1979
Arrive in nyc at nyu and practice being fabulous at Weinstein Dormitory
cafeteria. Xenon and the Underground on union sqare are the clubs of the
moment. I can't get in.
Saw Richard Lloyd of Television perform high on dope in his pajamas at
Hurrah; Madonna is working the coatcheck.
Tripping at Max's Kansas City in the back room; Lauren Bacall storms in and screams "Take me to the star!" I didn't know who the star was so we just stared at each other; she was really short.
1980
Grace Jones hissed at me at Interferon. She scared the shit out of me.
Met Andy Warhol at The Ninth Circle, my favorite hustler bar in the West Village. We're studying his contributions to cinema history at school. I told him I loved "Empire." "You must be the only person who ever saw it," he said, and then after that he didn't talk to me anymore. Ever again.
I had sex in The Warehouses today on the Hudson at the end of Christopher St. I was with this cute French guy and he took me into these huge empty buildings that were full of guys walking around cruising and then sex would start and a crowd would gather. Frenchie took me into this one room and we started having sex. A huge crowd gathered to watch and it was the first time I ever had sex in front of an audience. He started to get a little self-concious; I was loving it. Then he took me up to the roof and everywhere you looked there were naked men sunbathing on the pier and the roof, laughing, playing, sucking cock; it was like a gay paradise. "Grace Jones' "Pull Up To The Bumper" was blasting out of someone's boombox; it was brand new music i had never heard before; it sounded like The Eighties had arrived, like Grace's emotionless detached monotone was announcing the mood of the new era. We fucked in the sun and the Circle Line tooted its horn at us as it cruised by up the Hudson. The tourists looked happy.
The dorm is full of groupies and roadies for Richard Hell and Arthur Kane since The Dolls broke up. Everyone in the dormitory keeps overdosing on heroin. Rumor has members of The Heartbreakers living under dormitory beds while the daughter of the actress who played Vera on "alice" is feeding their drug habits. I fell asleep in Johnny Thunders' bed while they were out copping. I had to carry this one roadie back and forth in the halls for 15 minutes before he started breathing again. He was really cute.
My friend Danny is 18 and he keeps going to Uncle Charlie's and having sex with all these ugly old men because he's too friendly to say no and I think he genuinely likes it. I told him if he's going to be doing it anyway he might as well getting paid for it. I told him to start asking for money. Now he's a huge hit and he's on his way to Europe. He'll never work a real job again (and he never did). I wrote a song about him called "Money Can't Buy You Love But It Can Buy You Me."
1981
My roommate walked in this morning with a copy of the Village Voice and
said, "There's a new cancer that only kills gays."
Some trick took me downtown to Rock City and then The Mudd Club to see a band called Our Daughter's Wedding sing "Lawnchairs Are Everywhere." I'll never forget it; it changed my life because he had the worst hair transplant I've ever seen. I don't like hair; if you're not sitting near a mirror you always have to wonder how it looks.
Saw The Clash at Bonds. The Sandinista guy wouldn't shut up and Joe Strummer
had to kick him off the stage. It was real revolutionary.
Bridget Fonda moved into our dormitory. She's a total rocker chick, she
fits right in. Our desk clerk, Martha Quinn, got a job on this music video
network called MTV. Now we have to get our light bulbs and toilet paper
from someone else.
Danny and I were having 3-way sex wtih this hot girl in his room at Rubin
Dormitory. She was handcuffed to the radiator and we were tag-teaming
her. Then she decided we should try a simultaneous 3-way position. The
handcuffs were making it difficult; it was like playing Twister. All of
the sudden this girl started screaming at the top of her lungs; she had
dislocated her shoulder. Danny and I jumped up to find the key but she
was in so much agony and she wouldn't stop screaming at the top of her
lungs. Suddenly the door burst open and all these frat boys came running
in to see what was wrong. Danny and and I were standing there greased
up and boned with a naked woman laying the floor chained to a radatior
and screaming bloody murder. Thank God she had the presence of mind to
quickly explain to them that this was a consensual situation and some
jock popped her shoulder back into place and everything was cool. Be we
almost got in a lot of trouble.
Found a cool bar on second avenue a few blocks down from The Saint. It's called The Bar. They have a good jukebox. My first night there Klaus Nomi talked to me but he was scarier than Grace Jones. I saw Taylor Mead there.
Had sex in the dormitory rec room behind the bleachers while Rick Rubin and the Beastie Boys were rehearsing in the same room and didn't know we were there.
1982
Danceteria is the hot club.
