These are not pointless resolutions for a new year. They are simply life lessons that were hammered home to my heart in 2013 and will no doubt shape and strengthen me through 2014.
1. We're All Gonna Die
So Let's Be Nice. -- Iggy Pop.
2. There is no tomorrow so live as much life as you can fathom today.
3. If you are spending time with somebody who means something special to you, let them know their worth to you every chance you get. Someday you will be here and they will not.
4. Work plus time equals money.
5. Knowledge without mileage equals bullshit.
6. Do something for a job that makes you happy and you will never work a day in your life.
7. As long as you are contributing 100 percent to your life or your relationships or your job or your goals, stop giving a fuck what the other person is doing.
8. Never trust someone who can't look you in the eyes, smile and ask how you are doing.
9. Never be afraid to ask someone for help. If they can't help you, forgive them. If they won't help you, forget them.
I just stopped writing and started living.
I got married. I changed jobs and started working in a field that enhanced my personality.
I went out more and made a lot of friends.
One of those friends was Greg Verdusco.
I don't remember exactly how I met Greg. I'd seen him around a lot at my friend Todd's shows and later I got to know him at Todd's house. He didn't look like the type of person I ran into at those gatherings. He had a cool factor to him that most people there lacked. He seemed, like myself, to be a lot more critical and less awestruck by what bands were playing onstage that night, yet genuinely supportive of people whom he liked personally. It turned out I wasn't the only one in the crowd who noticed bum notes and/or bad cover song choices.
I was intimidated by him immediately. I was no longer the smartest guy in the room.
I remember the first time I saw him play live. First, he was left handed. You notice that when Paul McCartney and Jimi Hendrix are your heroes. Second, he had this stunning white left-handed Gretsch Falcon guitar, which he played with this Johnny Ramone/Johnny Thunders-like reckless abandon, which I found so refreshing in this Vegas sea of Randy Rhoads wannabes I find myself trapped in.
Through our mutual acquaintance Todd, I find myself hanging out and chatting Greg up on a regular basis. I realize he knows twice as much about KISS, Cheap Trick and The Ramones as I do, which is a first for me. Normally, I'm the guy musicians and fans call to verify details about those bands.
Soon, Greg became the guy I called when I needed the exact date Gene Simmons started playing an axe-shaped bass and what make and model it was. (1979 Dynasty tour--Kramer Axe Bass...FYI)
Because of schedules, Greg, Todd and myself didn't physically hang out together as much as we would have liked, but we were always in contact talking endlessly about nothing. We had several KISS Trivia game sessions at Todd's new house that went on for hours, literally listening to every CD the band released in the 1970's while fighting to the death until one of us acquired all four cards with members' faces on them to declare a hard but hollow victory. The three of us would then get hit up all the time by other friends of ours who wanted to come down and play but we never really had the time or energy needed to do another one once Todd started living on the road, Greg started a new band and I went to work for both The Beatles and KISS and living out my fanboy dream.
Greg's band became The Bloody Villains. I think I was at their first or second gig. They were awesome. Greg wrote, sang and played lead on all the numbers. They had shades of The Heartbreakers and X and Dead Boys in their sound and performance, but they looked like greasers in a street-rod club. I loved them from the git-go. Greg, as usual, never phoned it in. He was his usual calm and laid-back self until they plugged in and then he became a man on fire. Sweating and thrashing and dropping to his knees in a frenzy you only normally saw in James Brown or Iggy Pop.
I've always said the best live bands such as The Ramones or Motorhead always made me feel like I'd done a long mainline of pure adrenaline without all the negativity and self-destruction that comes with hard drugs. The Bloody Villains really were set on becoming another of those bands in my heart.
Greg and Todd and myself were all keeping very busy but would occasionally have time for a lunch date followed by a visit to KISS Mini Golf and ZIA Records. We literally spent two hours standing in ZIA's parking lot once just talking about Anchorman and Will Ferrell on SNL. It still boggles my mind that we could have these conversations and somehow have wives and families that hadn't deserted us. The three of us could speak about things in a type of shorthand that is very rare among anyone else I've known. I'd known Greg barely three years and yet I felt like I'd grown up with him my whole life, because when he talked about things he felt passion about, I completely knew where he was coming from.
