Everyone Loves You When You're Dead

(And Other Things I Learned From Famous People)

Neil Strauss

• Publisher: Canongate Books
• Year: 2011
• Print ISBN:
  9780857861160
• eBook ISBN:
  9780857861214
• Topic: Media & Performing Arts
• Subtopic: Music

You can tell a lot about someone in a minute. If you choose the right minute.

Join Neil Strauss as he:

- Makes Lady Gaga cry
- Tries to keep Mötley Crüe out of jail
- Gets kidnapped by Courtney Love
- Goes to church with Tom Cruise
- Buys nappies with Snoop Dogg
- And tucks Christina Aguilera into bed

The moment I decided to do a book with Mötley Crüe was the moment I first met them: backstage after a concert in Phoenix, during which bassist Nikki Sixx kicked a security guard, drummer Tommy Lee spit on another guard, and singer Vince Neil told the crowd to seize the stage, which it did, tumbling over barricades and causing thousands of dollars in damage. As I walked to the dressing room to introduce myself as the writer who’d be profiling them in Spin magazine, I heard concert security guards talking on stage left.

SECURITY GUARD: Get the guy who kicked Jim! The one with a beard. We’re fucking pressing charges.

I run back to the dressing room to warn the band.

Hey, I just heard security talking. They’re getting the police to arrest you.

NIKKI SIXX (laughs): Are you the guy from Spin?

Yeah, but I’m serious.

SIXX: Did Nick [Cua, Mötley tour manager] put you up to this?

No, they’re really coming back. I would leave if I were you.

SIXX: Did you ever interview Johnny Thunders?⁵¹

No, but I’ve interviewed Kenny G.

SIXX: Oh, just wondering.

I attempt to convince Sixx to leave before he’s arrested, but he thinks it’s a birthday prank, because in half an hour he will be thirty-nine. Suddenly, six police officers burst into the dressing room.

POLICE OFFICER ONE: Is this the guy who attacked the security officer?

POLICE OFFICER TWO: I don’t know. They both have facial hair.

POLICE OFFICER ONE (to Sixx): Put your hands behind your back.

POLICE OFFICER TWO (to Tommy Lee): You too.

TOMMY LEE: Why me? I didn’t do anything.

POLICE OFFICER ONE: We’ll check the videotape to see which one of you it is.

POLICE OFFICER TWO: We’re also placing you under arrest for inciting a riot. And for inciting girls to expose their breasts.⁵²

NEARBY ROADIE: Is that a bad thing?

LEE: Can’t I put something on? I’m in my shorts.

POLICE OFFICER TWO: No, just come with us.

The police lead Sixx and Lee, who is wearing nothing but tight rubber shorts, into the corridor and toward the backstage exit. Two teenage Mötley Crüe fans tentatively approach them, each clutching a copy of Shout at the Devil on vinyl.

FAN: Can you sign these for us?

Tommy Lee nods his head back toward his handcuffs.⁵³ As they’re led out of the arena, I return to the dressing room, where Cua is arguing with police. Meanwhile, Vince Neil blow dries his hair nonchalantly, as he has throughout the incident, while guitarist Mick Mars lounges in a chair nearby.

MICK MARS: Well, what did you think of the show?

[Continued . . .]

In history books, Ernie K-Doe is best known for recording the 1961 number one rhythm and blues hit “Mother-in-Law,” a song he found discarded in a studio trash can. But to the denizens of New Orleans decades later, he was known as a bona fide character, brimming with unpredictable energy and an unchecked ego. At an awards ceremony I once covered, for example, he told the crowd, “There have only been five [sic] great artists in the history of rhythm and blues: Ernie K-Doe, James Brown, and Ernie K-Doe.”

On the edge of the Tremé neighborhood, at the Mother-in-Law Lounge, a bar he’d opened with his wife Antoinette, K-Doe could be found almost nightly, performing impromptu concerts and talking about himself nonstop.

“I’m cocky, but I’m good,” he responded when I arrived with a New York Times photographer and asked to do a story on him.

Later that evening, he led us outside to his small touring van, and we huddled together on the seats as he gave one of his last interviews. Afterward, we returned to the bar to take photographs and watch him perform.

The trouble began when K-Doe suddenly stopped belting the song “White Boy / Black Boy” and looked directly at me . . .

ERNIE K-DOE: We had a good interview, didn’t we?

Are you talking to me?

ERNIE: I was good to you, wasn’t I?

You sure were.

ERNIE: Then why are you trying to record my show?

Everyone in the bar turns to look at me.

I’m not recording it! It’s not even on.

As I hold up the tape recorder to show him, his wife, Antoinette, runs at me from behind the bar.

ANTOINETTE K-DOE: Give me the tape!