The first time i went to a party at The Pyramid i was with the girl whose mother played Vera on Alice. She told them who we were and we cut straight to the front of the line...I didn't know you could do that. The doorman was wearing a leather vest with a mohawk and a miniskirt and he was high on heroin. The theme that night was a party for Straight To Hell magazine. They had a go-go boy in his underwear.
Found a great bar on 53rd St. called Rounds where cute preppy boys turn tricks with rich old men. Took some German tourist to the Essex House and kept him tied up for two days while I watched tv and ordered room service. Had a great view of the New York Marathon in the park. Went home and wrote a term paper on male prostitution for my friend Eric because he's taking a class on "Sexual Variations." The paper got an A+.
1983
Area is the hot club.
A new bar opened called Boybar. It's upstairs behind a beauty parlor
on St. Mark's Place. It has a good jukebox. Lots of Culture Club and Tears
For Fears. Marcus Leatherdale's boyfriend John Dugdale was doing the door
and Robert Mapplethorpe was there. I took my girlfriend Perry and we danced.
The next day they hired me to do the door. My job is to keep out girls
and stop people from dancing. One night Diana Ross came in and spread
her arms out as she was walking the hall in a dramatic diva-like gesture.
Unfortunately you could see right through her white Halston and her cellulite
problem was out-of-control. Whoa.
I moved to a studio on Lulow St. where I lived for the next ten years
for 300/mo.
I shot a porno movie called "Daddy Dearest." It was fun for a minute but by the second day of the shoot I was bored. It opened at The Adonis. Some poor girl from my father's church in New England saw the ad in the paper and thought it was a real movie. She showed up for the opening and had to sit through two hours of my butthole spread twenty feet across the screen (this was in the day when porn was shot in 16mm film and still opened in porn theaters).
1984
Saw Divine at The Ritz. It was snowing and there were about two dozen
people in the audience. She said, "I've been in bed with more people
at one time than this."
Nico is in town and she's playing the Pyramid tonight. She's a total junkie.
She plays this tiny little foot-pedal organ and sings "All Tomorrow's
Parties" like it's a funeral dirge; it's genius. She also covered
"Venus In Furs". But she smells bad. And she made Brian the
manager of the Pyramid pay her in advance. Brian said she needed the money
to get "Nico'd up."
After a year at Boybar I was fired for missing too much work. I kept calling-in sick to hang out at Area. I was there when someone payed the beautiful boy in the sex exhibit $100 to jerk off in front of everyone in the fountain room. That caused quite a spectacle and left a lasting impression on me.
My friend Perry shaved her head and I thought it looked cool so I shaved mine too. The next day the housing police arrested me for being bald. They said I was disturbing the peace because so many people were pointing at me and screaming and shouting. They arrested my boyfriend for having green hair but they let him off with a warning. I like being bald; now I never have to worry about how my hair looks. I'm keeping it this way from now on.
Dropped mesculin and walked along the East River Drive at sunrise listening to Iggy Pop and ABBA on the headphones. They were both awesome. Coming down Second Avenue I saw Madonna sitting out in front of "Love Saves The Day" shooting some movie. She was sitting next to this huge table full of food. I will never forget the sight of all that food for as long as I live. I was hungry.
Keith Haring was having this big opening at Tony Shafrazi but it was so crowded and intimidating that i was afraid to go in so I sat on some stairs across the street and just watched. The guy sitting next to me asked me why I didn't go inside and I said it was because it was too fabulous and made me feel insecure. He said he wasn't inside for the same reason. Suddenly, I realized I was talking to Keith Haring. So we sat there and smoked. After he finished his cigarette he said, "Well I better head back in there." He looked like he was facing a firing squad.
I had been writing a rap song about the trendy club scene ("Congo bill, what a thrill! Rockin' in the bosom of Dianne Brill!") and Michael Schmidt made me sing it for Haoui Montaug. Haoui put me in his cabaret No Entiendes on the roof of Danceteria. I rapped about Vivienne Westwood and Day-Glo and Rudolf and Anita Sarko and Teri Toye and Frankie Goes To Hollywood while my friend Taunya stalked the edge of the stage wired on crystal methamphetamine and flicking her ashes on the audience. Everyone mentioned in the song was there and they all seemed to enjoy it. As soon as I walked off the stage I was mobbed. "You're a downtown celebrity now,"said my trendy friend who would know. Tried to go to after-hours club Berlin after the party but the police had just raided it before we got there.
