Let's Spend the Night Together: Backstage Secrets of Rock Muses and Supergroupies

by Pamela Des Barres

  User Friendly

  grabbed the latest copy of L.A.'s local Rock City News to read about myself when another brazen headline suddenly became more interesting. "The secret to my SeXcess! The True Meaning of Groupie-ism," written by Lexa Vonn, the same journalist who had interviewed me. I eagerly perused her instructive missive.

  The word "groupie" has often been attached to many grave misconceptions over the years. The average person usually envisions a sexually immoral girl who sleeps around with famous people in order to satisfy a deeper need for notoriety or other form of self-gain. However, the former definition more describes what I refer to as a "star fucker."A true groupie defined by my own experiences, as well as the original groupie jet set of the 1960s, portrays a much deeper version of the meaning. Being a real groupie is a talent on its own, and not one that can be performed by just anyone. Sex, while an important part of the groupie experience, is only one facet of the whole picture. A true groupie has a deep connection and understanding of both music and the dimension in which musicians exist when they are performing. Rock and roll is a ritual and groupies are the high priestesses.... After all, what would a concert be without anyone there to hear it?

  Good question, doll.

  Miss Lexa is a founding member of the Plastics, a quartet of flashy groupie publicist-promoters, and their impudent photograph adorned the cover of the zine Rock City News. I recalled my recent snappy chat with the flame-haired, ivory-skinned Lexa and knew I had to investigate her escapades and those of her playmates-in-crime.

  It does me proud that Lexa and the Plastics do such a smashing job of decorating rock and roll events here in Hollywood. Especially since she insists that my all-girl group, the GTO's, helped inspire their inventive brand of merrymaking. Not only are these voluptuous show-offs proud to be called groupies, they are also successful business babes who use their savvy to get bands seen and heard. Their Web site, www.myspace.com/ backstage_plastics, offers various types of assistance to up-andcoming rock stars:

  • photoshoots, product endorsement, modeling

  • host, MC your event, show, or party

  • go-go dancing and burlesque for shows

  Lexa has invited me to her 1920s heart-of-Hollywood apartment, and as she brews tea in her Sex Pistols T-shirt, miniskirt, and combat boots, I wander around enjoying the lineup of vintage lunchboxes, rock 'n' roll action figures, and Gothic dolls that adorn the walls. Her furniture is covered in tapestries and fur, and the coffee table has been converted to an altar, littered with candles, incense burners, daggers, crystals, oils, flowers, and framed photos of Lexa with Marilyn Manson. A homemade collage featuring Kurt Cobain and Jesus Christ hangs in the kitchen next to the fridge, which is plastered with concert and club flyers. After Lexa shows me the trashy treasures in her frock-filled closet, I'm ready for an engrossing peek into her imagination.

  Lexa Nicoletti felt strangely out of place as far back as she can remember. Her artistic parents were considered peculiar in their conservative hometown of Andover, Massachusetts. "It was upper middle class-very white, very rich-and I was the total black sheep," Lexa says as she pours an herbal tea concoction. "There were blonde Christian cheerleaders, then there was methe girl raised in a pagan household. I never knew what church was. My mother was a painter and my father was a chiropractor who ran his own practice. They were never around. I had three older sisters and the youngest is always neglected, which is how I got away with so much. My father was a dark character. He was cold and uninvolved but claimed to be a high wizard. Both he and my mother claimed they could heal people with energy, but I suffered from bad bladder infections for years and was never treated, even though I complained. I also suffered insomnia, paralyzing night terrors, episodes of disassociation, and severe depression. I had no family structure and didn't have a family at school either. But I knew there was something else out there. MTV had just started, and I was addicted. I was reading music magazines and thought, `This is the world I wanna be in.'"