The last time I saw Greg was on Tuesday, September 4th. I was emceeing a rock trivia tournament at KISS that I was dying to get Greg involved in. He finally made it in on our fifth week. He brought in a replica poster of KISS' debut album which I was able to get him a couple bucks for in exchange that we hang it up in the building. He looked thinner and a little tired but generally was in his usual talkative, joking mood. He confided to me that he may have to leave early due to an acid reflux situation which had been plaguing him for weeks. He told me he was scared shitless about a doctor visit the next day to get a scope on his insides to verify if the acid reflux was cancer-related. Being the eternal optimist, I shrugged it off and told him he would be fine and that people go through these weird treatments all the time and they fight back and win due to sheer will power and inner strength, which he had no shortage of.
Needless to say, as days became weeks, I would keep in touch as best as I could. As much as I tried hoping and wishing for better news, as many positive thoughts I could muster up for him and his lovely wife during his treatments, as hard as I tried to make him laugh during our all-too-brief phone conversations, all the fight he had in the world was still not enough to keep him in it.
When he finally left us, it was after an excruciating three months of chemotherapy and radiation. I'm crushed to say that there was one thing in this world that worked harder than Greg did, and that was his illness.
I had never lost a friend before. I have had relatives a generation or two older than myself die and that was hardly easy but it was sort of expected. It all fits into that circle of life concept you learn from seeing The Lion King. As I get older, I hear about people who I kind of knew as a teenager or a twenty-something that have passed on for whatever reason, but they were always people I hadn't had contact with in two decades. That somehow alleviated the shock when I heard the news. But I counted my stars as being one of the few who had yet to lose a real friend at age 44.
I started to keep a new perspective on what I learned from being around Greg. I realized that if I have convictions about anything, whether politics or bands or movies or culture, someone will appreciate those convictions of mine regardless of whether or not they agree with me. If I didn't give 100 % to everything I put my name on, I might as well just give zero to it because that's how much it will mean to everyone else otherwise. The guy was never half-assed in performance or in his conversations with me or in his tastes. Like me, he was incapable of just casually liking KISS, The Ramones or Cheap Trick. We both have very strong, passionate feelings about why and how those bands and their ilk shaped and defined our identities. You either LOVED them with your bones or you had no feeling whatsoever. There was no 'like' in the equation.
As inspired and honored as I am from knowing Greg, I really have to shed an equal amount of that awe and inspiration towards his lovely and amazing wife Allison. She was not only a rock for Greg, but for all of us who wanted to do more leading up to the very end. I visited their house twice in his last weeks and she ended up consoling me and being my rock when I had every intention of doing just that for her. I never wanted to make it about me and I hope she understands that. I don't write this with the mindset that I got the shit end of the stick. Far from it. I am only able to help put Greg's influence on me in perspective thanks to her example of strength and pride and unconditional love in the face of tragedy.
Because of Greg as well as Allison, I guess you could say I'm lucky enough to have two people that changed my life and how I live it.
My only parting thought is to ask yourself who do you know that has changed your life and how you live it? Have you shown that person what they mean to you? If not, what are you waiting for?
Every now and then something from your past pops up and hits you upside the head without an ounce of warning. I had that happen to me today.
My hetero life mate Demolition Dave was searching for an old password in his inbox and found a piece that I wrote for our partner in crime Miss Keli when she was publishing a short-lived newspaper called MONKEY INK in 2000. She was kind enough to print a couple concert reviews I sent her and I compiled this fragmented recollection of New Years Eve, 2000-01. Sadly, the issue containing this story never went to press and, until today, I completely forgot I ever wrote this....
Dec.31,2000 8:00 PM- The festivities began early as we convene at Miss Keli's Bungalow Lounge for some tasty libations. We fill our flasks and our bellies full of rum. We greet new and old friends alike. We pose for pre-show snapshots. We hear stories of romance from McFarlane and the Tiger Lady from Pahrump. We each get groped and frenched by a slightly loopy Demo Dave.
