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about 8 years ago, i started writing about my life and times in hollywood. i'm cleaning out my computer and found the file. i'm by no means a great writer, but many had mentioned that they'd like to read about an 18 year old kid who took his band to hollywood on a greyhound bus in 1990. so, here's a bit of it.
sully
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A.M.F.
OR “ADIOS, MOTHERFUCKERS!”
The night I left, my friend Karen came over to see me to say good-bye. We used to date when we were 16 and we’re still real close to this day. Anyway, she and her cousin Dena came over to say good-bye to me. I gave her a photo album of pictures of us that I kept. I kinda wish I still had it, because her mom saw it and promptly threw it out. I told ya, parents dig me.
After they left, my friend Dan came over with some of my other friends Dawn and Stacy. Dawn gave me a card that I still have, basically wishing me well in my new “adventure”, and I gave them some of my stuff that they wanted to have to remember me by. I asked Dan (whom I now call “Catfish” for some odd reason) to take care of Tuffy until I got my own place, and then he could send it to me. I was afraid it would get stolen, or hocked or something. As they all left, I hugged them all tightly, and said “See you on MTV!”
As I got my stuff to go, my mom and my stepfather, Tom, were sitting on the couch downstairs. I hugged my mom, and left to pick up Steve.
I got to Steve’s house, and he said good-bye to his parents. They gave him their calling card number to use so he could call them, which was a fatal mistake that I’ll explain later.
THE BUS RIDE
We arrived at the Greyhound bus terminal in downtown Chicago at three o’clock on the morning of September 24, 1990. There were five of us headed for Los Angeles: me, George, Whiskey, Bones and Steve, who wasn't in the band, but unfortunately, was coming out with us.
I’ve known Steve since the fifth grade. He played guitar, badly. He was really annoying and I definitely did not want him to come along. When he found out I was going he called and asked if he could come too. I told him to ask the other guys, because I figured they’d tell him no. They wound up saying “Yeah sure”. Nothing like having friends you can count on to do your dirty work for you.
I had two huge Army duffel bags packed full of clothes, makeup, hairspray, band pictures, all of my song lyrics, my tapes and my Walkman. I also had a little Fender practice amp, and two guitars. One was an electric I had just picked up a few months earlier, a BC Rich Gunslinger with this crazy snakeskin paint job that I couldn’t stand, but it played great. I also had a Yamaha acoustic guitar that Mika gave me. Everybody else packed way lighter than I did, but I pulled together everything that would have been important to me, except for my white strat. I chose those guitars because if I had to hock them it would be no big deal, which I wound up doing more than once.
We said our good-byes and schlepped our stuff on the bus. For some reason, I had to bring my practice amp on with me. I put it on the floor, and put my feet on top of it. I was definitely less than comfy.
The bus was pretty crowded. There was one guy who was really strange. He was 25 or 30 and traveling with his mother, kind of a Norman Bates “Yes mommy, no mommy” type of guy. He kinda looked like Buddy Holly’s retarded little brother. I quickly noticed that some of the people we were getting on with were definitely the type that would consider chicken sodomy a “date.” To be perfectly honest with you, the thought that I was going to be spending three days on a bus with these people made my sack twitch.
We got on and I sat with Whiskey. George sat by himself with our Styrofoam cooler full of food, and Steve sat with Bones. Sitting across from us was this Deadhead guy named Larry. He was a big guy and had a really long beard, so I called him “The Weirded, Bearded Guy”. We all swapped stories about why we were going out to California. He was going to pick up his VW van. He also said that while he was living in Chicago, the DEA stormed his apartment looking for drugs. According to him, they went to the wrong apartment, and were supposed to go to the one next door, or something like that. He said that he was gonna sue, but then decided not to. Y’know, I never realized just how ridiculous that story sounded until now.
There was also a guy sitting behind Whiskey and me who looked just like the dead guy in the movie Weekend at Bernie’s. Most of the time he was curled up in his seat, asleep, so we called him “The dead guy”. According to him he was going back to California to face attempted murder charges. He didn’t bother us - he was sleeping all the time, so we didn’t care.