A friend took me to the Gay Pride Parade and I hit my head on one of the awnings on Fifth Avenue. Knocked me out cold. Regained consciousness surrounded by gay men and choking on the smell of Perry Ellis cologne. Wrote a song called "Bourgeois Boys".
I really needed money and they were having a beauty contest at The Pyramid and first prize was $100. Some girls from the club let me borrow some clothes; I found a red bathing suit Perry's sister left in my closet before she split for Europe; and one of the girls at The Pyramid gave me a hot pink Chanel suit. I found a Halston full-length original black evening gown with hippie-lacing across the bodice at the salvation army. Twenty bucks but I couldn't afford it. At the contest I was up against Hapi Phace, Tabboo!, and some queen I tricked with at the Metropolitan porn theater on 14th st. I sang a song I wrote called "Bourgeois Boys" about the absurd notion of gay bars opening on Avenue B some day. Everybody laughed. I won first place. Really needed the money. Went back the next day and bought the Halston.
Took all Perry's sister's clothes out of my storage closet and shot a
gender-blending fashion layout with health and beauty tips like "Don't
eat. If you do, eat pizza." Sally Randall published them as a two-page
centerfold in the East Village Eye and now everyone seems to know my name.
I like it.
East Village Eye is running letter from skinheads, particularly lead singer
of Cro-Mags Harley, who are furious that gays (i.e. me) have appropriated
their look and hairdo. Lots of argument about whether queers have a right
to shave their heads. Skinheads are growing their hair in protest. Meanwhile
my bald head is literally stopping traffic on Houston St. every time I
leave my apt.
Rapped at a Vito Bruno outlaw party in front of hundreds of homeboys from
the Bronx on an abandoned strip of the West Side Highway in midtown near
the tunnel. I sang "Teri Toye" and "Bourgeois Boys"
in a black minidress (A-line). They seemed to love it; now I'm a hit with
the uptown crowd, too.
Started doing door at a club in a gymnasium at Second Avenue and Houston Street called Nickel Bag; the invitations went out in little plastic baggies. The party was on the roof and the view was incredible. It was a very fashion crowd and at sunrise the view and the crowd and the drugs were all amazing. Jean Michel B. came tiptoeing up the street last night, he was so high he was afraid to lock up his new little bicycle on the sidewalk. I'm in love wth Jean-Michel. I told him to bring it inside and put it in the supply closet. That seemed to make him happy. He picked up this blonde woman and a large envelope full of cocaine and left with his bike an hour later.
Opened a club on Third Street called Uncle Bud's Amway, named after my Uncle Bud the Amway distributor. The club was a huge hit until the local mafia chased us out. I walked around the corner and took a job working the door at Save the Robots which immediately became the new hot spot. I would stand behind an iron gate on Avenue B in a green miniskirt on a platform and everyone would think I was a fashion mannequin and scream when they saw me move. Everyone started showing at Robots after hours, all the rock stars and models and club people. Joey Ramone hung out there a lot. So did David Lee Roth and all the guys from Def Jam like Russell Simmons and RUN-DMC and Keith Haring and his crew of hiphop hotties. Keith was the first person to really promote straight Puerto Rican trade as chic. Rudolf hung out there a lot and of course my favorite Teri Toye.
Wrote a song called "Teri Toye" about my obsession with the transsexual Sprouse model and "It" girl-of-the-moment. Performed it at the Pyramid with my back-up vocalists The Corporettes, girls in women's business suits who carry briefcases while they sing. Teri was there. She asked me for a cassette of the song and now she carries it on a boom box wherever she goes.
Got the best job I've ever had in my life go-go dancing on the bar at
The Pyramid. Last night Bunny was dancing too and after work we sat on
the sidewalk and split a 40. She told me her life story and I ran home
and wrote a song called "Fierce Ruling Diva." Later I met these
two guys who said they took the name of their band from my song. Funny
how these things go around. I love hanging out in the dressing room at
The Pyramid. International Chrysis and Ethyl Eichelberger are like guardian
angels watching over all the junior drag queens.
A bunch of Southerners arrived from Georgia this week in a van; one of
them is this beautiful thing named RuPaul. I asked him to go out with
me and I thought we were getting along well. We made out at Robots all
night but he wouldn't go home with me. Afterwards his friend told me that
Ru enjoys Public Displays of Affection to get people talking for the sake
of his career, but never actually puts out. I was told that RuPaul is
totally focused on his career and I should forget about him. I can't believe
somebody actually thought they could advance their career by making out
with ME! I was thrilled.
