Friday, February 9, 2007

Anecdote # 202

the first time I met robert was at The Bottom Line, well-known NYC nightclub.
I was there with david bowie and we we're all there to see steve reich's
new piece for 18 musicians.
(and a drummer, boomp chi)
the show was over, lights came up, david said,
"that's robert fripp sitting over there".
so I wandered over to say hi and he wrote his phone number on my arm!
later that week we met for coffee and conversation.
a few months later a call came,
"would your band GaGa like to open 5 shows
for robert fripp's band The League Of Gentlemen?"
"love to", said I. and so we did.

Anecdote # 202
Robert Fripp: The Man Revealed.
I should write a book.
hey wait, maybe I am!
one of our shows was at Bogart's in Cincinnati* which at that time had a large open balcony area upstairs which was used as a makeshift dressing room. the show was over and I was talking to a couple who had somehow made it up to the dressing room. I didn't really know the girl but I knew of her date Tall Dave Brown, a local guitarist. dave was, well...tall, about a head taller than I am. the girl was a head shorter than I am. robert was across the room changing out of his stage clothes. tall dave began relating how much he enjoyed the...blah blah blah and I would look up at him, then down at the girl. then up at him, and down at the girl. when I looked between them I could see robert.
he had his willy out and was making obscene faces at me!
so I'd look up at dave, down at the girl, and in between them at robert shaking his willy!
my expression must have been priceless.
because eventually they would turn around to see what I was looking at and robert would pretend to be tucking in his shirt, zipping up his pants.
they would turn to talk to me again and...I'd look up at dave, down at the girl, and there would be robert wagging his willy at me again.
and they would turn around, and robert would be looking down nonchalantly buttoning his shirt...and on and on it went.

that began our lifelong friendship (including free shock therapy).

*while watching The League Of Gentlemen's set with my manager stan hertzman I asked him what he thought of robert's "gamelan" guitar playing (which was featured that same year on the Talking Heads song 'I Zimbra' and was not unlike the music of steve reich). prophetically stan commented how much better it might be if I was singing and playing guitar over top of it. which is exactly what happened a year later with the formation of the 1981 King Crimson.

5 comments:

  1. Wow, that's a "side" of Robert I wouldn't have imagined (and, frankly, I'm glad not to have seen!). Great story; please keep them coming Adrian.

    This post seemed to show up retroactively -- I could swear it wasn't there earlier! Or am I having an early-senior moment?

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  2. Thanks for Anecdotes 101 and 202! I look forward to all the other ones in between. Margie is right, this is as close as we can practically get to going out to dinner with you, which we'd all love to do - let's hook up when you come back to Portland please!

    PS. Get well Ian Wallace!!

    - S.

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  3. I can tell from reading Robert's style of writing at DGM that he has quite a sense of humor. And I can tell from your writing here that you do too. It's no wonder that you two have stayed together this long. Being very serious about the quality of the music while enjoying life's fun outside of it is what makes reading these so much fun for many of us.

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  4. You've got to write a book dude, if ever there was a man full of amazing stories from the road it's you.

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  5. the GaGa/League of Gentlemen show at the Cleveland Agora was such a great show. GaGa donning those green hats to sing Hot buttered peas...priceless. Robert telling the non-dancers in the back that The League of Gentlemen was a dance band. You listen with you EARS, but you dance with your feet.
    good times.
    Kent from Oh

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