So, it's like the anniversary of the night when Tony would have gone to sleep and just not woken up. People might try to think it was something more glamorous than that, but truth be told, he had sleep apnea. That's when you stop breathing in your sleep, and it causes your heart to simply stop beating.
It's something I know about, as my dad has it. When I was born, I had Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, known as SIDS, and I was like the lucky one percent that lived, was dusky when they found me. Some say there is a link between sleep apnea and SIDS, so when I heard the tell-tale signs of sleep apnea when Tony was sleeping at my house in Florida, you can be sure I was the one who sent him to the doctor in Vegas for it when he got back, bitching that he had all the signs, and while he went, it wasn't enough.
It eventually killed him. I think about him everyday. He was one of my best friends, truly.
He would be the one to call and check in on me. He made sure I knew it. We talked about it.
In our last heart to heart conversation, he made sure to bring it up. "You know I'm the one who always calls to check in on you, always knows when you're sick, because I care. I call, because I care about you."
It makes me want to cry just thinking about it. *** Fighting back tears. Composing myself. ***
Ok. Deep breath. Don't care what you think about it.
I'd be in the hospital, and he'd be the only one who'd know. He'd know before family. He called.
Nobody has filled that void since he died. Some tried. Nobody succeeded.
Don't cry. It's ok. I'm talking to me, not you.
Let's just cut to the audio. Shall we? Sounds good.
So, they have the Turbo Driver's Seat thing where you can send in a few songs to Sirius XM. Since it was 20 years ago this month that I got pulled on stage, I decided to honor that with music. Who knows if or when it will air, so I'm going to clue you in as to a few of my choices, as one is for Tony Costanza.
Well, I might not be able to upload the audio files, says not supported on here, I can for sure find some videos on Youtube and tell you why I picked each one in a little more detail than on the air at least. The first one I picked was the song that I got pulled up on stage for 20 years ago, and I didn't even know that things would wind up turning out the way they would. It led to me touring on Ozzfest 2002.
So, here I am that the DTE Energy Music Theatre, known as Pine Knob to old schoolers in Michigan, and maybe I should paint the picture as to how I got there in the first place, as it was only slightly planned. First of all, there were two days of Ozzfest in Detroit, and I had press tickets to the first day to cover somebody on the second stage, but we'd luck into tickets for the second day from Drowing Pool's publicists over at Wind-Up Records at the time, Steve Karas and Brady Brock. Before even that happened, I knew I had a plus one, so the night before the first show, I told a few of my friends, who began bickering as to who would go, and I simply said, "whoever's in my car in the morning goes."
Well, the Russian boxer thought he'd outsmart everyone by basically breaking into my car while I was sleeping, so when I went out to my car in the morning, he was already buckled in and ready. That's fine, so as agreed, we started off on our journey, but as we began driving, our buddy was walking down the road, making his way to my house, as we both knew. My friend in the car told me to stop, probably thinking that he would gloat in his face, so he rolled his window down, only to be grabbed by the throat and yanked out of the window, thrown onto the street, Mack opens the door and demands, "drive."
Ok, fast forward to us running into his sister at the end of the first night, Jen demanding we stay at the hotel with her and stay for the second night, so we decide why the heck not, and before crashing at the hotel, we decided to chill will all the buses camped out in the parking lot at DTE. We didn't even really know who's bus belonged to who at the time, just chilling, seeing who we could run into and whatever. That's why you have to forgive me for this blonde moment, as I had a crowd of people hovering around me, checking out the pictures I had taken on my digital camera, and I wasn't paying attention.
Somebody asks if I had any pictures of Down. Yeah, no problem, let me find them on this camera, totally looking down, eyes glued to the screen, oh found Down right here. Then I hear somebody else ask, "hey, do you have any pictures of that Pepper cat because I hear that he's like pretty good?"
Oh yeah, sure. Let me look some more and dig. Yup, here's Pepper.
I finally look up. There's Pepper alright, big permagrin on his face, waiting to see how long it would take me to catch on that he was who he was. I felt like a jackass, and they thought it was hilarious.
I met Chet and a few of the Down camp guys, as we found ourselves camped outside their bus. I remember we made our way into a limo at one point, and all kinds of craziness before the hotel. Next day, we ran around old school style to a library to get online to email a request to Karas and Brock.
