Rock (or film or TV or political) "stars" you really REALLY met.

[ovidsen]

My claim to fame in this category was sharing a botlle of Jack Daniels with Bon Scott, the original (and in my opinion) the greatest front man of any rock band on the planet.

This dates me, because it happened on July 4, 1979, at an outdoor concert in Rockford, Illinois, about 60 miles northwest of Chicago and about as close as you can get to Wisconsin without actually being in Wisconsin. That is not meant to insult Wisconsin.

I was working for WDAI, then a "progressive rock" FM station in Chicago, so it was no problem getting backstage passes for me and my girlfriend. And there was Bon. AC/DC was the warmup act for Cheap Trick, a local band with a strong following. I sat in a chair next to Bon and he started talking. And drinking. And talking some more. And drinking. Talking about emigrating from Scotland to Australia when he was five years old, his love of bagpipes how he was transformed from a roadie into a singer, his ups and downs of life on the road. (If it's Tuesday, we must be... where?). He drank most of that fifth of Jack, and then hit the stage. Footnote: He probably could have had just about any woman there do anything he wanted, but he wasn't into groupies. At least not that day. He was too busy drinking and talking and prepping himself for the stage.

AC/DC just plain tore the house apart. Well, it was an outdoor concert, but you get the idea. Before AC/DC started the set, I asked Bon why he drank so much. He said he needed the booze to overcome his stage fright. Seriously. He'd consumed enough Jack to put most of us flat on our backs, but he was absolutely mesmerizing on stage. You can't make up that kind of magnetism. You either have it, or you don't.

I was saddened, but not surprised when Bon was found dead in the back seat of a car in London in February, 1980. The coroner's verdict? Alcohol poisoning.

I mean no disrespect to Brian Johnson, the lead singer for AC/DC for the past 29 years. But nobody, I mean NOBODY... not Mick Jagger, not Freddie Mercury, NOBODY could scream in tune like the late, great Bon Scott could.

And I can't end this post without a high five to AC/DC guitarist Angus Young. Doesn't smoke, drink or do drugs. He's just mastered the art of writing three and four chord songs that mainly share a common theme of "let's get drunk and have wild sex". He's in his 50s now, and can't do the pratfalls he used to, but his Australian schoolboy outfit remains SO darn becoming!

Okay, what kind of quality time have you spent with someone "famous". This is not a flippant question. I bet here are lots of DUers who have gotten up close and personal with somebody "famous", and I'd like to read your story.

[Aristus]

1. John Kerry.

Campaigning for Obama last February. Great guy! :thumbsup:

[Archae]

2. Does meeting Pete Seeger count?

I met him at an arts festival about 20 years ago.

Dummy me, I didn't recognize him until he started singing.

[MorningGlow]

3. Nothing "up close and personal", but...

Douglas Adams signed my towel about 100 years ago. Really lovely guy.

Also met John Waite in NYC (also 100 years ago) and nodded and smiled to Gregory Hines in New Orleans (he seemed quite nice too).

Met a bunch of bands while working on the entertainment committee at college too.

[Jetboy]

4. If you never heard of Mojo Nixon, Mike Watt or J Macias then

I'm sure you've never heard of the other rock stars I've met.

However, I did meet Matt Sorum of the Cult back in 89/90 when they played with Metallica. He is now in Guns-n-roses I believe. Anyway the other guys in the Cult were dicks but Matt Sorum took the time to talk to me and my friend. He signed autographs for us and was generally pleasant and friendly.

BTW Bon Scott was for sure one of the greatest frontmen of all time. LUV Bon era AC/DC!

This DU member was formerly known as HuskerDU! (pay no attention to the red sig!)

[abq e streeter]

5. several, incl. Bonnie Raitt, Dixie Chicks, Bobby Keys , Willlie Dixon, John Podesta ...

(John was Clinton's chief of staff, and Obama's transition team chief; and was a pretty good friend in our long-past undergrad days). Met Bonnie in '74, hung out for 20-30 minutes and I was unfortunately a combination of too hung-over and too star-struck to realize that either me or my buddy Russ ( or more likely both of us) could've gone back to the hotel with her ... oh well..... Met the Chicks in '92 ( quite a while before Natalie Maines replaced the one I had the hots for, Laura Lynch) , sharing the bill with them at the New Mexico state fair ( and we were a blues band; never figured out how they paired us up). We weren't even on the main stage; that's how unknown they ( and we) were. Sweetest nicest girls you'd ever want to meet( Bonnie too for that matter); I hope they've remained that way since becoming mega-stars; they seem like they've stayed that way, but you never know. Bobby Keys is the saxman for the Stones ( Brown Sugar etc.), and we did some gigs together in the 90's and became, I'd say, casual friends, and am going to see him for the first time in 6 or 7 years, this weekend in Santa Fe. Opened for Willie Dixon, a true legend of the blues, in 1984 and ended up hanging out, eating ribs and drinking beers with him before the show; another super-nice person.... Also met and hung out with Sarah Dash of Labelle ( met her through Bobby K)...On a lesser level, have had brief ( 1-3 minutes) conversations) with Ernie Banks ( a true gentleman), Joe Cunningham, and Curt Flood ( all baseball stars of the 50's and 60's for the non-jocks among us) as well as with Del Shannon ( yet another very nice person). A few others that aren't really "celebrities" but certainly had their moments in the spotlight: 1973 Miss USA Amanda Jones was a high school friend, Duke Dewey ( drummer for Country Joe and the Fish at Woodstock) is a friend, and Ozzy Osbourne's late drummer Randy Castillo was an acquaintance/casual friend...( both of them, once again, real nice guys).Thanks for the opportunity , Ovidsen, to indulge in what I freely admit,occasionally crosses over into obnoxious name dropping. BTW, what did you do when the station became disco-DAI in '79 ?