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Authors: Pamela Des Barres
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BOOK: Rock Bottom: Dark Moments In Music Babylon
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Marc was thrown into the backseat of the purple Mini-Cooper and died instantly.
(PA NEWS)
(PA NEWS)
The night of September 16, 1977, Marc went to the Speakeasy and then had dinner with Gloria and her brother Richard at Morton’s, where much imbibing went on. After the meal Marc convinced Gloria to play the piano and sing love songs for him, and they left for home at four A.M.
Gloria got behind the wheel of
her purple Mini 1275 GT with her brother Richard following behind. Just before five A.M., after crossing Putney Bridge, the Mini disappeared over the bridge along Queens Ride. When Richard neared the bridge, he saw rising steam. The Mini had crashed into a tree, the passenger’s side taking the force of the impact. Gloria was unconscious but still breathing. Marc, who had always had a fear of and fascination with cars, had been thrown into the back of the Mini, lifeless in his orange glittery trousers and neon-green shirt. He looked like he had fallen asleep in a tumbled heap—only one small scratch marred his porcelain skin.
her purple Mini 1275 GT with her brother Richard following behind. Just before five A.M., after crossing Putney Bridge, the Mini disappeared over the bridge along Queens Ride. When Richard neared the bridge, he saw rising steam. The Mini had crashed into a tree, the passenger’s side taking the force of the impact. Gloria was unconscious but still breathing. Marc, who had always had a fear of and fascination with cars, had been thrown into the back of the Mini, lifeless in his orange glittery trousers and neon-green shirt. He looked like he had fallen asleep in a tumbled heap—only one small scratch marred his porcelain skin.
Marc often said in interviews that he wouldn’t live to see his thirtieth birthday. He almost made it. He would have been thirty in two weeks.
“Eddie Cochran’s death was always interesting to Marc—the car death,” Beep said. “Cars are featured in a lot of his lyrics … .‘Hubcap driving star halo’ … There’s tons of them—‘I got a Rolls-Royce and it’s good for my voice,’ blah, blah, blah … . When Elvis died, we were talking about how Maria Callas died on the same day and she just got a little squirt in the corner of the newspaper. Marc said, ‘I’m glad I didn’t die today,’ and a couple of weeks later he did. It was very sad. He was twenty-nine. He was looking good again. He’d been through his ‘fat Elvis’ period. He had credence with all the punk people. It wasn’t like he died forgotten.” I asked Beep if he thought Marc had made an important contribution to the mercurial world of rock and roll. “Oh yes,” he says with no hesitation. “There are people who are very talented through practice and application, and then there are people who have a gift that goes beyond worldly definition. Marc had a lot of unworldly knowledge that can’t be learned. It isn’t born of study. It’s like trying to explain ‘soul.’ Either you know what it is, or you don’t.”
Marc wasn’t the only member of his bands to meet an untimely end.
After Steve “Peregrine” Took was booted out of Tyrannosaurus Rex, his life became a series of stoned-out mishaps and tragedies. Upon receiving a small royalty check, he bought some morphine and a bag of magic mushrooms, and in the middle of the night, October 27, 1980, he woke out of a bombed sleep and grabbed a cherry to eat. But the morphine had numbed his throat and Took choked to death on the cherry pit.
Bass player Steve Currie faded into obscurity and, disenchanted with the music scene, moved to Portugal in 1980. At midnight on April 28, 1981, on his way back home in the village of Val Da Perra, Currie swerved off the road and was killed.
The sad truth is, icons were made to be broken, but Beep was right—Marc Bolan didn’t die forgotten.
The Marc Bolan Tree on Queens Ride is tied with ribbons and covered in flowers and love notes to this day.
“I don’t think Marc is unhappy,” said Gloria. “The only thing that is happening up there is that Marc is telling Elvis how to sing and Jimi how to play.”
