Jon Bon Jovi’s dad, whom I had met at Mark Weiss’s wedding on that fateful night so many years before, came into the room first. Followed by Jon, and then his brother Tony, who was screaming at me, “You called my brother Bon Blow Me??? On our own stage?” Bon Jovi Senior then pointed in my face as I was held against the wall. He said, “I’ll fucking kill you,” or something like that. My insolent retort was, “Oh, yeah? And who in the FUCK are you?? Colonel Saunders???”
Doc McGhee came into the room as well. They all screamed threats at me. Jon shouted menacingly in my face, “I oughtta kick your fucking ass.” Jon and Tony and even his dad walked around in front of me and shouted threats at me. I screamed back at them, as I strained at my captors’ arms, “You want to kick my fucking ass? Get rid of your fucking security guards. Take me into the bathroom. And kick my fucking ass. Come on, let’s do it. Jon, you and me. Let’s fucking go.”
It was explained to Doc, by Terry, to everybody, what had happened before the show regarding the vat of freezing ice milk being poured into my hair. Doc was not aware of this. Neither was he amused. He managed us, too, after all.
After much repeated shouting, over and again, “I’ll kick your ass,” nobody actually kicked any ass, and nobody got their ass kicked. After more such meaningless epithets, the craziness was over. Or so we thought.
[[—WAS THIS THE SAME SHOW WHERE WE GOT TIED TO THE CHAIRS?]]
The next morning, at the hotel, we were informed that we were off the tour. We were very sad. We didn’t mean for this to happen. We all thought of those guys as our friends, more or less. But we did not want to be off the tour. We were having too much fun.
By the end of the night, after a couple of phone calls with Doc and Jon, before we had missed a single show, we were back on the tour. I think T-shirt sales might’ve had something to do with it. The Bon Jovi/Skid Row tour was an immense success, even though we were basically green, little kids out to play for the first time. We were with the big boys now.
Our touring days had just begun. More insanity was just around the corner.
Next up? We were off to Europe. For another tour.
With Mötley. Fucking. Crüe.
6
ROCK IT TO RUSSIA
Bach in the USSR
June 1989
Mockba, Russkie
Before we embarked on the Mötley Crüe European tour, we had a massive one-off stadium show in Moscow, Russia. The Moscow Music Peace Festival will go down in history as the first ever heavy metal festival in the USSR. We were the opening act on a show that consisted of Gorky Park (a local Russian band) after us, Ozzy Osbourne, Cinderella, Scorpions, Mötley Crüe, and Bon Jovi. There was supposed to be no real headliner. But at the end of the day, one band clearly gave only mouth service to that idea. One band had more production than the others, and proceeded in making one of the other bands on the bill extremely unhappy. To say the least.
The plane trip over there was epic enough. We all boarded a chartered 747 at JFK and of course, we were all drunk by the time we got there. I think we did a press conference that I barely remember. Along with every single top heavy metal band in the world on the plane, there were MTV camera crews, Rolling Stone, VH1, and a veritable plethora of journalists and photographers who took the trip over to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics with us. If the plane went down into the Atlantic, it would’ve taken the biggest names in the music industry along with it.
Someone, I believe it was Zakk Wylde, or perhaps even myself, had smuggled a bottle or two of Jack Daniel’s onto the plane. We sat in the back and Tommy Lee came back for a couple of swigs of whiskey with us. I was so excited to party with my heroes. I had been dreaming of that for years. And here it was. Even though Mötley Crüe was supposedly sober at the time, together we just ignored the fact that it was an anti–drinking and drug festival, and had another pull of the Jack. Life was good.
In 1989, going to Russia was like going into outer space. It was still communist at the time. Playing Lenin Stadium in the USSR back then was groundbreaking in every way. For the Republic of Russia, for rock ’n’ roll, for the broadcast TV industry, for all of us going there. We were very excited when we landed in Moscow to get our passports stamped with a Soviet Union seal of “welcome, comrade.” But they wouldn’t stamp any of our passports. Maybe the Russian government didn’t really want anybody to know this concert actually happened.
