in spring \u201968. Cass, whose post-pregnancy crash diet saw her weight drop from 285lbs to 175lbs, was ready to strike out alone. \u201cIt was a big risk,\u201d says Dunhill session man Mike Deasy, \u201cbut Cass\u2019s gift was on the line.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n \u201cI felt I was carrying the other three,\u201d Elliot would tell MOJO\u2019s own Fred Dellar, then of the NME. \u201cWhy should I be doing all this work for the four of us when I could be earning more as a solo act?\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Something else toughened her resolve. \u201cMy mom had said to Denny, \u2018Marry me, I love you, I will take care of you,\u2019\u201d says Owen. \u201cAnd Denny said no. He told me he wasn\u2019t man enough to deal with who she was, and kind of regretted not taking her up on it.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n In June 1968, Dunhill Records gave Elliot its blessing, lifting a song from the group\u2019s fraught fourth album (The Papas & The Mamas) and releasing it on a 45 credited to Mama Cass With The Mamas & The Papas. A smoochy, old-time ballad once covered by Ella Fitzgerald and Doris Day, Dream A Little Dream Of Me was an elegant launch pad for Elliot\u2019s solo career, a Number 12 hit in the States and 11 in the UK. <\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”pull-quote” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” header_2_text_align=”center” header_2_text_color=”#111111″ header_2_font_size=”46px” header_2_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”pullquote-name” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” header_2_text_align=”center” header_2_font_size=”46px” header_2_line_height=”1.2em” header_3_text_align=”center” header_3_text_color=”#111111″ header_3_font_size=”38px” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”text-with-dropcap” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n JOHN SIMON, WHO PRODUCED Cass\u2019s first solo album, says the pop star\u2019s home she\u2019d bought in January 1967 now became \u201cheadquarters\u201d. Situated on the fringes of Laurel Canyon, 7708 Woodrow Wilson Drive was, says Graham Nash, \u201ca very peaceful house for Cass, faux-English style with lots of wood and carvings.\u201d It was her refuge, a longed-for piece of paradise and a perfect setting for the new mother and child. To make it complete, Cass brought the party home.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n \u201cShe was like Gertrude Stein in Paris in the 1900s,\u201d says Nash. \u201cYou\u2019d go to dinner and there\u2019d be movie stars, artists, composers, people who were moving and shaking.\u201d And by day, in the garden or by the pool with their acoustic guitars and perfectly matched voices, three young men began to busk out the sweet, mystic sound of future rock. \u201cCass was friends with David Crosby and Stephen Stills,\u201d says Nash. \u201cShe knew The Buffalo Springfield had broken up, that David had been thrown out of The Byrds. She also knew my voice. She thought the three of us could sing together.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Stills insists CSN took its collective bow at Cass Elliot\u2019s. Crosby and Nash err towards Joni Mitchell\u2019s cabin up on Lookout Mountain, possibly with Elliot cheering them on. What\u2019s not in doubt, says Nash, is that Elliot made it happen. \u201cI believe Cass intentionally put us together. That\u2019s how important she is.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n \u201cI worked out what would be my ideal group,\u201d Elliot confessed months later, in spring \u201969, weeks before the release of the first CSN album: \u201cDave Crosby, Steve Stills, Graham Nash and myself.\u201d The realisation that it wouldn\u2019t be CSN&E was, she said, \u201cthe bitterest blow\u201d. It\u2019s news to Nash, though: \u201cThat was never in any conversation or any idea.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Elliot covered Nash\u2019s Burn Your Hatred on her Dream A Little Dream solo debut, alongside songs by John Sebastian, Cyrus Faryar, Leonard Cohen and her sister Leah. \u201cWe weren\u2019t aiming for hits,\u201d says John Simon. \u201cIt was more like a home-made object you\u2019d find in a craft fair. Cass was totally professional, fun-loving and could sing like an angel.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Meanwhile, the singer had been shopping at Tiffany\u2019s on Rodeo Drive. Her manager had just done a quarter-million dollar deal for a stint in Las Vegas, and her sights were on the full-length sable coat she\u2019d been promising herself since she was a girl, entranced by the mention of same in the lyric to Johnny Burke and Jimmy Van Heusen\u2019s 1946 standard, Personality.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n \u201cWhen the curtains open, I want them to go, \u2018WHAT???\u2019\u201d Cass told Rolling Stone\u2019s Jerry Hopkins shortly before opening night at Caesars Palace. And on October 14, 1968, that\u2019s exactly what the audience did. The orchestra struck up the fanfare, Cass \u2013 still out of view \u2013 misjudged a cue and started to sing California Earthquake. Then more fault-lines: half-remembered lyrics, weird ad-libs, slurred words and a voice, noted Esquire magazine, \u201creduced to a crusty whisper\u201d. \u201cThis show will blow their minds!