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Thanks to Decibel for their tweet alert that today is the 47th birthday (!) of “Brooklyn homeboy” C.C. DeVille (né Bruce Anthony Cecil Johannesson). Love him or hate him, there’s no denying that C.C. is one of the most entertaining cartoon characters ever to escape from Cool World.
Here’s some ridiculous video that tries to make it seem like C.C. is Jimi fucking Hendrix or some shit.
-AR
It was over a year ago that we first got the news that Bret Michaels was writing his autobiography (and by “writing,” I mean dictating to some dude named Shane Stanley who had to do all the actual work); the book, Roses & Thorns (nice title, schmucky), will now finally a get a release on June 23, according to People.com.
Granted, this will not be a good book. The chances that it’s as decent as The Dirt are pretty slim; hell, the chances that it’s as good as Slash are pretty thin (and even Slash was only okay). But, there is a lot of room for comedy here, especially if Michaels takes himself too seriously which, chances are, he will.
Here are things I’m looking forward to reading about in this tome:
Does anyone remember Blues Saraceno? He was part of that whole early-90s Joe Satriani/Steve Vai-wannabe boom (See: everyone who has ever been signed to Shrapnel Records, ever.). He released some instrumental solo albums on Guitar Player Records – yes, Guitar Player magazine had a label – and then joined Poison as a second replacement for C.C. DeVille. But the album he made with the Grand Slam Kings of Glam, Crack a Smile, didn’t even get an official release until after he’d already been kicked out of the band. And then he seemed to pretty drop off the face of the planet.
Anyways, watching this incredibly high budget for Saraceno’s “Rabbit Soup,” I was reminded how much the dude looked like a certain “elevator jazz”* musician. His tone is kinda cool but gets real old real fast. As for the rest of his playing, well…
-AR
*John Scofield’s words, not mine.
Just when you thought he couldn’t possibly get anymore annoying, Bruce Anthony Johannesson, better known to the world as Guitar World’s “Worst Guitarist of All Time” C.C. DeVille, has apparently found Jesus. For an on-again/off-again coke head/junkie who a friend of mine once witnessed asking a girl “I know you… did I fuck you?”, that’s pretty phenomenal. Still, that’s the great thing about Judeo-Christian religions: it’s never too late to repent.
Gotta wonder what this means for the future of Poison, though. Will God take kindly to a man who makes his living playing songs like “Talk Dirty to Me,” and “Look What the Cat Dragged In” (which actually features the lyrics “Livin’ my life sin after sin“)?
While you ponder that, here’s the video for Poison’s “Unskinny Bop.” As you can tell just from watching the prologue, C.C. was religious when they made this clip, too – it’s just that back then, he was a Mormon.
-AR
With the incredible success of The Dirt, I kind of assumed that every 80’s metal star in the world would wanna pump out an autobiography; I mean, really, most of the work is left to some poor “c0-writer” like Neil Strauss or Anthony Bozza, and there’s obviously a market for the finished product. But here we are, almost seven years after The Dirt was originally published, and it seems like we’re only now starting to get the influx of tell-alls I expected: just last year Nikki Sixx tried to hit the jackpot a second time with The Heroin Diaries while Slash took his first step towards a post-Velvet Revovler career with Slash, and now it’s been announced that we can all look forward to a tome from… Bret Michaels. A press release states:
“Not only can you see Michaels on Rock of Love this spring but you will also be able to read all about his life this fall when the singer’s much-anticipated autobiography is released by renowned publishing house Simon & Schuster.”
There’s no word on who is doing the real writing for Michaels – by God, I hope he’s not trying to write it himself – or when we can expect this literary masterpiece. But I do find the press releases assertion that Simon & Schuster is a “renowned publishing house” kinda hilarious. I mean, it’s certainly one of the bigger publishers out there, but it seems a little like saying “renowned record label Capitol” or something – most people probably aren’t paying attention to the label, they just wanna hear the album.
In any case, I’m not gonna lie, I will most likely read this book. Still, I wish more bands would follow The Dirt’s model and do a Roshamon-like multiple-perspective telling of events. Because even though hearing Michaels talk about how crazy C.C. DeVille is might be fun, it won’t be as much fun as a chapter by DeVille in the same book disputing his insanity would be.
-AR
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