In 1984, MTV gave contest winner Kurt Jefferis a chance to party all weekend with his heroes: the notoriously depraved band Van Halen.
The then-fledgling music-video channel flew Jefferis and a pal from Phoenixville, Pa., to Detroit, where they met up with the band at Cobo Hall. First things first, Jefferis told The Post, “a guy handed me a bottle of Jack Daniels. I took a sip and asked for more.” After being passed a joint, “I took a couple hits and a couple more swigs of Jack Daniels.”
During the show, Jefferis got smashed in the face with cake and showered in champagne by the band members, then he went backstage where there was a feast of lobster, filet mignon and cocaine.
“I did a couple lines. Then David [Lee Roth, the singer] said, ‘I think Kurt needs Tammy,’ ” Jefferis recalled.
The groupie “took off her clothes and started dancing naked. The two of us wound up together in the shower…”
…“I blacked out, and the next thing I remember is waking up in a hotel room bed,” said Jefferis, now 54. Tammy was long gone and “my head was killing me.
But he still had another day of partying with the band. So Alex Van Halen told him to shotgun a 16-ounce beer. A hungover Jefferis declined, but the drummer wasn’t taking no for an answer, “Alex said, ‘Kurt you are not leaving this spot until you drink it…’ ”
…His wild time is captured in a new documentary short, Lost Weekend, whichpremiered at the Tribeca Film Festival on April 20th. (The movie I Want My MTV, about the channel’s early days, is also part of the fest.) It’s a look at a time you can never imagine happening now, when the break-the-rules channel let viewers in on the fun by gifting them cars, VIP treatment at concerts and even their idols’ homes. The contests sometimes ended up in sex, chaos or with winners owing thousands of dollars…
…No way could that happen today,” he said. “You’d be signing releases out the wazoo — and that would take all the fun out of it.”
Former KISS guitarist Vinnie Vincent was a guest on the April 19th edition of Rock Talk With Mitch Lafon. Excerpts from the interview can read below, as transcribed by me, for EddieTrunk.com.
On his not doing many interviews anymore:
“I am just inundated with interview requests and I will not do them any longer…they’re flatlined unless it’s someone I respect who has a real working knowledge of what I do…has an overall quality to their interviews and respect for [the] artists. I will not do these any longer…the world needs to reset itself from this bash=and-trash society that we have turned into and I want no part of it. Right now, I am in a great place…”
Discussing his recently announced Speedballjamm show, scheduled for June 7th in Nashville, Tennessee:
“Fans can expect fun…I do things that are not expected…So [Speedballjamm] is that recording, the fun of that recording, come to life. The informal, onstage look at each other, everybody just join in, follow where I am going and let’s play our asses off and have fun…It will probably be an hour, or so, of guitar, but it’s fun…What’s following is…I got three albums written, in the can ready to record and this is the first launching…You’ve got the typical bashers out there [saying] “Vinnie’s not going to show up.” That is complete bulls–t…I picked out two great players, people that are very harmonious to me, and I’m not easy an easy person to work with…But, these people I picked myself, I have a great rapport with them. They’re great players and it’s a very comfortable vibe…I always buck trends…and that’s Speedballjamm, it’s gonna be a lot of fun…Vinnie’s back…”
Talking about having live recordings of [KISS’] Creatures In The Night tour:
“Oh, I have every single show we ever played. Yes, I recorded every single Creatures show. I’ve recorded every single Lick It Up show, U.S and Europe…I recorded them from the stage…on cassette and they virtually sound identical because we were so polished…there was really no variation from show to show, but they sounded great. It sounded like you were at the venue.”
On appearing at Gene Simmon’s Vault Experience:
“I could bulls–t you, but I won’t…It began with an email from Gene. Actually, two emails, because I did not see the first one…It was six months before I got to answer him…So I [wrote], ‘How are you? Merry Christmas, hope you’re doing well. Yes, no problem, love to see you again. If you need me, I’ll be there to help.” That was a tough thing for me [to write]. My natural instinct would have been to [write], ‘Go f–k yourself. You hurt me too much. I will never extend myself to you again.’ But I said [to myself], ‘No, I’m going to try and rise above that.’ It’s a way for me to put some closure [on things] I wasn’t sure I could put closure on…I almost didn’t do [it] because…the thing that kept coming to my mind was, ‘Hey, this is the first time I’m seeing this guy after being run over by his bus.’ It’s easy to run over someone when you can keep forking over hundreds of thousands of dollars into attorneys…[saying] ‘I want to destroy Vinnie…’ These were all detrimental reasons that were starting to reverse my decision to show up at his Vault…[But then I said to myself], ‘You made a promise, he’s expecting you there,’ and if you are going to try and put [this] behind you…try and bury this…which is very difficult. I said, ‘Okay, I’m going. We’ll see what happens.’ So, I did show up, and to be honest with you, I went there with a smile…and I felt that it was a cold reception…I was treated very indifferently. Driving home, I thought, ‘Why did you do this?…That’s the last time I will do the favor, don’t ask me again.”
Discussing working on KISS’ Revenge album:
…It began at Gene’s house [and] it was an everyday thing and I have all the recordings of everything we had written, tried to write, didn’t finish, intended work, ideas, etc…Then I worked at Paul [Stanley’s] house for another number of months…we came up with a lot of songs. There were so many songs written that should have been on that album. It really should have been a Lick It Up album again, because that team was recaptured again…we captured the vibe. I still have those songs, and I heard them not long ago, going through all the material I had, and I thought, ‘That song was great. That song was great, This song was great. Why didn’t they end up on that record?’