10:30 PM- The party is now divided into two camps traveling towards Mandalay Bay. McFarlane uses his press credentials to get us a parking space in the garage. The amazing thing is that McFarlane has as much press credentials as I do!!!It set the tone for the evening.Demo Dave stole my favorite Harley Davidson winter cap and the last I saw of it was inside Tiger Lady's car. It too was fingerfucked that night by a considerably toasted Demo Dave.
11:00 PM- The courtyard at The HOB is very packed and groovin thanks to Sweet Al and The Neon Chameleons. If the music got any funkier it would be sharing a cell with Rick James. No sign of what happened to the second team from the Bungalow Party. Mix Michelle and her Motor City Madhouse was AWOL. They were gonna miss out on their midnight tongue kiss by the soon-to-be demolished Demolition Dave. I worried that I would not be so lucky.
11:30 PM- The HOB Theatre is ten times sweatier and busier than the Courtyard. A feat made staggeringly unfathomable by the fact that The Goo Goo Dolls are playing. The VH1 house band were surprisingly energetic and lively. Honest. Maybe they had a couple drinks hoping to get a sequel to their "BEHIND THE MUSICK" special. Or maybe they were just trying to keep up with Demo Dave, who by this time was out-performing Nicolas Cage in "Leaving Las Vegas" by a landslide. I think he actually got oral sex from one of those tiki statue heads in the club.
12:00 MIDNIGHT- Happy New Year. JANUARY 1, 2001-12:01 AM- I dont feel any different than I did last year. I thought of the person I wished I was with at that moment. I took a little solace in the fact that she wasn't with the person she wished to ring in the new year with,either!!
12:45 AM- Back upstairs at the HOB Courtyard. The Disco Dudes are still turning the beat around. The chicks don't look so uptight like they did two hours and twelve beers ago. Demo Dave chats his way into a group of them. Captain Morgan has apparently knighted him the Pompatus Of Love for the time being. I dance a bit until I start to feel a little tired. Then I remember what was next on the evening's menu.
1:30 AM- Guns N Roses are scheduled for a 2 AM gig inside the theater. We arrive at the VIP lounge for soundcheck. This show was a huge deal. This was the first GNR show in about eight years. This was to be Axl's first public appearance out of court in eight years as well. This would be his first show with his new version of GNR. Metal Marcus, Miss Keli and myself empty our flasks and toast the reunion of our newly discovered pal Mix Michelle. Demo Dave stayed behind downstairs. He was lining up the drunken club sluts to participate in the world's first all-girl Bukkake Video. He had his ammo ready but needed plenty to shoot at, knowwhatimean???
2:15 AM- A handful of L.A. types file into the VIP area. Still no sign of GNR yet. Three truly stunning beauties escaped Demo Dave's recruiting downstairs to sit at the couch next to us. Two of them passed out within minutes. Roofies and Champagne. Hookers and Blow. A SURE THING!!! Turns out the two actually were hookers that finally crashed from all the blow they did earlier. These trophy chicks certainly did not need the breast implants but I'm very happy they let me inspect them for cancer lumps anyway!!
3:30 Am- Finally!!! The strains of "welcome To The Jungle" filled the House. We all scurried about for a peek at the Loch Ness Monster of Metal. He sounded OK. He looked awful. He wore a hockey jersey and black sweatpants. He needed a new StairMaster for Christmas. He only occasionally adressed the crowd, and when he did it was of the "Thank You for coming" variety. His energy level was way below what it was in those old videos. After the fifth or sixth song, those famous high notes became his worst enemy. The band, while competent enough, lacked the real chemistry and charm the previous lineups had. One guitarist, aptly named Buckethead for the KFC bucket he wore, looked like a bad Marilyn Manson impersonator. The rest of the guys, including Tommy Stinson of The Replacements, Brain from Primus, and Robin Finck from NIN, really just came off like a GNR tribute band without the energy. An interesting show to tell people you saw, but nowhere near its level of hype. Too bad.