First stage approval now, bitches! Thanks. I'm all excited.
Little did I know, people already knew who I was. I mean, it's not like there were that many female photographers there in the first place, and considering that I was shooting from behind the barricade, every security guard and most of the musicians had spotted the blonde with a yellow crop top that barely covered the bottom of her titties, with the flared out denim skirt, especially second day in a row. As a photographer, you kind of catch on when people pose for you on stage, and there was some of that for sure, but when Rob Zombie came on stage, he announced any females could come on stage.
I'm like cool. This will make for great pictures. I'm not catching on yet.
Second time, he stands in front of me, says a song and dance about how they usually have fire breathers and dancers, but couldn't because of the large tour, so any female close to the stage, come on. Still not catching on, I'm standing there, and the photographer next to me is glaring at me. Third time, Rob stares right down at me, "last chance, if you are a female close to the stage, come on up, but don't just stand there, be sure to move if you come up on the stage," and I'm still not catching on.
J.R. elbows me. "He's talking to you. Give me your camera."
I turn, and the security guard already has his hand extended, waiting for me to catch on and move. "He's talking to you. If you're coming up here, give me your hand, and step right here to come up."
Oh! Ok! On my way...
That's when I look down, and there's like I don't know maybe 40 chicks on the stage, but none of them seem to have been as blessed in the breast area. They were cute little A and B cups. I'm DD baby.
He said don't just stand there, right? It's not like my shirt was covering much to begin with. That was just enough to get me plastered on the big screen in front of like 45,000 people for most of the song.
I got off the stage after the song. As a photographer, we only got to shoot the first three songs anyway. I made my way back with the herd of photographers like usual, making my way to where Mack was.
We started walking like normal, and people started following. "Were you just on stage?" Nod and keep walking, but there's just more dudes that start following us like the Pied Piper.
You have to understand that we had not planned on two days at a festival a couple hours from home. That meant, beyond lacking a change of clothing, we also lacked funds, not prepared for the long haul. The more people that followed, the more it seemed like an opportunity, as some might see it.
We lucked upon Tommy, who had been following a random chick with a megaphone, screaming, "anal whore" at her, when he didn't even know here. We knew that was our people. It was like a sign.
Well, we saw a sign, too, and it said, "$1." Mack asked Tommy if we could borrow his megaphone. Tommy obliged, much to the relief of the girl he had been screaming at, so we worked our magic.
"Who wants to see more? Show me the money!" Grab handfuls.
Flash. Cheer. "But wait!"
"Don't you want to know what's going on downstairs? Who thinks this is a normal, innocent girl? Who thinks there might be a little more than what meets the eye with this here, and who wants to see?"
Put aways the dollars. Break out the twenties. Cough it up.
Grab fistfuls of money. No more problems with cash. Covered.
Lil bling bling downstairs always makes them scratch their heads and want to see more. That's about the time that Tommy said, "you should really join the tour." No problemo, "I'm serious," he said.
"I'm serious, too. I'm a journalist. Can I interview people?"
Mack chimes in. He wants to come, too. I send him to make sure it's legit before I go.
Come on down. Some mafioso dudes sent me a driver and a laptop, picked me up, dropped me off at a hotel in Indianapolis, and the rest is history. My job wasn't a journalist on tour, it was being a Harley girl, which was not selling shirts and keychains as I thought, but doing pictures on a motorcycle.
The song that led to all that? Living Dead Girl by Rob Zombie. That and more started it all:
Being a journalist before joining the tour, I had been scheduled to interview Drowning Pool before joining Ozzfest, but I wound up being late in traffic and missing the scheduled time. Instead, I was able to interview Dez of Coal Chamber about how he found a crow and nursed it back to health. I still met the Drowning Pool guys that night regardless, got to see them play, and I surely did not imagine then that I would soon be on tour with these guys on the Ozzfest tour, so the whole thing is surreal.
Bottom line is like three stops in, we were going to check into the hotel room, the other Harley girls and I, at this place in Virginia. We demanded nicer hotels than some of the other Village of the Damned, so they dropped us to go check in, taking everyone else to wherever else they stayed. As we were walking up, lugging lots of bags, as you can imagine, this guy brushes past us, running up to the front desk, and as we opened the door to the lobby, we heard him scream, "we need an ambulance to the gold bus out back," which made us super curious as to what was going on at that point.