  Once again, the saving grace of rock and roll gave the odd girl out a reason to thrive. Lexa's first mad crush was Poison's C. C. DeVille. "Pirate Radio used to broadcast from L.A. on Saturday nights and you could call the special guest rock stars. Every week I would dial until I got through. One night I got Poison's Bret Michaels on the phone and my question was `How do I meet you in person?' He didn't know I was fourteen and told me, `When we get to your town, come to sound check about three or four o'clock. Talk to the road crew, tell them you want a backstage pass, and they'll forward you to the head of security."' Lexa got the skinny straight from the rockers' mouth! "Yeah," she laughs. "That was my first time being backstage. It was cool, there was free beer, and I got my autographs. After that, my life depended on the next show. When I knew a band was coming, I'd go on a diet, buy new clothes, get my nails done. .. it was like going to the prom every time."

  As she traversed venues along the Eastern seaboard, young Lexa sensed right away that she shared something special with the performers. "I had a real psychic connection with the guys in the band. That's why I always go directly to the front row. As soon as the band hits the stage, it's magnetism. The singer will almost always start singing to me, stare at me, and communicate with me."

  Even though I know the answer, I ask Lexa how that kind of heightened communion feels. "It feels like sex-that is my sex, my religious experience-like being on drugs. But I never use drugs at shows. I don't want to alter the experience."

  Why were musicians able to move her in such a profound way? "Looking back, some of it was because my father was absent. I always knew something was wrong with me, emotionally and physically, but our issues were swept under the rug. At sixteen, I told my mother I believed my father had sexually abused me. She insisted it couldn't be true and instead of sending me to a psychiatrist, she sent me to her psychic-who told me I was right. But I never spoke of it again to my mother. I remember reading an interview with Axl Rose about how his father sexually abused him. As a teenager I thought if I could find a rock star who'd been through something like I had, they'd understand me and protect me. The attention I got from musicians filled a void and validated me. But it's the music, mostly, that drives me. I believe music comes from God, or whatever is up there: the higher power source. Musicians channel that source, and when they look at you with those eyes, it's like being with God. You're communicating with a medium that has God inside them at that moment."

  After leaving home at eighteen, Lexa got to California via the Misfits and hasn't looked back. She was so jazzed at their gig in Boston that she jumped onstage, got handed a microphone, and sang a song with the band.

  "After the show I hit it off with the drummer. I told him I was backpacking around the country and didn't live anywhere. And he said, `Here's our tour schedule. If we're ever in the same place, come hang out with us.' About a week later, I hitchhiked to California. I always had groupie assistants accompany me, but this time I brought a traveling groupie, and we met up with the Misfits in San Diego. After the show, the drummer and me went on our first date, skinny-dipping under the moon, then came back and had a threesome with my girlfriend on a private beach."

  Isn't that every drummer's dream? "Yeah, I was experimenting with my bisexuality, and we became a threesome for awhile. We had so much fun the Misfits said, `You guys are too cute to be living on the streets. Come on tour. You've got permanent passes, you're family now.' He went on to a side project, Graves, and they have a song about me called `Ophelia,' which is one of my nicknames. I saw him on and off for four years."

  Lexa moved with her girlfriend to San Francisco after the Misfits tour, but soon felt adrift. "The tour ended, I didn't have a car or money, I was completely estranged from my parents, and my relationship wasn't working out. Then one day I took a lot of acid and had a spiritual experience listening to Marilyn Manson's Antichrist Superstar. An entity came to me and said, `Don't kill yourself. You're meant to do something else. Go find Manson and go on tour.' I had met hi
m a few times in high school, when he was starting out, playing clubs. Back then, he was very accessible and I had that connection with him instantly. The first time he hit the stage, he came right over to me and gave me his water bottle, teasing me. He pulled down the bass player's underwear and started jerking him off right in front of me-so there was some sort of instant connection between us. I was just seventeen at the time. I thought, `This man is interesting.'"