Listen to Vincent’s entire interview below.
To get more information on Vinnie’s Speedballjamm show, pleaseclick here.
Dana’s note: Thank you to Bob Davenport for passing this interview along to me.
As previously reported, former Ozzy Osbourne, and current Red Dragon Cartel guitarist, Jake E. Lee, recently recounted that Mötley Crüe bassist Nikki Sixx, and drummer Tommy Lee, asked him replace guitarist Mick Mars, in the band.
Sixx responsed by tweeting, “Isn’t it funny how the has been’s, never was’, washed up long ago small career people all started coming outta the woodwork around the movie? I guess it’s their only way to get attention in 2019. God bless them. They must be desperate.”
Additionally posting that Lee’s story account was, “[A] make believe story. Everybody wants peice of the Crüe now. Believe me. Almost 40 years together. We know our story way more than some shadowy worms.”
Mötley Crüe, The Dirt movie, and soundtrack, were both released on March 22nd.
The formation of the beast we now call Exodus began in Richmond CA in 1979, and although many started their journey as fans a few years down the line, there is no debating that the early 80’s was a time for major growth in the world of Thrash Metal, especially in the Bay Area of California.
Day in the Dirt was perhaps the ultimate example of the Bay Area thrash metal underground scene in 1984. A plywood stage constructed in a Berkeley, California park where Slayer, Suicidal Tendencies and Exodus played to a frenzied crowd of headbangers. It was also evident from this show, and others like it, why Exodus was so influential on the Bay Area scene and thrash metal in general. With the eventual release of their first album Bonded By Blood, the band would take their music and their live show to new heights of insanity in the years that followed.
Take a trip back to that incredible time in thrash metal history with the recently unearthed live recording of No Love (Live At Day In The Dirt 1984), and listen to the raw power of the original Bonded By Blood lineup of the band that started it all… Exodus
Gary Holt comments, “Day In The Dirt was almost like the Bay Area thrash metal Woodstock, our own underground version on the legendary Day On The Green shows we all attended so many times. What happened that day at Aquatic Park in Berkeley has gone down in Bay Area lore as an epic day for the underground Thrash scene. The brainchild of the late great Wes Robinson, we were fortunate to have been a key part of such a great show. It was Rick Hunolt’s second Exodus show as well I believe!.”
Stryper frontman/guitarist Michael Sweet says that he would love to help Van Halen make another classic album along the lines of their first three releases.
“Chances are in this lifetime it’ll never happen, but if it ever did, and we co-produced [the LP] together, and I was able, as a fan, a singer, a guitar player, a writer, to pull that out of them, I guarantee you it would be the best Van Halen album since [Van Halen, II and [Women And Children First],” he told 10 Questions With The Musical Mind (transcription courtesy of blabbermouth.net) . “I can say that without even any hesitation at all, because, in a perfect world again, if they agreed to it, and we all worked together and went for that, I guarantee you it would happen and the world would be going, ‘What the eff just happened?'”
According to Sweet, the ideal Van Halen album should remain true to the band’s classic sound without attempting to incorporate any of the newer sonical influences which could dilute the group’s original songwriting magic.
“We don’t wanna hear Van Halen doing a modern song with no guitar solos,” Michael said. “You wanna hear Van Halen like you heard it on Van Halen and II and Women And Children First. That’s the Van Halen we all know and love, and that was the fire — a burning, ignited, raging fire.”
Back in 2015, Sweet said that Van Halen’s latest studio album, 2012’s A Different Kind Of Truth, was one of the most disappointing records he has heard in the last few years.
“I’m a huge Van Halen fan — about as big as they come — and I’ve always loved the band and everything,” he said. “And I just feel like the last album… You know when you feel like a band is just going through the motions and they’re just not giving it their best? That’s what I felt with that album. It got some really good reviews — people were saying, ‘This is great. This is great’ — and I’m just kind of sitting there reading them, thinking, ‘Okay, I’m hearing something completely different than these people are hearing, apparently.’ And I have absolutely no clue what I am talking about, because I just didn’t get it. I didn’t get it. There’s qualities there that you’ve come to expect that are still there that you love — you know, Eddie’s [Van Halen] playing… Eddie could play two notes and cause chins to drop, ’cause he’s Eddie. But… I don’t know, man.”
Stryper will be starting their History Tour – Greatest Hits & Covers That Influenced Our Generation on May 10th in Greenville, SC. To view the entire tour itinerary, please click here.
Accept have released a special seven-inch vinyl single, featuring a brand new studio track titled “Life’s A Bitch“ as well as Restless And Wild (Live at Wacken 2017), on the B-side.
Guitarist Wolf Hoffmann says, “We love the title of the single… Who does not agree to that ‘life’s a bitch?’ It is universal, even if the stories are different. Everybody knows what that means.”
Listen to the song below.
Accept’s latest release was, Symphonic Terror – Live At Wacken 2017, on Nuclear Blast records. It features a unique show, shot on August 3rd, 2017 at the Wacken Open Air festival, where the band played the biggest and most extraordinary show of its career in front of 80,000, on top of thousands more fans watching via a live stream.
