We're So Famous

by Jaime Clarke

  No sooner had we hung up with House than the phone rang again. It was someone named Ian Black from Cactus Records, a local label we recognized because they put out records by some of our fave local bands like Dead Hot Workshop and Wise Monkey Orchestra. House gave Ian our number (we wondered how House knew it but Ian told us the radio station had caller ID) and Ian suggested we meet. So me and Daisy went to Cactus Records in Tempe, the college town built up around Arizona State University, a shite college we couldn’t get into when we were thinking about studying music.

  Ian was surprisingly young. He was small but had an intense face, small dark eyes and a forehead like a movie screen. He said he was very glad to meet us and thought it would be great to work together. We toured the studio, which was a small two-room adobe with wood paneling on the inside.

  Let me introduce you to Jammin’ Jay Jasper, he said. Jammin’ Jay was blond and tan and looked like he belonged on the beach in California instead of behind the mixing board. Jammin’ Jay looked familiar too and sure enough he said he was the bass player for Phantasm, a one-hit-wonder band back in the early ’80s.

  Ian wanted to put out a record as soon as possible, to capitalize on the recent press. People’s minds are like sieves, Ian said, so we have to act fast. He asked us if we thought we could come up with some more songs. We said we thought we could but we’d need help and it might take a little while. Jammin’ Jay suggested we release a single with the two songs we already had and Ian agreed this was a good idea. ‘D.F.O.’ was the most requested song on House’s show that week, so that would be the A-side and ‘I’d Kill You if I Thought I Could Get Away with It’ would be the B-side. We all agreed that, due to recent events, the title should be changed. After some serious brainstorming we came up with the substitute title ‘You’re No Fun.’

  We let House dub the demo tape and he returned it to us. It still had a PROPERTY OF PHOENIX POLICE sticker on it. We talked about hiring studio musicians to re-record the songs, but Ian wanted to get the single out literally the next day, so Jammin’ Jay cut our single from the demo tape. He let me and Daisy hang around while he worked. We asked him about Phantasm and he told us some pretty cool tour stories. We didn’t know it, but Phantasm was still huge in Europe and Jammin’ Jay said they played just about every city in every country over there. He told us he played in East Germany before the wall came down. We asked him what it was like to be famous and he just smiled. It’s everything you think it is, he said, but it’s also things you don’t think it is. We asked him what he meant and he said there was a really awful side to being famous. Like being mobbed in a restaurant and stuff like that, we said, nodding our heads that we understood. But that’s not what Jammin’ Jay meant. People do things they wouldn’t normally do, he said. He told us a story about playing in Louisiana—he couldn’t remember where exactly—and how after the show they discovered a group of thirteen-year-old girls waiting backstage to meet them. The group recognized that these weren’t your average poster-plastered bedroom wall fans. The thirteen-year-old girls were painted up with heavy make up and wrapped in revealing dresses and low-cut costumes. Here’s the really horrible part, Jammin’ Jay said, the girls were wrapped up like Christmas presents by the women standing behind them, who were trying to drop them off with promises to pick them up later. Their mothers.

  Jammin’ Jay just sat there shaking his head. The story reminded us of the end of the License to Ill tape of Beastie Boys videos where the Beasties are backstage with these chicks who obviously are in love with them. The Beasties chase the girls around the room and after being caught one of the girls asks Mike D or Ad Rock or MCA—we can never keep those guys straight—to sign her stomach. So whichever one it was takes a marker and starts to sign but pulls back the girl’s stretch pants and ‘accidentally’ drops the marker inside. Then he goes in after it. It was probably one of those moments that shouldn’t have been taped, like that night in Rob Lowe’s Atlanta hotel room. Stella has a pirated copy of that tape and she showed it to me and Daisy. We love Rob Lowe. We think it’s a shame what that tape did to his career, though maybe it’s been long enough now everyone has forgotten. We hope Pee-Wee comes back, too. Last thing we heard, Stella was going to keep another notebook, Career-Ending Scandals, and she was going to put Rob and Pee-Wee in it, along with Roscoe ‘Fatty’ Arbuckle. Me and Daisy had never heard of Fatty Arbuckle until we got a letter from Stella, postmarked from San Francisco. Apparently Arbuckle was the biggest star of his day. There’s no one to compare him to now, Stella said. She was in San Francisco doing research on that day in September 1921. Stella said Arbuckle had three adjoining suites on the twelfth floor of the St. Francis Hotel. His roommate, Fred Fishback, arranged for the party—not Arbuckle like everyone thought. Fishback had invited an actress named Virginia Rappe who Stella said was also a prostitute. Rappe’s madame came too, Bambina Maude Delmont (who the state of California had charged with fifty counts of extortion, bigamy, fraud and racketeering). Arbuckle later said he expressed concern about Rappe’s presence at the party. It was known that Rappe had had five abortions before she was sixteen years old and she and her lover had been thrown off the lot of Keystone because of venereal disease problems. Apparently the producer had the lot fumigated. Anyway, the party took place in suite 1220—the sitting room. 1219 and 1221 were adjoining bedrooms which people traveled in and out of as that’s where the bathrooms were. Even though it was the early years of Prohibition, Fishback had secured liquor, a couple of bottles of Scotch and a bottle of gin. Orange juice and seltzer were sent up from downstairs and everyone was drinking. Virginia Rappe was drinking orange juice and gin.

