Acid for the Children: A Memoir

by Flea

By all accounts, Jack Dracup was an abusive husband and a thoughtless father. When Muriel once served him salad—a new concept in Australia back then—he threw the bowl of food at the wall yelling, “Don’t bring me any bloody rabbit food!” He was a complete ass to her, and at a certain point she left him. This was a super courageous move at the time, since being an alcoholic drunken asshole was a man’s right, and no long-suffering woman had society’s support in challenging it.

One evening shortly before we moved to New York, my sister and I emerged from the bathtub all clean, rosy cheeked, and pajama’d, when my parents told us the shocking truth that Bambi was no more. She’d gone to live with someone else. A misguided double-cross, they had stuck us in the tub, and then given Bambi the old heave-ho! They insensitively underestimated us, thinking we couldn’t handle it. I was devastated they didn’t let us say goodbye. I totally understood and accepted that she had to get a new home and couldn’t come to New York, but I felt betrayed that they’d denied us the dignity of a proper parting.

No explicit art ever hurt me. One notable exception. I saw The Exorcist as a preteen. Scared the holy fuck outta me. I was sitting next to an elderly and portly woman who wore a crazy curly wig and a big fur coat. At a certain point, during a peak moment of terror, the woman took her coat and placed it over my head, shielding me from the film. I was happy to hide under the coat for a minute, until I squirmed free and she gave me a matronly smile. Years later when I told this story to my best friend Anthony Kiedis, he said the exact same thing happened to him at the same theater! This woman on a mission went and sat next to kids to save their souls from the horrors of Satan.

Our lives were flipped upside down and we were expected to carry on like nothing had happened. Jesus, we’d just gone from living with a conservative Australian father in a big nice house full of rules, regulations, and schedules, to living with a beatnik tripper in his parents’ basement! No talk of our fears or feelings. I was hurt and needed some kinda guidance and nurturing, but didn’t know it.

My heart leapt when we took off in his purple single-engine Cessna, rising up like the Wright brothers, cruising over downtown Manhattan and out over Jones Beach, marveling and daydreaming, my head out the window hooting and hollering, he and I laughing and slapping five. For a young boy it was the greatest. Had I been aware that it wasn’t cool for him to be sucking on that pint of vodka in his lap while piloting the plane I might have been a little more hesitant, but hey what did I know!

My strong adventurous mama. All set to live the dream in Australia, a world she knew, trusted, and understood. A safe, solid, and secure life laid out in front of her. A good husband and two beautiful kids, ice cubes tinkling in cocktail glasses, lamb chops barbecuing in the backyard. Yet she chose to abandon it all and break the family bond. To run off with a junkie jazz musician who lived in his parents’ basement, to hurt my father, to risk the happiness of her children, and to venture into the complete unknown where nothing was safe or certain. I applaud her courage. She followed her heart against all common sense. God bless my beautiful mama, who engaged her whimsy and longed for a freedom she didn’t understand. I don’t know if her choice made her happy or not, but it was a bold and wild move.

The world’s just a sphere, No bigger than the balls that you suck. —John Frusciante

Age nine. PE class. Jumping on the school trampoline. All the other kids standing around it, watching and waiting their turn, leaning forward, their arms and elbows splayed out on its gray matted edges. I was a natural at gymnastics, and god how I loved springing up airborne, getting the most joy out of my few allotted minutes. Ready to do all my tricks; seat drops, back drops, and my showstopper, the front flip. I jumped as high as I could, pulled a funny face, and flung my legs out at a strange angle, and all the kids started laughing. Egged on by their amusement, the entertainer in me came out. I jumped higher and higher, making loud high-pitched OOH OOH OOH OOH monkey sounds and itching my armpits. The kids were in absolute red-faced hysterics, happily pointing at me. I was hilarious! A huge hit! Confident that I would no longer feel like the new kid, my now burgeoning popularity a certainty, I prepared for my flip, the grand finale. I focused and jumped hard, but as I looked down to make sure my feet were squared I saw it. My little cock hanging out of my open zipper, flopping up and down and doing its own crazy little gymnastic routine. Oops.

