Hollywood: Rock Of Ages

by Chris Solberg

  SPANKY - Vinnie Vegas

  Another band situation I got into for a few months was with a guy I knew named Steve Spangler who I called “Spanky”. Spanky was a guitarist who grew up with us in San Diego and moved up to LA a few months before us. Spanky moved to LA with his band, but everybody else moved back within a few weeks. That happened a lot in those days, and Cupkake and I were determined not to let this happen to us. Spanky had found a decent job right from the get-go and decided he wanted to stay in Hollywood even if his bandmates moved back. Spanky was the exact opposite of Leon and Liz-bone in the fact that he dyed his hair white, Vince Neil style, instead of the black that was so popular among the hair-dyers. This was no different health-wise, and his hair suffered. The only difference was that his pink scalp shown through a sea of white.

  Spanky was a huge UFO fan and played the same white Flying-V guitar that Michael Schenker played. Now I liked UFO and so we decided to try and start a band together. I grew up listening to KISS and Cheap Trick, so I had a more commercial style of writing that Spanky and I shared. He got his notoriety from playing in a band called “Shock”, which was one of the first full-fledged glam bands of San Diego. These guys went all out as far as glam goes, and I believe that is where Vince Votel got his inspiration for Street Angel a few years later. As a matter of fact, a very young Mike Kiner was the drummer of this new upstart band. Their singer was a guy named Jerry Jones who was one of the few lead singers in San Diego who could pull off the swagger needed to carry the role. Maybe a bit too much as far as some guys were concerned; including Vince Votel. But you’d never know it, because in the true rock style of the time, these two would high-five and hug like best buds if they ever ran into each other. Jerry was half Asian so he looked like a rock and roll Attila the Hun which suited his personality to a tee. Later, Jerry moved up to Hollywood as well, and fronted a big band he still called Shock. He and Votel continued to compete for attention from chicks just like back in San Diego. It was so nostalgic!

  The guys in Shock were young and looked exactly the way your 13 year old daughter looks when she first starts wearing make-up. Everything was heavy and stark, and they looked like they were going to a Halloween party as opposed to a rock show. Another thing that stands out about them for me was their album cover. I don’t know how they managed to record an album, but somehow they did. They decided to take a picture with all their groupies piled around them for the cover which was not an unusual idea at the time. Completely tacky and unoriginal maybe, but not unusual. These days, rappers like to surround themselves with bimbos in their pics and back then, that’s exactly what a lot of rockers did as well. However in this case, the girls dressed in mini skirts, heels and bustiers were all between 12 and 14 which made for quite the disturbing image. But after all, they called themselves Shock and they constantly tried to live up to the name. Shock was the first big glam metal band in San Diego and ruled the scene for a short while. Of course, this upped the ante for all other bands to try and outdo them, especially Street Angel.

  As far as Spanky goes, I ended up joining Tickled Pink in the middle of our jam sessions, and as far as I know, he never formed a band.

  The Tower - Vinnie Vegas

  There was a long list of girls who fooled around with other guys, while supposedly being your girlfriend. Spanky was also one of those guys who is a real sucker for a chicks who knew how to take advantage of guys. And when they got caught, he’d take them back most of the time. But not always, sometimes he would dump her and find another girl who was equally bad. It was a definite pattern of chumpness, but to his credit, Spanky never moped around about it. And come to think of it, they were all really cute girls. I guess that’s what he wanted no matter what the downside was, and that’s exactly what he got. As a friend, Spanky was one of the cooler people that you could meet.

  One day I was walking home from work and I passed by a unique set of apartments that I saw everyday simply called The Tower. These apartments were in a skyrise about 15 stories high and the building was completely out of place being right in the middle of Hollywood’s side streets. As I passed by, I heard someone yelling at me from high above. Two chicks were leaning out the window 200 feet above me trying to get my attention. They were shouting down at me and I was shouting back when It became clear that they wanted me to come up. I told them I’d go home and change first and they shouted the number of their apartment which I had to repeat in my head like Rainman all the way home. I told Cupkake about the girls and we both headed back to the building. It seemed to me like they were probably drunk and in hindsight, how smart is it to hook up with two girls leaning out their apartment window shouting at strangers? I figured this would be a great story to tell people and guess what? 20 years later I’m telling you!

  We buzzed the intercom, and they let us in. As we waited in the lobby for an elevator, we were marveling at our luck. After all, 15 minutes ago, I was

  simply walking home from work and the day seemed like no other, and yet, here we were! We got to the door and I knocked with a stomach full of butterflies. All sorts of scenarios had flushed through my head, each one more exotic than the last. I even thought that if they were super freaky, they might want me to suck Cupkake’s dick, and how was I going to get around that? Yes women; this is what men think about in these situations; that tidbit is on the house, thank you! We’ll, they opened the door, and the place looked more like a large hotel room than an apartment. I rushed over to the window to see what it looked like when they were shouting down at me. It was a fantastic view I’ll tell you that! However when I turned around, Cupkake was sitting on the edge of a bed white as a ghost with a “no-fun” look on his face.

