spinning the record - book preview

8/14/2019 Spinning the Record - Book Preview

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SPINNING

THERECORD

Sex, Drugs, Rock Stars, Divas andUntold Tales from the Music Biz

MARK YOSHIMOTO NEMCOFF

Wordsushi Books

a division of Glenneyre PressLos Angeles, CA


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Copyright 2013 Mark Yoshimoto Nemcoff.Allrights reserved, including the right to reproduce this

book, or portions thereof, in any form. No part of thistext may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded,decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in orintroduced into any information storage and retrievalsystem, in any form or by any means, whether electronicor mechanical without the express written permission ofthe author. The scanning, uploading, and distribution ofthis book via the internet or via any other means

without the permission of the publisher is illegal andpunishable by law.

ISBN: 1-934602-35-3ISBN-13: 978-1-934602-35-5

Published by Wordsushi Books

a division of Glenneyre Press, LLC.Los Angeles, CAwww.wordsushi.com

First Edition

Cover design by: MYN


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PRAISE FOR:

WHERES MY F*CKING LATTE:

I can tell you firsthand that what goes on behind-the-scenes

of Hollywood's glittering facade is usually shocking, insane

and full of sex offers. Where's My F*cking Latte perfectly

captures the abusive and often hysterically unbelievable

world of celebs and Tinseltown power-brokers and the culture

of excess and entitlement they live in. Two thumbs WAY,

WAY UP.

-Daniella Cracknell,Publicist to many of TVs iconicstars from Dick Clark, Howie Mandel, Geraldo Rivera,Mario Lopez to name a few


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Real names have been omittedin order to protect the sources.


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FOREWORD

DIRTY LITTLE SECRETS

Rock Legend has it that a newly-minted superstarscareer was killed by a single shot. This deadly bulletwas fired through the lens of a camera; it was thenbroadcast through the magic of music video to ananxiously eager public via the television channel thathad become the most powerful pop culture engine in

modern history.This video notoriously considered among theworst ever disgorged into this world would grow instature and infamy, ultimately murdering the future ofthis superstar. That future had previously seemedbright; a pair of hit albums and a handful of smashsingles had primed the artists career for a distinctivelyskyward trajectory. Tragically, a lingering image of the

artist himself one which seemingly robbed this sexymale rock star of very his manhood was the finalassassin that gunned down his high flying future. Ithappened so swiftly that all most could do was watch inhorror as the artists career plummeted back to earthlike a flaming Icarus. How the mighty have fallen,indeed.

Oh, the things I could tell you: like how thescheming Svengalis who handle that punk-ass talentlessteenage hack singer (the one we all love to hate) jizzthemselves whenever he ends up on TMZ. Quite theopposite of a Public Relations Nightmare, a TMZ storytranslates directly into another 10,000 units sold thatweek. It doesnt matter if you like the music or not: only


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that you talk about it online. Thats the only metric thatmatters to those who stand to benefit.

The truth is that the music industry has always beencommanded and commandeered by those whosedemands border on redonkulous. Take the 80s pop/rock heartthrob who had a short string of catchy mega-hits: every human with ears who was at least old enoughto be in middle school back then can still sing his tunesby heart. The once-heartthrob still tours to this day andhas instituted an on-stage do-not-cross line of death.

No sideman dares step over this invisible equatorialdivision of the stage for fear of being closer to theaudience than the handsome, dashing boss. I heard thatone bass player had too much fun on a gig and made themistake of crossing that line of death. The second theshow ended, he was pulled aside and fired on the spot; areplacement musician was flown in for the following

nights gig.Then theres the mega-superstar singer/songwriter.He literally personifies the American blue collarworkers life, struggle and viewpoint. In stark contrastto the lifestyle he represents, he insists that all five starhotels that he and his touring band stay in never givehim round bars of soap; he will only accept square bars.

Lets not forget the sociopaths and petty tyrants.

There was a deeply disturbing rumor that an executiveproducer of a popular singing contest show bedded oneof his rather young contestants and bought her adiamond ring; she even wore the jewelry gift on airduring the shows next episode. You could literallypaper the walls with all the allegations of sexualimpropriety and subsequent hush money paid to silence

underage singing contest show contestants and theirguardians.Its not all glitz, glamour, stage lights and the

blinding adoration of millions sometimes billions of fans around the globe. Sometimes crazy shit happensbehind the scenes: secret things.

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That being said, this book is also loaded with storiesabout superstar artists; as such, because we share a

certain familiarity with many of these folks, theiridentities may be discernible to some of you. A few aredownright easy if you know a thing or two about music.Other identities, particularly those involved with storiesof sensitive legal issues, have been obscured a bit more;again, this is to protect the innocent (particularly me)and to make sure nobody gets sued (again, yours truly).

