Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
ThesixweekspassedfartooquicklyforCampbell,andtimecamefortheDeeDeeRamone
Group's first gig at the Continental Divide.
NANCY ROGERS
The Continental Divide was the bar I went to when I first moved to New York.
Now it's just called the Divide. But when they called it the Continental Divide,
they used to put little plastic dinosaurs in your drink. It had to do with paleon-
tology and all that. They really made strong cocktails. After just a few of those,
everybody was best friends.
ROBERT CAMPBELL
Playing with Dee Dee Ramone on stage at the Continental Divide was the worst
time I ever had in my life. We weren't prepared, and as far as I was concerned,
we sucked. And suddenly I was chosen to be the lead singer!
Some people in the crowd were recording it, other people were acting like
they were shooting up. It seemed like they were getting into the music. I wish I
hadn't tried to sing lead because it made us too pedestrian. I was not ready. We
opened our only gig with “Somebody Help Me” by the Spencer Davis Group.
Instead of singing the right lyrics, “When I was just a little boy of seventeen, I
had a girl” I blew it and sang “When I was just a little
girl
of seventeen.” This
embarrassed me so bad that I hated every millisecond of the gig after that.
I hated every second of it and wanted to stop it instantly. It felt like being in
church when I was a kid—I wanted nothing more than to just get the hell out of
there. Now that I look back on it, I should've just gone with the flow. It didn't
matter what we played, people were freaking out on it because it was Dee Dee.
JOHN ZINSSER
When we went to see Dee Dee's band with Robert at the Continental Divide,
Robert was wearing button-down Brooks Brothers shirts with blue jeans. That
was his look, with the long hair and wire-rimmed glasses. He looked like an un-
likely rock star. And they earnestly tried to get it together, but I don't think they
hadpracticedthatmuch.DeeDeedid,however,play“ChineseRock,”anditwas
incredibly poignant because that's his story. He was still stuck on a rock. After
all this time, it was his song.
Campbell may have been mortified about The Dee Dee Ramone Group's performance at
theContinentalDivide,andJohnZinssermayhavethoughttheyneededmorepractice.But
when I listened to the tapes of their rehearsals, they were often quite tight, rocking hard
enough to get people up and dancing.
Search WWH ::
Custom Search