The whole concert was the brainchild of our manager, Doc McGhee, who was busted in the mid-’80s for smuggling 40,000 pounds of marijuana into North Carolina along with the alleged knowledge of Manuel Noriega. (See Esquire magazine article for details on this incident.) The Esquire article details how Doc came from Florida and may or may not have used drug money to launch the careers of Mötley Crüe and later Bon Jovi. He was ordered by the court to either go to jail or do something else to “pay back,” as a sentence for his involvement in this incident. Doc started the Make A Difference anti–drink and drug foundation, which gave money to organizations such as T.J. Martel. We renamed it the “Make A Different Drink Foundation.” Which is what it ended up turning into for some of us.
None of us had ever been to a place like the USSR. Before the fall of the Iron Curtain, before cell phones, pagers, fax machines, or the Internet, this was truly somewhere different than North America, in every conceivable way. As we rode from the Moscow airport to our hotel, I looked out the window of the van and saw that the sidewalks were dirt. There were shacks along the dirt sidewalks that had lineups to them. I asked what they were, and through the translator, it was explained to me that these were vodka shacks. Where men would line up just for a shot of vodka. Maybe this would be my kind of place after all.
When we got to the hotel it was yet another culture shock. We had been used to the Holiday Inns, the Ramadas and Marriotts of the world. Upon check-in to our hotel in Russia, I went to my bathroom and noticed the toilet paper. You could see that there was, at one time, print on the toilet paper. After examining it, I realized that it was recycled newspaper that I was going to wipe my ass with. Only this time not because of a bad review. Hey, it made for handy reading material.
The concerts were massive: 75,000 people, each day, for two days. Broadcast by TV satellite around the world. The undisputable star of the show was not Bon Jovi, or Mötley Crüe. The biggest star on the bill, to the Russian people, was without a doubt, the Prince of Darkness Himself. Mr. Ozzy Osbourne.
I was awoken from my sleep because of the sound of sheer pandemonium outside the hotel. I walked down the stairs. Looked into the lobby and saw this huge commotion. There was Ozzy, greeting the Hells Angels of the Soviet Union, who had gathered en masse upon the hotel, in the wee hours of the morning. Every Hells Angel contingent from the USSR had ridden their Harley-Davidsons from the farthest reaches of the Republic to this hotel, hoping only to meet their hero, Ozzy Osbourne. So many of them had gathered outside the hotel that it became a safety concern. Ozzy had no choice but to come down and greet them. Which made most of these badass Russian bikers cry like little girls seeing The Beatles. There is footage of the gnarliest human bikers from Serbia or wherever, greeting Ozzy that night and bursting into tears like infant children.
One can only imagine the early 1970s, in a place like Russia, what hearing music like Black Sabbath must have been like. The ominous tones, the dissident chord progression, the dark power of the music must have spoken to the desolate souls inhabiting places as downtrodden and seemingly depressing as a communist republic would have been to live in, back then. Of course records were hardly available, even when we played there, most being cheap knockoffs printed locally, found only on the black market. It must’ve been unfathomable to live in an environment such as this and hear a song like “Black Sabbath.” Everywhere we went, the whole trip, we heard the familiar refrain, “Ozzy, Ozzy, Ozzy.” It was clear who most people were there to see.
We spent the day before the first show sound checking at the venue. Myself and Skid Row g
uitar player Scotti Hill tooled around in a golf cart on the running track surrounding the lawn of the stadium. I scored some black hash from a local member of the crew, puffing away and having a fun time. Until I was walking around near catering, and I saw Mötley Crüe coming towards me.
“Hey guys!! How’s it going!”
“How are you doing, man?!?!” Tommy growled. He looked at me like he was pissed off.
The rest of the Crüe kept walking. Tommy stopped and came towards me.
He grabbed me by the shoulder and lit into me.
“Did you fucking TELL SOMEONE that I was drinking Jack on the plane?!?!?!?”
“Yes. I mean no. No. No, I didn’t. Did I? Yes, I did. No, I didn’t. No, I don’t think so!! Maybe I did.”
