Nerd Girl Rocks Paradise City: A True Story of Faking It in Hair Metal L.A.

by Anne Thomas Soffee

  Aside from the adoring fans and the glory they shine on Steve in my eyes, the other great thing about hanging out with him is that he is the first guy since Tommy who can keep up with my ever-increasing alcohol consumption. Steve can put away a whole fifth of liquor—and, unlike Tommy, he’ll actually buy it himself—and still be ready to head for the next party, which makes him the perfect companion for the newly fortified me, the me who is doing a better job of looking like Lester Bangs than writing like him. What started out as a way for me to swallow my pride and be the hack I needed to be to make it out here is turning into an excuse not to write, a reason to turn down freelance work in favor of drinking in dives with Steve—or sometimes at the Black-lite, alone. At least nobody at the Blacklite is asking me to sell out my artistic integrity for a half-page three-color ad.

  Partly to try and make up for the Tommy days, I set Raelynn up with Nick, the Seen’s slappy-slap bass player. After one date he gets picked up on outstanding traffic warrants and ends up cooling his heels in the Los Angeles County Jail. Try as I might to get her to visit—“he’s lonely, and besides, you can’t move to Texas without ever seeing the inside of the jail”—she chooses instead to wait until he gets out to resume their courtship. Fortunately for all involved— the Seen, Raelynn, and especially Nick—he only has to pull thirty days, and we pick him up at the end of his stay in my trusty Hyundai, singing off-key renditions of “Thirty Days in the Hole” on the way. We take him straight to Steve’s house to brush up on his bass-slapping, because the Seen is going to be opening for Trulio Disgracias at Al’s Bar on Saturday. They sound like another Red Kennedys—style joke band, but in fact, Trulio is a side project for members of Fishbone and the original bass slappers, Parliament Funkadelic. This is a huge deal for the Seen, and I’ve even promised to come out of retirement and write a review of their set for Screamer. Just when you think Fortuna has spun you downward, things start looking up again.

  Unfortunately, what goes up must come down, and the fall is often a complete surprise. Saturday night, as Raelynn and I drink a sloppy draft-beer toast to good times and bad boys between sets at Al’s Bar, we have no idea that the wheel is already in motion a few feet away from where we sit, starting its descent once again. As far as we know, the night is going swimmingly. In fact, we are practically gloating at our current position, on the guest list, with the band, as it were. No, folks, it doesn’t get much better than this, and here we are living the dream. That is, until Vic the Mouth, the band’s diminutive lead singer, makes his way down from the dressing room and offers to buy our next round. Suspicious. Suspicious indeed.

  “Uh, Anne?” Shuffle, shuffle. Gulp of beer. Earring tug.

  “Yeah, Vic?”

  “I think you’re really cool.” Nervous hair toss. Goatee scratch, shuffle, gulp.

  “Thanks, Vic.”

  “And no matter what happens between you and Steve, I hope we can still be friends.” That whirring sound you hear is the wheel spinning downward. Raelynn gives me the stink-eye, but I don’t even wait for her signal. I am already halfway up the rickety stairway/fire escape that leads to the dressing room, adrenaline rushing and a mixture of morbid curiosity and dread building in my chest. I’m not sure what I’m going to find, but I’m pretty sure my night is about to get a lot more interesting and a lot less great.

  Upstairs in the dressing room, the members of Trulio Disgracias, their girlfriends, and the rest of the Seen are crowded onto two couches, drinking, smoking, and generally doing what bands do backstage, which is actually sit around and wait a lot. This is one of the many myths that have been shattered for me since my CREEM-reading days: the myth of what happens backstage. Now having been backstage more times than I care to count, I can say with some authority that the backstage experience resembles nothing so much as an airport waiting room.

  Apparently, though, my date feels the need to live up to the hype. Seated on a folding chair by the door, Steve is displaying the dexterity that makes him such a good guitarist by managing to seamlessly alternate sips of beer, drags of his cigarette, and tongue-wrestling a busty blonde in a Daisy Mae gingham halter who is giving him a music-free lap dance in front of God, Blackbird McKnight, and everybody.

  “Hey!” Steve grabs my hand without letting go of the blonde’s waist. It seems like everyone in the room has stopped to see what’s going to happen, which means I am now not only being humiliated and cheated on, but I am being humiliated and cheated on in front of a roomful of famous and semifamous musicians.

