SAMPLE BRIDGE TAKEN FROM BACKSTAGE PASS:

Alcohol, Drugs & Neo-Nazis—The Punk Battle of Braveheart

"That’s when a huge Neo-Nazi monster appeared—a massive looking Viking dude. Covered in tattoos, thick beard, bald head, and crazy big arms."

RKL hit the stage and that’s when everything erupted. We had security—big bouncers, a few white, a few Hispanic, and our guy T-Bone, a towering giant 40-year-old Black dude whose presence was usually enough to squash any nonsense just by standing there.

The pit went nuts—probably 150 people deep. Kids were diving off the tiny stage, bouncing off RKL’s members and gear, bodies slamming into bodies. With a capacity of around 300, half the club moshing at once looked mental.

I was watching from our oversized sound booth at the back of the club, which had plexiglass shields to protect our fully analog soundboard. From there, I began to see everything break loose. The Nazi Low Riders were brawling with some of the long-haired metal kids. Shoving escalated, fists flew, and the crowd snowballed into an all-out brawl.

T-Bone jumped in to break up the first fight and got blindsided. Four Nazi punks jumped him at once. He wrestled one into a chokehold but the others kept swinging on him.

All around the floor, fights erupted. Our other bouncers were overwhelmed, tied up just trying to defend themselves. I saw T-Bone starting to wear down under the weight of the attack. I knew I had to help.

My girlfriend, my sound guy, his girlfriend, and a buddy were with me in the booth, watching it unfold. I told them I was going in. I grabbed the small can of pepper spray I kept in the booth and headed out. They yelled at me not to leave the safety of the booth. I waved them off.

The second I stepped onto the floor, a fist came out of nowhere and I ducked. The guy stumbled into another cluster of fighting bodies. That’s when it hit me—I had just walked into a full-on riot, and I wasn’t sure I’d even make it to T-Bone who was still swinging for his life at the front of the stage.

I kicked into overdrive, weaving and dodging as fists and bodies flew around me like some punk version of Braveheart. I was closing in on T-Bone when someone clipped my leg and I went down hard. My pepper spray slipped from my hand and rolled into the mayhem. I hit the sticky floor and immediately started crawling army-style through boots and bodies, trying to grab the can as it skidded away.

Just as I reached out, a boot sent the can spinning back toward me and I barely got a hold of it. At almost the same time, I felt someone yank me up by the back of my shirt. I spun around and there he was—some random skinhead dude with a huge beard cocking his fist to punch me. Instinct kicked in. I pulled up and squeezed the pepper spray right into his eyes. Direct hit. He staggered backward, screaming and clutching his face as he disappeared into the frenzy.

I looked up and saw T-Bone still battling, bent over and covering himself under a barrage of punches and kicks but refusing to be knocked to the ground. Without thinking, I pushed through the crowd and started spraying the attackers point blank one by one. Two of them stopped immediately, cursing and putting their hands to their faces. The other two swung blindly, coughing and gasping, but they couldn’t see shit anymore.

That’s when a huge Neo-Nazi monster appeared—a massive looking Viking dude. Covered in tattoos, thick beard, bald head, and crazy big arms. He locked eyes with me, pointed, and roared: “You’re gonna pay, motherfucker!”

I bolted. My adrenaline spiked, and I juked and zigzagged my way through the frenzy back toward the sound booth. I dove over the little step like my life was on the line. My friends stared at me wide-eyed, realizing at the same moment that the sound booth had no door. We were trapped.

I told everyone to get low in the corner while I stood hiding by the entrance, holding my now nearly-empty spray can. The Viking Nazi charged through the crowd toward me. I waited until he was right under me, reached over the ledge, and blasted him full force. He yelled in agony, spinning around, trying to grab me through the air. He had pure rage but the pure blindness and pain shut him down.

I stepped back and realized my pepper spray was empty. No more backup. My crew stared at me like we were in big trouble.

I knew there was only one move left.

I told them, “Stay put. I’m gonna end this shit.”

I jumped back onto the floor and sprinted gladiator-style toward the booking office behind the stage. I dodged punches, caught a few random glancing blows, but stayed on my feet. I burst into the office where the bar staff and waitresses were already huddled, frantically calling 911.

“What the hell is going on out there?” one of them asked.

“It’s a full-on riot,” I said, heading straight for my desk. I grabbed my last-resort weapon: a giant industrial bear spray canister.

They looked at me like I was totally nuts.

“Lock the door behind me,” I said as I headed back into the mayhem.

The stage was trashed. RKL had bailed. I climbed up, aimed the bear spray at the ceiling, and unleashed all of it. A thick, toxic cloud spread through the room like a chemical mushroom cloud. Within seconds, the crowd turned from violent maniacs into gasping, choking fools stumbling for the exits.

People wiped at their eyes and throats, desperately trying to get out. It worked. The club emptied. I stood coughing on the stage, watching the crowd spill out the front doors into the fresh air of the parking lot.