5:30 AM- A misunderstanding between our party and the rented security team resulted in an early departure. We'd seen enough, anyway. As we stood in the LOOOOOONNNNGGG line for a cab we found Demo Dave with a hip new green Afro and the nametag bearing the moniker of Mr.Brownstone. It apparently was a souvenir he got since he showed up to GNR a little late.On the cab ride he must proposed marriage to each of us at least a dozen times. Only I was foolish enough to accept more than twice. We will be looking forward to spending our next new year's eve with our beautiful daughter, Tiffany, a 17-year-old dance student that we've adopted along with her fellow students, Diamond and Pearl. See Ya Next Year!!!
POST SCRIPT-- We made it into all three of shows as a fluke. Had we paid for tickets, it would have been 500 bucks each easily. This was definitely one of those HOW DID I DO THAT? moments in my life. We had hung out at House Of Blues enough times to know about the service elevator in the kitchen that had no security. I swear it was like the scene in GOODFELLAS with Henry and Karen Hill at the Copacabana.
Somewhere I actually have photos of this night. I recently cleaned house and found evidence of the green Afro wig, fuzzy pictures of Axl onstage and, best of all, the topless hookers upstairs. We were eventually busted for walking around the balcony area with no tickets and taking said photographs. This was before cell phones had cameras so the bouncers couldn't just order you to put it away. If I were not actually at this party, I would never have believed it myself.
Let's Spend The Night Together is a new documentary about groupies airing on VH1 featuring the world's most renowned groupie Miss Pamela Des Barres. It follows Pamela around the country as she shares memories with other notable groupies who, after 40 years, still seem to enjoy being famous for fucking people more famous than themselves.
It's impossible to be a classic rock fan and not know these women by name. Pamela Des Barres has made a literary career out of writing five books worth of sexploits involving the likes of Jimmy Page, Mick Jagger, Keith Moon and many more musicians from the 60s and 70s.
Cynthia Plaster Caster is legendary for collecting plaster molds of rock star cocks such as Jimi Hendrix and Wayne Kramer of The MC5. She even inspired one of my favorite KISS songs, "Plaster Caster". Everyone needs an angle in showbiz and Cynthia definitely found hers and has been, uh, milking it for all it's worth.
Sweet Connie Hamzy is immortalized in the Grand Funk Railroad song "We're An American Band" and has seemingly fucked more musicians than Napster. Seriously, my brain was melting after her recent interview on Howard Stern. This woman dropped more names than a crackhead cutting a plea-bargain with a vice cop. Connie is one of those groupies who apparently has no quality control meter in her head, just a lot of rock star/road crew/event staff spunk.
The two surprises in the film were Tura Satana, an old flame of Elvis Presley who went on to cult movie immortality in Faster Pussycat! Kill! Kill! and Cassandra Peterson, who had flings with Tom Jones, Elvis and Jimi Hendrix and then went on to TV immortality as Elvira-Mistress Of The Dark. For some reason, these two women didn't come off quite as desperate for attention to me as the others. Maybe because they were too realistic about their careers and their future endeavors to think that anything serious was to happen between their dalliances. I guess they just chalked it up to being in the right place at the right time and don't try to convince the audience (or themselves) that they were muses involved in some spiritual meeting of divine souls, which, rather pathetically, is something the other girls seem to revel in.
What I came away with from this documentary was sadness for these women more than anything. The majority of the interviewees seem to suffer from delusions of grandeur. They genuinely believe four decades after their affairs in the drug-fueled world of Seventies arena rock that they were important contributing factors to the bands' creativity. Yet, if that were true, why were these relationships so fleeting and seemingly without any lasting commitment from the men? Were any of these women ever invited to the musicians' actual homes and included in their "normal" lives with family and friends? What was the appeal of jumping from one tour bus to another assuming this would lead to stability and yet never realistically pursuing it?
I felt particularly sad for Connie,a woman in her mid-fifties who lives alone in a house cluttered with posters and memorabilia of every musician she has had sex with. Trust me, she has so many souvenirs she could be on a rock and roll episode of "Hoarders". And I get the feeling she is not singular in this aspect. I deeply suspect there are thousands more like her in complete denial or utter disbelief that they will end up like lonely old spinsters from the Free Love generation.