JOHN “BONZO” BONHAM
T
he Bonzo I remember was a wide-eyed, sweet-faced prankster, a simple, adoring family man caught up in the maniacal rock-and-roll maelstrom. During Zeppelin’s slay-day, when I was a teenage nymphet hanging on the arm of Jimmy Page, Bonzo was actually protective of me, treating me with curious respect, and I saw him as an overgrown teddy bear, unaware of his gargantuan force, plowing through life with the unnatural grace only a rock drummer can summon up. Bonzo thrived in the comfort zone of his family, but when he was cut loose on the road for endless months, boredom and loneliness set in and his pranks became legend—TV sets tossed out of hotel windows, cars driven into pools, frightening things perpetrated on suspecting young girls all over the world. The only other musician who measured up to the level of Bonham’s mayhem was fellow drummer and close friend Keith Moon of the Who. They both debauched themselves to death within two years of each other—Keith made it to thirty; Bonzo, the ripe old age of thirty-two.
he Bonzo I remember was a wide-eyed, sweet-faced prankster, a simple, adoring family man caught up in the maniacal rock-and-roll maelstrom. During Zeppelin’s slay-day, when I was a teenage nymphet hanging on the arm of Jimmy Page, Bonzo was actually protective of me, treating me with curious respect, and I saw him as an overgrown teddy bear, unaware of his gargantuan force, plowing through life with the unnatural grace only a rock drummer can summon up. Bonzo thrived in the comfort zone of his family, but when he was cut loose on the road for endless months, boredom and loneliness set in and his pranks became legend—TV sets tossed out of hotel windows, cars driven into pools, frightening things perpetrated on suspecting young girls all over the world. The only other musician who measured up to the level of Bonham’s mayhem was fellow drummer and close friend Keith Moon of the Who. They both debauched themselves to death within two years of each other—Keith made it to thirty; Bonzo, the ripe old age of thirty-two.
John Henry Bonham, the sturdy son of a carpenter, grew up in the Worcestershire
countryside, beating his mother’s pots and pans, creating drum sets with coffee tins and other household doodads, making loads of unruly noise until his mother bought him a real live drum for his tenth birthday. A few years later his father brought home a complete set of drums, and even though the kit was a bit used and rusty, it was John’s greatest prize. Every day John Bonham’s crashing and bashing was heard throughout the quiet town of Kidderminster. At sixteen he left school to work at building sites with his father, which built up his stocky frame—all the better to beat the drums. His first band, Terry Webb and the Spiders, played locally, featuring a cheeky John wearing a purple jacket with velveteen lapels and a string tie. His family wasn’t keen about their son trying to eke out a living as a musician, so John dutifully worked as a builder during the day while spending nights playing drums with neighborhood bands like the Nicky James Movement, A Way of Life, and Steve Brett and the Mavericks.
countryside, beating his mother’s pots and pans, creating drum sets with coffee tins and other household doodads, making loads of unruly noise until his mother bought him a real live drum for his tenth birthday. A few years later his father brought home a complete set of drums, and even though the kit was a bit used and rusty, it was John’s greatest prize. Every day John Bonham’s crashing and bashing was heard throughout the quiet town of Kidderminster. At sixteen he left school to work at building sites with his father, which built up his stocky frame—all the better to beat the drums. His first band, Terry Webb and the Spiders, played locally, featuring a cheeky John wearing a purple jacket with velveteen lapels and a string tie. His family wasn’t keen about their son trying to eke out a living as a musician, so John dutifully worked as a builder during the day while spending nights playing drums with neighborhood bands like the Nicky James Movement, A Way of Life, and Steve Brett and the Mavericks.
Led Zeppelin’s John “Bonzo” Bonham—unnatural grace behind the drums. (MICHAEL OCHS ARCHIVES/VENICE, CALIF.)
At barely eighteen, when John made the decision to become a full-time musician, he also met his future wife, Pat, at a dance in Kidderminster. John knew right away that he needed Pat as much as he needed his music, and went about convincing her that one day he would be a hugely successful drummer and take care of her in grand style. After all the lofty promises, he moved his new bride into a fifteen-foot trailer where the newlyweds could barely afford to eat. John even had to give up cigarettes to pay the rent.