1985
The Village Voice named me one of the five artists to watch this year;
Karen Finley, too.
Performed at Area for new year's eve but the vibe there was very harsh and atttitude-laden. Plus the stage was really small and my heels were really high and so was I. I was so wired I was afraid I'd vibrate off the edge of the stage and break my neck. So I split before the second set and went to the opening of this new club called The World on the Lower East Side. When I got to the door it was total chaos; Atilla the doorman was having a cocaine-meltdown and owner Arthur Weinstein was screaming at everyone but he let me in. Inside I saw the best live show ever by a band called Konk and then I went home and wrote a song about my evening at Area called "Fuck You."
Save The Robots got raided by the Night Life Task Force last night. They were just coming from a raid at Neither/Nor where they had confiscated all the freebase so they were really high when they got to Robots and they were going beserk, waving guns and punching people and kicking holes in the walls. They arrested all the employees and wouldn't let us take our belongings from coatcheck. They held us at the precinct all night. When we got back to the club the next day they had stolen all our stuff from the coatcheck, even our coats.
A bunch of kids from the pyramid went to Tompkins Square Park late last night to put on a show but I didn't go cuz I had strep throat. I'll go next year. They want to start doing it every year and calling it "Wigstock".
Got the worst job I've ever had in my life: dancing on top of the pizza ovens at Pizza-a-Go-Go. It's a horrible midtown crowd and it's really hot on top of the pizza ovens and people throw cheese at you while you're dancing. It sucks.
While I was working the door at Save The Robots an obnoxious little man
insisted on being let in to the club and I had to turn him away. He said,
"You'll be sorry, I'm Arthur Weinsteins's brother, I'll have you
fucking killed. I'm gonna go get him right now. You'll be sorry."
Well, I was a little nervous since rumor had it that Arthur Weinstein
had killed a man at an after-hour club called The Jefferson, but there
was a higher principle at stake here. His brother was gross. A few minutes
later a shadowy, menacing figure showed up at my door. It was Arthur Weinstein.
"Do you know who I am?" he asked me.
"Yes," I replied.
"Did you turn my brother away from your door?"
"Yes," I repeated. He leaned in closely and looked me square
in the eyes.
"Would you like to come work for me?" he asked. A week later
I started as the doorman at the World.
Started a band called Dean and the Weenies. I'm teaching myself to write music by using a casio to dissect the hits on the radio. It's not that hard but everything I write has the same structure as "Material Girl" and "Footloose." We got a gig opening for David Wojnarowicz's band 3 Teens Kill 4 at the Pep Lounge. The kids seemed to like it.
Getting lots of cool gigs; Danceteria, Area, Pyramid. Saw Vulcan Death
Grip at Danceteria and I was really surprised by how professional Ann
Magnuson is. Or maybe she's just a total bitch, I wasn't really sure.
We opened for The Bronski Beat at Pyramid, Jimmy Sommerville was really
sweet.
Went to see Liberace at Radio City; it was the show of the decade. Sat
with Rudolf and Dianne, John Sex and Joey Arias. Went to party at Trump
tower afterwards. We didn't have invitations but when the doormen tried
to stop us we just turned and faced the papparazzi. The flashbulbs were
so blinding the doormen couldn't even see us walking by. The next day
we were in The Post. The headline said, "New Hairdos arrive for Liberace
Party".
The Palladium opened. I wore these cool-drop earrings that went halfway to the floor. Sally Randall and Haoui were doing the door. When I got to the door a huge crowd was getting really ugly. Sally shouted for me to just shove my way through but when people saw me doing this pandemonium broke out and the bouncers lost control of the crowd. People started jumping the velvet ropes and running for the door. The bouncers had to pull back and slam down the iron security gates, but even as the gates were dropping, men in tuxes and women in fur coats, dripping with jewels and Azzadine Alia were rolling on the pavement to get under the door before it closed. Jewelry was flying everywhere; it was like trying to catch the last helicopter out of VietNam. I've never seen anything like it. When I got inside, Boy George and Marilyn were coming up one staircase and Andy Warhol and Jean Michel Basquiat were coming down the other.
Somehow Perry and I managed to sneak into the Azzedine show at Palladium and grab front row seats while the security wasn't looking. It was a miracle. Booed loudly as Iman came down the runway in a fur cape. It was fabulous.
1986
The Palladium is killing nightlife. It's so big that in order to break-even
financially they have to let in EVERYBODY.
I was hanging out at The Saint because i was really horny and thought
I might get laid there but the music was so awful I couldn't stand it.