In the interest of full disclosure, I have in-laws and close friends in the music business. A handful of them spend their lives in constant motion encased in a crypt on a tour bus (if they are lucky, a car if they aren't)nearly twenty two hours a day for months at a time. It's not that glamorous.
Neither is hanging out backstage. I've done it a lot. It's fucking boring. You are forced to sit on a smelly couch in a smelly closet next to smelly people with little or no food, drinks or entertainment. Like a road trip with your parents to Walley World in 1981. I swear to God for years I've been plotting a lawsuit against Motley Crue for false advertising in their music videos.
Yet this is the life that was chosen by them and I can say the same for the groupies, past and present, young and old. I genuinely try not to come off as judgmental and sanctimonious on this subject. I truly love musicians and their work and understand the personal sacrifice that goes into that job day and night. But, I guess, from my perspective, I don't see the glamour and prestige and the magic that typical fans see when a live band plays a song they love.I'm almost jealous of them for that. I still get the hair on my arms standing up now and then, but it's in the subtle things now, like a wink or a nod between members when a bum note slips out,or when a song gets an unexpectedly huge reaction, or maybe even no reaction at all.
It's in that moment that I feel like I'm involved with the band personally. I'm just so eternally grateful this moment of clarity occurs from the comfort of my seat and not the caps of my knees.
This is the post I've been dreading to write. Mostly because I knew it had to be written since the day I started this page.
John Lennon died 30 years ago tonight. Some people never recovered from Pearl Harbor, Kent State or 9-11. I never recovered from the winter of 1980.
I was twelve years old. My grandfather who was my only real kindred spirit in my family at the time died of a heart attack the day after Thanksgiving. I was still pretty shell shocked from that psychological earthquake when on a Monday night I'm just sitting in the dark of my living room staring blankly at the TV showing some bad sitcom called "Ladies Man" when half of my entire friend population in seventh grade calls me at 9PM.
I had two friends. Carl and Vince. To say we were unpopular at school would be an insult to the true losers we aspired to be someday. Why were we unpopular? We only talked about three subjects, Saturday Night Live, Star Wars and The Beatles.
Carl calls me crying saying John is dead. I knew exactly who we was talking about. We only referred to one guy as John, and it wasn't Belushi. I didn't believe him. I was sure it was a mistake.
"Some motherfucker shot him, man." He hung up. I still hear him today saying that line yet I haven't spoken to him since 1984.
I don't think I slept that night. I cried a lot for the remainder of the year. I have been crying the week of Thanksgiving through December 8th every year since. I listen to anything John Lennon sang for the entire period and think hard about how cold and dark and gray the world has seemed to me ever since.
I have come to accept that this feeling will just hit me at this time of year for as long as it is supposed to. I don't prepare for it. I don't anticipate it. I don't try to deny or ignore it. I let it happen and then I say goodbye to it tomorrow. Until next time.
It sure does make me appreciate the love I have in the world come Christmas time. Anyone who has taken a minute of their hectic schedules to indulge my ramblings here has my undying thanks. I try very hard to keep these posts from being too self-indulgent although I realize that can be nearly impossible.
For all you who wonder how or why I'm always laughing and trying to bring my loved ones together and have a good time all the time, it's because I know all too well how quickly we can lose our favorite people and how much they are missed once they are gone.
A couple of weeks ago, i was in the trashy elegance of Hollywood, CA. I walked a couple blocks from the theater i was waiting to see a show in that night to my personal Mecca. That legendary iconic spot where everything I love about the world is right before me.
The Hollywood sign? The Walk Of Fame? The Rainbow Bar and Grill? The Capitol Records building? The Chinese Theater?
No fucking way.
Amoeba Records on Sunset Blvd. is my home away from home. My Disneyland. I would drive the five hours from my house every month if I could afford it.