My third-grade teacher, Mr. J, had just moved up to New York from Florida, where he’d also taught primary school. He had an outdoorsman’s adventurous charisma and the boys loved him. He spoke of the camping and canoeing trips he’d captained with schoolkids in the Okefenokee Swamp in Florida, where they reckoned with man-eating alligators, and camped out in the wild. Only the bravest boys would get to go. When the girls in class complained that only boys were allowed, unseeing of the future, he said, “When the bathrooms stop having boys and girls signs on them, then girls can come on my trips!”

Mr. J’s extra-curricular teachings soon took a new turn. He told us about n*****s, and all the problems they were causing. These n*****s were lazy, had smaller brains, wanted to ruin our lives, and take our parents’ jobs. They needed to stay in their place, and the modern world just didn’t understand, he was very concerned. I already knew this was all wrong, but I was terribly conflicted. I loved Walter’s black friends, and they seemed as smart and considerate as anyone else. I didn’t know what to do. I’d put so much energy into wanting to be the new Eddie Spaghetti, the wild man of the swamps, and to earn Mr. J’s respect.

Just this moment, while writing this, I stopped being an author for a moment and searched Mr. J on my computer. He came up as a registered sex offender in New York and in Florida. He’d been arrested more than once on pedophilia charges. I’m looking at his posted picture now. A ninety-year-old bitter and sick predator, recently deceased. Yikes. Fuck his camping trip.

I had begun to get into trouble and was prone to bombastic outbursts and crazy cursing. An expert at profanity, I enjoyed its effect. It was as if I had something to prove—that I was the wildest one of all. I took pleasure in creating chaos and stirring the pot.

Growing up when I did, I was skeptical of the hippie movement. I was hanging out with Stephen and his siblings at the duck pond one sunny afternoon, when an older hippie kid came along; long hair, a peace sign belt buckle round his bell-bottom corduroys, and John Lennon eyeglasses perched upon his Ichabod Crane nose. He sat down next to me with a philosophical air, cross-legged like a Himalayan cave dweller, and said, “What do you believe in?” I meekly stammered out some kind of I-don’t-know reply, but he kept putting on the creepy hippie pressure, becoming more aggressive, “Do you believe in peace and love, or war???” he demanded. I managed to whisper, “Peace and love,” but his putting me on the spot made me feel like shit. Like, just leave me the fuck alone and let me enjoy sitting in the woods.

L.A. was a huge concept to wrap my mind around, but I was excited, and embraced the change. My vision of an ideal life was running around outside all the time half naked (that has not changed) and it seemed like I would have a pretty good chance of it there. They also had the Dodgers, Lakers, and Rams, and that all sounded cool. California was another world, palm trees, sunshine, beaches, TV actors, Jerry West, Anita-Bryant-Mickey-Mouse-Club-SUNKIST-Oranges, bears, and giant redwoods.

I still felt like I was going someplace good. Man, I can’t even explain it, but despite the weird shit that had been going down, I still believed in a light I felt glowing within me, I was unfazed. I felt good inside, like I could rise up and fly where I wanted.

On my very first day, a boy in my class named Jack Irons drew a picture and passed it to the person sitting next to him, who giggled and then passed it to the next kid, the next and so on, it was surreptitiously passed all around the classroom, everyone getting a kick out of it. When it got to me, I saw a drawing of an ugly distorted face covered in boils and scars, snot dripping from its nose. The caption in the cartoon bubble above said, “Hi! I’m Michael Balzary!” I wasn’t gonna act hurt on my first day, so I chose to see the humor in it. Jack Irons was a fighter, everyone would gather around after school and watch him take on the toughest guys. I was impressed with Jackie, but the fighting also freaked me out, I couldn’t imagine doing it. To this day, I’ve never been in a fight. I mean, a few little kid scraps here and there, but not serious fisticuffs. Partly because I’m scared of getting hurt, and partly because it’s the stupidest. So many times I’ve seen people start fighting at gigs, bars, and sporting events; they always seem like complete morons engaged in an ill-conceived attempt to prove their manhood. Peace and love, dude. The world is cruel enough as it is. Everything that is not love is cowardice.

Time traveling to the hardcore punk rock days of the early eighties, I had a friend who would take me to church in South Los Angeles. She knew when the best touring gospel bands were coming through, and though I had absolutely zero interest in the concept of god and an open disdain for religion, I went for the music.

