When I heard Steven Adler play drums on paradise city, Bonham on “when the levee breaks”, and watch Tommy lee go up in the air and bust drums,
I knew all I wanted to do was play drums, I even joined the marching band so I could get free drum lessons, our marching band teacher sort of hated me, but he also let me get away with murder becasue i played my heart out and controlled all the freaky mutants that were our drumline, I used to murder the bass drum and fucking go apeshit on the triangle, this Russian kid ,Vlad who used to wrap metal forks around his body as jewelry, and once came to class bloody after beating the shit out of his dad , almost to death, and then became a skinhead , used to play the cymbals next to me, and was always off beat, which I loved. there was lots of musical people and inspiration growing up during these times, lenny Kravitz used to stop by the marching band class to say what’s up.
My buddy Alan used to write rhymes in Spanish class behind me while I scribbled graffiti all over the desks, he went on to record this
This kid Ariel, who I used to be really mean to in art class, but then later was cool with, ended up recording all this crazy shit.
My friend JK, who barely spoke English and used to wear cross colors, went on to become the biggest rapper in Korea.
As for me, I played in moderate to horrible garage bands playing mostly rock and punk but mostly just uneasy unlistenable music, but there was never anywhere to practice, so any girl our lead singer was fucking would let us play in their garage, and even though I couldn’t play that well, id make up for it by playing as loud as possible,so after 20-30 minutes all the neighbors would call the cops, and since I was the drummer and I didn’t have a car to transport my drums, we mostly ended up playing in my backyard, in a shack that my dad made, on weekdays after school, this is when most kids started experimenting with drugs and alcohol, I had other interests like shoplifting and jacking off, so I never fucked with that stuff, because i was very focused on my craft, which was shoplifting and jacking off and i didnt want to do anything that faltered my technique. and instead I had to deal with all the shitheads I was in bands with. Drug problems, in one of my bands got pretty bad, and one day I found out 2 guys in my band “borrowed “ my brothers shitty ass guitar amp, and sold it for drugs, I quit the band, and told those fuckers to never come to my house again. Cut to a few years later, I dropped out of art school, I was 23 years old living back at home with my parents trying to make it as an illustrator and having no luck and the worst time, I guess the guys in my old band in that time got covered in tattoos, herpes and even more drugs, but somehow landed a record deal with a major label, I love l.a.!! I had moved since the old house, but as luck would have it, while driving down the street they saw me walk out of my new place and invited themselves in , they told me about Hollywood, and crazy parties, and their record deal, but certain band members were already in rehab, and they remembered I was always crazy on the drums, so they asked me if i had gotten any better over the years, and asked me to join their band, which was already signed…. And here it was, what I always wanted to be, A drummer in a band , to go out on the road and fuck groupies and sample the finest junk foods in every town. It was all right here in front of me… I told those fuckers to get the fuck out of my house, told my family members not to ever let them in, and never come back, I hadn’t forgotten about the stolen amp.And even though i was a thief, i never stole from my own. I wanted nothing to do with these people. I’d go solo with the art and one day I’d make music on my own terms, exactly 2 weeks later, this video with some of the guys from my old band, in their new band popped up on mtv.
It was a sample they had taken from a red hot chili peppers song, and turned it into the catchiest faggiest song ever. It was the most played song that summer, it was in every movie, commercial, blasting out of every car, even though they got booed at ozzfest, they went platinum, it was one of the most played songs of 2001, and reached No. 1 in 15 countries.. I wanted to kill myself, these guys hit the lottery (remember in 2001 people still had to buy music) I fucking missed out, that could’ve been me in that video, and touring the world, the musicianship and the rhymes on that song were as close to what bill and ted were trying to do in their excellent adventures, bring peace to the world through their awesome music!.. Oh well in hindsight I guess things still worked out ok for me. What’s life without a few missed opportunities :)
"I see the sun breaking down into dark clouds
and a vision of you standing out in a crowd.
Come come my lady..."