The bus made stops occasionally so we could get out and smoke, and Larry always said “Smoke ‘em if ya got ‘em!” whenever we’d get off the bus.
On the way out, we talked a lot about our plans for the band. We had decided the first order of business once we arrived in LA (after we found a place to stay, that is) was finding a bass player. We debated a lot about the name, Hell’s Orphans. Whiskey and Bones didn’t like it.
Whiskey wanted to call the band Machine Gun Kelly, after a gangster from the 20’s. I said that was too much like the glam band Pretty Boy Floyd. Then he wanted to use the name Dead Marilyn. Again, I said no. Bones liked Knuckles L.A., named after a cartoon cat I drew on my jacket that I named Knuckles. George and I weren’t going to change our name. No way in hell. Besides, August liked it, and he was in a signed band. More proof that I was on the right track. After a while they got used to it, and got what it means - even Hell wouldn’t keep us - and there was no problem.
I was drawing Whiskey’s tattoos on his leather jacket with my paint markers most of the time. I recall asking him if I could write “Blow Cheez” on it, just to be weird. I thought it was funny. It meant absolutely nothing, but I just wanted to write something stupid on it. He let me do it provided I put it on mine, too, which of course I did happily.
The guys kept asking me where we were going to stay. I didn’t know. I just knew we had to get in touch with August. He never said we could stay with him. He just said to call him as soon as we got into California, but they didn’t need to know that. They looked to me for reassurance because I knew August. I also held on to the money, and kinda became the fearless leader of the group; I took care of everyone and made sure that no one got shot in the eye.
At that point I figured we’ll get to L.A., start rehearsing right away and start playing out within a month. I threw caution to the wind and said, “Fuck it-we’re going.” August knew a lot of people, and we’d have no problems meeting the right ones. We’d be rock stars soon enough.
STARS IN OUR EYES, STARS IN THE SKY
My most vivid memory of the bus ride was the night we stopped at a little rest area in Nebraska. It was really late at night, probably around two in the morning, and it was pitch-fuckin’-black outside. We got out and were having our cigarettes and peeing on trees, and we looked up at the stars. It was the clearest sky I have ever seen in my life.
Not only did you see the stars that were shining really brightly like you’d normally see on any night, but if you looked closely for a few seconds, you’d see stars that were really faint that looked like they were a hundred million miles above the stars that were really bright. That was the most gorgeous sky I’ve ever seen in my life to this day. Now, every time I look up at the stars, I think of that time, and wish I could see stars like that again. We got back on the bus, and I talked to Whiskey for the better part of the night, and then luckily, slept through Kansas.
EVEN IF YA GOT ‘EM, YA CAN’T SMOKE EM...
While we were going through Utah, we got a new bus driver. He must’ve been a non-smoker, because it seemed like weeks before this guy would stop. If I thought it would’ve helped, I would’ve eaten my fuckin’ smokes. It was a good thing that there were bathrooms on the bus, because if it were up to this guy, we’d have to pee in the aisles, which I’m sure probably happened more than once.
I guess Utah has strange affects on people, because while we were driving through it, Whiskey noticed these girls who were sitting in the back of the bus. They weren’t anything special in the looks department, but they were getting cuter as the miles went by. Anyway, Whiskey mentions that he hasn’t jerked off in days, and was having a hard time of it. I told him that I sure as hell wasn’t going to help him with his little dilemma. So he gets up, and skips off to the “loo” to go shake hands with the governor. All must have gone well, because when he came out of there he was practically singing the fuckin’ Hallelujah chorus.
LAS VEGAS
Once we got into Nevada, and saw Las Vegas glowing ahead of us on the horizon, the others decided that they wanted to get off the bus, and mentally regroup. At first, I was so stressed, I said “No fuckin’ way! We’re not getting off this bus until we get to Hollywood!” Two seconds later I decided that I had to get off that fucking bus.
So we did.