Call me crazy, but I think its more fun guessing who

these stories are about. In this day and age when non-disclosure agreements are everywhere there are somecelebs in L.A. who require all guests at their ragers tonot only sign NDAs but pose for photographs with saiddocument in hand its become tougher to extract thegood stories. In a way, I have only myself to blame; Iheard that the publication of WMFL helped make

NDAs a de facto requirement for all entertainmentassistants.So I had to dig deep to find these behind the scenes

tales of sex, drugs, and of course rock and roll:behind closed doors, and until now, previously untold.

The (sometimes strong) opinions expressed by those

interviewed for this book are not necessarily the same asthe authors. Sometimes they are, but Im not copping toany of them.

SPINNING THE RECORD

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SPINNING THE RECORD

Where I work in Canada there are three radio

stations that share a building. The particular stationwhere I work plays Classic Hits. It was the end of Mayand I was doing a charity drive for the station; I wasover in the studio doing some social media stuff. At theTop 40 station, a very famous female teen idol wasscheduled to come in for an interview with the morningshow.

The night before the interview, one of the producersdecided to edit together an audio file of her teen idol ex-boyfriends big blow-ups in the news. It was theGreatest Hits of his breakdowns, so to speak. Theproducers were going to play it for her to get herreaction, and see if they could get a laugh out of thewhole thing.

Well, that backfired.

They played it for her and she started to cryuncontrollably. Extremely upset, she ran out of the Top40 station and ran past our studio. She balled up in acorner and just kept on crying. Her people tried toconsole her to no avail.

Suddenly, she got up and ran back into the Top 40station. She tells off the DJs, shouting how their

prank was not cool, how they completely disrespectedher and her teen idol ex. She insinuated that this wasactually the worst thing they could have done to her.She said, Im leaving, and stormed out.

We watched out the window as she was rushed intoan SUV behind the station, still bawling. Several of herrepresentatives hurried after her. Our main record rep,


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to B. Most every movie studio in Hollywood used ourservices back then.

One of those studios used us regularly to keep theircontract actors/actresses happy. This large studio wasassociated with a particularly famous singer/actresswho was in the process of making one of her numerouscomebacks. She had signed on to do a limited series oflive concerts. One of the shows, performed in Canada,was to become a featured cable network special. It was ahuge project that demanded lots of pre- and post-

production.There was a problem, though. The media company

producing the event was in NYC; the singer/actress wasin Malibu.

As the event was about to be announced in themainstream media, the NYC production companycreated a series of promotional commercials scheduled

to air on the same cable network as the concert.The singer/actress had a reputation as a vindictive,pompous and controlling she-devil (a reputation shestill has to this day in Hollywood film community). Shemade it very clear to the cable network and productioncompany that she was not traveling to NYC to assistwith the pre-production. However, she insisted on rightof approval (or shit-canning) the promotional material

before it was made available to air.We received the call that Studio X here in LA (the

studio that the singer/actress was attached to)requested we feed the promotional material from ourfacility in the NY area via satellite to Culver City CA andrecord it on videotape. The studio would then pick upthe tape and deliver it to said famous singer/actress for

approval in the comfort of her Malibu home. Wescheduled the event and pulled it off without a hitch. Ipersonally gave the tape to our traffic booking personJenny (not her real name). She in turn gave it to thestudio courier who drove it out to Malibu.

About an hour after the tape was picked up anddelivered to the Malibu home of the singer/actress,


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Jenny received a call from Studio X. Apparently therehad been some kind of misunderstanding at the home of

the singer/actress, and the tape had been destroyed byher security people. Since the promotional material wasto start airing in days, Studio X requested we arrangefor a re-feed and recording ASAP.

We were a slick media company back then, so it waseasy to arrange for a repeat of the event. Within anotherhour, we had the promotional material recorded andready for the studio courier to pick up and deliver. At

that point we didnt really care how or why the tape wasdestroyed. They were paying us to do the same workagain at our rate card prices and we werent cheap.

Ninety minutes later, a new call came from Studio X.We are very sorry to do this, but we need you toarrange another re-feed and recording.

Once again the videotape had been destroyed by the

security people at the gate entrance to the singer/actresss estate. This time we were told that the tape hadbeen dropped into a bucket of water by her securitybecause they suspected it was a bomb.