Me and my friends would steal anything that wasn’t nailed down. We learned to get the money out of Pong machines, the early video game found in malls and arcades. We shoplifted the days away, anything we could. Little petty thievin’ street rats. I once tried to rob an old lady by running up behind her and grabbing her purse, but the old fighter had an iron grip on the thing, and started screaming “HELP!” at the top of her lungs. I sprinted away ridden with guilt. Though I robbed all the time, I had a code; I stole from businesses that seemed wealthy. So preying on a vulnerable old woman violated my half-baked ethics. It hit me square in the heart that I’d made someone feel bad. Even though I’d failed, I felt terribly ashamed.

Bancroft was economically and ethnically mixed and I loved it. Nowadays, if a family has any money, the kid’s going to a private school, but back in the Flea days, it was common for wealthy kids to attend public school together with kids from the ghetto, and everything in between. Thirty-one flavors of kid. Asian kids, black kids, Mexican kids, Russian kids, Orthodox Jewish kids, rich kids, and kids who lived below the poverty line. Every kinda kid.

Practicing my jumper alone after school, a couple of rival gangbangers from a different neighborhood show up on the courts, throwing up signs, talking shit, and hassling me, they take what little money I have. Then—Baam! Out of nowhere my friends appear and are all over ’em in two seconds. I feel like I belong, I feel love. I understand how good-hearted kids end up in gangs. We all wanna be loved.

We had a book at home, a pictorial history of jazz by Joachim-Ernst Berendt. I was cozy and happy hidden away in my room leafing through it, looking at the photographs, reading the short bios, and falling in love with the great jazz heroes like Charles Mingus, Richard Davis, Bud Powell, Dizzy Gillespie, Lester Young, Bunk Johnson, and Count Basie, before I knew what any of them sounded like. The trumpeters were royalty to me. When the opportunity came to play a trumpet at Bancroft, I went for it.

Inspired by Walter’s hard-core jazz collection and the jam sessions at our house, I kept blowing. I put my horn on the bed at home and left the room. Then, pretending I was in the Beatles, I walked back into the room and I thought: That’s just how it would be for a Beatle, they’d walk in the room and see their horn lying there. I had the same life as a Beatle! I was ignorant that they didn’t play the horns on their records, but still.…

On the night of the show we took our seats. I was bursting with anticipation to see the mythic being as a real-life man. I couldn’t believe we were going to be in the same room, let alone the same earth together. I had to pee and wasn’t sure what to do, but my mother told me to hurry and go, so I jumped out of my seat like a jackrabbit and ran. In my excitement I ran the wrong way, toward the stage instead of the lobby bathrooms. Somehow I found myself backstage, people all around. Then I saw him standing there in the wings, magic trumpet in hand. Man. It was Diz, busy chatting with someone. I was stunned. Without thinking, I ran up to him and stood awkwardly, just staring. He looked at me with a sweet warm smile and I nervously said “Mr. Gillespie, I—I—I.…” I clammed up, too starstruck to talk. Dizzy put his arm around me and pulled me in tight, my head wedged into the armpit of his sharp double-breasted suit, holding me there and resuming his conversation. This went on for a couple of minutes, he held me close, and I was quaking with happiness. He then finished up his conversation, let me go, gave me another incredible smile, patted me on the head with a magic touch, walked on stage, and started playing “A Night in Tunisia.” Wow.

Jane Sager was a beautiful teacher and I am eternally thankful to her. She is the only private music teacher I ever had (except I took a bass lesson once and the guy told me to play “Take It Easy” by the Eagles, and I said fuck off).

Halloween night. I was still thirteen and at the end of my trick-or-treating career. It was just before I stopped following the candy and started following the hope of teen romance. I was out with my pals the Cervanteses and the Shadids, candy gathering and creating trouble. I like to think that the other kids’ mischief was more mean-spirited, and mine was more innocent; like Omar was the one who would approach the door of the nice lady with a tray of choice candy, then quickly and violently bash the tray out of her hands, the candy scattering everywhere, grabbing everything for himself, the lady crying out in despair, and Omar running off cackling into the night. And woe to the benevolent lady who gave out quarters from her bucket of silver coins. But I grabbed the stuff too when it went flying. I thought of myself as a nice person. When I took the bus, which I did constantly until I perfected my hitchhiking skills, I’d always give my seat up to a woman or an elderly person. I’d offer kindness whenever I could, helping people out with things or being sweet to little kids. I knew the peace and satisfaction that came from being of service. I wanted to be good so bad. But my moral compass was just so damn wacky, I veered from the path of kindness into dishonesty and exploitation with just a modicum of provocation. Like I had something to prove to my friends.