  Arbuckle had a driving engagement and went into his bedroom, 1219, to change clothes. He locked the door because he didn’t want anyone coming in while he was changing. He found Virginia Rappe passed out on his bathroom floor. He helped her to the bed and, thinking that she was drunk, elevated her feet to help the blood to her head. Arbuckle went back into 1220 to find Maude Delmont, but didn’t see her. He told another guest ‘I think Virginia is sick’ and when Arbuckle and the guest reentered 1219, Virginia Rappe was sitting up on the bed, screaming and tearing at her clothes. Mrs. Delmont finally appeared, drunk, and Arbuckle asked her to make Rappe stop tearing her clothes. Rappe’s shrieks grew in intensity and Arbuckle tried to quiet her. One of her sleeves was hanging by a thread and Arbuckle said, ‘All right, if you want it off, I’ll help you’ and tore off the sleeve. Stella said they used that statement against him in the trial. They also said Arbuckle threatened to kill Maude Delmont. When Fatty returned to the room he found Rappe nude on the bed with Maude Delmont rubbing an ice cube over her body. Arbuckle said he thought Rappe needed real medical attention and Delmont yelled at him to shut up and mind his own business. Fatty didn’t like her tone and told Delmont to shut up or he’d throw her out the window. They tried to turn that into something against him at the trial, too. Finally Virginia Rappe was carried into a room down the hall, 1227, with the help of hotel management. Maude Delmont passed out on the bed next to her. Four days later Virginia Rappe died of peritonitis. Her fallopian tubes had ruptured because of pus accumulation from gonorrhea. But Maude Delmont told the police that Fatty raped her and because he was so huge, he flattened her. Me and Daisy sort of remembered the story after Stella told us but we remembered something about a Coke bottle or a champagne bottle being stuffed between the prostitute’s legs and that Arbuckle had kicked the bottle to wedge it up in there. Stella said a lot of people thought that but that it wasn’t even close to being true. The saddest thing of all, Stella said, was that after a couple trials where Arbuckle was found not guilty, he was going to make a comeback. But he was already an alcoholic and he had a heart attack in New York City.

  You can really learn a lesson from what happened to Fatty, Stella ended her letter. Me and Daisy thought, Yeah, you really could.

  Ian’s girlfriend Marika designed the cover for our single. She was also a singer (Ian was producing her first a
lbum). She used the photo from the Arizona Republic but enhanced the colors on her computer so that everything including Daisy’s pink shirt was bright. We told her it looked really great and she was glad we liked it. We met Ian on Sunday and by Tuesday morning ‘D.F.O’ was in every Tower Records in Phoenix. By Wednesday it was in every major record store in the state. Suddenly it wasn’t just House playing our record; flipping through the stations, FM and AM, we could pretty much find it any time of the day. We went to the Tower Records on Mill Avenue—the one by the college—and watched people come in and buy our record. Tower Records had it right up at the register. Mostly it was teenagers and college kids, but some older people bought some too and that made us happy. We wanted everyone to listen to it and thought anyone who liked good music would enjoy it. We gave a bunch to Daisy’s mom, who called it danceable, which, coming from someone older tells you something. But she was still concerned about Elliot and Hunter and called a lawyer she sometimes freelanced for and the lawyer called down to the police station but the police told him me and Daisy weren’t suspects. We were all relieved.

