Metal, Madness & Mayhem - An Insiders Journey Through The Hollywood 80s Read online

  We talked for a while and I promised Steve that I would to make it to the show and check it out.

  CHAPTER THREE

  The phone early the next morning. I didn't mind as soon as I realized it was a very sexy female voice all excited. “We're on the. bill Mike!” “I got the call at 2am!”

  “Who? What bill?”

  “W.A.S.P. Saturday night at the Troubadour!”

  As I started to regain conconess, I realized it was Betsy Weiss from ‘Bitch.’

  Bitch and Images had a brief but close history going back a few months when each band started out playing the Troubadour dates together. Our crowd liked them, and their crowd liked us. We would trade equipment and co-promote our shows sharing ads in the local press. I liked Bitch a lot, and there was discussion at one point where I would take over their management (amicably) from her mother who was currently handling the bands business affairs.

  I felt Betsy and her band could fill a niche void in the now-emerging (local) metal genre as a novelty act at the very least. She was extremely hot looking, very aware of her sexuality, had a decent voice and happened to be great performer. Additionally, the bands original songs were decent enough that I felt would garner at least some radio airplay and the musicians themselves were talented and skilled.

  Part of the Bitch stage show was her submitting to a gang-bang wherein the lead guitarist and the bass player would throw her on the floor, handcuff her to the drum riser, rip off her black pumps, fishnets and garter belt, tossed into the audience and proceed to violate her in ever way you can imagine with their guitars. The crowd loved it and besides, she seemed to enjoy it. Rock doesn't get any better than this.

  I had already thought of a title: Porn-Metal.

  I arrived early at the W.A.S.P. show while the large crowd was filtering in. The line snaked four blocks up Doheny Drive, a unusual mixture of Hollywood regulars and a good share of Aqua-Netted ‘Valley-ites’ drawn by the ads W.A.S.P. had run in BAM magazine as well as The L.A. Weekly and Music Connection.

  Walking in, I took a few minutes to say hello to Big 'Biker' Ron, head of Troubadour security, Lyle Atkins, Ron's assistant and a former Vietnam era Navy SEAL and then current member of a famous motorcycle club (who was to later work security for me) as well as Tony the manager and the various bartenders and waitresses I had come to know over the previous few months.

  I then went upstairs to Bitch's dressing room to wish them good luck with the show. "It's not good luck”, it’s "break a leg" Betsy pointed out to me. O.K, OK... so I'm kind of new at this but "I don't want you to break a leg, Hon, I want you to have a great performance.”

  To this day I still hate that “break a leg” expression, but it seems to be a show-biz law.

  Taking a reserved seat by the front of the Troubadour stage, I noticed a number of very unusual items the roadies were putting in place. A log with an imbedded axe, a large cheese-grater, various propane tanks, hoses and a steel framework of sorts, a meat grinder and a cage of white rats. White rats? I'm thinking maybe this Steve ‘the flash-pot guy’ is going to perform medical experiments on stage.

  Suddenly a very attractive young lady leaned over the table and grabs my hand, staring at my palm. “You have a wonderful life-line.”

  “Huh?”

  She goes “I'm Nikki Costa and I read palms. My big brother Don is in the opening act tonight, that's his cheese grater up there.”

  “OK, that’s uhhh...a nice one,” meanwhile thinking this girl is either way kooky or her brother's going to make pizza for the audience. In any event it was a very nice cleavage shot.

  Don. Don Costa? The name rang a bell in my mind. I remembered he was Ozzy's bass player for the ‘Speak of the Devil’ tour. Let's see what he has to offer tonight with his new band ‘M-80.’

  Lights go down and ‘Tubular Bells,’ the theme from ‘The Exorcist’ starts playing on the sound system, nice effect as the stage is smoked. Don, along with his guitarist/singer and drummer hit the stage with a powerful riff and a song called ‘Get out of Town before Sundown.’ I wasn’t terribly impressed, but yet altogether not bad.