  “You suck,” I say unoriginally and try to pull my hand away. Steve hangs on even as he takes another swig of his beer.

  “Hey, babe, don’t be mad,” he says, rivaling me for lack of creativity in the face of confrontation. I wrest my hand away and grab Raelynn’s arm.

  “Come on, we’re going,” I say, not willing to provide any more entertainment for the voyeuristic dressing room crew.

  “Aw, don’t go,” Steve says unconvincingly as the blonde rests her head on his shoulder. “Don’t go,” he says again, without getting up. Raelynn and I clamber down the stairs and straight out the door.

  I drive home in a blind rage. Raelynn tries to talk me into going to Boardner’s, but I think I would clock any musician who tried to talk to me, just on principal. As a show of solidarity, she vows never to see Nick again. Not that it’s a big deal for her; she was mainly dating him because of Steve and me anyway. With her plans to move to Austin solidifying faster than I would like to see, getting attached to a bass-slapping pretty boy is definitely not on her agenda—though I can’t say it didn’t occur to me that if they hit it off she might change her mind about moving. (I’m a good friend, but I have to think about my needs, too.) I drop her off at her apartment and go home to mine, where the phone is ringing when I walk in the door.

  “Hello?”

  “Hey, does this mean you’re not going to write our review?” It doesn’t seem to occur to him that I am the last person he wants discussing him in print right now. I drop a hint.

  “Well, I don’t know. I might still write it, but I ought to warn you, I’m not feeling particularly magnanimous right about now.”

  Pause.

  “What does that mean?”

  Q: So did you end up writing the review?

  A: Actually, I did. I gave them a pretty good review, with a lot of praise for Vic’s singing, Nick’s bass slapping, and Darryl’s drumming. In fact, the lackluster guitar playing was the only real weak spot. . . .

  Q: So you did exactly what you complained that journalists are unfairly accused of doing.

  A: Hey, even a broken clock is right twice a day. Besides, he really wasn’t a very good guitarist, scout’s honor. The spurning was a blessing in disguise for my journalistic integrity. I swear.

  With Steve and Nick out of our lives and Raelynn’s departure coming in less than a month, we return to Boardner’s with a vengeance. We’re there almost every night, and after parties are the order of the day—or night, as the case may be. One such night finds us slouched on the couch of an unknown stranger, nursing warm beers at four A.M., hoping to make our meager stash last until six when we can buy more. While we wait, we amuse ourselves by watching two good ol’ boys of the hair-metal variety, both as drunk if not drunker than we are, repeatedly high-five each other while screaming “BILL CLINTON! Yeeeeeeee-haw!”

  “Who is Bill Clinton?” I slur, more wondering aloud than actually expecting an answer.

  “He’s the governor of Arkansas,” Raelynn says bemusedly. Trust an Okie to know, but what does that have to do with the price of beer in Hollywood?

  “Why do they keep screaming his name like that?”

  “I dunno.” Raelynn rustles in the empty cardboard carton, hoping in vain to find a magically appearing cold one. Needless to say, she doesn’t. “Hey, guys,” she says, flinging the empty box at them, “enough with the Bill Clinton already! You’re in California now.”

  “And so will Bill Clinton be, too, when
he’s president of all fifty fuckin’ states!” howls the spokesman for the two, then they let loose with another yeee-haw and high-five each other again.

  “Bill Clinton for President,” the second one cheers. “He fuckin’ rocks!”

  “Whatever, dude,” Raelynn says, shaking her head. She laughs. “He’s kind of a horndog.”

  “We know!” They high-five each other again. “Horndog in the White House! Yeee-haw!” Raelynn isn’t buying it. “He hasn’t got a chance. He won’t even get nominated.”

  I don’t know from Bill Clinton. All I know is we have almost two hours until we can get more beer and I’m starting to feel like just going to sleep instead—and apparently I’m not the only one.

  “What the fuck, man? It’s foo-ah in the morning!” Mike Gasper storms into the living room in boxers and a bedhead, surveying the scene in what is apparently his apartment.

  “Chill, dude, just havin’ a few people over,” the unknown host, who may or may not be Mike Gasper’s roommate explains.

  “Well, keep it down! People are tryin’ to sleep heah,” he grumbles. I guess even conservative rockers need to rest sometimes.

