Tales Of A RATT Read online

  So, I couldn't see us doing it in the early days. But, I was proven wrong. The audiences really started responding. When we started getting popular, we evolved.

  We had gone from being a band on the rise, to recording our first full-length album, within a few weeks. An album that would go on to sell five million copies worldwide. We were signed in mid-August of 1983 and formed our plan. By mid-September, we were in the studio. There was no "cooling off" period where the label tries to pump up the name and buzz of a band before recording them.

  It was Slam! Bang! Here we are!

  We started getting into the meat of the recording on "Out of the Cellar" around the middle of October. It took a couple of months to get it done, but the album was finished by the end of November, early December. By the time it was released, in February of 1984, we were heading out on the road.

  RATT's creative process started out just like other bands. It was a normal writing session. At first, Stephen had a lot of songs that he had written on his own, but they needed some help. Robbin was the guy who really jumped in and took care of that. At that time, Warren was really young, but he was a guitar riff machine. So, Warren would come up with a great riff, which Robbin would work the melody up around and Stephen and Robbin would write the lyrics. Then we would all work on the arrangements. That's the way it ran up through the EP, and the writing sessions for "Out of the Cellar.”

  After that, things started heading south fast. Juan became this egomaniacal rock-beast. He was a pain in the ass to work with before, imagine what it was like when we were famous. Stephen became a problem, too. He was a rockstar! Suddenly, our work ethic became something to be compromised, and he wouldn't show up to rehearsals or writing sessions. He would come down after we had been working on music, then he would take home a cassette, and be writing lyrics and melodies. We had no idea what he was doing.

  But he is driven! No doubt about that. Unreasonable to a fault, but definitely driven.

  By the time we reached that first show was in Denver, Colorado at the Rainbow Theater, the flood was building behind the gates, and we had no idea what was about to happen to us. The album had just come out, and we had just shot the video for Round and Round. I.C.M. The flood gates were about to open, and it was going to be swim or drown…for a long time.

  Every move was huge. Every step was epic. Every thing we did was a gigantic leap forward, and as much as we thought we were ready, we really weren’t. Fame is like that. You fight and fight; struggle and starve; lose faith, then find it again. Suddenly fame hits like a wall of water, and you’ve become that “Cheers” episode where everybody knows your name.

  I was the only one in the band with home life commitments. I had Jeni. Michael was just a little toddler, and Marcus was a newborn. So, that pulled at me. But, the rest of the guys weren't married, and didn't have kids. I had cemented in my head exactly how I wanted to be a father, and while my job was one that dictated me being away from home for long periods of time, my family, especially my children, were crucial to me. It made it very difficult at times.

  I remember a time on the "Out of the Cellar" tour where we had a vote. We were deciding whether or not to go home early. It had been almost fifteen months, remember.

  Juan was talking down to me, saying, "Look, Blotz, I know you miss your kids, and everything. I really miss my dog, too.”

  I just looked at him and went, "You're comparing my kids to your fucking dog?” The prick! The balls on that guy, man!

  Turnabout is fair play, though, because it was Juan who made a huge deal about the European leg of that tour. His wife, Debbi, was pregnant, but wasn't due until November. We were touring the UK in October, and Juan wanted us to not do the tour because he was afraid he would miss the birth.

  I could understand his feelings, wanting to be there for the birth, but we weren't going to cancel the tour because she "might" drop. We had business to do, and a record to support. He rightfully needed the time off, though, so we were going to get Jeff Pilson, the bass player for Dokken, to fill in for him. That completely freaked Juan out, and he did the tour.

  He stayed, but he bitched and complained almost non-stop about having to be there. It was constant whining and moaning about how we fucked him over! In the end, we finished the tour, went home, and Debbi didn't have the baby for another two weeks.

  And, that was that.

  I was home in Hermosa when Michael took his first steps, which was an incredible moment for me. But, when Marcus took his, I wasn't there. I was on the road. It’s been little things like that all through my career that have given me a dual existence of pleasure and pain. I made an incredible living for me and my family, but it has come at a cost. Like the song says, “Nobody rides for free.”