My grades at Bancroft were up and down, mostly down. I didn’t concentrate well; I would get behind, then just give up. I didn’t mind when I was blowing it, I would just clown around and go get stoned, play basketball or trumpet. But come report card day, my Ds and Fs would make me feel bad and I got down on myself. So, in the second half of the last year at Bancroft, I decided to play their game. I aced everything they put in front of me and got straight A+s that semester.

Though Boaz had found me out as the wimp I was, I still had the edge on Tony Shur, and one day, during the first week of Fairfax, I had Tony in a headlock, delivering him a “noogie” (an act of grinding your knuckles into the top of your victim’s head until they beg for mercy). A crazy-looking kid ran up, he was sturdy and muscular, with a flattop haircut. NOBODY, except an old man with his belt up above his belly button, had a fucking flattop in 1976 Los Angeles. His intense eyes bore into me. He said, “Lay off him.” He was a new kid that Tony had befriended: Anthony Kiedis. Anthony was strange. I released Tony from my grip, and with an awkward red-faced post-noogie smile he introduced us. I liked Anthony right away. I could tell he was a misfit like me. The universe gives us the ones we need. And the ones we deserve.

Tripping our brains out on acid at my house one evening when my parents were out of town, we decided to go throw eggs at a kid from school we didn’t like. He was just a normal dorky kid, but we felt like he thought we were weird, and that he looked down his nose at us. The kid lived about five blocks from me. We decided to get stark naked and paint designs on our bodies with my mom’s lipstick. We set out into the Hollywood night wearing only the bright red lipstick, our hands clutching eggs. We ran down the street, covering the blocks, laughing our heads off, and approached our target’s home. We rang the doorbell, standing there naked, ready to throw the eggs at whoever answered the door THIS’LL FIX ’EM FOR THINKING WE’RE WEIRD! No one answered, so we ran back to my house, people shouting things at us in the street, we might have thrown the eggs at some random passersby, I can’t remember. It’s a wild feeling when you get a few blocks away from home, in the city, naked. We just didn’t give a fuck.

Becoming a part of a grown-up Hollywood nightlife became de rigueur. Getting ready to go see a band one night, I had on my favorite corduroy outfit that my mom bought me at the department store. I said, “I look cool, right?” to which Anthony replied, “You know, Mike, you look cool, but the thing is, anyone can dress like that. You’re a unique person, you should express your own self in the way you dress, not be like anyone else.” That really hit home, not just in the way I dressed, but in all forms of expression. I’m grateful to Anthony for encouraging me to embrace my own freakiness.

As eleventh grade careened its way along a path of acne and masturbation, Anthony and I remained inseparable. We were out in the Valley one day skulking about, riding the bumper cars in North Hollywood. Stoned as fuck, we approached cars at stoplights, attempting to convince them to give us a ride by talking to ’em with a personal touch. “Excuse me, ma’am, we are trying to make it over to West Hollywood, could you find it in your heart to give us a ride?” A little innocent charm went a long way, quelled the fear of the driver, and was a communicative and effective method of hitchhiking developed through oodles of practice. That’s when we saw Hillel Slovak drive by in his green Datsun 510, cranking Rush’s “La Villa Strangiato.” We yelled to each other, “That’s that dude Hillel, he’s in my social studies class, he’s cool! We know him!” We ran him down at the stoplight and he graciously gave us a ride. It was a marriage divined in the cosmos, and it was not long before our twosome became a threesome.