The Weirded Bearded Guy came with us; we had gotten along real well, so why the hell not? We got a little motel room to store our stuff, and we went out to have fun in Vegas. Problem was, we were all under 21, except Larry. So every time we’d go in a casino, George would go have a seat at the slots, we’d order a drink (why not, they’re free), and then the security guards would ask us for ID. So then we’d go to the next one. While we were out dicking around, people on the strip would ask us if we were in famous bands, and of course, we’d say yes.
A MOMENT OF SILENCE FOR THE KING...
...THANKS VERAMUCH.
We came up to a place called The Silver Bell Chapel, where according to George, whom we earlier named Dylan Chains (kinda like “still in chains” wow, deep.), Elvis was married. Now I didn’t think this is true, but just in case, I stole an “E” for Elvis off of the marquee out front. I must’ve looked silly as hell, jumping up and down like an idiot, trying to reach the marquee, but I got my “E”. I’ve always believed that everyone needs a little Elvis in their lives, and now I had mine. Hail to the King, baby.
“WE JUST WANT A FUCKIN’ OMELET!”
Around six or so in the morning, we got hungry, and wanted to go get some breakfast type o’thing, but all that were around were the casinos that kept kicking us out. We tried anyway, and time after time, they kept kicking us out. We kept saying that all we wanted was to get some eggs or pancakes. We didn’t want a shot with it, no eggs flambe, we just wanted some French goddamn toast. No one would let us in. Needless to say, it sucked, so we kept on walking with a song in our hearts and not a damn thing in our stomachs.
We did eventually find a restaurant, and our little old waitress was shocked that we’d had such a hard time. Believe me, sister, so was I.
There was a waiter there who didn’t speak English, but his friend told us that he liked the artwork on Bones’ jacket, so Bones sold it to him for $75. I finally made money with my artistic ability. My mom would be so proud. With Bones’ newfound fortune, he paid for breakfast.
After our omelets were reduced to just a memory, we all decided that we could face another day on the evil Greyhound bus. So we went to get our stuff out of our motel room, and went to the station to get back on the bus.
When we were about an hour out of L.A., I got off the bus and called August. It was around 10 o’clock in the morning and I woke him up. He said it was cool that we were coming to town and to call him back when we arrived. We got to the L.A. bus station on the morning of Wednesday, September 26th, around 11 o’clock or so. One problem was that a few of us got tickets to L.A. and a few of us got tickets to Hollywood. We didn’t realize there was a difference until then. So, we’re sitting in downtown L.A., which is not a fun place to be a longhaired white boy who happens to be wearing skintight leather pants. I was sure that someone was going to get sodomized or killed, and I’d have to call his mom and break the news. Luckily, Larry watched our stuff for us and helped us get the correct tickets to complete our journey to the Promised Land.
The guys were really happy that our bus trip from Hell was almost over. I remember that it was really overcast as we were going from L.A. to Hollywood, but as we were going up the 101 Freeway and saw the Hollywood sign on the hill (y’ know, the one that you see in the movies), it seemed as if the sky cleared, and a ray of sunshine shone right on it. Everyone perked up as soon as we saw that sign. I could swear that Bones was so happy, he was glowing. Whiskey kept saying, “Dude, you’re glowing! The whole trip you’ve been shriveled and curled up in your seat, but not anymore - you’re fuckin’ glowing! Look at him - he’s fuckin’ glowing!” What could I do but laugh, he was right.
I did notice that everyone seemed happy, everyone that is, besides George. He kept saying that nothing major was wrong when I’d ask him, he was just worried about his mom. Apparently, his dad was cheating on her, and understandably, George was pretty pissed about it. I thought that it was weird that he would be talking about shit like that now that we were in California, and here he was with a look on his face that you’d find on someone who repeatedly slammed his dick in the car door. I guess I would’ve understood if he was worried about where we were gonna stay, or somethin’ like that, y’know? I honestly believe that he was scared, which was no big deal. We all were scared to a certain degree.
Once again, the boys were asking me where we were gonna stay. I said, “I don’t know, we’ll probably just do hotels for a while.” I didn’t really know what would happen. August didn’t tell me where we’d be staying, and other than August, I knew no one else there. I figured we’d jump off that bridge when we got to it. And there it was, looming on the horizon.
