Hollywood: Rock Of Ages

by Chris Solberg

  CALIFORNIA AND NATURAL DISASTERS - Vinnie Vegas

  Hollywood of course is smack in the middle of Southern California which means you need to get used to earthquakes and fires. I grew up in SoCal, so earthquakes never bothered me. I actually considered them fun because contrary to what disaster movies show you, the earth does not shake violently and things do not collapse around you. Instead, it’s usually a 15 second roll that goes away and doesn’t return for another 3 years. I took Leslie to see Rodger Rabbit one night and while we were in the car, it felt like someone had jumped up on the bumper and was hopping up and down. Hmmm... only a 4.2 I’d say. I remember Matt and Perris playing an antiquated version of video football when a tremor struck one night. As usual, it was around 3 in the morning and Bobby jumped up alarmed. In LA, earthquakes jostle the transformers on poles until they explode, so the night is filled with numerous green and blue flashes throughout the city. Matt didn’t flinch and told Bobby in his surfer drawl, “Just ride it out man”. Nothing stopped those two from their late night football games, it was the first version of video game that had all eleven players and let you call plays. It was in real time so the games took about 45 minutes each but it looked more like space invaders than John Madden EA sports. They took this game very seriously, and that annoyed Tara who wanted attention from Matt. She’d have to sit for hours watching those two play that game like it was the play-offs. One dark night she was pouting on the bed and bumped the power plug on the wall which erased the game in progress. Man, you would have thought that she murdered the Lindbergh baby the way those two laid into her. She was banished from the bedroom, and skulked into the living room, tail tucked between her legs. It took her months to get back in favor and of course, I found this hilarious.

  Fires were another fact of life in LA, prompting bands like No Religion and The Doors to pen songs about it. Every October, the hills surrounding LA would give birth to hell in a ritual as reliable as the swallows returning to Capristrano. It was always amazing to see the Angelinos go about their daily routine oblivious to the multiple mushroom clouds rising in the distance like nuclear war erupted. In a city with no seasons, it was the closest we had to feeling like autumn when the smell of burnt chaparral wafted over the basin. And ashes floating down on the city like snow was the closest thing to winter. In Hollywood, the Santa Ana winds would create another localized hazard by blowing all the palm fronds down from the trees and onto Hollywood Blvd. These winds always kicked up around midnight just in time to catch the drunkards speeding home from Sunset at 2 in the morning. All night you’d hear the pop of tires from the Mercedes and BMWs running over these prickly monsters. This of course led to late night amusement for me which I found akin to the running of the bulls in Pamplona. One of the special joys of living in LA. The next morning the street would be absolutely littered with those fronds.

  Two things were certain in LA. First off, the kids were horrific at skateboarding. You’d see packs of kids in front of Hollywood High constantly falling all over each other trying to pull off the simplest moves. The constant clatter of skateboards hitting the deck became as common as the LAPD copters orbiting overhead. Another fact was that women sucked at cooking. To this day I don’t believe I’ve dated one girl that could cook. Leslie tried to fix me dinner one night buy pouring ranch dressing over a lump of Top-Ramen. Liz declared she was going to treat me to stir-fry which turned out to be the blandest thing I ever tried to choke down. When Vince Votel went out to Chicago with Liz-Bone for a short stint, his girlfriend Jodie had to become roommates with her friend Nina for awhile. They talked Cupkake and I into helping them move into their apartment with the promiseof a spaghetti dinner. Fresh off the face of the great spaghetti heist, this sounded like a good idea. I took a bite and leaned over to Cupkake and whispered, “Is this the worst spaghetti you ever had in your life?” He nodded quietly while trying to nosh his pasta like a dog chewing on a old bone full of ants.