  Don’t misunderstand. I'm not saying that Jeni and I would have made things work out, had I not been on the road so much. In fact, things probably would have deteriorated a lot sooner with me around more. But, there's always that thought in the back of your head when you have a family. That thought says, "They don't even know you.” It’s a cold-faced liar, of course; but, there's times when that thought can be really fucking convincing.

  We were on the road so much during those early years. "Out of the Cellar" was the longest tour we did. Fifteen months. But, the "Invasion of Your Privacy" tour, with Bon Jovi opening, immediately followed. That thing was 8 months in the states, then we went to Europe and Japan. All of our 80's tours were over a year each.

  I love the road. I don't want to sound like I don't. Playing gigs every night in front of 13,000 people is a physical rush. Better than any high you could achieve. I know, because I’ve tried a few in my day. In fact, playing live is very much like a narcotic. You can ride it, but it can hurt you in the end.

  On the Cellar tour, our managers kept us informed of the album's progress, at first. But, we watched the Billboard Top 200 every week. We would take the charts page and hang it up on the wall of the bus. When we did that first video, "Round and Round," it really started to go sky high. MTV was rotating that video in half hour increments, so we got tons of airplay. Then, we really watched the album really fly up the charts. Around May, June, and July, we were moving 100,000 albums a week, which was unbelievable. It was exciting for us, as a band, to see our work start catching on like that.

  We were headlining clubs up through April of 1984, and then went out for a while, opening for Ozzy Osbourne. After Ozzy, it was back to headlining the clubs; then a month opening for Blue Oyster Cult; then it was back to clubs again. We bounced back and forth like that up until the summer months. By then, the album was doing so well that it was time to headline some big shows.

  We did 222 shows on that tour. By the end of it, we were spent! We were so shot, that we were having problems remembering what city we were in. It reached a point where I quit looking at the itinerary. It was just a long list of dates, yet to play. All that did was remind me the end of the tour was nowhere in sight. It was an indefinite thing.

  On the other hand, you're completely excited. We were building this monumental momentum as a band. I remember the first big payday, $15,000 to play a festival in Kalamazoo.

  That show was amazing for a number of reasons, money not withstanding. It was May 27, 1984. Ozzy, Triumph, Accept, RATT, Quiet Riot, and Mötley Crüe were all on the bill.

  Kevin Dubrow, from Quiet Riot, kept trash talking Mötley Crüe, RATT and just about every other band who was popular at the time, in the media. In every interview, he would be talking shit. I guess what he didn't realize was that their fans were our fans, too. When he started talking shit, the fans picked up on it and saw it for what it was. Total bullshit. Kevin Dubrow killed Quiet Riot with his mouth. They took a huge fall from grace because he couldn't shut up and keep his jealousies under control.

  The Kalamazoo show was a time when Kevin Dubrow was at his worst, and Tommy Lee was hell bent on beating his ass. Tommy and I spent most of the festival walking around and looking for Kevin.

  It had
gotten so bad with Quiet Riot that Kevin had to be walked in surrounded by security. I looked on in astonishment as his contemporaries taunted him! These are the other bands, other rockstars, and they just wanted to rip this sorry cocksucker apart. I couldn't believe what I was watching. It wasn't just Tommy and me, although, we both wanted to get our hands on him, too.

  We actually went around to Quiet Riot's side of the stage, and Tommy had planned to go on stage, in front of the crowd, and kick the shit out of Kevin. People knew he was going to do that, and security met us at the bottom of the stairs. They let me up there, but they wouldn't let T-Bone up there.

  I see Tommy squaring off with this huge bone-snapper of a bouncer, so I cut back in. "Come on, Tommy. Let's just go back down.”

  We're on our way back down, and Tommy is pissed! There was a little trailer at the bottom of the stairs. It was the guitar tech trailer where they would tune up the guitars. Tommy took a bottle and fired the thing at the trailer, sending it smashing through the window, and right into Jake E. Lee's lap. Jake was tuning up for his set with Ozzy.