  “Hey!” This from one of the Arkansas boys, who obviously are unfamiliar with Gasper’s leanings. Raelynn and I exchange a worried look, both apparently thinking the same thing—horndog or no, Bill Clinton had better be a Republican or things are gonna get ugly—right as the oblivious duo screams in unison:

  “BILL CLINTON FOR PRESIDENT! Yeeeeeee—”

  “OK, that does it! EVERYBODY OUT!” That answers that question.

  I’ve been to a lot of parties, and I’ve gotten kicked out for a lot of reasons, but this is the first time I’ve ever seen a party called on account of Bill Clinton—although I’ll bet he’s been kicked out of his share.

  I suppose the next plot twist needs a setup. Unfortunately, I have none. What’s missing from this story is the detail about how Red got my phone number. This should, in fact, be a fairly significant plot point, as getting him, his number, or even his name was a longstanding and elusive goal of Rae-lynn’s and mine and has been referred to more than once heretofore. Suffice to say that the detail about the information exchange is lost to time and too many dollar drafts. I am assuming that the transfer took place at Boardner’s, since we never saw him off-duty, and I am also assuming that I gave him my number with no bidding from anyone other than Raelynn and good old Jack Daniels. In fact, even though I have no recollection of any of this, I’d be fairly willing to bet that the details are similar to what I’ve just told you. It’s remarkable how predictable my life had become at this point. What I can tell you with certainty is that he called me one night after midnight, collect, from the Los Angeles County Jail and, in a fit of unmitigated idiocy, I accepted the charges.

  Ask me now what he was in for. I couldn’t tell you that either. What I can tell you is that the following Saturday I find myself in line at visiting time, wondering mirthlessly how I came to be in a queue where I seem to be the only one without a tattoo on my face. At least the praying hands on the neck of the man in front of me give me something interesting to look at as the slow-moving line inches its way toward the door. I wait patiently for my turn at the window, where I am given a slip of paper with Red’s full name—Dwight MacPherson—and the number of a visiting cubicle. Then I sit down and wait. It occurs to me that I should have brought a book, or a crossword puzzle, but then I realize that would make me look even more out of place than I already am, as if that were possible between my Mister Peabody glasses and lack of facial tattoos. I try to act casual while I wait my turn, and I also try not to stare at my fellow visitors too much, intrigued though I am.

  When they call my number, I stand up with thirty or so of the other visitors and head into a catacomb of cubicles, each with a beat-up telephone receiver and a window through which you can see your orange-jumpsuited loved one. I follow the arrows to my cubicle, E-7, and find it already occupied by a tall, skinny woman with dark brown skin and an elaborate purple hairdo. Just to make sure, I peek through her window and see a black man remarkable for his lack of flowing red curls.

  “That isn’t him,” I say out loud.

  “It better not be him,” the woman says to me, swiveling her head like a cobra. I back my nerdy little ass up in a hurry, but her inmate is more understanding, shouting through the glass, “White boy? He down the end!”

  I head to the end of the row, buffeted by more helpful prisoners who continue to point me in the direction of Dwight, apparently the only white boy in the Los Angeles County Jail. By the time I get to the end of the row, he’s gone looking for me on the next aisle, and we keep chasing each other, aided by pointed fingers and shouted directions, all accompanied by the repeated question “White boy? White boy? White boy?” I finally find him on a far aisle, in a booth that’s missing its receiver, so there’s really only so much we can communicate. He shouts his thanks at me for coming, and I shout back “what happened?” but he either can’t hear me or pretends that he can’t. We’re hopelessly pantomiming questions—I don’t even attempt to spell anything in American Sign Language—when the bell rings and the visitors are herded out to make way for the next group.

  Over the course of the next couple of weeks, I accept more collect calls from Dwight, never finding out what he’s in for or how he got my number, but being reminded with every call that he’s lost his job and his apartment because he got arrested and he’s going to need a place to stay when he gets out.

  Raelynn takes me by both shoulders and looks me square in the face. “Are you sure you want to do this?”