Tina and I rush into bikinis, heading to the pool to see if we can find anything out. We heard the news from the guy who found him. A massive guy covered in tattoos was shaken, "I touched him..."
While artwork might have been planned, that did not take place. Instead, 20 minutes later, a helicopter was landing at the hotel. We were a little too close to D.C., so all the media flooded us that day.
That's when I learned what type of journalist that I do not want to be. Invasion of privacy is not cool. Everyone was dressing up, trying to act all casual and cool, get the scoop, like ants swarming the hotel, forcing us to leave, and while Tina and I had a salad at Wendy's with Grape, a tech for Rob Zombie, when we left, we were called to join Bruce the attorney and many others camped out at a restaurant.
"It's the Harley girls! Call them over here! Come join us!"
"No thanks, we just ate. We're not hungry. Thank you."
"Let us buy you drinks! Come on! You don't want to go back to the hotel..."
Twist our arms. We joined the group. It was a pretty fun night.
Drowning Pool left the tour after that. I'd see them again years later. In New Orleans that is.
I had gone to cover Damage Plan at the Howlin' Wolf I think it was, and I know it was the first time covering the brothers. I remember running into Pepper there. I wound up getting my last four vaginal piercings later that night from a girl's piercer boyfriend from the Atone Pain Tribe, another story.
This story specifically has to do with talking with C.J. and Stevie that night, as they had called it then, asked me to write it into the record, and years later, I still remember, clear as a bell that they called it. They had said they had a bad feeling, similar to what they felt before the Ozzfest tour, like they knew something bad was going to happen, like someone was going to die, only this time, it would not be them. Not knowing who or what, they just called it that someone would die, like their lead singer did.
They were right. Someone did die on that tour. Dimebag.
They called it. Even though the origins of this song I think have been taken out of context over the years since it was released on Wind-Up Records, which was the same label that Creed was on I think, known as more of a Christian label when they were first coming out. Interesting to think about still.
Never got the chance to ask if we were related. We just had the same last name. Not sure.
Did get the chance to ask Hank III. We were not sure. He doesn't know grandpa's family tree.
Anywhoodles, the third song harkens back not to Superjoint Ritual with Hank III, but to Down. Years after touring with them on Ozzfest, I remember that Norris Comeaux had invited me to watch them play with his new toy, which was basically like a traveling recording studio. The band had been asked to record an acoustic version of "Stone the Crow" for a radio station, and I watched them record it.
That's probably where I realized how good of a musician Pepper is, as he was watching and commenting on a television show, holding a conversation with someone else completely and still playing this mind-blowingly beautify melodies on the guitar that was just like what??? Who is this guy, and why did I not realize how talented he was before? I mean, I always liked Pepper, always was a fan of Corrosion of Conformity, saw them before Ozzfest and all that good stuff, but seeing him just so effortlessly playing, while others were all nervous because I was there, just blew my mind really.
The funny part about that night, being the local girl with a car, while the guys only had the bus to get around down, they had me drive them around to a few clubs to go check out the night scene. I just remember Rex just wanting nothing to do with the situation, because Pepper kept insisting to anyone who would ask that he was a different 80's hair metal musician to each person who would question. To top that off, each time, he would wind up by pointing at Rex, "yeah, that guy there's my roadie."
Rex would shake his head. Another shot down the hatch. Who believes this guy?
If it wouldn't have been for the guys in Down and Superjoint Ritual, I would have never met Tony when he was working with Crowbar in New Orleans. I guess I have to paint the picture as to why Tony meant so much to me, even upon that first meeting. It has to do with basic respect for me.
At the time, I had been living with a guy who led me on as a way to get signed onto Phil's label, which worked for him, congrats, but whatever. Let's go back to us living together as a sham, just after he confessed his real motivation to me, but I didn't have a car and was dependent on him for rides. It was this awkward in between phase, where we were not really dating anymore, but still lived together.