\u201d Cass had insisted backstage. The many friends who\u2019d come to support her, and who witnessed the audience walkouts, knew otherwise: Cass had just blown her career. The following day, she was released from her Vegas contract with immediate effect.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n \u201cIt was such a sad thing,\u201d says James Hendricks. \u201cHer manager had flown me down to see if I could straighten her out before the performance. We did a lot of walking, a lot of coffee, but it didn\u2019t help. She\u2019d taken some painkillers and she took too many.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n The truth was that, except for a spell in rehab, Elliot had been using heroin for over a year. \u201cYes, that did surprise me,\u201d says John Sebastian, a regular visitor to Woodrow Wilson Drive. \u201cBut that tells us something about Cass\u2019s skills as an obfuscator.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/10\/GettyImages_74282552.jpg” title_text=”Photo of %22The Mamas And The Papas%22″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text module_class=”image-gallery-caption” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font=”|300|||||||” text_font_size=”16px” text_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”-10px||||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n CIRCA 1970: The Mamas And The Papas.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”text-with-dropcap” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n AROUND THE TIME OF THE Vegas debacle, it was rumoured that Elliot planned to elope to Geneva with on-off lover Pic Dawson over Christmas. \u201cPic was trouble,\u201d says Caroline \u2018CC\u2019 Cox-Simon, who\u2019d met both Cass and Pic back in Washington DC. \u201cHe came from a wealthy family and had this devil-may-care attitude. It was very seductive. Cass absolutely loved him.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n But, as often happened in Elliot\u2019s private life, things got complicated. Backstage at Vegas, Elliot paraded a new fianc\u00e9, Billy Doyle. \u201cThose guys were bad news,\u201d Hendricks remembers.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Doyle and Dawson were regulars at Woodrow Wilson Drive, and embedded in Hollywood\u2019s elite party scene. In late August 1969, both were quizzed by police investigating what became known as the Manson murders. Elliot was also questioned. She was good friends with those slain at the Tate residence, a 20-minute drive away. Actor Michael Caine remembers being spooked by Manson one night at Elliot\u2019s place. And songwriter Jimmy Webb has claimed that Elliot was at the Tate murder scene before the police. Perhaps she was late for the party. Or, as is likely, she was never there.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n What\u2019s certain is that, like everyone else in the Hollywood Hills, Elliot was freaked by the tragic carnage. \u201cShe had a guy named Charles move into the house,\u201d says Owen. \u201cI have memories of him throwing knives in the backyard against a tree trunk. I think he was there for our protection.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n As for her career, Elliot affected not to care. \u201cI don\u2019t have any ambition, folks,\u201d she said post-Vegas. It wasn\u2019t mere face-saving. \u201cI\u2019ve never had any ambition,\u201d she reiterated. It was her inner rebel speaking, the one that never quite fitted in anywhere. Elliot was always, says John Sebastian, \u201ca bit of a misfit.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n By 1973, Cass felt ready to admit her predicament. \u201cI was looking for a home for myself in rock music,\u201d she told Skitch Henderson, \u201cwhereas all along I had known that I never really had a rock background. I liked classical music. I liked jazz. I liked what people now call middle of the road music. With The Mamas & The Papas, I was entrenched in rock music and when I left, I expected to stay there. But I didn\u2019t have the material, [and] I didn\u2019t really have the inclination.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n While her many peers and prot\u00e9g\u00e9s were all aboard rock\u2019s new express train, Elliot \u2013 who\u2019d famously mouthed \u201cWow!\u201d at Janis Joplin\u2019s performance at Monterey \u2013 returned to more natural territory in 1969 with It\u2019s Getting Better, a warm, upbeat bubblegum hit. The tie-in album suggested more: I Can Dream, Can\u2019t I?, a string-laden ode to ecstasy, sounds painfully close to the soul of Cass Elliot. After that, a stillborn collaboration with Traffic renegade Dave Mason was followed by two impressive, big budget 1972 solo albums for RCA. Her voice was better than ever, the songs were clearly close to her heart \u2013 and she photographed beautifully through the lens of legendary Hollywood shooter George Hurrell. In \u201971, Cass even got herself hitched \u2013 to dapper US writer Donald von Wiedenman, alias \u2018The Baron\u2019 \u2013 in a black dress from Biba. It didn\u2019t last long.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2025\/10\/gettyimages_84898929_2048x2048.jpg” title_text=”gettyimages_84898929_2048x2048″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text module_class=”image-gallery-caption” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font=”|300|||||||” text_font_size=”16px” text_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”-10px||||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Cass Elliot takes to the microphone in front of a red background.