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This little story comes from Doug Howard of Stun Leer, also known as "The Touch guy who swallowed a bee"! "EXIT
STAGE RIGHT" by Doug Howard Of Stun Leer
We had a keyboard player at one time by the name of Lloyd Landesman.
Now Lloyd was a very nice guy and a fabulous player, however Lloyd was
known to be a tad too serious sometimes. He also had a bit of a quick
temper and we could never get him to lighten up. I remember we were
once held at customs, not being allowed to board a flight out of Venezuela
because of some tax crap and Lloyd was reading the customs officials
to total filth. He was barking about his being an American and that
they had no reason to do this to him, and we could not get him to shut
the fuck up. So later, we decided that we had to do something to mess
with his grey cells.
(There is another story however about three incredibly drunken girls
in Alabama somehow getting past security into our inner dressing rooms
while we were changing and asking us if we had any jews in the band.
Lloyd being the good jewish boy said proudly , "I'm jewish"... The girls
then asked to see his tail as they had heard that jews had tails and
they wanted to see it.... AND they were fucking SERIOUS.... Welcome
to Alabama. I'd never saw Lloyd laugh so hard.)
Anyway.... I arranged for the crew to progressively, from show to show,
move Lloyd's riser approximately one foot give or take, to stage right.
I figured Lloyd being very attentive, would notice this immediately
and it would be good for a quick laugh. However, this went on for about
5 shows before Lloyd started complaining about the lighting on stage
right being really bad and could the lighting tech's give him some more
so he could see what he was doing. We immediately started ragging on
him about his being a "star" and a primadonna, wanting more lights and
broke his balls about this being Edgar's band and Edgar was the star...
yadda, yadda, yadda, ... all the while giggling like idiots as he was
clueless about what the real problem was. Poor Lloyd still had no idea
what was going on despite the fact that he was slowly moving futher
and further away from the rest of us.
So we started a pool, $25.00 a bet, picking the show off the itinerary
when Lloyd would finally figure out what was going on. It became more
and more hilarious as Lloyd was slowly, from show to show, moving completely
off stage and not noticing what as going on. It got to the point that
no one could look at Lloyd on stage without cracking up as he was practically
in Siberia and in the dark. Of course Edgar didn't notice what was going
on as his eyesight was so poor, but everyone else was in stitches.
(Of course there is another story of Edgar accidentally locking himself
out of his hotel room in his underwear and scaring the crap out of a
guest as he went down the hall feeling the numbers on the doors trying
to find our road manager's room. Imagine this lady hearing scratching
noises and opening her door to a very polite, half blind, naked albino.)
Anyway....finally ...FINALLY.... Lloyd walks in for a sound check one
day and his entire rig has now made it completely offstage and in the
wings. Lloyd goes ballistic at the stage crew and everyone starts laughing
hysterically as it took him weeks to figure out what the hell was going
on. Lloyd stomps around the stage yelling... "What? ...What? WHAT THE
FUCK IS GOING ON!?!", while everyone is rolling around on the floor
in tears and our guitar tech walked away with about $500.00.
Next installment... "You Can't Make A Quick Exit When The Limo's Wheels
Have Been Stolen"
All My Very Best, [ Photo by Jean Renard ] |
I was touring with Edgar Winter and had become quickly the best of
friends with the crew as a result of a certain "reward" system involving
their redeeming backstage passes worn by eager young ladies that managed
to make it all the way into band member's hotel rooms... great idea Dave!!!
...ummmm....yea... ahem.... anyway....