Of course I did. Tommy Lee was one of my heroes. Who the hell didn’t want to do a shot of Jack at 30,000 feet with Tommy Lee in 1989? It was a complete and utter dream come true in every single way. Drinking Jack, in the sky, above the ocean, with Tommy Lee was as much a sign of making it as my first Gold Record. I was proud and happy to be there. Even though now, Tommy Lee was holding me up by my black leathur [sic] jacket, ready to punch me out for ratting him out. But he didn’t. We have always been great friends. I would learn this later after my dad passed.
Make A Different Drink Foundation
It came time for the first show. Lenin Stadium. Not John Lennon. The other one.
We kicked off the show at 1:00 p.m. The very first words that our comrades heard, that the international audience of millions heard, broadcast live around the globe, was me uttering the eloquent phrase:
“Check this out, motherfuckers!”
A true ambassador of American culture, I was.
We finished our short set. It was still quite early in the afternoon. All we had to do for the rest of the day was stand by the side of the stage and watch our favorite bands play, in succession. One after the other. And since we had already finished working, it was time to party as well. Of course. Standard operating procedure.
The only thing was, we had never done a concert at one in the afternoon before. The other factor involved was that vodka in Moscow was around a dollar a bottle. So there was tons of pure vodka around. It’s like water over there. Or at least it was here at the Make A Different Drink Foundation.
We started inhaling pure Russian vodka, no mixer, about 1:35 p.m. Standing on the side of the stage. Watching the bands I had loved, all my life, having a blast, in the midday sun. By 3:00 or 4:00 I was shit-hammered drunk. I have never been able to handle hard liquor. Vodka, Jack Daniel’s, tequila, Jägermeister, it all Fucks Me Up Beyond All Recognition. I suppose that is the point. Nine times out of ten I react to hard booze like the T-shirt says: Instant asshole, just add alcohol.
It was around then that Scott McGhee ordered Terry Sasser to come to the side of the stage and take my bottle of vodka away from me. I was officially cut off. I did not understand why, since I was doing nothing but standing there watching the show. Maybe I was doing some other shit that I don’t remember now, almost thirty years later. But I was finished work, so now it was Miller time. Absolut-ly. I had polished a whole bottle off by now, pretty much. There was maybe a finger left below the label. When Terry took my vodka away, I became belligerent. Big surprise.
“What the fuck are you doing?”
“Give me the fucking bottle of vodka.”
“What are you talking about? You work for me. We are done with work. It’s my bottle of vodka. Go fuck yourself! Get the fuck away from me.”
“No, you go fuck yourself. You’re drunk. You are cut off. You’re an embarrassment to the whole Make A Difference Foundation.”
And with that, Terry walked away with my bottle of vodka.
Let the Games Begin
I walked around the hallways of Lenin Stadium, livid and drunk. I went to the dressing room to try and find Terry, or another bottle of vodka. But he wasn’t there. I couldn’t find anyone. Or any more booze. So, I kept walking around the cavernous halls of the venue, looking.
I opened a door near the production office and walked in. Doc McGhee was doing a press conference in front of the world’s music media. Cameras were rolling. Tape recorders were tape recording.
“Where in the FUCK is my bottle of vodka!?!?!?!!!” I shouted at the top of my heavy metal lungs, to all journalists assembled from around the world at the anti-alcohol conference.
A look of sheer terror spread across Doc’s face.
Scott McGhee jumped up out of his chair. Terry Sasser was also there in the room. Scott motioned to Terry to get me the fuck out of there.
Terry, like Scott, is an ex–football player. Terry came at me like a rhinoceros with his nose snorting. Ears twitching in rage. He walked towards me while in the conference room. But once he entered the hallway, and the press could no longer see, he started running at me. I turned around and ran, in a somewhat bemused state of terror, down the hall. Scared, but also giggling. Like it was funny.
Scott McGhee came out of the room and followed Terry, chasing me at top speed around the basement corridors of the Russian stadium. Great! Now I had a pissed-off ex–NFL player, along with a running back for the Chicago Bears, after me, trying to kick my ass. In a communist country.
I paid these guys, no less!
I finally got to my dressing room. Slammed the door behind my back. Grabbed whatever furniture I could find in the room and put it in front of the door. Recounting this, it sounds like an action movie. This is my life, for God’s sakes.