Some people like the mall. Some people like Starbucks. Some people like bars. I could spend a whole day at Amoeba and still not get enough done out of my visit. The last time I was there as soon as I walked in I was overwhelmed with this adrenaline in my veins. I am surrounded by the entire solo collection of John Lennon in a huge white 200 dollar box, some rare limited edition import Bowie box sets and an out of print GNR Live Like A Suicide on 33 rpm vinyl. Seemingly every CD title from every band imaginable is displayed before me in new or used condition.
It just takes me back to being a kid in the 70s and 80s who was obsessed with not just music, but records. Some people have a leather fetish, mine was vinyl. I know by the start of the 90s I had something like 500 or 600 albums alone, and probably that combined amount in cassettes and CDs also. At least a third of that catalog was Beatles-related alone. Yeah, I was a geek. But, fuckin' A, I knew my bands probably better than they did.
I think the main reason I adore going to Amoeba so much is simply because the record store itself is such an anomaly in the 21st century. Let's face it, nowadays convenience is king. Why drive somewhere to pick up the new Radiohead CD and pay the store's price when i just point and click and it's sent to my inbox to download and enjoy AND I can just pay what I want for it? I don't have to drive to Borders for the new Keith Richards autobiography when i can just download it to my IPAD for a fraction of the hardcover cost? Believe me, I understand the appeal.
But that doesn't mean I gotta go along with it.
I bring up this story to turn you on to yet another exciting rockumentary i watched recently. I NEED THAT RECORD! is a chronicle of the rise and fall and slow death of not just independently-owned record stores but the music industry itself. It interviews a lot of rock stars and journalists as well as those who champion the indie biz and the fans who keep it going. It helps one understand what record stores mean to a small but fiercely passionate percentage of the population; i.e. people like myself. It's an intangible satisfaction we get that puts some kind of emotional connection to this piece of property that we don't get from ITUNES or Rhapsody.
I don't go to Wal Mart or Best Buy to pick up music. I guess i can see why somebody would because they are already there to pick up groceries or a weed whacker or something. Why not check out the new Nickelback or Taylor Swift CD for my truck, right?
At home, I go to ZIA Records. I don't get the rush I get from going to Amoeba in LA but it still fits my aesthetic going there to trade stuff in and walk out with something else to enjoy.
I hope you have time to check this movie out. It will likely reinforce your commitment to music if you already have one.
I will acquiesce to convenience in this parting shot. I watched this film on my TIVO with my instant Netflix viewing option. I'm not above the point-and-click if it brings my satisfaction and music-geek enlightnment from the comfort of my couch.
It's been a great year for rockumentaries and my next piece of evidence is a doozy. Recently released on DVD and Netflix Instant Queue, I had the pleasure of seeing "WHO IS HARRY NILSSON AND WHY IS EVERYBODY TALKIN' ABOUT HIM?"
For those reading this who can't answer that question, watch this.
Harry Nilsson was an extremely gifted singer-songwriter who achieved much commercial and critical success in the early Seventies. He had the respect and admiration of The Beatles, Monty Python and Brian Wilson, and with good reason. His talent was on the same level as theirs. He was probably best known, at least for myself, as a hard core LA party monster who figured heavily into John Lennon's "Lost Weekend that lasted 18 months" in his words.
Lennon actually plays a very symbolic role in the story. They were extremely close friends. They had parallel childhoods, unbreakable artistic integrity and a sharp sense of humor about life. After Lennon's murder, Nilsson campaigned for stricter handgun laws and later retired from the music industry and concentrated on raising a family.
Nilsson was a fine example of that long list of geniuses who should have been bigger than they were. For whatever reason, Harry is one of those guys who, it seems, only real music fans are familiar with. Leonard Cohen, Randy Newman, and Tom Waits would be the closest I could compare him to. He's just one of those guys who you may recognize a couple of his songs but you really had to a music lover to understand how far reaching his influence was.
I highly recommend this movie if only because I learned so much about a man who had a long lasting effect on the lives of people, like John and Ringo, who in turn had a major influence on my own life. The movie itself was like the music of Harry Nilsson. It was joyous. It was witty. It was sad. It was deep.
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