I turned to the guy sitting next to me and said, "This town really
needs a rock and roll fag bar."
"What would you call it?" he asked me.
"I would call it 'Rock and Roll Fag Bar'," I said.
I went to the owners of the World and asked them to let me have Tuesdays since the club wasn't open that night anyway. (The idea was to have a gay club with live bands where people could dance to rock music and be free of the izod/designer jean mentality dominating gay culture in the early 80s. In four weeks Rock and Roll Fag Bar was the hottest party in nyc and dominated the club scene for the rest of the decade. Over the years it played hosts to dozens of celebs who will deny ever being there, but two who didn't deny it were Robert Plant of Led Zeppelin and Malcolm MacLaren. The night Robert Plant arrived and danced all night, many of us who had been raised on Led Zeppelin achieved Nirvana).
Suzanne Bartsch is doing an interesting party in midtown. This stripper named Lady Hennessy Brown comes out, takes off her shirt and then shoots breast milk all over the audience while the queens scream bloody murder and then run for their lives. Man, can that woman lactate!! She must have shot 20-30 feet.
Haoui Montaug took a bunch of New York performance artists to London to perform at the ICA. It was me, John Sex, Joey Arias, Karen Finley and a few others. While I was there I hooked up with my friend Danny the hustler from college and we turned a trick together, so now i'm an International Male Prostitute. It's impossible to find pot in London, everyone kept offering me heroin instead, which I declined. The police threatened to arrest Karen Finley if she performed, so every night onstage they put a spotlight on an empty chair and played her record instead. It was absurd. The police came all week to make sure she didn't try to do something "obscene" onstage.
1987
I asked NYJacks if they wanted to do an event at R&R Fag Bar and they
said yes so I put out inivites saying we were having a wild sex party.
Then they canceled at the last minute so I just darkened a back room and
put a box of kleenex and a 10-lb jar of vaseline under a pin light. I
hung a sign that said "This way to the Testosteroom" thinking
it was a big joke. About an hour later I wandered back in that direction
and some ACT-UP activist was earnestly trying to warn me that petroleum
doesn't work with latex condoms; I had no idea what he was talking about
until I looked down and realized the Vaseline jar was empty. I looked
up and I was surrounded by people fucking. That was how R&R Fag Bar
became a sex party. Later I heard ACT-UP was planning a protest so we
established a strict "lips above the hips" rule and hired drag
queens to enforce it. It had never been my intention to encourage unsafe
sex. The drag queens wore glow-in-the-dark lipstick and were very strict,
sort of like a backroom being monitored by catholic nuns. Or Joan Crawford.
Dean and The Weenies was the closing act at Wigstock this year; we got
into a little altercation backstage with officials from the Parks Department
who told me they'd pull the plug if I sang more than one song. I was tripping
pretty hard so we sang "I Wanna Take You Higher" by Sly and
the Family Stone. Afterward, Dmitri from Deee-lite came backstage and
told me I had picked the perfect song. I think he was tripping too. I
looked down and my hands were bleeding from hitting the tambourine so
hard.
I'm turning up in Details a lot; Stephen Saban wrote a profile on my
music and they keep running pictures of me with all my close personal
friends like Holly Woodlawn or The DelRubio triplets. Later Michael Musto
wrote a column about my music and they put me on the cover of The Voice
again. And I was featured in the first issue of someting called "InStyle"
whatever that is. Now I'm modeling for some japanese designers. I think
I must be famous in Japan because whenever I go to a sushi resteraunt
the staff bursts into applause. The best part of being famous is getting
to hang out with Sylvia Miles. She's really fun and she's always there
for the same reason I am: the free food.
I shot something for a show on MTV called "Andy Warhol's Fifteen
Minutes" where we sang "Teri Toye" and i put Teri wigs
on all the girls from the band. Debbie Harry was the host and Stephen
Sprouse was there too; we ended up with about ten seconds of screen time
but it's amazing how many people recognize you when you've been on MTV
for ten seconds.
The best party I ever went to was the Harmonic Convergence party at The
Pyramid in August. They were giving out LSD in the coat check and the
entire club was dosed. Billy Beyond was brilliant as Siddhartha. David
Ilku as Shirley Maclaine made me laugh so hard i fell down. I sang a song
about sex with a space alien called "Cosmic Vibrations." It
was great being in a crowd full of people on acid. The party lasted until
after dawn.