  I could tell something was wrong but I didn’t know what. One girl was pretty buzzed, and she really started chatting it up with me between swigs of a giant rum & coke, but the other had the same look on her face as Cupkake. The conversation got really awkward quickly and pretty soon we were all just sitting around staring at our feet not saying anything. I couldn’t figure out what went wrong but it was obvious that something went south quick. Cupkake rose up and announced that he was going to call it a night and head home. He didn’t even come up with a lame excuse, he simply got up and headed for the door. Now there was NO WAY that I was going to stay so I dashed out the door before it could shut behind him. Once we got into the elevator, Cupkake explained that he knew the girl from San Diego and it was Spanky’s new girl Laura who was supposed to be serious with him. We usually laughed at something like this, but I think we both felt bad for Spanky, and we had a fairly quiet walk home. As for Spanky, this is exactly what always happened with him and it probably still does!

  IMBECILE ROCK - Vinnie Vegas

  A had a few more batches of bad auditions, but I was getting pretty good at weeding through the nonsense. Sometimes my instincts weren’t quite strong enough. I auditioned for a band called “Jagged Edge” who claimed to be the best and baddest band in Hollywood and had “serious label intrest”. I got the speech on the phone about how these guys were going places quick and that I’d better have my shit together. So once again, I loaded up my rig and headed to their studio.

  To call this place a studio is a stretch. These guys had a rat-hole on Highland that looked like a homeless camp. If you’ve ever seen a drug movie, then this place looked like one of those rooms where junkies go to shoot-up. The place stunk and had old socks and cigarette boxes laying around. It had no windows, so the place was stifling and I really just wanted to turn around and leave. Apparently, all three guys lived in the rat-hole as well as played in there. Each corner had a pile of blankets like a dog’s bed and I saw a hot-plate sitting on the ground. The guitarist played what looked like a 2x4 with a neck, and the drummer had the same look on his face that you’d expect a caveman to have. We played one song and the guitarist was playing so loud that you couldn’t hear the drums, much less the vocals and bass. It was pointless, so I told the guy that he was playing too loud. He looked at me
with a huge sweaty grin and said, “I play Marshalls dude!” I told him “I know you play Marshalls, but you don’t need two stacks in this small room, it’s too loud”. He looked at me while he tried to process what I told him, then said “I play Marshalls dude!” I told him, “it’s way too loud, you can’t even hear the drums!” I looked back at the drummer for support, but the caveman looked at me like I just invented the wheel but he still couldn’t tell what it was. And after that, in a pure Spinal Tap moment, the guitarist looked up at me, then his face lit up and he said “I play Marshalls dude!” Later on the cave-man drummer moved in to my apartments down the hall. They continued to put out ads in Music Connection saying “Jagged Edge seeks hard rock bassist. Heavy label interest.”

  Ads in Music Connection were free to enter, all you had to do was call the 24 hour hot-line and leave your message. Once a month I’d enter an ad with the cave-man’s number stating, “Jagged Edge seeks hard hitting drummer. Pros only.” I can only imagine the conversations!

  I went to another pig-stye in the Valley where a pack of “Pros” were auditioning for their new project “Powerball”. The house was a mess and smelled like spilled beer, bong water and old dogs. A couple of pit-bulls roamed around, and the rug was full of dog hair. By then, I knew better than to bring my bass in until I talked to the guys first, and I’m glad I left it out in the car. Some tired looking guy in his 40’s met me at the door and offered me a Bud in a can. He told me to have a seat on the couch, but I chose to stand instead. There was another bass player there who had already auditioned, but he must have liked the ambiance and decided to stick around. The place was dark and looked like house from the seventies. The “Pro” leaned in to me and bragged about the chicks that were scattered about the dump. He explained that they were porn stars and were totally ‘into” the band. Somehow, he equated that to having a leg up in the music industry. He had a wig plopped on his head that looked like it really needed to be washed, but that matched his jeans. I looked at the chicks who looked like drugged out worn porn stars with leathery skin fifteen years past their prime. They were smoking cigarettes, looked burnt out and completely disinterested in anything going on.

  The other bass player asked me if I played bass. I said “yeah” and he slid back in the couch with a grin and told me, “Yeah? ...I smoke it!” He pounded his Bud, crushed the can and started chuckling like he pulled a cool one. At that point I simply headed out the door and got in my car. I had learned my lesson from Jagged Edge.

  After about another month of more hit-and-miss auditions, I saw an ad in the Music Connection which said commercial/metal band seeks bass player for forming band. The influences were Motley Crue, Ratt and Def

  Leppard. This was right up my alley so I gave them a call. My life would change forever and I would soon be known as Vinnie Vegas.