Throughout all of this, I was drunk as a skunk. Totally ripped. Kind of chuckling to myself at the action and how ridiculous the situation was. But it was about to get even crazier.
Just like in the movies, Scott and Terry barreled through the door, making a mockery of my makeshift barricade. I greeted them with the salutation, “What’s up, dudes?”
As I heard the words escape my mouth, Scott grabbed me by the chest. He proceeded to slam me into each wall of the concrete room. Banging into one wall, turn around, bang! Into the other. Around in a circle. Smash!!! Into the other side of the room. Turn one more time. Straight back into the fourth wall. I ain’t talkin’ about Broadway, folks.
Scott flipped me over onto my back and knocked the wind out of me, as he slammed my drunken ass into the floor. He jumped on top of me and held my arms down as he jammed his kneecap into my throat. Cutting off my windpipe. Not to mention doing who knows what to my vocal cords, I remember wondering at that instant. I wasn’t giggling anymore.
Scott McGhee was crying.
“I love you, motherfucker. But you drive me fucking insane,” he whispered an inch from my face, as his tears dripped into my eyes. I couldn’t breathe. I was going to lose consciousness if he didn’t get off my throat.
As big as I am, I am not an NFL football player. I could not overpower Scott. Especially since I was blacking out drunk at the same time. I turned and saw that Terry was also crying his eyes out. Scott would not get off my neck.
“I love you. But you are nuts. You burst in on a press conference, drunk and screaming, at an anti-alcohol benefit. What in the fuck is wrong with you?!?!”
“Give me my fucking bottle of vodka. I was done working. He took my bottle of vodka.” I choked out the words.
He got off me so I could breathe again, and not die. He sat down on a broken table as Terry continued to weep in the corner. None of us said anything for a couple of minutes, as our breath and heart rates returned to normal. We were all crying.
My memory is hazy of what happened after that, due to the entire contents of a quart of Absolut vodka coursing through my veins. I do know that my throat hurt.
The next day, we were onstage again at 1:00 in the afternoon in front of 75,000 people. I warmed up my voice in that exact same room where the brawl had occurred the day before. Or should I say, tried to warm up. To an Ozzy Osbourne song. I was so hung over I could barely stand up. My throat hurt from my manager almost squashing my windpipe the d
ay before. I was also extra hung over, from the vodka. That shit really does not agree with me.
We did our show and I remember Ozzy Osbourne himself watching from the side of the stage. After, I was coming offstage and Ozzy made a point to tell me, “Hey man, great voice. You’re a really good singer.” I’ll never forget that. Ozzy has always been one of my heroes. I have always loved his voice so much.
At the end of the show, I got to sing onstage live in front of the world on TV with my influences. Vince Neil. Klaus Meine of Scorpions. We all shared the stage at the end of the night for an all-star jam. After the concert, yet more pandemonium ensued.
Somehow, back at the hotel, I had managed to get more vodka. Not wanting to repeat the previous day’s activity of almost getting my throat crushed by NFL players, I was a very good boy and enjoyed my libations accordingly. No drama. I was just really happy to be there, after all.
After Mötley Crüe’s second-to-last set, Bon Jovi took the stage. All was well until the end of their set. The concert had been sold to every band as there being no specific headliner. No band would have more production than the other. Mötley Crüe was known for its stage show, fire, smoke, and production values much more than Bon Jovi was at that time. But sure enough, at the end of Bon Jovi’s set, a wall of pyrotechnics exploded at the front of the stage into the skies above. No other band at the festival had gotten any pyro whatsoever. Mötley Crüe went, well, Mötley Crüe on Bon Jovi. More specifically, the man who managed both bands . . . Doc McGhee.
It was clear that Tommy Lee viewed the situation as a rock ’n’ roll conflict of pyrotechnic interests. So Tommy came down the hall with some pyrotechnics of his own.
I was standing backstage, swilling from a quart of vodka. Tommy came up to me and screamed in my face.
“Your manager’s a fucking asshole!!!!! Gimme that!!!!!!!”
18 and Life on Skid Row Page 11