“It’s my most precious possession,” Max Ochs says as he retrieves a piece of broken metal from a guitar case — a scrap of trash he found on a dirt road in New Mexico in 1967 that he’s been toting around as a guitar slide for more than half a century. “The old cars were heavy, and they needed a really substantial car jack, and this piece had just broken off so beautifully,” he says, half smiling, fully aware that he’s holding his life’s essence in his palm.
Max Ochs never wanted to become a folk legend — just a better listener
He rubbed elbows with Bob Dylan and Richie Havens. He studied the blues with John Fahey and Robbie Basho. But his musical ambition always felt different.