THE ARRIVAL, OR “MAMA, I’M HOME!”
Well, we made it to the Hollywood bus station on Vine St. and Selma Blvd. We piled our shit into a taxi. I had called August a few minutes earlier, and he told me to take a taxi to the Hotel Howard on Hollywood and Orchid Blvd. Well, he should’ve told me that he forgot what fuckin’ street it was on, because it sure as hell wasn’t on Orchid. Actually, it was on Whitley Ave., three or four blocks east of Orchid. We kept driving up and down Hollywood Blvd. looking for this fuckin’ hotel for about 30 minutes or so. I was getting antsy because of the fact that a five dollar cab ride was quickly turning into a twenty dollar cab ride. I eventually got out at a pay phone and looked them up in the phone book.
We finally found the Hotel Howard, a little Japanese-owned place. It was kinda weird there. We couldn’t have visitors there after 10 o’clock without having to sneak them past the security guard. All and all, it was an okay place, there weren’t bugs crawlin’ all over or anything like that.
So we go to get a room, and when they asked me how many people were staying in the room, like an idiot, I said, “Five.” They didn’t like that answer too much, so we had to get two rooms. Now, mind you, these rooms were $220 a week. Each. And you had to put down a $20 dollar deposit to use the phone in your room. When your $20 was spent, you had to give ‘em another $20 before the phone would work again. So there goes another $40 for the phones in our rooms.
Now, since I was the only one with any kind of cash left, I paid for them. I definitely was not too thrilled about that, not to mention the fact that I had only about $400 left. J. Paul Getty was quickly going bankrupt.
I must say however that I was happy to finally be in Hollywood, the place I always wanted to be. It was kinda weird; everyone there looked like us, there weren’t any grown-ups to look at us like we were freaks, or short-haired jocks to start shit with us. We just fit in. It was definitely a cool feeling. For once, we found a place where we belonged (do you hear a chorus of angels singing too?).
We finally got into our respective rooms; Whiskey and I shared one room, and George, Steve, and Bones shared the other. I figured that if I’m payin’ for the rooms, it was up to me who I roomed with. Whiskey and I bonded on the bus, so I figured that we’d room together. Besides, we were the guitarist and the singer, the important guys in the band! We had platinum albums to write, and we should be together in case one gets inspired.
I remember that as I was carrying the last of our shit in, I saw Heavy D. drive down the street in a white Mercedes and shout “Heeeeyyy! whasssup y’all?” at me for some reason. Although I was not a fan, it was cool - I was in town for maybe an hour and I’m already seeing famous people. I also saw my first pierced tongue about three seconds later. I thought that was one of the stupidest things I ever saw, and I had no idea that soon I’d see 15 year-old suburbanites getting theirs done at the mall...
When we got settled, we had all called our moms to let them know we were here, and alive. Steve let me use his parents’ calling card to call my mom and to my credit, I memorized the card number. I had no idea just how handy those lucky thirteen little digits were gonna be in the future. Bad idea for Steve to let me use the card, but then again, he had no idea that I’d remember it. I reminded myself to feel bad for them when they got the phone bill.
I called August to let him know that we got into our hotel rooms and to see what we were gonna do for the evening. He said that he’d come over around six or so, so hang tight, he’ll see me soon. As I was about to hop in the shower, I realized that with all the shit I packed, I didn’t include a hair dryer. I totally freaked out. You need to understand that this was 1990. We were right in the middle of the “Hair Metal” era. Motley Crue, Poison, and Guns N’ Roses were the kings of rock n’ roll. From them we learned that how you look is just about as important as how you played. And a little thing like a hair dryer is a very important part of a young rock star’s life.
Eventually, I didn’t feel too bad about not bringing a hair dryer with me, because none of the other geniuses were bright enough to pack one. So I sent Bones and Steve (who decided that he wanted to be called “Winter”) to go fetch us a hair dryer from one of the shops on Hollywood Blvd. There went another 30 bucks. They got back an hour later, and I took a shower. And dried my hair. It turned out wonderfully; the desert climate beat the hell out of the humidity that I was accustomed to back home. Things just kept getting better.
sully
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A.M.F.