Looking longingly at the silhouette left behind barren space that could have would have thrived all colorful and vibrant and an immaculate group of grays alive with all the gorgeous art created by him…………we only eyeballed a glimpse of an iceberg tip, the behemoth of a psychedelic glacier hidden for all time had those drugs not set off a fatal explosion in his full heart acid, weed, heroin, freebase, meth, cocaine, MDA, mushroomz, some weird opiates that you stuck up your ass, and whatever else we could get our hungry mitts on. it was damn fun and free for a while. until the heroin sucked everything dry. Learning, trying still, to not brutally flagellate myself. ’Cause as his unexpected death approached, I was unable to be there for him in a nurturing helpful way. I miserably watched him descend into the false Eden of junkiedom and didn’t think enough about his pain, but instead about what was important to ME.

About Hillel Slovak.

I saw his drug-self go weak, hollow, and dishonest. I felt abandoned. I didn’t understand why he and Anthony would become addicted like that. I blindly saw a traitor to the cause, my hurt feelings, my severed connection. I, Me, My. If only I’d been strong, rid myself of all petty distractions my bull-in-china-shop ego.……been naught besides a mighty presence of love. Shed a brotherly light to show him he was killing himself, so he could get back to being the Israeli Cowboy, the Messiah, the one and only Pick Handle Slim. Maybe, maybe, I coulda saved him. He coulda figured it out. We were all of us bungling and banging foolishly through the danger zone, time yet to teach any of us……………

About Hillel Slovak.

As it stood, in the broad and baking L.A. daylight, while I shoveled dirt down onto the cold darkness of his coffin at the Mount Sinai cemetery, his grandfather sternly asked me in his thick Eastern European accent, “WHY DIDN’T YOU TELL US?”

About Hillel Slovak.

Hillel and I had gone to Bancroft Junior High together. He was just on the periphery of my awareness then. I first really noticed him when he and Jack Irons showed up to school one day dressed as KISS. Hillel was Ace Frehley, and he blew me away because it didn’t feel like a goofy Halloween costume. He transformed from a geeky kid into a bigger-than-life rock star. I was impressed, and I didn’t even like rock music.

I was in love with Hillel. His Picasso face, long curly hair and slim physique, the red Messenger guitar slung over his shoulder, his rock star aspirations. Man, he was awesome. He was a great addition to Anthony and me, a little more poetic, flowing with pen, paintbrush, and guitar. Anthony was the tough handsome actor with the contrarian confidence, I was the shy insecure crazy one with the funky groove, and Hillel was the artist. Hillel made me feel like I was a part of something special, that we shared magic bonded by a secret understanding. I knew something exciting was in store. We all came from broken homes and lower-middle-class backgrounds.

waiting in line at McDonald’s, a large man ordering at the counter became argumentative and angry. He was a furious psycho, he snapped and lost it, his anger escalating insanely, spinning around to the rest of the patrons and yelling, “I’M GONNA HAVE TO HURT SOMEBODY!” Fear shot through the fast-food crowd. He stared at Hillel, who calmly deadpanned, “How about Mayor McCheese?” pointing at a standing cardboard cutout of said character. The maniac’s hardened face softened and the situation defused. We became “The Faces,” a kind of inside joke of a gang. Hillel was not a thief like me and Anthony, nor was he willing to take the physical risks we took daily. But he sure liked getting high with us, listening to music, long deep talks, acting the theater of the absurd, and chasing girls.

Hillel, who hailed from Haifa, Israel, was in a rock band called Anthym: him on guitar, my sixth-grade classmate Jack Irons on drums, Todd Strassman on bass, and Alan Moschulski on guitar and vocals. Hillel was occasionally the lead vocalist too, but even though his soulful and arty guitar styling rocked righteously, he was a terrible singer. Almost as bad as me, and I’m awful.

Then Hillel, speaking of Anthym bassist Todd Strassman, said, “Mike, you know I don’t get along with Todd so great. I just don’t think he’s that into it, he doesn’t take the jams seriously. He’s not willing to give his life over to the music.” He went silent for a long moment while Jim Morrison crooned, “Into this house we’re born / Into this world we’re thrown.……” Then Hillel said, “What do you think about learning to play bass and taking his place?” Yes. In that moment I felt completely loved, maybe more than any time ever before. Excitedly, I ran out and got a hold of an inexpensive little Fender beginner bass and started banging away at it.