I'm not going to say this dude's name, but let's just say he was not trying to hide the fact that he had basically been whoring around with other women at the club, while I was holding down front row. I focused my eyes on the stage, not wanting to know who he was kissing behind my back, but the guys on stage could see exactly what he was up to and knew exactly who he was, that we lived together still. At the end of the night, the guys saw that he was going to make his way towards me to tell me it was time to leave, but he was still low man on the musical totem pole and knew when to keep quiet.
Before my roommate could call out to me, Tommy approached me to chat and Tony saw the scenario. My roommate stood back and watched as I chatted with the musicians who had been on the stage. They were not ready for me to leave, now that they finally had a chance to talk to the blonde chick.
They knew that he would wait. They knew he knew better. They were rubbing it in his face.
Tommy purposely asked for my number to call me, and Tony chimed in at that point. "Hey, I think I lost your number, so I'm going to need it again, too. Be sure to call me," just to make him jealous.
While my roommate might have been sucking face with skanky coke whores, these guys acknowledged that I was not just the average girl. Anyone can fall down with their legs spread. They preferred to holler at the chick that was not known to simply hook up with just anyone, and that's me.
Tony met me at a time when I was in a less than ideal situation, forced to live with someone who had led me on, simply because I did not have a car, a choice, and he agreed to take care of me in return. I had never been a kept woman before, and we had our arrangement, though it was less than ideal. Really, I think Tony could simply tell by my face how grateful I was to be acknowledged at that time.
He and I bonded because of doubt. That's why some of his last words to me still make me cry. "My biggest regret in life was thinking that I was never good enough," and as much as I try not to...
That was our second to the last conversation. Truth be told, our last conversation, he hung up on me, one of the first times that he ever did that. I was sick, and he couldn't understand me, and he was frustrated, "you know I hate it when I cannot understand you, so call me when you're not sick."
He hung up. When I called him back when I was better, he didn't answer. He didn't call me back.
I didn't get it. I was still recovering. His mom asked why I was being so silent.
As I texted Denise, explaining how I had been sick and in the hospital, she told me how she came out into the living room and found her son dead on the sofa. I don't want to rehash the drama after that. Let's just say that while some people remember Tony Costanza from being the first drummer in Machine Head, since I was not a fan of Rob's memorial of Tony, I prefer to think of him how I met him, working with Crowbar, but some people might remember that he was first the lead singer for Papsmear, being able to hold down just about any position on the stage, being so under estimated.
For the last song, I chose the theme song for Strangeland, when Tony was working with Crisis. Was that the first time I recall seeing him in music magazines? From back then, with his tattooed tummy?
Just a reminder that he was not afraid to work with a female. Lots of guys in entertainment are, believe it or not. At least, that has been my experience over the years, but Tony did not fall into that lump.She said the psychic had told her that a girl would write her son's book before she died. She specifically told me back then that, "nobody would know who you were," and we both meant that it was to mean like I was not famous, like I was an unknown author, and I was, I still am, but it means more. See, when he died, it's not like people knew we talked every night, as only his mother knew.
It's like we had some Hollywood showboat relationship. We were not in the tabloids. We were not even with each other most of the time, as we lived on opposite sides of the country from each other.
When he died, nobody knew who I was all right, nobody but his mother. None of his friends knew me. I had heard plenty of tales about them, but I didn't need to meet them, as I didn't live nearby.
I guess he did not tell them tales about me. They all kinda looked at me like who is this chick? Nobody knew who I was, except for one fan of Tony's who suggested I put together a book of whatever text messages I could find from him through the years, and I did that, compiling An Unknown Love.
That's not even the book he left me with. That's just our extra blubberings. The real book I'm holding.
I've been holding onto it for more than a decade. I will continue to do so, until I'm ready. The one thing I learned when I was earning my Master's in Writing from the Johns Hopkins University is that if it hurts to write, if it brings you to tears to write it, you know that's when you've tapped into the good.
No, it's not about Machine Head. Sorry, but I told on Rob on Twitter that he wrote himself out of the book, and I meant it. It's more about tony growing up with the likes of Mitch Harris and Ahrue Luster.
You'll see it one day. The book's been done. I might just need to write it as a movie one of these days.
Until then, check out the latest on www.outlandishwriter.com. Follow me on Twitter @Booksnbling or on Instagram @Thorisaz. You can also visit www.lulu.com/spotlight/thorisaz
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