OR “ADIOS, MOTHERFUCKERS!”
The night I left, my friend Karen came over to see me to say good-bye. We used to date when we were 16 and we’re still real close to this day. Anyway, she and her cousin Dena came over to say good-bye to me. I gave her a photo album of pictures of us that I kept. I kinda wish I still had it, because her mom saw it and promptly threw it out. I told ya, parents dig me.
After they left, my friend Dan came over with some of my other friends Dawn and Stacy. Dawn gave me a card that I still have, basically wishing me well in my new “adventure”, and I gave them some of my stuff that they wanted to have to remember me by. I asked Dan (whom I now call “Catfish” for some odd reason) to take care of Tuffy until I got my own place, and then he could send it to me. I was afraid it would get stolen, or hocked or something. As they all left, I hugged them all tightly, and said “See you on MTV!”
As I got my stuff to go, my mom and my stepfather, Tom, were sitting on the couch downstairs. I hugged my mom, and left to pick up Steve.
I got to Steve’s house, and he said good-bye to his parents. They gave him their calling card number to use so he could call them, which was a fatal mistake that I’ll explain later.
THE BUS RIDE
We arrived at the Greyhound bus terminal in downtown Chicago at three o’clock on the morning of September 24, 1990. There were five of us headed for Los Angeles: me, George, Whiskey, Bones and Steve, who wasn't in the band, but unfortunately, was coming out with us.
I’ve known Steve since the fifth grade. He played guitar, badly. He was really annoying and I definitely did not want him to come along. When he found out I was going he called and asked if he could come too. I told him to ask the other guys, because I figured they’d tell him no. They wound up saying “Yeah sure”. Nothing like having friends you can count on to do your dirty work for you.
I had two huge Army duffel bags packed full of clothes, makeup, hairspray, band pictures, all of my song lyrics, my tapes and my Walkman. I also had a little Fender practice amp, and two guitars. One was an electric I had just picked up a few months earlier, a BC Rich Gunslinger with this crazy snakeskin paint job that I couldn’t stand, but it played great. I also had a Yamaha acoustic guitar that Mika gave me. Everybody else packed way lighter than I did, but I pulled together everything that would have been important to me, except for my white strat. I chose those guitars because if I had to hock them it would be no big deal, which I wound up doing more than once.
We said our good-byes and schlepped our stuff on the bus. For some reason, I had to bring my practice amp on with me. I put it on the floor, and put my feet on top of it. I was definitely less than comfy.
The bus was pretty crowded. There was one guy who was really strange. He was 25 or 30 and traveling with his mother, kind of a Norman Bates “Yes mommy, no mommy” type of guy. He kinda looked like Buddy Holly’s retarded little brother. I quickly noticed that some of the people we were getting on with were definitely the type that would consider chicken sodomy a “date.” To be perfectly honest with you, the thought that I was going to be spending three days on a bus with these people made my sack twitch.
We got on and I sat with Whiskey. George sat by himself with our Styrofoam cooler full of food, and Steve sat with Bones. Sitting across from us was this Deadhead guy named Larry. He was a big guy and had a really long beard, so I called him “The Weirded, Bearded Guy”. We all swapped stories about why we were going out to California. He was going to pick up his VW van. He also said that while he was living in Chicago, the DEA stormed his apartment looking for drugs. According to him, they went to the wrong apartment, and were supposed to go to the one next door, or something like that. He said that he was gonna sue, but then decided not to. Y’know, I never realized just how ridiculous that story sounded until now.
There was also a guy sitting behind Whiskey and me who looked just like the dead guy in the movie Weekend at Bernie’s. Most of the time he was curled up in his seat, asleep, so we called him “The dead guy”. According to him he was going back to California to face attempted murder charges. He didn’t bother us - he was sleeping all the time, so we didn’t care.
The bus made stops occasionally so we could get out and smoke, and Larry always said “Smoke ‘em if ya got ‘em!” whenever we’d get off the bus.