  Nina was actually pretty cute, but had the reputation of hooking up with anyone and anybody. You’d think that wouldn’t matter much in Hollywood, but there was something about being where everybody else had been that was disconcerting. She looked half Spanish and half Persian with dark features and big doe eyes. She had a nice personality, but would throw herself shamelessly at anyone within striking distance. One evening after I played bass for a music student’s mid-term performance in The Valley, I high-tailed it to a party at Jodie & Nina’s apartment where the whole gang was going to show up. At around 2 am, Nina crawled into bed with the door open and gave me the “come here” signal with her finger. So I cruised in a shut the door behind me. I had just taken off my shirt when Jodie burst in and plopped down on the bed between us. She was completely smashed and rolled around on the bed giving us the “I love you guys, you guys are my friends” routine. I tried to get her out, but she wouldn’t leave, I think she was doing the worst job at “lifeguarding” ever, but it did ruin to moment. So I guess it worked after all!

  Hollywood was a unique place to live in the 80’s for so many different reasons, but it also held a mystic allure to it that everyone could feel. Hollywood as we know it, goes back around 90 years, but well before that, Gabrielino indians were drawn to the area and made it their home. There’s a definite energy there that for me personally, made me feel alive. But it drove many others to suicide as well, so you get affected on a personal level. It’s a restless place to live where you never feel like “sitting put”. And when you leave that city, you end up chomping at the bit to get back no matter where you are. The area itself has a history that goes back 15,000 years, indeed, if you could go back in time and visit Hollywood during the American Revolution in the 1700’s, it would not have changed at all. It wasn’t until Spanish, Mexican and Morman settlers arrived in the 1800’s did the place begin to change. Until then, the entire area was a vast expanse of chaparral and shoreline. Of course now all the streams and rivers are long gone and the once hilly terrain is a flat checkerboard of streets and sidewalks. But the wildlife in Hollywood has not evolved and lives the same as it did thousands of years ago. Gone are the woolly mammoths and saber-toothed tigers that get dug up in the La Brea tar Pits on the southern edge of Hollywood. But dozens of species of wildlife still roam the area through the new created environment of alleyways, drainage canals and easements. They do not study history and have no idea that this is a bizarre and unnatural life they are leading. To them it’s just the way things are, and at night, they go about their business scurrying around the same way they’ve done for millenniums. At night, you hear the same chirping crickets and hooting owls that the Gabrielino heard around their fires. These creatures are part of the original spirit of the place that has not faded in the face of progress. This spirit lives just below the surface but is undeniable in it’s presence. And if you can tune in to this energy and live amongst it, then it is a soothing companion that draws you in and guides you home. But if you cannot, then it’s whispers can drive you mad.

  Hooligan Holiday

  TO LIVE AND PLAY IN LA - Vinnie Vegas

  Not everything in Hollywood was serious business revolving around music, sometimes things came up that were strictly fun and social events, and I relished those chances to relax and hang out with friends. During the summer, Rock City News would set up BBQs at Griffith Park and invite all the bands who advertised with them. Hooligan Stew decided to partake one day which was very unusual, but I took to it whole-heartedly. As we drove up I saw two girls who I had dated recently, and I muttered “Oh boy, I’m in trouble!” Tara whispered in my ear “I’m in trouble too!” One girl was Penny the freaky teacher, and the other was Amber. They both rushed over to me at once when I got out of the car which led to an awkward moment. I don’t know which was more awkward, to see another girl vying for my attention, or the fact that I ignored them both. I had to think fast and I decided to play Frisbee with any guy I could find. Fortunately, there were plenty of willing guys and I played frisbee all day like a madman.
Love that Frisbee! Can’t get enough of that Frisbee I tell you!I was wearing a black Marshall T-shirt that I found in my apartment one day. It was not at all unusual to find peoples clothes in your apartment the next morning, but it was unusual to find men’s clothes. Somebody had taken the time to cut out the back in a spiderweb looking pattern which for some reason acted like an aphrodisiac to chicks. Thank you to whoever made that shirt! That and the fact that it had the Marshall logo on the front made this shirt the instant hit. Now I have a birthmark on my back and Penny later told me that even though she was suspicious of Amber, she noticed that Amber was poking at my birthmark as if she never saw it before. This gave her comfort that she’d never seen me naked. Whew! Anyway, somehow I survived that day without any drama but in hindsight, if any one of those girls would have given me any guff, I would have said good-bye and moved on to then next. That’s just the way we rolled back then and we didn’t think twice about it. I’m not trying to be a dick about it, I’m just telling you the truth.

