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The single most fun day of my entire life

For those of you who do not know Little Steven’s Underground Garage radio show, Steven has dedicated himself to preserving rock and roll as a cultural force. As Rock and roll gets shoved off commercial radio by pop princesses, emo crybabies, nu-metal and other soundtracks to sell cars and soda, it had truly gone underground. Steven is a rock star himself, and a TV star with the advent of The Sopranos, but he spends his own time and money to help indie bands that are true to the roots of rock and roll just because he CARES. And he practices what he preaches. I see him out at shows, at Manitoba’s and other low-key events where the die-hard rockers are, not on the carpet or in photo ops in the back of Interview Magazine. Tune into his show any time: www.littlestevensundergroundgarage.com

I can’t just go and get trampled by thousands of garage rockers – I also pride myself in my photos. Photo passes were all gone. I even signed up for the audition for Go-Go dancers so I could get close – but then I didn’t want to work. Then I work on my friends. Muck & The Mires, The Star Spangles, The Paybacks, The Swingin’ Neckbreakers and The Gore Gore Girls are all playing. Surely one of them needs a roadie, a guitar tech, a driver, a lackey? The Gore Gore Girls come through – I am all of those things, so I load up the cameras and go.

There is a big party the night before, and as I have too much party, leaving at 8:30 am is too much to bear – I have to get the girls in Brooklyn and get them to the gig – and we’re still late! They have to scramble to get dressed and get ready, but it all works out – they even get their own trailer that they only have to share with another band – The High Dials, who are cool. The cameras are out – lots of water – tuning guitars, getting on stage.

How are they going to have forty some odd-bands in twelve hours? The earlier bands get ten minutes to play, AND there is a rotating stage so one band sets up while the other one plays. Sometimes the stage starts rotating and the band in front is still playing – set over! I’m trying to get a good shot of the Gore Gore Girls before they get rotated but two guys are in my way! I look at the photo later, and realize it was Little Steven and Bruce Springsteen. The girls have a great three song-set, and setting up next are The Swingin’ Neckbreakers, whom Little Steven featured in an episode of The Sopranos. The Star Spangles are posing in front of the camera with Kim Fowley, the legendary producer songwriter who came up with the concept of The Runaways and wrote songs for Kiss.

We go to put the gear away and check out the trailer – get something to eat – I don’t think we had breakfast. We meet The High Dials, commisserate with the other bands. More people are starting to arrive, as they did not have to be one of the first bands on, but if you blinked or went to the toilet, you missed a few bands. I went back to see The Cocktail Slippers, five hot girls from Norway wearing Elvis suits. VERY rock! What made them MORE rock is that one of their members was VERY pregnant and she rocked out! The whole string of bands, Richard & The Young Lions, The Flaming Sideburns (featuring former Kowalskis member Jarkko/Jay Burnside on drums) and The Boss Martians were amazing! Who introduced the Boss Martians? The Boss himself, Bruce Springsteen, very fittingly. I snuck into the photo pit, got a few photos of him, and then was thrown out.

By this time, the rotating stage had broken a few bands back and it takes the bands longer to change over. What was it, noon by now? One? Time for BEER! I have not fully exploited the hospitality tent and I’ve already been there a couple of hours! What is WRONG with me! One the way to the tent, we run into the D4, whom I had met at Manitoba’s the night before. I ask the boy I was talking to his name, and he answers, “Beavah”, in his thick New Zealand accent. Being the New York wise ass, I have to comment, “Beaver, huh. Does that work for you?”. I run into my homegirl Wendy from the Paybacks, and me, Amy Gore and Wendy are a triple threat. We need beer!

I missed The Shazaam, whom I wanted to see as I was turned on to them by Bruce Brodeen of Not Lame Records at ‘Stockage last year. RATS! Back to the rock! The Fuzztones, The Romantics, The Mooney Suzuki are all amazing. The D4 rock hard in a very different way from the other bands, and put on an amazing show. The Paybacks are very true to form and it’s good to see another female front-person on stage (I show my support by wearing a Paybacks T-Shirt for the event). The shocker of my second foray into the crowd was The Creation. I knew nothing about them – just heard of them, but the music, energy and performance was amazing! This is a band that had hits just after I was born, and they were SMOKING some of the younger pups! I tried to get in the photo pit once again, and the security guard said, three times and you are out!

I go to meet a friend, Dan from The Volunteers, and we get to catch Nancy Sinatra, who was surprisingly good and had Clem Burke on drums. When I saw him the night before, I thought he was playing with The Romantics, as he had in the past. Big Star, which was Alex Chilton backed by The Posies were solid in the performance but seemed to be phoning it in on the energy. Also, sandwiched by The Creation and The Dictators, it would be hard to compete with those guys. The Dictators were AMAZING! The crowd was pumped up, liquored up and ready to rock! With their rock and roll anthems it seemed like everyone was a Dictators fan in the crowd!