  “Well, I can’t just leave him to rot on the street!” Shades of Andy, my high school boyfriend. I don’t know who made me the ASPCA of girlfriends, but I do a damn fine job of it. In this case, there is a little bit of the prom queen wannabe at work, because after almost two years of ogling him at Boardner’s and romanticizing him with Raelynn in our Winchell’s debriefings after the bars closed, the thought that he could, after all this time, be mine is an ego boost for sure. He is gorgeous, all jawline and shoulders and glossy red mane. And from what he’s been telling me on the phone, he’s in a band, and they have an agent and a demo, and as soon as he gets out they’re supposed to do a showcase, though I haven’t been able to ascertain for whom. But above all of the selfish reasons, the ones that boost my ego and fuel my fantasies of showing everyone that I’ve got what it takes to snag a hair god, the real reason is the ever-compelling sense of duty and responsibility I feel to rescue him from himself. Give me your tired, your poor, your incarcerated hair gods yearning to breathe free! “I can’t turn my back on him when he needs help.”

  “Sure you can. You don’t even know him!” Raelynn, as usual, brings the harsh light of reason to the discussion, something I choose to ignore when left to my own devices.

  “But he’s counting on me. And besides,” I say, trying to convince myself as well as Raelynn, “It will be worth it in ambience alone to have someone that good-looking hanging around the apartment! I mean, you have to admit he’s gorgeous.”

  “Gorgeous doesn’t pay the rent,” says party-pooper Raelynn. “And besides, I know you. You’re going to get tired of him. And your apartment is really, really small.” That is a concern—the apartment, I mean. But I’m considering this arrangement to be temporary, just until he gets on his feet.

  “How do you know he’s going to get on his feet? Have you guys set a deadline for how long he has to get a job?”

  “I’ll talk to him about it,” I say, just to get her off my back. I don’t tell her that part of the reason I’m so hesitant to let go of him is that with her moving to Austin, I’m worried that I won’t have anyone but half of Tommy. One whole jobless boyfriend beats half a jobless boyfriend is what I’m thinking. I don’t say so, though, because I know she’ll find some stupid way to make it seem like a bad deal—as farfetched as that may seem. And I start rearranging my things to make room for Dwight.

 
; “So where did he say he was from?” Still not thrilled with the arrangement, Raelynn asks way too many questions about Dwight now that he’s moved in.

  “Kankakee, Illinois,” I say for the third time. I think she just likes the sound of it. We’re at the Blacklite, where I absolutely will not bring Dwight. I told him we were going shopping.

  “Damn. And I thought Bixby was white trash. If you have his babies, they’re gonna have rattails and dirty feet from the day they’re born,” she warns.

  “And they’ll walk around in saggy diapers and nothing else,” I add. “And I’ll put purple Kool-Aid in their bottles.”

  “The older ones will eat bologna and white bread sandwiches for breakfast . . .”

  “And bring ’em to me in the kitchen and say ‘put some more may’naisse on it, Momma!’” We are both having way too much fun with this.

  “And you’ll be wearing terrycloth shorts and a tube top . . .”

  “And smoking a Misty Menthol! And I’ll scream ‘Damn it, Junior, cain’t you see Momma’s doin’ a seek an’ find puzzle?’” We dissolve in helpless peals of laughter while the drag queens shake their heads at the two silly white chicks.

  To be honest, I’m laughing because I don’t know what else to do. I haven’t shared all of the unpleasant details with anyone, not even Raelynn, mainly because I know she’s going to say she told me so and she’s absolutely right. The situation with Dwight goes beyond not having a job. It goes far beyond that.

  The first night after I picked him up at the jail was all right. He talked a lot on the ride home. An awful lot. So much that the words poured out on top of one another, sometimes not quite matching up into whole sentences. That was OK, though, because I figured he hadn’t had anybody to talk to for a good long while. We dropped his stuff off at my apartment and went to Boardner’s, where Dwight didn’t get the hearty welcome back that I was expecting from his former coworkers. Instead, they looked at us worriedly as we holed up in a back booth, alone. Dwight had a bottle of Tussinex he’d been prescribed by the prison infirmary, and he poured liberal shots of it into our Jack and Cokes. This slowed his patter down to a dull roar. I toured him around town like a new convertible, to all the bars until they closed and then to the after party. I felt vindicated. I may not have plastic breasts or silicone lips, but hey now, look at the arm candy! Say it with me: “I am! Somebody!” We got home and he promptly passed out, which was fine by me because I was exhausted just from listening to him talk.