  Meanwhile, we were hard at work in the studio recording our full-length album. We were having trouble coming up with songs. Jammin’ Jay co-wrote one with us called ‘We Love Goo,’ a sort of rock anthem. We had a lot of fun singing that one. Too much fun, in fact. It took us many, many tries to get that one ‘waxed’ (that’s recording talk for ‘recorded’). We would get so excited we’d start yelling the lyrics and laughing and Jammin’ Jay constantly reminded us about the schedule.

  Ian was busy promoting us around town. He visited all the radio stations and the record stores to meet the people who were handling our record. He said he even knew the guys in the warehouse and that’s what made him a good promoter. We asked Ian if he’d be our agent and he said he was already like our manager and that reminded him to have us sign a contract with Cactus Records. Daisy made a flower out of the dot above her i. That’s my new signature, she said.

  Ian booked us in a Tempe music festival called SaltBed, which was held every year in the dried river bed of the Salt River that runs along the border between Phoenix and Tempe.

  Ian said to come up with three more songs to add to ‘D.F.O’ and ‘You’re No Fun’ and ‘We Love Goo’ for our EP titled We’re Masterful Johnson. The three new songs, all written by Jammin’ Jay, were: ‘I Don’t Want It if You Don’t’ (starts out with slow synthesizers like ‘Forever Young’ by Alphaville or that Asia song we can never remember the title of), ‘Hurry! Hurry! Hurry!’ (a pure pop song, a cross between Cyndi Lauper and Adam Ant about one lover waiting for another at the airport), and a song about easy money and fame called ‘Desperately Seeking Pacino,’ which Jammin’ Jay admitted drew heavily on the early work of ABC, specifically ‘Poison Arrow’ from their 1982 album Lexicon of Love as well as from 1985’s How to Be a Zillionaire (the lead singer of that band got Hodgkin’s disease and we’re hoping when he’s well ABC will have a huge comeback). In just two days Jammin’ Jay had written three new songs and had the instrumental tracks laid down. We marveled at his brilliance.

  Masterful Johnson was the top bill at SaltBed and me and Daisy started to get really nervous. We practiced nonstop but our voices didn’t seem to be able to handle the material. Ian called a special meeting and it was decided that, until we could really perform our songs, we’d lip sync. We’ll record special live versions, Ian said. So that’s what we did, adding a ‘Hello Phoenix!’ at the beginning of ‘D.F.O.’ Jammin’ Jay rearranged a couple of the songs and added a sort of disco song called ‘Trip the Light.’ We’ll give them something new, he said. We also recorded an acoustic version of ‘You’re No Fun.’ Jammin’ Jay coached us on how to lip sync. It’s an art form like anything else, if it’s done right, he said. You can’t just get up there and move your lips, he said, you’re not puppets. He showed us how to breathe correctly and told us we should go through all the motions of actually singing except to keep the sound locked up in our throats.

  We were feeling pretty confident and agreed to work with a voice coach when it was over. Being the good guy that he is, Ian said he’d release the new recording as a special ‘Live from SaltBed’ recording. He said they could add the crowd noise and me and Daisy were amazed. It practically moved us to tears how nice Ian was to us. It reminded of us of how nice Rick was to us and thinking about him made us sad. We felt lucky to have in Ian someone as nice as Rick.

  Stella’s plane landed a few hours before the show. We’d been calling Stella all along the way, telling her what was happening with Masterful Johnson and she said she was happy for us, but we thought she was a little jealous, too. We picked Stella up on the way to our gig and the first thing she said was, Did you hear about Falco? We hadn’t and Stella told us that Falco—whose real name was Johann Hoelzal—died in a car crash in the Dominican Republic while on vacation. This happened back in February, Stella said, and the details are still a little sketchy. The three of us loved that song ‘Rock Me Amadeus.’

  It just goes to show you, Daisy said. One of Daisy’s greatest fears is dying a random, senseless death. She told me she had the feeling her life was going to end abruptly and violently, like Falco’s. Daisy asked Stella, Was he wearing a seatbelt. Daisy always wore her seatbelt. Stella said she wasn’t sure but she did know he hit a bus straight on and died at the hospital from head injuries. Was he the one driving, Daisy asked. Stella wasn’t sure. Daisy got real quiet and didn’t say anything else the rest of the ride.