On the way out, we talked a lot about our plans for the band. We had decided the first order of business once we arrived in LA (after we found a place to stay, that is) was finding a bass player. We debated a lot about the name, Hell’s Orphans. Whiskey and Bones didn’t like it.
Whiskey wanted to call the band Machine Gun Kelly, after a gangster from the 20’s. I said that was too much like the glam band Pretty Boy Floyd. Then he wanted to use the name Dead Marilyn. Again, I said no. Bones liked Knuckles L.A., named after a cartoon cat I drew on my jacket that I named Knuckles. George and I weren’t going to change our name. No way in hell. Besides, August liked it, and he was in a signed band. More proof that I was on the right track. After a while they got used to it, and got what it means - even Hell wouldn’t keep us - and there was no problem.
I was drawing Whiskey’s tattoos on his leather jacket with my paint markers most of the time. I recall asking him if I could write “Blow Cheez” on it, just to be weird. I thought it was funny. It meant absolutely nothing, but I just wanted to write something stupid on it. He let me do it provided I put it on mine, too, which of course I did happily.
The guys kept asking me where we were going to stay. I didn’t know. I just knew we had to get in touch with August. He never said we could stay with him. He just said to call him as soon as we got into California, but they didn’t need to know that. They looked to me for reassurance because I knew August. I also held on to the money, and kinda became the fearless leader of the group; I took care of everyone and made sure that no one got shot in the eye.
At that point I figured we’ll get to L.A., start rehearsing right away and start playing out within a month. I threw caution to the wind and said, “Fuck it-we’re going.” August knew a lot of people, and we’d have no problems meeting the right ones. We’d be rock stars soon enough.
STARS IN OUR EYES, STARS IN THE SKY
My most vivid memory of the bus ride was the night we stopped at a little rest area in Nebraska. It was really late at night, probably around two in the morning, and it was pitch-fuckin’-black outside. We got out and were having our cigarettes and peeing on trees, and we looked up at the stars. It was the clearest sky I have ever seen in my life.
Not only did you see the stars that were shining really brightly like you’d normally see on any night, but if you looked closely for a few seconds, you’d see stars that were really faint that looked like they were a hundred million miles above the stars that were really bright. That was the most gorgeous sky I’ve ever seen in my life to this day. Now, every time I look up at the stars, I think of that time, and wish I could see stars like that again. We got back on the bus, and I talked to Whiskey for the better part of the night, and then luckily, slept through Kansas.
EVEN IF YA GOT ‘EM, YA CAN’T SMOKE EM...
While we were going through Utah, we got a new bus driver. He must’ve been a non-smoker, because it seemed like weeks before this guy would stop. If I thought it would’ve helped, I would’ve eaten my fuckin’ smokes. It was a good thing that there were bathrooms on the bus, because if it were up to this guy, we’d have to pee in the aisles, which I’m sure probably happened more than once.
I guess Utah has strange affects on people, because while we were driving through it, Whiskey noticed these girls who were sitting in the back of the bus. They weren’t anything special in the looks department, but they were getting cuter as the miles went by. Anyway, Whiskey mentions that he hasn’t jerked off in days, and was having a hard time of it. I told him that I sure as hell wasn’t going to help him with his little dilemma. So he gets up, and skips off to the “loo” to go shake hands with the governor. All must have gone well, because when he came out of there he was practically singing the fuckin’ Hallelujah chorus.
LAS VEGAS
Once we got into Nevada, and saw Las Vegas glowing ahead of us on the horizon, the others decided that they wanted to get off the bus, and mentally regroup. At first, I was so stressed, I said “No fuckin’ way! We’re not getting off this bus until we get to Hollywood!” Two seconds later I decided that I had to get off that fucking bus.
So we did.
The Weirded Bearded Guy came with us; we had gotten along real well, so why the hell not? We got a little motel room to store our stuff, and we went out to have fun in Vegas. Problem was, we were all under 21, except Larry. So every time we’d go in a casino, George would go have a seat at the slots, we’d order a drink (why not, they’re free), and then the security guards would ask us for ID. So then we’d go to the next one. While we were out dicking around, people on the strip would ask us if we were in famous bands, and of course, we’d say yes.