  HooliganStew

  HOLLYWOOD BLVD. - Vinnie Vegas

  After a Summer of no responsibilities and thoroughly annoying Cupkake in the process, it was time for me to get a job. Well, how often in life do you ever get a 3 month vacation? The answer of course is never, so I took full advantage of something that I knew would never happen again as long as I lived. Cupkake had a job arranged from day one at a dreary warehouse down the 5 freeway near Downey, so he was thrown immediately into the grind of a 9 to 5 job. So after three months of partying, playtime was over and I started to look for a real job. My first stab was a delivery company where you had to use your own car. It was a popular scam where they hired you as an “independent contractor” so you spent more money than you earned. This went nowhere fast so I had to actually quit the job to save money. Next up was the job I would stay with for the rest of my stay in Hollywood. Scarlet Letters was a company who created graphics for motion pictures and I worked for them all through my Hollywood years. Our main job was to create the endtitles which is the scroll of credits that pops up at the end of the movie. But we did subtitles and maintitles as well. Maintitles are the credits that come at the beginning of the movie. Name any big movie, and we did it. There are actually some cave drawings of the animal characters at the end of Ice Age that I drew myself, and you can see me and my crew at the end of the movie Shallow Hal.Scarlet Letters was smack in the middle of Hollywood, in the old First National Bank building at the corner of Hollywood & Cahuenga. It was one of those old buildings from the 20’s that looked kind of like a mausoleum. We were on the 3rd floor overlooking Hollywood Blvd. and not a day went by where you did not see an LAPD vs. bum encounter outside. Work was so close that I walked instead of driving, and this meant I traveled down the length of Hollywood Blvd. twice a day. I got to know all the regulars quite personally. Being LA, there were a lot of kids roaming the Boulevard at all hours, and it was hard to tell which ones were true runaways, and which ones were just rebellious kids. Runaway guys always adopted the punk style, I don’t know why but they just did. Big mohawks and leather jackets with shit painted all over the sleeves was the look. The chicks knew that if they dressed up in the rock/glam style, they might have the chance of somebody with an apartment taking them in. Hollywood Blvd. also attracted a lot of girls who’s parents seemed to have no problem with their 14 year old daughter being gone for days at a time. These girls wanted to distance themselves from their suburban roots and try to fit in as “street”. So they emulated the look of the runaway girls and before long, it was hard to tell the difference. Whether they were true runaways or wanabees, the girls traveled in threes as they cruised the Boulevard between Highland & Vine. I’d see the same faces night after night on the way home because each pack seemed to gravitate around their own particular cross streets. Hollywood Blvd. was dotted with about thirty different diners along the way. To call them diners is a stretch, but I can’t find another word that fits. These places were dank grills on the corner with shoddy tables and fluorescent lights. Most of these places were owned by middle eastern foreigners who spoke limited English and had zero tolerance for any hi-jinks. Bums would sneak in to pilfer the trash before Akmid would shoo them off and go back to pondering why the Americans were not buying Falafel. I never knew what Falafel was, and 20 years later I still don’t. Some of the newer foreigners had to learn fast that if you were tolerant of one runaway punk hanging out for two hours while nursing a coke, you’d soon be chock full of punks that wouldn’t go away. The girls learned how to flirt with some of the younger workers on the night shift who’d let them hang for the evening. The girls were smart enough to cruise around the boulevard and only use the eatery as a home base. A few even helped shoo off the punks so they wouldn’t ruin a good thing. Since these girls hung out on the Boulevard every night, I got to know them well and they’d greet me with big hugs & kisses as I walked home. One girl really liked my hair and grabbed me as I walked by. She put her arms around me and purred as she rubbed a tress of my hair across her boobs under her shirt. These kind of strange things happened every night and I used to wonder if anybody else had such an interesting commute to and from work as I did. It turned out to be a boon later on when I was playing The Sunset Strip because these girls would spread the word, as well as flyers to all the regulars on the street. So I’d see Lisa & Dawn at Wilcox, then Sara & Amber at Cherokee, then Michelle & Julie at Las Palmas. Las Palmas was different and I’ll tell you why.

  Las Palmas & Hollywood was the home of Two Guys from Italy Pizza. This place actually took up most of the block and while it sold slices on the street, you could also dine in at a table if you wanted. Of course, the decor inside was more like a PTA meeting, with fluorescent lights, fake wood paneling and white linoleum floors, but that was a kitchy Hollywood look that actually had some personality. Every Friday and Saturday night, a bunch of older wannabee bikers would park en masse in front of the joint and hang out on their bikes eating pizza and drinking cokes. This led to a regular crowd of around 15 young chicks that would hang out and get the guys to buy them whatever they wanted. At around 9 pm, they’d all fire up their bikes and head up to the strip to hang
out. The deal was that the girls got a ride to the strip, while the paunchy biker got to be seen with a young chick on the back of his bike. The fact that the average age of the girls was thirteen didn’t seem to raise any red flags with anyone except me, but I figured that if you are going to live in Hollywood, then it didn’t behoove you to dwell on such things. So every night there was a Kabuki Dance drama played out with the girls awkwardly flirting and grown men acting like 7th graders. Oh gee!!! The funny part was watching some of the bolder girls actually order the dudes around! I’d laugh and laugh. Hollywood was something I will never forget!