  One of the bands, I'm not sure who, took the sign off of Quiet Riot's door and put it on a porta-toilet door. That's what the other stars were thinking about Quiet Riot. They were shit.

  I felt really bad for Rudy Sarzo and Carlos Cavazo. Those guys were good guys. Good players. Good people. And, in all honesty, they couldn't stand Kevin Dubrow either. It must have sucked ass for them, because they had to be associated with the guy. Frankie Banali was always on Kevin's side, but the others were just caught up in the mess. Guilty by association.

  That was a long, long feud between the Quiet Riot camp and the RATT camp. It was all started, perpetuated, originated and created by Kevin DuBrow. We toured with them in 2005, but that one show in Kalamazoo was the only thing we did with them in the 80s, which was a good thing.

  I knew that this part of the book was going to be difficult for me. I really haven't looked forward to talking about this. And, you'll see soon enough, there are other stories that are equally as painful and conflicted.

  Kevin DuBrow was notorious. He constantly had bad things to say about the people around him; especially if it was another band. He was an extremely negative person.

  As much as I couldn't stand the guy, when he overdosed on cocaine at the end of 2007, it really affected me. He had made so many people's lives just pure misery. Utter hell! But, when the guy died, all that hatred and animosity seemed to lose some steam. I couldn't stand the guy, but the reasons suddenly weren't as important.

  I started having really weird, disturbing dreams, after I heard about his death. I was losing sleep. I don't know if it was a sign of me struggling with my own mortality, or if it was just the thought of mortality in general, but I was having some problems with it. Kevin was only three years older than me. I was remembering playing clubs at the same time as those guys; working the same circuit; back in 1976 and 1977 when Don and I were playing together in Airborn.

  I've never gone as far as to publicly call the guys in Riot dicks, but Kevin and Frankie really were. There's no other way to put it. They were downright cruel to the people around them.

  They had calendars on their bus walls, and when we were touring with them they would draw a big rat on our individual dates, and then put a red circle and line through it. Just petty, juvenile shit like that, nonstop; and for no real reason. They wouldn't let their crew hang out or talk to anyone in the RATT camp. You'd think we were going to "infect" them somehow.

  Anyway, a few nights ago, I ran into Frankie Banali, the drummer for Quiet Riot. We were at a club called "Howl at the Moon" over in Universal City. It's a hangout for a lot of the guys from the 80s, and a great time. Especially on Wednesday nights. I'm in there, just sort of soaking up the room, when Frankie walks in. It's only been a couple of weeks since they found Kevin in Vegas, so the wounds of his death were still really fresh for me, but Frankie was a bit of a wreck.

  Keep in mind, Frankie and I were caught on opposite sides of this feud. It's not that we couldn't stand each other, as much as we simply defended our own camps. We didn't get along, even though none of this bullshit started with us. So, when he came up to me and started talking, I was a little taken aback.

  We immediately started talking about Kevin's death. It was clear that Frankie was pretty much devastated by it, and I really felt pain for the guy. It was hard to have that talk, just because of all the emotion involved. He told me that he would never take Quiet Riot back out on the road. Not in any form. That made sense, I guess. We'll see how the future financials for Quiet Riot work out without DuBrow.

  With RATT, we had learned that something gets lost when you change your front man. It's like the face of the band changes, and people don't recognize you anymore, yet, you're still trying to be who you once were. That would be double so for Quiet Riot, because Kevin had been so outspoken and notorious that he was the identity of that group.

  Frankie said he wanted to bury the hatchet. Which, I was willing to do, but I couldn't help but think that it took Kevin DuBrow killing himself with cocaine for us to get to this point. Frankie and I went back all the way to 1979. We were two very similar drummers with similar styles and influences. We always knew we were both pretty equal in ability, so, there was always somewhat of a rivalry based just on that.