A MOMENT OF SILENCE FOR THE KING...
...THANKS VERAMUCH.
We came up to a place called The Silver Bell Chapel, where according to George, whom we earlier named Dylan Chains (kinda like “still in chains” wow, deep.), Elvis was married. Now I didn’t think this is true, but just in case, I stole an “E” for Elvis off of the marquee out front. I must’ve looked silly as hell, jumping up and down like an idiot, trying to reach the marquee, but I got my “E”. I’ve always believed that everyone needs a little Elvis in their lives, and now I had mine. Hail to the King, baby.
“WE JUST WANT A FUCKIN’ OMELET!”
Around six or so in the morning, we got hungry, and wanted to go get some breakfast type o’thing, but all that were around were the casinos that kept kicking us out. We tried anyway, and time after time, they kept kicking us out. We kept saying that all we wanted was to get some eggs or pancakes. We didn’t want a shot with it, no eggs flambe, we just wanted some French goddamn toast. No one would let us in. Needless to say, it sucked, so we kept on walking with a song in our hearts and not a damn thing in our stomachs.
We did eventually find a restaurant, and our little old waitress was shocked that we’d had such a hard time. Believe me, sister, so was I.
There was a waiter there who didn’t speak English, but his friend told us that he liked the artwork on Bones’ jacket, so Bones sold it to him for $75. I finally made money with my artistic ability. My mom would be so proud. With Bones’ newfound fortune, he paid for breakfast.
After our omelets were reduced to just a memory, we all decided that we could face another day on the evil Greyhound bus. So we went to get our stuff out of our motel room, and went to the station to get back on the bus.
When we were about an hour out of L.A., I got off the bus and called August. It was around 10 o’clock in the morning and I woke him up. He said it was cool that we were coming to town and to call him back when we arrived. We got to the L.A. bus station on the morning of Wednesday, September 26th, around 11 o’clock or so. One problem was that a few of us got tickets to L.A. and a few of us got tickets to Hollywood. We didn’t realize there was a difference until then. So, we’re sitting in downtown L.A., which is not a fun place to be a longhaired white boy who happens to be wearing skintight leather pants. I was sure that someone was going to get sodomized or killed, and I’d have to call his mom and break the news. Luckily, Larry watched our stuff for us and helped us get the correct tickets to complete our journey to the Promised Land.
The guys were really happy that our bus trip from Hell was almost over. I remember that it was really overcast as we were going from L.A. to Hollywood, but as we were going up the 101 Freeway and saw the Hollywood sign on the hill (y’ know, the one that you see in the movies), it seemed as if the sky cleared, and a ray of sunshine shone right on it. Everyone perked up as soon as we saw that sign. I could swear that Bones was so happy, he was glowing. Whiskey kept saying, “Dude, you’re glowing! The whole trip you’ve been shriveled and curled up in your seat, but not anymore - you’re fuckin’ glowing! Look at him - he’s fuckin’ glowing!” What could I do but laugh, he was right.
I did notice that everyone seemed happy, everyone that is, besides George. He kept saying that nothing major was wrong when I’d ask him, he was just worried about his mom. Apparently, his dad was cheating on her, and understandably, George was pretty pissed about it. I thought that it was weird that he would be talking about shit like that now that we were in California, and here he was with a look on his face that you’d find on someone who repeatedly slammed his dick in the car door. I guess I would’ve understood if he was worried about where we were gonna stay, or somethin’ like that, y’know? I honestly believe that he was scared, which was no big deal. We all were scared to a certain degree.
Once again, the boys were asking me where we were gonna stay. I said, “I don’t know, we’ll probably just do hotels for a while.” I didn’t really know what would happen. August didn’t tell me where we’d be staying, and other than August, I knew no one else there. I figured we’d jump off that bridge when we got to it. And there it was, looming on the horizon.
THE ARRIVAL, OR “MAMA, I’M HOME!”
