by Steven Adler
We walked over and Freddie introduced us. Her name was Cheryl. I was already instantly attracted to her, and after just a few minutes of conversation, I knew that this was the girl for me. She was so down-to-earth and so sweet. We hung out that entire afternoon, just getting to know each other.
That night we played our show, and after, I brought her back to my hotel room. We talked most of the time and kissed a little, but I was so impressed with her, I really wanted to take this slow. I chose to treat her right. I got her number, and I would call her every night thereafter. We talked about everything and I discovered that she’d had only two boyfriends. She told me she had sex with each only once, and each time lasted about two seconds. I sensed that she wasn’t like so many other girls who were all “take, take, take.” She wasn’t looking around to see if something better might be coming along. She hadn’t fucked a bunch of guys and she wasn’t a user. Shortly after, I would fly her out to be with me in various towns and cities.
Surprise! I was deeply in love. More on this a bit later.
Even though we had shot it, our video was not getting played. David Geffen had to call in a huge favor from the head of MTV to get one fucking airing of “Welcome to the Jungle.” They tried to bury it at like five a.m. on a Sunday morning. But guess who’s wide awake at that hour on a Sunday and just getting in from a night of partying? That’s right, kiddies, GNR Nation! Legend has it that “Welcome to the Jungle” hadn’t even gotten done with its one airing and the MTV switchboard was lighting up like a Christmas tree. They were all demanding to know one thing: when would MTV be airing the video again?
Soon we started getting played in regular rotation, and our popularity grew and grew. We went from playing clubs to theaters very quickly. On the big tours, we were being told that more people were coming to see us than to see the headliners, like the Cult and later, Iron Maiden.
When we were on tour, we would take care of business, and it would be time to hit the road for the next city. Often it would be around three a.m., and there would be no sign of Axl. The parking lot would be completely empty, except for one car. And there, inside, would be Axl and whatever groupie he picked up that night. We’d yell, “Axl. Come on, fuck her already. We’re going.” He’d yell back, “Fuck you!”
DUMP THE BITCH
Finally, reluctantly, he would join us, insisting that the object of this night’s desire come along. This eventually caused a lot of commotion, because shortly after we’d leave, Axl would find something fatally wrong with his date and turn on the poor girl. We would sit there in stunned silence as Axl would make a big show of getting rid of her. We knew better than to get involved.
NEW YORK CITY
After we played the Ritz in New York, we were invited to appear on Headbangers Ball. It was very exciting. We went to the MTV building, and everyone treated us like the celebrities we were rapidly becoming. “Can we get you anything? Would you like a makeup or hair person? Have you eaten?”
They had people literally running around, catering to our needs, and I guess it was cool. You’d look out the window and see traffic and the people walking around Times Square. They had gold records and promotional posters all over the walls.
Interviewing us was a guy named Smash, the host of the Ball. This, however, would be his last appearance, as they were completely revamping the show. We taped the show on a Wednesday to be aired on Saturday, but we weren’t down with how it all worked. Slash was reading off some tour dates and he announced the show at the Ritz in New York for Friday night, and Smash corrected him by saying it already went down the night before. Slash was like, “No, man, it’s this Friday,” totally forgetting the airdate of our interview.
Since it was the last show of the “old” Headbangers Ball, Smash asked us to trash the set at the end of our piece, which we did gladly. Before going to a commercial break, Smash said, “C’mon, boys, on three, let’s rock. One, two, three . . . let’s rock!” Nobody in the band knew what the fuck he was talking about so we were totally silent. He must have thought this was some group conspiracy to make him look bad. “Well, thanks, guys,” he said sarcastically.
Next up was a show at CBGB, the famous punk rock club in Manhattan. Duff was particularly excited because his heroes Iggy Pop and the Ramones had played there. A lot of my favorites like Blondie and Talking Heads had started out there too. When we got there, I said, “Are you sure this is CBGB?” It was the smallest room, very, very intimate. It held only like fifty to seventy people. I just couldn’t imagine that all those famous bands had played there.