Pat Field had this huge ball way down on the lower east side and everyone
was there. Saturday Night Live was there shooting intro footage for the
new season but i declined because i was running a fever and decided to
leave halfway through the ball. As i headed out the exit and into the
bowels of the Lower East Side I spied Debbie Harry making her getaway.
She had been a judge in the contest and was cutting out early. There were
no cabs that far down on the Lower East Side. As she disappeared on foot
into the empty streets of a rough neighborhood I noticed that under her
Stephen Sprouse fun fur she was carrying a baseball bat.
Phoebe Legere is playing with my band and she told me about this movie
they're making called "Mondo NewYork". I took them a tape of
"Fuck You" and they want me in the movie. They're shooting in
35mm so i should get a decent looking video out of it if nothing else.
Shot my segment for "Mondo New York" at Save The Robots and it looks great. But they made me the finale and the movie is so awful that most people walk out before they ever hear me sing.
"Fuck You" was the most requested video on RockAmerica's club chart for six consecutive months. Dean & The Weenies is flying all over the country doing shows. A subsidiary of Island Records just gave us a record deal based on the strength of my performance in Mondo NewYork. The day after I signed the contract i found out I'm HIV+. All of the sudden nothing seems to matter very much. I'm having a lot of trouble dealing with the press junket for the movie knowing this is hanging over my head and I'm getting a reputation for being difficult.
1988
Island is not liking me because i won't shut up about being gay and apparently
they didn't realize how vocal i intended to be on this subject when they
signed me. In fact, they didn't seem to realize I was gay at all. To make
matters worse my A+R guy is in the closet and dying of AIDS. He hates
me.
David Wojnarowicz had a show at a gallery on Avenue A and I could feel
his frustration and rage so profoundly in the paintings that I started
to cry. Later I saw him at Rock and Roll Fag Bar right after The Weenies
had performed. He told me he had enjoyed my show; I told him his show
had made me cry and then I started crying again. And then he started crying,
too. Then he hugged me for a minute and walked away and I never saw him
alive again.
Island released my my new single in a brown unmarked paper wrapper and then told Michael Musto they were dropping my contract due to "low sales." On my way home from the meeting where I was canned, I was walking across St. Marks Place. The homeless people were selling CDs of FUCK YOU by Dean and the Weenies for a dollar each. They came in a festive wallet you could address to a friend and send in the mail as a joke. I had no idea these CDs existed. I asked one of the homless guys where he'd gotten them and he said they were in a bin behind Island's offices where they dump promo material they don't want or need anymore. There were literally a thousand FUCK YOU CDs laid out on the sidewalk from one end of the block to the other. I bought three. I went back the next day for more but everybody was sold out.
1989
My boyfriend and I were a blind item in Musto's column. I caught him having
sex in the bathroom at the club and flushed his head into the urinal.
The next week Musto wrote, "What night club promoter caught his boyfriend
having sex and flushed him down the toilet where he so richly deserved
to be?" We both thought that was really cool and cut it out and saved
it.
Madonna came to the club last night and there was no toilet paper in the
bathroom. My boyfriend had to hand her some paper over the top of the
john. "No peeking," she said.
"Oh please," my boyfriend replied, "As if there's anyone
left who hasn't seen your tired old snatch." He said she cracked
up and started laughing really hard.
I started doing a lot of heroin. On Halloween I was booked to play at
The World, David Bowie's manager was coming to check out the band. I stopped
to cop dope at Lucky Seven on 2nd and B on my way to the show. It was
a set-up and i got busted. I was chained into the back of a van with a
lot of other junkies. The fact that my arresting officer was a fan and
an obvious closet case didn't help me get out of trouble. For a while
the van was parked in front of the World and I could watch fans lining
up for my show while I was handcuffed in the back. That was pretty much
the end of Dean and the Weenies. Soon after the owner of the world was
shot to death in the deejay booth and I spent the next two years doing
dope and being shipped off to various rehabs. I tried doing Fag Bar at
The Pyramid but the owner fired me for writing, "Wear a shawl and
bring a spoon! All coke dealers admitted free!" on the invitations
to my Stevie Nicks tribute show. Fortunately Chi-Chi Valenti picked up
the idea and started a Stevie nicks night somewhere else. At the first
"Night of a Thousand Stevies" there were actually only three:
Chi-Chi, Joey Arias and me. Maybe somebody else will pick up my "Faggoty
Feud" idea and continue it at another club.
1990
The hot club of the moment is Larry Tee's Love Machine. I'm delivering
mexican food and shooting lots of dope. Tried rehab. Escaped from mental
hospital; long story. Then my best friend died of a cocaine overdose.
