Randy was an LA area native and avid surfer who was among the original pioneers of “surf music,” recording 30 albums with a variety of groups (including the original ‘Wipeout’ album with the Safaris). Sadly, he passed away less than three weeks after this interview took place. Family and friends said the cause of death was an apparent heart attack, possibly brought on due to the stress of losing everything to the fire and the strenuous effort he put into cleaning up his property and helping other people.
The Woolsey Fire marked the second time that Randy lost his home to flames. The first time was during the Agoura-Malibu Firestorm, which took place almost exactly 40 years earlier.
During the interview, Randy digressed into a brief account of his unique, celebrity-filled life. Because he now appears to be a victim of the Woolsey fire, it seems only fitting to pass that story along:
With the surf music scene starting to fade and America’s involvement in the Vietnam War ramping up in the mid 60’s, Randy left the U.S. to see the world. “I had no idea it would take me a year and a half,” he said. “I’d met Ravi Shankar at World Pacific Records, and he invited me to visit him if I was ever in India. I happened to arrive when George Harrison (of the Beatles) was there, and we became friends.”
Randy later joined a group of Peace Corps volunteers trekking into Tibet, where he met British war photographer Don McCullin. McCullin suggested that, ‘If you go to Calcutta, you should meet Mother Teresa,’ so Randy followed McCullin’s recommendation. “She was five feet tall wearing a little brown robe, living in a little cement room.
“After that, I returned to LA and was offered a job in music publishing. They moved me to New York, where I worked on the soundtrack for the 1970 film ‘Zabriskie Point’ as well as America’s first exposure to Pink Floyd. I was working on an album of unreleased Bob Dylan songs and knew his catalog pretty well. After a corporate takeover cancelled all my projects, I opened an LA office with Dylan’s manager because there were so many artists here.
During that time, I handled Dylan’s ‘Blonde on Blonde’ album along with ‘John Wesley Harding’ and ‘The Basement Tapes.’ After meeting Jimi Hendrix, I gave him a demo tape of five Dylan songs; and six months later he came back to me with his version of ‘All Along the Watch Tower.’” Unfortunately, Hendrix wasn’t the only ill-fated performer Randy worked with. “When Jan Joplin was recording ‘Pearl,’ I was in the studio working with her on the day she died."
On a brighter note, Randy said he also “Published funny stuff like Dr. Demento’s ‘Junk Food Junkie’ that did so well it helped me pay for my property out here in Malibu.” In addition, he worked on the Neil Young/Stephen Stills album ‘Long May You Run;’ and Young eventually became his neighbor in Malibu after purchasing the property next door.
Nauert bought property off Encinal Canyon Road in 1975 and spent several years building a house there, only to see it burn to the ground three years later in what became known as the Agoura-Malibu Firestorm. “My wife had a nervous breakdown after that. She couldn’t face coming back to the property. She told me, ‘This is too difficult, this is too hard. I’m going to try it with somebody else.’
“I ended up selling that property and bought raw land next door to it and started all over again.” Randy built three houses on the new property: one for himself, a guest house his Dad lived in (until his passing), and a rental home.
Forty years later (almost to the day), a fire broke out on Thursday, November 8 in the Woolsey Canyon area 20 miles northeast of Malibu. As a member of the local Arson Watch, Randy made a point of waking up early the next day to check on the fire’s progress. “I got up pretty early and the only coverage I could see on TV was the bombers (water dropping helicopters) on the Valley side of the freeway – nothing on our side.
“So I got into the Arson Watch van and drove up into the mountains to see if I could find out where the fire was, and discovered that it had gotten all the way to Fire Camp 13 – the women’s prison (just two miles from Randy’s house) – and it was BIG.
“I turned around and came back, and by the time I passed Charmlee Park it had already jumped the road and was burning down my ridge right towards the house. I raced down and went in and got a few things out of my desk, and by then the fire had come all the way down to within 80 feet of my house and it was 40 feet tall.
“The canyon was full of smoke – solid smoke – I couldn’t see to back out and I hit the rock wall in the driveway. Just as I got out, the whole house went ‘boom’ and burst into flames. I started heading down Encinal Canyon Road hoping I’d soon be able to come back and put out immediate fires. It just didn’t happen.
“I was down on Pacific Coast Highway helping other people evacuate. At one point, my friend Eric came up and said, ‘We drove through some flames and your car is on fire;’ so I got a fire extinguisher and went back to the property and put it out. By then, everything was gone. Everything had changed.
“Clinton and Olive – the donkey and the horse – their trailers were burning. I had turned them out into a big riding rink before the fire, and they were always in a clear space from the flames. The barn was burned. Gary Wonnacott and I went to Zuma Beach parking lot and got them a bale of hay, toasted oats and a feed bucket. I think they’re now with Elizabeth Gardner and the Pony Posse at White Cloud Ranch.
“I lost three homes and 14 vehicles, but I saved the donkey and the horse and got out with the dog. I was a homeless person with a dog standing in the road. We stood by Fire Station #99 for the first few days. Eric made sure that every night I had a clean, dry place to sleep and one good meal until I got this trailer, so now I don’t have to move anymore.
“It took over a month after the fire to get electricity back here. Some people just got phone and internet service back two weeks ago. It took me until Thanksgiving (three weeks after the fire) just to get a vehicle.” Randy’s only child, Mike Wibben, bought him a truck and brought it to him.
At the time of the interview, the financial picture wasn’t looking so good. “I still have to pay a mortgage. FEMA has rejected me. SBA has rejected me. There’s been no federal money, no state money, no county money – zero,” Randy said. “And my dog is diabetic and needs insulin.
“Gary and others helped me move 19 tons of charred vehicles out of here. A guy who worked for me, Roberto, and his father-in-law showed up about a week after the fire and came out to help three or four days a week, every week until now, hauling out the grinder, the generator, and cutting everything up and hauling it back to town. They refused to let me pay them. All of the vehicles are now gone except for the ’62 Ford – the car I was in when the ’78 fire was here.”
“Someone had left a blue Subaru at my house while they went off to Cabo san Lucas, and Blackie my cat survived the fire by staying inside it – but when he saw me, he ran away and wouldn’t come back. So every day I go put out a fresh can of cat food, and it’s always gone so he’s eating it. The car had a sunroof that was open, and that’s how the cat got in. He’s too scared to come back. Only in Malibu can you lose a million-dollar home and save a $15 cat, and everybody’s happy.”