We performed an acoustic set and I rocked the tambourine. We debuted some songs that we hadn’t played publicly yet. The lyrics “I used to love her . . . but I had to kill her” from “Used to Love Her” got a huge laugh. And “Patience” got a very nice response.
We also played “Mr. Brownstone” and “Move to the City.” Someone yelled out, “Drum solo!” so I shook the tambourine wildly. Everyone laughed. After CBGB, we played the Horizon in New York on Halloween. Then we went to Washington, D.C., and after the show we went out with the crew—Mötley Crüe.
Previously, in the winter of 1986, our publicist at Geffen, Bryn Bridenthal, had invited us to the record release party for the Crüe’s Girls, Girls, Girls album. It was at the Strip Club on Sunset, the same place where they later shot the video for “Girls, Girls, Girls.” We were socializing and partying while listening to the new record. I thought it rocked. We talked with their people, who loved our record and thought we were a great band. It was so amazingly humbling to me. These guys were my heroes.
In Washington, we met vocalist Vince Neil, drummer Tommy Lee, and bassist/songwriter Nikki Sixx. We didn’t meet guitarist Mick Mars until we were touring with them. Mostly it was Tommy and Nikki hanging out with us. We got along so famously we pretty much knew from there on that we were going to do a tour sometime. We just had to.
THE SIXX SHOOTER
That Christmas Eve, Nikki invited me to hang out over at his pad. He had a bunch of girls over. We were drinking and partying it up. Nikki asked me if I wanted to do some coke. “Hell yeah!” We went up to Nikki’s bedroom, where he had this huge walk-in closet. We went in the closet for some extra privacy. This was where he had his paraphernalia. He retrieved a tablespoon and a syringe from a hidden compartment. He mixed the coke with a little water in the spoon and sucked it up in the needle. He shot me up because I didn’t really know how to do it. The feeling was great, not what I expected. I wasn’t freaking out, like all anxious or something. I saw this leather jacket hanging there in the closet and I said, “Dude, that’s a great leather jacket.”
“It’s yours,” he said. It fit me perfectly, and that made me feel a little more entitled to his amazing gift because, well, I knew it couldn’t have fit him and his six-feet-three frame.
After shooting up coke, we continued with our orgy. There were so many hot young girls there, finer than fine. They were the hottest chicks I had been with at that point. The oldest couldn’t have been twenty. They were wearing lingerie and silky nighties. They were making out with each other and eating each other out. They had a dildo and were fucking each other with it. I was aroused the whole evening and blew at least three loads. At one point, Nikki and I were sitting on the couch getting blow jobs. We had seven or eight girls, with at least three girls sucking our dicks at any one time. It was great. It was beyond great. Think of partying with all that prime flesh. Okay? Now dream of how it would be to do it at a party with one of your all-time rock idols.
Nikki really knows how to work it with the ladies. When we were ready to come, they all crammed in really tight together in front of us. They put their heads together with their mouths wide open, anxiously awaiting our climax. We both shot our come on their faces. I yelled, “Make it sick!” and they swapped our come through tongue kisses, licking it off of one another. It was awesome.
Nikki is a smart, all-around together, down-to-earth, professional, cool guy. GNR originally wan
ted the Crüe’s team, Doc McGee and Doug Taylor, to manage us. Mötley had heard all about us from the club days and they had read about us in magazines. They came to our shows, they dug us, and we started hanging out. When November 1987 came around and the opportunity arose, we told Alan Niven, “Dude, we’ve got to do this tour with Mötley Crüe.” Shortly thereafter, it happened.
The pairing of our two bands electrified fans of both camps. Each band was in its kick-ass prime and I think we both delivered the best rock ’n’ roll show on earth in a long time. The first show was down south in Alabama. Late that night, after an amazing performance, Tommy invited me into the hospitality room where people would wait to meet the bands. They had catered food set up on three big six-foot-long tables.
