Sunday, March 30, 2008

Spring 1978 Bowie Tour - Part 3

May 7th - May 9th, 1978
Went to see Bowie at Madison Square Garden in NYC. We did get into one of the sound checks and spent some time talking with Adrian Belew, the guitar player. During this time, we saw Bowie at a few different locations. He did a interview at WPLJ radio and we were able to get into the radio station and wait in the waiting room for him. We also saw him several times at the Pierre Hotel where he stayed in NYC. He was usually with CoCo his assistant. Bowie was always extremely nice and posed for photos and I did get to kiss him once. This was last time that Bowie toured until 1983 so the rest of the postings will be coming from my diary and the different bands I went to see in NYC.


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Wednesday, March 26, 2008

Spring 1978 Bowie Tour - Part 2

April 28th & 29th, 1978
Went to see David Bowie at the Spectrum in Phili. Phili was always the best town to see Bowie in. Crazy fans there. Some of the guys that were fans looked quite abit like him. Two of the girl fans that stand out to me are Lenny Lame and Purple. They were both alittle crazy. Purple always lifted her shirt during the concert and there were always lots of rumors about Bowie and Lenny. No idea if any were true. The concert was great. After we stayed over in the same hotel as Bowie did, it was the Holiday Inn (?) right by the Spectrum. The next day, we were waiting in the lobby to see him and someone that worked there told us that Bowie was going to sneak out the back so about 6 of us waited in the back by the garbage dumpsters. He did come out and was very nice to us and gave us autographs. He looked amazing and was quite dressed up in a suit. So we followed him to the airport and waited with him while he waited for his plane. We did not bother him, just looked at him but screamed when he went to board the plane. I floated for days from so much David Bowie in such a short time.

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Monday, March 24, 2008

Spring 1978 - Bowie/Eno Tour for Low - Part 1

Cleveland Bowie Show April 22nd 1978
Bowie toured with Eno and it was a great tour. I got to see the concert at 3 different places, NYC, Phili, and Cleveland. Cleveland came first. We flew out there since one of my Bowie friends had an Aunt that lived out there and her boyfriend had something really big to do with the arena that Bowie was playing at. We were told we had front row seats. So off to Cleveland we went. We did buy Bowie flowers to give to him during the show since we would be so close. We found out we had gotten 3rd row seats instead because he thought that the 1st row would hurt out necks. I was a little disappointed but 3rd row was still really great and it was the closest I ever got to see Bowie in concert.

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Saturday, March 22, 2008

New Years Eve - Ringing in 1977

Dec 31st, 1977
Went to see Patti Smith for New Year’s Eve in Brooklyn. I went with some guy I had only met once at a Rock N Roll Flea Market. He was really into Bowie and kind of looked like him. The show was ok. Not a real big Patti Smith fan. It was my first time ever to Brooklyn.

Thursday, March 20, 2008

Meeting Iggy Pop.........

October 1977
Iggy Pop toured again in October and Blondie once again opened for him. We went to see him on Oct 6th at the Palladium in NYC and waited at the back door for him and got to meet him. In Phili, we had kind of strange encounter with Iggy. After the show, we went back to his hotel to meet him. He was staying at the Holiday Inn at the airport. While waiting there we met the Sales Brothers. I always thought that it was kind of odd that Soupy Sales’ sons were playing with Iggy Pop. They were not really very friendly but they were very cute. They always wore all black leather. Then Iggy came in to the hotel and came over to us in the lobby. There were about 8 of us. He was really out of it and I think we were taken aback by how out of it/overfriendly that he was to us. He kept talking to us and asking for something, but none of us were sure what he really wanted. No one went back to his room with him, I think we were all alittle scared of him. Then the Roadies came in and we began to talk with them. They invited us upstairs to one of the rooms to hang out which we did and it was a lot of fun. One of the girl’s I was with hooked up with the road Manager in hopes of getting some free tickets in the future. Overall, Iggy is an amazing performer and if anyone gets the opportunity to see him, he does still tour so I highly recommend going.
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Friday, March 14, 2008

Summer of 1977 - Mick Jagger, Rod Stewart, John Lennon...

1977 was a really great year. I met so many people that liked to hang out for bands. I used to go to the Palladium just to hang at the back door to get autographs and meet rock stars. The guys who worked the backstage were pretty disgusting. They would offer us backstage passes in exchange for favors but I never took them up on it. I tried to just have them give me the back stage pass but no one ever gave me one at the Palladium unless there was an exchange. I met alot of rock stars that year. I went to a Lou Reed concert at the Bottom Line. Mick Jagger was sitting at the next table with a guy from Monty Python. I finally got up the nerve to walk over on my way to the ladies room and ask for his autograph and he goes "Nah" and turns away. Not very nice, but I did take his napkin off the table that he had doodled on and saved it. I also saw Rod Stewart alot that year. He was touring alot and was everywhere. We met him a bunch of times and he was always so nice. The best night was at a big party that he was having at Regines in NYC. Of course we were waiting on the outside and we were not on the inside. But on the way we were driving through NYC and this is the truth, I almost ran a stop street and hit a limo and when we looked in it, it was John Lennon & Yoko Ono. So later on that night when we were are the party they came to it. We were laughing because we thought it was so funny to see them again, but alas, he also did not give me his autograph. One last thing to tell you about the summer of 1977, I bought some bootleg Iggy tapes. So I went to some guys house that did not live far from me and it was a very weird experience. His name was Bobby E, kind of became a little infamous in his own right and I bring him up because he will come up later in my story.

