When it comes to popular music there’s two things you’ve probably noticed about me.
One, I’m a huge Elvis Presley fan. I had to be if I was going to write a book titled Cloning Elvis after all.
The second thing is that I am also a huge fan of Guns N’ Roses.
I’ve seen the band live ten times now — seven in just the last two years, starting with the incredible show in Las Vegas on April 9, 2017.
On top of that, I’ve seen Slash performing live on eight separate occasions between 1996 when he left GNR and his return to the band last year.
So for a Guns N’ Roses superfan like me, what could be bigger than getting a chance to party with Slash?
Here’s how it all went down.
It was a chilly Southern California winter’s night in early 1997.
Slash and a collection of rock musicians billing themselves as Slash’s Blues Ball were playing the Galaxy Theater in Santa Ana, California.
My good friend Tito, who is primarily responsible for getting me into GNR, had found out about the show, and got four tickets.
On this Friday night myself, Tito, his cousin Mando, and our friend Tony piled into my used ’87 silver Honda Accord and headed to the show.
The Galaxy Theater was an intimate venue and standing room only for the attendees.
We got there early and were able to find spots standing right in front of the stage.
It was awesome.
For most of the evening Slash played directly in front of us.
We were so incredibly close to him that you could reach out and touch him.
I resisted the temptation, but Tito and Mando didn’t.
They kept reaching out and more or less slapping him on his bare stomach.
To this day we joke that they were trying to give Slash a pink belly.
We were also close enough to see a long line of snot slowly dribble out of Slash’s nose.
Slash was incredibly wrapped up in his guitar solo at the time that he didn’t notice
The snot reached down to about his chin before Slash became aware of his dangling snot.
But instead of wiping it away, he snorted it back up, and kept playing.
Everyone pressed up against the stage saw it and we all let out a collective “Eewww.”
About this time me and the boys decided we needed some adult beverages.
The bar was located in the lobby and we gave up our precious spots to get our drinks.
Instead of immediately fighting our way through the crowd, we held back and watched the show from about three quarters of the way back.
Near us sat the large box speakers that stood about chest high.
On a couple of the speakers, girls had climbed up on them and danced.
Tito thought this was a good idea and hoisted himself up the nearest speaker.
This wasn’t a first for him.
At a country bar we frequented a few years before, Tito used to get up on a speaker to dance when he’d see cowgirls doing the same.
Each time security made him get down.
I guess Tito felt that a rock show might be different, so up on the speaker he went and started to dance.
Within a minute a burly middle-aged security guard with a long bushy beard who reminded us of Grizzly Adams approached the speaker.
Dan Haggerty played Grizzly Adams on TV in the late 1970s.
He looked up at Tito and pointed to the floor.
“Down!” Grizzly Adams said as loud as he could so Tito could hear him over the music pouring out of the speaker.
Tito ignored him and kept dancing.
“Down!” Grizzly ordered again.
Tito remained on the speaker shaking his money maker.
I looked at Tony. Uh oh. We we going to get kicked out, we were both thinking.
“I said down!” Grizzly yelled.
Tito finally took the big man seriously, or seen the concern on our faces, as he lowered himself from the speaker.
I was relieved and said to Tito, “I think Grizzly Adams was about to throw you out.”
I’m pretty sure the big security guard heard me, as I couldn’t say it quietly over the music.
The four of us moved forward again and enjoyed the rest of the show from the front.
When things wrapped up, Mando caught a guitar pick Slash had thrown him despite the pink belly.
It was a good fun night out with the boys.
But something said to stick around.
There seemed to be more going on than most people noticed.
While Slash and the band had left the stage, there was a group of people hanging around nearby who weren’t going anywhere.
They appeared to be part of Slash’s inner circle. They were waiting for an after party.
The four of us hung back and slyly attempted to move into that group.
It didn’t work. A couple of other security guards told us and some other stragglers we needed to go.
They herded us back towards the lobby and the exit doors.
We had a long ride ahead of us so Tito, Tony, and I decided to hit the men’s room.
Mando, still staring at fascination at Slash’s guitar pick he held in his fingers, told us he’d meet us at the car.
When the three of us emerged from the restroom, we were the only people in the lobby.
Rather than exiting, we decided to take a look back into the showroom.
Maybe we could sneak into the party after all.
Immediately, a security guard about our age stepped in front of us.
“What are you guys doing?” he asked.
I played dumb. “Oh we just used the bathroom.”
He looked us over with a touch of skepticism then proceeded to ask an unbelievable question.
“You’re with the band, right?”
I couldn’t believe it. Did he really think we were with Slash?
We all had short hair and none of us had tattoos, visible or hidden.
Obviously, Tito and Tony couldn’t believe it either as they didn’t answer his question.
I knew if one of us didn’t speak up, we’d be out in the parking lot with Mando.
I figured we were toast, but decided to toss up a rhetorical Hail Mary.
“We’re with a band,” I said, paraphrasing a line Bart Simpson once told Robert Goulet.
The young security guard didn’t catch The Simpsons reference, or the fact that I said a band rather than the band.
“Then you better get in here,” he said motioning us back into the showroom. “If you go outside you’re not going to be able to get back in.”
No way! Somehow that worked. We’d weaseled our way in the after party with Slash!
The three of us strode into the ballroom, ready to meet the man under the top hat.
As long as none of us stumbled and said something stupid like, “We’re your biggest fans,” when we met him we should be all right.
I saw a roadie carry boxes of alcohol out on to the stage.
He opened up a case of Jack Daniels. This after party was legit.
Besides double Stoli and cranberry, everyone knew that JD was Slash’s mind-numbing beverage of choice in those days.
I wasn’t a whiskey drinker then, and I’m still not, but I would have drank Jack Daniels with Slash that night.
That’s right. Would have.
I would have if I could have.
We got half way to the stage when Grizzly Adams stepped out from behind a pillar.
“No. No. Not them,” he said, waving his finger at us and mad dogging Tito.
The young security guard who’d ushered us inside had a horrified look on his face.
He’d had one job. It was to keep guys like us out. Because of me, he had failed.
I rolled the dice again and tried to convince Grizzly Adams to allow us to continue into the party.
“Hey man,” I said. “We’re just going to hang out, have a couple drinks.”
Grizzly stared out me and didn’t say a word. Was he considering letting us stay?
I continued. “Come on, we’re already in here. We’re not going to cause any problems.”
Again he didn’t respond. I could see he was thinking it over.
The burly guard’s resolve was beginning to soften.
Then Tito spoke.
“Come on, Grizzly, be cool.”
“Out!” Grizzly Adams bellowed, pointing fiercely to the door.
There wouldn’t be any turning this situation around now.
Defeated, our shoulders slumped, our heads drooped, the three of us slowly walked to the main doors and left the Galaxy Theater.
The parking lot was mostly deserted except for a shivering Mando standing beside my Accord.
“What the hell kept you guys?” Mando asked in his Spanish accent.
“We almost got to party with Slash,” I told him.
“No way! You serious?” Mando asked.
“Yep,” I said, unlocking the driver’s side door of my car.
“You guys would have partied with him and left me out here?”
Tony looked over at Mando and said, “You shouldn’t have went outside.”
We got into my Honda and headed home.
About twenty minutes later, a still dismayed Mando asked from the back seat, “You really would have left me outside?”
“What are you complaining about?” I said. “You caught a guitar pick.”
And that’s the story of the night me and my friends got a chance to party with Slash.
But one word and one word alone — a nickname taken from a late 1970’s TV show — blew that chance.
How different things would have been if that security guard I nicknamed Grizzly Adams had simply heeded the wisdom of Tito and just been cool.