  Don was dressed head to toe in strips of white cloth, mummy-style. He was insane on stage.... At the end of the set during a wild strobe-lit drum solo, Don turns and grabs the cheese grater and starts ripping the skin off his knuckles over the crowd’s heads sending blood and tiny chunks of flesh into the audience. Always thinking business, I'm wondering how he plans on recreating this stunt each night if he happened to get a tour.

  It was a decent show overall, yet I'm wondering how W.A.S.P. will follow this. The rats, meat grinder and axe are still sitting up the on the stage waiting for whatever purpose they are about to serve.

  The WASP roadies begin putting the final touches on the stage set as the Doors song ‘The End.’ the Apocalypse Now version complete with the sound of the helicopter blades was blasting through the P.A.

  The house lights go down once again throwing the showroom into total darkness, the walls now shaking with nothing but the sound of the helicopter rotors. From the top of the dressing room stairs leading down to the stage, a figure appears silhouetted by a lighted ‘caveman’ type torch he’s holding runs down, hit's the stage and lights a gas-filled metal framework behind the drum riser which creates the effect of being inside a burning building. Considering how old and fragile the Troubadour was, it was a very strong possibility that the real thing could happen at any minute.

  Blackie takes center stage starting a blistering version of what I later learned was the song ‘Hellion,’ dressed in only chaps and the soon-to-be-famous buzz saw codpiece as well as thigh-high red 6” stiletto boots. Being straight I'm not an expert on male butts but it was obvious that some liposuction or a membership to a gym could come in handy here.

  The song concluded with a multiple blast of concussion bombs fired from the rear of the stage and a near riot in positive response from the crowd.

  At this point there was only one problem that I saw with the show and it was a major one, at least from my point of view. The bone-shaking volume pumped throughout the custom sound system that Blackie had brought in for the night was far too damn loud to hear any semblance of the songs themselves. I'd always felt that if my ears didn't ring for a couple of days after a concert it wasn't loud enough but in this case, my ears were cooking on site. Part of the problem was that the back wall of the room was only 35 feet from the stage which caused a sonic ‘roll’ of sound that was impossible to decipher as anything other than the roar of being inside a jet engine. Dramatic yes, but I was always looking for possible radio airplay material and really needed to hear song writing skills, melodies and hooks.

  Actually the only lyrics I heard throughout the entire set was the ‘I Wanna Be Somebody’ mid-song acappella chant, the opening lines to ‘Sleeping In The Fire,’ and something to the effect that he ‘Fucks Like A Beast.’

  A few songs later, Blackie grabs the rat cage and approached the log and axe. Holding the rats in one hand by their tails, he looks questionably and silently to the audience with a sinister grin on his face pointing to the axe then to the meat grinder. The audience votes for the grinder. Blackie strolls over, drops the rats in the machine and starts grinding away, all to the bombastic back beat of Tony, Randy and Chris's drum/guitar solo and a heavy light show and yet more smoke. The meat starts oozing from the tube and Blackie proceeds to toss it into the crowd who began fighting over it like it was a fly-ball at a World Series game.

  No rats were actually hurt in that stunt. I later learned that it was a custom grinder prop Blackie had built so as when he dropped the rodents in they simply slid down a enclosed chute to the safety of a second, hidden cage to await the next show, quite possibly partying with awaiting mouse groupies, perhaps enjoying a backstage cheese buffet. The meat was only raw hamburger that had been pre-loaded before the show to extrude while turning the crank.

  OK...so far this evening I've been showered with knuckle skin, bone and blood
and what I thought at the time was ground rat burger. I couldn't help but wonder ‘what's next?’ I made a mental note not to sit at a front table the next W.A.S.P. show, sexy kooky palm reader girl with great tits or not.

  Several songs later, again with a massive strobe light display Blackie pulls out a large pillow from seemingly nowhere, rips it open on his buzz-saw cod piece and sprays the room with feathers.

  Add feathers to the previously mentioned list.

  After more concussion bombs and fireworks the guys exit the stage, house lights once again blackened to the point of total darkness. The crowd is going insane with everyone’s ears still ringing and optical nerves firing off from the now dead strobe lights.