After a little probing by Jenny, we discovered thatour singer/actress was having an emotional fit thatweek. She was not handling the pressure of theupcoming concert events and had become paranoid that

someone out there was out to keep her fromperforming. Jenny discovered from Studio X that Ms.Singer/Actress had actually not performed in public atall for over ten years. We learned later that she waseven battling extreme stage fright when she finally didthe concerts.

Since our company sympathized with their

concerns, we performed the third recording (now thesecond re-feed) gratis for Studio X. We once againreceived the satellite feed from NYC and recorded it atour Culver City CA facility. This time, however, wewanted to ensure that whoever received the tape atMalibu estate would have absolutely no confusion aboutwhat was in the tape case.

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Jenny came up with a clever idea. Before handingthe tape to the courier this time, she wrote in big black

magic marker letters on the outside of the box;

To: Ms. Singer/ActressFrom: Media Company, Culver Cityand Studio XRe: Singer/Actress Live promotionalmaterial for your reviewNote: This is not a bomb, please do not

destroy.

The tape went merrily on its way via courier and wethought that was that.

We were wrong.About thirty minutes before I was due to leave work

for the day, I received a call from my manager. He

wanted to see me in his office straight away. As Imeandered into his office, I see Jenny and her managersitting in chairs, plus the Executive VP of Sales AND thePresident of the company.

My manager abruptly closed the door behind me as Iwalked in. I was offered a chair. At that point I had noidea what was up, but clearly something was wrong; mysphincter clenched so tight, that if I had farted right

then and there, the high pitched noise would have madedogs howl like there was a full moon

As it turned out, a series of calls had been receivedby the VP of Sales and the President of the company.The tape had been delivered to the singer/actress estatejust fine and in fact made it to her private media roomfor her review without being destroyed. Problem was,

Ms. Singer/Actress didnt think it was at all funny thatJenny wrote This is not a bomb, please do not destroyon the outside of the box.

After reading the note, Ms. Singer/Actresssupposedly collapsed in her home and had to summonan attending doctor. When the Cable Network and NYCproduction company discovered that their star had


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unceremoniously collapsed, an inquisition wasinstigated. Jenny and I had become sacrificial targets.

Ms. Singer/Actress and the Cable Network were callingfor someones blood for putting her through thisordeal.

We didnt really mean it as a joke, Jenny pleaded.We just wanted to make sure the tape got to Ms.Singer/Actress without being ruined. We just wanted tomake her happy.

Is this true? my manager asked me. Are you sure

you didnt mean it as some kind of cruel joke? All eyeswere on me.

Sure, I have been known as a joker from time totime, but hey I know my limits.

No sir, this was absolutely not meant as a crueljoke. It was not meant as anything as far as I amconcerned. I set-up the downlink, I recorded and QCed

the tape when the feed was completed, and I handed thetape off to Jenny. I was not involved in writing anythingon the tape box, other than I saw her do it.

Oh great. I realized I had just thrown Jenny underthe bus.

We continued to sit behind closed doors and talkabout the incident for the next 45 minutes. Our VP ofSales made it very clear that Studio X, the Cable

Network and Ms. Singer/Actress wanted blood to spill.Just as we were getting ready to break up thediscussion, or so I though, the phone on the desk rang.My manager picked it up and answered it. He noddedsilently for a few seconds and then handed the phone offto the President of the company.

He said hello and proceeded to listen very intently

for almost a full minute. He asked the other party tohold for a moment while he put them on speaker phone.The speaker phone buzzed slightly, popped, and then aquiet, sobbing female voice came through.

Are, are you still there? the voice asked, sniffingloudly.

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Yes, we are here Ms. Singer/Actress the Presidentsaid, his voice flat in a monotone.

Jenny went white as a sheet; I nervously becameflustered myself. All eyes in the room were coldlystaring at us.

The President introduced all who were in the roomby name and title. Ms. Singer/Actress introduced anexec from the Cable Network who was also part of theconference call.

Ms. Singer/Actress explained how seeing the

bomb reference on the tape caused her to have anemotional collapse, a point that the Cable Network execalso pounded home. It was a surreal, yet very tryingtime for me a real character builder.

We explained ourselves to Ms. Singer/Actress andthe Cable Net exec. We explained how there was nomalicious intent on our part, that Jenny was only trying

to ensure the tape would not be destroyed a third time.Ms. Singer/Actress seemed to understand and evenCable Network exec seemed less ruffled than before.

After a cordial chorus of apologies by our managersand executives, we then personally apologized to Ms.Singer/Actress for her harrowing ordeal. She acceptedour apologies and proceeded to excuse herself from thecall to prepare for a reception that evening. We all said

our good-byes, and the office door was finally openedafter the 2 hour conference. My manager proclaimedthat there was no planned punishment for our actions.