I take a trailer, toilet and beer break once again. I go back, get on The D4’s motorhome, and see out the windshield that Iggy has arrived! This is a day for memories, so I start yelling “It’s Iggy! It’s Iggy! It’s Iggy!”, and run off the bus as if my life depended on it. I run up to him and say hi, remind him that we’d met before (which I am sure he doesn’t remember). I have no shame. I just wanted to say hi to Iggy and shake his hand! Why I didn’t get the camera out? I don’t know. I either wasn’t thinking, or that would have been TOO MUCH!

I decided to get another view and stand on stage for Bo Diddley. It was getting close to The New York Dolls’ set, so I REALLY wanted to be as up close as I could. I meet Kim Fowley on stage. After chatting with him for a bit, he tells me I remind him of Courtney Love, “…without the damage”, he adds. He also declares me “fuckable”. Sounds like a compliment, so I’ll take it! Right before the New York Dolls, I start chatting with Matt from The Contrast. “Do you like English boys?”, he asks. Little does he know I like ALL KINDS of boys. “I think you are a little bit older than me”, he says cautiously, and tells me he is 22. I start laughing. Really, it is physically possible that I am his mother’s age, but we won’t go there. I tell him how old I am and he’s still interested! Awesome! Usually, they RUN!

The Dolls start and they are amazing! Johansen looks like a pretty, skinny girl, and Sylvain is a great performer and carries the front of the stage as the sideman. The tragedy of this show is that Arthur Kane, their original bass player who had been waiting for this reunion for almost 30 years, died weeks before the show. They found a fitting player in Sami Yaffa, formerly of Hanoi Rocks, and to add happiness to the bittersweet occasion, Sami was married the same day – he and his beautiful bride still had their wedding clothes on! Matt and I are talking about Thunders, and I mention how “You Can’t Put Your Arms Around a Memory” is one of the most beautiful songs ever written. “They played it in London”, Matt tells me. I am amazed and warn him, “If they play that song, I will cry!”. As SOON as that comes out of my mouth, they play it, and I am crying on stage. After the set, I have to take a trailer break, drunkenly attempt to play Matt a song I just wrote about Dee Dee Ramone and wind up missing The Strokes.

I am ready for Iggy! I run into Beaver and tell him I want to be in the crowd for Iggy. He agrees. The stage is too far removed. Besides, hospitality has run out of beer. We go out to the concession stands – THEY are out of beer! The show is not even sold out (due to threats of rain all day due to hurricanes) and the beer is sold out. I remember from when we did Cavestomp at Coney Island high, we would sell as much beer on those nights as we did on St. Paddy’s Day. Garage rockers DRINK! Anyway, we are there for the start of Iggy and start jumping around – he opens with Loose. We are going crazy.

The crowd starts moving toward the stage. I am getting knocked about, but hell it’s rock and roll. Beaver checks with me to make sure I am OK. I think it was for “No Fun” that Iggy starts yelling, “Get on Stage!!”, so we of course all start rushing the stage like obedient fans. I am really getting squashed now, and Beaver is protecting me from becoming another Who-convert-like casualty. We try going to the other side of the stage, and it’s just as bad. We resign ourselves to retreating safely to the stage. One side is packed and they are not letting people on, but we go to the other side and have a pretty good view. I stand on a wobbly chair to get photos – good thing Beaver is tall and I can use his shoulder as a brace.

I seem to have a Iggy photo jinx. Last year at Coachella, my new batteries DIED during his set. This time, Iggy comes charging RIGHT at me. Good thing I loaded a new roll of film. I am shooting as Iggy is skipping into my line of sight and the camera stops RIGHT as he gets close – and the film starts rewinding! I was only on frame 6!!! Weird! Arrrgh! What did I do?

The show is over! I have been there for over 12 hours, and I don’t want ii to end! EVER! Beaver and I plan to meet by his trailer, and I go to ours to gather the troops and get my gear. We have a LOT more people in the van coming back than going out – that’s fine. I go over to the D4’s trailer, and the driver has locked it, everyone is gone, and the motorhomes are anxious to pull out! Wendy from the
Paybacks had her guitar on one of them and they had already left!

We cram the van full of people, luggage, and souveniers – one happy rock and roll crew going to Manitoba’s – Gore Gore Girls, High Dials, Wendy, Clem, bookers, etc. Manitoba’s is SO PACKED you cannot even MOVE! We go to Vazac’s AKA 7B across the street just to get a break. THIS is now sensory overload. I take Wendy back to her hotel, which is blocks form my house, and call it a night.

The Dictators have a song that I love called “Who Will Save Rock and Roll”, which drove the crowd crazy at the Festival. I think the answer to that question is Little Steven!