  Suddenly the ‘fire framework’ ignites once again and the band encores with the opening lines of ‘Tormentor.’ Tony, Chris and Randy go into a solo so powerful that it would rock the gates of Hell. An intense spotlight shines on Blackie, holding up what looks like a human scull. In ritualistic, later to become classic Blackie manner, he holds it high above his head and pours gobs of bright crimson blood down his throat. The crowd surges forward trampling those in front (myself included) holding empty beer cups and cocktail glasses up to the stage to be filled with the red liquid.... and to partake and share in this new metal sacrament.

  The song ends to the sound of more concussion bombs, the stage empties and the house lights go up. It’s over. Wow…All this from the ‘flash-pot guy’ who spends his Saturdays quietly restoring classic British autos. I'm impressed. Just wish I could have heard their songs plainly.

  It popped in my mind that I was glad I wasn’t the janitor that had to clean up the stage that night. My second thought was to drop in the dressing room and say hello. Third and more reasonable thought... No. I'll call him tomorrow, keeping with my policy of never talking business with bands in dressing rooms immediately after a performance. I didn't consider it professional.

  Besides, I wanted to show respect and support for Bitch that was to follow after a quick set change. Looking around the room however, I saw most of the crowd, exhausted and drained from what they had just experienced leaving through the front door.

  It's been said that bands tend to draw their stage energy from the audience. If that's true, Bitch was in trouble from the start that night as there were only a handful of people left in the showroom. Despite a gallant and professional performance, after W.A.S.P, frankly no one was terribly interested and I actually felt sorry for Betsy and the band.

  The Bitch set concluded, I decided to call it a night and drove the short distance back home, still thinking about W.A.S.P, comparing them in my mind to earlier acts and wondering what Blackie’s influences were for this spectacle.

  KISS? Comic book characters with great business savvy. Nah...

  Alice Cooper? Close, but Alice never took his stage persona this seriously. It was a big goof that was and of course to this day very entertaining.

  The Crazy World of Arthur Brown? Perhaps. Although basically a ‘one-hit-wonder from the late sixties with ‘Fire,’ Brown became a featured act on the rock club circuit. He appeared in wildly colored flowing robes, face streaked with makeup and his hair on fire. From this apparition came shrieks, jumps growls and singing that electrified his audience. This later proved to be not only my opinion as Blackie, in a Kerrang interview mentioned that Arthur Brown was a huge influence on his concept for W.A.S.P.

  I also guessed that Blackie had heard of or was a fan of ‘Scream’n Jay Hawkins’ who was probably the original ‘shock rocker’ going back as back as far as a 1958 tour with Fats Domino where he earned his reputation for performances that bordered on lunacy at the time. On the Alan Freed package tours, he was carried onstage in a flaming coffin and spit fake blood into the audience.

  Yeah, my first impression of W.A.S.P. from the flyer Blackie had given me was right. These guys are serious.

  Yet, I still had only heard a loud roar. No song dynamics that would reach out from a car radio and grab the listener by the throat, which was my philosophy for a rock act to break, become and remain successful.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Country–Western music has never been big in Los Angeles, period.

  Someone should have informed former nightclub manager Chuck Landis of this fact before he and his investors spent several million dollars renovating a huge defunct Save-On drug store in the San Fernando Valley district of Reseda into his dream of a state-of-the-art hillbilly music palace.

  Even with the Nashville and Austin, Texas quality acts booked that were more accustomed to the county fair circuit than a plush, urban night club venue only a handful of patrons showed up each night to hear the twang’n, drink beer, fight and ride the mechanical bull.

  The doors were locked and the place was vacant and bankrupt after only a couple of months.

  Enter the Wolf & Rissmiller Corporation.

  Steve Wolf and Jim Rissmiller were the principals of ‘Wolf and Rissmiller Attractions,’ unquestionably the number one concert promotion firm in Southern California in the late '70s and early '80s.

  Having met while attending college at UCLA the two, who shared a great love of rock music, as well as an admiration of Bay Area promoter extraordinaire Bill Graham and a passion for business, immediately became best friends and soon partnered promoting small rock concerts on the campus.