By some miracle, no one had been critically hurt or stabbed. We had used metal detectors at the door, and I was thankful for that. I stumbled out, still wheezing and sneezing, as the last of the stragglers staggered into the street.

When I got outside, the parking lot looked like a war zone. About ten police cars, sirens screaming, floodlights blasting. A police helicopter circled overhead. The cops had twenty or so Nazi Low Riders lying face down on the asphalt, others standing with their hands laced behind their heads. Faces were bloody, hands were busted up. A few ambulances had arrived, and even a firetruck pulled up for good measure. The air was thick with leftover bear spray and pepper dust. Kids were coughing, sneezing, wailing—it was nuts.

I knew this was probably the end of any punk shows at Club M/Mancinis. Hell, I figured it was probably the end of my job too. But I was just relieved I hadn’t been completely stomped out, my girlfriend and the staff were safe, and even T-Bone and the bouncers—though bloodied and bruised—were alive and standing around.

T-Bone spotted me across the parking lot, limped over, stuck out his massive hand, and shook his head in disbelief.

“Damn, man,” he said. “I ain’t never had a white boy save my ass before… You’re fuckin’ legit.”

I smiled and said, “I got your back, T-Bone… and I’m only a half white boy, brother.”

He laughed, we shook hands, and for a second in all the mayhem, everything felt okay.

Later I found out some of the guys arrested had active warrants. The cops had been searching for members of that Nazi Low Rider crew for assaults, robbery, even grand theft auto and they finally got them. It could’ve been so much worse. No one died, no one got stabbed, and I walked away knowing we got lucky as hell. I was thankful for at least that.

After these incidents, plus several more over the years, it left me thinking about that strange, ugly conundrum. Why did different kids—even some barely out of high school—gravitate toward violence and anger? I realized most of them were outcasts from broken homes, kids who couldn’t find acceptance anywhere else. Their anger somehow twisted into a desperate need to belong to something, even if that something was completely toxic. They wanted to feel powerful, even if it meant becoming monsters. That warped psychology fascinated me and made me perplexed at the same time. I didn't like what they stood for, but I understood the emptiness and unhappiness that probably pushed them there.

That night burned a lesson into me that would repeat again and again throughout my music career: bad energy and bad choices are always lurking, ready to blow up a good thing. Alcohol, drugs, violence, ego—it’s the same ugly formula.

Over the years, I noticed that same self-destructive pattern everywhere—from unknown local band kids to mega-famous headliners. The drinking and the drugs always pushed people over the edge, whether it was random Nazi punks or riot-starting crowds causing unrest at little-known clubs in the Valley, or artists spiraling out of control onstage and backstage in Hollywood. Of course, alcohol in particular seemed to be one of the main components in the destruction of so many.

However, on the flip side, there were plenty of incredible moments where alcohol served more as a social lubricant than a destructive force. Nights when nearly everyone was vibing, connecting, and living for one shared goal: to have a good time with great music.

I remember being a little kid in the 1970s, when concerts were everywhere, and people got buzzed to let loose. Fights were rare. Sure, there were probably a lot of people with drinking problems, but back then, everyone seemed to drink and smoke—it was just part of the atmosphere. My dad even had a fully stocked bar in his office at Executive Car Leasing in West Hollywood. Top-shelf booze, fancy glasses, the works. He’d pour drinks for clients and coworkers in the afternoon like it was nothing.

That whole "sex, drugs, and rock & roll" vibe was very real. And the Roxy brought it roaring back in the 2000s during the Camp Freddy and Metal Skool/Steel Panther residencies. Those nights were like time machines.

Continued from the middle of the chapter bridge:

But there was this one night that went completely off the rails when I booked RKL (Rich Kids on LSD), and they attracted a ton of neo-Nazis from Antelope Valley. In particular, a white power gang that called themselves the Nazi Low Riders. They were a weird mix—some were full-on white dudes, but plenty were Hispanic dudes covered in Nazi tattoos, sieg-heiling in the pit. It didn’t quite make sense to me, but it was definitely a real thing.

I had no idea RKL had a Nazi following, and I remember being pumped about the sold out show because me and my boss Leslie got a cut of the door—that’s how we got paid. When the doors opened at 8 p.m., everything seemed smooth, the opening bands played, and kids were moshing with no fights. But by 10 p.m., right before RKL’s set, I felt the vibe shift. There was tension in the air. A few people were squabbling, but that was par for the course at punk shows. I didn’t think too much of it.

Some nights, the line between nostalgia and excess was blurry, but the energy? Pure magic. It wasn’t always about craziness or bad behavior. Sometimes, it really was about people reconnecting with the version of themselves they missed—or maybe never got to be.

I guess that’s the real lesson: sometimes we chase madness looking for meaning, but other times, we just want to dance in the firelight of the past for a little while. And when the lights go down and the amps kick on, we remember what it feels like to be free.

So buckle up, now it's time to get decadent.