Some of the local bands wouldn’t hire the brash John Bonham because he played too hard, too loud. He idolized Keith Moon and was awestruck by Ginger Baker, intent on imitating and outdoing the masters. His far-reaching goal was to be an equal member of an important rock band, not to be hidden away behind the front men. His reputation as a drummer to be reckoned with had begun.
John played a brief stint with Crawling King Snakes, featuring Robert Plant on vocals, but couldn’t afford to keep making the trip to Birmingham. For a while he went back to playing with A Way of Life, closer to Kidderminster, but when Robert formed the Band of Joy, the young singer convinced John
to join. It didn’t last long. Early in 1968 John was offered a tour with singer Tim Rose and gratefully accepted the forty pounds a week it provided.
to join. It didn’t last long. Early in 1968 John was offered a tour with singer Tim Rose and gratefully accepted the forty pounds a week it provided.
While John blissfully brought home the bacon, his friend Robert Plant was dancing on heady ground, being wooed by guitarist Jimmy Page. The former Yardbird and session man supreme was forming a new band, and after seeing Robert perform with his latest group, Hobbstweedle, had asked him to be the lead singer for this very important new project. Did Robert know any good drummers?
John hadn’t heard from Robert in three months, and when his old friend excitedly told him about the “New Yardbirds,” John wasn’t interested. He was finally being well paid for playing the drums and had even gotten a mention in the music press for his most recent Tim Rose gig. He thought the New Yardbirds sounded like a rehash, and besides, there were other possibilities. He had been offered jobs with Chris Farlowe and Joe Cocker. Why get involved with something untested and untried?
But after Jimmy Page heard John play with Rose at the Country Club in North London, he could see the future of his new band and was determined to hire the no-holds-barred, energetic firebrand.
John still couldn’t afford a phone and was stunned when the telegrams started to arrive at his local pub—eight from Robert Plant and
forty
from Jimmy Page’s infamous, imposing manager, Peter Grant. (There were none from Jimmy, already a notorious skinflint, who would soon be dubbed “Led Wallet.”) The drummer balked, weighing his options, finally deciding to take the job with the New Yardbirds. “I knew that Jimmy was a good guitarist and that Robert was a good singer,” Bonham said years later, “so even if we didn’t have any success, at least it would be a pleasure to play in a good group.”
forty
from Jimmy Page’s infamous, imposing manager, Peter Grant. (There were none from Jimmy, already a notorious skinflint, who would soon be dubbed “Led Wallet.”) The drummer balked, weighing his options, finally deciding to take the job with the New Yardbirds. “I knew that Jimmy was a good guitarist and that Robert was a good singer,” Bonham said years later, “so even if we didn’t have any success, at least it would be a pleasure to play in a good group.”
For the first rehearsal Jimmy, Robert, and John were joined by session player/bassist John Paul Jones, and after pumping out a couple hours of old R&B classics, the foursome knew they had struck rock gold. John was a bit intimidated by the quiet, mysterious Jimmy, but he also knew the music they created together was supernatural.
A few days later the New Yardbirds left for a tour of Scandinavia, where they got an inkling about their potential. The music they played was sheer, mad magic, and it demanded a new name. In Richard Cole’s book,
Stairway to Heaven
(he would later be Zep’s road manager and constant companion), he recalled how the band name came from a conversation he had with two members of the Who: “Moon and Entwistle were growing weary of the Who and were kidding about starting a new band with Jimmy Page. Moon joked, ‘I’ve got a good name for it. Let’s call it Lead Zeppelin ’cause it’ll go over like a lead balloon!’” Despite being the butt of a good joke, Jimmy decided to use the name, changing it to “Led Zeppelin” so there would be no chance of mispronunciation. Wasting no time, Led Zeppelin went into the studio, where
they cut their first record in thirty hours for a cost of less than five thousand dollars, including the cover art of the Hindenburg zeppelin sinking into the ocean. The album—full of forever-imitated raunchy riffs, Bonzo’s frenzied, primal attack, and Robert’s seductive caterwaul—sounds like it was recorded in a sweaty little club full of sweaty little girls. It’s still one of my favorite hunks of rock and roll, despite the lambasting it took from the critics.