Somebody put him out with the trash and they found him the next day behind
the garbage cans.
1991
Got an idea for a club where gorgeous naked go-go boys would jerk off
on pedastals around the dance floor. It was called "The Pubic Hair
Club For Men," and there was a hot backroom scene in the basement.
I threw the party at a place on the Westside Highway called the Comeback.
Very popular party until a bunch of people got shot on hip hop night and
the club was closed down. Back to rehab.
1992
Got fired from Webster Hall for being a junkie; my job was playing a midget's
wife while entertaining the crowds outside waiting to get in. It was hell.
Our audience was Webster Hall's rejects. Got a job doing shows at Dicks
Bar but got fired for stealing the penny jar for "God's Love We Deliver"
off the bar. Ended up turning tricks with VietNam vets in an alleyway
in Jersey City for crack. Back to rehab.
1994
Finally quit doing heroin and started taking antidepressants instead.
Gave up on club life. Got a boyfriend and a job and settled down. Worked
for Colossal Pictures helping develop film projects for the Rock and Roll
Hall of Fame. But watching all those great musical performances gave me
an itch to get back on stage. Then one day in the editing room I met Little
Mary Feaster, the bass player for the Velvet Mafia, and asked her if she
wanted to start a band.
1995
Mary and I formed The Velvet Mafia and started writing new material while
I went to work getting us gigs. I got arrested for putting up signs advertising
the first Velvet Mafia gig. They said it was a quality of life crime.
I spent three days in jail, the same jail time I did for buying heroin.
After a few live gigs we signed a record deal.
1996
Record deal turned out to be another disaster.
For three years I had a crush on the straight teenage bass player from
this great band Felonious Punk. The song "Rock God" on our CD
"We Know Where You Live" is about him. I finally had a chance
to fool around with him while we were both tripping on mushrooms during
a mixing session at the label's compound in Maine. Later he told his girlfriend,
"Having sex with Dean Johnson finally convinced me that I'm definitely
heterosexual."
1997
I've discovered the internet, or more specifically, the escort rooms,
where men of unique proportion can make a quick easy buck. I pulled in
over two grand in the first ten days, but then a huge storm knocked out
my phone line and I couldn't get on AOL. I waited until a repair man finally
arrived but he didn't want to climb the telephone pole and fix the wires
because it was still snowing. I told him if he got me back online I'd
give him a blow-job. He went outside, climbed my pole and fixed the phone
line. He was back in my apartment in ten minutes. He wasn't that good
looking but he was reasonably friendly and I'll do anything to stay online.
He wasn't hung and he came really quickly. I'm pretty sure he was married.
1998
After two years of struggle we finally released "We Know Where You
Live" by The Velvet Mafia but hated the mix. CD tanked. Spent next
two years trying to get released from contract.
Started hosting the Foxy Competition at The Cock for promoter Mario Diaz.
It's fun working with Jackie Beat but she's kinda mean to the audience.
I can't believe many how people line up for an hour in the cold just to
get a glimpse of someone pulling down his pants or putting a beer bottle
up his butt. It's nuts. We need more sex on nightclub stages. The police
raid The Cock on an almost weekly basis, and are homophobically abusive
to the crowd. Every time they search the backroom with their flashlights,
i think of that scene where the feds are scouring the woods for E.T. It's
the Giuiliani Era. Fear reigns.
1998
I was on my way to the bank near Washington Square and I went into the
men's room at the park to beat off but some cop snuck up behind me and
caught me. I thought he was arresting me but he took me to another location
with a private bathroom. He made me strip naked and masturbate in front
of him. After a few minutes of that, he made me bend over and grab this
towel rack while he got behind me and shoved his dick up my ass. He started
fucking me and it hurt so much that the towel rack broke off in my hands.
It was still kinda hot, though.
1999
Been doing live sex shows at Sperm. Did a Blair Witch theme where I raped
a boy scout in the woods, I was the Lincoln Memorial being polished by
a janitor on President's Day, even did "A Very Brady Thanksgiving"
where I read "Hop On Pop" (don't ask). These shows are giving
me an idea for a new kind of sex party but how would I ever find a venue
willing to risk it?
Decided the queer music scene needed a new home after squeezebox closed
and opened HomoCorps at CBGB (which ran five years as a monthly queer
music showcase celebration. Rufus Wainwright really helped us put the
night on the map and celebrities start slinking through the door on a
routine basis. Parker Posey shows up in her "Best in Show" braces
and Kirstie Alley wasn't too big to scale the amplifiers for a better
view of the stage. She was wearing a fur coat and she looked like a giant
hamster climbing a Habitrail.
