Checking In - This Ain't no Holiday Inn: Down and Out at the Chelsea Hotel 1980-1995 - page 22

Beat the Devil: Dimitri Mugianis
HailingfromDetroit,DimitriMugianishitthegroundrunningattheChelsea.Hewasacha-
rismatic twenty-year-old, armed to the teeth with intellectual firepower and an enchanting
smile. From one angle he looked like Marlon Brando, from another like Errol Flynn, but
his most striking characteristic was his voice. Its scratchy-energetic timbre belonged to a
man who had traveled to the dark side and survived. He arrived in Manhattan with his beau-
tiful girlfriend Julie Eakin and his eleven-piece band, Mr. Unique and the Leisure Class.
Complete with a horn section and a backup choir, the whole ensemble migrated to New
York around the same time. If they couldn't make it there, to paraphrase Frank Sinatra, they
couldn't make it anywhere.
DIMITRI MUGIANIS
Detroit is a great place. But when I came to New York, it was like “Ahhh! I'm
home!'” And then you move into someplace like the Chelsea, it was “Yeah! This
is what I want to do, man!”
Shortly after moving in, Mugianis and his fellow band member David Lawton were riding
the elevator down to the lobby, and who should step in but Tom Waits. 22 Daunted by Waits'
status, they didn't dare speak to him. But sensing opportunity for his band, Mugianis kept
one of The Leisure Class's demo tapes with him at all times.
DAVID LAWTON
The next time Dimitri saw Tom Waits, he actually got a demo tape into Waits's
hands.
Sometimelater,weranintoWaitsagainandaskedifhe'dlistenedtoourtape.
In that gravelly voice of his, he said, “My lawyer says I can't listen to your tape.”
Mugianis'smorelastingbrushwithfamecamefromachanceencounteratausedbookstore,
where he ran into one of his all-time counterculture heroes. He had always been inspired by
the Beat writers Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg. One day, while thumbing through some
oldbooks,heencounteredthequintessentialBeatwriter,HerbertHuncke,theverymanwho
had given young Kerouac and Ginsberg the term “Beat.” Mugianis and Huncke became fast
friends.
Huncke introduced Mugianis to other Beat icons like Gregory Corso and Marty Matz.
Here was this kid from Detroit actually hanging out with the Beats he had idolized!