Friday, April 29, 2011

Who's Next


I’ve been lucky enough to have met a lot of my favorite musicians. A lot of the names wouldn’t mean much to your average person but they do to me, so this is not about name dropping …well, not really.

            I met Arlo Guthrie coming out of the men’s room at the El Mocambo, and shook his hand, and No, I didn’t care. I’ve met Christine Lavin and ended up designing the cover for one of her CDs. Jill Sobule was at the Knitting Factory in LA and I brought down all my CDs  for her to sign. Micky Dolenz – Here he came walking down the street in Westwood. I could go on.
           
            But the most bizarre one involved my favorite group of all time, The Who.
And by bizarre I mean creepy and by creepy I mean probably only to me, but I’m telling the story so, fuck you, it’s creepy.
           
            I was walking home from the North Hollywood subway station, taking the route I normally took. I saw about 3 people standing outside a martial arts studio chatting, and I notice that one of them is Roger Daltrey.  I’ve been a huge Who fan since I was pre-pubescent, so I knew it was him, and I froze in front of this little group, heart pounding, barely breathing.  As he starts to leave I find the voice to say “Mr. Daltrey, sorry to bother you, life long fan. Can I just shake your hand?”

            He says “ Sure, Fank you very much” (listening to the Who in interviews is how I learned to do a decent Cockney accent) and he takes off in his appropo Austin mini. And I’m floating…

            The next morning, the news is blaring “The body of John Entwistle, bassist for the legendary rock group The Who, was found in a Vegas hotel Room”. Apparently drugs and a hooker were involved, even though Entwistle was always known as the quiet one.

            And I totally had this Twilight Zone moment. Cold fingers up the spine and all that.
            I mean I’d still like to meet Pete Townshend.

But not if Roger Daltrey has to die for it.

http://youtu.be/OhuLhcbY_08

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