  Lexa's remembrances of her early interaction with Marilyn Manson are sharp and clear. Each glance, word, and touch held complex, esoteric meaning. "We were hooked up with passes for Manson's Fourth of July Grotesque Burlesque show in Vegas. I had been doing pinup modeling for a couple of months and was excited about my new glamorous lingerie image. I had this see-through beaded gown and wanted to make sure I looked fabulous, so I didn't eat all day. It was over 100 degrees, and I had gotten a body wrap at the spa and was totally dehydrated. I was in the front row, and Manson threw me his fancy expensive stage hat, and I felt so cool. Backstage, I was pounding back free drinks and got plastered really fast. Manson invited us to a party at the hotel where they had half a floor rented, and I sat on the bed with him, wearing a bra and panties and the hat he had given me. We were staring at each other, and he said, `Shut up, Lexa. Stop laughing.' I was like, `I didn't say anything!' And he said, `But you're thinking it. "

  When Lexa left home for good, the bad memories came more often. "Finally, during one of my suicide kicks, I downed a bunch of acid, put on the newly released Antichrist Superstar album, and the whole memory of childhood abuse came back. I had a religious experience under the influence of music and hallucinogenics. It was as if I'd been unhooked from the matrix and was in a make-believe land where all the lies of humanity were exposed. I could hear this voice faintly coming from the music, guiding me through the experience, protecting me, showing me the truth about why I was so fucked up, letting me know it wasn't my fault. Within two weeks I Joined Manson on tour with nothing to my name but a backpack of clothes, a tarot card deck, and a journal."

  Lexa needed to explain to Manson how his music spoke to her and started writing letters to him. "I wanted to know if he had intentionally put subliminal messages in the music to induce this meditational state. He was impressed. I'd been doing a great deal of speed, coke, heroin, and acid. I quit everything cold turkey when I began following the tour. The withdrawal combined with the intensity of the show left me in a paranoid and highly aware state. He was oddly interested and took me seriously."

  Because of her unusual connection to Manson, Lexa eventually moved to Hollywood, started her own band, Ophelia Rising, and got into the music publicity biz through Manson's former guitar player. She also started doing extra work. "I was cast as a groupie in Almost Famous and Rock Star, and one of my gigs was Manson's `Coma White' video. I hadn't seen him in over a year and was nervous, but he spotted me quickly and beelined for me. We were like a mirror image of each other. We'd look into each other's eyes and giggle at the same time, then awkward silence. There was weird energy between us. I was on the set for two days and had to see him again. I went unannounced backstage to the L.A. show, and when Manson saw me, it was like `whoa.' I had just had a terrible fight with my most recent boyfriend, and the next thing I knew I was driving to Texas for the Manson tour."

  It seemed whenever Lexa was breaking up with another rock scoundrel, Manson was there. "I didn't know if he thought I was just a weird acid freak, but in Houston he said, `I want you to come to the hotel tonight. We're having a little party.' Five times he said, `Promise me you'll be there.' Even though their time together was usually brief, Manson always went out of his way to make Lexa feel included. One strange night, she was among a cadre of girls ushered into his inner sanctum. "Manson was at the height of his fame, his album was number one, and there was a lot of security because he got death threats. It was surreal, like going to see the president. We were shuffled into this hotel suite, and it was the most bizarre scene I've ever witnessed. Twiggy Ramirez was sitting in the corner drooling on himself, the keyboard player was rocking back and forth, and the other guitar player was hitting on this skanky groupie who had told me earlier how she fucked their drummer, and now she was gonna fuck the guitar player. There was so much going through my head: the insecurity about things I'd said to Manson years before, the guards in the room watching us like Secret Service men. I wondered, `Is Manson trying to sleep with me? What the hell is this shit?' I watched movies with him all night, but could barely speak. He didn't either. Finally I asked, `How're you doin'?' He didn't answer me verbally, but I could hear him telepathically. He just nodded, and I said, `Another day, huh?' There was this in-another-dimension glowing energy; too much for me to handle. I wondered, `Is he fucking with my head or does he wanna hang out with me? Does he want me to make a move?' But I certainly wasn't going to touch him! Maybe if he'd acted like other rock stars I'd hung out with, being a jackass, hyper and funny, it would have been easier to make a move. But he's so quiet and introspective, I was completely freaked out."