I had one bass lesson with Hillel. He told me to use the two first fingers on my right hand as the plucking ones, alternately, like they were walking. I only had to walk a few blocks to his house where he lived with his mother and little brother, who drew the most creative cartoons. Hillel and I spent hours and hours listening to his rock records; Hendrix, the mighty Led Zep, Rush, Jeff Beck, the Doors. I was such a jazz geek it was all new to me. I felt the Hendrix deep inside my little heart. Lying on his living room floor, I fell in love with rock music—listening to Houses of the Holy and leafing through his mom’s M. C. Escher book, the rhythms morphing in and out of each other. I imagined them throwing me around like a ferocious wave, contorting me into new shapes and giving me wings. I started looking at music in a new way, seeing color and attitude instead of notes and scales. Hillel’s rock star dreams beamed around the room; they were infectious, his yearning hitting me in the chest.

One funny nerdy day, Hillel told me he wanted to change his name, to have a rock star name, and he was thinking of David Sandheart. DAVID FUCKING SANDHEART!!!! I nodded seriously in response and pondered a rock star name for myself, Dash Macallister, Giuseppe Von Skylark or Sigmund Salamander.……Flea?

I wish he had explained the nickname.

Jack..…Always been able to count on him as a friend. One of the only………he has walked through the fiery furnaces with his demons and come out the other side, the kindest and most compassionate, insightful person I know. Fuck, I love him. I’d known Jack Irons since that fateful first day of sixth grade at Carthay Elementary, but never did I imagine that he and I would be unified just five years later, pursuing this limousine teen dream. Fuck, it’s wild how consequential the years when you’re a wee one. We were buddies in tenth grade when we sat next to each other in AP English class (the only subject I was good in besides music) and when the teacher spoke about Oedipus and the “Oedipus complex” (some sort of sex-with-your-mother neurosis), Jack yelled out “Eat a puss!”

About Jack Irons.

Alan Moschulski, the main singer and other guitar player in Anthym, was an interesting chap. He was from a Chilean showbiz family, a safe kid, a homebody, one who had spent a lot of time in his bedroom honing his guitar skills. I went over to his house for a day of instruction. He was adept with virtuoso-type abilities, and super into prog rock. I’d never even heard of prog rock. He played me Allan Holdsworth, Brand X, Pierre Moerlen’s Gong, Genesis, Weather Report, Yes, and Bill Bruford. It had the sophistication I admired in jazz, and helped me to see how I could hope to fit into rock, and what was possible on the electric bass. That day, Alan showed me a variety of technical exercises, scales and patterns, to help me gain bass proficiency. They enabled my hands to grow strong, and soon the bass started feeling natural under my fingers. He helped me develop the physical ability to play the rhythms in my heart. The exercises he taught me are still the ones I play before every show. Alan later changed his name to Alain Johannes, and still has a vibrant career in music. I’ll always be grateful to him, that day was magic. I was chomping at the motherfuckin’ bit with a bass in my hand, rarin’ to go.

Alan Moschulski, also known as Alain Johannes.

I took to it quickly, and three weeks from the day I first picked up an electric bass, I was on stage at Gazzarri’s on the Sunset Strip, playing a gig at a Battle of the Bands as the bassist in Anthym. (The guy in the band before us impressed me with a bass solo that included the theme from Popeye.) Dude in a rock band, been doing it ever since.

I was plucking with my two fingers like Hillel had taught me, then one day at school, sitting under a tree, I saw Ray rock the bass. The other popular band at Fairfax, besides Anthym, was Star. They were all black kids that were into the funk, and Ray was their bassist. I watched Ray bumping the low strings of the bass with his thumb bone, letting it bounce like a basketball BOOM the thumb came down……then his middle finger answered his thumb by digging under the high strings and pulling em up sharp POP thumb down BOOM finger up POP.…BOOM POP BOOM BA BOOM POP POP. Hot damn kill it Ray FUCK WOW WOW OH I was transfixed, I had to learn to do it…………….……So I did. Yeah.