Well, we made it to the Hollywood bus station on Vine St. and Selma Blvd. We piled our shit into a taxi. I had called August a few minutes earlier, and he told me to take a taxi to the Hotel Howard on Hollywood and Orchid Blvd. Well, he should’ve told me that he forgot what fuckin’ street it was on, because it sure as hell wasn’t on Orchid. Actually, it was on Whitley Ave., three or four blocks east of Orchid. We kept driving up and down Hollywood Blvd. looking for this fuckin’ hotel for about 30 minutes or so. I was getting antsy because of the fact that a five dollar cab ride was quickly turning into a twenty dollar cab ride. I eventually got out at a pay phone and looked them up in the phone book.
We finally found the Hotel Howard, a little Japanese-owned place. It was kinda weird there. We couldn’t have visitors there after 10 o’clock without having to sneak them past the security guard. All and all, it was an okay place, there weren’t bugs crawlin’ all over or anything like that.
So we go to get a room, and when they asked me how many people were staying in the room, like an idiot, I said, “Five.” They didn’t like that answer too much, so we had to get two rooms. Now, mind you, these rooms were $220 a week. Each. And you had to put down a $20 dollar deposit to use the phone in your room. When your $20 was spent, you had to give ‘em another $20 before the phone would work again. So there goes another $40 for the phones in our rooms.
Now, since I was the only one with any kind of cash left, I paid for them. I definitely was not too thrilled about that, not to mention the fact that I had only about $400 left. J. Paul Getty was quickly going bankrupt.
I must say however that I was happy to finally be in Hollywood, the place I always wanted to be. It was kinda weird; everyone there looked like us, there weren’t any grown-ups to look at us like we were freaks, or short-haired jocks to start shit with us. We just fit in. It was definitely a cool feeling. For once, we found a place where we belonged (do you hear a chorus of angels singing too?).
We finally got into our respective rooms; Whiskey and I shared one room, and George, Steve, and Bones shared the other. I figured that if I’m payin’ for the rooms, it was up to me who I roomed with. Whiskey and I bonded on the bus, so I figured that we’d room together. Besides, we were the guitarist and the singer, the important guys in the band! We had platinum albums to write, and we should be together in case one gets inspired.
I remember that as I was carrying the last of our shit in, I saw Heavy D. drive down the street in a white Mercedes and shout “Heeeeyyy! whasssup y’all?” at me for some reason. Although I was not a fan, it was cool - I was in town for maybe an hour and I’m already seeing famous people. I also saw my first pierced tongue about three seconds later. I thought that was one of the stupidest things I ever saw, and I had no idea that soon I’d see 15 year-old suburbanites getting theirs done at the mall...
When we got settled, we had all called our moms to let them know we were here, and alive. Steve let me use his parents’ calling card to call my mom and to my credit, I memorized the card number. I had no idea just how handy those lucky thirteen little digits were gonna be in the future. Bad idea for Steve to let me use the card, but then again, he had no idea that I’d remember it. I reminded myself to feel bad for them when they got the phone bill.
I called August to let him know that we got into our hotel rooms and to see what we were gonna do for the evening. He said that he’d come over around six or so, so hang tight, he’ll see me soon. As I was about to hop in the shower, I realized that with all the shit I packed, I didn’t include a hair dryer. I totally freaked out. You need to understand that this was 1990. We were right in the middle of the “Hair Metal” era. Motley Crue, Poison, and Guns N’ Roses were the kings of rock n’ roll. From them we learned that how you look is just about as important as how you played. And a little thing like a hair dryer is a very important part of a young rock star’s life.
Eventually, I didn’t feel too bad about not bringing a hair dryer with me, because none of the other geniuses were bright enough to pack one. So I sent Bones and Steve (who decided that he wanted to be called “Winter”) to go fetch us a hair dryer from one of the shops on Hollywood Blvd. There went another 30 bucks. They got back an hour later, and I took a shower. And dried my hair. It turned out wonderfully; the desert climate beat the hell out of the humidity that I was accustomed to back home. Things just kept getting better.
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