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”text-with-dropcap” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n ELLIOT HAD FAR MORE SUCCESS as a regular face on US television. Personality, the song she\u2019d loved as a kid, helped define what she had and who she was. \u201cShe could adapt to any situation,\u201d says Nisan Eventoff. \u201cAnd her talking voice was as beautiful as her singing voice.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n During 1972, she used that voice to help make the world a better place. She got behind the Voter Registration campaign and laid into US foreign policy. \u201cWhat we\u2019re doing is barbaric,\u201d she said. \u201c[It\u2019s] bomb them out or buy them out.\u201d She earned a large FBI dossier for her troubles.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Elliot even spoke of becoming a Senator one day. But first, she needed to secure her place in the entertainment world. Sparkling in pink in her new show, Don\u2019t Call Me Mama Anymore, she finally succeeded in Vegas, earning fine reviews in 1973 for her standards-heavy shows at the Flamingo. In July 1974, she was booked into the London Palladium for two weeks. En route, Cass stopped off in New York to spend time with John Simon and old pal \u2018CC\u2019, now Simon\u2019s wife.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n \u201cDuke Ellington had just died,\u201d says Simon, \u201cso I dashed together an arrangement of Mood Indigo which Cass sang on a makeshift stage in a neighbour\u2019s cabin with some high school kids on horns. It was just beautiful.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Elliot wasn\u2019t alone during that woodland sojourn. \u201cShe came with Pic,\u201d says Caroline. \u201cShe talked about her sadness that it had not worked out, but I think she\u2019d grown to love him in a different way.\u201d Certainly, their intimacy had been restored. Hours before leaving for London, Cass called The Baron. \u201cMy, my,\u201d she said. \u201cHow time flies when you\u2019re having sex.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Supporting Elliot at the Palladium were Paper Lace. \u201cShe was normal, at ease and seemed perfectly happy,\u201d says singer Phil Wright, who loved the show and met her backstage. But on July 29, two days after the last performance, Cass was dead.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n \u201cI understood she choked on a sandwich,\u201d says Wright. It wasn\u2019t true. The urban myth derived from a hasty, incautious autopsy report. Some, David Crosby included, blame long-term drug use. Others point to recent hospitalisations back in the States and insist there is no mystery.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n \u201cMy mother passed away from natural causes,\u201c says Owen Elliot-Kugell. \u201cShe\u2019d been up all night at Mick Jagger\u2019s birthday party. And all that dieting does something to the muscles around your heart. That\u2019s why she died.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Graham Nash was with Cass\u2019s brother-in-law, Russ Kunkel, when he heard the news. \u201cWe were on a balcony somewhere in Florida and we were incredibly upset. Then this beautiful, red, what looked like a mammoth butterfly, came floating by, stopped in front of us then flew off.\u201d The pair looked at each other, knowingly: \u201cAn amazing moment.\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_divider color=”#111111″ module_class=”custom-divider” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” custom_padding=”||0px||false|false” locked=”off” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_divider][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” locked=”off” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n This article first appeared in issue 315 of Mojo.<\/em><\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”credit-names” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font_size=”14px” text_orientation=”center” locked=”off” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Images: Getty<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The big voice and bigger soul of the Mamas & The Papas, Cass Elliot heralded the Aquarian Age and called Crosby, Stills & Nash into being.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":3351,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"on","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3345","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mojo-presents"],"acf":[],"modified_by":"kschwarz","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3345","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3345"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3345\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3473,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3345\/revisions\/3473"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3351"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3345"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3345"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3345"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}“Success was a real boost to her self-esteem. She got letters that would make you cry.”<\/h2>\n
John Sebastian<\/b><\/h3>\n
\u201dYou\u2019d go to dinner and there\u2019d be movie stars, artists, composers.\u201d<\/h2>\n
Graham Nash<\/b><\/h3>\n