I was a member of a secret society that was incomprehensible to the square world. All that time in those rooms playing together, building the telepathic communication, it made everything else in the world feel paltry, shallow, and mundane. All the people who made fun of me and called me names at school, all the world where I felt so ill at ease, the cruelty of its ridiculous competition, none of it mattered anymore. I lived on a higher plane, a place where dreams, feelings, colors, and hopes were real and concrete. Like a cat, I walked light on my feet. I started going to the secondhand clothing store and buying weird old clothes to wear. I wore a burnt match in my pierced earhole. I had no sense of fashion or cool (never really did achieve that!) but I embraced my freakiness;

There were a group of girls at school who loved the band, made up ANTHYM buttons and cheered us on. They liked the Ramones mostly, and we weren’t remotely that cool, but I reckon we were all they had. One of them had a big house and when her parents were gone she threw parties. At one of ’em I had an epiphany: When I drank a lot of beer I didn’t feel so shy! I’d been averse to alcohol since I vomited all over myself that night at the Rainbow with the Kiedis crew, but now I started to love it. The more I drank, the smarter and handsomer I became. At these parties I would do the crazy shit I’d always done, pull my pants down and wave my cock around, climb a tree, smush a piece of cake into my face while someone was talking to me. But in a new twist, I was now a guy in a rock band. That meant I wasn’t frowned on as a weirdo, but happily accepted as a wild and interesting young man, a creative eccentric!

(Side note: My public nudity was never aggressive, but in the spirit of the streaking craze of the seventies! My sister had the bug too, after she was kicked off the Hollywood High gymnastic team for smoking pot, she popped up during the City Championship meet and did her floor routine in her birthday suit! We thought it was hilarious. Clearly, I still think it’s a good look.) The day after the first party at this girl’s house, where I had pulled down my pants during an absurdly diabolical drunken dance, I received a letter from one of the party girls. Dear Michael, I had such a great time last night. When you pulled down your pants I couldn’t help noticing that your dick resembled the beer bottle you were holding! Hope to see you soon. Hugs and kisses, Naomi (P.S. My dick looks nothing like a beer bottle.)

One day we had band practice in my sister’s bedroom, and a strange head popped up in the window, peeping in to watch us play. It was a kid from down the block I’d seen cruising around the neighborhood, a tough cool-looking longhair. He’d climbed over the fence into my backyard when he heard the music. He told us his name was Saul, he was a guitar player, and had a band called L.A. Rocks, or something like that. We chatted for a while, he was an intense and spirited kid, I liked him. Years later, when he was the top-hatted iconic figure of the biggest rock band on earth it always warmed my heart to see him doing his thing.

That's Slash!

Jack Irons was my brother; a loyal friend and great drummer who was always down to jam. He had a birthday party at his house and I wanted to get him a crazy gift, one different than any he’d ever receive. So, I pooped in a ziplock plastic bag and wrapped it up beautifully with ribbons in fancy wrapping paper. The craziest gift ever! We had a lot of poop humor amongst us. Come present unwrapping time we sat in his bedroom, his parents and sister were also there, and he opened up cool gifts. When he got to mine and unwrapped it with anticipation, he realized what it was and laughed and yelled out, “Oh god, eww!” Out to the garbage bin it went. He got the joke, that I was being as ridiculous as possible, but I saw his parents look at me with disgust, and Hillel shot me a “that is not funny” look. Later on, Hillel told me I had fucked up. For a different friend’s birthday in the recent past, a guy whom I didn’t even care about like I did Jack, I’d stolen an armful of records from Music Plus on the way to the party, and given him twenty albums. I hadn’t even thought about it. Hillel said, “You give that dude a bunch of great records and you give Jack your disgusting smelly SHIT???” Of course, Hillel was right. I felt like an asshole. The weird thing was, in a way I was right too. I was foolishly excited about Jack’s poop gift. I really wanted it to be something he would never forget, and in that I succeeded. It still comes up now forty years later. (“Dude, I’m so sorry about th...

They just wanted to fight everyone who didn’t fit into their close-minded world. The kids had no imagination, most of ’em in the anarchy T-shirt their mommies bought for them. At a Black Flag show one night, I was just starting to realize the magic of the band, amazed by drummer Robo and the wild synchronous yes and no movement of Ginn and Dukowski, when I saw a series of people beaten badly to bloody pulps, gangs of idiots stomping the fuck out of them for having the wrong haircut, the unconscious victims carted out to waiting ambulances. It was disgusting, and turned me off to punk rock.