  Living in Hollywood in the 80’s was a lot of fun. You could simply walk down to Hollywood Blvd. and jump into any bar for a good time. Some were established hangouts, while some were holes in the wall. I used to walk to work down Hollywood Blvd. and every morning I was amazed that at 8:30 am, I’d hear bottles clinking and drunken laughter coming out of these places. These were the places that had an open door, but a curtain across the entrance so you couldn’t see in. Places like the Spotlight or the

  Rainbow Room were seedy haunts where you knew people were drinking whiskey and gin as opposed to beer. One place on Cahuenga was notorious for it’s seediness. Anytime you drove past this place, there was always some seedy looking character posted outside the door as a lookout. He’d be shuffling and twitching nervously as his friend was trying to cop inside. How do I know this? Well, to write this book, I read books by Nikki Sixx and Anthony Kiedis and they told me the story of what it’s like to go to various places at any given time where you know you can cop. I didn’t know it at the time because I never used smack, but now it’s all too clear. This place had that aura and I never dared to go in.

  There was a place called the Frolic Room II which was a small as a kitchen and as seedy as any. For some reason, for about six months, it was the place to go. The real Frolic Room was next door to the Pantages Theater, and I guess the owner decided to expand to a new place. This place had enough room for 7 people at the bar and two booths dominated by the best jukebox in Hollywood. We’d hit up Boardner’s and make a last foray into The Frolic Room before closing. Why? I don’t know. I remember it having a dingy bathroom with a window that you could look out into some anonymous Hollywood alley that looked perfect for shooting up. This gave the place a sinister aura that for some reason seemed very Hollywood. Back by the bathroom was a storage area where one night we found cases of beer. Somebody tore into it and soon the entire bar was drinking free warm bottles of Bud. I think that back then, everybody was strapped for cash so nobody even protested. The next time I went there, they had wised up and that fun was gone forever. Matt & Tara spent a lot of their early relationship at The Frolic Room. I think I’ll always remember The Sweet blasting out “Fox on the Run” as they did their covert dance of love while I laughed. One last ritual on the Boulevard was dropping into Two Guys from Italy pizza which smartly stayed open until 3 am. Every night on the way home. we’d drop in for a slice of the best tasting piece of pizza you ever had in your life. Well to be honest I still get drunk these days and when you’re drunk, even AM/PM corn dogs taste good. I’m sure it was good!

  Spiders & Snakes had an apartment on Larrabee St. which was one block off The Strip. Their apartment had a sliding glass door which opened up to a courtyard dominated by a typical Californian pool. This made the Sunday morning hangover ritual of jumping in the pool oh so much easier. After a dip in the pool, the spiderwebs in your head were gone, and you felt like drinking again. I’m talking about 10:30 in the morning! This led to what I refer to as the “Hazy Sunday” which soon became a blur by Noon. How I got home from these days is beyond me, but it led to the hung over Mondays at work which were just a fact of life. In those apartments lived a punker from England named Richard. Back in the day, he sported a hot pink mohawk, but now his hair was in dreads which was very ahead of the time. This guy spoke in a thick cockney accent and drank cider instead of beer. Now Cupkake and I had never heard of cider before, but were willing to give it a shot. Richard liked to call us “wankers” for not drinking cider and insisted that we do. Richard called us “wankers” any time we annoyed him, but that term just doesn’t insult Americans which annoyed him even more! Cider gives you a rowdy buzz which I guess gives soccer matches in Europe the hoooliganistic reputation so well deserved. One Sunday morning, we had a few ciders and decided at 10:30 am we needed more. We high-stepped down Larrabee to a liquor store where Richard assured us they sold it. Along the way we came across a plush green grass field and decided to get in a drunken wrestling match. After a few rounds of brouhaha, we suddenly became aware of a crowd of people surrounding us. Both of us where dirty, had grass in our hair and were laughing like Hyenas. Oh did I forget to mention that this was a church, and mass had just got out? My bad.