Tommy put his arm over my shoulder and said, “Stevie, come here, I wanna show you something.” He brings me into the room and closes the door and says, “Blow your nose real well.” I looked down, and on one of the tables were two lines of coke spread the entire length, six feet long. I smiled and yelled, “All right!” He handed me a short straw; he started on one end and I started on the other. Snort! We met in the middle, just looked at each other, and laughed. He fell back on a couch behind him, and I fell back on another couch, and we just sat there for at least ten minutes. Well, it could have been an hour. Who knows? We finally got up, wired to the max, and finished the rest of the “krel.” That’s what they called coke back then. “Got any krel? Got any krel? Où est la krel? Here comes the krelly, man!” All the guys in Crüe were great. Vince seemed kind of involved in his own coolness, though not nearly as stuck-up as Axl was becoming. They both shared a sort of “too good for you” attitude. Mick Mars was very quiet and shy. I got to know him a little better on their private jet. We were thirty thousand feet in the air, and Mick made me a drink. It was the first martini I ever had. It was awesome, and it really gave me a taste for the art of a nice dry martini. The plane was the way to tour. We made it to the next town in like forty-five minutes.
At the time, Tommy Lee was married to Heather Locklear. She was the hottest thing on wheels back then. Whenever she would come out to visit Tommy during the tour, everything was “hush-hush.” We couldn’t talk about girls or drugs. We’d have to stop partying and be on our absolute best behavior. Truth be told, it sucked when she was there. Tommy had to act like a saint, although the night before we’d be getting blow jobs backstage from a dozen groupies.
The Mötley tour lasted only a month, and on the last night of the tour we were in Florida. Tommy had a drum set that was built in a cage. It would rise, go out twenty feet above the audience, and rotate vertically 180 degrees with Tommy in it! I said, “Dude, Tommy, you gotta let me try that.” Since it was the last show and I was buddies with Tommy’s crew, he gave the go-ahead.
After sound check, they said, “Dude, you wanna do this thing? Let’s do it now.” They strapped me in, the set rose, and they flipped it around 180 degrees and just let me hang there upside down. I was trying to play while all this was going on, but I had to lock my feet into the base of the snare drum stand to keep myself anchored properly. I couldn’t figure out how the hell Tommy managed to keep playing. So I’m hanging and they’re all, “See ya, Stevie.” They start walking away. “Guys? Guys? Okay! Blood’s rushing to my head. Not good!” Finally they came back, laughing their asses off.
Now, remember, on the last night, it’s traditional for the headliners to play some sort of joke on the opening act. This show would be no exception. We were performing our last number, “Paradise City,” when all of a sudden what appeared to be cocaine came pouring from the rafters, snowing all over the stage. It wasn’t actually coke, but rather flour, massive amounts of it in the air. It was so damn funny. Anyway, sweat and flour do not mix. I was washing dough out of my hair for two weeks.
We got along so well with the Crüe that we felt it would be okay to get them back. We did the same prank we had played on the Cult. During the Crüe’s set we set up the gag. I had the cup containing a gross mixture of eggs, relish, mustard, and mayo. I walked up the drum riser, stood by Tommy, faced the crowd, and held the cup up for their approval. They cheered me on. I looked at Tommy, said, “Hey, buddy,” and slammed it down right on top of his head. All the gooey ingredients splattered over his face and hair. He was definitely cranky about it. While he was playing, it got in his eyes. I could tell that he was irritated, so I wiped his face for him. After the show he stared me down, shaking his head. “You fucker, man.” But we were good.
ONE DUMB FUCK
That night, Nikki, Tommy, Ronnie, and I were in the motel room doing coke and Nikki suggested that we cook it up. I knew this would take a while so I cut out to get more ice for our drinks, figuring I’d be back long before Nikki was done with the alchemy. Coming back though, I couldn’t fucking remember which room we were in! I knocked on every door on that floor, but nobody answered. I ended up roaming the halls in total agony, realizing I wouldn’t be partying with them on our last night together. It was such a bummer. Come to think of it, the way they were probably in a frenzy cooking up and smoking the shit, there was no way they were going to open the door anyway.