I wasn’t recording the music. It was just in my lap because I don’t have a bag and it’s too bulky to fit in my pocket.

ANTOINETTE: I saw you recording. We aren’t playing any more music till you give us the tape.

I’d give you the tape, but I have other interviews on here and I need them.

ANTOINETTE: We let you interview us. We let you take pictures of us. We waived our fee and didn’t charge you anything.⁵⁴ And now we want the tape. Give it to us.

I can play the tape out loud to prove I wasn’t recording the music, if that would settle this.

ANTOINETTE: Lock the door. Nobody’s getting out of here until he hands over the tape. And I want the photographs, too.

A small, stocky man, either plainclothes security or a loyal patron, runs to the door and stands menacingly in front of it.

BAR REGULAR: Let’s just hear some music. I’m sure he didn’t tape it. ANTOINETTE: This ain’t your business. (To me:) Ernie K-Doe is a legend. I am sick of people coming in here and taking advantage of us. You ain’t even from the newspaper. I saw what you were doing. You went into the back room to switch the tapes, then came out here and started recording.⁵⁵

I went into the back room to make a phone call.

ANTOINETTE: If you won’t give it back to us, then I’m calling the police. That’s K-Doe’s music on there. So it’s his property.

I can play the tape. I swear I wasn’t recording the music.

ANOTHER REGULAR: Give her what she wants. The police will probably throw you in jail because they support this bar.

Listen, I’d love to. But I’ve been doing interviews at Jazz Fest all week, and they’re on this tape. And I’m not giving it to anyone.

ANTOINETTE (on the phone): This is Antoinette K-Doe at the Mother-in-Law Lounge on Fifteen Hundred North Claiborne. We got someone here who’s stolen something of ours and won’t give it back. I want him arrested.

Fifteen minutes of no music and dirty looks later, two policemen enter the bar.

ANTOINETTE: They were making tapes of us and taking photographs of us, and we want them. It’s our right.

POLICE OFFICER ONE (to the photographer and me): Give me y’all’s driver’s licenses, and wait outside.

Ten minutes later, the police come out and talk to us. I explain what happened. One of the officers goes back inside and returns with Ernie and Antoinette.

POLICE OFFICER ONE: If y’all don’t come to a resolution right here, we’re going to have to take you in to the station and take depositions for a civil case. And I don’t think y’all want to go through that.

If you’ll just let me play you the tape to prove there’s no music on it—

ANTOINETTE: No, he’s lying.

Listen, I was just trying to help a musician I admired get some attention. I have no interest in even writing the piece at this point. I’ll erase the interview right now if that will settle things.

I partially rewind the cassette and start recording over a small portion of the interview.

ANTOINETTE: I want to hear the part you erase. I’m not going to let you leave here with anything.

I’m recording over it now as we speak.

ANTOINETTE: Man, that is no good.

What do you want? I just want to get this settled in a peaceful way and go back to my hotel.

ANTOINETTE: I know. I really want to get inside and get to my business, too.

POLICE OFFICER ONE: I understand, but now you got yourself in a situation. Just make sure that they know the interview is all erased from the tape. You can’t just leave and tell her, “I’m gonna promise you that by the time I get home, it’s erased.” You stay here till they’re sure that he’s not on that tape anymore and then y’all are even.

POLICE OFFICER TWO: Why don’t you just give me the tape?

I have other interviews on here that I need.

ANTOINETTE: Right, but you see what it is: You want everything you want, but you ain’t willing to give nothing back this way.

I’m erasing it as we’re speaking. It’s recording right now.

ANTOINETTE: You didn’t say that!

I said I was recording it. It’s recording us arguing right now.

POLICE OFFICER ONE: All you want to do is undo what they did. If they say they don’t want you to use it and y’all are not going to use it, that should be the end of it. Now y’all agree.

ANTOINETTE: And we want her film.

POLICE OFFICER ONE: I’d like to do this in a peaceful way. I’ll tell y’all, I’m not used to this type of stuff. I won’t lie. All I know is y’all entered into an agreement: maybe not a contractual agreement, but at least a verbal agreement to do something. That verbal agreement has been breached, even if it’s in her mind. Even if it’s her perception for whatever reason. But I can tell you that if you don’t give her the film, we’re going to have to take all y’all in.

The photographer hands Antoinette a blank roll of film, and keeps the film with the actual photos in her pocket.

ANTOINETTE: I saw...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Also by Neil Strauss
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Preamble
• Act One
• Act Two
• Act Three
• Act Four
• Act Five
• Act Six
• Act Seven
• Act Eight
• Act Nine
• Act Ten
• Epilogue
• Key
• Acknowledgments
• Index
• Selected Visual Index