Stairway to Heaven
(he would later be Zep’s road manager and constant companion), he recalled how the band name came from a conversation he had with two members of the Who: “Moon and Entwistle were growing weary of the Who and were kidding about starting a new band with Jimmy Page. Moon joked, ‘I’ve got a good name for it. Let’s call it Lead Zeppelin ’cause it’ll go over like a lead balloon!’” Despite being the butt of a good joke, Jimmy decided to use the name, changing it to “Led Zeppelin” so there would be no chance of mispronunciation. Wasting no time, Led Zeppelin went into the studio, where
they cut their first record in thirty hours for a cost of less than five thousand dollars, including the cover art of the Hindenburg zeppelin sinking into the ocean. The album—full of forever-imitated raunchy riffs, Bonzo’s frenzied, primal attack, and Robert’s seductive caterwaul—sounds like it was recorded in a sweaty little club full of sweaty little girls. It’s still one of my favorite hunks of rock and roll, despite the lambasting it took from the critics.
While they waited for the record release, Zeppelin played a few club dates in England, but Peter Grant had his huge sights set on America, the land of the almighty dollar. After signing his band to an unprecedented deal with Atlantic Records, he booked Zeppelin’s American tour without the benefit of product in the stores. It was a risk that paid off beyond even Peter’s grandiose expectations.
America knew they were coming. I could certainly feel it in the air when a new British band was about to hit town, and January 2, 1969, Zeppelin clobbered Los Angeles with transcendental force. The Whiskey-a-Go-Go was full of sweaty little girls, ready for mischief. Haughty Robert Plant shrieked and preened, totally at home in his glory. Enigmatic John Paul winked at the agog audience, and Bonzo’s thrashing made us all thrillingly deaf. But even though his guitar raged, the frail darling Jimmy Page was ill with the flu. I can still see the damp ringlets clinging to his cheekbones as he was carried offstage by road manager Richard Cole. One of his red patent-leather slippers fell off and was quickly retrieved—one of those memorable rock-and-roll moments.
By the final date at the Fillmore in New York, the album was being played on the radio and the members of Led Zeppelin were amusing themselves with two-hour sets, setting new rock-and-roll standards. The show was so extraordinary that the headliner, Iron Butterfly, refused to follow them. But the bad press had started.
Rolling Stone
called Robert “a pretty soul belter who can do a good spade imitation,” comparing Zeppelin to the Jeff Beck Group in “self-indulgence and restrictedness.” Despite hundreds of protest letters, the press continued to slag off Led Zeppelin, creating such contempt within the band that they refused to do interviews for many years to come, which added to their burgeoning mystique.
Rolling Stone
called Robert “a pretty soul belter who can do a good spade imitation,” comparing Zeppelin to the Jeff Beck Group in “self-indulgence and restrictedness.” Despite hundreds of protest letters, the press continued to slag off Led Zeppelin, creating such contempt within the band that they refused to do interviews for many years to come, which added to their burgeoning mystique.
Bonzo needed hours to unwind after one of his bombastic performances and, on that first tour, engaged Richard Cole in the first of many, many post-show antics. It all began innocently enough with raw eggs and half-eaten dinners sailing through hotel rooms, but soon degenerated to the lowest levels of rock-and-roll debauchery. From the outside, Zeppelin’s naughty road hijinks seemed almost decadently glamorous. In reality, the band had too much pent-up energy and too many hours to fill.
