When Twisted Sister/Adrenaline Mob drummer AJ Pero unexpectedly passed away, he not only left a void in the music world, he left a void at home.
His family has set up a GoFundMe page which explains their plight. It states:
“Hi my name is Michele Agnello. I was AJ Pero’s long time girlfriend of 19 years, his companion, best friend and the mother of his youngest daughter Briana, age 14. Briana was his sunshine. When he was not traveling and working as a world renowned rock star in Twisted Sister and Adrenaline Mob, he was just her dad. When he was home they did everything together. She was his shadow, he was her whole world. He was and always will be the love of our lives. As most of you know AJ recently passed away from a massive heart attack while on tour. Due to his unexpected and untimely passing we now need a little help getting on our feet, to keep our home, basically start over without him. AJ truly loved and appreciated his worldwide fans so now we are reaching out to you all. For almost 20 years AJ has been the sole provider for our family as the drummer in the legendary rock band Twisted Sister and had recently joined the band Adrenaline Mob. This is very hard for me to ask for help but at the moment we have nowhere else to turn. Since we weren’t legally married and he had no will, we are left with nothing and the bills are starting to pour in already this month. I have been unemployed for several years now due to an accident that left me disabled with 2 broken elbows and subsequently rods had to be implanted. I am asking for your assistance in helping us so I can get my daughter through this incredibly heartbreaking and difficult time in our lives. With my head held low and my heart completely shattered I ask for your help so we can keep our home, I can feed my daughter and buy her clothes until I find a job to support us. Anything you can spare would be greatly apprciated. Thank you and God bless you all!”
To contribute, please go here.
Photo credit: Mark Weiss
8 Responses
I am not understanding this…and before anyone says I’m a cold-hearted SOB, IM NOT. I just don’t understand why we would send money to this. People die everyday and get left with a pile of crap to deal with and this is no different. Was AJ so irresponsible that he didn’t take care of his kid? No life insurance? No money from Twisted Sister or Adrenaline Mob? I guarantee he was making more than your average Joe…the guys been gone less than a week and already the “bills are piling up”?? This sounds strange to me…and what is the long term plan, to live off of AJ’s fans money forever?? I am a very sensitive and giving person…extremely,extremely generous but this is all too weird and a little classless to me…how were they living just a week ago?? What is this fund for?? Sorry to say, but I don’t like this…maybe it’s too early after his death, or the way it was presented, but to say basically now who is going to take car of me and my kid because a man died doesn’t show a level of responsibility for that kid from AJ or this girlfriend. I have a 3 year old and im 45, so my wife and I have prepared for both of us in case something were to happen and we are not rich, just prepared. I can’t understand how this woman could be in this position and have a real hard time believing AJ just left them high and dry…makes no sense.
These are some of the same things that were said on facebook yesterday. The fund was not set up by the Pero family( they won’t see a penny of it) it was set up by his girlfriend of 16 yrs (who is disabled) for care of their 14 yr old daughter. AJ left no will, He also was’nt as rich as people think. TS was only on top of the world for one album back in the 80’s . One hit album does not set an artist for life. and royaltys when a TS song is played on the radio only equals pennies ( 10 to 15 cents a play if i remember from my internet radio djing days). According to AJ’s son ( who came on facebook and started just blasting comments like yours Coredrum). AJ sold his ONLY car about a month ago and was using a friends truck for the last 3 weeks of his life. Eddie Trunk you really need to chime in here. and talk about the business before it gets out of hand here as it did with facebook . My wonder is seeing he was with his girlfriend for 16 yrs and left no will if there is a common law situation here his girlfriend should be seeing a lawyer .
i stand corrected AJ sold his only car 2 months ago and borrowed a friends truck for 2 months.
I have to agree with you. I struggle to makes and meet =paycheck to paycheck. Am i complaining? Not at all I get by. Coredrum,I have to fully agree with your words.
No one is funding my single mom kid sister of 2 beautiful boys in NY. She is working and still about to lose her house after all we as struggling family could do but she is not looking for a handout.
Eddie posted this on facebook yesterday and it ended up going in a very bad place .
I agree with Coredrum and will throw in a few other things. First of all my heart goes out to his daughter for her loss. I think we all can agree losing your dad at 14 is very difficult especially at that age. However, as his biological daughter there shouldn’t be any probate issues as she is entitled to his estate even if he didn’t leave a will. Obviously, we don’t have info if he left a holographic will (handwritten will) or died intestate (no will written). However, since he didn’t legally married his direct bloodline (daughter) will have the best case in the surrogates court to his property and assets.
As Coredrum stated this is an unfortunate circumstance that could be helped without direct appeal to the public. AJ’s daughter should be able to have rights’ to any Twisted Sister royalties that were suppose to be paid to AJ. If no life insurance was left then there are options as tribute shows or band signings that can raise money without going to the public. I took the bold step of leaving my job since i got tired of my boss was disrespectfull and got a new job that didn’t work out, and i had to use $10,000 of my own savings just to get by for a few months. It wasn’t fun, however, if i needed help there are many public and private charities that are available. I always kept a safety net if that situation was present. As Coredrum pointed out no insurance or safety net was left in this situation.
In short, the Twister Sister family can do tribute shows to raise money or get other artists to sign memorabilia to raise the money. We remember that Chuck Schuldiner had money raised since he had to pay 6 figures worth of Medical expenses due to Brain Cancer. This was understandable since he had no health insurance and some bands did help out with raising funds.
I hope that AJ’s GF and daughter can survive this tragic event and Twisted Sister can help the CORRECT way by doing fund raising events. Happy Easter!
I have no opinion on whether this is right or wrong. But I think it SHOULD serve as a wake-up call to people to PLAN. I’m not necessarily surprised he didn’t have a lot of money. I can’t imagine TS making any money to speak of since about 1985 – 30 years ago and he hasn’t done much otherwise that I’m aware of.
My wife and I are fortunate enough to have very good jobs, we have a will in place and life insurance to take care of our kids and/or surviving spouse should something happen to us. I totally get that such things are out of reach for a lot of people. It costs money. But, when you have kids, you also need to put things in perspective and and make sure your life is somehow structured to take care of them now and/or when you die or get sick and can’t work. I realize now that I’m sorta happy I never made it in the music biz, as I likely couldn’t so a lot of things I can do today. I’m not judging AJ, as I know very little about him and I won’t pretend to know or understand his circumstances. But when someone is 50 years old, with a child (who’s a minor), it’s hard for me to understand why provisions weren’t made a long time ago to prepare for “life.”
No matter how you look at it, it’s tragic. I wish AJ’s family the best.