1999
Okay, I'm not going to tell you his name because I still have a little
bit of a crush on him and it would really piss him off, even though he's
not in the closet. People who know him say he's a jerk, but they always
say that about famous people. Someone on AOL contacted me for a POW roleplay
scene and he sounded hot so i invited him over. When I opened my apartment
door there was a famous actor with a hit TV show standing in my hall.
We stripped down to our jocks and pretended my bed was a tiger cage into
which we had been mercilessly thrust by the Viet Cong. Our efforts to
comfort each other's fear and loneliness quickly turned to passion and
then animal lust. Occasionally he would stop to shake his fist and shout
defiantly at our Viet Cong captors. It was really hot. Now every time
I see his picture in a magazine I get all turned on. He is SO my type,
and fame is such a potent aphrodisiac.
2000
Performed sex show at The Black Party. Boring. Everybody was cracked out
and took themselves way too seriously. Sex parties should be more fun,
less serious. I need to be throwing my own sex party.
2001
Started a party called TRIPLE XXX at The Hole with Jonny McGovern. The
idea was to create a highly charged sexual atmosphere but fun and less
serious where the customers can help themselves to the go-go dancers the
way you would help yourself to a tray of hor d'eurves. We were a little
nervous about opening night: Rentboy.com sent over these three drunken
frat boys who were really hot so we fed them viagra and put them on the
stage. The cutest of the three ripped off his shirt, pulled down his pants
and shoved some troll's face into his crotch while he defiantly pumped
the air with his fist. The troll was gratefully lapping up every inch
he could get. the crowd went wild. Jonny and I looked at each other in
amazement with our jaws hanging open.
"We're rich," I said.
After that night I never had to turn another trick. Triple XXX was hugely
successful, followed by the even more scandalous but all-too-brief MAGNUM
at The Park, which was raided by the police. At least they didn't steal
anythng.
2002
Took my sex party-earnings and recorded "Cheap But Not Free,"
the new CD from The Velvet Mafia. Produced by Wharton Tiers, who has gold
records for his work with SonicYouth and Helmet. Best work we've ever
done. Agreed to a deal with yet another record company. Waited for them
to release our CD. And waited. And waited.
The Daily News called me a hero for saving a drowning man on Fire Island, but the only reason he was drowning and I wasn't is because I'm a foot taller than he is.
New York Magazine is doing a story on MAGNUM and they're making me go
to a photo shoot on the anniversary of 9/11....three blocks from ground
zero.
I was laying on the beach in Fire Island and I got a call from the producers
of "The Rocky Horror Show" asking me to audition for the lead.
I told them I didn't look anything like Tim Curry. They said they wanted
to go in a different direction. I ran back to New York and learned the
lyrics to "Sweet Transvestite." I nailed the audition. The next
day they called me back. Said they loved what I was doing and the direction
I was taking it and the fact that I was nothing like Tim Curry. Could
I come back and audition for the backers? After the backers audition I
got the call from the producer's assistant: the backers hated me because
I didn't look like Tim Curry. The guy they ended up hiring looked exactly
like...you guessed it, Tim Curry. Found out later that Kevin Aviance auditioned
too. We sang "Sweet Transvestite" as a duet at HomoCorps since
we both knew the words anyway.
2003
HomoCorps hysteria peaks the night 80s icon Laura Branigan appears on
the bill with The Velvet Mafia as opening act. Many are left "stunned"
by her performance. Sadly, her first NYC appearance in twenty years would
turn out to be her last.
Performed "Do Me" at Wigstock, the dance track I recorded with RuPaul's producer Darrell Martin. The chorus goes, "Just because I let you do me doesn't mean you know how to dance; I don't have to let you dance with me just because I let you into my pants." It's a catchy song and the audience seemed to love it, but, as usual, I couldn't get a record deal.
2004
Saw Todd Oldham on the F train. He was really nice to me. I was shy, didn't
know what to say. Should have asked him for clothes.
Record company informed us they would not be releasing our CD after all.
Decided never to waste another minute dealing with record companies and
released our CD without much fanfare. A week later the police closed The
Hole. Now Triple XXX is over and I'm unemployed. But I did make this great
CD, so if u want one, look for me with the other homeless people down
on St. Marks Place. Oh, I even managed to turn a good trick last night;
43 years old and still getting paid for sex. Is this a great country or
what?