What actions? I did my job. I fulfilled my duty forthe company. I was only guilty of knowing that Jennywrote the word bomb on the tape box. I didnt write itand I didnt tell her to do it.

But wait, theres more.The weekend came and went. I returned to work thefollowing Monday to find the whole facility abuzz withrumors of Ms. Singer/Actress. I decided to play it cooland not discuss the incident out of respect for thecompany and Ms. Singer/Actress. The next day waseventless as well; however, I noticed that Jenny had not


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been at work the last two days. I asked around anddiscovered that she had been suspended for 30 days. I

felt bad, but after all it was she who wrote the words onthe box and gave it to the courier for delivery.I went to work the following Wednesday and was

escorted directly into my managers office. I waspromptly told I was being suspended for 30 daysbecause of the incident. I was blown away. It turned outthat when Ms. Singer/Actress found out that only one ofus was reprimanded, she insisted that the other guy be

suspended as well.Money being what it is in our business and the

business relationships that hang on it, my company didas she asked and suspended me as well.

I eventually sat through the suspension andreturned to work. Jenny left the company a few weeksafter she returned, citing emotional difficulties.

You would think the story ends here but itdoesnt.Flash forward four years. My best friend is a

carpenter and does really high-end work in Beverly Hillsand Malibu. He and I used to work together at themedia company, but he left to run his own business.Turns out he has been hired to install some reallyexpensive and massive double entry doors at the home

of Ms. Singer/Actress and her husband.My friend strikes up a pleasant conversation with

the husband as he works installing the massive doors.Just then Ms. Singer/Actress pulls up in her Mercedesand gets out. Her husband introduces my friend. Shesays he looks familiar and asks if he works in the filmindustry. My friend explains that while he never worked

in film, but he did work for a media company in CulverCity. At that moment, Ms. Singer/Actresss facialexpression changed from friendly to one of pure evil.

I know that company, she said. I got two peoplesuspended from there because they thought they werebeing funny. She then gave the thumbnail history ofwhat happened years earlier.

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She continued, Well, I really got the girl suspendedfirst. But then I was feeling embarrassed about the

whole thing a few days later. I felt she shouldnt take theentire blame, so I had the guy suspended as well. It wasonly fair.

At this point, my friend had not put two and twotogether and was surprised that she, of all people, wouldhave said such a thing about a company he used to workfor. After all, she was a respected entertainment icon inthe industry.

It wasnt until months after that that I hooked upwith my carpenter friend and he told me of hisconversation with Ms. Singer/Actress.

That cold hearted bitch! was all he said. You canguess whether or not I agreed with that assessment.

I got a call from Los Angeles. My boss the guywho founded what is perhaps one of the most famousrecord labels in all of music, which produced a songcatalog unequaled in any era of modern history tellsme hes not happy with some final mixes they had justcompleted. He wants me to remix the whole album.

Truthfully, I didnt know what to expect. A day or

two later I get the master tapes. I put them on, pushedup the faders and heard the lead vocal track and the boysingers clear, amazing voice. I just went, holy shit! Icould tell right away they were something special. It wasa family group, all brothers and they became legends.We certainly had our share of #1 Hits with them...

ENJOYED THIS SAMPLE?Theres a lot more of

SPINNING THE RECORD

PICK UP YOUR COPY TODAY

FOR MORE INFO GO TO:


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WORDSUSHI.COM

SPINNING THE RECORD

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BOOKS BY MARK YOSHIMOTO NEMCOFF

NON-FICTION:

Fatal Sunset: Vanished Beauty

Tearing Down The Wall: The Contemporary Guide toDecoding Pink Floyd - The Wall One Brick at a Time

Fatal Sunset: Deadly Vacations

Wheres My F*cking Latte? (And Other Stories About

Being an Assistant in Hollywood) The Killing of Osama Bin Laden: How the Mission toHunt Down a Terrorist Mastermind wasAccomplished

Go Forth and Kick Some Ass (Be the Hero of YourOwn Life Story)

Pacific Coast Hellway Presents - Pissed Off: Is Better

Than Being Pissed On Admit You Hate Yourself

Pacific Coast Hellway Presents - Porn vs. Chicken

FICTION:

INFINITY (The Complete Saga)

Transistor Rodeo

Diary of a Madman Number One with a Bullet

The Doomsday Club

The Art of Surfacing

Shadow Falls: Badlands

Shadow Falls: Angel of Death

Killing My Boss


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GOT A CRAZY ROCK STAR or MUSIC BIZ STORY TOSHARE?

Email it to me at:[email protected]

And it just might make the next edition ofSPINNING THE RECORD!


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