Zeppelin spent only two months in England before their second trip to America, opening at the Fillmore West with a three-and-a-half-hour set. In May they hit the American Top Ten, and most of the next year was spent on
the road. Bonzo was playing with the biggest bass drum made, and his solo was evolving into the highlight of the show, sometimes lasting over thirty minutes. When he threw away his sticks and played with his hands, the crowds went insane. The rest of the band took to ambling back to the dressing room during Bonzo’s thrash fest, where Jimmy and Robert would do a bit of primping (and later a bit of boozing, popping, snorting, and sundry sexual favors).
the road. Bonzo was playing with the biggest bass drum made, and his solo was evolving into the highlight of the show, sometimes lasting over thirty minutes. When he threw away his sticks and played with his hands, the crowds went insane. The rest of the band took to ambling back to the dressing room during Bonzo’s thrash fest, where Jimmy and Robert would do a bit of primping (and later a bit of boozing, popping, snorting, and sundry sexual favors).
Bonzo had a gigantic appetite for booze, often becoming belligerent, passing out, and sleeping it off in jail cells all over the world—and getting into reams of trouble in general. It was road manager Richard Cole, a mighty abuser himself, who was in charge of keeping Bonzo in line. Richard is a longtime friend of mine, and has been clean and sober for many years. He has plenty of tales about Bonzo dumping huge amounts of baked beans on Richard and his girl of the moment while they made love, then calling in Peter Grant, who doused them with champagne; trimming an adoring groupie’s pubic hair with Robert’s shaving gear; flooding John Paul’s hotel room with a garden hose; punching out complete strangers; or relieving himself in the most unlikely places.
The hedonistic concept of “free love” peaked with Zeppelin’s rise, freeing thousands of teenage girls to pursue these British cream-boats with rampant fervor. The band was besieged by packs of persistent dolls more than willing to sacrifice themselves to the hammer of the gods. “Percy” (as Robert was nicknamed), “Bonzo,” and “Jonesy” were married men but couldn’t always resist the teenage temptresses. In the middle of one night at the Chateau Marmont, Bonzo dressed himself up as a waiter and rolled a service cart featuring Jimmy Page as the main course into a roomful of underage girls the guitarist always fancied.
The Zeppelin “mudshark episode” at Seattle’s Edgewater Inn has become a torrid slice of rock-and-roll folklore. Though Richard Cole admits to being the ringleader, Bonzo was front and center with his fishing pole dangling off the balcony. “It wasn’t even a shark!” Richard asserts. “I caught this red snapper, and the chick was a redhead. It was still alive and I just pushed it in on her ginger pussy! Bonzo was in the room, but it was me that did it.” I am amazed that Bonzo didn’t assist. “No, he didn’t, but he brought his wife in to have a look!”
And then there was the octopus incident. “We were doing two shows that night and it was Bonzo’s birthday,” Richard tells me with a gleam. “Bonzo had a four-foot-high bottle of champagne next to him onstage. A lot of times on that second tour we did two shows a night, but had to stop them because we got so drunk during the shows—especially Bonzo—that the second show was always a fiasco.” After the mad second set, a friend took some of the boys back to a motel room where they were presented with four octopuses. “This guy had two girls in there, naked. There was all these mixed vegetables, fruit, turnips, and cucumbers in the bath, so we put the girls in there with the octopuses.” Apparently Jimmy was goo-goo-eyed as one of the sea creatures discovered
the joy of sex. When I mention to Richard that Jimmy had always told me he avoided those kinds of naughty displays, he roars, “Jimmy’s always been full of shit. He was there. Bonzo was there. His wife, Pat, must have gone home. Jonesy would come and have a look, but that’s about it. He would get up to his own devious things that we’d never see. The only one that was ever documented was when he woke up with a drag queen and the room caught on fire!” (Jonesy always insisted that he hadn’t known he’d picked up a transvestite.)
the joy of sex. When I mention to Richard that Jimmy had always told me he avoided those kinds of naughty displays, he roars, “Jimmy’s always been full of shit. He was there. Bonzo was there. His wife, Pat, must have gone home. Jonesy would come and have a look, but that’s about it. He would get up to his own devious things that we’d never see. The only one that was ever documented was when he woke up with a drag queen and the room caught on fire!” (Jonesy always insisted that he hadn’t known he’d picked up a transvestite.)
BOOK: Rock Bottom: Dark Moments In Music Babylon
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