  This place on Larrabee became an instant hit. I don’t remember the guys from Hooligan Stew ever making an effort to go there, but I was always a fixture. I was constantly in the pool with a beer in my hand. And at night, there was sure to be a house full of rockers partying it up. The thing that amazed me was how the gay people had such a disdain for our antics. This place was in West Hollywood and back in the 80’s, the gay community was trying to make it their own. When chicks walked into the courtyard at night with their high-heels, it made a distinctive “clop-clop-clop” which made you alert like a Pavlov Dog. But to a gay guy, this sounded like pussy which was a turn-off. Oh I can understand it, they’d much rather picture a swinging dick than a set of bouncing boobs, but they were very militant about it. Indeed, later on the community had a intrical part of pressuring the sheriff’s department to shut down the strip once and for all. It amazes me how an oppressed minority can swing full circle and oppress outsiders with the same zeal that they fought against for so many years. But they did, and they would call the cops at any given opportunity. One time we had a party full of chicks and the cops showed up. They were being pretty cool and basically told us that they didn’t think we were being out of hand but they were just doing their job. Now any sane person knows that this is a gold mine, so just say “yes sir” and they’ll be on their way. Not Liz-Bone, he started mouthing off about knowing the law and got the cops to come back inside right as they were leaving the building.

  At that point, they took a look around and spied a bong in the corner. Honestly. I don’t remember a lot of pot smoking going on in those days because it kind of went against the grain. I mean do you really want to be stoned in the corner like a sloth when there was so many girls to flirt with? But somebody always wanted to do bong-loads, so it was around. The cops informed us that by there being a bong in the room, they could take this to the next level but that’s not really what they wanted to do. Liz-Bone being the jackass, started popping off that pot was legal in California and that they could just fuck off. This lead to a tense stand-off that me and Timmy somehow diffused and sent the cops back into the night. Liz-Bone was a smart guy, but he was one of those people that bought into weird theories like you don’t really have to pay taxes, so I think somehow he really believed that it was legal to smoke pot in California. Now I come from the school of common sense that teaches: “If the cops are at your house, get them on their way as soon as possible and do not debate semantics.” But hey, that’s just me.

  SPIDERS & SNAKES CALIFORNIA TOUR - STINKAPOLOOZA - Cupkake

  Spiders & Snakes would often go off on short mini-tours that would last about a week. Timmy had been working on a small 5 day California tour for us to venture out and promote the band. I was always excited to play in San Franci
sco because of the wonderful atmosphere the city has. We always had a really good time in San Francisco and what was to change that? The second city mentioned was Fresno. Now that city has a completely different vibe. When I think of the city of Fresno, California, I can picture in my head a few things. High tension wires, trailer parks, dirty run down liquor stores with garbage flying in the wind, and lots of dry heat with the aroma of cow manure. This town was never in my mind a very attractive place. When I heard from Timmy that we were going to be traveling to Fresno, I was not jumping up and down celebrating. Lizzie seemed fine with the trip and told us it would be a good show. Vince Votel was indifferent and did not seem to care if we were going or not.

  Vince Votel volunteered his parents recreational vehicle (RV) to travel in for the short trip. His parents lived in a little town in Southern California named Sun City. This is a little sleepy town in the middle of nowhere between San Diego and Riverside. The band drove out to Sun City from Los Angeles to retrieve the RV from Vince’s parents. Little did I know this would be the last time I would ever see Vince’s dad again. We began the trip up north to play in San Francisco and Fresno. The trip was great because we could screw around in the rear of the RV while someone else drove. Vince and Lizzie ended up being the drivers because they did not trust me. They said I would always goof off, and Timmy was usually doing some type of promotional business.