When the Crüe tour wrapped, we jumped on the Alice Cooper/Ace Frehley tour in early December 1987. I had become friendly with Tommy Lee’s “krel” dealer, and he told me, “Dude, I’ll take you to the airport, we’ll get you some stylin’ new tennis shoes and a pile of coke.” So I scored some coke and a sweet pair of British Knights. I hid the blow in my carry-on while he drove me to the airport. I got on the plane and flew to Dallas, where we would open our first show with Alice. As I got to the curb to hail a cab to the show, I suddenly started to feel very tense about running so late. I jumped in the cab totally freaking out and said to the cab driver, “Dude, take me to where the concerts are. You got to get me there right away.” I just had blind faith that the cabbie would know the place I was talking about. I had like fifteen minutes to get to the place.
The hack drove like a wild man and I got there two minutes before we were scheduled to go on. The guys gave me mixed looks. Some were pissed and others just worried. Dougie had my stage pants and a fresh shirt all ready for me to slip into, and I ran right out to the stage with the rest of the band.
Afterward, I explained that the cab driver didn’t know where the fuck he was going. But the whole experience really shook me up and I swore to myself I’d never get separated from the band like that again.
When we got up to Madison, Wisconsin, a couple of weeks later, I finally had a chance to talk with Alice. I had resolved to have this conversation because it had bothered me for a long time. “Hey, Alice, remember that time when you let us open for you in California, and we kinda blew it?”
Of course he remembered. “Yeah?”
I told him I wanted to apologize. I told him how much I worshipped his music.
Alice didn’t blink and said, “Don’t worry about it.” Alice is the best.
Sadly, Alice’s father was mortally ill. Initially, they were telling us that the tour was canceled. And we were bummed. Then a few minutes later, they informed us that the tour was back on. Then word got to us that no, we were packing up and going home. We couldn’t get a definitive answer out of anyone. Then it became ridiculous. We’re going home, we’re not, we are, we’re not. I got so frustrated listening to all these clueless fucks telling us what was going on when they really had no idea. I said, “Fuck it. I’m going to the bar, let me know when you figure it out.”
This precipitated the beginning of a series of pretty self-destructive events that eroded my status with Guns N’ Roses while intensifying my occasional bouts of low self-esteem. In fact, almost missing the show in Dallas was nothing compared to what happened during the next few months. All these little things began to add up, although I wasn’t really aware of it at the time. That afternoon, I went straight to the local watering hole Slash and I had discovered the night before. I was so depressed; I slammed something like twenty kamikaze
shots. I got terminally shit-faced and became pretty damn obnoxious. I don’t remember exactly what I did, but the bouncer pounced on me, grabbing my legs, and another guy got my arms, and they threw me right out the front door. I remember bouncing up real quick, screaming, “Fuck you guys!” I charged the front door, but they slammed it shut, so I punched the metal casing that covered the light on the bar’s front door. I wanted to smash it but broke the little finger on my right hand instead.
Chapter 14
Everybody OD Tonight!
DOWNHILL SLIDE
My finger swelled up like a sausage, but I was too drunk to feel a thing. I staggered back to the hotel and entered the lobby screaming for Dougie. At some point, “naked boy” had reappeared, and hotel guests were flipping out. Fortunately Dougie was at the front desk, checking out or something. He spotted me, took one look at my finger, and his eyes bugged. My entire hand had blown up, making it look more like a foot. He said, “We gotta get you to the hospital.” I spun away and ran out of the hotel into the parking lot. “No way!” Dougie had to chase me down as I darted between the parked cars. We attracted a nice little crowd before he was able to drag me to the hospital in my birthday suit.
After that incident, things started to accelerate downhill. The band was just like, “What a dumbass, breaking his hand.” They didn’t care about me one bit. No one called the hospital while I was there. No one gave a shit. There was no talk of postponing anything until I knitted up. They just went out and got someone else to fill in. I swear, if it was anybody else in the band, they would never have gotten a replacement. No way in hell.