  But Lexa wanted Manson to make a move, didn't she? "Not on that tour. I was still nervous with him, but I did start falling in love. I didn't know if he liked me that way, or if he was being fatherly. He had one of those cult followings and thought of his fans as his children. He forbade the roadies from talking to me because he saw me as his child or because he was jealous. I don't know which. He treated me like a lady and not like a whore. He has my loyalty for life, because most guys, including my father, have never cared for me like that. Most big rock stars hang out and have fun, but want to have sex as quickly as possible. And here was this guy who spent the night with me and didn't even touch me."

  An encounter with Manson's guitarist, John 5, left Lexa perplexed. After a gig, John whispered in her ear. "He said, `Let's you and me hang out when Manson leaves.' I was thinking, `Why after Manson leaves?' I walked John to his car and suddenly he grabbed my hand and put it down his pants, and I thought, `Whoa. You know the rules with me. Ooh, big cock, too! This is scandalous.' So I pulled away. I thought he was cute, but I had too much respect for Manson to go there. He saw me as innocent, even though I wasn't, and I didn't want him to see me as a slut. We had always been platonic, but I felt very loyal. That whole camp is so strange-for all I knew, it was some sort of test."

  Despite all the drama, Lexa and Marilyn Manson have spent some rare quality time together through the years. "Once we were all fucked up at his house, and he took out his camera and got intricately involved with photography. He did a photo shoot of me wearing his underwear in the pool and filmed it, too. I believe I truly am a muse to him. He uses me as inspiration in his work, and that's much more than sex. Sex would be great too, and I'd love to be with him, but sex comes and goes and loses its passion. Art is immortal."

  What is it about Manson's music that has kept her fascinated for so long? "Manson gives a lot of hints in his songs. If you follow along and research each subject, you'll get an education. It's all there: philosophies, religions, magic, political history, lies in the media, conspiracy theories. After a while you figure out the fabric of the matrix we live in. He was following me following him, taking notes on my progress figuring him out. When I'd figured out enough, he gave me the wink-wink handshake, and the door to the chocolate factory opened. That was my goal: I wanted to crack the mystery."

  Perhaps the reason Manson and Lexa have been friends for so long is because they haven't slept together. "That's what his take is. We agree there is an attraction, but why ruin a perfectly good relationship? I'm a permanent fixture even though it's tortuous. I'd give up every man in the world for him. I've had sex with a handful of rock stars, and nobody has ever touched me the way he does. It's difficult for anyone to get in my pants now. I'm hard to impress after being intimate with Manson on a psychological level. I wind up comparing them to him."

  At least her passion for Manson hasn't stopped Lexa from giving rock romance a chance. "Ben Graves from the Murderdol
ls was interested in me, but he was intimidating, and had overpowering energy. I'm 5'2" and he stands 6'6". We got hot and heavy one night, and I backed out from going all the way because I was dating the keyboard player for London After Midnight and didn't want to fully cheat on him. Ben had some of the best pickup lines ever. When I asked, `Why me?' in a dark and dramatic, perfectly scripted way, he said, `Because I like to exist somewhere between a dream and reality, and you seem like someone I could do that with.' Just the way he said things got your juices running. One night at this Goth fetish club, Bar Sinister, he introduced me to his new band member, Joey Jordison, who was also the drummer in Slipknot. I didn't realize that because they wear masks on stage, but he let me know right away. There were a million girls, but he took to me from the get-go. He said, `I've got cocaine back at the hotel, why don't you come up?' At the time I was doing a lot of coke and was initially more interested in the coke than in Joey." Joey soon began begging Lexa to be his girlfriend. "He came across very genuine. I wasn't super-smitten, but I was single and thought I'd give him a chance. I soon discovered he liked me to talk dirty. I'd worked at a phone sex office and had my routine down. He was eating it up, my scenarios were getting weirder and kinkier, and I wondered how far I could push the limits. I finally told him, `What I really want is to put you in a dress, smear red lipstick all over your mouth, and bend you over like the bitch you are.' I expected him to say `Dude, that's not cool,' but his response was `I have a dress.' I love any kind of fantasy play, and my ears perked up. He told me to close my eyes, and he transformed into a cute girl. I liked seeing this heavy metal drummer, who hit the shit so hard, jump into bed in a little black minidress."