  When he came up and started talking to me, it was the olive branch that could have and should have been extended years before. Honestly, either of us could have done it at any time. So, hopefully, that whole thing is behind us, and there's a friendship to build on there. It's just unfortunate that it took someone dying to make something like that happen.

  I've always respected Frankie as player, and I know he respected me. We told each other that in the early days. When we hit it in 1984, I was buying a house, and I knew he had just bought a house off of the "Metal Health" album. So, I called him up, and was like, "I've got no idea how, or even a concept of what to do when it comes to buying a home. Do you have any tips?” It was a two-fold thing. One, I needed his advice, but two, it was sort of announcing that RATT was there, too. We were in the same vein again.

  Then, I ran into him after the 1984 tour at some bar in Universal. This was after Kevin had been running his mouth about everybody on the scene. I was like, "What are you going to do about your singer, man?”

  He just exploded! "You fucking worry about shit in your camp, Bobby! I'll worry about shit in mine!” He was real heavy.

  I just put my hands up. "Don't shoot.” Frankie was getting pretty weird about the whole thing. We were never the same after that.

  When I would see him, it was still pretty cool for a while. We'd see each other occasionally, and it was still hugs and shit. Then, on a website called Metal Sludge, he did a 20 questions kind of thing, and they always ask you to rate other players, on a scale of 1-10, you know?

  When they asked him to rate me, he goes, "I'm not going to even answer that. Because Blotz knows I think he sucks just like he thinks I suck.” I'm like, "What the fuck? Where's he get off going out on me like that?” I considered e-mailing him about it. But, again, I'm not an innocent peach in this. There have been a few times where I've said shit, and he's said shit. Although, it was almost always about Kevin DuBrow, not Quiet Riot itself.

  We toured with them in 2005, and I saw how Frankie had become. He was unscrupulous. I thought he was just brutal. There was a side of Frankie that I didn't know and didn't like. The "bro" side was still there, only it was laced with a crocodile smile. It was the kind of smile that promised to hurt you if you turned your back.

  When we patched it up a few nights ago, he said, "This is business, bro, but I always knew where your heart was. I want to bury the hatchet with this right now.”

  I didn't really understand that, coming from him. It's almost like he was saying, "Blotz, you're an asshole with the way you do business.” But, whatever.

  "That's good with me, Frankie. Just remember that none of this bullshit started
with me. We didn't perpetuate it.” And, that's where I left it.

  I've never envied his position in having to deal with Kevin. We both had our "singer demons" to contend with, so I'm not shining myself in a better light. But, it couldn't have been easy for Frankie. We just got mired up in it, and sooner or later, that shit has to get to you.

  The night Frankie and I spoke, it was the first time he had been out since Kevin's death. He was pretty down. The guy was in mourning. That was obvious. Plus, his gig just went away. He still has the rights to the band name, and there's ways he can make a living off that, but he made it clear to me that touring was over. Touring is where they made their money. It's not a good time for him. Not right now. All of which made me think, "Thank God for RATT.”

  The morning that the story had broken about Kevin's overdose, my phone started ringing with text messages at 4:00 AM from people back east who were already up and heard it. The whole thing affected me in a very strange way. I despised Kevin! I couldn't stand the way he was!

  I couldn't help but think, "Jesus, dude. How could you be such a fuck up? You fucked it up for yourself, and everyone who loved you! What the fuck was wrong with you, man?”

  It was anger. I'd watched this guy ruin his life for almost 30 years, and ultimately ruin everyone else's life around him. But, I could have done that, too. I could go out, get drunk, and kill somebody on my way home. It happens all the time. It happened to Vince Neil, and Vince was a good friend.

  I would never do that, though. I drive perfect when I drink, as ridiculous a statement like that is to make in this political climate. Flipped out "mothers against anyone who drinks" political climate. But, it's true. I'm focused when I'm behind a wheel. I've never been close to an accident while drinking. But, it still was possible.

  Every time I think about drinking and driving, I think of Sam Kinison. "It's not that we WANT to drink and drive! It's just that we don't have another way to get our fucking car home!”