  It wasn't long before Steve and Jim were moving their shows to larger and larger venues from UCLA Halls to the 3000 seat Santa Monica Civic Auditorium by the ocean and eventually to the 18,000 seat Forum in Inglewood.

  They treated their acts well during their reign. Everyone from The Pretenders to The Clash, The Knack to Van Halen, The Who, Zeppelin and many more international bands had not only respect for the pair, but a certain amount of loyalty.

  A case in point… The Forum, which was the premier ‘arena’ music venue in Los Angeles was owned by a very wealthy elderly gentleman by the name of Jack Kent Cook, who also owned the Los Angeles Lakers basketball team, the Kings hockey team, the Washington Redskins as well as the Empire State Building in New York City.

  Cook sold the Forum, Lakers and Kings to Los Angeles real estate magnates Jerry Buss and Frank Mariana whom I came to know personally through my then employer, L.A. Clippers basketball team owner Donald T. Sterling. As likable and business savvy guys as they were, they were a bit naive as to the ways of music concert promotion.

  Buss was quoted as saying shortly after the purchase of the Forum “Why do we need Wolf & Rissmiller? We own the venue, just get Van Halen's agent on the phone and we'll promote the show ourselves.”

  Good business logic, but it didn't (and still doesn't) work that way. Artists, agents and managers develop relationships with established concert promoters who have been around for a while and those unspoken bonds are honored as sacred.

  With that factor in mind, Wolf and Rissmiller saw an opportunity to turn the boarded up Country Club showroom into a ‘breeding ground’ wherein they could develop smaller acts of all musical genres and build that same trust and loyalty to their Company as the acts grew in their careers.

  Their timing was excellent. It was 1981.

  From their large concert operations, Wolf and Rissmiller had the finest stagehands, security, lighting and sound technicians in Los Angeles already on their payroll. The same guys that had rigged the lighting trusses for Led Zeppelin and did the sound checks for the Who over the years were more than happy to spend their off-nights from the Forum or the L.A. Sports Arena concerts setting up the Country Club for small acts. The professionalism at this large club venue was unparalleled.

  The Country Club immediately became the place for up and coming local Southern California bands to play. Acts that were happening at the time such as Missing Persons, The Tubes, Devo and Oingo-Boingo were booked on a regular basis and their fans packed the venue.

  Riding upon the success of the Gazzarri's/Troubadour shows and given the publicity that Images had received in the local music press, I was not
quite surprised but yet still ecstatic when I received a call from the County Club's in-house booker, John Miller. He told me they were planning a ‘heavy metal’ weekend and wanted Images to headline Saturday night.

  Second on the bill would be Quiet Riot, who at the time was going by the name DuBrow and thirdly an unknown power trio, White Sister. This was an unusual offer as metal was just barely, if even at all booked there. Prior to this planned weekend the heaviest band that had played the Country Club was REO Speedwagon at their industry release party for ‘High Infidelity.’

  Not only was the exposure and prestige of Images being invited to play there very welcome, but the dollar offer was very attractive too. This was years before the ‘pay-to-play’ days that essentially created a ‘tax’ of sorts on struggling bands.

  I accepted John's offer immediately. As it so happened, we had a show that night at the Troubadour with our new friends Dante Foxx, (Whom within a couple of years were to change their name to Great White) and Bitch.

  Holding back my enthusiasm, I decided to give the band the good news in person. When the Images equipment trucks arrived at the stage load-in dock that afternoon, the boys found their manager sitting there, grinning from ear to ear with a bottle of champagne and a fistful of good cigars.

  “Oh-Oh, Mike's got something good going on” Bob remarked as he stepped out of the truck. He was right.

  “Guy’s, we're headlining the Country Club”

  “No shit!” Gene was in near shock as it had only been a few months before that we had been thankful to receive a Sunday night slot at Gazzarris. We shared the champagne in plastic cups sitting in the alley behind the Troubadour enjoying the cigars like we were the Beatles who had just been invited to appear on the Ed Sullivan TV show in 1963.