  It was good to see Stella again. Sometimes when you get so driven about something you forget to stop and think about the whole thing. Me and Daisy would be the first to admit that we partly wanted to continue with Masterful Johnson just out of spite because of Stella leaving, but really SaltBed was about the three of us, like we used to be.

  We had some time to kill so the three of us milled around the Salt Mine, a camp of tents selling authentic Indian jewelry, potted cacti, beaded necklaces, vintage clothing, etc. Me and Daisy were surprised more people didn’t recognize us. Stella bought one of those necklaces with a little vial of colored beads hanging from it. For luck, she said.

  Besides us, the most exciting news that year was that the people at SaltBed were finally able to get a cool act that wasn’t local. We don’t know how they did it, but they were able to lure the Boston band Fuzzy out to Arizona to play. Fuzzy is one of the best pure power pop bands around. Me and Daisy think Hilken Mancini’s and Chris Toppin’s voices are right up there and once in awhile (like on the song ‘Glad Again’ off their excellent album Electric Juices) the band reminds us of Bananarama. We have been fans since we got a bootleg of a show where Fuzzy opened up for Dinosaur Jr. at some college. We like Dinosaur Jr. too but Fuzzy is the ultimate. Listen to ‘Miss the Mark’ and then listen to ‘It Started Today’ if you want to hear what a wide ranging talent they are.

  So it was one of the highlights of our life to actually get to meet Fuzzy. And they were cool, really down-to-earth. We were nervous about approaching Hilken and Chris but they were sweethearts (the bassist and drummer are dreamboats, by the way) and we gave Hilken a copy of We’re Masterful Johnson and she seemed genuinely eager to listen to it, which pumped me and Daisy up.

  What pumped us up even more was when we were backstage getting ready and this short, thick man with dark hair and dark eyes came over and said ‘Excuse me’ in a heavy accent that made me and Daisy think of Boss Hogg from The Dukes of Hazzard. He introduced himself as Scott Key, an A&R guy for Sony Records. Scott Key told us he thought we were terrific, just terrific. He said we were really going to be the Next Big Thing. When the floodgates open on you two, he said, the whole world is going to love Masterful Johnson. He said he’d been sent out from L.A. especially to see us and that Sony wanted to sign us. Me and Daisy and Stella just sat there with our mouths open. Scott Key asked us if we were free to sign with Sony. We said, What did he mean, free? He asked if we were under contract with Cactus Records for another album. It oc
curred to us then that as far as we had ever talked about it with Ian, we were free to sign with Sony. We thought for sure Ian would be happy that such a big record company was interested in us. Scott Key kept saying the floodgates were going to open up on the whole world and he got me and Daisy pretty excited. He said we’d go to L.A. and shoot a video for ‘D.F.O.’ to play on MTV. Posters, T-shirts, hats, bumper stickers—maybe your own cartoon series, he said. It all sounded good to us. He gave us his card. I have to leave immediately after the show, he told us. He had to be in Texas the next day for the South by Southwest festival in Austin to check out a whole roster of bands like the Paranoids, Ramona the Pest, and Astro Chicken. We said we thought he had a great job and he said it was only great when he found talent like me and Daisy. Scott Key told us to call him that Monday, and that’s what we planned to do.

  Summers in Arizona are notoriously brutal and the first day of the SaltBed Festival was especially so. In addition to giving away free bottles of water, a misting system was set up backstage along with industrial fans that whirred like a sky full of jet airplanes. The security staff took turns hosing off the crowd from the stage and it was hard to tell who was enjoying it more.

  The heat was certainly a factor in what happened. In retrospect, the Falco story probably didn’t help either. Plus we’d stayed up all night excited about our recording future. Plus we were excited to see Stella again after such a long time. Also some of the bands before us played longer than they were scheduled, adding frustration to our nervousness. Jammin’ Jay was nowhere to be found until right before we went on and he said Ian wasn’t going to make it at all. We thought Ian had found out about Scott Key and was pissed, and we felt extreme guilt about it. Another factor—and I still blame Stella for this—was that Daisy had found Stella’s Murder Book and found the page about Elliot and Hunter and Rick and, gruesome as she can be, Stella had autopsy pictures and Daisy’d ripped out the pages and had them in her back pocket. I found all this out later at the hospital and all Daisy said was, They don’t belong in the book, they were real people.