Next writing - The Iggy Tour in October 1977

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Meeting Deborah Harry

March 19th, 1977
Went to the Tower Theatre in Phili to see Igg & Blondie and we waited by the stage door. I got to meet Deborah Harry for the first time. It was kind of weird because I met a guy there also waiting that I had gone to high school with. He was also a really big Bowie fan. I thought for sure that Bowie would do something on stage in Phili since it was really his town but he just played the keyboards like he did at the Palladium.

I did not keep a detailed diary until the middle of 1978 so for the writings for the next year, the dates might be a little off. I did about 10 years ago, go back and write it all out which a good thing since I do not think I would ever remember it today.

Saturday, March 8, 2008

My First Encounter with David Bowie - Face to Face

March 18th, 1977
I was very excited to go to my first Iggy Pop concert at the Palladium in NYC. My main reason for going of course was because David Bowie was playing keyboards on this tour. We were hopeful that Bowie would get up and perform. Blondie was the opening act. I went with my 2 Bowie friends and we were not quite sure what to expect. All we had ever heard about Iggy Pop was that he had rolled around on glass while performing on the stage. The Palladium was on 14th Street and we were not sure where to part so we went around the block and found street parking. Little did we know it was at the back door of the concert hall. We saw some kids hanging out so we went over to see what was going on. Turns out, we were at the door that the performers enter through. And on this date, I had met David Bowie for the very first time. I met him several times after that but this was the biggest thrill since I never even knew it was possible. It was so completely unexpected. The concert was amazing. Bowie never left the keyboards but he looked great in his black leather jacket and jeans. It was a real departure from how he looked when he performed on his own. Iggy was also fantastic. He wore extremely tight jeans with no shirt and was an incredible performer. Blondie was also fantastic and that night Debby Harry & Iggy Pop became my #2 & # 3 on my list, in that order. I was so hooked. I could not wait to go the following night to the Tower Theatre in Philadelphia to see the same concert. One great thing about living in New Jersey, you are half way between NYC & Phili and it was easy to go to all of the shows.


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Tuesday, March 4, 2008

My First Punk Rock Concert

Dec 26th, 1976
I went to London as part of a college course for the last week of Dec 1976 and the 1st week of Jan 1977. The class was called Theater in London but my main purpose for going was to find everything and anything on David Bowie that I could. And London was great. I have not been back since but at the time but at the time it felt very safe and easy to get around. My memories are of really great rock & roll newspapers that always had the Sex Pistols splashed all over the front page. I bought a huge stack of different ones to bring back home. Once in London, I knew I wanted to go to the Marquee Club which was notorious for being one of the first club or one of the first clubs that Bowie got his start in. As luck would have it, I did get to go to a show there with Mick (Woody) Woodmansey. He played drums for Bowie during the Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars era so that was a lot of fun.

My biggest excursion involved taking a trip to the Roundhouse that took me off my little subway map. The club was advertising a punk rock afternoon show . I do not remember all of the bands that played at the time but I believe 2 of the bands were The Damned and The Gorillas. I was alittle scared at first. I was 18 years old and had ventured out alone since no one on the college trip was interested in going. I still remember standing on the outside of the Roundhouse alone and watching the groups of kids come. It was my first exposure to seeing guys dressing in all black leather with safety pins. But I went in to the show and really enjoyed it. All of this made my thirst for punk rock grow and when I returned home, I tried to get my two Bowie friends interested but they would not bite. They were alittle turned off by it so I did a lot of the searching myself over the next year. Coming up next, my first Iggy Pop Concert March 18th, 1977 at the Palladium in NYC.

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Sunday, March 2, 2008

Where it Began....

I have very early memories of my parents taking me to my first rock concert at the Steel Pier in Atlantic City. I think I was only 8 years old but they took me to see The Turtles. And for my 1st concert, we had pretty good seats. They were on the floor and I could see the band performing. What stood out for me the most was not seeing the band but in the front row, I still remember there were was a group of girls standing and screaming as the band played. At the time, they made such am impression on me. I had never see anything like it and to this day I still remember them.

I saw other concerts over the years but the next major impact on me was my 1st David Bowie concert at Madison Square Garden. It was the Thin White Duke Tour in 1976. The experience of seeing David Bowie was so powerful. I was instantly hooked and at least 80 % of my time was spent in my quest for things on him, bootleg albums, imports, photos, anything I could get my hands on. And keep in mind, this is all before the Internet so we had to get things the old fashioned way. I ordered from magazines & catalogues and entered auctions that were paper based. There was no Ebay. I used to have to drop off my film to get my pictures developed and wait a week to see them. There were no cell phones. We used snail mail to communicate and yet I had managed to build an amazing David Bowie collection. I had penpals from around the world. And we were a huge community that spanned many states and yet we all knew each other. Anyone that follows bands has it much too easy today.

So my next posting will be my trip to England at the end of 1976 and my introduction into Punk Rock.

Going Back in Time or How I Followed Bands from 1976 to 1980

Most people keep a blog of the present but this will be a blog that is going back a little over 30 years. I have decided to bring a diary I kept back to life with some additional memories during that time. The time frame for my writings is from 1976 - 1980. The diary captured bands that I used to follow, the excitement of meeting them, becoming friends with some of them, and most of all how we thought we were legends in our own minds. My diary was titled Hail True Love. It has always been my hope that my diary could be used as the basis for a book or a screenplay. I think I was also fortunate to live in NJ as we were so close to NYC. Not only did all of the big rock bands come through but all of the up and coming bands would play throughout NJ. I am changing some of the names where necessary. I have been able to transform some of my writings into designs and you can view them in my storefront at www.cafepress.com/jlporiginals. My designs can appear on T Shirts, Apparel, Art Prints, and Gifts.